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Negative Byproducts Of Success

It often happens that when an entrepreneur starts experiencing great success, they also begin experiencing new issues in their personal lives. In this episode, Dan Sullivan draws on decades of wisdom from coaching entrepreneurs to explain why this happens and what to do about it.

Here's some of what you'll learn in this episode:

  • Why it’s been a long time since Dan had conversations with non-entrepreneurs.
  • Why a successful entrepreneur’s children rarely complain.
  • Just how rare successful entrepreneurs are.
  • Why your business life is more predictable than your personal life.
  • How two ambitious people can get along together.
  • How entrepreneurs can introduce people in their personal lives to Strategic Coach® concepts.

Show Notes:

Successful entrepreneurs have more freedom than successful employees.

The greatest inequality of income and wealth in the United States is not between families—it's within families.

A great deal of our confidence and sense of being okay comes from how things are operating in our personal lives.

Successful entrepreneurs will often have a dismissive attitude toward a less successful, non-entrepreneurial family member.

Having an entrepreneurial spirit can be viewed by others as not respecting authority.

The only way to be independent as an adult is to be an entrepreneur.

Envy and resentment from others can hinder progress.

Most people are trying to be interesting when they should be interested.

Only a small minority of people decide to be their own employers.

Most entrepreneurs make an average salary, but spend twice as much time working.

The best way to tell the truth is to tell it to the person who’s caught up in the friction.

Your personal life is a lot more central to you than your business life.

Episode Transcript:
 
Shannon Waller: Hi, Shannon Waller here and welcome to Inside Strategic Coach with Dan Sullivan. Dan, we were talking a couple podcasts ago about one of the frustrations that a lot of entrepreneurs face, and that is that they outgrow their personal life, they outgrow their personal relationships. And I know that's a big source of friction, it's a big danger for our clientele and I want to dive into that a little bit more. Some other clients and coaches have been mentioning that to me and I think it's really topical because it's an interesting byproduct of growth and ambition.
 
Dan Sullivan: Yeah. Well, just two things to start. One of them is that a very, very small percentage of people ever become entrepreneurs. The vast majority of individuals go to university, they go to training school, whatever it is, and they become a specialist in a particular industry, in a particular type of business, and they're employees. So, roughly speaking, that would be the vast majority of the individuals. So someone who decides not to depend upon a paycheck, someone who decides to be their own employer, is very unique and it's not increasing. When I started coaching in 1974, I looked at the statistics and the main source of knowledge on this is actually the national tax departments in the United States, Canada, Great Britain. And it's never more than 5% of the adult working population who are self-employed, technically self-employed. Among those one out of 400 is a big success. So it's about one out of 400 that makes way more money and has far, far more success than they ever could have by being employed by someone.
 
Dan Sullivan: The biggest difference with most entrepreneurs is they make an average salary, but they work twice the amount of time and they've got more worries than most people. So anyway, that's just the backdrop to this. So entrepreneurs are very, very unusual creatures.