Welcome back to the Daily Mastermind, George Wright III with your daily dose of inspiration, motivation, and education. And we've got a great guest for you today. I know that everyone here that listens to this podcast generally fits into this category of owner, entrepreneur, CEO, executive, but overall just a personal development focused group of individuals. and I love you and I appreciate you being here with us. And today I've got a gentleman that is a best-selling author, just a great guy. His name's Ken Rusk. Ken, how are you doing? I'm doing great, George. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. We love to have individuals like yourself on the show. We kind of vet it out because we know that you've got not only the experience, but some really just insane abilities to help people to internalize and create systems to create the best life, which is our whole goal. So let me give a little bit of background and have you dig in for me. But for those of you that don't know Ken, He's the founder of Rusk Industries, a nine-figure construction enterprise. He's got 40 years of experience in inspiring entrepreneurs to build loyal teams and reduce turnover, achieve big growth. But more than that, he empowers individuals and people that have picked up his book to really create success that gives them the freedom that they need. That's why I think you've been featured on Forbes and USA Today, Fox News, and others. I'm glad to have you here today, but I'd love for you to take a minute because I think some people look at you and they're like, man, this guy is a rock star. And I know you're pretty grounded in your roots. So can you give us a little bit of a background as to where you came from and what kind of pulled you into this whole arena of educating and helping business owners? Yeah, again, thank you. It's very kind of you to have me on today. I appreciate that. So, yeah, I grew up like any kid. I probably had five, six jobs between the time I was 12 and 15 years old, you know, paper routes, bowling alleys, all that kind of stuff. And I always knew that, you know, I learned early on that trading labor for something that I wanted to manifest into my life was just a really cool formula. Like I wanted a new aluminum baseball bat and I could go work 20 hours for somebody making two bucks an hour. And there comes the baseball bat. It was just amazing to me that that kind of stuff could happen. It was so simple. And yeah, I was 15. I wanted to get my first full-time job in the summer times. And there was a hole in that fence. And I just remember we would sneak through that hole in the fence and walk through that industrial park on our way to the carryout where we hung out after school. And one day I just rolled in and I said, hey, what do you guys do in this particular business? There's lots of hustle and bustle guys running around, dump trucks and tow motors and backhoes and all that. and they said we dig ditches here and I said I'm totally qualified to do that so let's let's make that happen and yeah so I hired on I dug ditches in the summertime and in the wintertime I worked in the office um after school and I did that for probably three or four years and then it came time am I going to college am I not they came to me and they said we're opening franchises all around the country do you want to be a part of that so because I had known the front and the back of the house, as they say. I traveled around the whole Midwest, you know, Columbus, Cincinnati, Chicago, and Pennsylvania. And I opened up these franchises from scratch for people. So, you know, lo and behold, living out of a suitcase is no fun. After three or four years of that, I came to Toledo, Ohio, opened up my company, started with six people. And we have 200 of them today. So it's been a hell of a ride, George, that's for sure. Well, you know, it's interesting because I think a lot of people can relate to the grind and ultimately see and vision of creating something bigger. And they get started in business for a reason. It very quickly kind of gets out of control and they feel like they have more than a job by doing their own thing. But there was probably a point in time where you shifted a bit because you're such a great communicator with business owners, not just with strategy, but helping them to really drill down on what they do. And so you wrote your book, Blue Collar Cash. So I would love for you to just give us an idea of what made you pivot into a role where you actually wanted to start being an author and working with individuals outside of your current company and what's your driving factor for wanting to do that? Well, first off, I never woke up and said, hey, I'm going to be an author today. That just never happened. When you are hiring, I've probably hired 2,000 people in the last 38 years. And, you know, you begin to learn a whole lot about what makes people tick, right? I mean, I'm solving people's first car problem, their first, you know, driver's license problem, their first apartment, their first credit card checking account, all that kind of thing. And so you become an involuntary life coach, whether you like it or not. You know, I never spent a day in college for that. I don't have any letters after my name. I have no formal training, but I knew what worked for me early on in the chase, in the anticipation of things that you want to have come into your life. So I just used that formula and just mustered it all over all the people that I had in my office. And it really started to work in an amazing way. So the book came