Top Strategies for Developing Real Estate Teams That Thrive

Alex Kutchish
00:00:00

Are you doing your best Is really about having stars in every position and removing the old, outdated, destructive belief of the 8020 principle. Do not fall in that trap anymore. You do not need 20% of your team doing 80% of the work. You need 95% of your team doing 100% of the work.

And the 5% is someone that could not get to the standards. And if ever this is very important. If everyone is above your standards, raise your standards.

Mike Mills
00:00:36

Well, howdy, howdy, howdy to all you property pros out there grinding it out in this real estate rat race. So I've got a question for you.

So these days, do you feel like you've got the right team, full of talent, but you're still kind of getting left behind and in the dust by others in the market?

Or maybe your team's got potential, but there's a weak link in the pit crew that's holding everybody back, and you're not sure where the breakdown is. Well, as Ricky Bobby says, if you ain't first, you're last.

So today we are here to give your team the shake and bake magic that they need to fire on all cylinders and leave the competition in the rearview mirror.

If you're ready to shake things up and get your team performing like you just dropped a cougar in that car, then buckle up because we are about to give you the fuel that will push your team into the winner's circle. Thank you, sweet, tiny baby Jesus.

Welcome to Texas Real Estate and Finance Podcast, where we make sure that your business is always running in the fast lane. Every week, we bring you top tier guests to give you the strategies and insights to take your team performance to the next level.

Whether you're a realtor, loan officer, or real estate professional, I invite you to tune in each week for tips, tricks, stupid movie references that you didn't ask for, and dad jokes that you didn't need, but all aimed at helping you grow your business and have a little fun along the way. I'm your host, Mike Mills, a North Texas mortgage banker with Geneva Financial.

And when I'm not dropping racing puns or channeling my inner Ricky Bobby, I'm out there helping you and your clients secure the best home loan possible. Whether it's conventional va, FHA or specialty loans like rehab construction, helocs, or bridge loans, we've got you covered from start to finish.

So if you're ready to rev up your financing, give me a call and let me make sure that you're fueled up for success. All right? Real Quick, before we get rolling, if you're picking up what we're putting down today, do this old bald man a favor. Hit the like button.

Subscribe and share this episode with a friend. We're all about building community that helps each other win. And your support fuels the mission every single week.

And to those out there that you that keep coming back for more of my nonsense each week, I can't thank you enough. Your support means the world. All right, let's get to today's guest.

So if you're expecting standard, normal or anything remotely boring, well, I've got some really bad news for you. That is not what we are bringing in today. This guy's a shot of espresso with a side of rocket fuel.

He's all about shaking things up, breaking the mold, and doing everything differently. So whether it's.

Whether it's building high performance teams or flipping the script on how businesses train and grow, he's always pushing the boundaries and keeping the energy cranked up to 11.

So if you're tired of the same old, same old, and you want to learn from someone who's rewriting the playbook on team performance, you are in the right place. He's unconventional, unstoppable, and today he's here to show you how to fire up your team and leave the competition in the dust.

Please welcome to the podcast co founder and CEO of Fuel, Alex Kutchish. Alex, what's up?

Alex Kutchish
00:03:22

That. What can I. Can I cuss right away on the show?

Mike Mills
00:03:26

Like, let's go. Yeah, bring it on, man.

Alex Kutchish
00:03:28

What the. I'm over here making notes on the best opening ever. That was incredible. And the intro, I need a copy of that shit. You need to come with me. How?

You introduced me just now. I need you to just come with me. And like, when I come in and they're like, oh, hi, what's your name?

What I'm gonna say Mike, and you gotta do what you just did. That was remarkable, man.

Mike Mills
00:03:52

I'm an excellent hype man. I spend a lot of time, you know, hyping folks up. So I'm. I'm never the expert. I'm the introduction to the expert. So that's what I try to do here.

I gotta. I gotta refine my craft. We all have our role to play, right?

Alex Kutchish
00:04:04

Yes, ma. Masterfully done.

Mike Mills
00:04:06

That's right.

Alex Kutchish
00:04:07

That's right.

Mike Mills
00:04:08

So I really want to jump right into it because I don't like to as you. I don't like to beat around the bush with this stuff. We'll get to all your credentials later on.

But what I want to talk about right out of the gate is if you were going to walk into a room full of real estate.

Alex Kutchish
00:04:22

Mike, Mike. Could I. Could I. I'm sorry. I know. I got. I thought you said I'm unconventional. Here I go. Yeah, here I go.

Mike Mills
00:04:27

What you got, Mike?

Alex Kutchish
00:04:28

What do you call a shoe made out of a banana?

Mike Mills
00:04:31

What do I call a shoe made out of banana? I don't know. Alex. What do you call a shoe slipper? Okay. All right, all right.

Alex Kutchish
00:04:38

You said you make bad jokes, Lore.

Mike Mills
00:04:40

I love it. Now we're in.

Alex Kutchish
00:04:41

Okay, Perfect. All right. That's all. That's all. I wanted to fit in. I want to fit into the show.

Mike Mills
00:04:46

I'm with it. I'm with it. Okay.

Now, what I was gonna say is, you know, if you were to walk into a room full of real estate professionals, loan officers, real estate agents, anybody that's in this game, and you were going to give them, you know, one.

One piece of brutally honest advice that you would drop and wake on them about how they're struggling to push their teams to the next level, what would you tell them?

Alex Kutchish
00:05:06

Okay, I want to make sure I'm talking to leaders, right?

Mike Mills
00:05:08

Yes.

Alex Kutchish
00:05:09

Okay, listen, leaders, there's only one thing you should ever do all the time. It's really not that hard. All you should ever do is focus on developing the talent on your team. That's it.

The truth is, leaders, you are not responsible for your own personal performance anymore. You may have been the best salesperson. You're no longer that your team made you a leader or you chose to be a leader.

As a leader, your job is to develop the talent of your team every single day. There's nothing more important. Never go to your team and ask them, what have they done for you lately? Alex, I never say such a thing to my team.

Oh, okay. Let me put it in different words for you. How many calls did you make today? How many leads did you follow up or create?

How many referrals did you follow up with? How many referral partners did you follow up with? How many contracts are in. That is you saying, wow.

Mike Mills
00:06:12

Exactly.

Alex Kutchish
00:06:14

That was brilliant. Thank you, Apple.

Mike Mills
00:06:17

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:06:17

Tim Cook. Appreciate you, buddy. When you ask them those things, you basically say, what have you done for me lately? You want to encourage and build your team.

Stop it. Stop it right now. You hear this? Stop at this instance. Why is the eye upside down?

If you're just listening, you don't see it, but there's an eye that's upside down in the logo of Fuel Inc. The eyes upside down looks like an exclamation point. Because that is what you need to do.

You need to get on your heads and do it backwards and come up to your team and tell them how you will help them get better today.

Mike Mills
00:06:54

So what you're saying in a nutshell there is. It's all about accountability. You can't be a great leader if you're not capable of holding your team accountable.

Alex Kutchish
00:07:03

Yeah, well, hold on. Maybe that's part of it. Accountability is part of the recipe, but that is not the cake. Okay, okay. The cake. The cake. The outcome.

The final product that includes accountability as one of the ingredients. The outcome is talent development. It's a talent development cake that includes accountability.

But your job as a leader is to develop talent for two reasons. One, to discover the best performers on your team, and two, to discover the underperformers on your team.

It is your job to make sure that the underperformers try their best. I'm not kidding. This is key. Try their best and see what they can do. Come up to your underperformer today and say, are you doing your best?

And if they say yes, it's fantastic. Thank them for their honesty. But they're probably playing the wrong game.

