Episode 87 Podcast Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:00:00):
My youngest son, hunter, who was at the time, about four years old, he drew a picture of him and I was like, okay mate, it’s a big round potato body. I get that. Fair enough. Dad’s not looking after himself too well, but why does it have an angry male? And it had this full on jagged, angry mouth. And I said, why? Why is that? And he just said, oh, that’s you. That’s how you always are, dad. And that broke me. Absolutely. That drawing still hang in. My office now is just up here. I’m looking at it now. It reminds me why I had to change.
Speaker 2 (00:00:54):
Hi everyone. Rob Kropp and Dan Stones here from Pravar Group and welcome back to another episode of The Trade Den. Good to have you back. Dan, how are you?
Speaker 3 (00:01:01):
Good to be back. Hey Rob. Hey everyone. Yeah, really looking forward to today. Another client feature. And this is a guy we’ve known and love for Fair. While it’s certainly not your average story, so really looking forward to bringing today’s story about Phil Kerr to the podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:01:19):
Welcome to you Phil from Minibeasts Enterprises. Welcome to the pod.
Speaker 3 (00:01:23):
Thanks guys.
Speaker 1 (00:01:24):
Great to be here.
Speaker 3 (00:01:25):
Excellent. Hey Phil, before we start, we’ve just said Minibeasts Enterprises. Do you want to start off before we get into who you are and everything like that, let’s just set the scene for what is Minibeast Enterprises?
Speaker 1 (00:01:37):
Yeah, so I have a business where every single week I’m sending out around about 3 million crickets, 2 million mealworms and a couple of thousand rodents off to zoos pet shops all around the country. So supplying the pet industry.
Speaker 3 (00:01:56):
Excellent. And how long have you been working with us at Pravar?
Speaker 1 (00:02:01):
I’ve been with Pravar now for five years in the business for about 13 years.
Speaker 3 (00:02:07):
Nice. And I’m going to ask Rob, Rob, was this part of your niche marketing to go after this section of the market or how did you, we’ll get into Phil’s story in a minute, but how did you come across Phil when he first came in?
Speaker 2 (00:02:20):
It was interesting. We actually had a colleague of Phil’s at the time who was in a similar industry and was worm farming and I think that’s how we met along the way. Somewhere along the way there, Phil. But I just love the business. It’s such an interesting, it blows my mind how many little critters go out the door every single week. And so when you hear the numbers that Phil and his business punch out on a yearly basis in terms of revenue that is so much, so much, little critters have to go out there. We’re in the millions and millions and millions and that’s why I just love this business. It’s such an interesting business to work with.
Speaker 4 (00:03:03):
Yeah, it really is. So that’s Minibeasts Enterprises. We’re going to talk way more about that, but we had to get that out the front because if you were listening you’d be thinking, what the hell are we talking about here?
Speaker 3 (00:03:12):
So Phil, welcome to the podcast. Let’s get into it then and start off with, as we always do, just getting to know you a little bit. Whereabouts did you grow up and tell us a little bit about what life was like as a kid, family, all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 1 (00:03:25):
Yeah, look, I’m a kiwi. I grew up on the east coast of New Zealand on a typical, everyone loved us, a sheep station, eight and a half thousand acres. So we were on a really big station over there in New Zealand, very remote part of New Zealand. My dad was the farm manager and my mom was the rural nurse. So we went to a local school. My sister and I have a younger sister and we were the only four Pakeha, which are white kids effectively in the school. The rest were all married kids and it was very coastal country. Town life was filled with lots of animals, nature and adventure during that stage of my life. It was cool. It was great, great time.
Speaker 3 (00:04:18):
Did you always love nature and animals and did it come directly from this or did it grow over time? What was your sort of early memories and some of the adventures you got up to?
Speaker 1 (00:04:27):
Yeah, look, when I think back on that, those early adventures very much were, because we were coastal as well as country, I got to have the best of both worlds in the sense of a farm upbringing, but we were often down fishing or on rock pools and collecting different things and putting them in tanks or jars or whatever. So that interaction with nature was just part of life. It was just what you did and that was really cool. It really has obviously laid a foundation for me later on in my life to what I do today.
Speaker 3 (00:05:05):
Did it translate from you being that life that you live, the rural, the coastal, the animals, nature, all of that sort of stuff to what you do now? Did you know what you wanted to be growing up or was there something else that you wanted to be?
Speaker 1 (00:05:17):
Look, I was transfixed when I was a younger kid around good old David Attenborough. That was my sort of driving force around that. And both my parents were always into animals and it wasn’t just farm stuff. I’d come home and dad caught a wild ferret or something like that and he’d have it in a bird cage and we’d sort of check it out. So we were sort of naturally always wanted to collect things and observe and learn more about nature and the animals in it. So yeah, it was a big part of my growing up through that stage. Unfortunately, look, well not unfortunately, as part of life when I was about ten one morning wake up and mum said, right, sorry, kids get in the car, we’re off. So mum and dad’s relationship had ended or she’d chosen to end it and off we went and I really spent a lot of time then just trying to bounce between my parents.
(00:06:22):
So we’d have school holidays with dad, but we’d have our normal time obviously during school time with mom and dad though was self-employed and he out of farming, but he did things like landscaping and pig farming and commercial wheel fishing. So he still ended up in the environment doing those sorts of things, was very keen on being self-employed, didn’t want to work for other people. But I grew up in a family environment that was all about work ethic. That’s how we valued ourselves. You were hard workers, that’s what you did. And so geez, when I was even around about from 11 years old, I was doing paper rounds, I was selling stickers at school, making stickers at home and selling mowing lawns, milking cows, failing hay, whatever was sort of needed. It gave me a huge amount of independence and prior to, honestly, when I reflect on it, it allowed me to deal with my parents’ breakup. It was get busy working and don’t think about all that sort of stuff going on. I loved that work ethic and it really sort of pushed me to be that self-made type person I think I am today and why I’m in the business similar to what I’m in now.
Speaker 3 (00:07:42):
Did you leave school and go straight into the business? I mean obviously there’s the travel and the trip into Australia and all those sort of things. Just set that for us in terms of what you did going out of school. Did you stay in school? Did you do school? When did you come to Australia, that sort of phase?
Speaker 1 (00:07:57):
Yeah, so my sister left home when she was 14. I left at 16. So from that at 10, 11 years old up to that time, I’ll be honest, life wasn’t too great. It was school and go and work as much as you could to just deal with it all as a young kid and it is been really interesting for me to reflect on this as part of this. I don’t think I actually had much of a chance to be a kid at that time and I really find that now even with my kids, I struggle to go out and play because play is a waste of time. If you’ve got time, you work it, it’s what you did. So I formed a belief back then that play was a waste of time, but I left at 16 and I went, man, I’ve heard that the fishing industry is pretty good.
