The Art of Intentional Business Development with Mark Jamnik

0:01Light that spark 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 the art of intentional business development. To drop these value bombs, I brought Mark Jamnick into EO Fire Studios. Mark creates art with intention called Subliminal Story Art, author of Look What's Inside and co-founder of Kindred, advising professional service firms on a proven business development framework. In today's foundation, we'll talk about feeding our starving inner artist, the best way to road test our business systems, intentional design, frameworks, Redivining Business Development, and oh, so much more.

0:38And a big thank you for sponsoring today's episode goes to Mark and our sponsors. Fire Nation, this is your year to get unstuck and to grow a successful business. Attend the world's highest rated business growth workshop taught personally by Clay Clark and now featuring football star Tim Tebow and President Trump's son, Eric Trump at thrivetimeshow.com slash EO Fire. Again, request life-changing tickets today at thrivetimeshow.com slash EO Fire. Mark, say what's up to Fire Nation and share something that you believe about becoming successful that most people disagree with. Beautiful. Well, hello, Fire Nation.

1:17This is great. John and I just chatted. It's been a little over 10 and a half years since we last were talking here. So super glad to be back here. Something that I think is a little controversial is from the standpoint of re-evaluating what business success looks like. So when we think about business success in a lot of ways, we think about, oh, okay, it's got to be financial growth and it's got to be all of these things, right? Like if you're not increasing financially in some way, shape or form, you're quote unquote failing. So what I would say to the listener out there is when you think about your growth, it's about who you're becoming in the process.

1:59And sometimes that's a financial gain and that's beautiful and that's wonderful and all of those great things. The other thing is you discover a whole lot more about yourself when you go through a lot of trials and tribulations that don't immediately turn into financial business success. So I think flipping what business success looks like and the time frame in which it needs to happen as well. We hear a lot of what's happening in terms of, we could see things in influencers and all of these things kind of talking about how quickly things can happen. And yes, they can, yet sometimes they take a lot longer.

2:40So evaluating what business success looks like for you and taking a look at what that is, I think is a really key thing that others may disagree with. The art of intentional business development is what we're focusing on here today. And Mark, you believe that feeding our starving inner artist helps us reconnect to what matters. Tell us more. So I wrote a book called Look at What's Inside. And the subtitle is Feed Your Starving Inner Artist. And the thing about where we are today is we are constantly bombarded with messages. And we are taught to be consumers. Creators are who we are. And so my invitation and talking about this particular topic and which case I have a gift for your listeners that we'll get into a little later on about this book that I'm talking about here.

3:37And it just gives you a chance to when we were little, we were all creative in some way, shape or form. That could be dancing, singing, writing, you name it. And somewhere along the lines, we put that artist into a corner. and because we needed to make money and do all of these other things. And so my invitation for people is to feed that starving inner artist. We've always heard the term starving artist, yet we haven't heard the term starving inner artist because there's a lot of starving inner artists that are happening because of that pursuit of business success that really started this whole conversation off.

4:11When people think about they need to make all this money, well, they're losing a lot of the parts of who they are deep, deep, deep down as that creative aspect. And this could be anywhere from people starting out on their journey. They're trying to figure out what they want to do on the entrepreneurial side, or they might be mid-journey inside of their business might be going well, and they're trying to kind of figure out those next steps. Or you may have been in business for a long time, and you're kind of looking for that spark. Looking at that starving inner artist will allow you to reconnect to a part of yourself that you might not have engaged in in a long period of time.

4:46Yeah, and I definitely qualify for what you're talking about. And for me, it was because I made the decision to do ROTC for college and then go into the army for really four active years and then four years in the reserves. And I just shifted my persona as a result from the creative that I was to, you know, forming to what I thought I should be as an officer in the army. And, you know, looking back, it is what it is, but I do regret that. And there's a lot of things that I feel like I gave up in that timeframe of my life that I didn't have to, there wasn't a need to, I still could have done the army and done all that stuff.

5:21It could have been good, but I'd have to give up that part of who I was. And so now that I have a 14 month old, and we talked about this a little bit pre-chat Mark, I'm so looking forward to seeing his creative develop. And I'm really going to work hard, like as a father to encourage him to not let that go and to encourage him that there's no reason he can't pursue what he wants within that inner artist. Now, what's the best way, Mark, to road test our business systems through unconventional experiences? This could look a lot of different ways to a lot of different people. I'm going to go back to an example for me.

5:58In 2020, we all know what happened in 2020. And late that year, I was meeting up with a friend that I had done Bible study with and we were catching up on our lives. And I heard this quiet voice, peace beyond all understanding, sell your car, sell your home and trust. So I had been in business now for almost a decade and I had developed a lot of systems and I was taking it now to the road quite literally. And all of the, this kind of the safe or the comfortable elements of what my home provided was now out the window. And I was delivering these workshops on a weekly basis. And each week I was in a different city.

