May 13, 2026 – NYT Best Selling Author Jay Kopelman and Greatest Hits Kevin Johnson

Intro 1 0:04
Broadcasting from am and FM stations around the country. Welcome to the Small Business Administration award winning school for startups radio where we talk all things small business and entrepreneurship. Now here is your host, the guy that believes anyone can be a successful entrepreneur, because entrepreneurship is not about creativity, risk or passion. Jim Beach,

Jim Beach 0:25
hello everyone. Welcome to another exciting edition of School for startups radio. I hope you’re having a great day out there, treading through all of the stuff that involves being an entrepreneur, the loans, the money, the marketing, the HR, that one employee that you Oh, I hate that employee too. You are a saint to put up with them anyway, just all of the things about being an entrepreneur. I feel your pain, and I’m here to help motivate you to enjoy it and to give you the tips, the tricks and the techniques to continue to be successful, or to give you the tips and tricks and techniques to go out there and do it successfully, and to start, got a fantastic show for you today. First up, we have Jay Cooperman. He is a Marine veteran, and we want to thank him sincerely for his service. He wrote a New York Times bestselling author about his dog, lava from Baghdad, and we will let him tell that amazing story. He is now helping veterans around the United States get their lives back together, and it’s a little bit controversial. You may not want to let your kids in on this one. It’s nothing harsh or anything, nothing violent or anything, but we do talk about some of the advanced drug treatments that are available. And you know, this is for adult information. I do love the fact, though, that he mentions neuroplasticity. Of course, my all time favorite word, my favorite word used to be veritable plethora. And I know that’s two words, but anyway, I love neuroplasticity, the idea that we can make our brains better, that our brains can heal and get smarter. I just love that idea. Anyway, Jay is a superhero with what he is doing with veterans, and he plays the quick 10, so I’m excited to have that. Then we are doing another Greatest Hits. Remember, I lost a server. The company went out of business after 10 years, and I had been there for nine years or something, and I lost all of those shows that were there. Didn’t lose them, but they are not available. We have to get them back up on a new server. And how do you do that? You make them part of a show. So we have Kevin Johnson in the greatest hit segment tonight. He wrote the book entrepreneurial mind, which is one of the best selling entrepreneurial thought leadership books ever, hundreds and hundreds of five star reviews on that place called Amazon. Sue he is certainly, certainly worthy of being in the greatest hits. So it’s a fantastic show. Appreciate you being with us. We’re gonna get started in just a second.

Jim Beach 3:43
we are back and again. Thank you so very much for being with us. I’m very excited and honored to introduce my first guest today. Please welcome Jay Kopelman to the show. He is the CEO of mission within foundation. It is a veterans mental health nonprofit, and is helping provide therapy for 1000s of individuals. They’ve raised $3 million in the last year or so. Jay is retired Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel and a New York Times best selling author. That is incredibly impressive. I’ll talk more about that in a second. And is a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu world champion. Wow, quite a combination. The organization has raised $3 million as I’ve said, and it is helping veterans and first responders navigate all of the regulations out there, the public skepticism and all of the issues they have to deal with. Jay’s book is called from Baghdad with love, a marine the war and a dog named lava. It is about the dog named lava getting smuggled and rescued out of Baghdad. It was a New York Times bestselling book. It has 588 five star reviews on. Amazon, 588 you know, normally in nonfiction, we’re excited to get I guess this is nonfiction, but, you know, normally you get 100 reviews for a business book. You’re excited. This is 600 reviews. Very impressive. Jay, welcome to the show. How you doing?

Jay Kopelman 5:18
Hey. Thanks very much, Jim, I’m doing great. Thanks for having me on I do need to correct one thing though. Oh,

Jim Beach 5:24
I’m sorry,

Jay Kopelman 5:24
Nope, it’s all right, the organization is actually mission to live Foundation, not mission within foundation.

Jim Beach 5:32
Again, mission, what?

Jay Kopelman 5:34
Mission to live foundation?

Jim Beach 5:36
Okay, I’m sorry.

Jay Kopelman 5:38
No worries at all.

Jim Beach 5:40
I cut and paste from your PR releases, so we need to get to fix that up at a higher level than me. Anyway. Jay, fantastic. What you are doing. I love this. Let’s start off with the dog story. Though I think everyone loves a dog story. Let’s go there first

Jay Kopelman 6:03
everybody, yep. So everybody does love a dog story, hence the book becoming a New York Times bestseller. Because, as you said, I’m a former Marine and on a good day, I have trouble reading a book, much less writing one. So lava was a five week old puppy found by Marines from Hawaii, from First Battalion third, marines also called the lava dogs, and he was found during a fire fight, hiding in a overturned 50 gallon drum. One of the Marines crawled in there, grabbed the dog, they took him back to their command post that in the house they were using in Fallujah, and kept him there. So I managed to work out a deal to with some folks back in the States to help support bringing the dog back. Yeah. He ultimately ended up being taken to Baghdad, where he lived with Anne garrels, the late Anne garrels of NPR radio fame, and she connected with Triple Canopy security in Baghdad, and they brought him back to the States with a load of their military working dogs, and he came home to the US became my dog for 11 years.