(00:08:52):
You can make some money out of that commercial guys I’d seen maybe it’s TV shows or something of guys deep seat trawling and doing stuff like that was pretty exciting. So I hit it off and I did a TAFE course for three months. I’d saved up enough money at 16 to own a car. I was allowed to drive in New Zealand. You could fast track at the age of 16 and have a licence. So I was off to do this fishing industry course and I just took off and went for it. But three months into a TAFE course, I suddenly found a place that actually I could learn really well because school was a bit of a struggle and I really sort of became that human sponge of knowledge. I was like, wow, this is really cool. I want to learn more. And so I worked.
(00:09:46):
I decided after that fishing industry course to carry on and do more sort of training and that was around marine studies and I just fell in love with the marine environment, became a dive instructor as part of it and still I just went and worked at night. I was in seafood packing places, diving on weekends at marina or collecting cray pots or whatever it might be for big guys with fancy boats, whatever it was that I could do to make a living and carry on doing all this training and look, I would’ve scrubbed toilets. It didn’t matter to me. It was just gun work so you can get enough money to keep doing all this sort of stuff. I got offered apprenticeships and building and plumbing and those sorts of things, but it just wasn’t really the right fit for me. I still didn’t have that.
(00:10:35):
Yeah, this is what I want to do. After a few years though, I got a job as an aquaculture technician for a live crayfish farm and crayfish, which we all have here in Aussie. It’s something that cost you a fortune to go and buy. We were going out diving and collecting, building traps and collecting juvenile purists. They’re called really small crayfish, bringing them in and growing the mountain tanks. And that was a total first for New Zealand. That was really weird back then in that time. And I loved it. I was out in boats cruising around the coast, New Zealand, collecting crayfish, baby crayfish, putting them in tanks, everything I was doing as kids anyway sort of stuff in rockports. So I really enjoyed that. But then I said, right, I need a bit more. I’m a human sponge, I need to learn a bit more. Let’s get into aquaculture, fish farming, maybe that’s the go.
(00:11:32):
And TAFE had a relationship with Deakin University over here in Australia and in Victoria. And so I applied and said, right, I am basically, God, let me in, look at all this experience. I was about 20, look at me go. So they said, yeah, we’ll put you into the masters of aquaculture programme, don’t worry about an undergraduate degree. You’ve got all life skills, let’s put you into that. And they class me as a mature age student based on I think work sort of history. So I jumped into that and I got really impatient quickly. It was way too slow. I needed more and more knowledge.
Speaker 3 (00:12:15):
Was that still in New Zealand or was it running you had to come across?
Speaker 1 (00:12:18):
Yeah, so that was in New Zealand and I then went, Hey, I’m going to come across, I can supercharge this and really get it happening. So that was 90, 99. I turned around and said, right, I’m coming to Australia. I was 21 and I flew over with a bag of clothes and a really old set of golf clubs, which I don’t really know why I did, but the uni had a, I was living on campus and they had a small nine hole golf course. So I thought that’s the good thing to do. And I really got into it. I didn’t have a scholarship or anything like that. My mom was awesome. She loaned me 20 grand as a second mortgage. It was caught at the time so I could pay for it. I was classed as an international student and within a couple of days of being at the uni, I had a job again, just walked around, knocked on doors and ended up working at a service station while I was at uni for a bit and jumped into this master’s course and I thought, this is me. I’m going to become a fish farmer effectively. And I very much came into it with, I did a mature age mindset. I was there to do a job, I was there to get as much knowledge as I could and I was going to take it back to New Zealand and show these guys how to farm type sort of carry on.
(00:13:39):
But as part of that marine studies master’s course, I got to hang out with people who were doing doctorates, doing their PhDs. And I was hanging out with a guy who was looking at galaxus, which are a thing called, it’s a common jolly tail, a little freshwater fish area. People in Australia know this is put it on hook to catch my Murray Cod. It’s a live bait type thing in New Zealand that’s called the juveniles called white bait and it’s worth a hundred bucks a kilos. So good old entrepreneurial self-made kiwi fill, said that’s the thing I need to know about. You can only get it for three months the year in New Zealand, but here in Australia there was a population, you can get it for about 10 months. The dollar signs are going through my mind. I’m going, that’s it. I’m going to figure out how to grow that and I’m going to take it back to New Zealand and I’m going to be a billionaire sort of carrying on.
(00:14:30):
I’m in my twenties. And so I turned around and said, you know what? The masters was good. I’m going to become Dr. Phil, that’s what I’m going to do. And I jumped into a doctorate. I thought, this is going to help me with the ladies, Dr. Phil. Sounds pretty cool and I’m going to start my own farm and make mega bucks again, no scholarship. So I went part-time, I just work and I worked as an abalone farmer, a diving instructor, government fisheries sort of officer thing. I was student teacher, whatever I could do. And the good old servo was still there just as backup to keep making ends meet. So that really took me down a pretty cool pathway for a long time. And that’s when, of course I met Kate. So my initial saying was always, I’ve been brought here to this country to breed your convicts out of this country.
(00:15:28):
I don’t know if you’re allowed to put this in podcast, but I met Kate and that was gone without a doubt. We clicked and she has a love for animals and nature as well. And it was just a foregone conclusion really. It was just really was that love at first sight, sort of carry on stuff. And that was cool. We were going really well. And then Kate said, you know what? I’m going to go to Melbourne. I want something different. I’ll be following you for a little bit Phil time to make a bit of a change and perhaps you might want to follow me. And I said, no, I’m going to stay doing my doctorate. I was just writing up and after about a year I said, yeah, right, I’ll come to Melbourne. And off I went to Melbourne and I said, I want to challenge, I want to do something a bit different.
(00:16:19):
I’ve heard in the regional areas that everyone thinks in town, the city, that governments are pretty silly, so why not go and jump into government and really see if it’s real what this is? I didn’t want to believe what other people said. I wanted to see it for myself. So I jumped into government as an indigenous aquaculture development officer, all things. So across the state level, 30 something of a building in a two by two cubicle going on a train back down to Chelsea where I was living and just totally outside of my comfort zone. Within two weeks I remember turning Kate saying, we’ve got to get out of here.
