Through the Entrepreneurial Voyage with Parker Harris

Tim Melanson: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to today’s episode of the Work at Home Rockstar podcast.

I’m excited for today’s episode. We are talking to the president of Junto Global and what he does is he helps to unlock. Human potential through peer-to-peer learning. He helps people get set up with masterminds. Very excited about this interview actually. So we’re ready to rock with, uh, Parker Harris.

Hey Parker, you’re in rock. Let’s do it. Perfect. So we always start off here in a good note. So tell me a story of success in your business that we can be

Parker Harris: inspired by. Success in my business that you can be inspired by. So I. I, my business started organically, not really as a business, but as something that I needed in my own life.

And, um, over a four year period, it created some breakthroughs for the people involved as well as myself. And I just got a lot of value from it. And I think that, you know, that’s the good news is if we really desire to add value to other people, we will be rewarded for it. Um, After doing some soul searching and talking [00:01:00] with different mentors and executives at the company that I worked, I realized that I was willing to suffer for this company and, and this movement, and decided to go all in.

And it felt like a life or death decision. And it was one of, um, one of the most challenging things I’ve ever done. But now, um, you know, in a sustainable place and thriving and now traveling the world with my, with my wife. That’s awesome.

Tim Melanson: All in what did, what did that look like for you? Going all

Parker Harris: in? Yeah.

Yeah. So for me it was, it was cutting the umbilical cord of like a nine to five job and really figuring out this world of entrepreneurship. Yeah.

Tim Melanson: And. Was that something that, I mean, I, it’s, it’s difficult I think for everybody really to, uh, to, to cut that umbilical cord. But was that something that you had support from your friends and family about, or were you kind of going it

Parker Harris: alone?

I. [00:02:00] I, I think there was definitely some moral support to it and like I really surrounded myself with other entrepreneurs that were, people go like going through it. But I think that part of the journey of entrepreneurship becomes like learning to trust, in this case myself, like learning to trust myself and really get in tune with my own gut and, you know, learning how to make difficult decisions.

Yeah,

Tim Melanson: that, and that’s really good, uh, insight as well because I mean, oftentimes when you ask someone for their opinion, they are almost thinking that you’re asking for permission, and they might even feel responsible if you fail. So oftentimes when you sort of ask around, you don’t necessarily get the support that you’d expect from some people.

And then on the other hand, like you say, if you surround yourself around people that are actually doing it and going through the same journey, they will definitely support you. And that’s, you know, that’s a good place to be, right? You can support them as

Parker Harris: well. [00:03:00] I think it becomes like easy to ask for advice from like so many different people because then if we ask for advice then we’re not like, we can’t be wrong ourselves.

But I think something that I learned myself and I’ve seen a lot of other successful entrepreneurs do is they gather data and get counsel from people that got have, like, have already gotten the results that they’re looking to achieve, but then just using that as data and not really as like truth necessarily.

Figuring out what’s truth for, for themselves based on their unique situation, their business, um, and, and what’s working now versus maybe what worked 10 years ago or 20 years ago, or 50 years ago.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. That’s that’s a good point too, because the world is changing very quickly and you might get success in something 10 years ago that you’d try the exact same steps and you wouldn’t necessarily get there using that same, uh, that same tool set.

Right.

Parker Harris: I mean some, you know, at the end of the day, business is business and there’s a lot of [00:04:00] similarities between different businesses, but I. Entrepreneurs are, are sometimes u like often unique and different. Like people are unique and different and have their own skillsets and maybe their own vision and what they’re looking to, to achieve can sometimes be different than like, oh, I want to have a billion dollar company and thousands of employees and like, raise capital from other people.

Like, like sometimes the journey is different to get to different, different results.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Some people when they wanna be a, an entrepreneur that’s not even anywhere near what they want. They just want free time. They just wanna be able to control their schedule. Right?

Parker Harris: Yeah. I think freedom is a, is a core like value that most entrepreneurs have, and I think it’s also probably true with like musicians and, and artists and, and actors.

Yeah. I see a lot of similarities between entrepreneurs and, and artists in that there’s a lot of. [00:05:00] Like it, it has a low probability of success, but then if we drag it out over a long enough timeline, it’s almost guaranteed. Right? If we, if it’s not something we have to do in six months, but we can give it 20 years, eventually we’re gonna work through the challenges and, and be successful as long as we don’t quit.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. Because music and in many of the arts, it’s. You know, the journey. That’s, that’s what’s important, right? It’s, it’s actually playing the music. It’s, it’s that, that’s driving you to it. So a lot of times in a, in a business, um, if you don’t have something that you really love doing or that you really, that fires you up, but that has purpose, all those things, well, then you might not go through all that work and get to the end finish line.

