IPO Blogs

Code Of Silence

I come from a place where if you talk too much you’re at risk. And up until a few years ago I lived by that code of silence. I would observe and analyze but keep my comments to myself. I would pick up on trends and opportunities but wouldn’t share them. Instead, I would keep them to myself because I thought of everyone as an opportunist.

This is how I was raised. The intention to help was always there but fear of breaking code was holding me back.

I had the revelation a few years back to say fuck fear and go against that code of silence. This was around the same time I came to the conclusion that if I wasn’t doing what I wanted, then I wasn’t living, because on the other side of fear is opportunity, and if I wanted to get out of the box I had to go against the grain.

I decided to play an unfamiliar role, disregarding everything I was taught — at this point second nature — and extend trust to everybody. I laugh at myself, but it was with intent that I put all my cards on the table and watched everyone to reveal their hand as soon as possible. I spent this year dealing with the successes of it and analyzing the lessons of it. 

A. You can’t build anything great with people with bad character. That’s not a judgment of what you’ve done in the past but what you’re doing in the present. I never judge a person’s past. I try to go off their word and my overall vibe when talking to them. Of course, there are always people looking to get ahead at your expense, but there are things you can look at to see if a partnership would be beneficial. Do they keep their word? Honor their commitments? Repay their debts? I can’t do business with anyone who defaults on any of these basic codes of trust.  I will give you the opportunity to show me whether you’re worthy of my trust. 

B. Helping is great, but be intentional with help. That means steering with a result in mind. Too much help has a negative effect and is a waste of time. You also can’t help anyone who is not ready it. That means talking with them and seeing where they are  mentally and making a judgment call.

Seeing someone struggle and helping is an easy choice. It can also be a selfish one . It relieves our conscience.  Even if we know that our help only enables someone to continue a negative cycle, we can feel good about ourselves for helping them in the short term.

But sometimes struggle is what people need to grow, and being there for them non-monetarily will achieve your desired results for them much faster. 

Sometimes people just need a positive influence. Of course that involves time, and a lot of times we try to buy our way out of situations where we should be putting time in.

 Just know that you  aren’t really helping by throwing money at a problem. At that point,  you’re more of an enabler. 

So what I’ve learned this year is:

1. How to open up and the pitfalls of being too open.

2. Character traits to look for and avoid when doing business with someone. It’s the foundation of everything.

3. How to properly help, which may mean not helping at all because the goal is for everyone to be self-sufficient. A lot of times the issue is deeper than any financial help you could provide. Sometimes, it’s moreso about a person’s mindset being readjusted. That’s what IPO is looking to address. 

Balance Brings True Clarity

Today I woke up wanting to write a blog post like I have been over the past month, but I’ve been unable to get the clarity to go through with it.

If this were any other day this month, I’d just close the laptop and go about my day, not wanting to force anything.  But today I thought, “This is how I thought of the Moment of Clarity series.” I would have so much going on that I just had to write and sort out my thoughts in order to gain clarity.

Before I knew it,  a stream of consciousness was flowing that helped me with my creativity, and most important, —my mindset when facing  obstacles that had been stressing me. That’s when I learned the power of seeing different perspectives, and want to share it with everyone. 

What has been holding me up this time is trying to be perfect, something I’ve written about before, but old habits die hard. I started to look at the big picture and  wanted to delay discussing certain topics so they would come out at the perfect time. The problem with that is that I still wanted to talk about them now, so when I would try writing about something else, my writing was less passionate.

The lesson for me: Don’t get so caught up looking ahead, that you forget why you started in the first place.

For me, Moment of Clarity was something I would do randomly, for myself, when I just needed to flush out ideas. It worked for me, and I saw an opportunity there that could help other people. I was frustrated with the advice I was given, so I made my Moments of Clarity public  meant to be shared in real time. But I have to remember that it’s mainly for me to flush ideas, so structure and delaying the discussion of topics “for the right time” can be limiting. 

There’s a fine line between being consistent with idea flow and pressuring yourself to come up with new ones. The latter will kill your  creativity, so you must find that balance for yourself and what actions typically restore that balance for you. Really puts emphasis on knowing yourself. If you fail to restore this balance, you could end up in a situation where you’re working hard but stressed and further away from your goal. I think stress and creative block are signs to step back and look at the bigger picture. 

One of the reasons I’m such a proponent of entrepreneurship, what I call the “The Hustle” is because it’s more of a self-discovery path than anything. You find it’s not about the money quickly. And you really start to define your character and fix your own flaws. You learn self-accountability, because blaming someone else won’t get you out of a situation. In my opinion, the sooner you take this path the better.  