So allow them to find something they can be great at and create space for that next person that can do it. That's your job. Now, if you find one more thing, Mike. When you find the talent in your team to is a rising star.

And because you're building talent, that's all you're focused on, is just building that talent up and up and up and up. Motivationally, skill set, all of it. You're. You're inspired. When you find that rising star, then you find the next rising star.

Then you find the next rising star. And you don't settle for 80, 20. You put stars in every single position because it's possible.

Because you're now a talent developer, you're no longer somebody that manages human beings, which is impossible. Ever have a baby? Impossible to manage a human? Okay, but. And we're just big babies, so it's impossible to manage us.

So the point is talent development accountability is part of it, Mike.

Mike Mills
00:08:46

So when you said about team members doing their best, it reminds me that recently we both participated in a little book writing adventure here called Leadership Matters. And that's kind of how we hooked up on this. And, and the, the title of your chapter is are you doing your best?

And I want you to talk a little bit about that because a Lot of the philosophy behind it seems like what you guys put together, Fuel Inc. Is kind of built around that idea. So I want you to kind of elaborate a little bit on that. I mean, we're. We're back to back chapters. I don't know.

You were 13 and I was 14. So we're like, you know, right next to each other there. You.

Alex Kutchish
00:09:22

You are to my. You. You are to this side to me. So high five me right now on the screen.

Mike Mills
00:09:28

No, no, no. I got to go this way.

Alex Kutchish
00:09:30

Other way. Other way. Yep. Boom. That's it. That's. We're like. We're actually. We're like chapters in a book right now.

Mike Mills
00:09:36

That's right. Yes, exactly. Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:09:39

Okay. Tell you about this chapter. So, look, are you doing your best? Is a question that leaders ask themselves and the people in their team constantly. Okay?

It's. It's a very important exercise because if someone is doing their best, it's very.

I get emotional about this because if someone is doing their best and you push them further because you say, I need you to be here. I'm off screen. I need you to be here, but you're over here. Nope, over here. See, I'm off screen again, right? I'm in the wrong places.

I need you to be here, but you're over here. And I'm doing my best. Then you're just gonna break me, right? You're just going to make me miserable, and you're going to make yourself miserable.

And so that question, are you doing your best? Allows people to say, yes, I am great. If they are performing at the levels you expect them to perform great.

Now, now is the time they're doing at the level that you want them to be. Now's the time to say, could you do better? And of course they're going to say, yes. Right?

But those are the people that are already operating at the standards and the places you want them to be. Now, when you have someone that is consistently underperforming and you ask them, are you doing your best?

And they say, yes, that is the time to allow them to find the thing that they can be great at. Are you doing your best as an equalizer?

Mike Mills
00:11:05

Okay, look, I want you on the. Allow them to do the thing that they're great at. That's a really nice way of saying.

Alex Kutchish
00:11:12

What it's time for you to go, right? Yes.

Mike Mills
00:11:16

Okay. Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:11:16

It's time for you to go move.

Mike Mills
00:11:18

Them within the company and find them another spot. It's like, no.

Alex Kutchish
00:11:21

Okay, well, listen, maybe, by the way, absolutely what is the thing they're good at? Because this is the thing they're not good at.

Mike Mills
00:11:27

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:11:27

Like, you have to realize that sometime. I make two different analogies. I'll make one that's really funny because it's a. I make fun of myself on this, okay?

If I went to the NBA and said, hey, coach, let me play center. For those of you that don't know I'm five foot five, let me play center. And the coach goes, oh, that's a good idea. Let him play center, everyone.

Mike Mills
00:11:49

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:11:49

And we don't get a rebound that game at all. Okay? That's not on me. I am doing my best. I am jumping as high as I can. I'm doing everything in my power to do it, and I can't do it.

It's on the coach, the leader, to go, okay? This person is doing their best, and they're reaching nowhere near where we need them to be.

You can either break their will, destroy them while destroying yourself and rotting the core of your team, or you can very simply, let's just follow the sports process. Coaches in professional sports don't cry when they trade their players. They know they've created space. There's a gap.

They need to fill that gap with someone that can do it. They're not upset. They're very excited and strategic about how they're going to help their team succeed, because that's all they're thinking about.

They never ask, hey, quarterback, what have you done for me lately? No. Coaches come to you and say, remember that thing where you didn't throw it as far as you wanted to? I realize what's happening.

You're taking too small of a step back. You need a little. They're not coming to the quarterback saying, hey, you better throw more yards. This.

They're saying how they're going to help them throw more yards.

Mike Mills
00:12:54

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:12:54

But you can't help somebody like Alex be a better center in the NBA. So my point is, are you doing your best? I would tell my coach, yes, I am. Have you tried soccer, Alex?

That's what he should say right after that, right?

Mike Mills
00:13:08

Yes.

Alex Kutchish
00:13:09

And the answer is, yes, I have, Coach, I'm going to go do the thing I should be doing.

Mike Mills
00:13:12

Right?

Alex Kutchish
00:13:12

Right. And so the whole point about, are you doing your best? It's a simple way. First, look in the mirror. Are you doing your best? Yeah, look in the mirror.

Are you doing your best? You may find that after hearing this conversation right here with Mike on this badass show, man, your opening is the best. You may Find that shit.

Maybe I'm in the wrong place right now. Good. Life just became brighter. You will come outside and the sun will shine brighter. The minute you say to yourself, maybe I'm in the wrong place.

Okay, let's say you're in the right place. Good for you. Perfect. Lovely. The world loves that you're in the right place. Trust me. Now look at your team. Who's underperforming?

Let's stop there for a second, Mike. Do we even know what underperformance means? Do you have a standard set for your team?

Mike Mills
00:13:59

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:00

Is there a standard that everyone has to follow no matter what? I don't care if it's your brother, your mom, your best friend, someone that's been with you for 20 years. Are they.

If there were no standards in sports, Peyton Manning would still be playing.

Mike Mills
00:14:14

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:14

Yeah.

Mike Mills
00:14:15

He played till 60. Yeah. He'd keep going. Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:17

Aaron Rodgers. We're going to find out what happens at the end of the season, right?

Mike Mills
00:14:19

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:20

If there were no standards, all of those people would still be playing. By the way, Russell Wilson, this. This weekend. What the heck was that?

Mike Mills
00:14:28

I. Yeah, I didn't. That one you're gonna have to inform me on. I didn't get to see that one this weekend. I was. I was.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:34

Dropped bombs.

Mike Mills
00:14:35

Yeah. He was doing well, huh? With the. With the.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:38

He wasn't playing all season and he came back, first game back and dropped bombs. I mean, he just put it down. It was like, whoa. Anyway, the whole point is, if are you doing your best is really about having stars in every position.

Mike Mills
00:14:55

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:14:56

And removing the old, outdated, destructive belief of the 8020 principle. Do not fall in that trap anymore. You do not need 20% of your team doing 80% of the work. You need 95% of your team doing 100 of the work.

And the 5% is someone that could not get to the standards. And if ever. This is very important. If everyone is above your standards, raise your standards, period. So are you doing your best? Is just that.

Where are people? Are they. If they're doing their best and they've never gotten to the place you want to be, probably wrong place.

If they're doing their best, but they're just hovering above the standard, can you do better?

Mike Mills
00:15:40

Right?

Alex Kutchish
00:15:40

Can you do better now? Develop that talent, and when the standard goes up and they now fall below that, are you doing your best?

Mike Mills
00:15:48

So on the. On setting the standards, and this is. I think this is something that a lot of people in leadership roles have a ch.

Have a challenge with is, you know, Telling somebody that they suck at their job is a difficult conversation.

