Gold Nuggets
- “Keep saying ‘yes’ whether you know how to do it or you dont know how to do it. At some point you will make it if you just keep saying ‘yes’ and faking it.”
- “To be an entrepreneur, you’ve got to have that persistence, and you’ve got to have those multi-skills and be able to get through a lot of different things.”
- “Entrepreneurship is not for everyone. It does take a special kind of breed.”
- “A lot of people who hire designers, or any creatives in general – anything that you’re hiring somebody to create for you, is owned by them by what’s called creative ownership. It’s that creator’s intellectual property until the creator gives that company the creative ownership. An action item to help companies get around this is creating something as simple as a creative transfer agreement.”
- “There is a belief that once you pay for something like a logo that it is yours, but it is not by law.”
- “Being an entrepreneur, as lonely as it can be, make sure that you’re finding ways to connect and be inspired. If you’re having a hard day, just call someone.”
- “Be good to yourself. Rest. Take a day off every now and again.”
- “You see things and you say ‘why?’ I dream things that never were and say ‘why not?’” – George Bernard Shaw
Meet Brady Dahmer
Our guest is Central Branch Founder, Brady Dahmer.
Brady is a multiple award-winning designer and creative entrepreneur. With over 25 years of experience, Brady has held board positions in several arts foundations and events, developed courses, served as a faculty member of a national art school, worked with Fortune 500 Companies, entrepreneurs, revolutionary thinkers, and current and future leaders. He taught Design and Art Direction, and designed a curriculum, at The Art Institute, and ran the TYE international youth entrepreneurial program for high school students.
He is the author of ”I Wish We Knew That Before We Started…”
Brady holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Design and Advertising from Conestoga College.
Smart Man, Smarter Woman References
We talk about a lot in each episode; however, we don’t want you to miss a thing! Here are some key items were mentioned if you want to take a closer look.
Website Recommendations:
www.thecentralbranch.com/
Book Recommendation:
Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins
Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink
Stay Connected:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/centralbranch/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bradydahmer/
Learn more about our Cloud Accounting Services here
Transcript
Steve Loates (00:00):
Welcome everyone, to another episode of the podcast Smart Man, Smarter Woman, a podcast for entrepreneurs by entrepreneurs. Thank you very much for giving us a listen today. I am Steve Loates.
Juliet Aurora (00:14):
And I am Juliet Aurora.
Steve Loates (00:17):
We are your co-hosts. Before we bring in today’s special guest, let’s hear a few words from my wonderful cohost, that smarter woman herself, Juliet how are you doing today?
Juliet Aurora (00:29):
I am excellent. Thank you Steve, so much for asking. By the time this podcast airs, it’ll probably be public already, so I can share why I’m excellent is that our house was sold this week. Day before yesterday, actually, it was sold. Very stressful process, it’s been a long time since I’ve sold a house. Forgot how stressful it was, so glad it was such a short timeframe. But more than that, I’m excited about our next adventure. That now the house is sold, we’re thinking of moving to the East coast. We don’t have a house yet, at least at the time of this recording. We don’t have a new house, so I’m a little worried we may be homeless. But other than that, I guess I’m excited that being an entrepreneur has given me this opportunity to pick up and move my life and my business, because it’s virtual it doesn’t even need to move, and basically live out where I wanted to live out my retirement long before I’m retiring. So, I’m excellent.
Steve Loates (01:31):
Well thank you, Juliet. You sounded most extremely excellent, I don’t know if that’s a correct use of the English language but that’s exactly how you sounded. And, the homeless part, would that not be part of the entrepreneurial journey?
Juliet Aurora (01:47):
Yeah, probably. It might take me back to places I don’t necessarily want to remember in my entrepreneurial journey, but yes, absolutely. It probably correlates in there well.
Steve Loates (01:58):
Yeah. No, that’s a good point, that’s a good point. We shouldn’t make light of that, because we don’t want to experience that. Anyway, that’s enough of that. This audience does not want to hear from us, they want to hear from our guest.