Jim Beach 7:31
Fantastic. That is a heartwarming story. And

Jay Kopelman 7:37
it, yeah, go

Jim Beach 7:37
ahead.

Jay Kopelman 7:38
Certainly. It certainly is unique or, well, at the time, it was very unique. This has happened more than, more than once. Now, however, so which is a wonderful thing, you know, any life that can be saved is, is a great, great ending.

Jim Beach 7:54
Yes, that is true. Tell us about your service in Fallujah and wherever else that you’re allowed to tell us about.

Jay Kopelman 8:04
Yup, so I was, as you said, and as I stated, I was a Marine for 21 years. I went to Fallujah in 2004 in about August of 2004 and I was sent over to train Iraqi Special Forces at Camp Fallujah. And in about October, the planning started kicking off for Operation phantom fury, the Battle of Fallujah. And I was assigned by the commanding General’s chief of staff to take an Iraqi Army battalion into that fight. So took them in, linked up with one three who would be mentoring the Iraqis in combat operations. Served in Fallujah until Thanksgiving, Day of 2004 and was pulled out of there and sent to Balad, Iraq to work with Task Force six to six for a few months, then sent out to the Syrian border for another month and a half, two months before I was returned stateside following the end of my deployment in late March, early April of 2005

Jim Beach 9:27
All right. Well, thank you for your service, Lieutenant Colonel. I’m sorry I don’t know this. That’s one step below general, isn’t it?

Jay Kopelman 9:35
It’s too below.

Jim Beach 9:37
What comes after Lieutenant Colonel,

Jay Kopelman 9:40
then it’s Colonel.

Jim Beach 9:41
Oh, so colonel was, I thought lieutenant colonel was higher than colonel, okay, colonel and then general,

Jay Kopelman 9:50
yeah, Brigadier General would be the next step. Correct,

Jim Beach 9:53
all right.

Jay Kopelman 9:55
I think the Marine Corps decided I had fallen through enough cracks to get promoted. As far as I did, and that was the end of the road for me. So

Jim Beach 10:04
they do a good job of making it clear, don’t they

Jay Kopelman 10:08
crystal clear?

Jim Beach 10:13
Excellent. All right, so what did you feel experience leading after 21 years? Tell me about that transition and what you hoped you would do and what you ended up doing.

Jay Kopelman 10:26
Yeah, it’s very much like my journey into the military. When I left, I really didn’t know what I was going to do or what I wanted to do, and so the book had been doing very well. I had been hired by a speaker’s bureau to go out and give talks and to large organizations, big companies, and just to kind of tell my story and tell the story of the dog and the book. So I did him work for probably almost two years. I didn’t have a quote, unquote job, right? And so I didn’t really have any direction either. You know, I certainly didn’t have the community that I had when I was on active duty, didn’t have that sort of network of close people that I could rely on, and I ultimately was sent, you know, not said I went to the VA ultimately To begin my disability claims, and was diagnosed with severe Complex PTSD and multiple traumatic brain injuries. But that was probably, you know, that was a good seven, eight years after I got out of the military that they finally diagnosed these things. Up until that time, I was a very angry, reactive person, and it certainly didn’t help any of my relationships. I ended up getting married shortly before I retired from the Marine Corps, and my son was born, you know, not long after that, so things started to really percolate and show up after I retired, after that structure, the everyday routine that I had was gone now all these things that I had been holding down inside while I was serving on active duty started to rise to the surface and come out, and it was not a pretty picture,

Jim Beach 13:00
right? Thank you for your honesty and sharing these situations, Jay, I really greatly appreciate that. How did you eventually find solace?

Jay Kopelman 13:12
Well, I started going to therapy, probably in about 2016 and I went religiously for two years every Friday to see a therapist. And it helped some, but it didn’t. It didn’t get down deep enough to really address the core issues. You know, in 2015 after years of my bad temper and anger, and you know, seeing me one day with a gun in my mouth, my now ex wife decided that it was time for me to go, and she was right. She she did the right thing by throwing me out. And then ultimately, in about 2022 A buddy of mine, who had been a seal for 30 years, called me up one day and he said, Hey, bro, I just went and did this remarkable thing in Mexico where it’s just absolutely life changing, and you got to go and do it. And you know, if it wasn’t for that phone call, I don’t know that I would have ever found any kind of peace. But thankfully, he called. I looked into it. I ultimately went to a clinic in Mexico where I was able to participate in psychedelic assisted therapy that completely

Jay Kopelman 14:48
changed my

Jim Beach 14:49
life.