And nobody likes to have difficult conversations, especially because if people have been on your team for a long time or if you're just now like, okay, I got to get my shit in gear and try to figure out where we're at, then odds are you've developed relationships with these people. They're your friends, they're your coworkers. They're people that you spend time with every single day.

And sitting down and having a conversation with them and trying to explain to them how they're not performing at the level that you want can be really, really tough. And so when you talk about, you know, setting these metrics on where everybody's judged, that's where that starts to play a big role.

Because if you have data and if you have information that you can show them and you can show them how they compare to others in their role and what they do, then those conversations, I would imagine, are going to be easier in that way. Right?

Alex Kutchish
00:16:44

100%. And first of all, yes, of course.

Mike Mills
00:16:50

Yeah, it's.

Alex Kutchish
00:16:51

Let's just go back to sports. You don't get hired on anything except for your stats. How fast do you run? How fast do you jump? You.

You don't get hired for the job except for your performance, how you do just your stats. And so it's easy to make a decision.

As a matter of fact, when there are stats and there's expectations of reaching certain stats, people self select out. Yeah, they run. They see the time on the clock. Seven seconds. Well, I guess I'm not playing for this team. They don't get mad.

They're like, what do you mean? Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You can't make one exception? Just one. Yeah, I'm two seconds slower than everyone else on the team.

Mike Mills
00:17:25

But come on, it's me.

Alex Kutchish
00:17:29

Principal. Let's go. Right? You got the people that can do the job. Let me just sit there. Yeah, no, it doesn't work that way. And. And so.

So the answer is instantly, yes. If you have metrics and you keep people to a standard, to a metric, it's. Listen, everyone on. In business, I love asking this question to people.

I'm gonna ask you, Mike, you have a team, right? Okay. Do you want them to be. To be better? To get better?

Mike Mills
00:17:54

Of course.

Alex Kutchish
00:17:54

Every day.

Mike Mills
00:17:55

Every day. Yep.

Alex Kutchish
00:17:57

Better represents a comparison. Better than what or who?

Mike Mills
00:18:02

Well, better than they had performed before. So, I mean, a lot of times it's competing against themselves. I mean, obviously there are circumstances in which, you know they have to do better.

You know, where they were before wasn't great and compared to others, they need to improve. But more often than not, it is just, you know, I. I'm a big believer you got to get a little bit better every single day.

One step in the right direction, you know, goes a long way after a long period of time.

Alex Kutchish
00:18:25

Okay, so better at being themselves, the better version of themselves. And since you're in business, you want them to be better than your competitors.

Mike Mills
00:18:35

Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Kutchish
00:18:36

Right. Okay, so this is very important. This is very, very important. You said a very important word that people forget that they're in every single day.

You're in a competition every single day? Yes, every single day. The world around us changes every single day. The amount of information released into the world every single day.

I don't know, does it double? Does it grow by 1% every single day?

Mike Mills
00:19:01

If it grows like the US debt's been growing, we're growing at like 30 or 40% every day.

Alex Kutchish
00:19:06

There you go. Yeah, 30 or 40. Let's just assume. Yeah, okay. Information in the world continues to compound and grow. How are you growing with it? Most people are not.

And that's okay. That's the point here. That's the point of setting standards.

Your job, and I'm talking to you too, Mike, as a leader, is remind yourself and your team that we're in a competition every day. And competitors train competitors, focus on 1% better every single day. Marginal gains, aggregation of marginal gains.

They don't need to be leaps and bound. Better every single day, but every day they make growth. And your job as a. As a talent developer, that's it. I just heard a CEO who ran Campbell and.

And another craft company, and he said, my job as the CEO of those companies was just to develop talent. He wrote 30, 000 personal cards to the people on his team in his life.

When he got sick, the hospital brought him bags and bags and bags and bags and bags and bags of personal cards from people who were on his team. Because in his lifetime, he wrote 30,000 personal cards. And he said, my entire job at those.

When he came to Nabisco, Nabisco and Campbell, when he came to Campbell, they were in shambles. They left us one of the best performing companies because he focused on talent. But you don't have to wait to be Campbell's to focus on talent.

You can do it when you have a one person team, a two person team, a three person team. Start now, become Campbell's.

Mike Mills
00:20:37

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:20:38

Don't wait to become Campbell's. Become Campbell's now. Right. And so to two things. Better is about competition. Don't forget you're in a competition.

So you want to train every day to get better. Then you said, hey, you suck at your job. That's hard to say. That's because that is. Again, we're going to. We're going to flip the script.

We're going to flip it. That's because we're approaching it the way we've approached it for so long in business, which is, I am the judge of you.

And when you're not good, I'm going to tell you and you're fired.

When the truth is, if we look at this as development of talent, then we can say to someone, we were not able to develop your talent to what we were looking for.

Mike Mills
00:21:23

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:21:24

Whoa, stop for a second. That's a whole different thing.

Mike Mills
00:21:28

It's not you, it's me. That's.

Alex Kutchish
00:21:29

That's right. It's own. It's ownership of this. It's not just, you couldn't be successful here. We couldn't help you be successful here.

We're developing a team to do certain things, and when we find someone and we work with them and we look to develop that talent, when our approaches don't work, we make a move as quickly as possible. So we can give you a chance to go find a place where you can grow, where somebody can help you reach the levels you want to reach.

But in this organization today, we were not able to get you to where we needed you to be. Okay. And we want to give you the time to go find that, the space to go find that.

Mike Mills
00:22:01

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:22:02

When you start to think about this as I'm in charge of your success and you're not succeeding, why are you mad at this person? They just weren't. You were not able to help them, but that's okay, too, because we sometimes speak different languages.

Mike Mills
00:22:16

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:22:17

So. And that's. That's the. Your response was beautiful. Right? That's right. And that's okay. Not everyone has to be on your team.

You don't have to be the savior of every person on your team to be like, they need this job.

No, they want to feel great about themselves and they want to matter when they don't matter because you're constantly telling them they can't do the job. They. They don't need this job. They only believe they need this job. And you're helping reinforce that by keeping them there.

Instead, give them the freedom.

Mike Mills
00:22:47

Give them the freedom to walk. Give them the freedom yeah. Yeah. So, you know, part of the. The measurements thing, which you said a minute ago, too, is, you know, there's.

There's incremental gains and incremental losses that people achieve every day. And, you know, one of my fav. I appreciate him so much more after he retired from basketball and, you know, rip to. To Mr. Kobe Bryant.

But he's one of my favorite speakers when it comes to talking about things like this. And I. I quote him to my kids all the time. It drives him crazy.

But there he was asked a question one time about how what makes him so much better than everybody else? And his answer was amazing because he says, look, I wasn't the tallest. I wasn't the most athletic. I wasn't the fastest.

Alex Kutchish
00:23:28

He.

Mike Mills
00:23:28

He's like, my hands are tiny. You know, he's like, I didn't have all of the tools. He's like, but it came down to math. He's like, it was a simple math problem.

He said the average kid in high school would go to the gym and practice two or three days a week for maybe an hour or two in the gym working on their game. I was in the gym seven days a week, six hours a day, 365 days a week or a year. And he's like.

And if you compound, you know, six more hours a week or six more hours or, you know, two more hours a day at 12 more hours a week, at, you know, 30 more hours a month, and then 70 hours a year, five years later, I'm dramatically better than you. And. And it has nothing to do with talent. It has nothing to do with. With skill. It's purely about working on your craft and spending the time to do it.

And the only way that you can do this is in small steps. You cannot climb the mountain tomorrow. You cannot eat the well in one bite. But in order to know that you're headed in the right direct.