I, I have noticed that the entrepreneurs that do get there, they did actually get fired up by the work that they were doing. Just the same as an artist, uh, would get fired up by the work that they’re doing right.

Parker Harris: [00:06:00] Yeah, I think that’s a really good point, the journey piece of it. I think that’s just so true of life itself, and I noticed for, for me, like it’s so, like I said, when I left, um, corporate America to start my own company, it, it felt like a life or death thing where I had to make this work and it caused me to be manic.

My approach and like really seek to go like fast as possible to hit certain goals. And I, I heard this idea that that’s really resonated with me. It’s that fast is actually slow, but going slow is smooth and smooth is fast. And, and the more that I’ve slowed down and gone a little bit smoother, I actually spent the time to reflect on what’s working and what’s not working, and do more of what’s work, you know, working and less of what’s not working, and create like a plan and then execute that plan in a consistent pace.

Um, the, the growth was a lot faster than when I was manically going fast. Yeah.

Tim Melanson: Wow, that’s [00:07:00] good insight as well. So now, I mean, not everything goes as planned and there are some bad notes along the way, so can you share something that didn’t go well and how you recovered or how we can recover?

Parker Harris: Yeah. Um, lemme give you a real answer on this.

For me. My, my business is incredibly personal. You know, it started, it’s, it’s, it’s really bringing together people and there was a point where, A lot of the, like, people in the community were, were also my friends were like, there was like a strong personal relationship with, and, and sometimes customers leave, you know, and, and in this case it was like friends leaving and I took it so personally that I almost like cut off.

The relationship was like, wow, this person, like, you’re dead to me. You made this choice. It’s a lack of.

I regret the way that I showed up in that. Um, I think it was very like short-term thinking and it didn’t [00:08:00] serve me, it didn’t serve them, it didn’t serve the company. And it’s really not like aligned with my mission. I think at the end of the day, it’s like a transactional relationship versus actually being relational in a relationship.

And as I’ve learned from that, um, I’ve been able to repair some of those relationships and like start, start adding value and receiving value and, and at the end of the day, just caring about the person. But some of those people aren’t open to that type of relationship anymore, and it, and it doesn’t and, and it, and it hurts.

Tim Melanson: I can relate to that. That’s exper. I’ve been on both sides of that, I believe over the last, you know, several years. And it, it is. It is difficult ’cause um, you know, a lot of times in business you will get into business with people that are already friends and then something happens in the business and it ruins your friendship and also you make very good friends with the people that are in your [00:09:00] business as well.

So it, it, you know, the, the friend business, personal business line gets a little bit weird when you are definitely when you’re self-employed, right?

Parker Harris: I call it a complex stakeholder relationship, and I. There’s something like, the way that I think about things is like no one really deserves anything. Right?

It’s like, what? You know, we don’t deserve what we want. You know? We get what we’re willing to suffer for and no one owes us anything. And you know, The more that I seek to add value to other people, like the stronger the relationships are versus like resting on the past or resting on like what I have done for someone.

Um, and so, you know, there’s just some examples that I can think of where I really could have supported someone and, and like added value, but I was being selfish, shortsighted, [00:10:00] and, um, I. I think long term, like whether it’s like, I think on a spiritual level, an emotional level, on a mental level, it doesn’t, it doesn’t feel good to show up, um, that way.

And sometimes people can be mirrors for us. And I think that eventually happened to me. And I think the, the next part of that story is that like, That, you know, not for me not to stay in that victim mentality, to not like stay down about it and then assign like myself an identity as part of that, but to like embrace reality, accept what happened, and learn from it, and then make new decisions in the present.

So what

Tim Melanson: are some of those new decisions now that you make that can help to alleviate that, that problem? Or is that just

Parker Harris: unavoidable? Yeah, no. So the new decisions for me is to be relational, not transactional, um, to look at things from other people’s point of view versus my own point of view. And, you know, seek to be less selfish.

Yeah. Yeah. [00:11:00] Nice. Right on.

Tim Melanson: So now, uh, we’ve already talked about masterminds and, uh, that is one of the topics I’d like to talk about is learning from the best. So, uh, let me just tell you, ask you like about your experience with, you know, learning from mentors. Like, did you, like, how did you get started? Did you start with a mastermind?

Did you, uh, hire coaches? All that.

