How To SET & ACHIEVE GOALS Like A MILLIONAIRE! |Shark Tank's Kevin O'Leary & Evan Carmichael

Hey, Mr. Wonderful here, and I've got an amazing new episode of Ask Mr. Wonderful because it's the Kevin Evans Show! Yeah, Evan Carmichael. Amazing! We're going to ask each other questions, and you're going to hear it all. This is going to be absolutely spectacular.

I think first, it starts with you having a goal that you actually want to follow through on, right? I think a lot of people set goals that they don't actually care about. They set a goal because they see somebody else doing it, and they think, "Oh, I want to do that." But you don't actually deeply want to do that thing, or your parents want you to do it, and you don't actually want to do that thing.

I think it's really hard to have a big goal and stick to it if you don't have the passion for actually achieving that goal. And then the second part is just having a schedule for success. Like, you can have a dream, but if it's not in your calendar, it's not happening.

Yeah, that's a good point. I've made a lot of money in my investment career with women CEOs and entrepreneurs. More than half have come from successful women, and there was one in the wedding industry. She ran a very, very large online wedding registry business and taught me something that I now use today. It's very simple; she takes sticky notes—old tech yellow sticky notes—and she writes the night before three things she's going to get done before she texts, emails, watches anything, or engages in anything or anybody.

She puts them on her mirror, so when she's putting her makeup on in the morning, they're sitting right there, and she does nothing until she's torn them up. Three things! Three things! I do that every day now. Every day, it's powerful—it's really powerful. You know what you haven't finished the evening of, and you simply put the three things down. I swear it's so corny and so low tech, but it works, and it makes me so productive because I get those things done before anything else, and they really make my day productive. And it doesn't have to just be business; it could be some personal thing you got to get done, a medical thing, something else—it's just the things that really matter in your life towards achieving your goal. That's the new thing for me.

That's the next business: Mr. Wonderful Sticky Notes!

Yeah, Mr. Winner! I have a business that's called McSquares, and it's actually magnetic sticky notes. We're crowdfunding it right now on Start Engine. It's a Shark Tank deal, and the reason I did the deal was the sticky notes, but now we have little magnets you just throw anywhere around the room. I just love it.

And what, you write your goals on the magnet?

Yeah, it's just with a felt pen. Nick Squares—it's just a fantastic idea! And there are big ones and small ones, and because everybody's working at home now, kids love them. You know, there's multiple colors. They're not paper, but they're reusable, and that's another theme these days. But that's kind of why that was the crazy reason I invested in it.

It ended up being a pretty good investment. It's that it's reminding yourself in your goal setting that you need to establish a timetable, which goes to your reference of the schedule, right? I mean, where'd that schedule thing come from?

I just think if you're not following through, you either don't want to do it or you're afraid to do it. You don't want to do it because you don't love it; you don't have the passion for it, or you're afraid to do it, and you allow other things into your calendar and schedule, and you live somebody else's version of your life.

Well, how do you run yours? Do you have one where you're looking at what you've scheduled for the next day?

After I go through the morning routine, I do different things on different days. So today, as opposed to my CEO day—Friday is my CEO day—and I think about what are the big picture things I need to do to grow my business, and also just stay in touch with the people who could make an impact on my business. So I'm here, we're doing this here on a Friday. This works.

Monday, I spend the whole day mentoring my team. Tuesday, I spend the whole day working on YouTube content. Wednesday, I pick a project that I want to work on—it's totally free to do whatever I want. So, Wednesday is my white open. Right now, what I want to do on Wednesday? Like, what do I want to focus on? Just the whole day because I think switching the tasks are too high.

To switch between mentoring somebody to then writing a book to then doing a YouTube video, it just mentally—I don’t know, maybe it’s just me—that the mental switching costs are too high versus the setup to make a YouTube video. To do one video, you might as well do ten because the lights are all set up and the camera's set up, and you know we’ve done our hair—I’ve done my hair too—and you're in the flow, you’re in the zone like you’re in content mode, which is a different energy than going to write a book.

So I think being able to create your schedule around not just getting tasks done, yes, but around just your optimal energy zones allows you to be a lot more productive.