In order to know that you're headed in the wrong direction, you have to have something that you can see and measure yourself on on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis. Right?

Alex Kutchish
00:24:39

Sure. Yeah. I mean, first of all, thank you for sharing that. I love that. That story. I love that message from him. He. Hey, kids do well in math.

It helped Kobe. Okay.

Mike Mills
00:24:52

Yeah, exactly. Okay.

Alex Kutchish
00:24:54

You know, it's. It's. It's really. It's really great because he's obviously right. He also chose the thing that he was good at in general. Right.

I think it's very important for people to realize that don't just do what. What you love. I'm changing my story. It's weird, but I have to change it. Don't just do what you love. Do what you're good at, and you will love it.

Mike Mills
00:25:22

Yep.

Alex Kutchish
00:25:23

Do what you're good at, and you will love it.

Mike Mills
00:25:25

And so there's a guy online, his name Scott Adams, who. Who. That's his mess message to, you know, he does a lot of, like, speaking to kid, you know, youth of America. How do you succeed? Whatever.

And he's like the old adage of doing what you love and you'll make money out of it. He goes, that's okay. Kick that out there. He's like, do what you're good at, and you will make money and get better at that.

Now, if that happens to be what you love, great. And often, often the thing that you're really good at, you do start to love. Because otherwise. Yeah, why wouldn't you? But yeah.

Yeah, you have to find your skills and your talents and try to expand on those and not chase something that, yeah, you may love today, but, you know, it isn't going to pay the bills.

Alex Kutchish
00:26:01

Mike, right there, right there, right there. That is the essence of it all. You. You could hang up your show today, and you have given people the essence of it all.

What is the thing you're good at? And are you going to pursue it? Yeah, that's it. So makes management. Management leadership easy. Are you doing the thing that you're good at?

How will you know? I guess we have to measure. What Mike just said. Measure. And here's the standard. Are you above it? Okay, keep going. How good can you get?

Kobe didn't just win one championship, right?

Mike Mills
00:26:40

No.

Alex Kutchish
00:26:40

He's like, well, I did it. I love. I love in the Olympics, like the. The.

The people that set world records, you know, the very next thought after celebration, after they set a world record, what's next? Exactly.

Mike Mills
00:26:53

Yep.

Alex Kutchish
00:26:54

Can I do it again?

Mike Mills
00:26:55

Can I break it again?

Alex Kutchish
00:26:56

That's. That's all they're asked. They just did it. Yes, they just did it, and that's what they're asking. And so it's not about ego. It's.

It's not about being better just to be better. It is literally being in that flow, being in that. I think I'm doing the thing I'm good at, and I'm doing it really well.

Mike Mills
00:27:15

So there was a. Sorry to cut you off. There was a study that was done in the.

I believe it was in the 50s, when they were a little less ethical on what they could do to people but they took. They took.

Alex Kutchish
00:27:27

It's grown so much.

Mike Mills
00:27:28

About 20 people. What's that?

Alex Kutchish
00:27:30

I said we've grown so much.

Mike Mills
00:27:31

Yes, yes, yes.

They took a group of about 20 terminally ill patients that had brain problems, and they implanted these nodes into certain parts of their brain that would elicit certain types of emotion. They even knew this back then on how that worked. And they gave these subjects a. Like a keypad, essentially, that they could choose how they felt.

They could give themselves an emotion.

Alex Kutchish
00:27:57

It's crazy.

Mike Mills
00:27:57

They could be happy, they could be sad, they could have joy, they could have pleasure. They could have all this. I'll look up the study and give you the name when we're done here. But.

But the idea was, is that the expectation was that these people that could choose their emotions to some degree would choose happiness, joy, all the stuff that pleasure. All the things that we chase. That we chase, Right? And what they found is they chose more often than not, frustration and discontent.

And the people running the study couldn't figure out, they're like, we don't. Why is this happening?

And so after they kind of dug into a little bit and we got further down the road, what they hypothesized at least, is that as human beings, right, and this goes back to what you said a minute ago. As human beings, we are all about the journey, right? We're about getting to the destination. The destination itself. Where you land and where you.

Where you get to is just a fleeting emotion.

It's just a fleeting thing that you feel, because the moment that that happens and you get to that destination or that goal or you accomplish whatever it is that you were trying to do, then it becomes, well, then what? Now what? Right? What happens next? And, you know, it's like, again, I tell my kids this all the time, too. It's like, you know, you're gonna.

Do you have to go to school tomorrow? Yes. Okay. Is there any way out of that? No. Okay, well, then, fine. So then we have to do this process.

You're going to go through this, and then they're like, well, then I'll graduate. Okay, well, okay, graduate from high school. Then what? Well, then I got to go to college. Exactly. And then you go to college. And then what?

And then I probably got to get a job. Exactly. And then you get a job and you work, you make a lot of money. And then what? Well, then I get to retire. Okay, cool. Then what? I don't know.

Like, what happens after that? Well, you stop living. You start dying. So one way or Another, you have to be in constant pursuit of something.

And that's what this study was showing, is that people, the frustration of accomplishing and trying to get to a place is where that's what we want to feel. That's why we're constantly making new phones. That's why we're constantly improving on technology.

That's why we're constantly improving, improving as a culture, because that's really what we chase. It's not the goal, it's the pursuit of the goal.

Alex Kutchish
00:30:04

But, but I wonder if, if it's just nature in general, I wonder if Mother Earth and we're the children of this earth. Right, right. I wonder if it's just part of the natural process. For instance, a tree doesn't go like, well, I'm five foot tall, I'm good.

Mike Mills
00:30:22

Exactly right, yes.

Alex Kutchish
00:30:24

The tree's like, oh, there's more light. Right. And it just keeps going, oh, I need, I can grow some more leaves to get some more light. I can reach out further, a flower, a piece of grass.

You know, the line doesn't just finish eating a gazelle and go, well, I guess I'm good now.

Mike Mills
00:30:40

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:30:41

See you on the next lifetime.

Mike Mills
00:30:42

Yep.

Alex Kutchish
00:30:43

No, I wonder if this is just the natural process. Evolution.

Mike Mills
00:30:48

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:30:49

Is maybe just a natural process. And you know, I guess our, our choice maybe is the, is, is which way do we evolve?

Do we evolve up towards the light or do we evolve down towards the couch or something?

Mike Mills
00:31:02

You're moving one direction or another. You're never stagnant. Yeah, you're, you're either going up or you're going down. You don't stay still.

And even though you think you're staying still, you're not. You're, you're moving one way or the other.

And you have to be able to be realistic or, you know, you have to be able to real judge of yourself and know which way you're going.

Because trust me, there's many times where I am headed in the wrong direction and it, sometimes it takes a minute to realize that and sometimes it takes a minute to get there.

But if again, bringing it back to where we, where we are here is if there's a way for you as an individual to see your progression on a day to day basis. Right. And where you're headed on a weight and you can measure yourself every day, am I headed in the right direction?

Am I headed in the wrong direction? That's going to make you a better human every single day.

So as a leader of a team and as a leader of A company or anything else, that's how you're going to grow your people and be able to see nobody's staying still. Is that employee going up or is that employee going down? And if they're going down, what do I got to do to get them back on track?

Alex Kutchish
00:32:01

And I think it's important to realize too, from the Kobe story, and we say this all the time. Top performers are not born, they're built.

Mike Mills
00:32:12

Yes.

Alex Kutchish
00:32:13

Building better performance, not birthing better performance. Right. Although in the future, that can change. Right? Today, that's just how it works.

Mike Mills
00:32:23

Hey, you might be birthing it, but if they're birthing it, they're still building it. They're just building it on a DNA and a gene, right? Exactly.