from the fact that my daughter, when she was 12, she got stricken with cancer. And she's fine now, but it was a really scary five years for her mother and I and her, of course. And I just remember writing her letters about what she should be chasing in life. Like what should you anticipate? What's the ultimate goal of life? And I started backing those letters up with stories of friends of mine who are blue collar entrepreneurs who overcame, George, the most horrendous situations to be successful people. And so I started including those stories in the letters that I would write to her while she was getting treated. And then pretty soon I had 80,000 words and someone, I think my wife said, I think you've got a book here. And I said, you know, I didn't intend that, but here it is. So yeah, we, I found an editor and then I found it, I somehow landed a big agent and then I got this big publisher, Harvard Collins in New York, and it went crazy from there. And I had no intention of doing any of it. So it came through. And all I really did was try to share in very simple ways, is this very simple plug and play ways. If you want to build a company, if you want to grow it, then you need to have people that can make the following statement. I can get what I want for myself with and through this company called Ken's Company or XYZ Company. So if I can see my future here, why wouldn't I remain loyal and effective and goal oriented and make things happen for Ken and for myself at the same time? And I think the real secret sauce comes right there, George, where you put a lot of time and effort into exposing the individual's personal goals and tracking them. And if those align with the corporate goals, you have this insane amount of momentum and synergy that comes from that. and then look out because those folks are going to take you and your company way further than you can take it yourself. That's for sure. Yeah, I think that's a real secret sauce. And I want to kind of double down on that vision and culture, but I want to go back just a second because I want to point out to our audience, I've been working with authors for 30 years and I've found time and time and time again, because there are some amazingly good books and content out there, but the ones that create the best results for the reader are the ones that come from a background of someone who's been through it. And so, you know, obviously the best guides you could have is someone who's already ahead of the path for you to help you navigate the path. And I think that what you done really well with the book and also with I think probably why you have such a great impact But you mentioned something to me before we kind of got going and I would love to just bring this into perspective for a few people listening You have multiple different types of readers that read your book and this will kind of help individuals that are listening to sort of relate to who they might be. Tell me a little bit about who your book's for. Now we know why you did it and where you come from. Who are these different types of readers that read your book and the individuals that you're talking to? Well, when you're coaching people, you definitely want to help them see what the possibilities are for themselves, how you can control your input, your output, the quality of that output, your day, your time, your schedule, your financial gain, and the vision that you see your life happening for you. So that one was an easy one because I was actually, the readers were the same people I was coaching within my organization. And then it went crazy across the country. So what I didn't expect is the second reader was someone who, you know, they kind of made it, they were like into their life already. You know, they were on the 15th floor in the cubicle of some building selling medical supplies and they hated it and they wanted to reinvent themselves. So that was another reader that read the book. But the most surprising one was, and maybe some of the most rewarding one too, was when companies started buying the book and using it as a book club within their organizations because the bosses, the owners, the managers, they just couldn't do all of it. They couldn't do it all. And they knew that they needed to have people with and around them that they could call entrepreneurs, people who owned their divisions, who owned their departments like they were owners themselves. And they ran it with the fever and the fervor of an owner. And they ran it so effectively that you could kind of take your eye off them for a while, right? And move on. And what that did for people is it allowed them to go where they're supposed to be. They're supposed to be in the helicopter at 10,000 feet, looking out one, two, three miles ahead and seeing what's ahead, what's coming at them from what side and what angle so that they can drive the company visually versus mechanically. And I think that was the biggest thing is getting an owner to go, I need to give up the mechanical part of my company that's killing me and get into the visual part, which I really love, and then let me run the company instead of it running me. Yeah, it's a real catch-22 because as you build a company and scale a company, the vision is what motivates and inspires people to go forward, but you get so trapped into the organization. And it's the reason I wanted you to comment on that because the second and third type of reader you have, someone might be listening to this and thinking, I'm so deep into my business and so overwhelmed and so overloaded