RV (00:00): To, you know, every once in a while I meet someone and I go, man, this person is a rolling stone. Like, this person is making a big impact in the world, and they’re gonna be big. And that’s how I feel about Jordan Montgomery. I’ve heard this guy’s name for years and we’ve kind of gotten to know each other a little bit. He became an official client, a brand builders group. Through that, our team’s really gotten to know him and he’s really, really impressive. So he is an executive coach. He coaches you know, top, top athletes high performing CEOs, entrepreneurs, et cetera. He’s also a very busy speaker, keynote speaker. And so he speaks to sales organizations, small business owners, and just talks really about high performance in general and, and has worked with he, he was a sales manager and managed top performing sales teams. So he came, he comes outta the financial services industry. We’ll hear a little bit about that. He’s got a new book coming out called The Art of Encouragement. We definitely want to hear a little bit about that. And you just wanna hear his story about how he has made the transition from somebody working in professional services to moving into, I think, becoming one of the fastest rising stars in the, in the space of sales and leadership and communication and just like personal development in general. So, Jordan, welcome to the show, man. JM (01:24): Rory, thanks for having me, man. So fun to be with you. Honored to be here. Fun to share some time with your audience. And for so long, I’ve respected your work, respect, what you’ve built at brand Builders. Actually heard you speak circa 2013 in Chicago, Illinois. Really, it was my first experience being in, I remember this, a Marie Vaden room, and I just thought, man, this is a guy that I wanna follow I wanna learn from. And man, just fun to grow a friendship and kind of surreal man, longtime listener. First time caller to be on, to be on your show. So thanks for having me, RV (01:57): . And you were, wasn’t that a, was it a Northwestern Mutual event, right? That JM (02:00): Was it, man. Yeah, you got it. RV (02:01): You got it. You were a speaker. You were also speaking, right? I also speaking, you were working for the company at the time. That’s JM (02:06): Right. That’s right. Yep. And so I was a manager at the time, and you were the outside, you know, keynote speaker, and I think it was after you had written the book, take the Stairs, and you delivered a great keynote message. And I just remember thinking, I gotta follow this guy and learn from him and continue to spend time with him. So 11 years ago, man, in a ballroom in Chicago. RV (02:25): So, so that’s really cool. So tell us the story about how you transitioned. You know, I think particularly in like professional services, we meet a lot of people who are, you know, they’re successful lawyers, they’re, you know, accountants, they’re doctors, they’re financial advisors, and they grow a great practice. And a lot of times they grow a great practice because they’re consuming personal development content and knowledge. And it’s a pretty common path that they go, man, I think I wanna do more of this. I wanna spend more time teaching, training, coaching others. But it’s hard to, you know, like not many people make that leap fully successfully. You’ve, you’ve done a really great job. So can you talk to us about, like, how did you go about doing that? When did it all happen? How did you kind of structure it and like, when did you kind of, you make that transition? Hmm. JM (03:18): Well, I wish my story was one of like, extreme success meets like extreme success, but it wasn’t that way. There were a few bumps in the road. There was actually a really large bump in the road, and the bump occurred April 1st, 2015. So I get a call from my then supervisor. I’m working in financial services for a Fortune 100 firm. I have one of the top offices and organizations in that firm. It grew really quickly. I came from kind of a blue collar background, Rory. So my dad’s a painter. Mom’s a teacher, didn’t really have any relationship with money growing up. The , Iowa, RV (03:53): Right? Iowa. JM (03:54): Iowa, man, small town, Iowa. Yep. One stoplight town. God bless, Kelowna, Iowa. And so, man, like when I graduated college, I just knew like I’m willing to work and my dad taught me the power of like, working hard. So I got that from dad and I worked, man, and I, I just, I was putting in the 70, 80 hour weeks. And so from 22 to 25 that business consumed my life. And I had some success. I had a lot of success. To kind of paint the picture before I tell you about April 1st, 2015, I’m traveling the country. I’m speaking at all these major conferences. I’m flying private. I’m the closing keynote speaker at a lot of major industry events. Matter of fact, I was the closing keynote speaker at one of the largest industry events. It’s 15,000 people sold out MBA arena. JM (04:38): I am living in like the proverbial penthouse. But I had an issue, Rory, I was overexposed and I was underdeveloped, meaning my character wasn’t really keeping pace with my influence. Hmm. I was