you’ve all probably heard that saying
money meant money can buy happiness
we’ve all heard that yeah I respectfully
disagree that money can’t buy happiness
I actually believe that it can and I
believe that an idea worth sharing is
having that conversation but in order to
do so I do need your permission because
these are gonna be real conversations
real stories of mine and we’re gonna go
some hard places together so can I have
your permission to do that I’m glad you
said yes because I can’t change my
slides now and the next one’s a doozy
so this was a the beginning of my story
on September of 2004 my two best friends
and I hopped in a car to drive out to
Las Vegas Nevada Steve was driving this
is his car Matt was in the passenger
seat and I was in the back seat we had
all just turned to 21 years old and this
is gonna be our first time in Vegas at
21 as you can see we didn’t make it to
Vegas we got in a rollover car accident
where I was ejected a Steve was ejected
Matt did not get ejected he was rushed
to the hospital in an ambulance Steve
and I were both rushed to the hospital
in a helicopter
I was ejected they they think out of the
back there where you would open it for
groceries and Steve was ejected out of
the driver’s window the long story short
of that is Matt and I survived
Steve didn’t and so Matt I just survived
an accident where we lost our best
friend and made it personally and so
what that did is it put us in this place
of not just grief as to be expected but
guilt Matt now we’re trying to figure
out why we’re here there were three of
us now there’s just two of us and Steve
Matt and I go way back we were you know
Steve and I grew up together he was like
a brother to me and so it was a tragic
loss 66 days later Matt and I fell into
an abandoned mineshaft together on my
way in I was able to grab a bush and
stop my fall and climb back out Matt
fell 780 feet to the bottom of didn’t
survive so in 66 days I was in two
accidents that took the two closest
people to me at that time in my life
accidents that should have taken my life
as well and as you can imagine going
through that is something that changes
you forever I went through all the
obvious
grieving stages I was extremely
depressed I was never suicidal I didn’t
write a note I didn’t plan on ending my
life but I didn’t want to be alive
because I had soul-crushing grief I was
in an accident with Steve man I survived
I fell in a mineshaft with Matt I
survived and I’ll never forget being at
his funeral not being able to look at
his mama down the face because I felt so
guilty that I’d escaped twice and their
boy didn’t make it and so I went through
a very ugly ugly season and what I
decided in probably the ugliest moment
of the whole ordeal was that I couldn’t
do anything about bringing Steven Matt
back I couldn’t do anything about
reversing the clock but I could do
something with the time I had left and
instead of being a victim and feeling
sorry for myself and blaming the world
for bad life circumstances I decided I
can let that create Who I was going to
be and I looked up to them and I
promised them that I would tell their
story forever and that would live a life
big enough for the three of us that I
was going to use my god-given talents
gifts my relationships and my resources
and lay it all on the field and do
everything I had for them and so
naturally I had towards toward I turned
towards philanthropy yes okay they only
had 21 years of life I don’t know if
I’ve got another year another decade or
if I get to live my full life but I’m
gonna make every moment count I’m gonna
make my life matter and so I went to
start a non-profit and I wanted to start
a non-profit I want to go change the
world in honor of Stephen Matt and what
I found out pretty quickly as nonprofits
are extremely non profitable and you
actually need money and so as I was
creating a business plan that was
something I hadn’t thought about I just
saw my life changing and helping the
world and then all of a sudden you have
to write a check for that and so as I
was evaluating business models for
nonprofits it looked very simple or very
similar to regular for purpose
businesses or excuse me for-profit
businesses to get someone to hand me
money for a tradable Act seemed actually
more difficult than to get someone to
hand me money for a product good or
service and I could either commit to
starting a non-profit and then rely on
donors to believe in me or my cause
enough to continue to give me money or I
could start a business that I was just
getting people to buy my product good or
service and use the profits from that
business to fund my dream so that’s what
I decided to do I said you know what it
seems just as hard to make money in
business as it is to raise money in
philanthropy I’m gonna start a business
I’m gonna be so rich I’m gonna be like
Bill Gates and I’m gonna be like Warren
Buffett and just have so much ooh – I’ve
got nothing but
and money to give back to the world so
that was my plan and as I look over
these 12 years it’s been 12 years since
those accidents back over over my
history I’ve been in four distinct areas
of life I call them seasons of life and
as I’ve shared my journey of my ups and
downs with others they can always find
themselves in one of the four seasons I
was in and so to illustrate this
actually created a graph to demonstrate
where I was and you guys can probably
take a look up here and figure out where
you are personally so this is a graph we
made it more of a kind of a cartoonish
looking graph but that vertical axis
represents profits the higher you go up
the vertical axis in this graph the more
money you’re making the horizontal axis
represents purpose the farther to the
right you go the more purposeful you’re
being so where I started my careers in
