Many start their businesses seeking more flexibility and family time, but instead, they often feel overwhelmed by insurmountable work, stressed by growing responsibilities, burned out from long days and sleepless nights, and guilty for losing precious time with loved ones. I'm Stephen Capps, and I help overwhelmed business owners overcome adversity to achieve the life and business they desire. But my journey wasn't smooth. I started with a dream that quickly turned into a nightmare. In less than a year, I lost my wife to cancer, our largest customer, got remarried, and faced near financial ruin. I learned that hard work alone wasn't enough. Through trial and error, I made every mistake possible, but I turned my business around from the brink of bankruptcy to debt-free and thriving. In each episode, I'll share the nuts and bolts of running a successful blue-collar business. You'll gain practical insights and strategies to overcome adversity, avoid burnout, and build the life and business you want. Tune in for actionable advice that will propel your business forward, featuring Stephen Capps, the expert who transformed his own setbacks into success.
### Keywords for Google and Podcast Platforms: - Blue-collar business success - Overwhelmed business owners - Overcoming adversity in business - Stress management for entrepreneurs - Practical business advice - Building a thriving business - Business turnaround strategies - Avoiding burnout in business - Stephen Capps podcast - Achieving work-life balance in business - Real-world business lessons - Debt-free business strategies - Family time for entrepreneurs - Entrepreneurial resilience - Small business growth tips - Business mentorship - Effective business management - Business failure recovery - Inspirational business stories
Are you overwhelmed in your business and know you have 100 things that need to be done and you're asking the question with everything that needs to be done, where do I start? In the episode, Stephen leads you through the most important first 3 steps that every business owner should take. With all the noise and hyperberbaly follow along as Stephen teaches you the nuts and bolts of business that will drive you forward.
What would a perfect day in your business be like? What would that perfect day in your life? Be like? This podcast is all about helping you get there. See, we help overwhelmed business owners, overcome adversity, avoid the crash and burn so you can have the life and business that you want. But lots of business owners they have no idea how to get there. Well, it's pretty simple. It's all about choices. You get new information, whether it's from a book or a podcast like this. And when you're presented with the new information now you have a choice to make. Are you going to receive the information and do new things? Are we will you continue on the path that you're on? What I share in this and every episode of pull up and thrive are the nuts and bolts of life and business.
That has changed my life.
Today, you have the same power to choose right now do something different
than what you've been doing?
And that decision can change your life.
Think about what keeps you up at night.
What are the things things that cause you the most
anxious, and the most frustration.
What is the thing that you wish that you could change the most? Are you ready? Are you ready for this? change it.
If you don't like something about your life,
change it.
When I lost my wife to cancer, and we lost our largest customer, and I got remarried all within a 10 month period.
And on top of that, we were supernaturally in debt.
It was like I was in a whirlwind, things of God and things not of God.
To say my head was spinning would be an understatement.
I didn't know which way was up.
And it was that way for months.
But when the storm calmed and the fog lifted,
I had a choice to make
Would I be the victim? Would I make excuses?
Or would I just say I'm stuck and I can't do anything?
In that moment, I was not powerless. And neither are you. Imagine with me if you would that you're at a door and behind the door are stairs. those stairs take you to the life and the business that you want. But you have to make the choice to go through the door and take the action steps to get to the top.
In 2008, I went to my first business conference that put me on the path that would change my life in
business.
At that business conference, we got this box and in the box was a bunch of books. And one of those books that's very special to me is
that 21 irrefutable laws of leadership by john Maxwell.
He was a first leadership or business book that I ever read.
You need to read it if you haven't read it.
It's a business one on one.
If you're in business, you're a leader.
Well, I didn't think I was a leader.
But if you ask yourself, Is anyone counting on me?
If the answer to that question is yes,
then you're later.
Whether you know it or not, or people say it or not, they are counting on you to open that door and climb the stairs. If you listen to any of our previous episodes, and what if any of that is striking a nerve. I want you to know that you're not alone.
I've been where you're at
a little while back, I told someone my story.
And they asked me a question that I'd never been asked before they said,
So what was your greatest takeaway
from that experience?