Jay Kopelman 14:50
Nope, this is, this is Ibogaine and five Meo DMT therapy.

Jim Beach 14:57
I saw the gain on link. In today and had no clue what it was. And, wow, weird how things can connect like that. Okay, and it helped.

Jay Kopelman 15:11
Yeah, it, it saved my life to be honest. And, you know, it

Jim Beach 15:19
stupid question. J Sorry to interrupt. Focus it this way. Yeah. How does tripping help you get happy?

Jay Kopelman 15:29
Yes. So it’s not tripping in the sense that people think of the hippies in the 60s and 70s on LSD, or somebody taking heroin. It it’s not tripping in that way.

Jim Beach 15:43
Okay, help me then. I have no idea this morning.

Jay Kopelman 15:47
Yep, I will be happy to do that. So Ibogaine is a it’s a molecule that comes from the Iboga plant, which is native primarily to equatorial Africa in the nation of Gabon, and when you use Ibogaine in a therapeutic and also clinical setting, because it does have some cardiac effects that could be very detrimental. So there has to be the proper safety put in place when you do this. But what it does is it has neuroplasticity and neuro regenerative properties that essentially rewire your brain and allow you to begin to look at the world and situations and events in a completely different way than what you’re used to. That’s the neuroplasticity. The neuro regeneration is that Ibogaine has the ability, and it’s been shown in scientific studies, to regrow white matter in the brain. So your brain is actually healing from things like traumatic brain injury and and what it shows you during your journey. And I call it a journey, not a trip, is it? It shows you typically, how you have behaved toward others, how you have perceived others, and it gives you the ability to understand these things in a completely new way, so that you now, with the neuroplasticity, can make Decisions about relationships, about your life, about your habits that you can change to make your life better. And then you do couple days later, you do the five Meo DMT, which is a very, very strong psychedelic medicine that comes from the Sonoran Desert Toad, but it ultimately shows you how to let go of anger, guilt, self hate, and how to accept love and everybody’s experiences on these are different, but the end result is typically the same. These medicines don’t show you what you want to see or what you want to know. They show you what you need to know and what you need to see, and oftentimes it’s showing you things that you just didn’t even know were there you’ve been holding on to for your entire life, and it allows you to let go.

Jim Beach 18:51
All right, absolutely fascinating. How would someone find that treatment if it were interesting to them?

Jay Kopelman 18:58
So there are a number of places that people can go to do this. There are, as I said, the clinics are in Mexico because Ibogaine is still a schedule one drug until that changes, and the EA is the organization that has to make that change, even though President Trump signed the executive order on psychedelics a few weeks ago, these medicines are still considered schedule one in the United States. Psilocybin, for example, has been taken up by some of the states and you can receive psilocybin therapy. It service centers in Oregon and Colorado has just legalized it, and I believe New Mexico is coming on board as well. But for Ibogaine, you do have to leave the country. And so, you know, if somebody wants to go. They should just Google Ibogaine clinic Mexico. And, you know, I don’t like to recommend one place over the other, because it’s a very personal thing, and people, people should select a site that resonates with them, where they are going to feel the most comfortable, because ultimately, you have to feel very comfortable in the setting where you’re doing this. And as a nonprofit that is giving scholarships to veterans and first responders to go and access this care, I don’t make recommendations to them either. I will give them a list of places they could look into, but I don’t, I don’t think I should be exposing the organization, my board of directors, to any liability that may occur if somebody has a bad outcome. All right, so more

Jim Beach 20:58
about mission to live and the work it’s doing so it’s raising money to provide this Ibu gain to others, right? That? Correct,

Jim Beach 21:10
correct?

Jim Beach 21:10
Okay,

Jay Kopelman 21:10
yes, Jim, so what we’re doing is we we raise donations to provide scholarships to veterans and first responders to access psychedelic assisted therapy at clinics outside of the US. And in the last year and a half or so, we’ve raised almost $3.5 million to do that, we’ve awarded nearly 350 scholarships, and just in 2025 we had about 120 veterans and first responders actually received treatment that year. And we’ve got, you know, many, many more who have been awarded scholarships, who have either gone through treatment this year or are getting ready to go through the long pole in the tent for all of this is the availability of what I call bed spaces at the various clinics. They are all very busy, as you can imagine, given the PTSD rates that we see in veterans, and it’s very high in first responders as well. So our our goal is to raise $3 million in 2026 to continue this work.

Jim Beach 22:36
All right, great idea. I love that. What website should people go to to contribute?