Alex Kutchish
00:32:29

Well, in the future, when they're birthing AI humans, then I don't know, maybe it's top performance, a guaranteed type of thing. Right? Like, that's what you see in a. Anyway.

Mike Mills
00:32:37

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:32:37

So if you realize that top performers aren't born and they're built, that should excite you very much. Who on your team is a top performer? If they are built, not born, then you're looking for that drive, right?

That's that little gene that's like, hey, I do want to kind of get better. I do want to kind of. Just for me. I'm not doing it for you, boss. I don't care if you think I'm need to do better or not. I'm getting better for me.

I'm going to probably outgrow you, boss, just telling you, but let's go.

Mike Mills
00:33:05

I'm ready. Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:33:06

Look for those people. And you gotta know that there are people out there that don't ever want to do that either. That don't ever want to be the above the boss or.

Or the number one performer.

Mike Mills
00:33:18

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:33:19

They just want to be great at what? They don't need to be number one. They want to be great. You want those too?

Mike Mills
00:33:24

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:33:25

But then there are those people that are okay. They're just okay with not being great. They're okay with it until they find the thing they really are good at. So I want to be clear.

They're only okay with being well because you know you can go in either direction. Right. You move. But they're only okay with the thing of not being great now.

They're okay with it because they haven't found the thing that they're good at.

Mike Mills
00:33:49

Right?

Alex Kutchish
00:33:50

Right. That's all. And it's our job as leaders. How many times does an athlete come out of Let's I guess stay in football for a second.

Come out of college as a wide receiver and now they're running back.

Mike Mills
00:34:00

Yeah, absolutely.

Alex Kutchish
00:34:02

Or they played offense, now they play defense. Who made that decision? Yeah, right. Coaches are watching, going, this kid thinks he's good at this, but really his talent is right here.

And we're going to prove that. Yeah, do that, do that. Just do that. That's all you got to do. Build talent.

And when you start to spend time with your team, not about getting results, but about building their talent, when you start to do that.

And by the way, fuel is a tool for you leaders to use that to build yourself and build your team simultaneously and have standards that you track for yourself and your team simultaneously. When you spend time with your team focusing on their talent, you will discover those that want to be great, they'll want to be number one.

And those that don't. And that is a beautiful thing.

Life just becomes easier when you can look at someone and say, hey, not for you today because we couldn't help you get there. Or the opposite, oh, my gosh, put wind under those wings, because this person is going to be soaring and I want to be there for it.

And I hope I can keep them here with us as long as possible, but I will not stop them from leaving and following their dreams. But I hope I can keep this person with me as long as possible. That's so easy.

Mike Mills
00:35:10

So if I was listening to this right now and I'm hearing all this and I'm fired up and I'm like, okay, I'm with you. This is all, all of this makes sense. Like, of course. This is what I got to do. This is what I got to do. But, Alex, how the hell do I do this?

This sounds amazing and it sounds awesome, but I don't know how to do it. So obviously that was a question. I'm sure that crossed your mind and you guys have looked to address it. So, so, so how do we do it?

Alex Kutchish
00:35:36

So I think number one is to do it for yourself as a leader is to just make a decision that you're going to be a talent developer. That's just make. If you make that decision right now, drop the shoulders, kind of relax a little bit and go, I'm going to focus on developing talent.

That's my job. I'm no longer going to try and prove that I'm the best salesperson or the best customer success person or the best marketing person.

If you lead marketing teams or the best. Any leader. No, you're only the best if your team is the best, right.

You are no longer the best at anything until someone tells you you're the best talent developer, then you're the best at something. Okay, so the first thing is make that decision. Then you ask, okay, I don't know how to develop talent. How do I develop talent?

Well, start reading books. Okay, that doesn't hurt. Go, go find out what it means to be a developer of talent and surround yourself with resources that will drive you.

Want to be a better version of you. I start with Fuel. Okay.

Mike Mills
00:36:37

Yes.

Alex Kutchish
00:36:37

Fuel is built for positivity, for growth, for. I can. I'm going to read something to you. I. This has not been shared with anyone in the world just yet, so you'll be the first one to hear this.

Exclusive. Exclusive. I hope you do like a sound. I don't know. Do something.

Mike Mills
00:36:57

Yeah, we can. There'll be post edits.

Alex Kutchish
00:37:00

So, you know, we're, we're, we're three months into this thing. I want to mention these big, big brands, but I can't. Fortune 100 brands are signing up for pilots. I want to.

There's another version of Alex that say it. Just tell everybody right now. Yeah, but, but I don't want to do that.

I don't want to disrespect this relationship that we're getting into and, and, and how we want to spread this.

But I believe all of these Fortune companies will want the world to know that they're on this platform because it's about being the best version of yourself. And so we asked our users, okay, we said, tangible results. We need tangible results. You've been on the platform for three months. Tangible results.

Ready? I'm not going to share my screen, just going to read it. Better communication with my family. Better sleep.

Mike Mills
00:37:47

Okay.

Alex Kutchish
00:37:48

Healthier eating. Really closing more deals, selling bigger contracts, scheduling more appointments, better communication with my boss.

And an additional one, better communication with my team. So leaders are saying they're communicating better with their team. The team is saying they're communicating better with their leaders. So.

Mike Mills
00:38:10

But on the first on that list though, that you just read, the first three that you read, which were probably the top three, have absolutely nothing to do with their work. Nothing.

Alex Kutchish
00:38:19

And yet everything to do with their work.

Mike Mills
00:38:21

Yes.

Alex Kutchish
00:38:22

Right. That is it. That is it. And so look, Todd says this all the time. If it's not right off the job, it will never be right on the job ever.

So if you can't communicate with the people you love the most, well, easily trust. With trust, how can you ever do it? There yeah. If the people you live with, you can't communicate and trust with, how can you trust? Right.

So it's like, yes. So you're. I love that. Better communication with the family, better sleep, healthier eating. Those are the first three and the top three. Yeah.

So the reason I say this is number one, a big tip for any leader is start to surround yourself and it's happening in the world. Self care is becoming a real thing for everyone. It's beautiful.

And, and we're entering this market at the exact right time with a solution for self care through this experience, man, you have to, you have to jump on there and watch this new course from John Murphy, Beyond Doubt. Wow, what a powerful course.

Mike Mills
00:39:18

Well, I mean, at this point, health insurance companies are pushing it.

So if you, if you own a large company and you have health insurance, they want your employees to take better care of themselves because that means less claims, less cost. So you see all kinds of initiatives coming out from these big insurance companies about wellness, about taking care of yourself.

So that way you have less. And heck, there's an entire platform, you know, regardless of political things, whatever. But you know, the make America healthy again.

That, that, that Robert Kennedy is trying to do to, to fix the food system, to fix all these things. These are all about making people better, you know, here. And not just self care.

Alex Kutchish
00:39:53

Self care.

Mike Mills
00:39:54

Yeah, yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:39:55

Self care. And so leaders, if you're listening to this, it's like, how do I start to build my team and focus on talent development, focus on self again?

It just goes within. How are you going to make your. So it's about all of these things. Fuel is fuel for a reason. It's what you put in, right? What you put in comes out.

That's fuel.

Mike Mills
00:40:10

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:40:11

Fuel also represents the people on your team. The people on your team are fuel.

They're the ones that are going to get you to where you want to go or you're going to break down on the side of the road. And so that's the name of fuel. That's the power, the beauty of fuel. Okay.

And so if you're a leader, this is a resource to help you become a better leader and better version of yourself. And then it becomes a gym for you to train your team. It becomes a gym for you to train your team.