6:45And what that gave me the opportunity to do was to see how effective my systems were, because I had to quote unquote, stress test them. So I think, you know, when we're looking at what we do, how do we make sure that those repeatable steps that we're doing in our business are able to be duplicated, replicated with or without us and with or without the regular comforts that we normally have. And so how do you have redundancies? I have a couple of things on my desk here, just in case something happened with the recording today. You know, I'm like, okay, well, this might goes down. I have this backup.

7:21And if that doesn't work, then I'm going to go over here. And it was just one of those things that glad I don't have have to do any of that at the same time. It's not about, you know, thinking about every single scenario that could possibly go wrong. At the same time, how do you think about the necessary steps to make sure that you can remain consistent with your word? Because I believe systems equal integrity and systems allow you to create that integrity. And again, when you road test these things, you have a chance to see how true to your word and your integrity are you. This is powerful, Fire Nation.

7:59And for me, it goes back to all the magic happens outside of your comfort zone. And so many people live inside that comfort zone. They don't want to stress test themselves because they don't think they can handle it. They're fragile. They don't think they're anti-fragile, which by the way, is a fantastic book, Anti-Fragile. But all the magic, every little bit of it's outside of that comfort zone. So when you just kind of wander out there and see what happens, man, it can be magical. Now, Mark, you believe intentional design creates authentic marketing that our ideal personas feel. Tell us more.

8:33As we also have kind of been talking about so far, it's really about who you're becoming inside of what your organization is about. When you launched Entrepreneur on Fire all those years ago, you really understood who Jimmy was. And I rewatched the video of who you is Jimmy. And as important as the persona is, I think the first step that we also need to take is who are we? And I know that that's a very, very deep question. And it's one that I have been seeking coaching and doing reading a lot of books as you do as well as many of the listeners do as well. And it's who are we deep down when the mic is not on and I'm not in front of an audience that's listening to the types of things that I've been listening to, discerning and all of that.

9:19And so I really believe that in this new world of what AI is happening, unless you have your voice clearly defined and know who you are, AI can start to shift that in ways that you might not even be aware of. and I remember a quote that he was a guest of yours many many years ago and I follow a lot of his um his podcasts and I'm reading his book right now called what's what's in it for them it's Joe Polish and one of the things that Joe Polish said years ago was if you don't know who if you go to Hollywood and you don't know who you are it will grossly misinform you and I believe that we're in that place right now if we don't have intentional design about who we are we can get very easily manipulated by the consumption that I was talking about, how we're taught to be consumers instead of being creators, unless we're intentionally seeking out who are we and who do we choose to serve with the gifts and abilities and skills and insights that we have been able to walk through in our own lives.

10:21That is really what I'm focusing about in terms of creating authentic marketing that is uniquely you, that is not going to be something that ChatGPT can maybe come up with or any of the AI tools that are out there. And I think that's going to become so much more important as we go forward in this transition to a more AI world that's just going to happen, whether people want it to or not. So definitely things to think about. And Fire Nation, we have so much more to talk about around this topic when we get back from thanking our sponsors. Starting your own business can feel overwhelming. There's so much to consider.

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12:47Become the next success story. schedule a free consultation and request tickets to join football star Tim Tebow and President Trump's son, Eric Trump, at Clay Clark's next business conference today at thrivetimeshow.com slash EO fire. Mark, we're back. And you believe that frameworks create freedom and flexibility. Some people think that frameworks are stifling, but you believe freedom and flexibility come from them. So tell us more. I have intentional frameworks for my art. I also do, I have a site, I have another business. It's an advisory. And I've actually created something called the Reconnect Framework.

13:23And what it does is it gives you various steps. There's seven essential steps of the Reconnect Framework that allow you the opportunity to say, you know what, I'm good on step one, two, and three. So I could skip, so I could look at step four and say that aspect of my framework needs to be worked on and enhanced. I look at the same thing from my art perspective. I create an intentional art called subliminal story art. And it's a subgenre of abstract art. And basically, it's galvanizing moments of a memorable journey. And when you think about subliminal story art, there's an opportunity for this element, for people to be able to contribute to a canvas or for myself to add words, phrases, thoughts, emotions to a canvas that then inspires what the actual art turns out being.

14:14And another thing that we were chatting about a little bit earlier is I wanted to do a framework here is obviously the framework is the canvas. And it's this this framework of subliminal story art. And what I want to do is and we could kind of lead this into a little commercial for later on in the sense that I wanted to give your listeners an opportunity to contribute to a future piece of art utilizing this framework. Now, it's completely flexible and fluid, and I have no idea what's going to be included in here. At the same time, I wanted to have this interactive experience that is completely fluid, yet it also still is bound by a framework in which of how I'm creating art.