Jay Kopelman 22:47
Yep, our website is mission to live foundation.org, and it’s the word to to not the number two, and there’s a Donate button right there on on the homepage we, you know, we’d be thrilled if, if people would do that. In fact is we’re sitting here talking, I just saw an email pop in that somebody just donated $10,000 to our website. So

Jim Beach 23:14
that was me, you know, not

Jay Kopelman 23:16
unless your first name is Louis.

Jim Beach 23:21
That’s our donation arm. That’s my CFO. To every guest through the interview. I didn’t know if you knew that or not.

Jay Kopelman 23:30
Oh, that’s That’s wonderful. Thank you so

Jim Beach 23:32
much. I’m gonna get struck by lightning. Sorry. God lied. Okay anyway. Well, congratulations on that, and Lewis, you’re a champion. So we’ll throw that out to whoever Lewis is. You should find out who Lewis is and email him this interview.

Jay Kopelman 23:51
Yeah, absolutely talked

Jim Beach 23:54
about him and praised him after we tried to pretend we were stealing from him. But anyway, yeah, send this to Lewis. Lewis, we appreciate you. You’re the man Louis, Jay. What do you want to say to Lewis?

Jay Kopelman 24:08
You know, I extend my deepest gratitude, of course, not just because it’s money coming in, but because that donation is going to save a life.

Jim Beach 24:18
You

Jim Beach 24:28
all right, Lewis, we appreciate you. Let’s move on. Jay, I heard that you were willing and brave enough to play our little game, the quick 10.

Jay Kopelman 24:36
Let’s do it. Are

Jim Beach 24:38
you currently sober? I’m required by state law to ask.

Jay Kopelman 24:41
I do not drink. I’ve been clean and sober for more than two years. So

Jim Beach 24:46
excellent. And do you want to accept the standard wager?

Jay Kopelman 24:52
What is the wager?

Jim Beach 24:53
The bet that everyone else made

Jay Kopelman 24:56
sure? There

Jim Beach 24:57
you go, peer pressure for an adult. Awesome. I love it. Number one, your favorite creativity hack,

Jay Kopelman 25:05
yep, so I’m not terribly creative, Jim, so I don’t know I have any hacks, but I’m a huge fan of AI and apps like Canva that help me create just fantastic presentations.

Jim Beach 25:18
Number two, your favorite bootstrapping trick

Jay Kopelman 25:22
that’s easy, get out of bed and get to work. Nothing beats hard work.

Jim Beach 25:26
Number three, name your top passions.

Jay Kopelman 25:30
Number one, being of service to others. Number two, Jiu Jitsu. Number three, reading, and I’ll say reading anything from the Bible to great history and intrigue novels to scientific studies. Number four, fly fishing and hunting.

Jim Beach 25:54
Number four, the first three steps in starting a business are

Jay Kopelman 26:00
have a unique idea, and can be something somebody else has done, but I’d say, do it differently and with a twist, number two be first, or at least early, right? You know, it’s tough, because these days, there’s really nothing out there that someone else hasn’t thought of and done. So I go back to number one, right and then three, hire the right people. It’s critical. You’ll find that you got to have the right people who fit your culture, believe in your mission, and make sure they’re smart. I mean, no one’s ever accused me of being the smartest person in the room, and I aim to keep it that way.

Jim Beach 26:39
Number five, how do you get your first real customer?

Jay Kopelman 26:43
So in the nonprofit world, we don’t have customers, or, I guess, our customers are donors. And the best way to get that first one is just ask. Which is what I did. It ended up being a $1 million donation that has been repeated since

Jim Beach 27:00
number six, your dreamiest technology is

Jay Kopelman 27:04
cloning, because then I could clone my highest performing people and we’d be unstoppable.

Jim Beach 27:10
Number seven, your best entrepreneurial advice,

Jay Kopelman 27:14
take calculated risks. I know it’s cliche, but don’t let perfect be the enemy of the good.

Jim Beach 27:22
Number eight, worst entrepreneurial mistake

Jay Kopelman 27:26
riding my bike to deliver newspaper in the winter in Pittsburgh, there’s a ton of snow on the ground, and a Schwinn Stingray doesn’t handle well in the snow and ice, so it’s been a lot of time on the ground, and was late for school.

Jim Beach 27:41
Number nine favorite entrepreneur and why,

Jay Kopelman 27:44
I’d have to say my board chair. His name is Aaron lore. And Aaron not only built and exited a great company very successfully, but he has a really rare ability to identify and retain talent. He provides me with the kinds of advice and guidance I don’t see other entrepreneurs offering to people free of charge. He has a team of people that he retained when he exited his company that he uses at no charge to the organization. This is all free, pays them out of his pocket to help me build a gold standard nonprofit organization. He you know, he’s part board chair, part therapist, part coach, part cheerleader, 100% friend. He’s never afraid to tell me what I need to hear and do, and he’s just invaluable to me

Jim Beach 28:41
number 10 favorite superhero

Jay Kopelman 28:44
underdog. The name says it all

Jim Beach 28:48
All right. Great answers. We will calculate your score and find out the winner of the wager in just a second. Did you ever see the movie where Kevin Kline gets cloned? Cloning movie with Kevin Kline,

Jay Kopelman 29:01
I don’t think so.