Equally I think “The Hustle” teaches you the importance of balance and values. We all have gifts that can be used to do good things, or without discipline, can get us in trouble —the exact same gift. An old rule I go by every day is too much of anything is bad for you. In the situation of trying to control everything in your life, you’re hurting yourself.

I think success is a combination of hard work and luck or randomness. When you try to control everything to have it fit your vision, you’re actually hurting yourself. You’re limiting your randomness, which is a key component of success, thus not allowing your vision to grow and take shape. Action and hard work put you in position to receive random luck.

Good Friends, Good Business

A lot lot of people say don’t do business with friends. I say don’t have friends around who do bad business. I never fully understood not being able to work with friends. It seemed totally opposite of growth. How could I have opportunity and not put my friends on? Wasn’t that my original goal?

I get where that saying comes from, though. I’ve had my share of bad experiences with hiring friends for professional jobs but receiving unprofessional service. I think the problem stems from a few things:

1. Not setting expectations prior to start

2. Not being brutally honest with friends or family/ afraid to damage personal relationships

3. Incorrect valuation of job worth.

4. Cutting corners

Not Setting Expectations Prior to Start

This is huge. A lot of times with family or friends we expect things to be “understood.” But as in any client/service relationship, everything goes better when it’s explicitly stated. Many problems stem from a misunderstanding of what’s expected. You want things one way, but they do it another. Or they may take months to do something that takes a few days because you are friends and leniency is “understood.”

A proper conversation prior to starting a transaction, even if it’s awkward, will kill all the misunderstandings. It adds a layer of professionalism to the transaction and lets your friend know that even though you are friends, it’s business first, and you expect the highest level of professionalism. You both get a chance to negotiate and hash things out ahead of time, instead of after when someone feels cheated. It also adds a checklist you can refer back to in case things go sideways. If they’re a high character person, they will look at that checklist and acknowledge their mistakes. Skipping the boring stage of setting expectations is what kills friendships—not doing business with friends.

Not Being Brutally Honest

If my best friend plays basketball with me and takes 10 steps before he shoots every time, and I encourage him without letting him know his flaws, am I helping him? No. When he leaves and plays somewhere else he won’t see the court.

I use sports as an example because most people are brutally honest with friends when competing, but we like to lie to our friends when it comes to business. If you don’t like how something was done, the most honest critique should come from you as a friend. Give them pointers on what you liked and what you didn’t. If the service pales in comparison to the competition, let them know you’ll give them a chance to do better or you’ll use a competitor. Continuing to use a friend who is doing half of what the competition is doing is a disservice to you and your friendship. They may hate your honesty up front, but when they go back and improve their work, they will thank you. Real friends want to see growth and success from friends. Don’t hide the truth from them, and disguise it as motivation. The fact that you are friends allows you to say what others can’t; don’t waste this privilege. Not being honest will cause you to harbor bad vibes which will then leak into the personal relationship.

Incorrect Valuation of Job Worth

When you overpay for a service you feel cheated—I don’t care if you’re friends or not. Feeling cheated over time will make business feel personal. This could have been handled by setting expectations and properly negotiating or being brutally honest, but sometimes as friends we feel like we will contribute to our friends’ dream no matter the cost. True value should be consistent, friend or not. Time, experience and skill are all critical factors of value. If you’re a startup, you shouldn’t charge what a pro is charging who’s been doing it for 20 years. If you are, then I’d expect the exact same if not better service, friend or not. A lot of startups come out of the gate charging sky high prices;, I don’t think this is the proper valuation. Cheap work comes with some mistakes; expensive work come with the expectation that it will be fixed at all cost—even if the business takes a loss. Knowing that, cutting breaks for friends will leave you feeling cheated and damage a personal relationship.

Knowing your worth is a common saying, and most of the time it’s used to express the fact that you’re undervaluing yourself, but it works both ways. As a friend we should have the difficult conversation letting them know when they are overvaluing themselves, based on time, skill, and experience of competitors, effectively pricing themselves out the market.

Cutting Corners

As I mentioned earlier, there is this “understood” leniency with friends and family. Setting expectations should take care of this but planners leave room for error. When these errors come up, as business partners first, we should do whatever it takes to leave our client with a positive experience. Don’t leave off the finishing touches because you are friends. If mistakes are made, concessions should be made. This sets the tone for future partnerships and let’s your friend know you are serious. A lot of times we don’t use friends because we feel like they’ll cut corners. Everybody wants top notch service friend or not, and instinctively when we receive it we want to refer other people. Make your friends subconsciously refer you. It shouldn’t be forced. They shouldn’t have to think about it because they don’t trust you. If you treat friends with the same respect as strangers, you’ll see growth. Again if all the steps are taken prior to this then this shouldn’t be an issue.

