From Naval Officer to Skincare Founder: Building From Scratch with Zero Industry Experience with Sean Finney

0:01Who's ready to rock today Fire Nation JLD here and welcome to Entrepreneurs on Fire the only daily show interviewing the world's top entrepreneurs seven days a week. Today, we'll be breaking down going from naval officer to skincare founder, building from scratch with zero industry experience. To drop these vibe bombs, I brought Sean Finney into EO Fire Studios. Sean is a Navy vet, Naval Academy, and UT MBA grad and former Tesla leader, now building Tano Skincare, a clean brand rooted in science, storytelling, and banana sap. And today, Fire Nation, we'll talk about expertise being overrated. We'll talk about a message from Garcia and also being an outsider can actually be a superpower and oh, so much more.

0:44And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Sean and our sponsors. Are you ready for the ultimate all-in-one platform for entrepreneurs, marketers, coaches, and agencies? Build funnels, automate follow-ups, manage clients, and even white label your own software. Say hello to our featured partner, High Level, and visit highlevelfire.com to start your free trial today. Franocity has helped hundreds of people leave unfulfilling jobs, invest in recession-resilient businesses, and create legacy income for their families through franchising. Get started today with Franocity's Franchise Funding Guide, packed with real-world strategies to launch your business without draining your savings.

1:28visit franocity.com. That's F-R-A-N-O-C-I-T-Y.com. Sean, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. What's up, Fire Nation? Hey, I'm a longtime listener, so it's pretty surreal to be here on the show myself. What I believe about success that I think others might disagree with is that you don't need to be an expert to succeed. I think there's an idea that you have to pay your dues before making an impact. But I actually have found the opposite to be true. I think coming in without preconceived notions lets you challenge the status quo.

2:07And rather than expertise, what's really critical for success is being curious, being adaptable, and learning fast, really having that growth mindset. And we're actually going to dive deeper into that thought in just a second here, Fire Nation, as we talk to Sean about building from scratch with zero industry experience. Now, as you were just talking about, you do believe that expertise is overrated and that learning fast is actually the unfair advantage that we have. Tell us more about that. Yeah, absolutely. So from the intro, you know, I'm, I am in a space that I have very little experience in, but whether it was in the military or in construction, The phrase that I heard a lot was that it's always been done like this.

2:52People would say that all the time. I'd ask a question and say, well, that's always how we've done it. But what I realized is that people that had been in the industry for a long time, that expertise that they had, what it caused them to do is they would only learn the past ways. Right. They would have this blind spot when it came to innovation. and probably from listening to this podcast and others, you guys have heard the phrase that good enough sometimes is the enemy of great. And that's why I believe expertise is overrated. I think that when you have expertise and you get comfortable in your field, I think that sometimes people stop looking for what the great solution is.

3:32And so coming into this new industry, what I've found is that not having the expertise causes you to question everything. It takes a little bit longer, but back to the point about learning quickly, as long as you're willing to learn fast, you can find gold. For example, for us, going into the skincare industry, I knew nothing about that. The first thing that hit was formulating a product. When you put a product together and you put all the ingredients, this recipe, that's the formulation. I did it in a way that made sense. I didn't know what the right way to do was. We formulated all of our products to a certain level of effectiveness.

4:10And what I realized as I learned more is that actually was wrong per industry standards. Most people formulate to a certain price point. They formulate to, hey, this unit is going to cost$1.25. And then they put the best things they can in there. What that means is the best ingredients sometimes get washed out. And so just by the fact of me not having expertise and me looking for the best possible solution without that bias, we were able to make products that really stood out in the marketplace. And so, yeah, the expertise is overrated piece. I'm a huge fan of that and it's gotten me a long way so far.

4:48Now, Sean, you told me when we first chatted that you were willing to be a little vulnerable here because you actually had a childhood accident that led to discovering a never before used skincare ingredient. Tell us that story. Absolutely. A little bit of background on that is my dad was an oil man. And so we moved all over the world. And so to paint the picture, I'm nine years old living in Brazil at the time. And we had gone to a remote beach about three or four hours away from the nearest town. Beautiful place, sunny day. I'm playing in the waves, not too unlike Costa Rica where you're at, but playing in the waves and a wave crashed on top of me and raked me along a coral reef, mangled my right leg.