Jim Beach 29:02
Oh, you’ve got to see it. Every time he gets cloned, he’s like 95% you know, and so by the fifth or sixth, the guy’s a moron. Oh, it’s just hysterical, Jay, you’ve got to see that. Jay, while we find out the winner of the wager, how do we get in touch as you find out more get a copy of the book about lava.

Jay Kopelman 29:24
Yeah, I think Amazon is the best way to get a copy of the book. It’s on amazon.com of course, just look for from Baghdad with love. There are two versions of it. There was a revised edition that came out in 2019 so the covers are slightly different. The original version has green and gray, the newer one is blue and gray. So yeah,

Jim Beach 29:49
fantastic,

Jay Kopelman 29:50
and yeah. And then you can follow all our social media mission to live foundation on Instagram or on. X, we’re on tick tock LinkedIn, and my personal Instagram is my first name, Jay, underscore Koppelman, underscore USA on Instagram there

Jim Beach 30:11
fantastic, Jay. I just Oh, Jay, oh my gosh, I am so sorry for you. I just Oh, apparently we had one guy from the Air Force, one guy from Army, and they ding do some points. I don’t know what that’s about, you Marine, but anyway, you got a 94 which is an excellent score, but you have to have a 95 to win. So you owe us a Tesla. We always play for a Tesla, sending us one right away.

Jay Kopelman 30:41
I’ll tell you what

Jim Beach 30:42
Marines that need care our Tesla comes first.

Jay Kopelman 30:46
Instead of the Tesla, I was going to wait another five weeks until the Ferrari electric car comes out. Is that okay?

Jim Beach 30:54
Okay, sure, I’ll compromise. That’ll compromise. That’s how big a man I am.

Jay Kopelman 31:00
There you go, Jake,

Jim Beach 31:00
hope

Jim Beach 31:01
woman, thank you so much for being with us. Great stuff, and we’d love to have

Jim Beach 31:04
you back.

Jay Kopelman 31:05
Thanks so much, Jim. Have a great day,

Jim Beach 31:07
and we will be right back.

Jim Beach 31:08
You. Oh,

Intro 2 31:24
well, that’s a, that’s a, that’s a wonderful question, actually, oh my gosh, I love the opportunity to do this. Thank you, Jim, wow, that’s, that’s, that’s a great one. You know, that is a phenomenal question. That’s a great question. And, and I don’t have a great answer, that’s a great question. Oh, that is such a loaded question, and that’s actually a really good question school for startups radio.

Jim Beach 31:48
I just want to remind you that this is one of our greatest hits interviews. Here it

Jim Beach 31:52
is,

Jim Beach 31:54
and welcome back to school for startups radio again. Thank you so much for being with us today. I am very excited and honored to introduce you to my first guest today. His name is Kevin Johnson. He is the author of one of the better selling entrepreneurial books out there. It’s called the entrepreneur mind. You can find it on Amazon and all the other places. Of course, it has almost 300 customer reviews, which is a lot that is puts it in the top 1% and it is five star rated. It has tons of accolades from all sorts of different people. You really need to check it out. It’s quite impressive. Kevin also runs a company called Johnson media, which has several Fortune 100 clients. He has appeared in all of the major media, including the big network news magazines and, of course, the TV shows. He was reviewed by Forbes. He was featured in Publishers Weekly and forward. Seth Godin gave him a gorgeous review. His book is used at Harvard, brown, Columbia, Dartmouth, places like that. It won the 2014 axiom Business Award, the 2014 grand prize of the Eric Hoffer awards. It won the 2000 national, I’m sorry, 2013 national, indie excellence Book Award, the 2014 Image Award. I could go on all day. Wow. Kevin, thank you for being with us, and welcome to the show. How are you doing?

Kevin Johnson 33:24
Oh, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

Jim Beach 33:27
Well, it’s an amazing accomplishment. Great job on the book you self published. This is that true?

Kevin Johnson 33:34
That’s correct, and that

Jim Beach 33:36
makes it even more impressive, my friend, without the backing of a major house, what you did is even more impressive.

Kevin Johnson 33:44
Well, I appreciate that. That was a decision that I made, and I’m very thankful that I made it.

Jim Beach 33:51
Tell me the thinking behind it. Why did you go that route?