And you're going to use this gym, you're going to use this gym to figure out who's in it for themselves, who wants to become great and who might be playing the wrong sport.

Mike Mills
00:40:43

Right?

Alex Kutchish
00:40:43

Okay. For you, it's okay. For you, that's. You're going to use this for this. You're going to use this to develop talent.

You're going to use this to give your people a chance to be autonomous. I'm going to ask you a question. This is in. In our platform, the leaders can see what their team is viewing and practicing. Okay, they can see it.

We do this very special reason. There's assigned courses you can give people. But mostly this is about autonomy. Again, we're following the sports philosophy.

Sports is built on autonomy and accountability. Accountability to the team, the players, the practice, the understanding, the goals of the organization, the ownership, the fans.

That's the accountability. But you know what? That is a small fragment of the time that the person has to develop themselves. It's a small fragment. That's the accountability.

The larger part is autonomy. What are you doing in your spare time to become great? Because we only practice this much. What are you doing to keep making yourself great?

And so the autonomy here is amazing. I'll ask you this question here, Mike.

If somebody on your team, okay, somebody on your team was watching a course on overcoming personal failure, did you just learn something about them without speaking to them once?

Mike Mills
00:41:58

Absolutely. Because if they are concerned and, well, if they understand that they fail and they're going to fail, because we all are going to fail. You're.

Nobody walks through this world successful 100 hitting a thousand. So we're all going to fail probably more often than we succeed.

Then if they're looking at that, to me that means that they understand that, number one, that they are going to fail, and number two, they need to know or they see value in learning how to deal with that failure. Because that's the important part. It's. The failure is going to happen regardless. It's just whether or not you care about how you rebound.

Same thing again. I tell my kids all the time, you cannot control what happens around you.

All you can control is how you react and what you do in response to whatever it has occurred. And so that's the entire nature.

You have to constantly understand that it's not going to be perfect, and you have to constantly improve and get better.

Alex Kutchish
00:42:54

I love that. And so you, as a leader, here's. Here's how it could sound, speaking to someone that just watched this with your belief.

You have this belief, and I'm on your team, and I just watched this. What. What a conversation could sound like is, hey, Alex, I just checked out Overcoming Personal Failure.

What cool approaches to overcoming personal failure. What inspired you to watch this course oh, man. You know, whatever that reason is. Oh, my gosh.

I promise you, if you just spend time and ask your team what made them choose that thing to watch over something else, you will discover something about your team you've never discovered before. Something they care about, not something you want them to care about, which is numbers.

Mike Mills
00:43:42

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:43:43

Talking to customers. Stop all that. We already. Product sales, sales skills. You're going to never stop doing that.

But if you want to rev up their engine and put the fuel in there, high octane, you will find out what's inside.

Mike Mills
00:43:57

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:43:58

Why they tick. And you will only know that through autonomy. Because if you assign something to them, it's just obedience. It's great. That's okay too, by the way.

It's important. That's team.

Mike Mills
00:44:09

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:44:10

But when they autonomously choose. Overcoming personal failure. Hey, what made you choose that? Yeah, how are you going to implement that today?

Do you want to hear my philosophy about it? Oh, my gosh. That person is fired up because they just sat with you. Who they look up to. Believe me, they do.

If you've done this right, they look up to you and you just spend time not telling them to get better numbers, not showing them how to close more deals, but really understanding what matters to them.

And that is why companies that you mentioned, insurance companies, that's why companies like the Fortune companies we're speaking to, literally, literally have an entire agenda for personal well being and development in their teams. Like invest heavily in personal development and personal well being of their teams. You don't have to wait to be a Fortune 100. You can do that today.

Mike Mills
00:45:08

Yeah, well, and isn't that the reason a lot of companies too, you know, and I've heard this before, I'm not a Fortune 100 CEO, but.

Yeah, but I feel like there's, there's enough studies out there that show that, you know, employees stay with companies, not compensation isn't the top reason. That's not the main reason they go. That's not reason they stay. They.

Alex Kutchish
00:45:28

90% of people say they will take a $5,000 cut to have a better relationship with their team and their business, their company. $5,000 cut. Sorry, go ahead.

Mike Mills
00:45:39

No, no, that's. I mean, that's what I was saying. It's just basically like the reason this is important is it's about retention.

It's about finding who fits into what role. It's about learning about your employees. So, you know, it's, it.

I mean, that thing that you just said about the failure discussion, that is the reason you Know, often I think leaders sometimes like, okay, what am I going to talk? I talked to this person once a month, and I don't really know them very well, and I don't have a lot in common. What?

I don't want to just ask them about their numbers. I want to humanize them a little bit. So what can I speak to them about?

Well, if you just saw that they watched this video on failure and you go through the exercise that you described, you've shown that person two things. One is you're paying attention. Hey, just so you know, I'm watching all the time. And number two, I want to know about you.

I'm not asking about, you know, your. Where your sales are, where your numbers are. I want to find out about you.

And that is deepening the relationship with the leadership group to keep the. That employee happy, keep them there, keep them fulfilled in what they're doing every day. And it's not just about money.

Alex Kutchish
00:46:40

And Mike, you said something earlier that fits perfectly into what you just said. Again, we humans are about the journey. When you ask the person about their numbers, that's the destination, Right? Stop asking about the destination.

Mike Mills
00:46:56

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:46:56

Start focusing on the journey.

Mike Mills
00:46:58

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:46:59

Yourself and your people. Focus on the journey. Develop that talent. Clear the path for them. Challenge them.

Give them access to tools like Fuel so they can personally develop at their time and watch what they're working on and then dive in with joy and ease. This is a game. Fuel is a binge worthy personal, professional development. Binge worthy. It looks like Netflix. Everyone's like this. Like Netflix.

Like, yeah, why not? They did it, right?

Mike Mills
00:47:24

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:47:24

Thank you, reed and Patty McCord, who, by the way, Patty McCord is the inspiration for Fuel in general.

Mike Mills
00:47:29

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:47:30

Patty wrote an article that said businesses should be built like sports teams, stars in every position. It's known as the most important document to come out of the Valley.

Mike Mills
00:47:39

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:47:40

Incredible.

Mike Mills
00:47:41

What.

Alex Kutchish
00:47:42

Maybe we'll put a link in there.

Mike Mills
00:47:43

Just, just so you know, anybody listening to this knows and I. And you know, we got about 10 or 12 minutes here, so I want to.

I want to get this out there, but give some basic breakdowns of what fuel actually does for these groups. Because, you know, you showed me some stuff that I think is amazing with the metrics and measurements and the graphs and everything that just.

It's a whole other level of training that you've got training and measurement of metrics all into one with entertainment, with real value. So give just a few highlight points about what exactly fuel does and how they do it.

Alex Kutchish
00:48:15

Yeah. Thank you. So think of Fuel as a platform that's ushering in a brand new experience for the human race. And it's like, whoa, Alex, that's huge.

You're talking about a new sun emerging, kind of. But not think about this for a second.

99.9% of all information out there is about knowledge, gathering, learning platforms, books, schools, not all schools, most schools. Just gathering. Gathering information. Right? What we're saying, we're just proposing something here.

We're proposing that let's not learn just for information. Let's learn for performance, for being able to do the thing we learned, to actually be able to implement, apply the thing we just learned.

Because knowledge is simply saying, I understand. Performance is proving you understand. And we want people to be able to prove they understand.

I can go into a million different reasons why, but I think it's crystal clear to everyone. Go back to sports. I can show you how to play golf. We can watch videos, can do for months.

But I wouldn't send you into a golf tournament until we went and shot a couple rounds of golf. Right? You have to show me you understand. Don't just tell me you understand. That's Fuel. Fuel is a performance platform.