so young and so naive. And I had sort of been on this rocket ship to like this crazy professional space that I really wasn’t ready for. And so April 1st, 2015, I get this text message from my then supervisor and he says I need to meet, I need to meet with you right away. To which I respond because I was naive. I don’t have time. My calendar’s full. Not today, but maybe some other day, , you know, like, how about next Wednesday? He says, Hey Jordan, this is a, a meeting that you need to clear your calendar for. It’s really important. I need to see you in the next couple of hours. JM (05:31): So then I’m thinking, Rory, someone on my team must have made a grave mistake. I gotta go clean it up. ’cause I’m, you know, sort of player coach. I’m running an office, but I’m still doing financial planning. I walk into his office a couple hours later, and this is what he says to me, Rory, he said, you haven’t been malicious or intentional, but you’ve been careless and casual. And when you’re casual, you create casualties, said, Jordan, this is gonna be really uncomfortable for you, but today you’re the casualty. This will be your last day with our firm. JM (06:03): The story was, there was a person on my team who had taken a test on, on be on my behalf, was a continuing education assessment. And that industry, that’s an infraction. It can’t happen. But moreover, there were just like things that I was missing, Rory, in my development and my leadership wasn’t dotting i’s wasn’t crossing the T’s and it was within his right to say, I don’t trust your wisdom, discernment, your leadership, your development, and so you can go work somewhere else. You just can’t work here. Well, this was devastating for a 27-year-old man. He found all of his identity in achievement, status, accomplishment. It, it becomes more devastating. The company sends out a company wide email with my name on it that explains my termination, kind of at a high level. I get about 3000 text messages within a matter of, you know, 24 hours. JM (06:54): And I just sort of go into hiding. I didn’t just lose my job. I lost all my money. I was involved in some real estate deals. They go sideways ’cause they weren’t structured properly. And I literally, Rory go from like the penthouse to the outhouse overnight. A guy by the name of Tim Bohannon scoops me up, says, you can come work for me. Same firm, min apple, Minnesota, I’ll give you a second chance, but here’s how this is gonna work. No speaking, no training. You’re gonna rebuild your business and rebuild your life and I’m gonna help you do it, but it’s gonna be really tough. And it was tough. So for two years, man, I’m in this valley season I think God does his best work in the valley. And I read my Bible and I got connected to a church and I started to call home to mom and dad and rebuild some relationships that I had sort of let go of. JM (07:40): And God just met me in that place in a really, really broken place. And I met my now wife who was coming out of a rough divorce. So we kind of met both in a broken place. And what I didn’t know, Rory, is God was preparing me for my biggest leadership job, which was gonna be becoming a daddy to two little girls, ages five and three. I dated Ashley for six months. We got engaged, we got married. Six months later I moved back home to Iowa. I’m still doing financial planning. I looked at her and I said, babe, I just, I got this itch for coaching. I started coaching five people. Coach 10 got open doors, 10 turned into a hundred, a hundred turned into a thousand. And I left the financial planning business behind. And I say all that to say this for most of us, we wanna pivot from a place of strength. JM (08:28): Like we think that it’s like, again, extreme success meets extreme success. But for me it wasn’t that way. Like I think God’s preparation was packaged as pain and I had to go through some really, really tough stuff to ultimately get to where I’m at today. And I want people to know that about my story. And I write about that in the Art of Encouragement. It’s actually the first chapter. And we talk about the art of character, encouragement and encouraging people in valley seasons. And man, God just met me in a really unique place and I was fortunate to have some people that stepped into my life who encouraged me and cared for me in a really unique and special way. RV (09:09): Mm-Hmm. . Yeah. That’s, that’s powerful. Did, so you rebuild the financial practice, did you take on your first coaching clients while you were still doing financial planning then it sounds like you started like having a few clients. JM (09:28): That’s right. So I moved back home to Iowa, kind of moved the practice with me. I still planned to grow that business, right? So I’d rebuilt the business. I didn’t plan Roy to start a coaching business. I just thought I’ll coach a few people on the side as I’m running this financial planning business. But I, I can’t explain it other than like, I think God blessed it, but I think I also had to I had to be humbled. Like there had to be something in me that changed for me to really be ready to do that work at a high level. And