Parker Harris: Yeah, so I, I was really fortunate to start attracting mentors into my life as a teenager. Um, I got really involved in different organizations. Like the one that comes to mind for me is called Youth and Government, which was a nonprofit, um, like a nonprofit organization that, that’s goal was to teach democracy to the next generation.

And that, um, you know, that brought together some really interesting people and. I was like a little, I was alone in that, that organization. Like I, I started my own delegation and I was able to attract some mentors that were just a few years ahead of me as well as a few [00:12:00] decades ahead of me that really impacted my life and, you know, taught me to take my hat off inside, take my sunglasses off, you know, pull my pants up and just, just show up a little.

You know, I, I kind of came from a certain type of neighborhood that was a little rough. Mm-hmm. For around the edges and the type of success that I wanted to experience in life was not present in my immediate vicinity. And so I had to seek out mentors at a young age. And then what I realized was when I was a student, it was really easy to ask for that meeting and ask for that help.

And it became easier when I leveraged, like when I was seeking to add value to more than just myself. And so what that looked like was. Like creating speaker events or, you know, personal and professional development events where I would bring in an entrepreneur, an executive, an investor to teach, to share their story and to share their wisdom with other students.

And that created a lot of [00:13:00] opportunity for me. And, and also I noticed this, this kind of thing where people that would step into those leadership roles and like do the doing versus just sit passively and absorb the information. They got all of the opportunities, you know, it was like this like 90 10 thing where people in these leadership roles ended up getting multiple job offers and, and then, you know, the people that were, were just sitting there, you know, passively didn’t really get as many opportunities.

So that was like a really interesting insight for me. And then after I graduated from, from college, I continued to put these speaker events on both within my corporation as well as outside. And I surrounded myself with people that were like really driven. You know, they weren’t lost. They had opportunity, but they were seeking to like continue to level up and grow and, and succeed.

After organizing a number of those events and surround and creating like a really interesting community of people that would attend them, I [00:14:00] started getting more and more benefit from the interaction with peers at the beginning and the end of the event than I did from the speaker. I. And so I was reading, um, Benjamin Franklin’s autobiography and he created something called Junto, which was, he called it Club for Mutual Improvement, where he did, he brought together 12 people that were industrious, and I decided to utilize that model with the community that I had created and.

It was just magical. Like, it, it is one of those things that it’s hard to explain in words. Um, there’s actually a, a science around it now called epigenetics that helps explain how our environment really, um, impacts, you know, the translation of our D n A. And I think this is where knowledge like we move from, like knowing something to applying that knowledge in, in, in, into like action.

Tim Melanson: Wow. Wow. That’s really, really cool. And uh, I, I, I can speak to that as well because I’ve, I’ve actually experienced very similar things [00:15:00] being in sales organizations where you, you know, you go to, to a, some sort of like a conference and you get more outta the conversations before and after than you do from the speaker himself or herself.

Right. So why do you think that is? Yeah, that’s pretty cool. Well, I, I, I think, I think part of it is because you see your peers as more equals than somebody who’s up on stage. When I look at somebody up on stage, I think subconsciously, or maybe even consciously, I think, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I. They’ve had a different experience, right?

There’s no way I can get to that point. But when you talk to people that are, you know, your peers sitting next to you in in the audience, they’re both sitting there looking at that guy, and if that person’s getting some great success, then I’m like, okay, I wanna listen to you. I wanna know what you’re doing.

’cause that’s more applicable to me. That’s just my thought on it. Is that what you

Parker Harris: think too? Or? I mean, I’m, I’m like really interested in this idea of like what’s authentically relevant to a person, right? [00:16:00] And like, And, and we can, you know, ask, it’s like, Hey, what’s working for you right now? And it’s like, oh, that’s really interesting, right?

Because we’re both really busy people or, you know, have a lot, a lot going on. We’re trying to go above and beyond in our work, but we’re also, you know, need a grocery shop and clean and I. Date at the time and work out and it’s like, hey, like we don’t really have any extra time. Like, what are you doing to get more time?

Right? Yeah. And, and it’s really interesting when someone’s like also in the trenches and maybe they’re two steps ahead, maybe they’re at the same level, maybe they’re two steps behind. But I think there’s always a way to create value even at those different levels. Um, And then I, I think it’s like just a nerd out with you for a second.

There’s, there’s something called like Web 3.0, which is like the age of the internet that we’re living in now, where these. Where basically the internet is talking to each other. It’s like through these APIs, these application program interfaces, the internet has become horizontal. And [00:17:00] if we look back on it, web 1.0 was when it was like really only available for these like academics and engineers and, and elites.