or my job or my company or my position that I always say with our podcast and our listeners, it's never too late to create the life you were meant to live, the business you wanted to create in the first place or whatever it is. So you might be redefining your identity, your authority, your focus, but that sometimes you need that blueprint to do it. And so you're right. There's those people that want to do that. And then And then there's these entrepreneurs and individuals that are part of a team, and you give kind of a nice little blueprint for ways to do that that allows a CEO and an owner and a visionary. So you might be that person, and you need this for your team, or you might be a team, and this can help you to learn. But I think that that's a big key factor. You talk about entrepreneur, but I also love that most of your messaging is focused around the vision. So what do you recommend or what are some of the key things you tell, whether it's a business owner or a team? Where does it start when it comes to creating loyalty, just outside of creating a big vision, creating teams and loyalty? What are some tactical things that you generally recommend for them to start with? Well, you should probably date mark this part of the recording so people can play it back. because there's a sentence that I've used for years that I think is just absolutely huge. I will stand in front of all 200 of the people that I love so dearly in this organization, and I will say this. I can't get what I want for myself, nor can my company get what it wants or needs until all of you get what you want first. And the reason I say that is because companies are linear creatures, George, right? You have from the left, you have some type of human element, some type of supply or material or raw material or pieces and parts that something is then created. And within that organization, something is created, a product, a service, a software, something is built. And then that thing gets a price tag attached to it. And then a sales force goes out and sells that thing. And then it's installed and it is paid for. And hopefully there's profit at the end of that formula. Well, guess what? As the owner, you're at the end of that line every single time. So why wouldn't you want everybody in front of you winning for themselves? Why wouldn't you want to walk the hallways and go, wow, she's getting herself a new car. He's putting a new deck on the back of his house. He's having his second child. That's wonderful. He's got a 401k set up for himself. He's got a 529 plan set up. Why would you wouldn't you want to know exactly what those people are chasing? Because if everybody's chasing and anticipating something, the company thrives. It has no chance not to. Because the only way those things are going to happen is if those people are individually successful within the company. Now, you pile a bunch of those people in that same scenario with that entrepreneurial Meryl attitude, I'm telling you, get out of the way because it happened to me. And the company went from so many figures to a lot of figures and still is there today. It's just so much more fun to run the company because you're running winners. You're overseeing winning. And it's interesting because so many businesses, the number one problem they have is they're trying to do it on their own because they're the smartest guy in the room or gal in the room. And I think you're right. I think many people that I've spoke with over the years know that when you can help other people get what they want, you're going to get what you want. But I think there's a power in what you said when you stand in front of people and tell them that. And you do it with integrity and belief because you can't just try to motivate people. You have to inspire people. And I think that the idea that you would make that statement to your team instead of assuming they know that, hey, if we're winning, they're going to make more money. Your commitment by stating that is really huge. What do you think holds back most organizations from truly developing the culture? Is it just not identifying the vision and goals of their team? Or is it not formalizing that? Or what is one of the, or maybe a couple of the biggest obstacles you've run into when you have talked with individuals? Because you've been all over the world. The first thing is this. The first thing is you have to lose this attitude. So you go home on Friday and you say to your wife or your husband, man, did I do it this week? I fixed this. I changed that. I motivated these people. I yelled at that person. I broke this. I repaired that. I also have high blood pressure, diabetes. I can't remember my kid's first name, but that's okay because I made a pile of money. OK, that's the first thing you have to drop this ego of me, boss, me, everything, because that right there will keep you down. It'll stifle your growth and and you you're not going to have any fun. OK, I'm just telling you, that's the way it is. I would never want people to if I lined up all 200 people in my parking lot, shoulder to shoulder, I would never want anyone to pick me out as the boss. because I celebrating the victories of the people within it That really what I doing So that the first thing The second thing is they think it a lot of work and it really not If you have a larger organization, you pick somebody out and you call them the chief cool officer. And the chief cool officer's job is just to make sure that environment is awesome and that goals are put out there. They're tracked. They're