so it’s that old adage that like, sometimes God asked to do something in you before he can do something with you. So I think he just changed my spirit, my empathy, my compassion, my heart for people and, and then blessed it man. Like yeah, today we get work with pro athletes and high level CEOs and I got a team of 22 people who does this work at the highest level around the country. And it’s been a, a real joy. RV (10:20): Mm-Hmm. . So, so how did you, so walk me through that. How did you, how did you go from, I got a few clients on the side, which I’m assuming are mostly like referrals and friends of friends that you probably met through your financial practice, right? Just like your family and then those people you start to take on more clients and then at some point, like how, how far along are you when you go, man, I need another, I need another coach on my team. And where did you find the first coach and how did you get past the fear of like, oh my gosh, they’re not gonna be able to coach like I can and you know, it’s my reputation on the line and it’s my business, but they’re the one doing the coaching. Like, tell me about that. JM (11:01): Yeah, so let’s speak to some brand builders who wanna scale and we didn’t do everything right. So full disclosure, there was so much that I did wrong and there’s things that I would redo. But if there’s one thing that we did right it’s that I think I was willing to let go early on and trust and empower some other coaches. Hmm. And I’m really proud of that. I think for so many of us, we, we can be control freaks as type A, you know, leaders of people. But I realized early on, like, unless I’m just gonna sell my time and fill every slot on my calendar and live sort of a miserable life that’s totally consumed every hour of my day by work I’m gonna have to figure out a, a different way to do this. And so Rory, I I just started connecting with other people who do some coaching. They were established leaders who wanted to take on a handful of clients. And we sort of just organically grew the business and I wanted to make sure that I over-delivered in every situation. So we had a really referable brand. We grew our business through word of mouth scale to team, but I let go early. And our friend Craig Rochelle says this, you can have control or growth, but you can’t have both. RV (12:15): Mm-Hmm, , I love that quote. It’s so good. Giving JM (12:18): Up control was really scary. But I learned to just sort of step into the pain of being less than excellent. I didn’t have all the answers, I just realized that I needed to build the plane as I fly it. And I had to do that with the help of other good people. And also that there’s other people that had expertise that I didn’t have. And so yeah, letting go early was for sure a, a key move for us. RV (12:42): Mm-Hmm. . And so you bring those people on just as contractors, they’re people who had their own coaching business and you contracting? JM (12:50): Yep. Yep. So they’re all 10 99 independent contractors. Some of them have 40 clients, some of them have five clients. Some of ’em will speak 50 times a year. Some of them will speak five times a year. And so they’re all different in terms of their capacity, their background, their skillset. But I wanted to build sort of a robust team where from a personal development, leadership development place, we can help and equip just about anybody in any situation. So if somebody comes to us, says, Hey, I wanna coach, I wanna grow my development in most cases we have an answer. Not always, and I certainly don’t have the answer, but because we have a team, we’re I think uniquely equipped to help a variety of people. RV (13:31): Mm-Hmm. . And so how did you get your clients right? Because that’s, I think that’s the other part is to go, I mean, that’s what most people struggle with is like, you, you had enough clients early on that you were bringing on coaches. How, how are you getting your clients? JM (13:45): Okay, so I’m gonna say this tongue in cheek because this is the Brand Builders podcast, right? And we’re talking to people who wanna build a brand. So you should build a brand, but you should also just be really, really, really good at what you do. I was having this conversation with John Maxwell the other day, Rory, and he said, you know, so many people come to me because they want me to like, put my stamp on them. You know, they want me to sign off on them or help them kind of build their name or thrust them out into the world and give them a bigger platform. And John said, I, you know, I can do that in some cases, but what happened to just being really, really good at what you do? Like he said, a lot of young people should be worried less about like their reputation and brand and more concerned about being really good at what they do. Now, this is the Brand Builders podcast, Rory, you’re thinking, okay, hold on. Like, we still want people to build a brand. They need to, RV (14:42): No, I’m not. I, that that is, that’s how we define brand is reputation. Like it is, right? Brand is not, it’s not reputation. You’re, you’ve got pretty websites and nice videos