Doing business with friends requires both people to maintain high character and always express honesty. This will not only strengthen your friendship, but these two things will also have ripple effects on everything they do, improving them as a person.

Information Applied is Knowledge

The world stopped on Sunday for a lot of people after the news that Nipsey Hussle had been killed— even for those who didn’t know know him personally but were inspired by him. To see someone from the community who was inspiring people through action and investing back into his community was a blow. I saw a lot of people with similar goals, myself included, take it hard.

But then I thought about how dwelling in that devastation could be detrimental to growth. Even though he’s dead, the positive impact of his life is felt today, and that’s what matters most: continuing to learn and share something that will outlive you.

So the marathon continues.

One of the things he’d recently done with his business partner, Dave Gross, was come up with plan to take advantage of so-called “Opportunity Zones” and invest back into his neighborhood and other neighborhoods nationally. It’s a fairly new program, so I wanted to give the ins and outs of it.

What are opportunity zones?

The goods news is the program just started so you’re not behind. Educate yourself because when the results start to show it will be too late.

A key point to note is that capital gains are the only types of funds you can invest into opportunity zones, also known as OZ.

Capital gains are the profits you receive when you sell stock or real estate, money that is usually taxed by the IRS. But by investing this profit into qualified opportunity funds within 180 days, you can bypass capital gains taxes. After five years, the percentage you owe drops by 10%, 7 years- 15%, 10 years- tax free.

Opportunity zones pretty much are neighborhoods that are “distressed,”meaning low-income areas that haven’t been invested in for a while. The federal government has started a program lt that rewards you with a tax break, essentially making money tax-free, if you invest in these areas over a 10-year period.

Many investors nationally are raving about the benefits, but a lot of people don’t know about them, especially the people who live in these opportunity zones. For those who hate the idea of “gentrification”, childhood neighborhoods losing their identity, this is a way to take control of the situation with action. Just be aware that this type of investing is about gains over the long term. So don’t think about the short play.

It may not be something that can benefit investors right away, but I feel that this is a great tool for those with vision to have and know about. Could be the start of generational wealth, especially for those of us who already want to reinvest in the neighborhoods we grew up in.

You can find a map of the areas below:

https://esrimedia.maps.arcgis.com/apps/View/index.html?appid=77f3cad12b6c4bffb816332544f04542&fbclid=IwAR2xFo3srgfXpD_bLxKIY6HVkAmzg-20AyaP2i9dhHm3-yXd-FCSALqjh_w

How to invest in Opportunity Zones (The rules)

1. 1. You have to invest via a designated opportunity fund which has been set up through the IRS. These can be self-certified, set up by you, or you can put your money in an existing one. By certifying through the IRS, you are promising to abide by the rules that 90 percent of the money in that fund will be invested in opportunity zones.

2. 2. You can use the money from these designated funds to invest in real estate, stock ownership in businesses within opportunity zones, and partnership interest in businesses in the zones.

3. To Invest in real estate, you can build either from the ground up or rebuild an existing structure. If you rebuild an existing structure ( house or commercial property) you must invest more in improving the building than what you you paid to get it.

Example: If you paid $50,000 for the house, you have to put at least $51,000 into renovating it. Remember, these are are long-term buy and holds.

All work must be done within 30 months of purchase.

Hopefully you find this useful. The biggest thing to remember is that you can only invest capital gains, but you never know when you’ll run into an opportunity where you’ll have capital gains. The two cases I see most often are:

1. Kids who inherit homes that require too much maintenance, so they sell them.

b. People who have investment properties/rentals and want to sell them.

The time to do your research is now, before your capital gains opportunity comes along. Then when your opportunity arrives, you’ll be ready to act.

We are always looking for new ideas to help fund and kickstart!

Business plans and general details will be required.

Please reach out via email – ipobranding@gmail.com

Treadmill Effect

There’s something I battle daily, and being independent only makes it worse—idea overload.

I’ve got a million ideas and feel like they all can pop. And when I’m in the early stages of developing them, I’m doing all the work myself. It can get pretty hectic. One way I’ve learned to deal with the overload is to slow down and focus on one thing.