And I must say that my greatest tech takeaway
comes right out of Psalms 23. Four.
Do I walk through the valley of the shadow of death? I will
fear no evil for you are with me. So in my darkest night, in my hardest
hour, I was not
alone.
Now, if you were to Google business or how to grow my business,
there is a ton of information.
Probably more accurately said there's a ton of noise from The latest and greatest business gurus and online courses and I have students that did $20,000 their first month.
There's a lot of noise and a lot of hyperbole.
Wealth gain hastily will dwindle. But who ever gathers gathers little by little will increase.
Proverbs 1311
here on the pull up and thrive podcast.
This is just the nuts and bolts. No hype, no noise
because what we're doing and what you're doing
is serious.
Get to know the facts. 20% of
businesses fail in the first year.
Get to know the facts.
20% of businesses fail within the first two years
and 45% fail in the
first five years and only 25% make it 10 years. Business is not for the weak business is not for the faint of heart. And did you also know that in 2018, only 9% of small businesses do over a million dollars in revenue.
That means
91% are doing under a million dollars a year.
If you've
if you're just getting started with this
working on the business stuff and yourself Same with all the things I have going on. Where do I start? And how long will it take? If you do the things that we teach on, pull up and thrive, you can start seeing results in weeks or months. But if you stick with it over time, you won't recognize your business a year from now. I love what john Maxwell says stop asking how long it'll take
and start asking how far can I go?
Here we go. The
three most important steps
in growing your business.
Start here.
Number one,
start here.
mission statement, core values and strategic priorities. If we've only been working in the business and not on the business, you may say something like, this is Chinese. What is this? mission statement core values? Why do I need that? How does that help me in my painting business? You get these right? And you can double your painting business.
Because the mission statement gives you out of bounds
gives you your out of bounds lines.
And mission statement
is the out of bounds marker.
A mission statement is why you exist.
Here I got a few I wanted to read. And this is under armours mission to make all athletes better through science, passion and the real and the relentless pursuit of innovation. Yeti coolers with a simple mission build the cooler we'd use every day if it existed. One that was built for the serious outdoor enthusiast rather than mass discounted retailers. One that could take the abuse we knew we'd put on it through the field and on the water.
Why do you exist?
Are you a painter? Are you a carpenter? Are you a IT guy?
It company?
Why do you exist? What gets you out of bed in the morning
to serve your customers
and it has to be more than money.
It's beyond the work. Now I'm going to read you another one and I'm not going to tell you the name or the product but we exists to protect what matters to you, your truck and all the important things that matter to you that ride in your truck. Now I transport a lot of important things in my truck.
My wife and my a beautiful twin girls.
That is a mission statement of ranch and truck equipment. They make heavy duty bumpers. Notice our mission statement has nothing to do with welding or bumpers or that they're black.
We exist to protect what matters to you.
So dig into your passion, dig into your higher
calling that's beyond or that is behind why you started the business. Then, let that Show in your company trucks and your appearance and your company uniforms. And ask yourself what matters to the customer. Now, let me throw this in there.
Not
everyone is your customer. If you want to provide a premium product or service, not everyone is your customer. When you give them a price, and they're always beating you up on the price, and they want it done yesterday and you're already booked in your schedule, so you rearrange the whole schedule and
push back the good customers for another day.
And then after you get the job done for this person,
you have to track them down to get paid.
Not everyone is your customer.
I had lots of customers like that.
And there came a day where I said I'm done. I'm done with that. Sometimes to get the life and business that you want, you have to let customers go. Or this is a price. We can get it done next Tuesday, and we need payment upfront. Oh, that's being mean that's not customer service
who's driving this
business?
Because there are customers that are out there that are waiting for you. And it's not about the money and they're not. They're not looking for the cheapest price. They're looking for someone who has passion. They have a mission, and they're there to serve. Okay, here is Texas gates mission. This is our
custom gate business,
TX gates Comm.