Speaker 4 (00:17:04):
I was going to say, there’s no way you were going to last very long in that I didn’t know this chapter, but it was so short. But yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (00:17:10):
Yeah. So look, it wasn’t short. It ended up being two years of, yeah, so that was the time where Kate and I suddenly were getting serious and said, right, let’s start saving for a house our first home. And we spent a year by ourselves trying to save. It wasn’t really working. Kate’s folks turned around and said, why don’t you come and live with us and save? And I was like, nah, I’m doing this all on my own man. I don’t want to help. I don’t ask for help type sort of attitude. But I eventually went, yeah, this is the best way to do it. And we jumped in with them, spent time and got enough of a deposit to buy a home. We live in a place called Teasdale, which is sort of halfway between Ballarat and Geelong and Victoria and Regional Little Town bought our first home and we’ve just said again, we’ll start again, we’ll find work, we’ll figure it out.
(00:18:08):
And I decided to jump out and do what most ex-government people do. I became a consultant and cruised around for a couple of years, pretty much looking at opportunities for people to set up aquaculture farms and I loved it. That was really cool. But I was sort of getting a bit over, I suppose, saying to people, here’s a great opportunity. I’ve done all this work for you. All you’ve got to do is go implement this realistically. And people just either were or weren’t, and I didn’t sort of get that next step, which I realised even as a young guy, my dad was my hero in that space and I wanted to have a business around animals myself and I want to be that self-made guy. So that really pushed me to go, you know what? I’m going to start growing fish. I still had aquariums, I’ve always had animals like that in my life.
(00:19:10):
So I went, you know what? I’m just going to grow lots of fish at home and sell ’em to pet shops. I’ve had a look and there’s a pretty good market in the ornamental trade at school. And by chance the owner of Minibeasts Enterprises was 10 minutes away from home and he had a dozen stores that he was supplying and us just buying for some frogs that I grabbed from Dunny in New South Wales way back when sort of thing. Some green tree frogs. So yeah, that’s sort of how we sort of suddenly got an interaction with mini bees. Kate and I, we just bought our house. We’d got married, we’d been trying for two years to have kids. Wasn’t happening. There was no loving, it was the moon is doing this, the sun’s doing that. It was very mechanical after two years of trying and we were pretty stressed. We weren’t able to make it happen. And that’s sort of where we got to.
Speaker 3 (00:20:11):
When you started to make the transition, you’ve got access or you’ve got exposure into mini beasts. Was it then that you started to say this is the business idea as it formed, did you keep falling your way into it? Where did the incarnation of Minibeasts as we know it, start to take shape and really hit its straps?
Speaker 1 (00:20:31):
Yeah, look, I am really thankful for that consultancy aspect that I did for a bit of time where I was out training myself to look for opportunities realistically and looking for the wins that could be there. And I saw potential instantly. I already knew a bit about the pet industry market and minibeasts have a thing around if you wanted small crickets, you have to buy them every week because next week they’ve grown to a medium size. So if I had a gecko at home that just ate small credits, I’ve got to buy these things every week. And so it’s not something I could put on a shelf that’s going to last months and collect dust. It’s a here and now type product and it just meant repeat business. And so I really looked at that and just said, hello, that’s pretty good. I don’t have $2 million to set up an abalone farm. Wait for two years of running it and hopefully nothing goes wrong and sell it. Here’s something I could possibly do and get good cashflow and turnover.
Speaker 3 (00:21:39):
Did you know at the time what to do to start breeding this stuff and start to build it out and start to make it productize it effectively?
Speaker 1 (00:21:49):
No idea. No idea. In that instance, I had a good ornamental fish breeding background, so I knew how to breed fish to a certain extent. And I honestly had just such ego as well as belief that I could do anything and I still believe I can do anything. My body tells me a bit differently these days, I have to admit. But I had that mindset that I could do this. And so the owner wanted to retire again. He’d got it as a retirement project and it was getting a bit out of hand. We struck up a relationship and I was going to sell him ornamental fish and he could sell ’em to the pet shop, but I said, if you ever want to get out of it, let me know. And pretty quickly he said, yeah, I’m pretty interested. So I looked at there was a gap in the market and the demand was so high that I just went, alright, I’m going to negotiate to buy.
Speaker 3 (00:22:46):
So you jumped straight into that deal once it presented, you were in, you were like, this is the opportunity, this is what, this is what I’m going to put all my chips into.
Speaker 1 (00:22:56):
Absolutely. And back then, I think when I was even doing the consultancy stuff, I was looking up stuff like business plans for dummies. It was very early days and I put a plan together, I went, okay, we agreed on a price and I went to the bank and I thought, here we go. I’m the man, the bank’s going to give me money to buy this Bug Business. So you can imagine the, I was laughed at several banks, it’s like, who is this guy? What’s going on? So I approached the owners and I said, look, I’ve been able to get this much money from my own savings. I asked for loans from family and friends and offered them 19%. I was so sure this was going to work, I still didn’t have enough. And they came to the party and said, you know what, we’ll give you vendor finance. And I went, okay, I dunno what vendor finance is, but let’s see what that looks like. So that’s what we did and it took us about six months of negotiating to actually be ready to do that now. And that was my all in moment, really. I’m all in six months. I just went for it to get that business.
Speaker 3 (00:24:09):
So as you get a couple of years into business, you’re now running Minibeasts. There’s obviously the confidence is there, the whole idea and the vision’s probably there from day one knowing you where you wanted to take it, but when did you start to see some gaps and that moment leading up into coaching? Was there sort of skills that were missing? Was there, the pressures building everything so far? Sounds like it’s just sort of rolled through. I know that’s not to say it was easy, but you’ve sort of had this plan and you’ve just been executing against it. When did things start to feel like they were starting to shift a bit more?
Speaker 1 (00:24:42):
It was actually about six years into it that I really realised I actually was in trouble. So I had that belief that I just keep working, just work really, really bloody hard. And that’s what it’s always worked for me in the past, just keep working. So that’s what I did. And we were stuck. Sorry, just to sort of back up a little bit. Two weeks into having the business, by the way, Kate suddenly pregnant because we decided don’t you hear that all the time? And so all of a sudden we are newly married, got a business, got a family on the way, here we go. It’s all happening 15 months later, the second one’s on the way. But six weeks, six years into it, our turnover of Plato, I’d always wanted to reach $1 million turnover. That was man million dollars turnover. Woo-hoo. What a legend. Not good if it costs you 1.1 to do it.