monitored. people are anticipating wins and you go you walk the hallways and just high five people it really is amazing we have this big black glass board in our hallway it's like eight by eight feet long and it's got at any one time 50 to 100 goals on it where people have stated this is what I'm after I'm going to Scotland to play golf at the old course in 2026 it's going to cost me four thousand dollars i'm saving you know i'm saving forty dollars a week for two years the apparel department knows about it it's coming out of my check i'm going to sign this goal i'm going to date it and everybody in that organization knows wow he's going to scotland in two years to play golf and and there's 50 of these at any one time on the board as people are anticipating and then we have a whole other board in a whole other section that has all the things that people have already done Wow. Pictures and photographs. And it's beyond just the old vision board conversation. It's like vision board on steroids because you really need to, you need to actually make this thing live, make it living. And then what happens is you put it in a public place and everyone sees what everyone else is after. It's really cool because it's very collaborative. probably. Yeah, if I know that you're after a new Ford F-250 or if I know you're after this or after that, there's this whole thing of let me help you get yours and let you help me get mine. And it's just really fun to work that way because what's the alternative? I mean, we don't live to work, right? We work so that we can live. Well, supposedly, right? Like we hear that phrase, you know, do today what most want so you can live tomorrow like most can. It's like, I want to live today the way I want to live, right? Exactly. And isn't it cool if you find out what living means to the people within your company, right? Because I mean, if you think about every human being has 24 hours, eight hours of sleeping, eight hours of like working and then eight hours of something else. Well, I'm solely focused on what the something else is. I want to know what that third period, I want to hire the whole human being. I don't want to hire one third of them. Yeah. So if I can see what their personal life is all about and how they're how they're making their life better, it's just it's just so much more fun to be a CEO that way. Well, I love this. I love this idea of the vision board, because I'll tell you why. I mean, there's so many I love to have systems and processes that create results so that you don't feel like you have to do it. But having a vision board, we already know the power of that. But having it public inside a team adds both collaborative effort, but also accountability for the person that's now declared this is something they want to do. And so it gives all these benefits. And I was going to ask you another question, which you sort of answered with that, which is I think a lot of times people hear culture and team and vision, and they try to figure out how they can balance that with accountability and KPIs and driving results. And they see them as two different things. It's like success and happiness. Your success creates happiness. They're mutually exclusive, just like culture and accountability are sort of mutually exclusive, but they can help each other. So how do you balance that when you're talking to organizations about, look, we're not talking about just having fun. We want that. But we're going to set up a system, not a person, but a system that creates accountability in this culture, that creates results in the culture. If you think of – I mean, you're right. You can misconstrue what culture is. Some people think culture is crying rooms and massage rooms and places you can go buy baskets of fruit. Trust events. Yeah. Or drop off your laundry. I mean, that's all fine. I'm talking about turning people into hardcore, gold-crushing machines. And the only way you do that is by documenting what it is. I mean, look at it this way. If I drop the thousand-piece puzzle on your desk right now, okay, and ask you to build it, the first thing you would ask me is, well, where's the box cover? Okay? Because I need to know what it is I'm building. So if I took that box cover away, you're kind of done. I mean, you might get the square edges, but you're not going to fill it in because you're like, well, what am I building? Well, what I'm trying to find out, I'm trying to explore is I want 200 different puzzle boxes in my organization that individual people are staring at. Did you know that when you build a hundred, a thousand piece puzzle, you stare at that box between 50 and a hundred thousand times when you build it? So why are we not doing that with our own life? Why are we not doing that with with everything in our life. And that's all I'm trying to say is don't just sit here and work for Friday, get something done, chase something, anticipate something just like you would anticipate, you know, a spring break vacation. I mean, we're all so good at that. Yeah. Why aren't we good? We're good at planning that to the end detail down to the number eight copper tone suntan lotion that smells so good. Right. Why are we not good at planning the rest of our lives? And as a CEO, that's what I do. I walk around helping people plan their lives. And it's just so much more fun. Yeah, if you put as much effort into like, we're just planning a trip to Cabo. And it's like, if you did that same fun, goal setting environment, vision creating with your people, you'd be going to Cabo twice as often, right? It's