Let's talk about writing books because I've written three of these things now. This is hard work; this is not as easy as people think. I believe in the book business, in that it's almost like a business card you hand somebody—it has your philosophy encapsulated in it—but the actual process of writing 11 or 12 chapters, I found very challenging, and each time it didn't get easier; it got harder because I wanted to make sure I wasn't going over the same ground again in the third book that I wasn't in the first.

I think it forces you to organize your thoughts and get a flow to it because I remember the way I used to do it—I’d write from 10 to midnight trying to write a chapter in a night—and then I’d get really excited about it, I’d drink a whole bottle of Burgundy while I was doing it, and I’d think, “This is a great chapter!” I’d get up in the morning and read it and say, “This is [__]!” And that would happen over and over again.

Finally, I needed to get someone to bounce ideas off, and I started working with a ghostwriter, and I found that really helped me. I'd send it to her. She works out of Los Angeles, and she'd say, “Kevin, this is garbage," or "This is good, and why don’t we go in this direction, that direction?” But it made it a lot longer to do it, but the books kept getting better, and I could test them by how much more they sold.

So I'm working on my fourth now; I'm hating every minute of it, but I think it’s going to be my best. But I always say that about every book.

How do you do yours?

Well, I like that mindset too, is that I think you always want the next one to be the best one. One of my biggest fears early on was I don’t want to be the aging rock star and be, you know, in my 70s and still singing my songs from my 30s, right? It’s like, the next one is always the best, the next video I want it to be the best—not, “Hey, go look at what I did when I was 22.”

So that resonates with me. For me, you know, these are non-fiction books. To write a non-fiction book, I think that a lot of the practice comes through all the experience that you've built. I think it's a different process if you're doing fiction; you're going to come up with narrative and storytelling and all that. But this book came when I was on tour last year, and I was hitting the city every four days and doing a speech in front of a group, and the questions that people asked me, I just kept kept like a note of what people kept asking me over and over again.

And then it turned it into—and you got thematically—you would get some very questions over and over again that people had, right? And say, “That is a kernel. That’s an important question because they keep getting it all the time. Is that the idea?”

Yeah, I was on tour, and people kept asking me, “How do I find my purpose? How do I find my purpose? How do I find my prayers?” Like the number one question in every city across America. I said, “Well, that’s pretty easy. You don’t have to sit on top of a mountain for ten years or hire 20 thousand business coaches; you know, there’s a three-step process to find your purpose.” And I just guided them through, and then everyone said, “Pick me! Pick me! Do it with me!” It’s like, “Okay, well, I’ll turn it into a book,” and that became Built to Serve.

Sounds good! I gotta read that book, man! That sounds pretty good. I got to find my purpose; there’s no question. That's great!

I have been getting a lot of questions about wardrobe as an entrepreneur. East Coast tends to be a little more formal—ties are involved—a suit in the traditional days where you would go rolling around to VCs and pitch your ideas. West Coast—no tie—that was the original thing. And now I say it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what you wear. If you want to be naked with tattoos, you can do that, but it’s going to limit the scope of who you’re going to get to see. It might help—depends on the market—it might help, but there is no wardrobe for success, is what I tell people now.

It's your personal style—you're reflecting on what you wear. I learned something years and years ago shooting Dragon’s Den in Canada, then Shark Tank, and I worked for Discovery Channel. I think probably Steve Jobs, who I used to work for at Apple— I used to do his educational software—he always wore the same thing, always. And I asked him one day, “Why do you always wear the same outfit?” You know, that look that he had—the jeans? He said, “I have 25 of these, 25 of these tops, 25 of these jeans, 25 belts, 25 sets of shoes. I never have to spend a second worrying about what I’m going to wear.”

So I learned from him; my outfit for Shark Tank is the same white shirt, black tie, black suit, and it has been for 12 years, and I’m the only guy that doesn't have to do pickups because they can take a shot of me 10 years ago and use it today. You know, maybe I'm a little grayer, but it's the same suit, and I always wear watches with red bands so that there's a continuity to it.

So I’d argue continuity and simplicity are really good if you're an entrepreneur. It takes that one element and reduces it so that it’s a single decision every day.

What do you think?

When I started my first business at 19, I was honestly even too afraid to talk to anybody. So I did all my business over email—I never went to go see anybody because I was afraid of, you know, disappointing, the rejection. And as I slowly started getting out in front of people, I wore a suit everywhere. My normal attire was in a suit, but if I knew I had a meeting, it’d always be a suit because I felt that was professional.