Kevin Johnson 33:56
So when I started the book, rather when I finished the book, I thought I should pitch it to publishers, and a couple of publishers were interested, but the numbers didn’t make much sense to me, and I figured out that a lot of the publishers wanted writers because they didn’t have a platform or know how to use their platform to sell books. And being an entrepreneur and understanding the importance of an author’s platform, I decided to self publish the numbers better. I figured I have a marketing and communications firm. Let’s give it a try, at least on the first book. And what I learned really helps to sell a lot of books and get the word out there. And so I’m very, very happy that I went that route.

Jim Beach 34:45
Well again, I think it’s even more impressive that you did that, considering the success. Tell us what the book is about, the entrepreneurial mind. The subtitle is 100 essential beliefs. Characteristics and habits of elite entrepreneurs tell us about

Jim Beach 35:03
it

Kevin Johnson 35:04
Sure. Well, in March of 2012 I started a business blog that discussed various ways that successful entrepreneurs think so. The blog became really popular with readers from all around the world, and received 10s of 1000s of page views within weeks. So I figured I was on to a good thing. I mean, my original intent was to help entrepreneurs, young and old, those who are just starting out, those who have been in business for years, to avoid some of the mistakes that I made. I wish when I started out in 1999 it seems so long ago, I wish I had a book like the one that I that I’ve written. And so before long, you know, I was encouraged by some of my readers to write the book. They simply asked, wow, this content online is great. Where can I buy the book? And being an entrepreneur, I thought, Wow, I’m leaving money on the table. So I put together a strategy for the content would eventually would constitute chapters and put some more organization around it. And eventually came up with a book, and furthermore, I wanted to provide, you know, a comprehensive body of work and advice for the many people that I mentor. And ultimately, I think this book, the entrepreneur mind is, you know, a really great way to reach not only the people that I mentor, but literally hundreds of 1000s, and perhaps even millions of people who are interested in entrepreneurship.

Jim Beach 36:33
All right, tell us some of the essential beliefs, characteristics and habits of elite entrepreneurs. What do they do? Give us some of these?

Kevin Johnson 36:41
Well, one that I really believe in is to think big. I think entrepreneurs, elite entrepreneurs, really have the ability to come up with big ideas and go after them. You know, I think one of the entrepreneurs, elite entrepreneurs of our time that has this principle really down, is Elon Musk. In fact, there’s a new book that just came out about him and his companies and where he would like to take his company. So I think starting off with a big idea is very important, because the energy, often the energy that it takes to go after a big idea is the same energy that it takes to go after a small idea. So why not go for a big idea? So I like to start off with that one. It is actually the first chapter of the book, and it really speaks to a lot of those folks who are actually scared, believe it or not, to go after a big idea, even though they may have the idea and the capability to do so. So that’s one I really like to start off with. Let

Jim Beach 37:53
me ask you about if it helps people who are scared. It seems to me that that would be a little bit counterintuitive, if I have to, you know, to start a million dollar business is not quite as scary. To start $100 million business, wouldn’t that be 100 times scarier,

Kevin Johnson 38:09
right? I love that. I’m imagining a graph, right?

Jim Beach 38:13
Exactly. It’s called the scary graph,

Kevin Johnson 38:16
right?

Kevin Johnson 38:19
You make a great point. And I think, well, that reminds me of an idiom, how do you eat an elephant? Right? One bite at a time. I’ve heard, right? Yeah. And so, you know, your your ultimate goal may be to be a billionaire or have 100 million of revenue, but you’ve got to take that, that first step, and build a company that that ultimately makes that first dollar. So think big, but, but start small.

Jim Beach 38:48
Okay, number two, give us another one. Kevin, I’m loving these. I could do all 100 of them, but we only got 22 minutes, so, but give me a couple more. Give me number two,

Jim Beach 38:57
right? Well, one that people really like, and it’s a bit controversial. I’ll put that

Jim Beach 39:06
way, good. I love controversy

Kevin Johnson 39:09
is to be very aware of who you marry, right? And that speaks to a bigger principle, and that’s surround yourself with people who are supportive and that can build you up. And I talk about some of the experiences that I’ve had, growing through life and connecting with people who weren’t supportive and didn’t have my interests at heart. So I talk very candidly about how you know, even certain venture capitalists will look poorly upon certain couples that are in business together don’t have a good relationship, right? That’s a huge risk. And so if you take a chapter or a page out of the VCs books that. Those who are very skeptical about those types of relationships, I think it’s a lesson there. So you really got to surround yourself with people that are supportive, that are going to build you up, and that’ll that’ll make you a better person. So that one is a very controversial one, because there are a lot of people who are surrounded with negative people, and they understand firsthand how that can divert their success to business.