Performance is a service platform that's designed to improve the personal and professional performance of any individual that wants to become the best version of themselves. This will get you there, okay? And it's designed to break down all those previous experiences and learning, which has to be boring.

Which companies are doing this now? Masterclasses. And there's other companies, they're like, okay, let's not make it boring. But they're also still testing for knowledge.

They want to know if you understand. And we're saying, wait, if I teach you how to leave a voicemail to get someone to respond, I don't want you to understand how to do that.

I want you to prove you can do it.

Which is why a microphone pops up and you actually get to practice the thing you were just taught, not just going back and forth with an AI, which is just trying to get things right for you. Which, by the way, AI is a big part of this thing too. But it's not just practice. It is understanding it becoming a part of you.

So they can use it all the time, right? So when you learn something and practice it, you retain about 75% of it. When you read something, you retain 10% of it.

When you watch something or listen to something, you retain 5% of it. 75% retention means you can actually apply what you learned. And that's the purpose. Why do you put anyone for it through any training?

You want them to be able to use the training tomorrow or today. That's the purpose of Fuel. So that's number one. The second thing is performance analytics, performance measurement.

How do we create a place where we can create a baseline and a set of expectations for our team to measure themselves against? Just like we talked about, how do we keep moving up the bar?

Fuel has a performance analytics platform that is using one of the most essential concepts of actually improving performance, which is simple analytics, not Complex Analytics. Not 38 data points, but one data point that tells you it's time for you to dig in with this person.

One way, because they're moving in one of two directions. You said it. They're good. They're moving in a direction. Which way they're moving. If they're moving up, good. They're moving down. Not good.

Discover it early. If they're moving up, good. Discover that early too, by the way. Help them get there faster. It's wonderful.

Mike Mills
00:51:48

And recognize it. Reward them for it. Shows you're paying attention.

Alex Kutchish
00:51:52

Yes. I want to share with.

When you have a baseline and you're below baseline, if you look at the baseline as if it's water, what happens to people when they're underwater? They're drowning. What happens when people are drowning? What do they ask for? Lots of help. So if you're helping people that are drowning, can not.

Don't know how to swim. But you have people who are trying to soar. They got wings. They're trying to fly.

Your focus should be on helping them fly, not helping someone that can't swim try to not drown. They're not asking to learn to swim. Did you hear the difference? They didn't say, help me learn to swim. They're trying not to drown.

Mike Mills
00:52:22

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:52:22

So you help them up, get them above water. Look at the bird trying to fly. Look back. They're drowning again because they didn't learn how to swim. They're trying to not drown.

Mike Mills
00:52:29

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:52:29

The baseline helps you realize who's trying to not drown and who's trying to fly. It's a beautiful thing that is built in. And it's built in not just for sales. You can use this for operations.

Fuel is for personal professional development for all. This is a gift to HR departments and people who are responsible for growing the entire company, not just a single segment.

We have more non salespeople on the platform now than salespeople.

Mike Mills
00:52:56

Wow.

Alex Kutchish
00:52:57

Yeah. And it's growing. We have a whole. We have, I think we have like 400 people coming on this week.

And yeah, actually this one's probably going to be about 50, 50 sales, non sales, about maybe a little bit more non sales. Operations, customer C suites, accounting, legal is coming on like.

Like they're coming on because as a CEO, I don't want just one department to keep growing and being the best in their role.

Mike Mills
00:53:25

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:53:26

I don't just help the point guard get better. I help the center. I help the power for all of them. I want all of them to be great because one person doesn't do it.

I don't believe in the Pareto principle. Right. So it's like everyone needs to be able to do the job well. So you.

Every department has a data point that will show you if they're trending in the right direction or if they're trending in the wrong direction. So Fuel, is that right? Fuel is a world leader in personal and professional development for all.

And every single week, this is very important for everyone to recognize. If you're asking like, what does it do and how does it work? Every single week, new content is released. Why do we do that?

We've learned the human loves novelty. Loves it, Gets bored with things that just stay in the exact same place all the time.

And so we've developed a process to release brilliant content every single week. We have a schedule already built out through April of 25th, and we're able to slot new things in depending on what's happening in the world.

Mike Mills
00:54:21

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:54:21

To make sure that the right content at right time arrives. And it's always some. If there's, if there's not something you love in there, this, this morning, next week, you might. That's the point.

Just like Netflix, just like Instagram, just like TikTok. The novelty is key.

Mike Mills
00:54:36

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:54:37

And then the next thing, novelty is part of it. And then what makes it very special is that the novelty then becomes curated just for you, the individual.

Just like Instagram, every single Fuel account is as unique as the person using the account, because not everyone needs to grow the same way at the same time for the same reasons. And so why do we need to give everyone the exact same training? We don't.

Now we have a way to give them exactly what they need when they need it for themselves. Based on. Haha. This is important. What's it based on? It's based on the people who are currently performing at a higher level than you. How do we know?

Analytics.

Mike Mills
00:55:10

Right.

Alex Kutchish
00:55:10

So now we're passing down information that will help you grow, not just randomly but based on your interests and how other people are performing because we'd imagine that people want to reach those next levels. And so it's like, hey, let's not guess what the best are doing, let's just pass it along. And that's fuel.

Mike Mills
00:55:26

There's also the other element that you showed me which is, and you touched on it a few times but I do want you to elaborate a little bit on the. You go through the course, you do the, you know, the modules or whatever.

But then there's, I don't want to call it homework but there is action that has to take place once that is completed. And it's not, it's the how do you. Like you said earlier, I don't want to just teach you how to leave a voicemail, I want you to practice it.

So explain that a little bit as well.

Alex Kutchish
00:55:58

Yeah. So within each lesson there's going to be some sort of performance module. Write something, speak something, record something.

So if I'm doing a social media course about how to record my. There might be a, the, a camera from your phone will pop up.

If you're using your phone or if you're using your computer, it'll pop up and you'll do it. Instead of just saying I'm going to do it, you're going to do it so that you can see it. You've just been taught.

Practice the thing you've been taught and so you don't have to do that every single day like homework and I'm going to grade you. Yeah, but it's recommended. That's the thing. If you now leaders, you could force it.

And I would recommend for some people forcing it because forcing some people to do some training helps them break through their own self limiting beliefs.

Mike Mills
00:56:40

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:56:40

So be like, I need you to do this 10 days in a row but I just did it yesterday. Yep. And I need you to be so good that when I wake you up at 2 o'clock in the morning like and you repeat exactly what you said. Okay.

That's, that's important too. So the practices are there for you to just keep getting better at that skill. Michael Jordan didn't just take a shot once.

Kobe Bryant doesn't just practice a shot once he spends. He did the math on what it takes to become the best.

Mike Mills
00:57:02

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:57:03

Because it was about practice, it was about repetition. You learn it, practice it, learn it, practice it.

So that's the thing that's in this, it's a practice platform, application of knowledge platform rather than gathering of knowledge platform Right. And so that. But it's not homework. It's personal work. It's for you.

Right now, the leader can assign, and I highly recommend you do assign philosophies and things that you believe that would help them, especially when you can recognize people individually. You could get better at this and you can get better at that. Help them individually grow. So that's the, that's the homework part.

Mike Mills
00:57:33

So then the other question then becomes, well, you know, you're Talking to Fortune 100 companies, you're talking to these big groups, so obviously the only benefit that you can get is if I have a, If I have 50 employees that work for me, but if I'm a small brokerage or if I'm just running a team of two or three in a small business, then I obviously couldn't use this because the cost would be outlandish, right?