5:30It was a pretty rough injury. When I walked back in, I remember looking down and being able to see my shin bone. I apologize for the gruesome description, but it was bad enough that my dad was going to put a tourniquet on my leg. I likely would have lost my leg on the way to the hospital. But one of the local guys stopped him, chopped the trunk out of a banana tree, squeezed the sap on my leg, and it stopped the bleeding almost immediately. Turns out that this sap from banana trees has been used medicinally for hundreds, if not thousands of years. and I've been obsessed with it ever since, this thing that saved my leg.

6:05So from that child end injury, that traumatic experience is where we found our ingredient, banana stuff. I mean, this is one of those incredible stories, Fire Nation, where sometimes people are just like, I don't have an idea for a business. And I say, well, look in your past. Like, do you have any trauma? Do you have any things that happened to you that are either amazing or were incredibly traumatic, like Sean just shared, that you think you could turn into something. Or by the way, if not, maybe you go out and be a little more adventurous and experience some things. I mean, not to try to hurt yourself by getting raked over coral, but to experience life and to see things.

6:42I mean, there could have been somebody that was there that just watched this individual do that to Sean. And then Sean, maybe in a different world, was not an entrepreneur and he didn't do anything with it. But that guy that watched him said, I can do something with this because they were out in the world experiencing life. I mean, there's just so much out there when you're willing to be adventurous and open to ideas. And, you know, I think some of that may have come from your military experience. You know, we both are veterans. We both served in the military. And you also had a pretty amazing, I think the word might be, experience when you read a message to Garcia, which taught you something pretty crazy about entrepreneurship.

7:20So share both of those, the military and a message to Garcia in your entrepreneurial journey. Yeah, absolutely. So the message to Garcia, for those of you who haven't heard about it, it's a pretty awesome little short essay. It was actually published in 1899 by Albert Hubbard. And the book is set at the height of the Spanish-American War. This is way before tech, late 1800s. And the premise of the story is that Lieutenant Andrew Rowan is given a mission to get a sealed message to General Garcia in Cuba. Right. It's in the middle of the war. Communication is difficult. And he has to get it down there.

8:01And the entire basis of the book is that he takes that message and starts off on it right away. And he gets down to Cuba. He starts talking to people, ask questions on the way. but when I read that I was actually a freshman at the Naval Academy at the time and what stuck out to me then and what continues to stick out to me is this this theme of initiative of starting even if you don't know exactly how in the military there's a phrase and I'm JLD I'm sure you've heard this one is that an 80 % solution now is better than 100 % solution too late and for me that book really encompasses that. But along with that is this sense of extreme ownership of when you're given a task, when you're when you're given a project, when you're in charge of something, doing whatever it takes to succeed and finding a way no matter what.

8:53And so the combination of those two for me, especially in that formative time in my life and continues to be a really inspirational thing for me. Now, how does that translate to entrepreneurship? I think there's a lot of people in entrepreneurship or want to be entrepreneurs who want to have a perfect plan, who want to think through everything, who want to ask all the right questions, get everything to develop. But what Message to Garcia teaches us and taught me is just move. Sometimes moving is the best way to go, even if you don't know exactly where you're headed. He didn't know where General Garcia was in the mountains of Cuba, but he knew he was in Cuba.

9:34And so he went there. And so I think it's a great lesson for us. And then going back to kind of the general military experience, a lot of those same themes come through and make have helped me a ton in my entrepreneurial journey. right? That extreme ownership piece of owning all of it. But I think the piece that has helped me the most in entrepreneurship from the military is what most non-military people might not know, is when you show up for a job in the military, you are extremely underqualified for that job. When I graduated from college, I immediately went to my first duty station and I was in charge of 60 people, I think 57 of whom were older than I was, right?

10:17I was extremely underqualified for that job. But that's standard in the military. When you first show up, you're expected not to know what you're doing, but you're expected to learn and you're expected to learn fast. And so I think that process of continually being placed in positions that I was underqualified for, One, made me comfortable with the uncertainty and not being the expert and knowing who to ask for help, but also instilled in me the sense of learning as quickly as possible, getting proficient, getting to be a subject matter expert in a new topic as quickly as possible. And that applies to entrepreneurship as well.

11:01Right. A lot of entrepreneurs, they have no idea what they're doing. There's a lot of entrepreneurs that you'll hear say, if I knew how hard it was, I don't know if I would have started. But that's kind of the beauty of it is you don't know. And you're always going to be underqualified. But as long as you take that mindset of learning and growing in every new challenge that you have, you're going to find a way to succeed. It's okay not to know, but it's never okay not to learn. There's a lot of similarities in the military. You're a Navy vet. I'm an Army vet. So the actual phrase that we had that says the same thing as what you just shared is a good decision now is better than a great decision later.