the top left quadrant I want to make a
ton of money and I said to myself
someday I’ll refresh my balance in my
bank account and that magic number will
be there whatever that number is where I
know that for the rest of my life I can
now just work on Philanthropy and I
don’t have to worry about money again I
didn’t know what that number was but I
knew some day would come and I was in
what’s called the earning quadrant a lot
of people in the earning quadrant pursue
it because that’s where the world told
us we’re gonna be happy the more money
you have the more cars you have the
provocations you have somehow you’re
gonna be happier
yet I personally have found no
correlation between happiness and the
amount of money you have more so what
you do with the money you have and so I
was out there doing what you know I was
I felt born to do start businesses make
a ton of money and someday be so rich I
didn’t have to work anymore and I I did
that I found a mentor I said okay if I’m
gonna be successful in business what’s
the first step and everyone’s always
asking you know Cole what’s the secret
to success I don’t believe there’s a
secret at all you just find someone who
is where you want to be you copy them
and you can have similar results right I
always say that I’m just the best
copycat I know
so I read an article somewhere that real
estate people make money and I asked my
father to be my business partner I
pitched him with the best business plan
I could ever think of I said dad you
have the money I have the time let’s do
this right luckily my father shot me
down and said I will be your business
partner but I’m not gonna hand you money
we had to learn how to raise money and
we did so by being mentored by a real
estate multi-millionaire and it worked
really well for us mostly due to timing
mm five six and seven we crushed it
2007 turned into 2008 you already know
what happened
I was a real estate professional
exclusively making money in real estate
in our recession and collapse of real
estate and I started going down the
gradient I stopped making money I
started losing money and I found myself
in the surviving quadrant so if you look
at these quadrants again I’m now low
profit low purpose I’m in a surviving
quadrant and statistically that’s where
most people are just based on the facts
of living paycheck to paycheck you’ve
heard those statistics fifty to eighty
percent of Americans are living paycheck
to paycheck that’s where I was more deal
to deal and I like to clarify something
and say that your net worth has nothing
to do with your human worth who we are
as human beings is not defined by the
dollars in our bank account however the
dollars in our bank account give us more
options and being Who I believe God made
us to be and so in the surviving
quadrant I had one option make it
through the day figure out how to pay
the bills and instead of having an
outward focus of going out there and
changing the world for Steve and Matt I
hadn’t have an inward focus of just
getting through the week I had to figure
out how is going to pay my car payment
my insurance and sometimes things
weren’t paid and I spent two years in
the surviving quadrant just trying to
get by and I realized that that wasn’t
what I was born to do and I had a chance
to somebody mentioned Haiti earlier I
had a chance to go to Haiti in January
of 2010 immediately following that
earthquake you guys remember that
catastrophic earthquake that Haiti
endured I was sent as an emergency
responder and I met this little boy
right here and he changed my life
forever part of my role and
responsibility in Haiti was to search
and rescue was to go and find people who
had been panned get them on pin and
bring them back and as you can imagine
as the days went on it wasn’t search and
rescue was more just recovery and we
found this little boy he’d been buried
alive for days his leg had been smashed
and had become infected and from the
about the shin down his leg had to be
amputated and I’m doing his
post-operative care here I’m cleaning
his wound and they speak Creole in
French in Haiti I speak neither so this
gentleman right here was my translator
and what’s interesting about this boy is
he could see the huge scar on his
forehead and just his injuries is he had
this piece about him he was always okay
no matter what we did hey this is gonna
hurt he was okay and he always smiled
and through my translator asked him why
he always smiles and he responded
looking at me and the translator
translate he says he smiles because you
gave him life again
coming home from Haiti all the sudden
struggling to pay for a Cadillac
Escalade wasn’t important to me anymore
and seeing the catastrophic devastation
every single day while I was over there
changed my priorities I didn’t want to
pursue money anymore I wanted to get
right into living a life of purpose and
so what I did was I stepped down for my
company I gave my company to my father
and I moved over to the giving quadrant
I said you know what it’s pretty hard to
start your own nonprofit it didn’t work
out for me to get so rich that I then
have enough money in time to give back
for the rest of my life I lost it all in
the recession and that’s my fault for
being over leveraged in real estate so
what I’m going to do is I’m going to
join someone else’s nonprofit and now
I’m just going to do philanthropy the
rest of my life and so what that did was
it took away my profit but it gave me
purpose again and I moved to the bottom
right quadrant as you can see her on
this access hi hi excuse me high purpose
low profits and the type of individuals
and organizations you find there are
your peace workers those are your
churches those your nonprofits these are
individuals and organizations that are
designed to give back however always