(00:25:46):
So it was one of those steep learning curves and turnover to plateaued. We were sort of hitting that 1.2, $1.5 million turnover. We pretty much weren’t paying ourselves. And both Kate and I were working 60 to 80 hours a week. It’s a seven day a week business. It’s farming animals. And what really hit home, or the big turning moment for me about coming into coaching was my youngest son, hunter, who was at the time, about four years old, he drew a picture of him and I was like, okay mate, it’s a big round potato body. I get that. Fair enough. Dad’s not look after himself too well, but why does it have an angry mouth? And it had this full on jagged angry mouth. And I said, why? Why is that? And he just said, oh, that’s you. That’s how you always are dad. And that broke me. Absolutely. They don’t have a filter on at that age, four or five years old. We hadn’t created filters yet for, and it broke me. And that wasn’t how I wanted my kids to identify dad as I didn’t want them to say, dad is angry, dad is never around because he’s working. Dad is not present. That drawing still hangs in my office now it’s just up here. I’m looking at it now. It reminds me why I had to change and it still has a lot of power over me.
Speaker 3 (00:27:36):
How long ago was that, Phil? Just to put this in context, I mean Rob and I have heard you talk through this story several times I’d say, and every time it still gets you. How deep does that run and how long have you It just is there.
Speaker 1 (00:27:50):
Six years? Six years since he did that? So I’ve been at Pravar for five. So yeah, it really got me and it stood has such a massive hold on me. I’m not that person anymore without a doubt, but I love having it there. It reminds me, this is why I needed to change. My dad was my hero, absolute hero still is. And he did the best with what he had at the time with what he knew. I really came into coaching wanting to understand how I could not give the kids the things I never got given but teach ’em the things I never got taught.
Speaker 3 (00:28:48):
You said it was accurate. Where did the anger come from and what do you think was causing, I mean as you’re talking through this story, you’ve just jumped back to your dad, you think, were you embodying parts of what you might’ve grown up with? Do you think it was just the pressures of business? Was it just a quirk of who you were and the way you went about it with the discipline and the approach to hard work and just no nonsense? How do you sort of see that you obviously Hunter translated that into the picture. How did you translate that in your own mind?
Speaker 1 (00:29:20):
Look, I had effectively put myself on a pedestal around how I needed to show up and this was who a man was. And I think that all the anger, I think it was actually more of fear of failure and it did fuel me for that. It drove me to work harder to just keep batting my head against the brick wall to go, if I just keep doing this, this will eventually move. Because that’s historically what I saw. I just keep working hard and things happen. And it came from trying pretty much to do everything myself. I felt I couldn’t or was unwilling to rely on anyone because if I relied on anyone, I exposed myself and I might get, someone might come and get me or something might go wrong. So I was firefighting constantly in the business. Staff were underperforming. I wasn’t sleeping, I was self-medicating with either alcohol, recreational drugs at the time a little bit.
(00:30:35):
And for years I just said to myself, Hey Phil, just work harder, push through, it’ll come good, succeed. You have to work hard or you’ve made your beer, go line it buddy. You’ve put your big boy pants on, you’ve got to do this and don’t be a failure. Everyone’s counting on me. I’m the provider. Make it happen. And I totally beat myself up. Whereas other people were saying, man, you’re amazing. Look at what you’re doing in the business. But that picture that Hunter did just ripped all of that out and said, Hey, this is not what I signed up for. This is not what my vision was.
Speaker 3 (00:31:23):
So how did you go then from Hunter’s obviously cracked, you open with the picture, there’s a moment you still this idea of I don’t need help, I am the guy, I will do this stuff myself. How do you go and then add the third element in which has now become such a big part of your world, which is coaching? What was it that allowed you to even ask for coaching at the time and how receptive were you to it when you began?
Speaker 1 (00:31:48):
Yeah, look, Rob Kropp was listening to me via Facebook. It is quite amazing when that transition, I’ve still almost got a year from when Hunter did the picture to me getting involved with Pravar. And I went away and said, right, I’m going to change this. That’s not good enough. So I’ll go in and I’ll crack heads and I’ll change things because it can’t be me. It’s got to be everyone else around me. So all I did was I went back in and really screwed it up even harder because I was justifying and I was justifying all these things I was trying to change in the business and I really didn’t have an even keel. I was shotgun approaching trying to fix things. I was Mr. Fix it, but I hadn’t clued on to what actually needed fixing at the time.
(00:32:48):
Eventually I sort of got on to going, well this isn’t working. I can see it’s not working. I’ve got this picture from Hunter here and it’s changing now. I was aware nothing’s changing because prior to that, that was just life. That’s just what you do. And by having that thing to refer back to, it really made me just question and say, hang on, if nothing’s changing that maybe I got to change. And that was that impetus to go right, let’s look for maybe some coaching. Maybe I need a bit of help here. Lived everything for my, I’m going to say for a lot of my life had been black and white. I didn’t want to go in the grey area. It was black and white and the way I dealt with emotions and everything because that was safe and you don’t go to that grey area, it’s a bit murky and you don’t want those feelings come up, push that bloody feeling back down type attitude. So I started just looking through Facebook coaching to see what it was like and that’s when sort of Pravar came along and they had the case study of a worm farm. And so what sort of struck me was that Pravar wasn’t just about profits.
(00:34:05):
I’ve known quite a few business people prior to jumping into Pravar that were really successful or what looked like they were really successful, they’re under their second marriage, their kids don’t like him, all that sort of stuff. And they were miserable. And I was like, that is not what I wrote. And Ava came across and certainly do lived that life where it was focused about the whole person. It was business, family, wealth and health. And I wanted more of that. I wanted, like I said, I wanted to teach the boys the things that I wasn’t taught and I really wanted to find a group or a community or a place that would give me a whole picture solution. Not that one dimensional, I’m that business owner and yes I’ve got profit, but I’ve got all these other issues going on in my life.
Speaker 3 (00:34:56):
So what came first then you get in your own coaching, you’ve got three probably areas that you can look at and you’re probably looking through the lens yourself. One is your business, one is your family, and the other one is yourself. Just internally within yourself, what did you do to approach it? And did you go, alright, where do I start this? Did you start with yourself? Did you start with family? Did you start with the relationship connection side of things or the business? What was it?
Speaker 1 (00:35:23):
It was business. For me, my identity for seven odd years in the business was I’m a scientist father and my kids called me that and I loved it. That was my identity. I was a scientist farmer and I was high fiving. I created this identity for myself. And so I went back to the business and said, right, I’ve got to actually systemize me effectively and remove, I’d created this environment where everyone would come to me for everything. And part of that was ego. Part of it was I was the expert. I really had done the hard yards and earned the right to be known as the expert in that space, but I trained my staff to just come to me with every sort of issue. They didn’t have to think and I didn’t let ’em think really. So a massive transitional change was I turned around and said, Hey, if you come and see me, by all means come and see me if you’ve got an issue, but also come to me with two possible solutions to what it might be. All of a sudden half the people didn’t have to come to see me. So that simple sort of thing allowed me to free up time within the business to start working on, well actually now I need to systemize our production process. I’m the system. I need to remove myself as much as possible of being the system. And that’s what we started working on.