When I catch myself moving too fast, I feel annoyed and stressed and find myself questioning what’s up with me.

That feeling of going nowhere fast, just spinning my wheels, I’ve nicknamed it the treadmill effect. It feels good sweating, but I’m just running in place. When I feel like I’m being lapped by competition or when I feel like I’m not working hard enough, I’ll try to do a lot of stuff to make myself feel busy, but I’m not really being productive.

I’ve found I can be way more efficient when I slow down and come up with a process to work smarter, not harder.

I want to run my business, not have my business run me. I’ve noticed that I get way more done when I move slower and with purpose. Moving too fast is the equivalent of overheating. I prefer working at a consistent pace rather than in spurts. If I can figure out a way to automate what I’m doing, I’ll head off a burnout.

Another problem with moving too fast is lack of attention to detail. This can negate any progress I’ve made—two steps back for one forward. Developing the reputation of missing things will kill you. I see it a lot with businesses that become franchises. The more distant owners are from their businesses, the more detail is missed, and after a while they lose customers because the service just isn’t good anymore. Growth too fast isn’t sustainable if you can’t apply the same attention to detail that led to your success.

Believe me, getting off the treadmill is easier said than done, because when you slow down, you feel like you’re missing opportunities. That may be true, but it’s the long game that matters.

Make Goals Apparent

In today’s world of social media everything is a highlight reel, and it should be. The problem is that we begin to think that’s the only thing that exists and that if it didn’t happen on the ‘Gram it didn’t happen. 

We can’t allow that appearance of perfection to cause us to shelter our goals because they’re not perfectly executed. You have to know who’s ready to go with you to next level, both with support and applying themselves.

Two ends of the Spectrum. Fear or Jealousy.

It could be that you are scared of failure so you keep goals a secret so that you only hold yourself accountable. Or two, you’re surrounded by people that make you feel like you’re bragging if you try to talk goals. 

Either way the pessimism and bad energy has to go away, and the only way to get rid of that bad energy is by bringing goals to real life and conversation. I’d venture to say that if you don’t feel comfortable talking goals or plans around certain people then that could be indicator that they’re not fully in your corner.

Accountability is a huge factor. You need people around you who support you and call you on your BS. 

A friend who agrees with everything you say isn’t necessarily a good friend. A friend who listens to your goals and provides direct or indirect resources is powerful. Can’t tell which one you have unless you make your goals known to them.

I was talking with a guy who launched an app about how he did it. The biggest take-away from the convo was that he had to take a leap of faith and just start telling people his idea. 

Initially, he was guarded with it, having people sign nondisclosure agreements or never even talking about it. But he said in order for him to get over the hump, he had to just put the idea out there. He needed developers, and most were reluctant to sign nda’s because it hampered their creativity. 

He said he realized that only he knew what the big picture was for his idea, and if someone else ever duplicated the idea there would be something about it not quite like his. In the marketplace, there are tons of similar products, the distinguishing factor is the drive behind it. A quick money play wouldn’t offer what he could.

Another guy I know, happened to share something he was working on with someone random at Starbucks, and it turned out they had similar interests. Not only that, but he was this missing piece. They’re now partnering on a deal. 

It’s the Law of Attraction. The person you need to take your idea to the next level could be next to you. We all have that home run play in mind, a secret hobby. Some of us share it and see it come to fruition, while others quietly wait for the perfect time or perfect rollout, making it much harder.

Learning How to Take NO and Say NO

For someone starting a business, the word “NO” can be a huge obstacle, especially when you’re providing a service. No one wants to hear it, and sometime it’s hard to say because of the fear that it could cost you business. I’ve learned though, that the sooner we tackle the NO’s, the sooner we can get down to business.

Taking NO

Regardless of the industry you’re in, if you want to generate business, you’ll have to prospect and market. I wish the success rate was 100% or oven close to that, but it’s not.The reality is that if you’re getting a 10% success rate, you’re doing pretty well. So realize that 9 out of 10 people you approach are going to say no. I prefer to be direct, but sometimes you’ll beat around the bush because you can tell the vibe is leading up to the Big NO. If you’re motivated, you’re going to think that you can change this NO, and you can, but only after they say NO. I learned this the hard way, spending so much time talking to people, thinking I could change what’s going on before they state their objections because I’ve heard them before.

The reality is most people listen to about 10 seconds of what you’re saying and then the rest of the time they’re tuning you out, anxious to say NO. Therefore, trying to avoid the NO is wasting your time. Let them state their objections, even though you’ve heard them, and work on those from a different perspective. At the end of the day I’ve heard NO more than a 100 times, and the last one doesn’t sound any better than the first one, but overcoming rejection is part of growth.