Steve Loates (02:11):
Our guest today is Brady Dahmer. Brady joins us all the way from Vancouver, British Columbia, beautiful Vancouver. How are you doing today, Brady?
Brady Dahmer (02:24):
Awesome, Steve. Great to be here. Thank you so much for having me on. And morning, Juliet. How are you guys doing?
Steve Loates (02:31):
We are fantastic, thank you.
Juliet Aurora (02:33):
Excellent, thank you.
Steve Loates (02:34):
So before we start getting into this, why don’t we begin, Brady, if you could perhaps just tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do, and how you help people. A little bit about your own entrepreneurial journey.
Brady Dahmer (02:48):
Awesome. Well yeah, thank you so much. My entrepreneurial journey actually, one of the things I was listening about … You guys inspired me today, because I was listening through some of your old podcasts and I was like, “You know what? I think my entrepreneurial journey starts back when I was actually a kid.” Some of the speakers you guys have on inspired me to look back even further. I think my entrepreneurial journey started when I was really, really super young. I grew up on a farm, and my grandfather was a farmer. I think his voracity to run a farm and be a part of the community was a blueprint or a foundation for me to become this entrepreneur.
Brady Dahmer (03:28):
He was this hardworking cattle farmer that sold beef from his farm, so he always had people coming and going. He was the guy that sold all the feed to the local farmers. And then, he was also the local mailman so he was a hustler. He had the hustle going on long before, and I think that for me was a really great view into what it took, but also what you could get from it. And also, the reciprocity within the community as well, because I thought of just how well he was respected in his community. We would do these massive community gatherings a couple times a year, and it was so great to see everybody come together.
Brady Dahmer (04:11):
That, for me, I think was the very first introduction to my entrepreneurial journey, as I thought about it. Throughout the years, my parents were incredibly supportive of this as well, my mom being an artist and my dad being a mechanic and a constant tinkerer. That also, I think, really, really helped me with both side of my brain, that being the creative side and also, too, the engineering, how it’s made side.
Brady Dahmer (04:38):
For me, I really started with design. My business is all around branding, design and communications. I went to college for that, moved to Toronto. Worked in the agency world for many years, but me being an entrepreneur and also, too, loving my own thing, I did a lot of side projects. My boss, knowing I did a lot of side projects, got me involved in even more. At which point, I started sitting on boards for large … Toronto Film Festival was one of the bigger boards I sat on. I was this young little kid that was in his early 30s, working on some of these larger boards just because I was so interested in wanting to learn, and that really was one of the things I always enjoyed and loved, and the passion of what I did. I just threw myself into anything and everything and I never said no, and I think that’s one of those key things as an entrepreneur, you have to have that no filter at the very beginning, just to start learning and understanding where the boundaries are and everything else. For me, I just said yes to everything.
Brady Dahmer (05:42):
And then, as I grew I threw myself into other positions, and other jobs, in around the design, and branding and marketing field. I did website design and a bunch of those things. The bubble burst, and the company I was working at was on the downward slope. At that point, I decided to jump out onto my own. One of the things I asked, and I guess I’m not really sure where I learned this, but I asked all of my friends, and my relatives, and everybody that I knew to say, “Can I be an entrepreneur? Can I run a company myself?” At which point, everybody rolled their eyes and just basically laughed and said, “You’ve been doing this for however long, you’ve got a network now of people. You’ve got all the key ingredients.”
Brady Dahmer (06:25):
But, one of the things I really wanted to do is learn from my mentors and from other people that I knew, and ask them their opinions of certain things. I’m not really sure where I learned that, but that’s also, too, one of the things that followed me around, is that I have coaching and mentorship. Before I make any big decisions, I go in and I try to be as honest and open as possible, and look for that feedback. So I asked them, everybody laughed at me and they’re like, “You were born and made for this so go out and do it.” My mom was probably the scared out of anybody. Because generationally, there’s very few entrepreneurs out there and it was always tough for them, so my mom was probably the most worried out of anybody because how is her son going to survive going out on his own and being an entrepreneur.