relying on donors to support to stay in
business and one of the number-one
function of churches and nonprofits
rightfully so is fundraising they want
to go change the world
someone’s got to write a check to do
that now we’re leaning into how money
can buy happiness
and so as I lived in that giving
quadrant I actually moved to Mexico and
I joined staff full-time and worked five
to six days a week building houses for
almost families then I would surf any
tacos then I would go work with orphans
and then I would surf and eat more tacos
and then we would give back to the
homeless on the streets by bringing them
tacos and it was something about just
giving to others the entire time the
tacos and the surfing and just being out
of my own element I mean I shut myself
home down I fell off the map this was
like my time in the wilderness I found
happiness myself and part of it came
from this little girl right here who
changed my life forever this is a view
gallo and just gives me a little
emotional I must be pregnant
my
my wife cries through every pregnancy so
I commercial oh but this is a beguile
and she changed my life forever she was
not an orphan so we I helped start an
orphanage and she lived just on the
other side of the wall from that
orphanage she had two younger sisters a
mother and a father and they were living
in a 16 by 20 foot house I know this
because we built it for them in the
nonprofit and I absolutely fell in love
with this little girl and when I would
pull my truck up in front of the
orphanage she and her sisters would come
and tackle me and just love on me and
tell me that they love me and I started
supporting them
I would buy their groceries and I would
bring it to them and I found that maybe
40 to 50 US dollars in Mexico at their
grocery stores could feed a family of
five every week and I’ll never forget
one of the experiences I had when I was
carrying the groceries and I knocked on
the door the father opened the door he
saw that it was me he knew who I was I
had the groceries and he just had a tear
come down his face and he just thanked
me and I realized that I figured out how
to buy happiness and that was my first
experience of making money matter see
I’d made a lot of money before and spent
it but this is a way to make money and
make it matter I was feeding a family I
wasn’t able to start feeding that
orphanage as well now this was out of
the savings and the things that I was
selling while I was in Mexico remember I
had walked away from my business but I
was saying how so little to me was so
much for them although it was maybe four
to five hundred bucks a month there were
21 orphans that didn’t have to
experience hunger anymore and I became
obsessed with this idea of making my
money matter of finding ways to not just
spend your money and fun and you do that
and feel guilt free about it but I’ll
portion of my money was going towards
feeding children and it gave me a
feeling that I can’t possibly explain to
you with words but what I learned is
that those that say money can’t buy
happiness they’re shopping in the wrong
stores try feeding a child and tell me
that dad’s doesn’t give you a greater
sense of joy than you’ve probably ever
experienced before but I realized I was
out of money
when I came to another T in the road and
I said you know what I’m gonna go back
to America I’m gonna restart my
businesses start new businesses and I
have this newfound ambition to make more
money than I ever have before because I
want to make a difference I want to make
my money matter and so I climbed up this
gradient of profits and purpose now I
was in the top right gradients and what
we call thriving as you can see that’s a
business that’s making a lot of money
and giving back and instead of just
making money and then donating it it’s
actually built into my business model
see traditionally you have what are
called for-profit businesses and
nonprofit businesses by taking a
business and creating some social cause
or some give elements we’ve created this
hybrid that I’m calling it for purpose
business it’s not a non-profit it’s not
a for-profit it makes money but changes
the world simultaneously again it
doesn’t rely on me to give my wife and I
do that privately this is a business
that gives back as I make more money and
I’ve got record-breaking quarters and
I’ve got record-breaking earning
statements I also have record-breaking
impact and my wife and I have had the
privilege of teaching thousands of
business owners around the world this
for purpose business model of how to get
to the thriving quadrant and so they’ve
started to call themselves the thrive
tribe they’re super fired up they found
me they’re here
but the Thrive tribe of men and women
who take their talents or resources and
their businesses to change the world and
it’s really cool you’re seeing more and
more of these pop up everywhere you’ve
got 7li who they donate seven dollars
and this is just a small sampling they
donate seven dollars for everything you
buy off of their website to charity of
Tom’s that’s probably a pretty famous
one that started their business model
one for one buy a pair of shoes they
give a pair of way more recently we’ve
seen Stella step up and partner with
water.org still it was founded in 1366
it’s been around for hundreds of years
but recently they started to buy a lady
a drink which what that means is when
you do business with Stella they give a
portion of their proceeds away to
water.org to provide clean water to
people at children women and men who
don’t have access to clean water you see
companies that are being started for
purpose from day one so this is a
company here when you go to Stella that
changed their business model they’ve
been around hundreds of years they did
this so you’re seeing existing