Alex Kutchish
00:57:53

Oh, of course. Yes. Forget you little businesses. No, the exact opposite of that. Yeah, we, we love, we love all, all people that want to improve themselves.

And so the cost of this thing is 22 per user per month. $264 for the year of unlimited access to this content.

So it's, it's, it's designed specifically to democratize personal development rather than separate the haves and have nots. Yeah.

The amount of content in here, if you were to sit in front of this person and get training from them, each of them, the combined total, you probably have to spend, I don't know, close to $1 million to get this training.

Mike Mills
00:58:32

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:58:33

This performance training, I'm talking about one time. Right. And you have this on demand, full access at all times. So it's $22 a month per user, including the leaders.

And you have all this performance analytics. We're working right now on a model for all those people.

They're like, hey, we have a lot of people that give it to their husbands, their wives, their daughters.

Mike Mills
00:58:53

I don't want my wife handing this out to me. Tell me you need to get better. Maybe, maybe more than likely, it probably do. Good. Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:59:02

And so we're working on, on, on a model where all of those, like, leagues and leaderboards and goal setting and all that stuff, that's all the gamification that's in here for individuals that don't need to be part of a team, that all that gets removed and the price will probably cut in half.

Mike Mills
00:59:16

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
00:59:16

So there are people that just want to personally develop and say, look, I just want this for myself. I don't need to this for my team. But, but for Teams to have all that Transparency and analytics. 22 bucks a month.

Mike Mills
00:59:27

Yeah, well, I mean, it's. It's amazing. When you showed it to me, I was. I was blown away at what you've done. But, I mean, everything that you've.

All the companies that you've started and move forward have been, you know, out of the box and innovative on. On what they're accomplishing. That just nothing like that is. Exists in the market in most places.

So if you don't mind, if you have just a couple minutes, I would. Because we never talk about you, because you never talk about yourself, because all you do is build and grow and build and grow.

But, you know, a lot of times people want to know, you know, what. What. How the hell did this dude get to this level of. Of, you know, operating at a 12 all the time and, you know, never slowing down? And.

And so I just want to give just.

Just a couple minutes for you to just kind of tell, you know, a little bit about where you came from and how you got here and, you know, where all your inspiration comes from to. To do all this stuff. Because, look, we all have big ideas. Everybody does. I do.

Everybody on the planet has things that they're like, I want to do this, and I want to do that, and I want to do this. But the. The.

The knowing and the wanting and the needing and all of that stuff is great, but it's the ones that do that set themselves apart from everybody else, and you're one of the doers. So, you know, I always want to know how you. How you got that drive inside you to be that person.

Alex Kutchish
01:00:44

Man, that's such a good question. I. I have to attribute all of it probably to my parents. They took the biggest risk.

And entrepreneurialism and building businesses and trying to reach for something big is a risk, right?

Mike Mills
01:00:58

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
01:00:59

Because you do jump, and then you build your parachute. That's just how it works. And my parents did the same thing.

I was born in Kyiv, Ukraine, and my parents brought me here in 1990 when I was 7, my brother was 9. And they kind of paved the way for what's possible, which is anything.

I asked my parents just recently, this past Father's Day, I had a conversation with my dad and my mom about this, and I said, did you ever dream that you would build businesses in the United States and retire in Florida and have this beautiful home here? They're like, alex, we didn't dream we could get out of our town. This was this. What? No, no. Where.

Nowhere was this written that we couldn't have even imagined. What are you talking about? Like this. We thought where we lived is where we're gonna die.

What we did was what we're gonna do, what our parents did is what we're gonna do, and so on. That's, that's it. That was it.

And, and so how much more inspiration do you need than people that just go and uproot their entire life to help their kids live a better life and themselves? Of course they weren't just doing it for us, they were doing it for themselves.

But in their mind, they were doing it just for us because they're like, well, we're old enough, we've kind of been through it. Let's just make sure they don't go through what we have to go through. And potentially worse.

And so that inspiration, I think is, is the drive behind the risk taking and business building. Well, my parents became entrepreneurs two years into a new country, barely learning a language. They both own their own businesses.

Mike Mills
01:02:27

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
01:02:27

Interior design, limo business. I mean, it was, it was like, it was clear that that's probably my path. And, and I just followed him.

I just followed him into one business and then split off and decided to do my own thing based on, on, you know, writing, riding their coattails in the first business, which was the medical business. And, and since then I've every company, this Is company number 10. Has been a new industry. And that's part of my fun, that's part of my game.

I have a tattoo that says, always doing what I love. Yeah. And, and, and I live that. Meaning I, I will not continue to do something I'm not having fun in and growing in. And it's just, it's not worth it.

And I learned that from my 83 year old amazing mentor, Paul Naden. That's his little book. The name of it is Dimwit. Don't interrupt me. Wait your turn. That's. This entire book is acronyms. It's all acronyms.

We can just see. Cam, what's this say? Clear the air. Meeting. Okay. Cam, this guy was brilliant. I came to him with a, with an idea for a business at. When he was like 81.

And I said, hey, join me in this business. And I was like, 20 something, right? I told him my idea and he loved me. He's my mentor. I told him my idea and he goes, that sounds good.

I'm not interested. I was like, I was like, wait, Paul. What? What? How could you say no? He goes, it doesn't sound fun. I was like, what? Do you mean doesn't phone?

It's gonna make money? He's like, it's not fun. I don't do it. And that's. That's an acronym in here. If it's not fun, I don't do it. I was like, oh, that's.

I'm gonna live by that. I'm gonna live by that. And so, you know, starting a new business in a new category and building a brand new team, it's exciting. It's also very scary.

Yeah, that's the biggest project I've ever imagined. No, no. I'm like my parents. I could not have imagined this size of a project.

Mike Mills
01:04:21

Yeah.

Alex Kutchish
01:04:22

I could not have imagined countries. We have four or five countries on the platform already.

Leaders in other countries are asking us to speak at their conferences to get this into their world there. It's really, really cool. And, you know, I'm just. I'm just eating my own dog food. I do what I love, and I keep pushing myself.

I want to evolve 1% better every day.

Mike Mills
01:04:42

Yeah, well, I mean, you are. You are living proof of the lesson that we talked about a minute ago, which is, you know, it's the journey, it's not the destination, man. And.

And every time you. You finish a company or build one, and then it's like, okay, great, I did it, but what's next? You know, what, what, what now?

Where do we go from here?

Alex Kutchish
01:05:00

So I'm just that tree reaching for the. For the light. That's all.

Mike Mills
01:05:03

That's right. That's right. Well, Alex, dude, I can't thank you enough. I always enjoy our conversations because I learned so much from you and get such.

I mean, I'm not. I'm not a. An inspirational guy as far as, like a.

Take inspiration, but you're one of the few humans that I've met that every time I meet you, I want to go run five miles and just go. Go out there and beat the streets. Because the level of enthusiasm and energy that you have for what you do is so commendable and impressive. So I.

I appreciate your time, man. I know you're a busy dude and, you know, fuel's an amazing platform. I recommend anybody.

We'll put the link in the description for the site so you can sign up, go check it out, get an idea of what they do. It's incredible. It's innovative. It's training at a whole other level. So I can't recommend enough to go. Go look at it.

And then, Alex, I can't wait to see what the next journey looks like for you, too, man.

Alex Kutchish
01:05:54

I'm, I'm, I'm pumped for it myself. I, I, I, I sit in the front seat of my own, of my own movie and, and watch. It's all we got, right? Let's see what happens next.

Mike Mills
01:06:04

I'm a big fan of that movie, so keep it rolling. All right, guys, I will. We'll be back with another market update next week, and then we will see you next Thursday.

Alex Kutchish
01:06:15

Thanks.