Brady Dahmer (07:11):
But I thrived in that and 15 years later, I’m still running an agency, still doing what I love. My journey has taken me right through from Toronto, moved to Vancouver 15 years ago, ran an agency here. But, I still had that entrepreneurial spirit that, as much as I loved doing the agency work, I also am very passionate about so many other things. Everything from I wanted to write a book because I had an idea that us as designers, as people who create, especially things for clients, we produce only a very small portion of our work ever really gets seen. So I decided that I wanted to write a book about all the unseen creative talent that’s been untapped. The book, I approached a few publishers, the publishers said no but I decided that it was a still a great idea, and understood that there’s still great creatives out there with work that’s unseen, and the people that get the most unseen stuff are usually photographers.
Brady Dahmer (08:10):
So I created an entire fundraising photography exhibit called Not Fit For Print, which was a collection of the best unseen fashion photography from across Canada. That raised money for any kind of … Out here, it was called Dress For Success, I did another one in Toronto, but any sort of charity that would help people get to the next step in life, or help them from one place to another in dressing them, and helping them with coaching and things like that. And then, I realized for me to scale it, it would take an immense amount of energy and everything else, so I left that alone. I did that for about a year and a half, did three exhibits. It was such a great success, I loved doing it. But again, too, I also realized looking ahead, understanding what it would take to get it to the next step and everything else, I had to leave that there.
Brady Dahmer (08:58):
But not to be undone, my next project, and this was all while I’m running the agency as well, is I decided to run a film festival with a partner. It was about 10 years ago, and it was just when TED was becoming just, just, just starting to become a thing, and also, too, the environmental movement was out there. I realized that there wasn’t enough platforms for people to watch some really great environmental, social environmental films. This was long before Netflix or anything else came out as well. For seven years, I ran basically a film festival. It was a film and speaker dialogue series, where we brought in speakers and films from around the world dealing with social and environmental issues.
Brady Dahmer (09:43):
So like the TED format, what we would do is we brought in a film dealing with a specific subject, and we’d find a local expert on that subject. We’d create a dialogue within the theater, where the person would basically say, “Here is a film that maybe takes place in another country, another city, but here’s what’s happening in our local city.” So a huge success, but again, as the entrepreneurial journey goes you have certain barriers and certain things that you know that once you hit a certain step, that to scale or to do anything else, or maybe sometimes it’s just run its course, and I think in our case, too, we were battling against the couch. We were battling against TEDx and the way that people can now receive … We fast forward to this time where anything’s accessible by all these platforms that we can get on our TVs, so trying to get people out of their houses. And then also, too, the proliferation of all the TED and TEDxes. So there was so much more content and things around that we realized it was really tough to earn those bums in seats.
Brady Dahmer (10:40):
So that was a big learning thing, too, was knowing when to shut that down. Where our input wasn’t getting the right output that we wanted, and we had to be very open to seeing what was going on in the industry, and being very aware of it. Unfortunately, giving up one of these passion projects that we have and we loved doing, because what we were doing was so much fun and so interesting, and watching how people were engaged was fantastic.
Brady Dahmer (11:08):
And then, also too, like you said Steve, being an entrepreneur and still having this passion of growing. I think with the film festival, I loved how I could change and help people, and that’s always been a big passion of mine. I still sit on a lot of boards, using my learnings in marketing and branding to help those boards and everybody else really get to where they want, help the most people that they possibly can.
Brady Dahmer (11:34):
I was going to say, I’ve been happily peer pressured and inspired to write a book for my clients and coworkers, that focuses on our industry, and I think a bigger thing that’s been happening in our industry, titled I Wish I Knew That Before We Started. It’s basically a project handbook for any small business owner, for any startup, who is working with freelance designers or agencies. And essentially, it’s a collection of things not to do on a project. It is a step-by-step guide to help people understand that there is a knowledge gap between what creatives know, what they know in their specific fields, right through to the clients as well. I think, especially with COVID and society the way we are right now, I think one of the issues that, because of all the layoffs and things like that, there is a lot of now consultants out there, there’s a lot of people who left their job and they’re becoming consultants and helping other clients.