But you’d have to buy multiple suits?

No, I had one suit. I didn’t have a lot of money. I made 300 bucks a month, you know, so I bought one suit, and then I had a meet, and I just made sure that that suit was ready to go. And slowly, as I got more confident, I slowly lost the suit. It just became a blazer, then it just became a polo, and then it became, eventually morphed into this. And I've got at least 25 of these, which is the logo, and branded, and you know, custom colors and all that stuff.

And now when I show up, this is how I show up. It hasn't offended anybody. I had to give an award at a black tie event, so I wore my hoodie, but I had slacks and decent shoes on. I think ultimately, it’s opened up a lot, so you’ve got a lot more freedom and flexibility than ever.

I think just keep in mind of who you’re meeting. You know, if you’re trying to go get a bank loan for your company, showing up naked probably doesn’t give you, you know, that might be your expression, but it probably doesn’t give you the best shot at getting that loan. So just keep in mind of the types of person that you're selling into, and not only, you know, not dressing in a way you would never dress just to try to please them, but just keeping that in mind so that you don’t offend them because otherwise, you're putting yourself behind the ball to try to get.

How about this one while we're staying on personal dress: I met with an entrepreneur two weeks ago that had a lightning bolt across his forehead tattooed. It's distracting; it's a big one. And you know, you can’t really get anywhere until you address it because it’s so out there. How do you feel about tattoos?

I don’t have any tattoos. I don’t mind them. For me, I would work with someone who’s got a tattoo on their forehead. I like the expression; I think it just—it can help you in some circles and hurt you in other circles. I would say the bank loan’s a little harder.

Yeah, lightning bolt across your head — it might be a little harder, but coming to what about coming with Shark Tank? Somebody came on with a lightning bolt on their forehead?

Actually, someone did. And so, we’re going to test that theory. It turns out the tattoo industry is a multi-billion dollar industry now, and it’s also a community, and it’s also a culture. Ink has been on human beings since tribal times, and so it really—I—it changed my mind to see all the businesses that were tattoo-oriented that showed up on Shark Tank because of the size of that industry now.

There's a health aspect to it, there’s an ink application and removal industry, there is a maintenance of tattoo industry; I mean, it is a business. And so, I respect it that way. So if you’re going to be leading one of those businesses and you have a lightning bolt in your forehead, I get it—that’s your flag, and I’m cool with it.

I don’t care; I mean, like to me, can you make money? Can you build a business? And their argument was this: like, lightning bolt is my business, right? And it’s a good bolt—it's going up to the right. I like that! I said, “I got it; I totally get it.”

And so, I’m cool with it; it doesn’t bother me at all. And I think it’s part of your wardrobe really. It's just knowing your audience, right? If somebody's coming in, they're going to talk to Kevin O’Leary, you’ve got to show them how to make money, and they can, yeah, if they can do that, you’ll talk to them—sure. That’s why I’m there. I mean, I’m trying to invest in opportunities, but it takes a certain amount of discipline to mark your face up that way because you know it’s going to be for life.

Even the removal of it is difficult because the skin is so thin against the scalp, so it sounds like you’ve done a lot of research.

Well, I learned a lot from this individual, and we talked a lot about it, and this person was very knowledgeable about the industry and the new technologies coming into the tattoo artistry. There are inks that are more removable, for example, and colors that are more preferred that don’t bleed as much, and all this stuff. Who knew?

What really nailed me was multi-billion dollar!

Evan, how do you stay motivated daily?

You have to feel like when you wake up today, the work you’re going to do matters—that it means something to the world, to somebody, to some people. You might have a big mission; you want to save the world. Some people might wake up and just want to feel of value to their family. They may not have some giant mission; they might not be an entrepreneur, but you just want to—you care about the 25 closest people to you. You want to feel like when you wake up today matters. It means something. I'm going to create something that’s going to have an impact on something.

So you could be a mother caring for a child, or you could be an entrepreneur with 100,000 employees. Yeah, but it's still—it’s a mindset. It's about how do you stay motivated? It's the mindset that today is going to matter because if you wake up especially consistently and feel like it doesn’t matter—nobody cares if I show up or not, nobody cares if I make a video or not, or show up to my office or not—if you felt like that, that's the path down to depression; that's the path to not creating a successful business or company or happy life.