businesses connect to social causes
you’re also seeing new businesses being
started for social causes Bridgette
she’s the founder of listen and they
build premium headphones and for every
pair of headphones you buy through the
Starkey Hearing Foundation they donate a
hearing aid to a child who can’t hear
and we’re seeing this ripple effect of
just entrepreneurs that are deciding to
not want to just be capitalist consumers
but philanthropic entrepreneurs and
there’s actual consumer behavior that’s
starting to change from this as well
there was a study done
icon it’s called their corporate social
responsibility report and these
statistics are pretty startling what you
can see here on the screen it’s doing
that there we go
91% of global consumers expect companies
to do more than a profit now I want you
know this is a global survey 91% of
people doing business for any of us who
own a business expect us to do more than
just make money 84% this is the big one
say that they would purchase products
from companies with a cause over
companies without that means greater
market share this next one blew my mind
90% of global consumers say that they
would like to see more purpose-driven
products and companies in the
marketplace what that means for those of
us in here who may own a business or
someday hope to 90% of people that are
gonna be spending money with you wants
to see you do something social with it
and this is a quote from that research
article that says consumers consider a
company’s social and environmental
commitments before they make buying
decisions consumers more and more saying
ok if I do business with you what are
you going to do for others and another
reason that I personally believe that
you’re seeing more and more of these
companies start up other than just want
to be good human beings and leave a
legacy and do meaningful work with our
money and make our money matter I
believe another reason we see it is just
people aren’t happy in the workplace
Deloitte did a study that said that over
80% of employees are unhappy in their
careers or profession men and women are
realizing that they spend more time with
their employers and they do with their
own family and careers and jobs that
don’t serve them emotionally that don’t
challenge them that aren’t using their
gifts and their talents they’re just
showing up for a paycheck and they’ve
had enough you see an even greater
number of that amongst Millennials that
are even more so in tune with wanting to
do work that matters and I love what
Time magazine says right here about
Millennials this is just interesting it
says that we are the me me me generation
I like this part it says Millennials are
lazy entitled narcissists who still live
with their parents so I thought that was
an interesting article I was going to
read it I was too lazy but
I’m sure it was fantastic and so why I
believe that an idea worth sharing is
making your money matter is starting a
for purpose business is because this is
a way that we can make a difference in
the world in here real quickly if time
and money didn’t matter anymore how many
of you by show of hands would spend some
of your time and money giving back raise
your hands I know this is requires
participation Catholics like all of you
and so why start a for purpose business
because this gives you a greater self
purpose it makes you a part of community
if you heard them in here a tribe of
growing entrepreneurs who want to use
their businesses to make the world a
better place where the bottom-line
matters you got to stay in business but
more so as the impact we’re making the
unromantic facts of this is that this is
an emerging trend and for those of us
who are in business know that you want
to be an early adapter you want to get
ahead of trends you don’t want to be one
of these stuffy corporate entities that
takes forever to come around and is
losing market share to companies that
are more innovative that are
incorporating a for purpose element
immediately so there’s emerging trends
in business you want to be ahead of that
consumer behavior is actually changing
and again as much grief as we
Millennials gets I’m on the older end of
that but I made it by dates I guess but
millennial isn’t even whoever’s after
that are becoming more and more socially
conscious so you can oppose opposition
call them lazy and narcissistic or you
can actually create companies that cater
to where they want to spend their money
when you want to get on to the romantic
side of why to do this you connect your
income to meaningful work you feel
fulfilled not just because you’re making
money but because you’re making your
money matter it creates a legacy and
then you’re joining a family our thrive
tribe who are committed to leaving the
world better than we entered it and
that’s my goal and as you know I
promised Steven that that I would make
my life matter and so I like closing
with this quote by John C Maxwell he’s
one of my favorite authors he says the
truth is you can spend your life any way
you want but you can spend it only once
and so I challenge you guys to consider
that this is our only at-bat and so all
of us want to do something that we want
to be remembered for one of the earlier
speakers showed a picture of a funeral
with empty seats man I want mine to be a
sold-out audience with people fighting
for the microphones but a lot of the
work that I want to do in the world
requires money which means I’m gonna
have to write a check
and when I’m writing these checks I’m
buying my happiness and so my commitment
to you know my commitment to Steven
matters is to live a life that matters
I’m doing that by building businesses
that make the world a better place and I
challenge you to consider doing the same
thank you for give me a moment to talk
about seeing that