Brady Dahmer (12:43):
But, the problem is that, a lot of times with these consultants, that there was project managers and a team between them and a client, to manage and help guide the project to success. This is that space where this handbook fits in, is that between someone who knows an extreme amount of … they really know their specific skills and talents on one side, and then the client on the other side, who’s just looking for a really great result, but also a process that’s going to help them get to that goal as well.
Brady Dahmer (13:15):
That is my long journey of everything from the farm right through to now, getting a book and writing it.
Steve Loates (13:21):
Nobody could every accuse that journey of being boring, that’s for sure. There was a couple of things.
Steve Loates (13:29):
The first thing that came into my mind as you were speaking was, because this seems to be such a common trait amongst so many entrepreneurs, when you said “say yes to everything.” And then I think, how many entrepreneurs out there are still doing it, is fake it til you make it. You keep saying yes, whether you know how to do it or you don’t know how to do it, you just keep saying yes. And at some point, you will make it if you just keep saying yes and faking it. I thought that was awesome.
Steve Loates (14:08):
But you also, I’ve got to tell you, you gave me a bit of a flashback there, to something I hadn’t thought about for a long time. You were talking about your mom and how she was nervous when you were starting this entrepreneurial journey. I had this flashback. I remember when I started my very first business, my very first business I was in retail. I graduated from college, I had a degree in electronics, and I can remember the very first time my mom came to visit me at the retail store. I can remember her looking around and going, “Yeah, this is really great. You know what’s really great is at least you got your degree from college so you can get a real job if this doesn’t work out.” I had never thought about that again, until you said that. Honestly, my mom was incredibly supportive of everything I did, but I just remembered that one conversation.
Steve Loates (15:10):
Like you say, it’s a generational thing. That I was supposed to go out and work in that big corporate world, because that was going to be the safe thing for her child to do. Wow, that came back to me so real, I can’t believe it so thank you for that.
Brady Dahmer (15:30):
Yeah, you’re welcome.
Steve Loates (15:30):
Thanks for that.
Juliet Aurora (15:30):
I would like to touch on something that you did not mention in your journey.
Brady Dahmer (15:34):
Okay.
Juliet Aurora (15:35):
Only because I thought it was so interesting, and would generate an interesting conversation. Or, at least a question I had. That we read that you had started an entrepreneurship course for high school students.
Brady Dahmer (15:51):
Yes.
Juliet Aurora (15:51):
Which Steve and I feel very strongly, it should be taught in the high schools, it should be taught in the schools because nothing in the education system prepares you to be an entrepreneur. And, so love that this is something that you launched. Was it in Vancouver that you did it, or was it when you were in Ontario?
Brady Dahmer (16:08):
No. Well, it was something that I was a part of. We launched the Vancouver chapter of this. It’s an organization called TiE, and TiE’s an international, global, Indo-entrepreneurial network, so every city has a … The founding group is called T-I-E, and it was for East Asians and Indonesians across the globe to find their network and find the people within that. It was a business organization for them to find their peers and everybody else, that they could help each other within each one of those cities.
Brady Dahmer (16:50):
And then from there, they realized that they wanted to help educate the next generation of entrepreneurs, and through that they created a program called T-Y-E, so The Youth Entrepreneur program. It is a global competition where it’s a multi-month course. Where each week, another entrepreneur from the community comes in and talks to the students about their specific skills and talents, everything from accountants, to marketing people, to business coaches. At the end, all the high school students in that class, they’re broken into groups and each one of the groups comes up with a business idea. That business idea, they have to write up the financials, the business plan, the marketing, do prototypes if they can. And then at the very end, they have to present these ideas to a panel, and the panel gets to pick which one of these ideas is the best, has the most fit within it’s go-to-market, can win on that way.