Jim Beach 40:24
Well, I have to admit, Kevin, I am on my second marriage. I’ve been an entrepreneur my entire career. Almost my first marriage largely fell apart because of entrepreneurship, but I lied to her when I was when I asked her to marry me. I thought I was going to be an architect, and she married a architect, not an entrepreneur, and so I don’t blame her. I 100% blame myself. And my second wife is incredibly supportive of my entrepreneurship, and so I don’t think what you said is controversial at all. I think it’s just some damn good common sense, and I’ve lived it, so I can attest to that. One wholeheartedly. Give me another one. Kevin, these are great,

Kevin Johnson 41:07
sure. So out of chapter five, the marketing and sales, I start with, you’re in sales, whether you want to be or not. And this is a principle that I had a lot of difficulty learning because I was a techie. I prefer. When I started my company, I prefer to stay in and code all day and not interact with human beings. So you know if, if you build it, they won’t come. I learned that very quickly, and I sort of morphed into this person that loves people, and ironically, the folks that do me when I started my business are just astonished that I’ve become more of a people person, but I realized in trying to pitch the business that ultimately it’s people who understand sales, understand the importance of sales, who are most successful. So I encourage everyone, even developers all the way up to CEOs, to constantly enhance their skills in sales, because ultimately, that’s what it’s about. It’s about building value, and building that value so that customers will actually pay you for it. And I think sales and marketing go hand in hand.

Jim Beach 42:18
I got to agree with that too. Is it possible you think Kevin to change your personality and go from a techie dork to an outgoing salesman? Is it a personality change, or are you lying to people when you’re outgoing? Do you think your personality can really change? Because a lot of PhD psychoanalytical BS type people will tell us that it’s not possible to change your personality once an introvert, always an introvert. But I think that you can.

Kevin Johnson 42:48
Yeah, I think that you can. And I really tell aspiring entrepreneurs turn entrepreneurs that you just have to learn what’s natural to you. So, you know, I’m a bit of an introvert and a bit of an extrovert. But, you know, there are different ways of selling right? There are those who are more analytical, and so me being a bottom line data guy, I would speak very well to someone who speaks my language, right? Data, bottom line, whereas it may not work so much for someone who’s the smoother, hey, take you out to lunch, get to know you, and let’s become friends for three meetings. And you know, you go that route. So I think it’s really important that you understand not only your personality, but also your natural ability to persuade. For some people, it may be more, charismatic others, it may be hardcore data. And so there are different personalities that go with different selling styles, and it’s important that you understand how that works. But no, I think it’s possible that your personality can change, can morph, depending on the exterior factors I am still an introvert. I don’t program as much anymore, but I very much prefer to be with people who draw out those extroverted characteristics of my personality.

Jim Beach 44:14
I love it, all right. Give us another one. Kevin,

Kevin Johnson 44:17
sure. I guess from the finance perspective, I try to tell people that, you know, it’s sometimes counterintuitive to think that you have to raise money to start a business. One of the great things about today is that you have at your disposal so many technological advancements and therefore a cheaper price than they were 1015, years ago. And so you can create a startup, a company, for a lot less now than it cost to cost years ago. So don’t always think in terms of having to raise money for an idea. You can bootstrap. Us and find ways to make that idea happen. Unfortunately, when I started my first company, someone told me it takes money to make money. Well, yeah, that can be true many times, but in my experience, you know, it takes very little money, often, to create really big companies, right? So if you have the resources and the tools to create a product yourself, you can put in some sweat equity and find other ways to to bring resources to the table to get the job done. So I always encourage, especially entrepreneurs that are just starting out, to not focus so much on on raising money. If you can find the means to get what you need done without raising the money to pay for it, because ultimately, in many cases, you have to pay that money back.

Jim Beach 45:49
That’s true. Very good one. All right, tell us about a business that you’ve started, Kevin, and what lessons you learned from it.

Kevin Johnson 45:56
Yeah, so I guess one of the biggest lessons that I learned was how important just building a team is having the ability to program and create products was not enough to create a thriving business. I realized early on that I needed people in sales. I needed people who were product developers, people that could really grow the company. So, you know, I always encourage entrepreneurs to never underestimate the power of a team. And it’s easier said than done many times. You may have heard this advice before, but I always encourage people to stay with it. You know, it’s a revolving door, and that’s difficult for a lot of people to understand, because they think they’re going to hire people and have that perfect team. Me, personally, it took about five or six years to find a really good core of five people that would help me grow my business to the level that I wanted to grow it to. So it took a long time, good five years of bringing on people as interns to contractors to eventually full time employees. It took that long process to really get the core team. So it’s necessary to get to the next level. But again, you have to stick with it and be committed to the long process of bringing on good people.