It was, it was not like open and then Web 2.0. Was when it started to be democratized, but it was very vertical. Kind of like the way you were talking about like being at an event and there was like a speaker and they were like, it’s like this top down approach. Mm-hmm. And then it moved to this Web 3.0, which I described.

I think personal development is going through that same transition where 1.0 was, you know, 500,000, 2000 years ago when a lot of these ideas were only available to the elites, whether that was the government or. Or, you know, in within religions or, or, you know, they’re very rich. And then over time it started to be democratized.

I think Benjamin Franklin supported that effort, Napoleon Hill. And now there’s just been this like influx of authors and speakers and, and, and people that have, are trying to share their wisdom, but it still was like in this vertical top down [00:18:00] approach. Mm-hmm. And now I think we’ve moved to that next stage of personal development, what I call it personal development 3.0.

Where essentially now it’s horizontal and we kind of all know the answers, but, There’s a difference between knowing and doing, and the difference between those is everything. Yeah,

Tim Melanson: I agree a hundred percent. And, and yeah, I, I, I, that’s a really, really cool way to think about it as well. Uh, and, and I think we’re seeing, um, we’re with all the communication, I mean, you’re, you’re on the other side of the world.

We’re having a conversation right now. This was not possible even five years ago. I don’t even think. Was it? I, I don’t know. It, it probably was, but uh, but definitely 10 years ago it wasn’t. So, uh, I think that we have the ability now to connect with people all over the place that are in similar points in their journey and have different perspectives.

And I think before you, it was like a, like you say, I mean, it [00:19:00] was a top down approach. If you didn’t align with the person standing on stage, well then tough luck for you. And, and I’ve noticed that different speakers speak to me different ways, and some of them I connect with, some of them I don’t, you know?

Do you find

Parker Harris: that as well? I’m not sure I’m answering your question with it, but you know, it’s sometimes I think about like this from like an addiction framework where it’s like, You know, we can sit in a, in an audience and be lectured at on why not to drink alcohol or why not to use drugs or something like that.

But like, does that, like, what does that do? Um, you know, even going to a psychiatrist or going to, you know, an elite coach that specializes in this stuff. There, you know, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. But then you can go to an AA meeting, you know, and sit around a group of peers that all have the same problem.

And this like vulnerability happens. Yeah. This bond of [00:20:00] trust happens and then something inside of us, like it snaps and you know, people never drink again. It didn’t cost anything and it’s, it’s, to me, that’s like a peer-to-peer environment versus like that top-down environment. And so I think at the end of the day, this is where, you know, this is where education is going.

I. There’s a, a brilliant thought leader in the education space named Simon Kahn, who created Khan Academy, and he talks about, you know, utilizing technology within the education system. And it essentially reverses the education system where people go home and they get lecture to through YouTube or you know, whatever the on, like they watch the video, they’re able to pause it, rewind it, and really absorb it, and then they go into the classroom.

And these pockets appear, they, they do the homework in the classroom and students are helping each other. And when one person teaches, two people learn, so the teacher benefits just as much as the person that’s, you know, that’s, [00:21:00] that’s receiving the answer. And so I think that this is very human. At the end of the day, and, and I think it’s more than an emotional breakthrough or an intellectual breakthrough, I think there’s, there’s something more visceral and energetic that’s transferred, um, in this type of relationship.

Wow.

Tim Melanson: Well, we know straight up that doing something is a better, is a better way to learn than, than, than just listening. Right. So I mean, that definitely Wow. That, that is a really cool concept. I love it. I, um, I’m hoping that, so this is being taught in where, what, what, where do we find out more about

Parker Harris: that?

Yeah, so Salman Khan did a, a, an amazing Ted Talk, I think it was in 2011. Um, bill Gates actually introduces him. Wow. And, um, and it’s a nonprofit, Khan Academy is a nonprofit and they were testing this out in high schools in California at the time, I believe, if I remember correctly. Um, unfortunately, [00:22:00] and this is potentially less popular of an opinion, is, you know, the people that are really fighting against this type of transition.

Our teachers, you know, are, are the, or maybe more accurately is the teacher’s union, right. They just kinda like, like it the way it is and think that it’s working. Um, so it’s

Tim Melanson: surprising. I I I, I know a lot of teachers and they don’t think it’s

Parker Harris: working, so. Yeah. Yeah. So I, I, I think that there is some models for us to look at for how we can do it better, and I think it’s, it’s this combination of utilizing technology and then.

Know, allowing students to teach themselves to like do some peer-to-peer learning and then bring in mentors that can really share information that’s authentically relevant to the students. Where it’s not like no longer, like, why am I learning this? Why is this important? Like, I think we need to, you know, start with why like, People need to understand why it’s valuable to them to learn [00:23:00] it or even choose what is valuable to them, and then connect them to the right resource, the right person, the right experience that’s aligned with their why and their goal.