Our mission is approval. worthy of trust to God
each other and our customers
by bringing to market, reliable and enduring products that bring joy and peace of mind to everyone. It's more than the product. You find that mission and you tap into that mission. Then you hire and you fire based on the mission. You want people who want to commit to your mission, they want to join the mission, they want to join the crusade. It was like whenever the Twin Towers were hit on 911 professional athletes were leaving their life a luxury to go and join the military and fight in Iraq.
Because There's a mission
and we spend half of our lives working. We owe it to ourselves and our family to be passionate
about what we do.
We owe it to our customers to serve them well. Now, sometimes, well, Alright, number two core values. Every individual and every company has core values. No matter if you've written them out or not. Everyone has core values.
They're either good or they're bad.
As an example,
Texas gates some of our core values are hard work, a whatever it takes attitude, a team spirit and honest and open about what happens in the early days. We're busy and we need help. So we hire someone that needs a job. And their core values are dishonest, laziness, entitlement and independent. So they're not a team player. They don't. They don't believe in hard work. Everyone owes him something and they're dishonest
and we wonder why they don't fit in.
Whenever you're hiring
people,
it's more than just the skill
because we're not looking for good welders.
We're hiring for a culture fit. Number one. Because this is about growing something bigger than ourselves. This is about building a place that you love to go to work at. Building a place that is healthy.
No stress,
but we hired Crazy people and then we wonder, you know, we we hire someone that does not have our same core values and they were disillusioned why they didn't work out. And then we blame them that they don't want to work. Well who was the lunatic that hired them? So,
core values
you can either have
you can either be intentional about writing down your core values,
or spend the rest of your life stressed out.
If you want to win in your business, you have to be intentional. Identify your core values.
Maybe
on the weekend, just really get some time by yourself and write what are the core values, not aspirational values, not the things that you want to be but what are the core
you know, again, for us, it's
a mind to work, team spirit,
a whatever it takes attitude.
Are there phrases that you say on a regular basis?
Whatever it takes is something that I say. I mean, I've said that, I don't know. 1520 years, well, whatever it takes. So that was something, something that was core for me. So we identify it by taking the time to write these things out.
So let me show you how powerful this is.
The day that our company rolled out our core.
Let me show you how powerful this is.
The day that our company
rolled out the core values.
There was one guy that didn't quite
we didn't feel like that he quite lived up to the core values.
So we called him in into my office is myself and his leader. And we said, so how do you think that you align with our core values? And we went through a few of them and Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm all about hard work. And I'm all about
being a team player and
one of our core values is a mind to work. Whenever Nehemiah was rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem, he told the citizens to have a sword in one hand and a trial in the other because they didn't have a wall around the city. So I had to fight off the enemy and build the wall simultaneously. And Nehemiah, Nehemiah four, six, so we built the wall until
all of it was joined together,
up to half its height for the people had a mind to work. So one of our core values is having a mind to work. And I challenged him on his mind to work. I said, I don't think that you have a mind to work.
And we pressured him on a little bit. And
I was like, well, no matter how you feel, we don't feel like that you have a mind to work and you don't have a whatever it takes attitude. And that is something that if you want to be here that'll have to change. Well, the next day, he self selected out,
he calls in and said, I got another job.
This isn't what I want.
When you start taking this seriously,
people will opt out.
That is one reason why it's important to do this as a team. So just don't do this by yourself and then show up on Monday said Alright, here's our here.
Here's our core values.
sort of have an idea.
You know, write down five For 10,
then call in the team for an afternoon or do a lunch.
Hey, I'm
wanting to grow the business I'm wanting to really, you know, define some things in the business. What do you think are our core values and just talk about it. And then you get 10 or 20 of them or 30 of them, however, you know, however many and then you whittle them down, get them down to, you know, three to five things that are really, really core. Something else that the mission statement and the core values do is that this is advanced decision making. This will make hundreds of decisions for you going forward. Once that this is crystallized, once that you have it hammered out. Now, it can take weeks or months to really drill down and really get this right.
So what we're doing is super important for the future and the success
of your business.
So take the time to do it.
And number three strategic priorities. So mission statement, core values and strategic priorities. These are the big things that drive your business forward. When I asked you earlier, what is that dream? You know, what was that thing that you thought of?