Speaker 3 (00:37:01):
The business evolving into a business at this point remind you here we’re seven, eight years in whatever it is. It’s just now where it starts to become a business in your mind and not just a fill curve project that is your stamp your world, this is it. It’s got to now exist within the confines of a profitable business, a well run business, a properly managed business.
Speaker 1 (00:37:24):
Absolutely. And I do look back and I think I really didn’t know what I was doing in a business sense. It was everything I wanted, but I didn’t have any training, any expertise in actually being a business owner. I was a scientist farmer and I was bloody good at it. I was an expert like most people in trades. I’m an excellent plumber, I’m an excellent electrician. You know what, I should go and run a business. It’s a totally different thing. And so there’s such similarity in that regard. The business, we’re all the same. Business is business and I was the expert, but now I have suddenly went know what? I’m actually running a business. I need to approach this really differently and be mindful of how it impacts everything else around me. And that’s where Pravar came to the table because they actually I guess offered that turnkey solution that a lot of people in the marketplace just didn’t really even look at that. It was just, let’s focus on just your profit and loss. And at the time it was like what the hell is a profit and loss type of thing.
Speaker 3 (00:38:32):
I’m going to put you on the spot here because you’re talking about the fact you had to unlock business and learn business and do business. Even that answer though, Phil, is you reflecting on where you were falling short, that was that vulnerability piece you were talking about before. So was focusing on the business that way, really just a soft toe in the water to learn the skills or was this the first part of you breaking down who Phil was and starting to reinvent Phil as this person that he needed to become from the get go, just using business as the vehicle?
Speaker 1 (00:39:05):
Yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah. The second option, without a doubt, and I do look back and reflect and say I am that human sponge for knowledge, I suddenly found this great new thing within my world that I could learn about. And what Pravar did is they not exposed me just to the business side of it because that was just one part because I suddenly got mixed in with everything else around the wealth, health and connections. It really suddenly said, Hey, it’s not even just about business here, Phil. The more you show up and the more you work on yourself, this is all going to get better. Oh, okay, well what does that mean? How do I work on myself? I didn’t even know what meditation was. Yoga was something funny that people didn’t like. Really that was the extent of me back then. So all of a sudden it’s like, well, okay, what happens if I start working myself? What’s this grey area you talk about? Not black and white. So I really didn’t have any or such limited capacity for self-awareness at that time. I removed it to be black and white because that was safe survival mode. And now I actually had an opportunity to go, hang on, I can actually look at this a bit differently.
Speaker 3 (00:40:30):
Rob, I’m going to bring you in here. I know you’ve been listening, you are here and you’re in the background. But in listening to this, I think this is a big thing because you talk about this all the time, your mindset proceeds the business success, all of this sort of stuff. But I think it’s the difference between thinking of coaching as a set of skills that gets transferred from your coach to whoever’s being coached into what we call proper transformation. And I think this is really a great example of this where Phil’s at in this story at the moment.
Speaker 2 (00:40:58):
Yeah, definitely. There’s definitely a transactional nature of coaching where it’s like here’s the strategy, do this, learn this, understand that that’s definitely the transactional nature of a coaching relationship and you need that. You just don’t know what you don’t know in business. And so you’ve got to be able to get that skillset and strategy from something or some or someone. So that definitely applies in the coaching world. But the true power of coaching is the ability for a coach to unlock the potential in the individual. It’s helping them find the blind spots that they can’t see, but it’s also helping them unlock things that they didn’t know the capability and the potential that we can see inside of them as a coach, but they can’t yet see. And that’s the true power of coaching. And when you combine that transactional nature of hardnosed business with the soft nature of a little bit of life coaching or the mindset work, that’s the true power of coaching.
(00:42:01):
And that’s where the real transformations happen, not only in the business but more so in the individual on the family front and the connections front and then in the leader front and then on the business front. And that’s somewhat our secret here at Pravar is we work more on the individual than we do on the business and then naturally the business grows and flourishes and becomes a more profitable because the owner becomes a better leader, they become a better person and they run a better business as a result. So you write, Dan, this is the transformational nature of the coaching of a coaching relationship.
Speaker 3 (00:42:35):
And I think this is great because now that sets the scene coming back to you Phil, you’ve gone into that sort of space, safe space to go, I dunno probably for the first time in a long, long time if ever that you’ve ever said those words. I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say them quote like that. But anyway, you’ve got this business element that you’re working on now. There’s an awareness that’s growing the next phase that comes into this, then as you lean further in is the person and it is the family side. So we’re going to cover both of these, but take your pick. How did this then lead into your connections if you like? Let’s go there and how did that sort of translate into your next phase of your journey? Working obviously with Kate is a very big part of the business and this sort of continues on this sort of theme and story in the work you’ve done here. It still continues, but how did you lean into that and what did you learn about yourself in that time as you started to embark on this new version of Phil, if you like?
Speaker 1 (00:43:31):
Yeah, I recall quite vividly within the Pravar Group, some of the discussions around some of the people were going, I might actually go and see a psychologist. And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait, wait guys, what’s going on here? Isn’t that what crazy people do? Type of attitude really where I still was and over a bit of time I really started to click and go, no, you know what, this actually, this might make sense. Even within Pravar, while we had fantastic some mindset based work happening, there are some pretty deep seated stuff that I possibly have got going on here that’s starting to show up. And I was starting to link those sorts of things. And I recall sitting in a car park outside a psychologist’s office and it was one of my quarterly goals was to actually get there for this meeting to have one and start to explore, see whether I even liked the guy.
(00:44:38):
I was angry. I was still this fiery redheaded dude at the time who would just go off like a cracker because I had such high expectations more of myself. And I had to call up people in the group to say, guys, I don’t think I need to go into this. This is a bit silly what’s going on? And it was the best thing I did because while coaching brought this really just fantastic whole of environment sort of type approach, that psychologist was the expert who could really drill down deep and really go well, why are you angry? What’s really showing up here? And dive deeper into it. And combined with rather and a psychologist that really helped me actually be willing to go deep and by being willing to go deep and actually ask questions about that led to such stronger connections with Kate with my kids that I was one ready to receive feedback and actually really try and grow my level of self-awareness. And that also became a human sponge type moment for me around, oh this is really interesting, a bit of psychology. Well why do we act this way? That’s really interesting. How am I showing up today? And the more I worked on myself, the better it was not only in the business but with the kids with Kate.
(00:46:19):
It was a no brainer. The more I worked all myself, the better it was everywhere else and I really fell in love with that to be honest. That really pushed me to break through a ceiling personal.