Wow.

Tim Melanson: So the next topic was gonna be practice makes perfect. But it seems as though we’ve just talked about that and because I mean a lot of the application, but is there anything else, um, you know, maybe even in your own personal life or your business life where, like are there routines? Are there ways that you get good at what you do?

Parker Harris: Yeah, that’s a good question. Um, I think people that are, are driven or ambitious and, and maybe have like, have a growth mindset is kind of like my frame on it. There’s naturally this like goal setting, like, like desire to set goals and like plan for the future. And that’s where I, I was, I was there for a long, long time and you know, and I think that for me, the keystone to really good planning and goal setting [00:24:00] is actually in reflection and looking back.

And, and for me, the way I look at, it’s like gathering data, you know, let’s, let’s, let’s build this rhythm of essentially reflecting on what happened, creating a plan for what we want to happen, and then executing that plan. And then whether it’s every three days or every week, you know, I, I would say like, you know, let’s let go of the year or the month, or remember that, that medium term.

Um, reflection piece, but like, alright, I said this was gonna happen in, in the last three days and it didn’t. Like, why not? Like, what worked, what didn’t work? What did I fail at? What am I learning from this? And how would I rate, you know, this period of time on a one to 10 scale? And do that on a consistent.

And then every month, every year, every quarter, start to look back on that data, to look for trends. Um, so that’s, that’s [00:25:00] one thing that has really moved the needle for me. I, the, when I started doing this, I, I was doing this on a weekly basis when I looked back over 50 weeks and I was like, wow, I did not have one week that was above a six, like on a one to 10 scale, like not a single week.

That’s like really interesting, right. And. Let me, let me look at like, what did I fail at? What am I learning? What were my lessons? Um, And, and I was able to like really see a few things very clearly that then over the next six weeks, I didn’t have a single week below a nine, so, wow. I, I think entrepreneurs, you know what, what gets measured, gets managed and a lot of times, you know, the only thing we’re measuring in life is, you know, is our weight or our bank account and, and maybe not even doing those things, you know, very consistently as well in cleaning the.

The wisdom or the patterns from that, um, you know, I think [00:26:00] makes us a better craftsman. Right on.

Tim Melanson: And, and, and I mean, I’ve,

Parker Harris: I’ve experienced

Tim Melanson: this process a few times as well, where you, you say you’re gonna do something and then ends up not getting done, and then you like, why do you think people have hard time telling, saying what they’re gonna do?

Like, like writing down

Parker Harris: these goals? I think instant gratification is a pretty powerful thing. Um, and. Delaying gratification and doing like suffering for the things we really want and, and like really doing the volume of what it takes to do it. Like, I think a lot of times it is like, oh, I want 20% more, or like, whatever it is, right?

Like, I want to, I wanna lose this amount of weight, or I want 20% more money, or, or whatever it is. But in order to do that, we have to do 10 times as much, or a hundred times as much. It’s not just doing 20% more so, People tend to think very linearly, and I don’t [00:27:00] think growth is, I think growth is non-linear often.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. I think also we tend to, like, I I, I keep on hearing this thing, you know, don’t wanna get my hopes up, you know, that kind of thing. Right. And, you know, you, you don’t necessarily put what your goal is gonna be because then if you don’t get it, then you feel depressed or whatever it is. Right. You think that might have something that maybe there’s a psychological

Parker Harris: aspect of it.

Maybe, um, I, I, I tend to not think with, with a lot of, like, hope in mind. I’m a pretty much like a make it happen person. Yeah. But I, I think a lot of times we judge success on lagging KPIs, whether it’s like, you know, the, a lot of times the way that goals are set, it’s the output versus the input. Yeah. As I’ve started to set more like input goals and like the leading KPIs, and I think one of the biggest challenges is most people don’t know what they have to do to hit that goal.

Right? It’s like, it’s easy to have the goal, but it’s, it’s a lot harder to know what we need to do [00:28:00] and do those things every day to achieve that goal. Yeah. And, and

Tim Melanson: just for, and any, if anybody doesn’t know what we’re talking about, like, uh, it would be the difference between setting a sales goal versus a number of calls goal.

If you’re, if you’re saying, oh, I wanna make three sales tomorrow, uh, well that’s a great goal, I guess. But get there. Everybody wants to make three sales tomorrow. Yeah. Yeah. And, and but on the other hand, if you say, I’m gonna make 10 calls, that’s something that’s in your direct control. And like you said earlier, I mean, if I say, if I write down my piece of paper, I’m gonna make 10 calls and then tomorrow I don’t, I look at that and I go, oh, I didn’t make 10 calls.

