The Small Business Safari
Have you ever sat there and wondered "What am I doing here stuck in the concrete zoo of the corporate world?" Are you itching to get out? Chris Lalomia and his co-host Alan Wyatt traverse the jungle of entrepreneurship. Together they share their stories and help you explore the wild world of SCALING your business. With many years of owning their own small businesses, they love to give insight to the aspiring entrepreneur. So, are you ready to make the jump?
The Small Business Safari
Business Resilience, 9/11 Reflections, and Adventures with Ian Hay Pt. 2
Discover the secrets behind the "Lickety Split Preparedness Kit" with our guest, home security expert Ian Hay. Drawing on the lessons from 9-11, Ian walks us through the essentials of creating a practical and effective emergency kit using everyday items. We also delve into the necessity of having a solid communication plan and a designated rally point for emergencies. While the topic is serious, we balance it out with light-hearted moments, sharing survival tips,and of course jokes.
Join us as we explore the critical role of private sector resilience in national security, particularly during significant events like the G8 summit. Ian shares his extensive experience on the coordination between military, law enforcement, and private sectors to protect critical infrastructure. Reflecting on the profound impact of 9-11, we emphasize the importance of staying motivated and making a positive impact in daily life. Whether you’re a small business owner or looking to enhance your personal preparedness, this episode is packed with valuable insights and practical advice to help you move forward with confidence.
For those that have listened to your other episodes 9-11 was a catalyst for you and you just said what can I do? And you found people which is amazing to me actually that's part of a story we haven't talked about like how you even got to this. That's episode four People that you spoke to I mean high level, like what can I do? Did you find other people like you?
Speaker 2:Welcome to the Small Business Safari, where I help guide you to avoid those traps, pitfalls and dangers that lurk when navigating the wild world of small business ownership. I'll share those gold nuggets of information and invite guests to help accelerate your ascent to that mountaintop of success. No-transcript. Again, this is a serious small episode, so this will be a 15-minute event. We're just going to knock it out because Ian was going so awesome on our last podcast.
Speaker 2:If you didn't hear him, we've had Ian Hay in here twice. He is not only a home service I'm sorry a home security guru. He is a gold nugget master. He knows Sir Winston Churchill. But we've got to get into this because, guys, you got to go back and check this guy out. He dropping some serious dimes on everything we're talking about. And so I said, alan, we got to have him back. So we made Ian drive all the way back to my basement just so we could do this again. And you know what we did? We made him bring more wine, more liquor, liquor, more scotch. So what are we doing, alan? I'm drinking scotch let's do it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, cheers. Whiskey without whiskey? Let's do it that voice. Whiskey with the e, here we go all right, everybody.
Speaker 2:No, without the look a little bit different episode. Right, you guys are in your truck. This is a 15 minute or man. Follow in, here we go, we gotta rock so I three, three things.
Speaker 3:First of all, what we have here is a lickety split preparedness kit.
Speaker 2:All right, what's a lickety split preparedness kit.
Speaker 1:I thought you brought that because you're going to spend the night with Chris.
Speaker 3:Well, as the way this is going, I think we should go for the 15 part podcast. However, I hope I'm your first guy to ever do three, because I think that's cool. I like to be inaugural. As many of my friends know, it's like an SNL five-timers club, right? Yeah, let's do that. And so, basically, for those of you that are watching on the screen, grab two bags a quart bag and a gallon bag and then just walk through your house. What are the things you touch every day? Toothbrush, deodorant, I've got some Listerine, lip balm, toothpaste, a flashlight, my little cabinet, and so right there. And I have some rubbing alcohol, right, so right there. In about three and a half minutes, I have a lickety split preparedness kit. If I had some water and a snack we're good to go.
Speaker 1:So you kind of make me nervous, ian. Do we need to have one? Because yeah, you see my face.
Speaker 3:I'm like I'm shocked you don't have this together.
Speaker 2:Lickety split preparedness kit. Yeah, where are we going? And why Grab an old duffel bag?
Speaker 3:Hey, I've watched those Bourne movies and I'm telling you, man, this one Just imagine like, just imagine, like all your guys who took those enterprise cars, yeah, they probably had this if they were military they probably had this.
Speaker 2:So if you're just catching up on this episode, as you guys all know, uh, we did this one over 9-11 and we talked about this one. We had to have him back, but he we did not get a chance to talk about his lickety split preparedness kit. So go check this out. We'll put this thing in the show notes, but we gotta have.