Brady Dahmer (17:50):
And then from there, each one of the chapters, pre-COVID, they would go down to an international competition and each one of the students would go and compete. It wasn’t so much even about how great the idea was, but it was the presentation skills, how deep the business plan went into, all their market research and things that they did within that. There was a lot of different things, not just the viability of the product but everything around it. I’m very happy to say, the first five years that I was part of it, the Vancouver chapter won three. Our very first two years that we were in this competitions, amongst dozens. I think it was up to over 30 other chapters from North America competed, and Vancouver won the first two years it competed, and then it won the fourth year. It was awesome.
Brady Dahmer (18:41):
I was a mentor, and then I started to run everything after that.
Juliet Aurora (18:44):
I guess the question I wanted to ask you around it was what have you found … Based on the students that you worked with, and obviously the entrepreneurs, yourself and your clients, what are the correlations that you have found that, at a very young age, you can see something in an entrepreneur or in a student that you think will set them up for success?
Brady Dahmer (19:08):
Great question. I think the setting up for success, actually, it’s going to go into two streams. One being a lot of people who think they want to be an entrepreneur realize that what they really love are those specific things in the business itself. So you have the people that really, all of a sudden, love the fact that they can be an entrepreneur and they can do all of these things, and they know what it takes to be an entrepreneur.
Brady Dahmer (19:31):
All of a sudden, you see the other channel, too, where people love the idea of being a part of a business and a startup, but don’t really necessarily want to be an entrepreneur. Where it might have seemed like a really great idea at the beginning of coming up with a business, but they also see the energy, the work and the effort that goes into being an entrepreneur, at which point they realize, “I just really love my specific talent and what it can bring to a company.” Maybe it’s a startup, or maybe a smaller business that it can help in that way. Whereas, you have those people who all of a sudden see what it takes to build a company, be an entrepreneur, and you can just see the fire in their eyes.
Brady Dahmer (20:06):
So from that, I think that was the biggest thing we learned. Or, the students learned from going out is understanding themselves better, about what it takes to be an entrepreneur. That’s one of the greatest things, because we’ve all see those people who we know have incredible talents and skills in one area, but to be an entrepreneur you’ve got to have that persistence, you’ve got to have those multi-skills and be able to get through a lot of different things. That’s the greatest thing we offered a lot of these students, saved them a lot of pain and suffering in the future, undo stress and everything else in the future, based on that. So thinking it’s one thing, but realizing it’s another.
Steve Loates (20:49):
Yeah. Juliet and I talk about that all the time, that entrepreneurship is not for everyone. It does take a special kind of breed.
Steve Loates (21:03):
I would like to come back a little bit to your handbook. I mean, I love the title of it but I ask that question a lot of our guests. And perhaps, if you wouldn’t mind … And again, for our audience, the name of the handbook, I Wish I Knew That Before We Started. I think we can all relate to that sentence. Maybe if you could share, perhaps a couple of things maybe around marketing, that you wish you had known before you started that would have been helpful.
Brady Dahmer (21:37):
Yeah, awesome. Thank you. This is really a collection of the wins, and also, too, like I said, the failures that we’ve had and also the failures that we’ve heard our clients go through as well.
Brady Dahmer (21:50):
One of the stories that we had was one of our clients used an online service, 99 Designs, or Fiverr, any of the tools that are online. One of the things that they did when they hired, they had a logo done. This was a larger company, and they just didn’t see the budget for needing someone to do this important logo for them, like an agency, so they hired somebody online thinking they’d save a few dollars here and there. Literally, a day before they were going to launch this separate product and a bunch of other things, someone decided to go online and just do an image search. They’d heard about something online, and so they did an image search using their logo and realized that the logo that they were about to launch their entire new product and everything else was an exact duplicate with just a different name on it.