So how can you connect the daily work that you do into service, into helping other people? And it will have to evolve and change. You know, I’ve had my YouTube channel for 11 years. It’s not the exact same; I'm still making videos—the format's similar—but the content has shifted and evolved and changed over the years. Otherwise, you get bored just showing up and photocopying your life every day.

So it’s connecting on a daily basis, why does today matter? What am I about to do today? If you don’t have an answer to that question, you’re not going to have a great day. And if that's consistent, you're not gonna have a great life.

I agree with that; I would put a slight twist on it. I want to pursue the things that interest me. I’m a bit of a Ying and Yang, or I like a little arts. I like to play music—I’m a photographer; I’m an editor—but I also like business, so I deal with my 50-plus portfolio companies daily, and I don’t know the difference anymore between a weekday and a weekend. It’s all blended together, and I think that's the new digital world.

I try and, you know, have a routine. I like to get up early and work out, burn 500 calories on the bike or the Peloton or the elliptical, whatever it is—routine matters. But I always try and do two artistic endeavors a day, like edit or, you know, go to my recording studio, record some music, or something that has nothing to do with making money to keep my mind in a balance.

And the whole idea of being an entrepreneur, I say that to anybody listening to this, is you're buying your freedom. You're working really hard to one day have financial freedom. It’s not about the greed of money; it’s about the greed of wanting to be free. And that’s what I think.

So I do things that I really enjoy, and I look at my schedule each week with Nancy who runs it, and I say, “No, I don’t want to do that. Don’t want to do that. Don’t want to do that. Let’s do this, do this, do this.” Why? Because I can!

And I wish everybody gets to that place. There’s nothing worse than feeling that you’re enslaved and doing something you don’t want to do. You're not in that situation; I'm not, and I wish everybody achieves in their life freedom.

And now, that may be that you have to provide some financial stability to your life, but you don’t need to be uber-wealthy to get it. It’s just what is free to you, and I just don’t think you should work for somebody your whole life. You should figure out how to work for yourself at some point.

That’s the whole theme of what we were talking about today. If you look at your calendar and you hate everything on there, you’re not gonna be motivated. If you look at your calendar, A, and it doesn’t have any white space, and B, you hate everything you’re doing, you’re [__]. That’s the definition of hell. So if that’s your situation, you need to change it. You need to work on changing that because you don’t deserve to live like that. That’s horrible!

And so I look at my calendar saying, “This looks good this week! Let’s do this! Let’s do that!” You know, there’s a bunch of balance in there. You got to do with family stuff and the arts and business and everything else, and you can’t make everybody happy all the time, so you might as well make yourself happy—not to sound greedy about it, just that’s just the way it is.

Evan, let me ask you this question: Should you lend money to family members? Should you hire family members in your business? How do you deal with the pressure of a family member saying, “Hey, you’re a successful entrepreneur. I want to work for you,” or “I want money from you?”

I love working with family! My wife joined the business two years ago or something. I love working with family; I love it a lot. It really depends on the strength of your ability to communicate, and a good test is how have you handled other problems? You know, the first person I hired in my business ever was my best friend from high school, and I had to fire him, so that’s a lesson—but it saved—we're still friends.

It’s how you communicate; I think that’s at the core of everything. So he was writing content; I had a website before I did YouTube about a website. We had 100,000 pages of content, and he was writing content for my website, and I needed content like every day.

Like, “Andrew, come on, man! Let’s—and he was an English major writing the perfect novel, and it took him a long time to write a single—and you were saying, “Chop chop! Let’s go, man! Like what are we doing?”

And it started impacting our friendship and our relationship, and it just came to communication and say, “Hey, we just want different things. I’m not saying what you’re doing is wrong, it’s just not what we need. You know, I need somebody who can pump out the articles a little bit faster than what you’re doing, and I don’t care if a period is misplaced or like spending hours on the perfect word.”

So I’ve loved working with family members over the years; I haven’t lent money to people. I don’t—most of the time, money isn’t the problem. I think in most businesses, I just operate from I want to make money before I’m spending it. So, I’ve never had, you know, like having debt. I haven’t had debt in my business ever.

And you know, pros and cons, now I don’t even know what to do now—we’ve got too much incoming! I don’t know what to do with it.