Speaker 3:One of those is that a cigar cutter in there, um, I actually carry a carry one with me on my keychain, okay if you're not a follower, sir winston everybody has known I would have brought cigars tonight, gents right, there's a reason.
Speaker 2:Next time you're coming.
Speaker 1:I'm just gonna make sure I'm gonna say hey, uh, to my wife you know, maybe you should go visit your folks, or something like that episode five.
Speaker 2:That's right episode. You know what he might? He might be the snl guy, I don't know. All right, that's another gold nugget, everybody. So what is this thing about this liquidly split preparedness kit? It's about being ready right. And so we're not talking about biz, we're just talking about life.
Speaker 3:Well, this is biz. I mean, this is uh, you know, uh, federal government has the readygov. Make sure you go there, have a plan, at least have a communications plan. Know what, know how, you know if 9-11 happens, know how you are going to communicate and make sure it's via text and you can do a chat string. Many people already have family chat strings, but start there and then like, okay, this is going to be our rally point. If all communications go down, we are going to meet at you know, chris's basement with cigars, good spot, ski and right. So this is where we're coming.
Speaker 2:I'm not gonna lie, we're not gonna have any guns. But man, we're A lot of liquor.
Speaker 3:Well, we can find plenty of people with guns if we need to.
Speaker 2:I have friends with guns but I'm not one of them.
Speaker 3:And so really all I'm asking people to do is to grab an old backpack. I might be able to help you out. Thank you, all right, go grab an old backpack. I actually have an Eagle Creek bag. It's about the size of a fist. It opens up into a backpack. You can just throw stuff in there. It's fabulous.
Speaker 3:We'll make sure all this stuff gets to the website if you're interested, or I'll make sure I have it on mine. But that is how you prepare as a small business owner. Make sure you can take care of yourself. Then you make sure you can take care of your family, include your pets. Make sure you got some pet food. Make sure you got some stuff to keep your animals happy, because most people won't evacuate without their animals. Make sure you're ready for that play through. Uh, you know, you could actually do like like a fire drill. So what I do is I know that the uh tornado alarm is going to. You know the warning alarm is going to go off at noon on the you know whatever, the first of the month or I can't remember what that is. That is when I checked my kit, and if I can't get to it in 17 seconds, then I'm not ready for a tornado 17.
Speaker 2:Mark that that's a pretty specific number 15 minute episode, 17 seconds Get your kit Go. Huh, hey, don't quit listening. Hey, keep listening.
Speaker 1:All right, we're back I gotta ask you, ian, so, uh, for those 17, go ahead for the. For those that have listened to your other episodes, you know 9-11 was a catalyst for you and you just said what can I do? And you found people, which is amazing to me. Actually that's part of a story we haven't talked about, like how you even got to that's episode.
Speaker 1:Four people that you spoke to, I mean high level, like what can I do? Did you find other people like you? Oh, yeah, and and I love that because, like whenever I read one of those novels where it's like we've got some black ops guy that goes and, you know, kills all the terrorists and the bad guys and stuff, and like I hope those are people that actually exist, and then to meet somebody like you who just threw themselves into the problem and they talk about I think it's the Jack Reacher book, so it's fake because it's a book but there's, you put somebody under stress and most people run away, and there's the occasional person that runs towards the problem and those are the people that we want you're. You're somebody who ran towards the problem.
Speaker 3:yeah, it could be in a business thing too. I was not a first responder. I am not a first responder, but I support first responders. Right, you weren't a?
Speaker 1:first responder when this happened, but you ran towards the problem. I mean, that is a huge character thing to me.
Speaker 2:Thank, you yeah, my parents heard that, so yeah, and you're, you're, you know what they did, by the way, because, uh, we're in neglect again. I think we actually move.
Speaker 1:Do you think god listens to our podcast? Is that what you're saying? I think so. I mean, frankly, I think it just plays on a lifetime member in the adventure team.
Speaker 3:Come on, come on. You know what you want to see. You want to see it by uh, by uh swear words.
Speaker 2:I was gonna say you want to see a go kid.
Speaker 3:Imagine reaching into it and having exactly what you need, just as you need it.
Speaker 1:That god's listening to a podcast and he's laughing and he's like oh, chris, do you really have to swear so much?
Speaker 2:I do. You know what. You know what? Yeah, it wasn't in the bible's good, it wasn't one of the bad words.
Speaker 1:Oh, thou shalt not swear, okay, no, I'm good those words were not there, and I have not.