money meant money can buy happiness
we’ve all heard that yeah I respectfully
disagree that money can’t buy happiness
I actually believe that it can and I
believe that an idea worth sharing is
having that conversation but in order to
do so I do need your permission because
these are gonna be real conversations
real stories of mine and we’re gonna go
some hard places together so can I have
your permission to do that I’m glad you
said yes because I can’t change my
slides now and the next one’s a doozy
so this was a the beginning of my story
on September of 2004 my two best friends
and I hopped in a car to drive out to
Las Vegas Nevada Steve was driving this
is his car Matt was in the passenger
seat and I was in the back seat we had
all just turned to 21 years old and this
is gonna be our first time in Vegas at
21 as you can see we didn’t make it to
Vegas we got in a rollover car accident
where I was ejected a Steve was ejected
Matt did not get ejected he was rushed
to the hospital in an ambulance Steve
and I were both rushed to the hospital
in a helicopter
I was ejected they they think out of the
back there where you would open it for
groceries and Steve was ejected out of
the driver’s window the long story short
of that is Matt and I survived
Steve didn’t and so Matt I just survived
an accident where we lost our best
friend and made it personally and so
what that did is it put us in this place
of not just grief as to be expected but
guilt Matt now we’re trying to figure
out why we’re here there were three of
us now there’s just two of us and Steve
Matt and I go way back we were you know
Steve and I grew up together he was like
a brother to me and so it was a tragic
loss 66 days later Matt and I fell into
an abandoned mineshaft together on my
way in I was able to grab a bush and
stop my fall and climb back out Matt
fell 780 feet to the bottom of didn’t
survive so in 66 days I was in two
accidents that took the two closest
people to me at that time in my life
accidents that should have taken my life
as well and as you can imagine going
through that is something that changes
you forever I went through all the
obvious
grieving stages I was extremely
depressed I was never suicidal I didn’t
write a note I didn’t plan on ending my
life but I didn’t want to be alive
because I had soul-crushing grief I was
in an accident with Steve man I survived
I fell in a mineshaft with Matt I
survived and I’ll never forget being at
his funeral not being able to look at
his mama down the face because I felt so
guilty that I’d escaped twice and their
boy didn’t make it and so I went through
a very ugly ugly season and what I
decided in probably the ugliest moment
of the whole ordeal was that I couldn’t
do anything about bringing Steven Matt
back I couldn’t do anything about
reversing the clock but I could do
something with the time I had left and
instead of being a victim and feeling
sorry for myself and blaming the world
for bad life circumstances I decided I
can let that create Who I was going to
be and I looked up to them and I
promised them that I would tell their
story forever and that would live a life
big enough for the three of us that I
was going to use my god-given talents
gifts my relationships and my resources
and lay it all on the field and do
everything I had for them and so
naturally I had towards toward I turned
towards philanthropy yes okay they only
had 21 years of life I don’t know if
I’ve got another year another decade or
if I get to live my full life but I’m
gonna make every moment count I’m gonna
make my life matter and so I went to
start a non-profit and I wanted to start
a non-profit I want to go change the
world in honor of Stephen Matt and what
I found out pretty quickly as nonprofits
are extremely non profitable and you
actually need money and so as I was
creating a business plan that was
something I hadn’t thought about I just
saw my life changing and helping the
world and then all of a sudden you have
to write a check for that and so as I
was evaluating business models for
nonprofits it looked very simple or very
similar to regular for purpose
businesses or excuse me for-profit
businesses to get someone to hand me
money for a tradable Act seemed actually
more difficult than to get someone to
hand me money for a product good or
service and I could either commit to
starting a non-profit and then rely on
donors to believe in me or my cause
enough to continue to give me money or I
could start a business that I was just
getting people to buy my product good or
service and use the profits from that
business to fund my dream so that’s what
I decided to do I said you know what it
seems just as hard to make money in
business as it is to raise money in
philanthropy I’m gonna start a business
I’m gonna be so rich I’m gonna be like
Bill Gates and I’m gonna be like Warren
Buffett and just have so much ooh – I’ve
got nothing but
and money to give back to the world so
that was my plan and as I look over
these 12 years it’s been 12 years since
those accidents back over over my
history I’ve been in four distinct areas
of life I call them seasons of life and
as I’ve shared my journey of my ups and
downs with others they can always find
themselves in one of the four seasons I
was in and so to illustrate this
actually created a graph to demonstrate
where I was and you guys can probably
take a look up here and figure out where
you are personally so this is a graph we
made it more of a kind of a cartoonish
looking graph but that vertical axis
represents profits the higher you go up
the vertical axis in this graph the more
money you’re making the horizontal axis
represents purpose the farther to the
right you go the more purposeful you’re
being so where I started my careers in
the top left quadrant I want to make a