Yeah, you’re not making any interest on cash anymore; it’s very difficult—I get it, but it’s—I have no debt either. I don’t like that; I don’t like what that does to you. But regarding family, I have a different attitude. Now, when a family member comes to me and says, “Look, I need money; I want to take—I want to borrow money from you,” I recommend this to anybody that’s dealing with this problem: I say to them, “I don’t want to lend you any money; I’m going to give you money, and I never want it returned, but I never want you to ask for it again.”

If you’re asking me to borrow money for whatever reason, no, but I’ll give it to you, but our contract between each other now is you never ask again. It’s worked for me, and it’s very difficult because I have a very large extended family, and I would rather, you know, keep business and family in a separate place because I can’t stand sitting around the Thanksgiving table and having the tension of loans between family members sitting there just destroyed.

Money destroys families sometimes when there’s too much of it; it just does! And really, it should be about being in the family and taking care of each other, but that doesn’t extend to, “Oh, I want to open a disco; I need a hundred thousand dollars.” Well, no, I don’t want to be in the disco business, you know, the bar business and the restaurant business—those are businesses I don’t want to invest in for a whole minute of reasons.

But I’ve faced that in our own family, and I’ve decided no loans—gift—never ask again.

I like it; that’s a cool policy.

Yeah, I would never do it for business just because that’s not how I run a business, like go find a way to start smaller, just start smaller.

Yeah, whatever your idea is, find a way to start smaller.

I like that idea—start smaller because it doesn’t require too much capital, and you can road test your idea. And if you can sell it to 100 people, you can sell to a million people; that’s the way I look at it too. But I can’t stand companies that continually keep raising money and losing more and losing more and saying, “Don’t worry; I’m the next Amazon.” The chance of that happening is very low. If you can’t be profitable after 36 months, you're probably going to fail—that's the way I look at it.

So how about working with friends or family?

I went through that high school story you said, and I did fire my high school buddy, and we are not the closest of friends anymore because it was a contentious—see, I don’t like hiring friends. I’d rather say, “Look, we’re in a business relationship here. I’d rather treat it that way. I don’t want—I want to keep my friends as friends; I want to keep my business partners as business partners.” So I have a divide.

Because of my experience, you’re a better communicator than I am. I’m going to whack you!

But let’s be friends! I mean, you’re a really good kumbaya guy!

Like I’m a kumbaya guy, dude! If you’re the fact that Anthony’s here filming—yeah, my regular camera guy is in quarantine because he’s getting back from the U.S. So, Anthony filled in—but like if you’re around me, you have to be getting better.

I listen, I appreciate that. I mean, the thing is by all the metrics that you can measure success, you’re achieving success, whether it be how you’re scaling your YouTube channel, publishing books, being transparent with people—that's important.

I mean, you know, before we sat down, I went and looked at your stuff, you know, because you’re out there and you can look at—as you said, go back years and look at the content—you’re a very transparent guy. You are definitely not bullshitting people, and you can just feel it, and I think that’s very, very important.

Not everybody can do that, and that’s where your brand value is. So I congratulate you! And frankly, I don’t do interviews with people I don’t like; I don’t have to.

And so, you know what? We just met, and we, you know, we know of each other, but this has been great, and I think it’s interesting that some things we agree on, some things we don’t, and that’s why—it’s a market; that’s the way it is.

What has been my biggest failure, and what did I learn from it?

I guess a financial failure is what we’re talking about here as an entrepreneur, and I’ve had some doozies. I’ve made some big mistakes. One of them I tried to do a cable channel with one of the largest telco companies in the U.S. to consolidate online gaming so you paid one subscription fee, and you got all the online games. We were early; I lost millions of dollars doing that.

And I also got involved with a really large company, so everything was tied up in bureaucracy all the time; it was a big mistake. I won't mention which one, but you know, I learned from that. I’ve never made that mistake again. That was my biggest financial failure because it was millions and millions of dollars, and it was my money.

And so, it frustrated me. But the great thing is, you know, it doesn’t matter how successful you are, you’re still going to make mistakes, but you’ve got to learn from them. Today, I like to say I make new mistakes; I don’t make old ones, but you’re always winning and losing.

And so I make new mistakes now, and I’m learning, and that’s what they call experience.