Speaker 2:Okay, maybe I've hit a couple of George Carlin ones, but the seven words you can't say on TV. All right back to Ian, though, can we? All right, because we got 15 minutes man role.
Speaker 3:This is a fast one, so so thank you for that and yes, there are others out there and you can be one of them as a member of the adventure.
Speaker 3:No, that wasn't where I was going to you, okay I want to know about the other people that yeah so, uh, the way I describe it is about seven to ten people we created. We created a category. There was no private sector outreach. I mean, if I could, on episode four, I will share about what it was like to be a complete outsider standing in front of military law enforcement. People who did not trust my motives, questioned my motives, and thankfully I had enough people who were for me rather than against me, and those that listened really benefited. Like we had some stuff during the G8 summit that didn't happen because I helped put people together. I don't need a medal, I don't need thanks, but I can tell you we didn't have headlines during the G8 summit Wait a minute Because of some of the coordination that we did.
Speaker 2:Are we? Are we unpacking some shit?
Speaker 1:right now. Yeah, ian, and the g8 summit. Okay, back up. Talk about that, can you?
Speaker 3:so what I can say about the g8 summit is that that is what I was really invited to help with and you got to remember at the time, 15 minutes. You remember at the time, right, 80 minutes. You got to remember at the time, right, 80% of the critical I think it was 85% of the critical infrastructure is in the private sector and 15% are designed to protect it and they're not really talking to each other. No, just like you were a critical sector transportation but you weren't in an operation center, critical sector transportation Right, but you weren't in an operation center Until that point, the only people in the operation center were telephony, right, so that interoperability piece.
Speaker 3:Those folks were in there, power was in there, and you had department of transportation and sometimes you had tech right, cause obviously some, some of this is really involved heavy tech and you've got to have people in your operation center who speak that language. It could make sure all the technology allows us to coordinate. That's not what we were talking about. Now we're talking about protecting facilities. Everything is an open target, right, you've got a mass gatherings that are now a target. That's right. Cnn center me as, as chris just described, like you don't want to be anywhere near the cdc lord supply 100, 100, and so those two weren't used to talking to each other.
Speaker 3:And so you know, me and a handful of other people helped create that category of private sector outreach, and now there are probably hundreds and thousands of people employed in that sector. One of the things that happened is the government got very heavy into our business, pushed a number of us out, so I mean, I'm not doing that anymore. There are a handful of people are doing it. It's not nearly as robust. I could line up 50 people that would tell you, oh, we were better coordinated, we did this.
Speaker 3:And again, not to be disparaging of the federal government, this is a natural thing that occurs over time. Right, after 20 years, you think about things differently, and the key is to not prepare for the last attack, right, that was. The problem is that we were focused on okay, well, how are we going to prevent that from happening? And then it was at least a couple of years before I started hearing well, what is this new Madrid seismic zone? What is the Yosemite caldera? What about a massive tsunami? Right. And then we started to get focused on all hazards and the whole community of how, uh, how do you prepare a whole community? I'm literally fast forward to 20 years.
Speaker 2:Alan in that one sentence before he said the word tsunami. What were the other two things? I have no idea what he said. I was like what are those things?
Speaker 3:something called era. Yeah, what is that?
Speaker 2:new madrid seismic zone oh, dear god, all right, I run a small, a handyman company, uh, here, and so I'm very worried, uh. But no, but he's talking about the stuff that can happen, because people say, hey, chris, how are things going to go next year? I said you know what, as long as the real ian is there, then we're okay. Well, now I'm thinking, as long as the world keeps their shit together and ian keeps it all together, then I'm doing great, yeah, but the world loses their shit, I'm in trouble. So that's the thing. We can't do it as small business people. But when you hear about what, uh, what ian is doing and with these people, it's amazing that the gravitas you could have and the impact you could have, it's so cool.
Speaker 3:Well, that's the key about small businesses is you or any business is. It's who you network with and who you seek advice from and be be interconnected. The. The issue with uh, you know the? The the issue with critical infrastructure is we are all codependent. We call that interoperability, but we're codependent on each other. Right, we are. We are intrinsically entwined. You can't run technology without power. You can't sustain life without water, right, you can't run a hospital without water. You got to have it. And so the key is that we know we're all in this together. How do we network, how do we coordinate? How do we maximize the synergy between our organizations? Maximize the synergy between our organizations, and then you know. I think a second part is a small business owner is really look for a niche that somebody isn't really doing something, or maybe somebody tried, or look for something that you're passionate about and explore.