Jim Beach 47:23
What was the first business that you started? Kevin,

Kevin Johnson 47:27
I created an internet consulting business, and that grew out of just an opportunity while in college as a sophomore in Atlanta, Georgia, at Morehouse College. And I actually pitched the idea of creating online registration to my institution, and much to my dismay, they felt me, felt that I was incapable, or just they weren’t interested. That sort of put some fire under me to pursue some other ideas to prove them that I was certainly capable. So even though we didn’t go on to create online registration, we went on to consult for other companies, and we created a college website that was very popular for the not only the colleges in and around Atlanta, but also throughout the world. In fact, we had some of our the most interested in most sticky countries coming from Japan, Germany. So it was quite a learning experience with that first business.

Jim Beach 48:29
All right, I want you to give me your favorite piece of advice for each of the major business sectors. We’ve already done a little bit, but I want to double down on some of them, creativity. What? When I say creativity, this is like a war shot test, I guess Kevin, creativity. Give me your favorite piece of advice involving creativity.

Kevin Johnson 48:51
Change your environment. That’s one thing that’s really helped me when I’m in a creative environment that involves elements that I haven’t ever come across that really sparks creativity or being exposed to different things. For example, don’t always read business books, read fiction novels or like I used to do, I would listen to Hindu music or go travel to a country I’ve never been to, to be inspired in different ways. So I think creativity really comes from being exposed to different things in your life.

Jim Beach 49:29
All right? Passion, entrepreneurial passion,

Kevin Johnson 49:33
wow, so passion, my advice is, don’t be afraid of what you’re good at right? And what you’re passionate about. A lot of people have reservations about following their passion because of whatever social norms are putting pressure on them to be a lawyer or a doctor, and that’s fine, but you know, if it’s not your passion, then ultimately you won’t be fulfilled and you won’t reach. That that level of self actualization,

Jim Beach 50:03
all right? HR, you’ve already talked about the importance of team. Give me something else about HR that sticks out to you, please.

Kevin Johnson 50:11
Well, one of the really practical pieces of advice I touched on a little bit earlier, and that’s to hire slow fire fast at Johnson media, we bring in interns, then we hire them as contractors, and then we hire our contractors, the good ones, as employees. So I think it’s a really good process that helps to minimize risk and makes it a lot easier for people to get used to you, and you get used to them if it’s going to work.

Jim Beach 50:43
Raising money, finances, right? You already said that you should. You don’t necessarily need to raise a bunch of money. Give me another financial tip.

Kevin Johnson 50:53
Sure, make sure that your own financial house is in order. You know so many businesses. In fact, the great majority of businesses are funded by credit cards, and so if your personal finances aren’t in order, then you won’t be able to maximize the amount of money that you can apply for, whether it’s through credit, personal credit, credit card. So I always encourage people to make sure that you get your personal finances in order to maximize your business opportunities.

Jim Beach 51:28
All right, the final question on our war shot test to find out if you’re saying or not crazy entrepreneurship craziness, I’ve read that you call yourself crazy.

Kevin Johnson 51:39
Yeah, I think I’m crazy by the average standard. And I talk a little bit about it in my book. How give me entrepreneurship or give me death, right? I think the prospect of returning to a nine to five is scarier, more scarier to me than actual death, and I say that with 100% honesty. So by many people’s measure, that that’s crazy,

Jim Beach 52:10
it makes a lot of sense to me. I couldn’t go back either, mostly because no one would have me. Kevin, how can we learn more about you? Find you on social media, or buy a copy of the book.

Kevin Johnson 52:23
Oh, that’s great. I appreciate that. Jim, well, you know, people can find me online. The company address is Johnson media.com and the book you can find online at the entrepreneur mind.com Again, that’s the entrepreneur mind.com and if you can’t spell entrepreneur, or it gives you a little difficulty, just pop it into Google and you’ll find

Jim Beach 52:50
me. It is one of the weirdest spellings of any word out there that all the E use and stuff like that. It’s just a weird one. Anyway. Kevin Johnson, thank you so much for being with us today. Great information. Congratulations on the success of the book, and I hope you’ll come back when book number two comes out. When will that be my friend?

Kevin Johnson 53:09
Wow, that’s good. I’m working on it now. So we’re looking at either next year, the following year.

Jim Beach 53:15
Okay, and what’s it about?

Kevin Johnson 53:17
It actually will be very similar. So when I started to write the first book, I literally had to force myself to stop at 100 even though I had three or 400 principles. So it’ll be another iteration of this book.

Jim Beach 53:34
Fantastic. All right. Kevin Johnson, thanks a lot, and hope you have a great day.

Kevin Johnson 53:39
Thank you so much.

Jim Beach 53:40
We are out of time for today, but very appreciative that you are with us and promising that we will be back tomorrow, be safe, take care and go make a million dollars. Bye. Now