Brady Dahmer (22:41):
At which point, they realized that they could never trademark this, they could never copyright it, there was nothing they could do because they didn’t properly own the logo. They couldn’t use it in the way they wanted it to so they’ve just spent all that time, energy and effort producing just a logo, all the business cards and a bunch of other things, the website, all that stuff with the logo and branding on it. That now they realized all that time, money and energy had gone to waste because they didn’t just know the proper steps to go through when hiring the right people and the right questions to ask.
Brady Dahmer (23:13):
Another one of my clients, about a month ago, realized that she didn’t own the creative rights to the illustrations that an illustrator did for her. He created some gorgeous … She teaches meditation, she does meditation, she basically a success coach. She wrote a book and she hired this illustrator to do these gorgeous, beautiful illustrations all about meditation and everything else, but she didn’t realize she didn’t own her illustrations that were in the book. Needless to say, she found out that he was using these illustrations on pillows, on posters and a bunch of other things. Again, it just ate away at her brand and everything else.
Brady Dahmer (23:52):
I think a lot of people don’t realize those key important gaps within a project, timelines, budgets, all of those things that could affect or not affect the success of a project. Like I said, it’s those small things, those little details that end up sometimes being those big problems. Those little stones being the big, grinding annoyance in our shoes, that we don’t know about.
Brady Dahmer (24:20):
Over the years, and I’ve interviewed my clients and other designers, and other people in the industry, being like, “What have been the big blind spots? That people, you think they’ve seen or understand, but once you get deep into a project, that they have no idea about or they don’t realize certain things.” This is a collection of all of those things, those blind spots, those things that you would think that the other person, that being the creative or the client, would know but they just don’t. I simplified it a lot so that any small business owner, any small startup, it’s written in a way that is just really super helpful for them, and it doesn’t go too far into it. But, it helps them ask those specific questions based on what kind of project that they have, so that they know going in they’re ahead at every step. They know, eyes wide open, going in and understanding exactly where those risks are, and where the opportunities lie as well. That’s what it’s written for.
Juliet Aurora (25:22):
We’re always trying to make sure that every episode of the podcast gives an action item for our audience. If we go with your scenario, which is just horrible, that this woman wrote a book, had it illustrated and the illustrations didn’t belong to her. What is the solution for that for our audience, so that doesn’t happen to them? Is it a clause that needs to be in the contract that they need to look for, or some wording? Let’s make this an action item for them, so that they don’t encounter that.
Brady Dahmer (25:55):
Love the question, and this is a really, really, really big thing for a lot of companies because I don’t think a lot of people who hire designers, or any creatives in general, so everything from anybody that does branding, any logos, brochures, videos, photos, anything that you’re hiring somebody to create for you is owned by them, by what’s called creative ownership. What a lot of people don’t know is it’s actually protected by law by the creator, so it is that creator’s intellectual property until the creator gives the company that creative ownership. This also includes all of the graphic assets, all of the concepts, all those things.
Brady Dahmer (26:42):
So an action item to help companies get around this is creating something as simple as a creative transfer agreement. They can search it up online. It doesn’t have to be long, but it just it helps protect the small business owner and creatives, with what the exchange is on the contract side. They can look it up online. I’m actually right in the middle of writing a very simplified one at the time of this, you can put this in the show notes as well, but I’ll send you guys a link to where someone can download a sample version of this.
Juliet Aurora (27:14):
Great.
Brady Dahmer (27:15):
It’s just a one-page thing just saying that everything that’s been produced and has been paid for has been properly transferred from the creator to the small business and company, and that’s a really great way. It’s not a big legal contract, it can be very simple but it protects the small business and the creator for anything that comes up. Because I’ve also heard stories where a company will back in asking for their logo or their brochure and everything else, and the creator will be like, “You have to pay me again for that,” and it becomes a very big issue and a very complicated issue, lawyers get brought in because at that point, the creator can really ask for anything that they want.
Brady Dahmer (27:53):
The small business can really be held over a ledge on this, because it’s just something that, if not discussed … Not to scare people, but this is a very gray subject in a lot of contracts, and no one really thinks about it, and everybody believes that once … There is a belief once you pay for something like a logo that it is yours, but it is not by law, that it is yours. You’re just paying for that one use of that logo, or whatever that creative piece is.