I guess I lost a 40 million deal when I was 21; I could have sold my company. I was too slow because I was trying to be perfect, and I stomped out the perfectionist gene in me of now just go release and create.

I got another deal; it wasn’t as good. I mean, you could have made 41 million when you were 21.

Yeah, you bozo!

Yeah, I know exactly; I still feel it!

You’re a kid!

Yeah, like we had a biotech software company as my first business, and we were building it and having a lot of success, and the market was consolidating. So like this is our time to sell, or we have to wait for the next round to come however many years later.

And I spent the whole summer working on our plan for how we would sell the company, and I picked the right market, but I picked the wrong company. I thought we’d sell to the number one company, and it just made sense, but when we actually went to talk to them, they didn’t care about us.

It ended up being the number four company that made the big play that raised an 800 million dollar fund to go buy companies, and I didn’t know enough to go think, “Hey, the big guy; of course, they’re going to buy us.” Not that they’re slow and lazy and they don’t care.

It’s the number four guy who wants to be the number one guy, so we got to the table three months late; they were already talking our biggest competitor. They said, “We love you guys; we love your software, but we've already done the due diligence with these guys,” and they bought it for 40 million.

Ouch! Now, would we have gotten the deal guaranteed if I was there earlier? No, it’s not a guarantee, but 50% chance!

But listen, what you’ve learned from that—I mean, that won’t happen to you again. You won’t make that mistake again, and you’re successful anyways, but that’s my whole point about those mistakes.

I don’t think anybody can be an entrepreneur without going through a series of mistakes that they learn from, otherwise, you know, they have no experience. But I go back and think of how painful it was and how I could have used that money for other things, and I pissed it away on that stupid deal! But I can’t change the past, so there’s nothing I can do about it, but whenever anybody wants to get me involved in a deal with a large bureaucratic company now, I just say no—not interested at all.

I like small entrepreneurial situations where decisions can be made like that and executed. You can’t do that when there are 21 people at the table for every meeting—every guy and his dog has a different thing. You know, we had lots of problems with that.

But anyway, that’s that—that’s a fantastic 40 million!

Thanks, man! [Laughter]

I had a really interesting question asked to me on a radio interview last week from an entrepreneur in California, so I’m going to ask you, Evan. There are so many Zoom calls now in business because you can't do meetings, right? And she asked me, “I have this really sophisticated series of backgrounds that are almost mood-oriented. I can have the ocean; I can have the moon rising; I can have the sun setting; or I can just have my kitchen and my condo.”

When I'm talking to potential VCs, you know, when you put the fake background on, sometimes your ear melts into it, and you know what I mean, right? So I said to her, “I’d go with the kitchen in the background; like you're real, like you're really an entrepreneur in your condo kitchen with the set. You know, the dishes stacked up back there, go verité; go honest."

What do you think?

I would almost always agree. And even this here—not like this is your office; it’s not some place that we rented out to film this. This is actually Kevin's office that we’re filming in.

I see that as, are you making a decision out of strength or weakness? And most of the time, it’s weakness. It’s fear making a decision out of fear. I don’t think is the right play. Where I would say yes to is if it's expression—if it’s just this is how—just like wearing. This is my expression.

This is how another opportunity to express yourself, whether it's putting the lightning bolt on your forehead or switching up the background so that you’re on, you know, Mars or something. But most people ask that question because they’re afraid of how they’re gonna get judged, and it’s just—it’s going to show you’re going to be nervous. They’re going to say, “What is this person doing?”

So they're coming out of the wrong place making that decision. They're trying to give a falsehood with the fake background, right? It’s coming from a place of fear and weakness. So I don’t think that’s a smart play; I like embracing the kitchen better. If you’re pitching VCs, show them your kitchen like you’re hustling; you're working hard; you don't have some lavish lifestyle—that's okay!

Maybe the sink is broken because everything you put is going into building your business, but it just shows you that kind of a question, which is very thoughtful.

Is it because of what's happened in the world? It's a present-day problem because you see, if you could do Zoom calls, you can tell right away who’s got the fake background. It’s always their heads melting into it, and there's nothing you can do with that. That’s a contrast issue in the technology, and it’s also ridiculous to have waves crashing on the beach like you’re sitting on the beach. You’re not sitting on the beach, so it’s sort of—it now is a hallmark, and people are talking about it.

