Robert Herjavec on Mindset Shifts That Turn Entrepreneurs Into Millionaires

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1:41Your customers can pay all the ways they want today. With PayPal, Venmo, Pay Later, and all major cards. So you can focus on the future. When you need a partner trusted by millions, there's one platform for all business. PayPal Open. Grow today at PayPalOpen.com. Loan subject to approval in available locations. Your journey as far as being an immigrant, coming to this country, being extremely successful in business, what mindset shifts, if any, did you have to make to kind of have the success that you've had in the United States of America? You know, we sharks always talk about this. Like, what makes one person successful and another one not successful?

2:26I remember one night we were having dinner with Mark Cuban, and we got into this topic. Like I said, Mark, when you were 12 years old, did you know you were going to be successful? And Mark said, yes. I knew I was going to be very wealthy, and I was going to buy a basketball team one day. And I remember how much that affected me because at 12 years old, I just didn't want to be poor. And so this mindset of fear and simply getting by is what I had to change. I think if you're going to build a great business or you're going to do anything great in life, you have to have the ability to believe in yourself.

3:18and most people have this fear, what if I don't make it? What if people make fun of me, especially as an immigrant? You know, people are always making you feel less than you are, and I think that was the big mind shift for me because I wasn't born like that. I wasn't born Mark Cuban. I wasn't born confident. When I was 20, I was afraid of my own shadow. I couldn't speak in front of a group of people, And so that was really hard for me to get out of that shell. Yeah, you spoke about something that I'm sure that everybody can resonate in here. And that's that idea of like, I just don't want to be poor.

3:58And so when people go into business, and a lot of people here are entrepreneurs, the first thing they think is, how can I make money? And I think that's kind of a mindset shift that we need to change. One of the things we recognized earlier was money wasn't the goal. It was really the value. Talk about how you have to have that mindset shift, because if you're going into just trying to make money and then you don't, then you give up on it. Yeah, I'm going to disagree with you just a little bit, just a little bit. I think there's two phases of starting a business. Just reality. I think the first phase is survival.

4:40I think a lot of people start a business to get out of a condition they're in, or at least I did. I just wanted to start my business in order to make enough money to pay my mortgage and maybe pay off my house one day. I mean, my dream was to make$1 ,000 for my life. So if I was 50, to make 50 grand a year, buy a used Corvette, and maybe pay off part of my house one day. because that's something my parents had never done. So in the realm of my ability to dream, that was, man, that was it. But to your point, I did that. And then if you do that and your goals are really small, you look around and you realize it's pretty empty because if you're only doing it for the money and you have some level of success, you're going to get very lonely.

5:38Money doesn't keep you warm at night. Money doesn't inspire you to keep going. So when you make a million, if that was your goal, what makes you go to 10 million or 20 million or a hundred or a billion? And I think eventually you have to have a great purpose. Eventually you have to look at yourself and say, all right, forget the money. Why am I working my ass off 20 hours a day, not getting in to sleep, sacrificing everything? What's my why in doing it? So for entrepreneurs, I'm sure everybody watches Shark Tank. And, you know, when people come in front of you guys, you ask them a lot of questions as far as their profit margin, their addressable market, their marketing plan, all that stuff.

6:24What do you think is the key, the number one thing as far as on a business bottom line that entrepreneurs need to focus on and completely understand fully in their business? Wow, that's a great question. I think, first of all, every business is slightly different. I think everybody out here who has a business, you have to figure out what the heartbeat of that business is. And it's different for every business. So I know in my business, I had to know what the recurring revenue was, what our margin was, and what our cash flow was on a daily basis. So if you woke me up at two o 'clock in the morning and said, what was the cash flow from yesterday?

7:10I could tell you that. Now, I couldn't tell you a bunch of other things because I have to learn along the way, but I think you have to figure out what the heartbeat of your business is, and it's usually only two or three things. You know, people make the mistake of trying to do too much, but there's two or three things that advance the ball every single day. It's not about maintaining, it's about growth, and what are the things that are growing your business. You talked about fear just earlier, and a lot of people have that fear and they start to question the why, right? I wonder at what point did you realize this is my why?

7:51Because sometimes people get passion and purpose confused and that could sometimes be hurtful in business. When did you discover the why? Oh man, that's such a great point and I think that's such an individual thing for everybody and I think I was very fortunate to figure that out really early, because I think a lot of people don't, they kind of drift along, and fear can be all-consuming. Everybody in this room is going to wake up one day and have a crappy day and question, why am I doing this? Why is this so hard? Why isn't it easy for me. So for me, I started my first business and, you know, man, I'm working like 18 hours a day.

8:41I'm not making enough money in my business to support myself. So I'm working nine to five at the business. I'm waking up at five in the morning to read about cybersecurity because I'm not an engineer and I'm competing with engineers. And then from eight at night till one in the morning, I'm working as a waiter to make enough cash to pay my rent. And I'm doing this every day. And I come home one day and I'm like, this sucks. And I go, this is really hard. And my mom is in the room and I'm telling her how hard it is. And woe is me, my life sucks. And my dad comes home. He's working at the factory, sweeping floors, and he comes home to take a shower and get some food before he goes back to the factory to work a second shift to pay for them to exist.

9:49And I look at him and I say, I will never in my lifetime work as hard as that man is working right now. And that was it. And what I realized is they gave up everything. 37 years old, they came to a foreign country, didn't speak the language, didn't know anybody. will live in someone's basement for 18 months in order to give me an opportunity? How do I then not acknowledge and justify that sacrifice? And that was my why. And I realized, stop complaining. Nobody cares. Nobody cares. And from that moment on, like customers would say to me, Robert, how are you doing today? And I'm a pretty happy guy 90 % of the time, but everybody in this room has a crappy day where you don't feel good and something's going wrong.

10:55My customers ask me, Robert, how are you doing today? You know how I'm doing 100 % of the time? I'm wonderful. Because I get the opportunity to live out my dreams, and somebody gave up everything in their life to give me that opportunity. So if I'm not willing to work hard enough for me, I better be willing to work hard enough for them.

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