Some people will string you along, and you’ll have to know when to cut that short and move on even though you may feel like you’ll be able to turn them. Find ways to automate the process so you’re not wasting your time on someone who doesn’t respect your time.

Saying NO

You just get in business, you find someone who is interested and your instinct is to say yes to everything. You have the go-getter mentality. That’s the right mentality, but time will teach you to say NO sometimes. Especially when it comes to doing a lot of favors. This comes hard to me because I like to make sure everyone is happy in the equation, but some people will take that kindness for weakness. More often than not, when I go out of my way to accommodate someone, I get burned.

It’s just not smart, and it goes back to keeping business business. I’ve found that when you just say no and shut up, it has a weird effect. So many people want to explain themselves after the NO, but when you don’t say anything and stand firm, the negotiations work more in your favor. Just like when you’re playing cards, a lot of times people just want to see who will fold first. Come in with your expectations, know your limits and be ready to walk if they’re crossed. The big thing is to being ready to walk. If you’re too attached to the situation, you’ll come back and negotiate your leverage away.

(In 2018, I talked to about 20 to 30 new people per day, a lot of NO’s, a lot of learning opportunities from self-generated marketing)

Starting the new year off with ACTION. People who know me well know that I’ve been throwing around the idea of writing for some time, and I have a book that needs to be finished.

The problem with the book is that I feel like I’m missing out on the real-time effect I want. I’ve read things from successful people, but it’s always with a tone of reflection, which allows you to be comfortable because you know the end result. I’ve always wanted to hear from the perspective of real-time and the mixed emotions because of the uncertainty. It may just be me, but it feels more genuine.

With that being said, this is not a book, it’s a blog, and my aim is to provide short weekly posts which I’ll call “Moments of Clarity” to address various obstacles I’ve encountered and lessons I’ve learned in real-time, with the hopes that we all can benefit and learn from them.

This week the topic is few things I’ve learned from 2018.

Emotions don’t belong in business. 

Every time I’ve made decisions based on emotional triggers, I’ve ultimately been on the losing (learning) side. It’s a short-sighted view and has caused me to lose sight of my main goal. Experienced people know this and will put you in a situation where you are likely to react emotionally. They’ll use your emotions against you.

In many ways, business is more mental than anything.

Remember that situations are all about perspective. A lot of times we are stuck in this maze where we feel like we have no way to get out, but there’s always a way out. I’ve found that I’m often overlooking something. It’s like Finding Waldo. Emotions cloud judgment and views and make it almost impossible to see what’s in plain sight.

If you’re someone who loves winning, fear of losing will do this to you. But a shift in perspective is all that’s needed as a remedy. Look at it as a new opportunity to learn. A new challenge.

Last year I learned this lesson the hard way. For those who don’t know, I’m a real estate agent. I had run into someone who said he had property he wanted to sell. My job was to negotiate on behalf of my client. But it turned out the person who approached me about selling the property wasn’t the owner, though he had an interest in it, and had plotted to   blindside the owner into negotiating a sale.

At one point, three parties were at a property, and no one knew what was going on. The meeting’s mastermind was nowhere to be found. I reacted emotionally because I was embarrassed to have a client show up amid all this confusion. I also felt that the owners were attacking me personally, when in reality they were as confused as I was. All shortsighted and misguided views. I thought I had gained my client’s respect at least, for standing up for him and proving I wasn’t a pushover. But I had missed an opportunity. We left and had a talk, and he told me, “You think you did something there, but in reality you just blew that deal. I can’t work with you.”

At that point I realized I had lost sight of the goal.

Be accountable at all cost. 

I’ve made it my goal to take find ways to be accountable, take ownership.  Harvesting bad vibes hinders you from reaping the true reward from a situation, the lesson. No such thing as loss in my perspective. Its trial and error and a way to get better.  It natural for our self-defense mechanisms to kick in and cause us to be the victims of situation, but this mentality puts you in a situation where you have no control of what’s happening. This means that it could happen again. Taking ownership, even of the slightest mistake gives you the control again.  I compare it to driving. You can do everything right and still get in an accident because someone runs a red light. Part of the game is working on your defensive skills. Looking at situations from afar and making judgment calls. And when you make a bad call, learn from the pain and make sure you factor that experience into future situations. Doing everything right on your part is great, but the other percentage of success is managing the unpredictable.

True leaders see change and growth where others see crisis.