Speaker 3 (00:46:37):
For someone that defaults and I’ll say it defaults to anger and not now, but you know what I mean. You had that switch, was there always, how did you do that do you think? And what was it like to put that? Did you just have to keep pushing it aside or did you find a way that opened up and came with the ability now to actually not be so self-critical at that point in time? What was it that allowed you to do that and keep moving forward without breaking into what are you doing at dickhead? Why are you being this way? This is stupid and just shutting everything down.
Speaker 1 (00:47:12):
I think there are a couple of things that really grabbed me when you said that. One was Rob always talks about the journey and I’ve really resonated with that because I’ve just gone, our journey is our own journey. I used to initially go into Pravar and I’d be sitting next to a guy who was doing a $3 million turnover and I’d go, oh, I can’t believe I’m sitting next to this guy. And I’ve realised over five years of doing this, now my journey is my journey and the beauty of what I have is I have an opportunity to make a stuff up. It’s my business. I can make a stuff up and I can practise and go again. And so even in the terms of that level of self-awareness, I was able to go, okay, I still get angry. It still comes up. It’s not like I can just switch it off, tick the box. I’m no longer an angry guy, but it’s something that I’m getting more and more aware with practise and I can capture it a little bit quicker at times or while I have some strategies to go, Hey, I need to step away right now, otherwise I’m going to lose it.
(00:48:29):
I’ve been able to become more aware of what my triggers are and those feelings, the emotions that are coming up, not push it down but just move it to make sure that it actually serves me instead of define some.
Speaker 3 (00:48:44):
Is that you growing? I mean it’s yes, but it’s also tolerance. And do you think it’s more being tolerant of others or tolerant of yourself?
Speaker 1 (00:48:54):
Tolerant of myself. I can only control me.
Speaker 3 (00:48:58):
How does that show up with the kids and at home with Kate in that sort of family space these days?
Speaker 1 (00:49:06):
I wish I could say it’s perfect, but it’s definitely not. It is a work in progress without a doubt. But I do very much sit there and have some very deep conversations with Kate now that just would not have happened. And we are closer because of it. Communication, communication, communication. The fact that I’m willing to receive feedback and her as well and no topics, off limits. I can talk about anything to it. And prior to any of this work, no, I was alpha male provider, honey, you very stereotypical. How about you just follow me and do what I need you to do? I honestly believe without working on myself, we most probably wouldn’t be together. My kids would be possibly doing what I did coming to holidays with dad or week on, week off, whatever it might be.
Speaker 3 (00:50:12):
With the kids at the moment. How do you think, I’d love to be coaching you still because set you another task I’ll be saying to, you need to ask the kids to draw you a new picture, but what do you think they would draw? How do you think they’d react or has there been anything in their world that you can see or is it just knowing within yourself that you are doing better or is there something material that’s happened in that space as well?
Speaker 1 (00:50:35):
I think it’s more that connection sort of time that we have now. Our conversation, some of the stuff we talk about, I’m even amazed and how deep for an 11 and 12-year-old we can sort go effectively. The coaching and the growth journey that I’ve had has been a journey for them as well. So I will tell ’em, Hey, dad’s off to go see the psychologist. And they know I’m working on being a better person and the best version of himself and the language that they’re using is very similar. We are going off this week to a motivate thing for young boys. They’re getting the things that I was never taught, which wasn’t around mindset, training based sort of stuff. How do you show up? How do you be a better version of yourself? And I just see it in every day with them and it’s a total transformation in my life.
Speaker 2 (00:51:32):
And what you’ve created there, fillers is generational change and we see this a lot. I know within my story with I didn’t want to end up my parents broken up because I was a similar age to you when my parents and I didn’t want to be like that, but here I was in my early twenties going down the same path. And that’s because we develop our mindset and our beliefs in and our environment shapes who we are as a very young age. And so we see that a lot. And like you just said, then if I hadn’t have made this change, then I probably would’ve ended up like my mom and dad and my kids would’ve been following the same footsteps. And so this is what happens through the generations. The generations keep repeating the same patterns of behaviour until someone’s got the courage to stand up and say, I’m going to make change.
(00:52:19):
And that’s what you did, mate. You made generational change and you’ve done that because you’ve had the courage to be able to go, I’m no longer going to be this person and I’m going to be the best version of myself that I can be. And that’s something you should be bloody proud of, mate, because five years ago you said I’m changing and you’ve done it, you’ve changed, you’ve done the work, you’ve done the hard yards to be able to shift this and explore that and understand this and understand that and you’ve not only helped you become a better man, but you’ve completely course corrected the path that your kids are on now and that’s something you should be really proud of, mate.
Speaker 1 (00:52:56):
Thanks buddy. I am.
Speaker 3 (00:52:59):
As we sort of bring this full circle now in this conversation, Phil, you’ve talked through, as you said, you came into coaching thinking it was all about business. Pretty quickly found out that it wasn’t, you’ve had to work on yourself, you’ve worked on your relationships at home and with family. Talk us through then the change that then sort of comes about having, I’ll say sort of squared away. Obviously it is still a journey. There is work in progress. The work never ends in that sense as you go back around now and start thinking about the business, it’s not that it’s not no surprise, but it’s no coincidence now that the business has gone to a whole new level again. It didn’t just happen that you went into business coaching, the business got better, you had to do all this work, but once you unlock this in yourself, all the stuff we’ve just spent time talking about, talk us through the biggest changes and the momentum that’s now grown in the business and what it’s allowed the business to become from maybe where you were when you started coaching.
Speaker 1 (00:53:55):
Geez, I think back then that ceiling I had that was to break over a mill and I’m sitting around at 1.5, all of a sudden we put systems in place in the business and we were able to gear up and get ready to grow. And I thought, here we go. The goal at that point was future state model, let’s go for three mil, why not go for three mil? If I got two I would’ve been happy. And man, we went for it and we hit within a year something went from 1.5 up to about 3.3 in turnover, really good profit too. And it was like, whoa, this is pretty amazing. Great systems. And then the wheels sort of started falling off and you guys talk about this, that what you want is that good stable growth happening all the time over time, consistent growth over time.
(00:55:01):
I had a big whopping, wow, bang, here we go. I remember at an awards thing getting a mention around what was called the Rainmaker Award at the moment and Rob up there saying, shit, that’s a lot of crickets. Started doing. And while that felt really good, and this is something we might talk about later is that big dogging sort of stuff. While the systems were good, I didn’t actually have a structure or the skills and even self-awareness to actually perform as a manager and business owner. At that point I was still a scientist farmer and I had suddenly put some good systems in place to get production and go out and just sell product, but that’s sort of where it sat. And then the wheel started falling off. We are back on the track again. We talk about a bit of a journey of going up those rises because three mill was as big as I could see. I very much changed my tune and it’s taken a good couple of years to go back in and say, okay, well the systems were pretty good, but we are now going backwards. Why are we going backwards? What’s going on? And that’s where I started identifying that actually I needed to change again. I’d broken a ceiling, but I actually couldn’t operate sustainably at this level. Now I actually have to do a full, full version 7.6 or whatever it was at that time because I’d gone through so many levels to ceilings to get to that point.