Pretty clear you didn’t make 10 calls. And you could have, but if I say make. It’s easier to, to, to brush that away. Well, I made, I made 50 calls and I didn’t make any sales. Like you, you know, next thing you know you’re gonna say, well, tomorrow I’m gonna set a goal, make two sales. Like you have these decreasing goals if you do it that

Parker Harris: way.

Right? Yeah. I think what you said is, is, is [00:29:00] is often how people learn this lesson. I think salespeople are one of the first to like learn the leading versus lagging. Um, because it’s so cut and dry and like easy to measure it. I also. Not to continue to back on the education system. Um, I think that the education system can, can set us up for, for.

Failure or doesn’t, maybe a better way is like doesn’t prepare us as well, whether it’s being a rock star or whether it’s being an entrepreneur or a salesperson. Like if you think about the failure rate associated with those type of callings or those type of professions, it’s so high. Right, like, I think the last statistic I saw was that 95% of small businesses don’t make it like, like fail within five years or just businesses fail within five years of starting.

If you think of baseball, right, like the best baseball players in the world fail 70% of the time. Like they’re, you know, to get to the Hall of Fame, you need a 300 batting average. Um, you know, I’m not, I’m not a musician or, or an artist, but, [00:30:00] When I’ve studied those stories, it’s usually just fraught with failure.

Even being an actor, right, or an actress, like, it’s just, there’s so much failure that when we come from a system that desires that a hundred percent or that a, it’s like I. It’s very difficult to have the emotional bravery and the courage and just the grit to, to get through that significant amount of failure.

Even the best salesman in the world, right? They have like a 30% conversion rate, so that means they’re failing 70% of the time. And as someone that sells, I, I, I still can take it personally and I’m like, oh, no more. Like I just, you know, tap out. But it’s like, that doesn’t, that doesn’t serve me. I. So that’s one thing I, I find is really interesting with like the money game is I think the people that make the most money are the people that are willing to experience the most amount of failure.

Yeah. Well, let’s talk a little

Tim Melanson: bit about money then. So how do you manage your cash flow? How, how, how? Like what are some tips that we can [00:31:00] make sure that we have more common in than going

Parker Harris: out? Yeah. I mean I think that starts with measuring it, you know, and I, I think that’s something, you know, money is often can be a very emotional life.

Thing for an individual. It was for me for a long time where like I like didn’t even want to look, you know, at, at, whether it’s a credit card statement or a bank statement or like even the financials. It was something I did at the end of the year because I had to for tax purposes. Um, now I measure it on a daily basis.

Yeah. And, and measuring that on a daily basis, it becomes very visceral, you know? Um, and I think it goes back to the instant gratification piece too, is. Yeah, often instant gratification is the most expensive thing. And, you know, delayed gratification is, is where, you know, is where the gains come from. So, um, I think it becomes like a matter of changing our relationships sometimes with money and, and also changing.[00:32:00]

The pattern of measuring, you know, I don’t even think monthly is enough. I know a lot of corporations do like month end close or, or whatever, and they have their reasons for doing that. But yeah, as an entrepreneur, for me, measuring my net worth and cash flow on a daily basis, something happens with my relationship with money where it, it’s doesn’t become as very, doesn’t become as fun to spend.

Change in, in mindset from spending to investing. Right? And it’s like I no longer even enjoy spending money. I enjoy investing money and I enjoy that investment. Paying a return that then will impact my cash flow in a positive way. And, and really like having, like knowing what that is and figuring out how that impacts my life, my lifestyle, my impact, and you know, the people important to me.

Tim Melanson: Love it. Yeah. And, uh, so now why do you have a good relationship with [00:33:00] money?

Parker Harris: I think part of it has just been willing to like, continue walking the path. Um, and I also surround myself with some incredible people that do have a good relationship with money, um, for whatever reason, um, that, that have been able to share their wisdom with me.

So I think that, that, you know, Can highlight some of the benefits of a Mastermind. And I think another idea that has been valuable to me is like walking people out of my life that aren’t like serving me or we’re not heading that same direction. So, um, that’s something that that also comes up as well.

Yeah.

Tim Melanson: And that’s super difficult too, especially if it’s people that have been very closely for a very long time. Right?

Parker Harris: Yeah. Yeah. I’m. It, it, it definitely is challenging. I, you know, I think sometimes it’s, it is just that pain and pleasure and when the pain, you know, becomes more than the pleasure of, of keeping the [00:34:00] relationship.