Juliet Aurora (28:24):
Yeah, absolutely.
Brady Dahmer (28:26):
If not, [crosstalk 00:28:27].
Juliet Aurora (28:28):
Absolutely. I would assume that if I paid somebody to draw something for me, or illustrate something for me, or create something for me, that it belongs to me because I paid them to do it. It would never occur to me that it still belongs to them. So I appreciate that, and I’m sure our audience will be going back and looking at their contracts to see whether they own their logo or not.
Brady Dahmer (28:50):
I would highly say that there’s probably a good chance that 99.9% of the people that have ever had anything done by a creative person does not own outright their creative of what they’ve paid for. It is, by law, the ownership still belongs to the person whose created it. This is just something, it doesn’t have to be brought up, a lot of creators just very fluid with giving clients their things but still having them understand it’s still owned by them. So that I wish I knew before I started, and one of the big things that come up.
Steve Loates (29:23):
That’s great advice because you’re absolutely right, and just exactly what Juliet had said, that there is an assumption of those who don’t know better that if I paid somebody for that, that is now mine.
Brady Dahmer (29:35):
Yes.
Steve Loates (29:36):
But, that’s great. I will come back a little bit later, as to how people can get your handbook.
Steve Loates (29:43):
But, that brings us to the part of the show that we love to call the Smart Man, Smarter Woman version of James Lipton’s Actor’s Studio, where we ask everyone of our guests six questions, the same six questions. And if you are ready to be on the hot seat, Brady, I can get started.
Brady Dahmer (30:02):
Absolutely. Bring them on.
Steve Loates (30:04):
Perfect. What one word best defines an entrepreneur?
Brady Dahmer (30:11):
Passion.
Steve Loates (30:13):
What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?
Brady Dahmer (30:19):
Pilot.
Steve Loates (30:21):
Okay. What profession would you like never to attempt?
Brady Dahmer (30:25):
Oh. I don’t think there isn’t one, but accountant would probably be close to it. Anything dealing with numbers and charts, for me, would be off the list, actually. Yes.
Steve Loates (30:36):
Perfect. What sound or noise do you love?
Brady Dahmer (30:42):
Cha-ching.
Steve Loates (30:46):
You’re the first to give that answer. That’s a good answer. What book would you recommend every entrepreneur should read?
Brady Dahmer (30:58):
Oh boy. I’ve read one … I’m a voracious reader. Actually, I have a few. One is, and I think this is just bringing on that passion, is Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins. That’s been incredibly inspiring. When I’m having a bad day, the way he talks, the way that he gets things done is phenomenal, and that’s something that’s really been inspiring for me.
Brady Dahmer (31:31):
And then, there’s another book by an author, by Jocko Willink, and it’s all about … I don’t know the title of it, but it’s about being disciplined and that one is phenomenal. It just gets me set in the … It takes the very sometimes chaotic, sometimes creative, the explosive mind of the entrepreneur and helps focus it into a very specific stream of action.
Brady Dahmer (31:59):
So for me, the Jocko Willink book about discipline is amazing. And honestly just about the grind, really Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins. It resets my brain in a way that I understand what other people have gone through and life isn’t as tough. Those two have been two big ones for me.
Steve Loates (32:21):
Good recommendations. And, our last question here. When your own entrepreneurial journey is completed, what do you hope your legacy is?
Brady Dahmer (32:33):
I hope my legacy is that I’ve been able to help a lot of people, actually. Just connect and affect a lot of people, and just bringing joy and happiness into their life, reduce their stress and make their lives a little happier. Bring a smile to their face, so they’ve been happy that I’ve been part of their life.
Steve Loates (32:51):
Awesome. And for those in audience who would like to connect with you, Brady, what is the best way for them to do that?