Speaker 3 (00:56:41):
Without doing the work, you would never have had that realisation without doing the work you’d done. You never would’ve been capable of doing what you needed to do to take it to the next step, which the thing I want to talk about is the challenge, and if you can link it up for us, you lived it was the importance of building your team out, having the right people around you. You’ve come from basically a self-made, I’m the guy and I’ve got the expertise and no one else could help you. In that sense, no one knew what it was. Not even you had to figure it out. But now you’re at a point where having to hire people in, build a team and actually hire people that are smarter than you or more capable than you in certain areas. How do you feel about being able to say that you’ve sort of cracked that next level to be able to do that? What does it mean to you to be able to say, and I know you can, that you’re now capable of hiring people smarter than you in areas?
Speaker 1 (00:57:34):
Yeah. Look, is it easy? Absolutely not. Again, sitting at that ceiling that I busted through to get to that next level, the whole organisational structure and the culture of the business needed to change. And while I’d love the systems, even the systems are black and white. Step one, step two, step three, there you go. There’s your system. But to actually, the reason that the wheel started falling off for me was I didn’t have the culture or the people aspect really in place at the time. And I was still living on this principle of here’s a person and I’ll create a position around them and I needed to change that to, here’s a position now, I’ll get the right people and then I’ll build a process after that. And that realisation really transformed the way I also stood up as a leader and a manager within that sort of space.
(00:58:40):
We sat there for the last few years, we’ve been sitting around that $3 million and then we dipped a little bit after that first year because I was burning out really good staff because I was quite happy to accept pretty ordinary behaviour because I put a position around a person. So we actually, we talk about big dogging is something in the group we joke about. And that’s what happened with me at that first breakthrough, that three and half, close to three and a half mil, I was Big dog and Beton. Now big dogging came about because a mate of mine who’s a roofing plumber, self-employed at the time, we’d get together, have a beer each weekend and he started nicknaming me Big dog. That’s where that sort of came from and I was growing and I growing so well. I remember towards the end of that year and I’m sitting there and I’m going real white Maserati.
(00:59:40):
I’m not sure which one I’m going to buy. I was all over the show with it and I was completely complacent. I had lost that. I was complacent to what really was going on in the business. So then I caught it pretty quick and that was coaching. Coaching really brought me back really well in the private community and being involved in it all and talking with other like-minded business people really brought me back pretty quick, learning from other people’s mistakes to a certain extent. And I was able to go, okay, I’ve got to get on top of this. And by chance we had some training around cultural audits. So I went in and did a cultural audit in the team and that was an amazing experience for us as a business. We were now at over $3 million turnover, but the people side of things and the culture needed work.
(01:00:35):
So we did a cultural audit, had 12 people in the business at the time. I’ve got around about 33 staff here at Minibeasts, and we turned around and went, okay, what are we willing to accept? What are we willing to tolerate and what are we not willing to tolerate? And we created our new standards and new behaviours that we were going to operate as a business. So I then put the whole business on notice instead of the next four months, we are lifting ourselves to the standard. You’ve got four months. And that’s when the wheels really fell off because I had people and the real interesting thing was that I turned around and said, and I am going to live to the standard too. I remember kicking, screaming, fighting, all sorts of stuff going on as we were trying to justify this or blame that and going through this process to lift not only the team but myself to the standard, but we held to it.
(01:01:34):
And that ended up with us creating a brand new organisational structure that was focused on the position first. So we did a full restructure. I really shared quite a few staff because I actually had to have these things called necessary conversations. And sorry, difficult conversations is how people would refer them. I had to have them as necessary conversations. And I had my coach at the time turning around and saying, Phil, you have to have a necessary conversation every day. No worries. I’m going to do that. And I went out and told everyone exactly what they needed to do, type of attitude, got to the end, reported back me, and I’ve fixed it, it’s all done. I’ve had necessary conversations. I’m the man and the cop saying, Hey, no, you actually have to have that conversation every day. Oh, I’ve finished. No, no, you’ve got to have a one.
(01:02:32):
Of course I suddenly realised I’ve got to have a conversation with myself. So I had to have a necessary conversation with myself and suddenly I was going back around and going, actually, I really didn’t approach that really well with that person and it’s not very good leadership. I am not living up to my own standards that we’ve all set. I need to actually increase my leadership skills here. And that’s led us on a great journey to where now a lot of the employment that I bring in here, it’s hard for me to find a cricket farmer on seek. I can’t exactly go and look for the cricket farmers out there. There’s not too many.
(01:03:17):
A hundred percent, a hundred percent. So what we actually do a massive amount of is we look at fixed and growth based mindset recruiting. We can teach most of the stuff of what we do is on the job, and that’s all well and good, but I can’t teach those attitudes and behaviours that people generally are going to carry and those beliefs they bring in. So I spend a lot of my time now really looking at trying to get the right people now for the position and people who come in and already live and breathe our standards realistically. And that’s where I’ve been able to find now really, really knowledgeable people who are smarter than me in their zone of genius or their particular area. And I’m only really coming into realising, well, what is my now sweet spot? How do I manage or show up in this role that I can actually support them? I don’t need to do their job, but they still need management as we sort of talked about. They good people still need management. So what are those boundaries? What are those escalation points where I need to just make sure that we’re still on the same direction as a group? And that’s sort of where I’m at now. I love, absolutely love.
(01:04:47):
When I hear staff at Minibeasts say to new staff wasn’t expecting this, they say to new staff, this is how we do it at Minibeasts. But then they go that next step, and this is why it like Proud Dad moment sort of thing. It’s like, wow, this is now bigger than me.
Speaker 3 (01:05:24):
Your baby’s growing up.
Speaker 1 (01:05:26):
Yeah. And so my identity is I’m a business owner. If I go back into production or back on the tools, I am the biggest bottleneck. I am not happy. I am no good back in production. I really am not, and I need to. Yeah, it’s a real interesting transition.