I think you just lean into it, though. If you're trying to fool them, forget it! Like there’s no way you’re gonna fool them to think you’re actually in a coffee shop or you’re actually in whatever because you’re right—your ears are going to melt into the background; you’re not fooling them!

But can it be expression, like if you had your favorite guitar up on the wall or a picture of Jimi Hendrix or, you know, whoever you’re—a I like that. You know, sort of—I have done things like that or taken one of my own photographs and stuck it in the background for a point of conversation.

But I probably do six to seven Zooms a day now with my own team and many, many other teams, and Zoom is not going away. I think it’s going to reduce business travel by 15% after the pandemic’s over because why do I want to go to San Diego if I don’t have to and spend two days getting there and coming back? Why not just do the call, get the business done? Even though it’s not as efficient, it still gets 90% of the work done, which is great.

We did a Zoom call with our team, and Nina and I was live together—we’re married—and she put her background as the San Francisco Bridge just for fun, and there was a moment where she kind of became a floating head in the bay.

And it’s just, she's not trying to fool anybody that she's actually in San Francisco.

Yeah, and it’s just expression!

It’s fun to head in the bay!

Yeah, exactly! It adds to it.

So I think if you’re approaching it from that, like, how can I use it to have more fun with my team? To express myself better with my team by switching up the background or by wearing something different, right? Versus I’m going to pull one over on these guys and make them feel like I’m going to fly.

Well, there’s another piece of Zoom etiquette while we’re talking about video conferencing, and I’ve learned stick to the time allocated. In other words, if you say it’s going to be a 15-minute call, it’s a 15-minute call; if it’s 30, it’s 30. Very few are longer than that, but there’s been a problem of time bleed, and it just eats up time; it’s inefficient.

So what I like to do now in my Zoom calls, I say, “Okay, we’re starting this at 3. It’s going to be over at 3:20. Does everybody agree? If you have agenda items, be cognizant of the time,” and, you know, put up your hands to have this thing to talk about because it’s 3:15—we’ve got five more minutes. Everybody cool with it?

The average Zoom call is generally six to nine people, so you really want to make sure everybody gets their agenda item done.

I found that to be very efficient at the beginning. I say, “Okay, here’s the timeline, everybody,” you know, and what I’ll often do if I’m sharing the call, I’ll say, “Hey, five minutes is up; we’ve just done five. Now we’re at the 10-minute mark; now we’re at the 15-minute mark.”

Keeps everybody cognizant of that very valuable commodity called time.

But do you think it’s a Zoom issue? Like if you had nine people around the boardroom table, do you think those meetings are going super?

No, they’re not!

But the thing is, the trouble with Zoom is because it bleeds; your day is being pushed inefficiently. In other words, you’re not showing up on the next call on time. Mine are racked and stacked, and so I’ve got to leave one meeting and start another one.

It’s a very big insult to show up five minutes late, so that’s a Zoom etiquette. I say Zoom, but there are multiple platforms. Most people are using Zoom right now because ease of use and so, at the end of the day, that etiquette is something that’s being built into our culture.

So I’m giving advice to my own entrepreneurs, “Guys, you start a meeting at three, and it’s supposed to be over at 3:20? It’s got to be over at 3:20 because I’m going to use something else right after that.”

Yeah, I think that’s just good business etiquette.

I agree; I agree! You have to go to a meeting, but it’s sort of the world has gone digital that way, and I think time is your most valuable asset, no question.

And a great way to end it! I’ve really enjoyed our time today; it’s great. You’re a good guy. I’m going to endorse you!

That's fantastic! Listen, it was really terrific, and I think it’s going to be great. I know my followers are going to hear from this, so that’s wonderful!

Thank you for your time!

Cool! And welcome to the office for as long as like ever! Like everybody else in the pandemic, I don’t think I’ve been here for six months.

Yeah, it’s really weird to come back here; and my staff too—I mean they’re here saying, “Whoa, remember this place?”

Just think about how challenging it’s going to be for commercial real estate when this is all over—so many of us have realized we don’t need to work in an office anymore.

Yeah! And not just need— a lot of people don’t want to go back to it.

They don’t want to! You’re right—they’re willing to live a different way.

Anyways, thanks for your time today!

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