and beautiful colors and, and, and nice fonts that pair well together. Like, that is not what brand is. Brand is reputation. That’s, that’s how we do, that’s the core of how we find it. It define it. So like, I’m, I’m Amen. I I think I’m, I’m, I’m behind that a hundred percent. JM (15:11): Well, you and I, yeah, you and I align in terms of, I think how we think about growth and scale and brand. And you know, for me, I just realized early on, like, I need to overdeliver and I need to make sure that I’m really good at what I do. And we’d ask for, you know, an endorsement, a testimonial, connection, introduction. And, but I think it was really through being good at what we do and developing reputation that allowed us to scale. RV (15:33): Mm-Hmm. . And then is that still now, like you’re, if you’ve got a team of 20, that’s a lot of people to feed, so to speak, that’s a lot of clients to, to, to be generating, keeping up, is it basically just they’re all, you’ve been able to build a culture where everybody is doing that? Or have you been able to build your personal brand to a point where there’s enough runoff and wake from that, that you’re able to kind of like put them in with the team? JM (16:02): That’s part of the reason that we’re working with brand builders full disclosure, is because we have a lot of work to do and, and we have opportunity to grow. And, and I would say, yeah, a lot of what we’ve done is, you know, we’ve built the brand around me, which is both good and bad. But I think again, we’ve, it’s gotta be less about me and more about the company. And I think we’re in that transition phase sort of right now, transparently Rory, of figuring out like, how do we move this away from Jordan and more towards team? Because we we’re fortunate that we do have a lot of just inbound, you know, inquiries based on building reputation and brand. But then there’s some strategy that goes into it as well. We host some webinars, we do some live events, virtual events. So we’ve been really fortunate to spend off opportunity from that. And then when those opportunities come in, my brother, who’s the director of coaching sort of filters those opportunities to the appropriate team members. But we have a lot of work to do. You know, I think we’re just getting started in so many ways in terms of what God’s called us to and what we hope to eventually build. RV (16:58): Now you’ve also done speaking so simultaneous. So you’ve, you’ve built a great coaching business, which I love. And I, I love the coaching model ’cause I just, I think it applies massive value to the customer quickly. It app it, it applies real significant meaningful revenue to the coach. And it’s, it creates, there’s a scalable opportunity and great, I think great content comes outta great coaching conversations and all that. But then speaking is very different. That’s a very different skillset. It’s a very different business model. It’s like more of a B2B where coaching, coaching is like business to consumer speaking is like business to business coaching is one-on-one speaking is one on many. You know, I think coaching is, is like, you know, very organic and I think speaking is much more like polished and like you, you know that, so how did you, when did you really start? Did you, when did you start building the speaking side of things and how fast did that take off compared to the coaching business? JM (18:02): Well, they’re uniquely tied together to your point. I would speak and then because I spoke, I would naturally have, you know, inquiries on the coaching side of the business. And like any other speaker just like you, Rory, like I’ve become more selective over time on what fits and what works. In the beginning though, if I’m talking to some folks who wanna speak or maybe you’re doing some speaking and you’re trying to scale that business, like I, I would just go back to be good at what you do and also be willing to do stuff either for free or for very little. If there’s one thing I’m proud of, like when we started that business I would just, I’d speak and I’d speak to small groups. I’d speak to churches, I’d speak to youth sports teams. And I just, I never I was never too good for that. JM (18:47): And I’m, I’m proud of that. And some of our best relationships that we have today, Rory came out of those environments and I see so many people that wanna speak who aren’t willing to do that work. I’m talking to one of the top speakers on the planet, like Rory Vaden is a, well-known, unbelievably gifted keynote speaker. But I think part of your magic, Rory, is you had humility and still do today to serve and add value and jump in where God’s called you to reach people. So, you know, in the beginning it was like, man, I do stuff for a cup of coffee or a really small check or sometimes, you know, again, just for free for the relational opportunities. But I was always really keen on follow up, making sure that I communicated the fact that I didn’t want this to be a one-time engagement. JM (19:34): Like, Hey, I would love for our impact to go beyond today. I would love to better serve your organization in a deeper and more