Speaker 2:I like that, and on on the edge, you're going to find something finally all right, but before we let you go because we're on the fast track 15 minutes you brought something that was really cool and you keep tapping it and we don't even know what it is and all you keep saying is the constitution, it's the red, it's the red bag, and you know what all I'm doing is is National Treasure and I'm doing Nicholas Cage 100% Dude.
Speaker 3:I want to know what is in there, All right, so we'll probably get into this late episode four and five more. However, right here at this table, I can reconstitute the United States government. Oh my God, and this came from His I, I, I don't, I don't have permission, so I can't tell you who I had the conversation with. However, it was a chief of staff of a very important member of Congress, and they were assigned to a committee to to talk about the continuity of government, or cog, uh, and what would happen in a sort of a post 9-11 scenario or worse. So one of the things he said to me is look, the legislative branch hold up.
Speaker 3:I'm coming back to the legislative branch. Right, we have two branches inside the legislative branch. One is the House and one is the Senate. Those have to be together because those members have to conference together, so they physically have to be located together. However, the judiciary and the presidency and be somewhere else. And right now, right, we're talking zero day here, we're talking Skynet, we're talking this is really bad, we have no idea what's going on. And blah, blah, blah. So you always carry. So if I am taken down, you go into my go kit and you grab the red bag. Inside the red bag are four copies of the Constitution. Alan, what's he showing us? Who feels like being the judiciary today? Alan, okay, alan is going to be the judiciary. I've got to get my glasses on. Chris, you want Congress? Let's give him the presidency.
Speaker 2:Oh, of course we know, we know, we know.
Speaker 3:Which thankfully leaves me as the legislative branch, which is actually Article I, and people forget that, and that's actually in my congressional testimony, which I submitted on the fifth anniversary of 9-11. And then we did our oral arguments on the 13th. So I'll be drinking out of a different mug on the 13th, which is my US House of Representatives mug. But the key here is we have two copies of the Constitution, one for the House, one for the Senate, so that they can conference together, and this is what's supposed to be running. The country is Article I, that's correct.
Speaker 2:I love that he is talking about this. What is in your hand? I have the Constitution of the United States of America, but I'm the president. But it starts with the people. That's the part. 100% Back to our founders and our framers. They did a great job. It starts with the people, the one guy, the one lady, the one person, whatever doesn't matter as much as well. It's all three, but the judiciary has got the one. But the biggest and the most important is the masses, and that's what I think a lot of people forget and I think that part makes us the greatest country in the world.
Speaker 3:It's the best, the design that I've seen, or I think, uh, you know, sir winston churchill, since chris asked for this. Uh, democracy is the worst form of government, except from all others that have been tried from time to time exactly right.
Speaker 2:Ian hay has done it again. This is the 15 minutes of fun. Alan's over there trying to figure out how he could be. No, I'm reading the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 3:He's being judicious because he is going to interpret the laws of the United States.
Speaker 1:He shouldn't be writing me, Chris, because you're going off all half-cocked.
Speaker 3:I am, he's being very presidential I am. You are being very judicial and I'm going to be legislative and, but get into this in about two minutes.
Speaker 2:Love this e and a. You've done it again.
Speaker 1:You came back here you dropped some serious events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bans all right and alan has taken on your eyes at the declaration of independence.
Speaker 2:I'm not, but Alan, we have a, we have an obligation to the adventure team and we got to make it happen. All right, everybody minutes. How many are we? How many we're at 15. We got to go everybody.
Speaker 3:So, before we go, if I may we could just have a quick moment of silence. I like it for those we lost on 9-11.
Speaker 2:Move it.
Speaker 3:Amen.
Speaker 2:Thank you all for listening. We don't want to leave it on a somber note, but you've got to remember the gravitas of 9-11. If you weren't alive then or you don't remember it as much, go back and listen, because for a lot of us that has been a lot of us, our amalgamation it really has galvanized us and changed our viewpoints. When you think about what we did before and what we did after. It has changed our lives. It changed the way we think about people. It changed the way we think about looking and interacting with people. It's horrible, but it is, and that's what we do. And now we're always thinking that we're a threat where we never were a threat, and so you're not. And so here you go. You got to go make your own business happen. You got to keep going. You know what this somber moment means that you guys can make it happen. Go on that walk, drive that truck, get out there, make something happen and go make somebody happy today. Let's go make it happen.
Speaker 1:We're out of here we're gonna go cheers everybody.
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