11:41And I can actually remember my platoon sergeant yelling this at me one day during training because I was like trying to make the best decision in the world and like be like Napoleon and like win the war. And he's like, LT, you're not going to be alive to make that great decision. Like make a good decision now so that we can just act and take action. And then to the other thing you were talking about, there's actually a quote by Martin Luther King that I love, which is you don't have to see the whole staircase to take the first step. You just take that first step and then you can see that second step.

12:12Like for me, back when I wanted a podcast, I just bought a microphone. That's the first step that I took. And then I got the microphone in the mail and I plugged it in. And then I plugged it in and I literally said something into the microphone. Like I literally took one step at a time. Now I have 4 ,684 podcast episodes in 13 years. From what? But it all started with that first step. The first flipping step, Sean. Fire Nation, we have a lot more to talk about when we get back from thanking our sponsors. Okay, let's talk about a platform that's completely changing how entrepreneurs are running their business, and they are also our featured partner, High Level.

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15:02Visit Franocity.com. That's F R A N O C I T Y.com to download your free franchise funding guide today. Sean, there's a lot of things that you believe. One thing specifically is that it's okay not to know. I mean, we can't know everything, but it's not okay to not learn. Tell us more about that. Whether it's entrepreneurship or life, right? Life and business puts us in a lot of situations that we're going to be uncomfortable with. And I think that's where the true benefits That's why that's where we grow as a person, where we grow as a business leader. And it's OK not to know in any of these situations.

15:42But but not learning takes us out of that growth mindset, that that thought, that idea of a growth mindset is really important to me. And I've I've tried to push it in all areas of my life. But the if we stop learning and we stop developing, I see this entrepreneurial journey kind of as one of personal development as well. and even failures. It's a lens through which to view failures. If you take the stance of it's okay not to know, but never okay not to learn, then every failure is a learning experience. Then you flip that on its head and it's not something that you did wrong that's going to ruin everything.

16:25It's a place that you learned. It's a place where you got better and you start stacking those learnings on top of each other. And I think that's one thing that a lot of people don't realize. And why I was excited to come on this show today, JLD, was I haven't made it. I'm not all the way there. I'm not the$100 million exited founder. But what I am doing is learning and doing it in a space that I don't have a lot of experience in. But so far, it's working. And I'm hoping that this conversation can encourage some people to do the same. You were an outsider. And in some ways, you still are. And a lot of people are listening are outsiders as well.

17:01But you actually believe that that can be a superpower. So what do you mean by that? Being an outsider is a weird place to be. It's uncomfortable. We as humans don't want to be outsiders. We want to be part of the group. But what I've realized coming into the skincare, into the beauty industry, which is funny to say as a military veteran, but being an outsider has a lot of perks. Initially, I didn't see it. But what I realized is, one, it allows you to ask stupid questions. right if you've been in the industry for 20 years and you have a question and you're not willing to ask that because the reputational risk but being that outsider i could ask all the dumb questions and sometimes it's the dumb questions that really give you those aha moments kind of back to the formulation piece of hey i asked the dumb question of why aren't we just making this product work as good as it possibly can and there wasn't a good answer for that other than we're trying to maintain a certain profit margin, right?

17:59The stupid questions can sometimes be the path to greater understanding. The other thing about being an outsider, back to my first point, is you don't know how it's always been done. And so it's a lot harder of a path. You have to learn everything as you go, but you're not biased by kind of the preconceived notions of the industry of what can and cannot be done. And the last piece, and this is one that I've only recently started embracing, is as an outsider to an industry, just the fact that you're trying to overcome that informational gap, that lends itself to some authenticity. I mean, no one who looks at my picture or hears my bio thinks, oh yeah, this guy is obviously a skincare beauty founder.

18:52no one thinks that and so for me it's really easy to showcase my passion and the purpose behind what I'm doing because of that it highlights that it gives a contrast to it initially a lot of people said hey you're starting a skincare company you need to get you need to get a cute blonde girl to be your to be your front face of the company that's what sells that's what people want to see and actually shucking that and leaning into the outsider mentality, people have appreciated that. They've loved the story. They've loved the idea that somebody who wasn't part of this is building in this space.

19:31And so for all of those reasons, I really think that flipping the narrative on its head and thinking of being an outsider as a benefit and as a strength rather than as a weakness is the right way to be as an entrepreneur. Now, something that I've always loved is transparency, is being authentic, is being genuine. You believe specifically that authenticity is the new brand currency. What do you mean by that? JLD, I'm sure all your listeners are feeling this right now, but it's a strange time in the world. I mean, the last four or five years have been weird. We've had a few once-in-a-lifetime events happen.