intentional way. And so we had a really strategic follow up process to engage with the company beyond the stage. And I think that’s where so many speakers go wrong, is they come in for an event, they get a 25,000 check or whatever the check is, they feel good about it and they move on. And there’s really no process for engaging with that culture or with that group of people in a deeper way. So for us, that became a big part of growing the company, is making sure that we had a follow up process that was really dialed in. RV (20:07): Mm-Hmm. . Yeah. I mean that’s, that’s, speakers are classically known for like, come speak, hit the road and gone forever and, and, you know, easy, I mean, yeah. It’s, it’s, there’s a big opportunity for sure that I think they, they, they miss out on. And, and frankly I think some businesses, you know, they just hire speakers almost as like entertainment and never really go, if I like this speaker, why don’t I commit to working with them to actually install the systems behind what they’re teaching? So companies sometimes perpetuate it too. ’cause It’s like they think of speakers as more like entertainers than they do, like actual people that significantly move the organization. But, but so your early, I wanna talk about the fall part, but, but the early speaking engagements, I think that’s so true. I mean, it was like, I was speaking to two people in the back of a Perkins restaurant. RV (21:01): I was doing high schools, I was doing cheerleading teams, I was doing standup mic, you know, open mic nights to four people at some crummy like com. Yes. You know, comedy bar like a anywhere and everywhere. And I did, you know, hundreds of Toastmaster groups that were all like between three and three and a, a large audience was like eight people. You know, local real estate offices and car dealerships. Like, I mean, I was going anywhere that people would listen for for like three years, four years, like a, a, a hot minute. Did most of your speaking engagements evolve out of that? So basically was it like, speak for free, do an amazing job, get referred to people who have money, or was it like, let’s build a system to go prospect people who have money and pitch me as a speaker? JM (21:55): I think it was a combination of both. I think, again, what worked for us is I knew the audience that I would work well with. So first off is like, be really thoughtful. Like as you continue to grow experience and you gain confidence, then I think be strategic and thoughtful about where you would work. Well, so I knew my, my deal, Rory, is I would work really well with folks. You know, the emerging professional, typically under 40 years old, he was trying to grow a sales oriented or people oriented business. Mm-Hmm. , I got in the room with those folks. I could speak from the stage about tactics, strategies, concepts that were gonna add value to them long term. And so I knew that if I could speak about those things, I would have a captive audience that would naturally convert into coaching clients that talk about our coaching business. JM (22:38): And we, and then we’d have, you know, a lot of coaching inquiries that would come off of that. From a speaking standpoint, I would just follow up with the person who booked me to speak and I would just be really candid. I think, you know, so often this isn’t complicated. Like, I think we just, we overthink it. I’d just say like, Hey, I really enjoy being with your people. I love speaking to organizations like yours. If there were three to five people that you think I should be spending time with, I’d love to know who those folks are. And in the spirit of adding value yeah, I’d love an endorsement or testimonial. Like I just, it’d mean a lot to me if you’d be willing to share a couple, you know, kind thoughts, remarks about the speech. And so it was never like, invasive and it, I didn’t, never felt like I was asking for too much. But I wanted their feedback I wanted their endorsement, and if they were kind enough to make it an introduction, I would always gladly take it. RV (23:26): Mm-Hmm. , I mean, it is the same, you probably got really good at that script from doing financial planning, I’m guessing where you learned to ask people for referrals and then just that skillset just tra it’s immediately transferrable to like ask you for referrals to, for speaking. JM (23:44): Yeah. And I, lemme say this, I think a lot of folks focus on the referrals that they get and they’re not focused on the referrals that they give. So like, if you’re a speaker, for example, if you’re doing what we do, I wanna try to out-give, I wanna try to give more than I get now over time, that, that, that takes on a new shape and form. But in the beginning it was like, okay, if I spoke to an organization, I knew I could introduce them to other speakers or other thought leaders or other people in their industry that they needed to know. And so I was always trying to be really strategic about that as well. Like, Hey, you need to meet Rory, or you need to meet David Nurse, or, Hey, for your next event, you need to bring this person in. Maybe I can get ’em at a discount