Because if you're going to spend half of your life working,
you owe it to yourself and your family to hit the mark. Dream no small dreams because small dreams don't stir the hearts of men.
Victor Hugo,
there are customers out there that are waiting on you.
And they're not looking for the low cost provider.
Because when you have a dream and you have passion and you communicate it with your team over and over and over again
and they begin to catch it, too.
There are customers out there waiting for you.
And they're not looking for the low cost provider.
Because when you have a dream, and you have passion, and you communicate with your team over and over again,
they begin to catch it too.
Whenever what you do every day is a higher calling and not just we make widgets. How is that widget impacting someone's life? How would someone's life be different if you did not make what you make? Ask yourself the question, What would your community
what would America
what would your state, what would your family look like if your business did not exist?
You matter what you do matter what you make matter.
So let's hit the mark on
this.
So maybe you're dreaming about you're in a labor and labor intensive business and you're tired of doing the labor
and you just want to oversee it.
Maybe you have a service business with a couple of trucks and maybe you want five or 10 trucks or maybe you don't even want to run it.
Maybe you want a GM to run it.
Well write the vision and make it clear so that those that read it may run.
So you have to have a clear mission.
This is our mission.
You're like Texas gates mission. Our mission is to prove ourselves worthy of trust to God each other and our customer by bringing to market
enduring products
that bring joy and peace of mind to everyone.
It's an out of bounds marker. If the products are not reliable and enduring. We don't make them. If they don't bring joy and peace of mind to everyone, we don't make them. So this is where it starts with the strategic priorities.
What's your three year goal?
How many employees
do you want? How much revenue Do you want to be making? What's that dream? What's that three year goal? What's that big dream? what's what's the one year goal? Just make it a little bit more granular? What's the one year goal? How much revenue how many employees how many trucks? And then ask yourself, What do I have to do today? To make this true a year from now? In Episode One, I talked about overcoming adversity. And we talked about the four health holes and exercise to help you narrow down those things that are important that you need to work on. So this will help you get your strategic priorities or your rocks you know, those big things that you want to accomplish. So the four help fools, you make four columns. what's working, what's missing? what's broken and what's confusing?
And you write everything that you can think of.
I mean, there is no right wrong answers. If it's working, write it down. If it's missing, write it down. If it's broken, write it down. If it's confusing, write it down. Now surely on this list, you're doing some things, right? Surely. So circle those things that you're doing right? And they're probably in the, what's working column? Well, those things you want to magnify, do more of that. What's missing? The things that are missing, you want to identify the things that you wrote down that are in the missing column. And what's confusing we want to clarify and what's broken, we need to fix
so out of everything that you wrote down,
in the missing broken or confusing,
circle, the top
five, what are the five things you know the top five Then after you circle the top five, okay, out of those five, what are the top
123
whenever you identify those 123 items, those 123 items are your strategic priorities for the quarter, or for the next 90 days. So you have the three year goal, the one year goal and then the quarterly goals that drive you closer to your goal. And you only want to pick one Earth 123 because everything is important than nothing is important. So if there's a bunch of things that can just go on a to do list, put them on a different list.
So just to
communicate better what I'm trying to say. Imagine that you have a bucket of rocks, bucket of gravel, bucket of sand And a bucket of water and a large jar. And I tell you, all those items can fit into that jar.
Well, if you start with
the sand first, and then the water than the gravel than the large rocks, it's not all going to fit. But if you put the large rocks in first, then the gravel, then the sand, then the water.
Everything fits perfect.
That's why you have to have rocks, you have to have these strategic priorities, what are the big things that have to get done to drive you closer to your goal?
Let's be doers of this.
So we can overcome adversity and avoid the crash and burn and have that life and business that you dream of. If this episode has been any help at all You please share with two friends I'm upping my ask on this one. Surely you know two people who can use this.
Share this with two people. And if you have any questions or comments, please post them on our Facebook page
at pull up and thrive.
Remember, it really helps us out
if you'd rate, review, share and subscribe wherever you listen to podcast. Thank you for joining us. I'm Stephen Capps. You're the best