exactly right. And I can only tell you this, there is science behind what you see, you get into your life. If you see something clearly enough, you will have it in your life, no question. And there's actually science, you know, I'll take you through the whole neurotransmitter thing if you want, but it is an actual fact that if you stare at something, you will find that in your life. And that's why we have people anticipating around here by the dozens, because it's just so much more, it's just a better way to work. No, I love that you said that because, you know, I often talk a lot about, you know, we're doing a lot in the authority marketing space right now, but a lot of times I talk about the mirror effect, which is things that allow people to get trust and credibility, but this reticular activating system and the idea that once you see something and you want it and you're going after it, you're going after it. But I want to go back to one thing you said, which I loved. And I think this is the subtle shift. You mentioned it, but that a lot just don't get. And I think there's a reason, which I wanted to ask you a question on. I love that you said you become a people building goal crushing machine, right? And I think that that is the goal. And I think sometimes you'd think it comes off as confidence, but I think a lot of business owners don't have the ability to allow trust in their team to help them get to the goal. So that's why they do it themselves. And it's a combination of confidence in their team and trust that the process will happen. And I think when you have a plan that helps you to have that, but how do you work with, if someone's listening to this and they're an owner, a team leader, a level five type leader, how do you help them to build, because this is an internal game, the trust and confidence in their team so that they will focus on that? Because otherwise they're so busy doing it for themselves, they won't focus on creating people, builders, people that are gold crushing machines. How do you how do you get that? First off, again, you need that that chief cool officer in there to help start the process. Number one. Number two, start very small. One of the first goals we had here was a gal that thought she could never do this. She wanted to pay off her father. She borrowed from him to buy a used car And she always felt bad that she never paid him back and i looked at her and i said hey can you afford 48 bucks a week and she said yeah i said okay you have paid off in a year well she looked at me george like i invented penicillin okay so i mean you just start small and guess what that very very young very um mild and meek mannered young gal since then has bought her second new car. She's bought her second house. She's gotten married and has a couple of kids and now she's planning for their futures. So here's this very meek person walking down the hallway, kind of like not making eye contact with you that now is like, get out of my way and let me do this. And guess what? If you have enough people that are confident in their own ability to win, how much do you think they're going to be confident in the ability of your company to win? Because that's the vehicle they use in order to win. So now you have all these people going, all right, what are we going to do to kick ass today? Okay. We need to make something happen because I've got stuff I'm anticipating. I have these timed pathways I have up on the board that I need to achieve. Now the only vehicle they have is your company to make that a reality. Well, guess what? Where does momentum come from, right? Yeah. It's a difference between being a company that provides a paycheck and the vehicle that they need to realize and execute on their goals and their dreams, right? Yeah, we call them timed pathways. We've kind of dropped the word goal because goal means so many things to so many people. It's kind of an overused term. And so we've dropped that. Yeah. And we've dropped even the word dream, hope and wish. And we've converted all those words to timed pathway because until it's on a track, it's just a hope. And what's, I mean, what's a hope? It's a maybe. So time pathway is the way to do it. You know, plaster them all over the walls in your company and then get out of the way because it's going to be a fun ride. Yeah, I love that. Well, you know, we don't have a lot of time left, but I'd be remiss if I didn't mention this because I know you're pretty passionate about giving back. You donate your time, your resources. And I think that there's a lot of individuals that are passionate about that, but I think it's part of your makeup as well. So what's your big reason or focus for giving back? And do you feel kind of part of this create your best life as a business owner as well, that you would recommend others? And tell me a little bit about what you're passionate about. So giving back is a huge part. And I can tell you that. Here's another thing that I hope people remember. You've heard this before, but I'm going to say it again. Time, talent, and treasure. It's so easy just to write a check and tell everybody, hey, I sent a check to this lung association and wherever. Okay. And they're like, okay, well, that's cool. Wrong. You can find your local Ronald McDonald House, okay? And for 90 bucks, you can have six people go to Ronald McDonald House, spend two hours building, you know, lasagna and salad and garlic bread and meatballs. And you put it in these trays and you lock it down, you put it in the refrigerator and you all leave. And the recipient never knows who you are. And that's okay, because you gave them your time, your talent and your treasure. And there's millions of ways to do that. You know, we build peanut butter and jelly sandwiches by the hundreds once a quarter here. We do all these fun things where you're involving the people and you do it because obviously you should if you're a successful company. But also there's kind of this karma thing. And I don't recommend people do it for this reason, but the more you give, the more you just seem to get. And I don't know how that works and I don't really care how it works, but people out there realize that if you're a giver, they're going to find ways to give you more to give. And then people around your organization, again, they're like, man, this place is so cool because we care about other people. And they wouldn't do that on their own, potentially, not in that big of a way. So giving back is just an amazing thing for a group of people to do. Yeah, I think it's that next evolution that people realize as they get older in life, too. It's funny, I used to chase success, and it served me, I made a lot of money, did a lot of things. And I got to that place in my life as you get kids and grandkids where, you know, that Jim Rome quote came in really well for me where it was, you know, success is not to be pursued. It's to be attracted by the person that you become. And you think I got attracted and you just don't realize it until you really engage with it. And, and that's why I like, you know, maybe, and with this thought, I know through your speaking and coaching and consulting, you, you know, help leaders, but I love the, you know, the title of like, for example, you've got a course that's a path to a successful life. That's what it's really all about, right? We're not just trying to create a business most of our life so that we could live the best life. We're really trying to create a successful life. And if you don't build it with that intention, you can't build it by starting with the business, being so overwhelmed, you don't have a life and you get later on, you wish you had. It really is a path to a successful life, you say, right? Yeah. So there's a big difference between living a if-then life or how we do it, which is starting with the then first. You know, I mean, if I go to high school and if I get good grades and if I go to college and if I get a degree and if I get, you know, some great job and if that job pays me money, well, then I can start living my life. Wrong. That's completely backwards. I want to know what the then is first, because if you don't know where you're going, it doesn't matter what you do or how you do it. And having a successful life is a life is a long trail. It's not a destination. Right. Yeah. So, yeah, you want to put yourself in a position where you can be winning all along the pathway so that you become confident and you become, you know, sustained and you become comfortable, peaceful and free, like we say in Blue Collar Cash. Yeah, it's it's it's a it's a journey, not not an end. That's for sure. Well, I love that because it also goes so hand in hand with a lot of things I tell people because I also tell them, you know, if you start operating like the future version of yourself, the decisions you make today will be different. Your future more confident self, your future free self, your future, you know, evolved self, like you will make different decisions. You will act differently. You will do things differently. You'll be down a different path. And so focusing on that future vision, I think, is key. what's the best way for people to connect with you? I mean, I can put a lot of things in the show notes as well, a lot of links to your content, but what's the best way for people to connect with you if they want to learn more about kind of what you do and how they can connect with you? Well, if you go to KenRusk.com, you'll see what we're up to there. You know, there's the book is there, the course is there, my consulting and the speaking is there, where we do groups. We do kind of like, instead of keynotes, we do kind of like long-term, longer-term consulting speaking, where we actually work with people while we're speaking to them. And it's kind of a cool spin on just listening to somebody yap up there for an hour. So we try to help businesses. I want to impact the business before I leave it. I can't just talk to them and then say, see you later. So yeah, you'll see me at kenruss.com and you can figure it all out from there. That's great. Well, we'll put that in the show notes. I encourage anybody because I do love the idea. It's not about a great masterclass as much as a of relationship of learning and constant lifelong learning. And so I'll put those in the show notes. Thank you so much for being here. And for those of you listening, do me a favor, share the show. You know, there's people out there that are just feeling like they're doing it on going it on their own. That's why the masterminds here. We want to be able to help to inspire and not just motivate, but inspire and educate you so that you know it's not too late to start living the life that you're meant to live and building that business that you really truly want to have. So do me a favor and share the show. I'll look forward to seeing you. Hit me up on The Daily Mastermind on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube. Make sure that we know what it is you're working on and what we can help you with, and we'll look forward to talking with you more tomorrow. Have a great day.