It’s something that’s naturally happens. But I think that sometimes people don’t have the difficult conversation and they kind of just ignore exit. And I don’t think that that necessarily supports either one of those people. Maybe it does, but what I’ve noticed from going through that journey, In those conversations is that some of those people can reenter my life in the future.

Um, and they’ll be grateful, right? It’s like it’s, I think it’s part of leadership is, is leading by example sometimes, and then that can be a wake up call and shift people, um, into a new place. I.

Tim Melanson: I think that’s really valuable because I’ve noticed the same, I mean, people follow leaders, right? They don’t follow followers, and you know, if you’re making a decision that you’re going to be, you know, more responsible with your money, more responsible with your health, or whatever it happens to be, and you’re gonna make these different choices, you might be surprised because the people that are holding you back, you know, quote unquote, they [00:35:00] may be waiting for you to lead.

And, you know, I’ve definitely experienced that in, in my life and I’ve seen it, you know, in other people’s lives as well, where they, you know, they’ve, they’ve been on this bad path for a long time with this person, and then they make a change and that person follows them and ends up passing them. Right.

Parker Harris: You know? Yeah. And then potentially pulling them up in the future. Right. And it becomes this amazing, um, you know, visuals like climbing a mountain and sometimes one person’s getting pulled up and sometimes they’re walking together and sometimes the other person’s pulling them up. Yeah. Um, I think, you know, you mentioned earlier like the mindset piece, um, being.

Sometimes easy and maybe the tactics and strategies being the hard part. For me it was the opposite. I think the mindset piece was more challenging. And then once I got the right mindset, some of the tactics and strategies like either found me or I, I already knew them. Um, and I think one of the biggest challenges I see in the world and, and maybe just within my own life and my own family, um, is.[00:36:00]

Like a victim mentality, a survival mentality. Like I grew up and my father was said to me like point blank. He was like, plan A is to survive and have a good time, instant gratification, plan B is to survive. Right. And it was, and it came from a good place for him because he grew up without a dad and slept on the couch and joined the military when he was 17 and.

Was dependency for a, a lot of it. And so he was just like, I’m never gonna be dependent again and I’m gonna survive on my own. And that was his, you know, generational, like uplifting us as a, as a family out of dependency. Um, and I gotta grow up in that, in that survival place. And then I gotta look ahead of that and being like, What does thriving look like?

What does success look like? And like I’m looking around and I don’t see it, so I have to go find it. And so that led me to move out when I was in high school and like go find another path. Um, So sometimes I think this [00:37:00] like larger journey of success and self-actualization and transcendence and Maslow’s, you know, hierarchy of needs is not all like, is sometimes not just like a, a single person’s journey.

Sometimes I think it’s like a multi-generational journey and you know, we have to figure out where we’re at in that journey. Yeah.

Tim Melanson: Um, yeah. Yeah. And just to clarify what I said earlier about the, the, the, the mindset versus the tactics is that I think that if you have the mindset, you will find those tactics eventually, which is gonna make a whole bunch of stakes in the process.

And so, you know, what we were talking about is, is the inception of this podcast is that I wanted to tackle the tactics directly to try to save time. Uh, because the people who have the mindset are looking for these tactics right now.

Parker Harris: Right. And I and I, but I also, I, I appreciate you, you clarifying that. I think the mistakes are an important part of the journey too, and often judging ourselves on the mistake, and I [00:38:00] spent so much time doing this.

That’s why I can see this is like judging myself for that mistake and then assigning that to my identity and thinking that because of these mistakes that I made, I couldn’t be who I want to be in the future. I was essentially creating a false narrative for myself that was playing out and keeping me.

In this like downward spiral. And when I got clear on what the story was that I was telling myself and was like able to look at it and be like, is this story true? And it’s like, no, probably not. Like I’m still young. I if, if I keep on believing it’s true, it’s true. But if I start rewriting that story and, and make it one that serves me, my identity can shift.

And that again, is moving from that victim mentality to a hero’s mentality. Wow.

Tim Melanson: So it’s time for you to guest solo. Tell me what’s exciting in your business right now.

Parker Harris: Uh, I, I remember what I was gonna say earlier. Do you mind if I just jump one thing in into Absolutely. Go ahead. This was, this came up on the cashflow piece of it was [00:39:00] doing more with less.

I think that that’s something that. You know, like there is so many resources out there that we already have at our fingertips that, that 50 years ago, even 20 years ago wasn’t even possible. Whether it’s social media or YouTube or, you know, I, you know, I think libraries were one of the first like iterations of this, right?