20:10And I think people are starting to be more intentional about things. They're thinking about where they're spending their money, where they're spending their time, whether it was COVID and making us realize the importance and the value of human connection, or if it's the rise of AI. And now it's incredibly easy to get a super polished video or an incredible script or an email or copy. It's so easy to look polished these days. But what I've been realizing through this journey and for myself as well, is I feel like there's a regression back to the more human parts of business. And the reason I say that is we've realized that every entrepreneur, when they start, they want to look legit, right?

21:01They want to look good. They want everything to look pretty, to look polished. And I did too. I wanted the great pictures. I wanted to look like we were a bigger brand than we were, that we were just killing it. Everything looked great. And then we realized that, you know, what was actually working was the less polished videos, was the kind of off the cuff videos that I would shoot are just off the cuff posts, really giving a real insight into the company, showing the behind the scenes, those conversations, those posts, those pieces of content, people love that. And what I realized is it's the humanity piece of it.

21:41That's what's missing. People want authenticity and brands. And I think the more we move into an uncertain future, the more we move into a world where AI can do more and more things, being polished is not going to not going to be difficult anymore what's going to be difficult is being human and being able to connect with people on a human basis to show the the high points the awesome things that you have but also to showcase the struggles and the difficulties and show that human side of you and so as as a brand and as a founder or I'm trying to lean into that authenticity more and more. And I think it's only going to get stronger in the future.

22:27Well, Sean, I think you've done a fantastic job of those things today. So I commend you and give us a call to action for people that are listening right now. They want to learn more about you and about this amazing product line that you have. Where do we go? Yeah. So easiest place to find us is TanoSkincare.com. So T-A-N-O. The name actually comes from the Spanish word platano for banana or plantain. So we took the second half of that. But T-A-N-O skincare.com. Check us out on Instagram at Tano Skincare. I'm on LinkedIn. I'm not on a whole lot of other social platforms. But kind of the other call to action that I'd have for the listeners today, JLT, is I think there's a lot of entrepreneurs that are out there.

23:14There's a lot of wannabe entrepreneurs and people that have great ideas. I can't be the only one that has an experience like this. But too often, I feel like people wait until that timing or the plan is perfect, or they let the fact that they don't know things stop them, that they're not an industry expert. Like I said before, I haven't made it. I'm not an exited founder. I'm still very much in the trenches. But if I can do this, so can others, right? Start now, learn fast. and there's a few quotes that I'll share. One, somebody told me once that people drastically overestimate what they can get done in a year or in a week.

23:56Yeah, people drastically overestimate what they can get done in a week, but they drastically underestimate what they can get done in a year. And that's been really powerful to me. The other thing I'll leave you with is a quote from Mark Cuban. Why not me? Why shouldn't I be the one to change the world? So I'd leave that with the listeners and encourage people to start on their own journeys. Fire Nation, you're the average. Of the five people you spend the most time with, you've been hanging out with SF and JLD today. So keep up that heat. And for links to everything we talked about, visit eofire.com, type Sean, S-E-A-N in the search bar.

24:33The show notes page will pop right up. And Sean, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation today. For that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side. Thanks, JLD. Hey, Fire Nation, a huge thank you to our sponsors and Sean for sponsoring today's episode. And Fire Nation, over the last decade, I've interviewed more than 4 ,000 of the world's most successful entrepreneurs, and I've created a revolutionary 17-step roadmap to your financial freedom and fulfillment. I put it all into my first traditionally published book, The Common Path to Uncommon Success, which is personally endorsed by Seth Godin and Gary Vaynerchuk.

25:07The Common Path to Uncommon Success is the step-by-step guidance that you need to achieve the lifestyle of your dreams, visit UncommonSuccessBook.com. I'll catch you there or on the flip side. Are you ready for the ultimate all-in-one platform for entrepreneurs, marketers, coaches, and agencies? Build funnels, automate follow-ups, manage clients, and even white label your own software. Say hello to our featured partner, High Level, and visit HighLevelFire.com to start your free trial today. Franocity has helped hundreds of people leave unfulfilling jobs, invest in recession-resilient businesses, and create legacy income for their families through franchising.

25:51Get started today with Franocity's franchise funding guide, packed with real-world strategies to launch your business without draining your savings. Visit Franocity.com. That's F-R-A-N-O-C-I-T-Y dot com.

26:09Thank you.