or maybe I could get ’em to do something for free. Here’s this event that I’m gonna be a part of. I’d love to take five of you with me. You know, I I just was trying to find unique ways to add value. But then that also helped on the referral side, right? Like people, people were more willing to give me referrals, Rory because they knew I was reciprocating and I was interested in adding value and, and giving referrals. RV (24:47): Yeah, I mean, to this day, to this very day, that is the number one way I get speaking engagements is because I’m introducing my friends to my past clients. And it’s probably, the ratio is probably like three to one, probably for every three I give, I get one back. But if you keep doing that and doing that, then like, it just keeps growing and growing. And what’s interest, what, what I’ve realized is it’s it that actually is my follow up strategy for keeping in touch with my past clients is introducing them to other speakers because they need a speaker every year, or multiple speakers. Most of ’em at this point, you know, a lot of times I’m one of like several speakers and going like, it gives me a reason to stay in touch with them and see how they’re doing and what’s going on with the business. RV (25:38): And like, a lot of times what happens is they go, Hey, it’s been four years since we’ve had you, we should bring you back. And it’s like, I’m not even trying to do that. I’m literally trying to go, how can I give to, you know, who, who, whoever our, our friends or up and comers and that, that kind of a thing. You know, and to your point, I think it’s important to speak in front of other speakers for that reason is like when, when a speaker sees you, sometimes they’re the, they’re the re the best marketing strategy you have. Like, you know, like I’ll sometimes I’ll speak at speakers events, you know, like, I just did this for John Maxwell and I was like, look, the requirement is you have to sit here and watch me speak. That’s all I want. I just, but I want you to sit here and I want you to have the experience as an attendee of what it’s like to be in the audience because I know that that always turns into more fruit for everybody. And you know, so amen. About, and that’s, you know, the, on the referral side of giving out, you know, giving more than you get, get, it’s like that applies for every business at every level. That’s right. Services. Like, that’s right. RV (26:48): The key to getting referrals is to give referrals. It’s that simple. And nobody does it. Nobody does it. JM (26:53): It’s crazy, isn’t it? Like I’ll say this because you’re a really, really well connected person, Rory because you’re a connecting person. Mm-Hmm. So like, if you’re listening and you’re like, man, I wanna be more connected, then start connecting. Because connecting people are connected people and connected people are connecting people. So like, if you understand just the art of adding value, you might be listening and going, well gosh, I’m not Rory, I don’t have high level introductions that I can make. Well, here’s what you can give, you can give your attention, you can give your time, you can give your empathy, you can give your counsel. Like, it doesn’t always have to be an introduction, but just get obsessed with giving and adding value to people. Overdelivering, somebody says, Hey, what do you look for in a new hire? Like if you’re gonna hire somebody in your organization, what do you look for? I would say I look for the person who’s hardwired to overdeliver. Mm-Hmm. . And I would say the same thing if I was booking a speaker, hiring a coach, you know, or looking at our next employee. Like we just want to be around people who are hardwired overdeliver. So be the person who’s hardwired to over deliver, add value, serve, connect, give Rory, I’ve watched that work for you. And there’s a reason you’re at where you’re at today. You’re a connected person ’cause you’re really busy connecting people. We RV (28:15): That’s so good. That’s such a wise, I I love that Jordan, that that connection between just be connecting because like yes, today I am introducing people to the biggest stages in the world. I mean the biggest speaking stages in the world, but it’s like all I’m doing I was is I’m doing the same thing I was doing when I was speaking at Perkins. I was like, Hey, I spoke at this gig at Perkins, like there’s this little book club that meets like, would you wanna speak there? It’s, it’s just the same habit but at a different scale and a magnitude, which is just the, you know, happens organically over time if you do that. I love that idea. If you just you’re a well connected person because you’re a connecting person. Alright buddy, I know we only have a few minutes. So you have the art of encouragement. You’re a fantastic encourager. You’ve encouraged me in and out of just this conversation alone, why encouragement? Tell us a little bit about the book and like what, what, what it’s about and why you believe in it. JM (29:20): I think encouragement for so long has been a topic that people either engage in or they don’t. So a leader will say something like, I’m an