ton of money and I said to myself
someday I’ll refresh my balance in my
bank account and that magic number will
be there whatever that number is where I
know that for the rest of my life I can
now just work on Philanthropy and I
don’t have to worry about money again I
didn’t know what that number was but I
knew some day would come and I was in
what’s called the earning quadrant a lot
of people in the earning quadrant pursue
it because that’s where the world told
us we’re gonna be happy the more money
you have the more cars you have the
provocations you have somehow you’re
gonna be happier
yet I personally have found no
correlation between happiness and the
amount of money you have more so what
you do with the money you have and so I
was out there doing what you know I was
I felt born to do start businesses make
a ton of money and someday be so rich I
didn’t have to work anymore and I I did
that I found a mentor I said okay if I’m
gonna be successful in business what’s
the first step and everyone’s always
asking you know Cole what’s the secret
to success I don’t believe there’s a
secret at all you just find someone who
is where you want to be you copy them
and you can have similar results right I
always say that I’m just the best
copycat I know
so I read an article somewhere that real
estate people make money and I asked my
father to be my business partner I
pitched him with the best business plan
I could ever think of I said dad you
have the money I have the time let’s do
this right luckily my father shot me
down and said I will be your business
partner but I’m not gonna hand you money
we had to learn how to raise money and
we did so by being mentored by a real
estate multi-millionaire and it worked
really well for us mostly due to timing
mm five six and seven we crushed it
2007 turned into 2008 you already know
what happened
I was a real estate professional
exclusively making money in real estate
in our recession and collapse of real
estate and I started going down the
gradient I stopped making money I
started losing money and I found myself
in the surviving quadrant so if you look
at these quadrants again I’m now low
profit low purpose I’m in a surviving
quadrant and statistically that’s where
most people are just based on the facts
of living paycheck to paycheck you’ve
heard those statistics fifty to eighty
percent of Americans are living paycheck
to paycheck that’s where I was more deal
to deal and I like to clarify something
and say that your net worth has nothing
to do with your human worth who we are
as human beings is not defined by the
dollars in our bank account however the
dollars in our bank account give us more
options and being Who I believe God made
us to be and so in the surviving
quadrant I had one option make it
through the day figure out how to pay
the bills and instead of having an
outward focus of going out there and
changing the world for Steve and Matt I
hadn’t have an inward focus of just
getting through the week I had to figure
out how is going to pay my car payment
my insurance and sometimes things
weren’t paid and I spent two years in
the surviving quadrant just trying to
get by and I realized that that wasn’t
what I was born to do and I had a chance
to somebody mentioned Haiti earlier I
had a chance to go to Haiti in January
of 2010 immediately following that
earthquake you guys remember that
catastrophic earthquake that Haiti
endured I was sent as an emergency
responder and I met this little boy
right here and he changed my life
forever part of my role and
responsibility in Haiti was to search
and rescue was to go and find people who
had been panned get them on pin and
bring them back and as you can imagine
as the days went on it wasn’t search and
rescue was more just recovery and we
found this little boy he’d been buried
alive for days his leg had been smashed
and had become infected and from the
about the shin down his leg had to be
amputated and I’m doing his
post-operative care here I’m cleaning
his wound and they speak Creole in
French in Haiti I speak neither so this
gentleman right here was my translator
and what’s interesting about this boy is
he could see the huge scar on his
forehead and just his injuries is he had
this piece about him he was always okay
no matter what we did hey this is gonna
hurt he was okay and he always smiled
and through my translator asked him why
he always smiles and he responded
looking at me and the translator
translate he says he smiles because you
gave him life again
coming home from Haiti all the sudden
struggling to pay for a Cadillac
Escalade wasn’t important to me anymore
and seeing the catastrophic devastation
every single day while I was over there
changed my priorities I didn’t want to
pursue money anymore I wanted to get
right into living a life of purpose and
so what I did was I stepped down for my
company I gave my company to my father
and I moved over to the giving quadrant
I said you know what it’s pretty hard to
start your own nonprofit it didn’t work
out for me to get so rich that I then
have enough money in time to give back
for the rest of my life I lost it all in
the recession and that’s my fault for
being over leveraged in real estate so
what I’m going to do is I’m going to
join someone else’s nonprofit and now
I’m just going to do philanthropy the
rest of my life and so what that did was
it took away my profit but it gave me
purpose again and I moved to the bottom
right quadrant as you can see her on
this access hi hi excuse me high purpose
low profits and the type of individuals
and organizations you find there are
your peace workers those are your
churches those your nonprofits these are
individuals and organizations that are
designed to give back however always
relying on donors to support to stay in