Where it just like democratized information and resources for people, but, I spend so much time just like wanting to do more and like do, do more, do more, do more. And then I had, I’ve had a realization recently where it’s like, no, just do what I’m already doing better. And so those are kind of two paradoxical ideas that I think can really contribute to more cash flow and better cash flow management for people.

Nice. Um, so yeah, I agree with you. Thanks, Tim. [00:40:00] What’s exciting in my business, so, um, We’ve been in business for 10 years now, and, um, we’re at a point where we’ve, Frank, Frank Kern, uh, who’s a, a brilliant like online marketer and, and just online business owner has the same like every six months you should fire half, you double your prices and fire half your customers, and it hasn’t been quite linear like that for us, but, Um, after really wanting to go broad and serve everyone, because I really believe in peer-to-peer learning, we’ve really narrowed down on who we serve and how we serve them and seek to be the best at the world at what we do.

And that’s created a lot of viral growth where our members refer people that they know that they think that would be a good fit for our community and our mastermind. And so last week we got. 13 referrals just from our existing members, and we’re in the process of launching a new mastermind and new forum, [00:41:00] and that really excites me, the possibility of serving more people.

I, I get to see the impact that this has on someone’s business in terms of like growing revenue as well as like increasing profitability. And I think those two things are great. I also get to see this other side of it where, They, they get to enjoy their business in a, in a way that maybe they weren’t enjoying it before, kind of getting to that point of burnout.

Um, maybe feeling like they were in a silo and potentially not enjoying the journey anymore. And sometimes like, um, Mark Twain has this quote that I, that really stuck with me. It was, um, it’s not what you don’t know that’s gonna hurt you. It’s what you know that isn’t so, and I think masterminds are an environment where we can get challenged around what we know that isn’t so.

And because it’s. There’s that horizontal environment where there’s a certain level of vulnerability and trust, and people really understand what we’re going through and have our best interests in mind. [00:42:00] Those challenges come from a place where we can hear them and, and maybe make a shift. That’s just a two degree shift that ends up making all of the difference in the destination that, that they’re going, and so, It impacts the business, like I mentioned, but I also see them that starts rippling out into their health, into their family, and then, you know, just into their, their own life and lifestyle that they get to live.

Wow. So who would be

Tim Melanson: the best, uh, who would get the most out of one of your masterminds or, or

Parker Harris: working with you? Yeah, I mean, so long. Um, long term we really hope to get this into colleges and high schools, and I also have me mentors that are in their sixties and seventies and are like, Parker, I don’t have, you know, 10 people that I can talk to about the things that most matter to me.

I. And I’m a millionaire and I still have dreams. Right. And I think, um, you know, I think we live in this, you know, this world of hyperconnectivity, but a lack of true connection [00:43:00] sometimes to other people as well as ourselves. Yeah. Um, So at the end of the day, like we, we serve people with a growth mindset that are really on their hero’s journey.

Um, because of the price point and, and the level of investment, we’re usually looking at like high, high earners that are really committed to being in a fundamentally different place. They’re, they’re experiencing in something in their life where they’re like, something has to change. Right. And I feel, I feel stuck and.

And, and I know there’s gotta be, I know that there’s a way to level up or there’s a, I know there’s a way to make things different, but I just don’t know what that way is. And all of a sudden they’re a little bit more open to getting the answer or hearing the answer that maybe is already within them sometimes too.

Um, So, so we really serve entrepreneurs that are doing at least multiple six figures. Um, up until about 10 million in revenue is kind of our sweet spot, and, um, and are committed to growing their business and [00:44:00] growing their profitability. And also interested in like, holistic goals. So it’s not just about money, money, money, but there’s often, you know, a desire for personal development, health, better relationships and, and having a positive impact on the world.

Wow. Love it. So how did we find out more about it? Uh, you can go to our website. It’s Junto Global, that’s j u n t o global. And um, I’m also pretty active on social media where I try to share some of the wisdom that our community discusses and creates. Love it.

Tim Melanson: I love it. This has been a a lot of fun. I loved rocking out with you today, Parker, this has been great.

Parker Harris: I appreciate being able to be a rockstar with you for the day.

Tim Melanson: Awesome. Thank you. And thanks to the rock stars as well as who are listening. Make sure you subscribe right and comment, and we’ll see you next time on the Work at Home Rockstar

Intro: podcast. Thanks for listening To learn how you can become a work at home rockstar or become a better one, head on over to work@homerockstar.com today.[00:45:00]