14:57So we could talk a little bit more about that later, yet I felt that was a very appropriate place for us to start talking about that because that's exactly it. It gives fun and flexibility to something that could be normally consistently done in a way that, okay, well, there's paint on a canvas. Got it. Fire Nation, this is going to be exciting. Stick around because you are going to be a part of this artwork if you so choose. Now, obviously, Mark, I believe in consistency. I've been doing a daily podcast for 12 and a half years, 4 ,500 episodes. I believe getting up every day and doing your art, whether that be painting, whether that be podcasting, whether that be playing cornhole, whether that be fill in the blank.

15:38What is it that you like to do, Fire Nation? What is it that you do? That is your art. But you found that a commitment to this consistency forges new discoveries, which I can tell you has definitely been the case for me as well. Tell us more. So forging new activities gives you a chance to try different things that you normally might not connect. And there's so much more scientific studies are going on out there about the neuroplasticity of the mind and that they say whether you're, you know, a newborn, like your young one there that you were mentioning earlier, Arthur, and then also the opportunity when you're 70 or 80, the neuroplasticity of the mind, if you're consistently using it to try new things, you're making new connections and it it has an opportunity to continue to grow and evolve and expand.

16:29And I really believe that changing and being consistent with things that you're doing and also being consistent with the activity of being curious. And when we start to become curious in a lot of our activities, we start to see new ways of doing things that other people haven't necessarily seen. We are now living in a world because of other people's past ideas that have now given us an opportunity to take that and yes and it. A number of years ago, I did an improv class and everything that we needed to do on stage was yes and our fellow basically classmates in this case because we were taking a class.

17:11And that just was such a beautiful thing. And I believe that so much of our activities should be consistent. You need to be consistent. And also, you need to be able to be flexible enough to make the changes that you need to when you see something isn't working or maybe some ways that it could be enhanced. Okay, the time is now. Let's talk about how we're giving Fire Nation the opportunity, our listeners here today, to be a part of your art. Yes. So what, as I was alluding to a little earlier, each one of the pieces of art that I invite the audience to do is I want to invite people to share what their entrepreneurial journey is, whether that be something that they're thinking about it, whether they're in it, whether they're, you know, just starting it, whether they're in it or whether they've been in it for a long time.

17:58I would love for you to share a word or phrase or something about what your entrepreneurial journey has meant to you. And what I'm going to do is I'm going to take over basically about a month or so. So until May 15th of 2025, I'm going to be collecting these contributions. And normally I have people write actual right on the canvas. That's not going to necessarily be as possible here. So there's going to be an opportunity for you to click on the page, look inside dash fire nation. and you can, there'll be a form for you to fill out and you can add in your word or phrase and then I'm going to collect all of those.

18:31I'm going to add them in and then I'll have an opportunity to share all of that with you afterwards and you'll have a chance to be a part of a future piece of art. So thank you so much. And I love the opportunity of just kind of engaging community and connection in a way that is a little different and it is uniquely me. It's one of the values. Community is a value of mine And obviously you have done an incredible job of creating the community of Fire Nation. So I just am so grateful for the opportunity to even extend, extend this to, to them. And, and thanks so much for, for having me on today.

19:04Well, it's going to be fun. And just real quick, let's be very direct. It'll obviously, the link will be in the show notes page, fire nation at eofire.com. Just type Mark M A R K in the search bar. This episode will come up with a show notes page and a link to what Mark is talking about. But one more time, What's just that direct link, Mark? Markjamnik.com slash lookinside-firenation. And Markjamnik, and that is spelled J-A-M-N-I-K, Fire Nation. So again, we'll have a direct link on the show notes page, but you can go ahead and just go to that direct URL if you so choose. Because remember, you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with.

19:46You've been hanging out with MJ and JLD today. So keep up the heat. For links to everything we talked about, go to that website, eofire.com. Type Mark in the search bar. The show notes page will pop up. Jump on over to that form. Be a part of this Art Fire Nation. I'll be sharing it on my Instagram sometime in mid-May, late May, we'll make it happen. Mark, thank you for sharing your truth, your knowledge, your value with Fire Nation. For that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side. Thank you so much. Hey, Fire Nation, a huge thank you to our sponsors. and Mark for sponsoring today's episode and Fire Nation, are you ready to rock your very own podcast?

20:21Check out our free podcasting course where I will teach you how to both create and launch your podcast for free, freepodcastcourse.com. I'll catch you there or on the flip side. Fire Nation, this is your year to get unstuck and to grow a successful business. Attend the world's highest rated business growth workshop taught personally by Clay Clark and now featuring football star Tim Tebow and President Trump's son, Eric Trump at thrivetimeshow.com slash EOfire. Again, request life-changing tickets today at thrivetimeshow.com slash EO fire.