encourager or I’m just not much of an encourager. So I think it’s sad that we see it that way and we don’t see it as an art. I think it’s an art form. It’s an art form just like any other leadership skill. And so we wrote the book, the Art of Encouragement. There’s 10 Arts if you wanna truly encourage and recognize the people around you. I think it changes relationships. I think it’s a universal language that people understand. And I think it taps into our most basic social and relational psychological need, which is the need to be known, seen, and valued. And so my belief is that if we can get busy encouraging people in real and authentic ways, we can change relationships, change lives, and help people feel seen, valued, and understood. And so yeah, I’ve just been the beneficiary of some world-class encouragers and it was a book for me that was easy to write because it’s been such a huge part of my life. So that’s why we chose the topic. RV (30:21): Yeah, I remember Zig Ziglar used to say all the time, encouragement is the fuel on which hope runs. Which was basically to say, if you keep encouraging people, they will continue to have hope and they will keep going. If you stop encouraging people, they lose hope. And so they stop, you know, they stop pursuing. And it’s like, what, what blows my mind about encouragement is that it’s free and it’s unlimited. Right? Right. Like, you can give it, you can give it. And I think to take what you said about connecting the same thing applies to encouraging is like if you’re a great encourager, you will always be encouraged. JM (31:00): That’s it. RV (31:02): Yeah. And I think your life is evidence of that. Jordan and I, I watch, I watch What’s Happening to You and it excites me. ’cause I feel like I love it when I go, oh, there’s the good people are winning. Like, it’s still, you know, there, there’s a lot of places in the world where like, oh, you know, the, the best marketer is, you know, looks like they’re winning or the, you know, the richest person is winning. But it’s like, nah. Like ultimately it’s still the good guys still win. If you, if you do all the work and you do and you do the things, and I see that happening with you, that’s very convicting to me. And and I love what you’re doing, man. You are, you’re on the right path. I mean, it’s just like you can’t do all the right things, right? You can’t like do all the right things and have it not end up in a good place. JM (31:46): Hmm. RV (31:48): And so where do you want people to go? So Art of Encouragement is the book July coming out July 24th. So right now, July 24th, 2024. And where do you want people to go to get the book? Because you’ve got some bonuses and stuff that you’re giving away. Yeah, JM (32:06): Yeah, yeah. Go to the Art of encouragement book.com. You could register for a free webinar John Gordon Ryan Leak, David Nurse and Jess tro. We’d love to have you that webinar’s taking place on July 12th. There’s some other freebies and we’d love to hang out with you, get to know you better have you a part of our community. But or the book, we’d love for you to read it. We’d love for you to share it with a friend. Yeah, I think this is a universal language that the world understands. And to your point, Rory, it’s free to give our our listeners, I’ll, I’ll leave us with maybe this final question. John Maxwell asked this question one time. He said how do you know if somebody needs encouragement? Like, how are you to know that? And then he answered his own question and he said they, they have a pulse. JM (32:54): You know, like the world needs encouraged. I don’t care if you’re the most successful person on the planet or the least experienced person in your industry. You need to be encouraged. And I do think it’s fuel. And we’d love to help people with that. And so yeah, go to the go to the website Art of encourage book book.com. We’d love to have you for the book launch webinar on July 12th. Book drops July 24th, Rory, God bless you. Appreciate your friendship man, and all the help that you’ve offered. Let me say this. Your company is top-notch. You communicate at the highest level you follow through, you touch base, you connect. Like what you are building at Brand Builders is so significant and so special. We will work with you until the end of time because we just feel cared for, valued, seen, understood. And again, the fact that you’re having me on this podcast is just more evidence of the way that you care and the way that you show up for the people that you work with. So thank you, man, for your support and your friendship really means a lot. RV (33:55): Yeah, buddy. Well, it’s, it’s a pleasure. We, we started this company to find mission driven messengers that we could get behind to go. These are people that we want to teach, what we have, what we’ve learned to go help them, like make the world a better place. And, and, and you represent every part of that brother. So we wish you all the best. Thanks for being here and we’ll catch everybody next time on the influential Personal Brand podcast. Good luck, Jordan. JM (34:20): Thanks for having me, Rory. Be well. God bless.