Speaker 3 (01:05:49):
I think beyond that, you’re not growing if you do, and I think that’s what you’re hooked on. The idea of you being a sponge and you learning and you taking on board things and leaning into being vulnerable. All this is you growing as a person and going beyond who you thought Phil was. And I think that’s the whole essence of what we’ve been talking about today is how you’ve expanded. And every time you’ve done that, it’s been tricky. It’s had its challenges. You’ve had to see those through, but you’ve stuck with it and you’ve gone through those and that’s what’s enabled. Every good steps come from facing the challenge, not relying on what you already knew. And I think it has to be that way. And I think that’s the way that we, for better or for worse, that’s the way we coach at Pravar and that’s the way that you get these transformations like you’ve talked about today. Phil, when we talk about this, I like asking this question. I’m fascinated to hear what you’re going to say, but just round us out if you can, in terms of what the community’s meant to you. It’s played a big part in your world. You’ve had your ups, your downs, the community’s been there and you’ve been with it all the way through over the last sort of five, six years. What does the Pravar community mean to you and what would you say about that?
Speaker 1 (01:07:04):
Yeah, look, you’ve had a bunch of client features on, it’s such a similar sort of response, but I think it is different for everyone and I’ve absolutely, I couldn’t have done this without the community. I know there are a lot of guys who move to Legacy the next step in Pravar and struggle a little bit with that by missing the community. There is something powerful about being with a group of guys who actually get you, my friends, even other business owners that I know or family, they just don’t get some of the things that I have to deal with. And one, to meet one person like that, it’s like, wow, this is so cool. They’re going to be my best friend for a life type sort of thing. I catch up with 50 of them, 50, I don’t know how many Rock 60 now, 70 or whatever from when I first started.
(01:08:03):
And that community is really, it is something that’s hard to put into words. It really is. It’s a way of being and that allows me to be me without fear, rejection, anything like that. I can talk about anything with these guys and I do mean absolutely anything. So sorry Kate, who will be listening to this, I might be cheating on you, but it’s an amazing community. It really is. It’s taken on, again, a life of its own. It’s not Rob’s community, it’s the Pravar community. And I know Rob you like you love that too, don’t you? It’s taken on something bigger than you.
Speaker 2 (01:08:56):
Definitely. Now I love your story and to give the listener appreciation of the size of this enterprise, which is Minibeasts Enterprises, how many states do you operate in?
Speaker 1 (01:09:11):
We are in every single one now. We are now everywhere in Australia.
Speaker 2 (01:09:16):
You’re a national company, how good is that?
Speaker 1 (01:09:19):
We are now a national company. Five years ago we were just Victoria, then we went to South Australia and then we just went boom. Yep.
Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
Love it. Good’s, that nationwide company. How many pet stores do you supply across the nation?
Speaker 1 (01:09:35):
We’re hitting around about 400 pet stores now and about 70% to 80% at the zoos in Australia. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:09:45):
How many staff have you got on at the moment?
Speaker 1 (01:09:48):
- Yeah, we’ve got quite a few casual staff. It’d be around about 24 full-time positions.
Speaker 2 (01:09:57):
Impressive, isn’t it? And how many million critters do you send out the door every single year, do you think?
Speaker 1 (01:10:07):
Oh geez. I honestly, I’ve lost track. We are growing actually pretty well and considering, I reckon we’re pushing 150 million crickets, maybe about a hundred million worms, and around about 150, 200,000 rodents every single year are going out to feed all these animals. They reckon one in 10 households now has a reptile for a pet. Everyone has a dog and a cat. Every second household has a dog and a cat. But hey, we’re in Australia. You can have all sorts of weird and wonderful things, and if you have though, they’ve got to eat. And so yeah, we are in a very niche part of the industry.
Speaker 2 (01:10:52):
And you’re such a big player in it, and you live and breathe this yourself. You just built, renovated a house and built in this whole setup of everything, of everything that you can have in terms for all your snakes and fish ponds and everything. It’s so cool seeing all the photos. So this is your life. You live and breathe this. It’s a huge part of who you and your family are, isn’t it?
Speaker 1 (01:11:18):
It is. It’s our passion and it’s our hobby. We haven’t renovated, we knocked down our original home who does this, buys that one home and says, this is where I’m going to live forever type sort of thing. And we knocked that down and built the bloody mansion and went to town on it, but actually didn’t compromise. And this was a huge part of my vision for many, many years. And I honestly think that’s been a real secret to the success that I’ve sort of had is that vision document. I get a reminder every week and it sits on, I’ve got a two pager on my desktop and it takes me five minutes to read it. I could read it without looking at it these days, and it is like a letter to myself in the future. This is what my day will be like. This is what my working life will be like. This is what I’m going to do with Kate, this is what I’ll do with my kids. And it just brings me back, brings me back and says, that’s north. Keep going. All this other stuff has just stopped. That’s north. Keep going towards that direction. And it’s allowed us to effectively build a zoo within a home. That’s what we’ve done. It’s pretty insane. I have to admit, I’m looking forward to getting fluffy, the crocodile at our place at some point soon. So yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:12:38):
Love it. Well, what a great story. And mate, it’s been, as you said earlier, it’s a journey and it’s been your journey. We talk about that a lot in coaching is it’s like the equivalent of we’re all swimming together in a pool, but everyone swims in their own lane. And that’s what’s really important to remember, and you’ve certainly done that, mate. You’ve swung your own lane in your own lane. You’ve had your highs, you’ve had your lows. It’s been a huge journey of change and growth and transformation within yourself and to what now is an epic business. And that’s why I wanted to ask those numbers around the amount of where you operate a nationwide business, every state, the amount of critters that go out the door every single year. It is a huge enterprise and you are a market leader in something you should be bloody proud of. And yeah, it’s an epic business, but it’s been an epic journey that you’ve been on for yourself personally. So Dan, what a story it’s been and yeah, we’re super proud of Phil and what he’s done in coaching, aren’t we?
Speaker 3 (01:13:37):
Yeah, absolutely. It’s been a privilege to have a sort of front row seat for a big part of that, and to be able to see you work through the challenges more than anything else and keep coming up the other side is awesome. And I think you’ve explained it really well today, what it does take to go beyond just having passion for what you do and really committing to being the best version of yourself. So yeah, Phil, it’s been amazing and thanks for spending some time with us today to share your story. We can’t wait to see what that next chapter looks like.
Speaker 1 (01:14:09):
Yeah, look out legacy.
Speaker 2 (01:14:14):
Thanks again for joining us today, mate. And yeah, we really appreciate you coming on board. So if you’ve enjoyed this episode and you know that you need to be able to make some changes within yourself and in your business as well, jump across your strategysession.com.au. Jump into time and get a discovery call booked in, and let’s see how we can help you and your business move forward. That’s it for today. Hope you enjoyed today’s episode. Looking forward to coming back to you with another episode next week. Till then, take care.
Speaker 1 (01:14:40):
See you soon.