Brady Dahmer (33:00):
Email and LinkedIn are two of the key ones for me. And also, too, we have an Instagram that people can be inspired by, and I’m going to be putting up tips and things like that. But usually, LinkedIn and email are the two easiest ways to do so.
Steve Loates (33:16):
Perfect. We will have your email and a link to your LinkedIn profile in the show notes, so people can find them there.
Steve Loates (33:25):
Before we conclude, do you have any final thoughts you would like to share with our audience of entrepreneurs, Brady?
Brady Dahmer (33:32):
I don’t today, but I just love you all. It’s one of those things where get out there and get going. One of the things, maybe, that I’ve learned in the last year, too, is being an entrepreneur, as lonely as it can be, just also, too, make sure that you’re finding ways to connect and be inspired. If you’re having a hard day, just call someone. Just say hi, and just reconnect because I think partly in this time and place that we’re in, and also too, being entrepreneurs, I think sometimes we feel very lonely in what we do. I would just say find your people, make some calls, be connected, and just stay passionate about what you do.
Brady Dahmer (34:15):
I guess one last thing, too, is be good to yourself. Rest, and take a day off every now and again. And just, A, be good to yourself, let your mind go, because that for me, I did that last week because I was getting very stressed and very overwhelmed by everything. But what I realized that I had not taken a proper break in a couple days, and actually not even a couple days, probably a month and a half, and back to back, to back. We need that as well, for ourselves, and to recharge and everything else. So a few little things in there, but it’s also about self care.
Brady Dahmer (34:48):
If I could wrap it up in one big thing, it’s all about self care for yourself. Yeah, being good to yourself, loving yourself, and just that way you can be passionate about what you’re doing, and you can help more people when you’re able to do that. That’s the last little nuggets I’ve found in my life to do. It’s hard to remember, I wish I actually would put that into my calendar. This is a great inspirational thing for me to do today, is actually put days off into my calendar because as entrepreneurs, hours turn into days, which turn into weeks. And then, you look back and time flies so fast. I think that’s one of the big things, is scheduling. I’m going to start scheduling my time off, so that I can recharge and things like that.
Steve Loates (35:34):
That’s great advice. That is great advice, Brady. That’s something Juliet and I do. When we plan each quarter, the first thing we do is put in the calendar our time off, and then everything else gets booked around it. But it took us many, many years to get to that point where we actually started practicing what we preach.
Steve Loates (35:57):
What about you, Juliet, you have any final words for our audience?
Juliet Aurora (36:00):
I guess the only one is Brady has also very generously offered, for our audience, a discount code for the handbook, I believe?
Steve Loates (36:10):
Yeah.
Brady Dahmer (36:10):
Yeah.
Juliet Aurora (36:11):
And, Steve you will have that listed in the show notes. But just wanted to say thank you, on behalf of our audience, for sharing that as well.
Steve Loates (36:19):
Yeah, absolutely. No, I will have a link in the show notes and I will also put the code in the show notes as well. And, the joys of doing a podcast from your home.
Juliet Aurora (36:33):
The dog.
Steve Loates (36:34):
Yes, we have a dog who apparently someone is ringing our front doorbell and he is not happy about it. I love doing podcasts from the home office.
Steve Loates (36:46):
That brings us to this episode’s Words of Wisdom. This is one that, maybe it’s fairly well known, but I think we could all benefit from either saying it or reading on a more regular basis. It’s from George Bernard Shaw. The quote is, “You see things and you say why, but I dream things that never were and I say why not.”
Juliet Aurora (37:16):
Excellent.
Steve Loates (37:18):
So again, thank you very much Brady, really appreciate it, great job. Thank you very much Juliet, for your support again, great job. But most importantly, thank you to you, our audience, for tuning in, giving us a listen. We sincerely hope you found some value and if you did, we’d love it if you’d subscribed. Our podcast is in all the regular places, or you can go to the website smartmansmarterwoman.com. So thank you again, until next time, take good care of yourself and those that you love. Bye for now.
Song by Adam Vitovsky / CC BY 3.0