business and one of the number-one
function of churches and nonprofits
rightfully so is fundraising they want
to go change the world
someone’s got to write a check to do
that now we’re leaning into how money
can buy happiness
and so as I lived in that giving
quadrant I actually moved to Mexico and
I joined staff full-time and worked five
to six days a week building houses for
almost families then I would surf any
tacos then I would go work with orphans
and then I would surf and eat more tacos
and then we would give back to the
homeless on the streets by bringing them
tacos and it was something about just
giving to others the entire time the
tacos and the surfing and just being out
of my own element I mean I shut myself
home down I fell off the map this was
like my time in the wilderness I found
happiness myself and part of it came
from this little girl right here who
changed my life forever this is a view
gallo and just gives me a little
emotional I must be pregnant
my
my wife cries through every pregnancy so
I commercial oh but this is a beguile
and she changed my life forever she was
not an orphan so we I helped start an
orphanage and she lived just on the
other side of the wall from that
orphanage she had two younger sisters a
mother and a father and they were living
in a 16 by 20 foot house I know this
because we built it for them in the
nonprofit and I absolutely fell in love
with this little girl and when I would
pull my truck up in front of the
orphanage she and her sisters would come
and tackle me and just love on me and
tell me that they love me and I started
supporting them
I would buy their groceries and I would
bring it to them and I found that maybe
40 to 50 US dollars in Mexico at their
grocery stores could feed a family of
five every week and I’ll never forget
one of the experiences I had when I was
carrying the groceries and I knocked on
the door the father opened the door he
saw that it was me he knew who I was I
had the groceries and he just had a tear
come down his face and he just thanked
me and I realized that I figured out how
to buy happiness and that was my first
experience of making money matter see
I’d made a lot of money before and spent
it but this is a way to make money and
make it matter I was feeding a family I
wasn’t able to start feeding that
orphanage as well now this was out of
the savings and the things that I was
selling while I was in Mexico remember I
had walked away from my business but I
was saying how so little to me was so
much for them although it was maybe four
to five hundred bucks a month there were
21 orphans that didn’t have to
experience hunger anymore and I became
obsessed with this idea of making my
money matter of finding ways to not just
spend your money and fun and you do that
and feel guilt free about it but I’ll
portion of my money was going towards
feeding children and it gave me a
feeling that I can’t possibly explain to
you with words but what I learned is
that those that say money can’t buy
happiness they’re shopping in the wrong
stores try feeding a child and tell me
that dad’s doesn’t give you a greater
sense of joy than you’ve probably ever
experienced before but I realized I was
out of money
when I came to another T in the road and
I said you know what I’m gonna go back
to America I’m gonna restart my
businesses start new businesses and I
have this newfound ambition to make more
money than I ever have before because I
want to make a difference I want to make
my money matter and so I climbed up this
gradient of profits and purpose now I
was in the top right gradients and what
we call thriving as you can see that’s a
business that’s making a lot of money
and giving back and instead of just
making money and then donating it it’s
actually built into my business model
see traditionally you have what are
called for-profit businesses and
nonprofit businesses by taking a
business and creating some social cause
or some give elements we’ve created this
hybrid that I’m calling it for purpose
business it’s not a non-profit it’s not
a for-profit it makes money but changes
the world simultaneously again it
doesn’t rely on me to give my wife and I
do that privately this is a business
that gives back as I make more money and
I’ve got record-breaking quarters and
I’ve got record-breaking earning
statements I also have record-breaking
impact and my wife and I have had the
privilege of teaching thousands of
business owners around the world this
for purpose business model of how to get
to the thriving quadrant and so they’ve
started to call themselves the thrive
tribe they’re super fired up they found
me they’re here
but the Thrive tribe of men and women
who take their talents or resources and
their businesses to change the world and
it’s really cool you’re seeing more and
more of these pop up everywhere you’ve
got 7li who they donate seven dollars
and this is just a small sampling they
donate seven dollars for everything you
buy off of their website to charity of
Tom’s that’s probably a pretty famous
one that started their business model
one for one buy a pair of shoes they
give a pair of way more recently we’ve
seen Stella step up and partner with
water.org still it was founded in 1366
it’s been around for hundreds of years
but recently they started to buy a lady
a drink which what that means is when
you do business with Stella they give a
portion of their proceeds away to
water.org to provide clean water to
people at children women and men who
don’t have access to clean water you see
companies that are being started for
purpose from day one so this is a
company here when you go to Stella that
changed their business model they’ve
been around hundreds of years they did
this so you’re seeing existing
businesses connect to social causes
you’re also seeing new businesses being
started for social causes Bridgette
she’s the founder of listen and they
build premium headphones and for every
pair of headphones you buy through the
Starkey Hearing Foundation they donate a
hearing aid to a child who can’t hear
and we’re seeing this ripple effect of
just entrepreneurs that are deciding to
not want to just be capitalist consumers
but philanthropic entrepreneurs and
there’s actual consumer behavior that’s
starting to change from this as well
there was a study done
icon it’s called their corporate social
responsibility report and these
statistics are pretty startling what you
can see here on the screen it’s doing
that there we go
91% of global consumers expect companies
to do more than a profit now I want you
know this is a global survey 91% of
people doing business for any of us who
own a business expect us to do more than
just make money 84% this is the big one
say that they would purchase products
from companies with a cause over
companies without that means greater
market share this next one blew my mind
90% of global consumers say that they
would like to see more purpose-driven
products and companies in the
marketplace what that means for those of
us in here who may own a business or
someday hope to 90% of people that are
gonna be spending money with you wants
to see you do something social with it
and this is a quote from that research
article that says consumers consider a
company’s social and environmental
commitments before they make buying
decisions consumers more and more saying
ok if I do business with you what are
you going to do for others and another
reason that I personally believe that
you’re seeing more and more of these
companies start up other than just want
to be good human beings and leave a
legacy and do meaningful work with our
money and make our money matter I
believe another reason we see it is just
people aren’t happy in the workplace
Deloitte did a study that said that over
80% of employees are unhappy in their
careers or profession men and women are
realizing that they spend more time with
their employers and they do with their
own family and careers and jobs that
don’t serve them emotionally that don’t
challenge them that aren’t using their
gifts and their talents they’re just
showing up for a paycheck and they’ve
had enough you see an even greater
number of that amongst Millennials that
are even more so in tune with wanting to
do work that matters and I love what
Time magazine says right here about
Millennials this is just interesting it
says that we are the me me me generation
I like this part it says Millennials are
lazy entitled narcissists who still live
with their parents so I thought that was
an interesting article I was going to
read it I was too lazy but
I’m sure it was fantastic and so why I
believe that an idea worth sharing is
making your money matter is starting a
for purpose business is because this is
a way that we can make a difference in
the world in here real quickly if time
and money didn’t matter anymore how many
of you by show of hands would spend some
of your time and money giving back raise
your hands I know this is requires
participation Catholics like all of you
and so why start a for purpose business
because this gives you a greater self
purpose it makes you a part of community
if you heard them in here a tribe of
growing entrepreneurs who want to use
their businesses to make the world a
better place where the bottom-line
matters you got to stay in business but
more so as the impact we’re making the
unromantic facts of this is that this is
an emerging trend and for those of us
who are in business know that you want
to be an early adapter you want to get
ahead of trends you don’t want to be one
of these stuffy corporate entities that
takes forever to come around and is
losing market share to companies that
are more innovative that are
incorporating a for purpose element
immediately so there’s emerging trends
in business you want to be ahead of that
consumer behavior is actually changing
and again as much grief as we
Millennials gets I’m on the older end of
that but I made it by dates I guess but
millennial isn’t even whoever’s after
that are becoming more and more socially
conscious so you can oppose opposition
call them lazy and narcissistic or you
can actually create companies that cater
to where they want to spend their money
when you want to get on to the romantic
side of why to do this you connect your
income to meaningful work you feel
fulfilled not just because you’re making
money but because you’re making your
money matter it creates a legacy and
then you’re joining a family our thrive
tribe who are committed to leaving the
world better than we entered it and
that’s my goal and as you know I
promised Steven that that I would make
my life matter and so I like closing
with this quote by John C Maxwell he’s
one of my favorite authors he says the
truth is you can spend your life any way
you want but you can spend it only once
and so I challenge you guys to consider
that this is our only at-bat and so all
of us want to do something that we want
to be remembered for one of the earlier
speakers showed a picture of a funeral
with empty seats man I want mine to be a
sold-out audience with people fighting
for the microphones but a lot of the
work that I want to do in the world
requires money which means I’m gonna
have to write a check
and when I’m writing these checks I’m
buying my happiness and so my commitment
to you know my commitment to Steven
matters is to live a life that matters
I’m doing that by building businesses
that make the world a better place and I
challenge you to consider doing the same
thank you for give me a moment to talk
about seeing that
Please follow and like us: