The Second CEO Expert Reveals the #1 Mistake Founders Make When Hiring Their Replacement (#436)

436 Matt Sharrers
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Jeffrey Feldberg: [00:00:00] Matt Shares is a seasoned CEO, advisor, and thought leader, specializing in leadership transitions and scaling businesses. As the former CEO of SBI, he led the firm to consecutive recognitions as one of America's most admired management consulting firms by Forbes. After successfully grooming his successor, Matt shifted his focus to empowering CEOs and advising private equity firms, helping leaders navigate the complexities of growth and transformation.

Drawing from the firsthand experience as a second CEO, following a founder. Matt offers unparalleled insight into the unique challenges and opportunities of this critical transition. His latest book, The Second CEO, Accelerating Scale When Following the Founder, provides a blueprint for successor CEOs looking to drive rapid, sustainable growth while honoring a founder's legacy.

With a career spanning three decades, including roles as an elite athlete, Fortune 500 executive, and CEO of a PE backed company, Matt combines real world leadership experiences with a deep passion for [00:01:00] driving impact today. His mission is to help leaders unlock extraordinary results through strategic guidance, coaching, and board advisory work driven by a commitment to transformation over transactions.

Matt continues to shape the future of executive leadership and business scalability.

And before we start this episode, a quick word from our sponsor, Deep Wealth and the 90 Day Deep Wealth Mastery Program. Here's Jane, a graduate who says, and I quote, the Deep Wealth Mastery Program prevented me from making what would have been one of the biggest mistakes of my career. I almost signed on the dotted line with an unsolicited offer that I now realized would have shortchanged my hard work and my future had I accepted that offer. Deep Wealth Mastery has tilted the playing field to my advantage.

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Deep Wealth Nation welcome to another episode of the Deep Wealth Podcast. What you heard in the official introduction, we have an author, a thought leader, a fellow entrepreneur, and yes, a post exit entrepreneur and a whole number of other things, but they all add up to success. So that said, Matt, welcome to the Deep Wealth Podcast.

An absolute pleasure to have you with us. And I'm curious, Matt, because there's always a story behind the story. So what's [00:05:00] your story? What got you from where you were to where you are today?

Matt Sharrers: Yeah, thank you, Jeffrey. Good to be on the show. I mean, answer number 1 would be I was a retired broke minor league professional hockey player in Canada at the age of 26 and got into sales in a large company called Cintas. Moved up there and that really prompted meeting my 2, the 2 co founders of sales benchmark index, which is now known as SBI Greg and Aaron and 3rd partner, Mike, and we went on a journey from 2007, a couple of exits to private equity, which now resulted in me being chairman of that business.

And I think it worked out pretty well. So the story behind the story is high discipline, high work ethic, and a lot of street smarts. I'm not the book smart guy, decently savvy, and a couple of things,

Jeffrey Feldberg: My goodness, there's so much there to unpack. And by the way, DeepWealth Nation, go to the show notes. [00:06:00] There you'll have all kinds of links. But one of the links is to Matt's book, The Second CEO, Accelerating Scale When Following the Founder. And Matt, I do want to talk about that. But after all, this is a DeepWealth podcast and exits liquidity events.

I mean, that's what we're all about. When you look back at your exit and I know you've done a number of them and then you put on your private equity hat, I mean, you've been on both sides of the table, so I don't know where you want to start with what worked, what was successful or what perhaps didn't work that second thought.

I don't know if I would do that again. Is there any tip or two that you can share with us when you look back at that journey?

Matt Sharrers: Having money doesn't equal having joy.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Okay. Talk to us about that. And I know offline, we began to go down that very interesting rabbit hole. And I know some listeners who aren't there yet. They're saying, come on, Matt, what do you mean? Having money doesn't have joy. Let me tell you all the challenges and issues that will go away. Once I have more zeros in the bank account, once I raise that capital or exit my company.

So what are you talking about? They're asking. So what's going on with [00:07:00] that?

Matt Sharrers: Well, I think what I would say, and what I have said to those people is. You can have happiness because happiness is a dopamine hit and it's short lived. So you have some extra zeros You buy some stuff You do some things Those things are finding whether it's a big trip whether it's a new car Whether it's joining a country club whether it's giving a bunch of money away joy is enduring and that's where i'm spending my time now is This interlock between head and heart.

And I think the myth, especially for men, Jeffrey where we say, man, once I get to my number, then I will be good or in conversation. I can't tell you how many times people are like, Hey man, what's your number? Hey, what's your number? Once I get to this and it's like, I was in it, from my early thirties, all the way through to my mid to late forties, I'm [00:08:00] 51 now.

And it was like, okay. it does is really create this moving goalpost you go, well, I thought I needed this. And then I thought I needed that. Then I'll be happy when I get this. And then I'll be happy when I get a second home, you just move the goalposts versus joy is what am I uniquely qualified to give to the world?

I can still be a capitalist and pursue things from a business standpoint, but they don't have to define me. They can be an acceleration of who I am as a person. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: Yeah. So much. They're in deep automation. For those that have been in the community for a while, you know, my story, very similar to Matt. Cross that finish line. And Matt, like you, I never thought of the day after is let me just deal with getting the deal across the finish line. It dies a thousand deaths as you know. and once I got there, woke up the next morning. And okay, yeah, all the zeros in the bank, but I'm still the same guy, the same fears, the same hopes, the same aspirations. And little did I know that I'd be like so many other post exit entrepreneurs, the happily ever after didn't happen right away. It took a while.

And in [00:09:00] my case, which is a little bit different than others, the biggest, if I can use the word stupidest mistakes that I made were post exit, not pre exit because I hadn't prepared. And I know it's still relatively new and offline. We're talking a little bit about that, but you've. Really gone into this area now and you're focusing more time and attention you've started something So what's going on with that?

What's a cold and what are you focusing on

Matt Sharrers: so I am, we transacted once in 2017, which was to buy out 1 of my co founders, Greg Alexander. And then we did a full private equity sale in 2020. We sold about 80 percent of the firm to CIP capital. I moved to the chairman role in 2022 and. Replaced myself with our COO, Mike Hoffman, and he's done a wonderful job and SBI will eventually transact again.

And that'll be good for everybody involved. What I'm doing now, and the impetus on writing the book, the 1st impetus, Jeffrey was. This very tricky slope in private equity of following a founder. And when you [00:10:00] become a CEO and you follow a founder who is typically an innovator, right? Incredible visionary can get something started because without founders, there's nothing.

It doesn't necessarily mean when you have to scale that business and you come in behind that person, it's a heavy job. And the CEO job is a big job, but that unique tightrope. Following the person who started a company was something I was drawn to and I lived it following Greg. I made a bunch of mistakes.

I got a couple of things right. And so I felt like that was something I could uniquely offer the world. That would allow other founders to feel they could pass their companies for the right person, but also allow 2nd CEOs to go. How do I take all the goodness that the founder built? And move it to the next level in the next element of scale.

Jeffrey Feldberg: and Matt? What I really like about this and the area that you've selected you don't hear a lot about that and [00:11:00] I'm so Thrilled. And I so happy when I say, Oh, okay, finally, someone's addressed this because I know at deep wealth, one of the first questions we ask someone who's going through our flagship program, 988 Deep Wealth Mastery Program, it's a simple question and we ask them just yes or no, no stories, no narratives, yes or no.

Does your business run without you? And even if they have a leadership team, more times than not, the answer is no. Everything, especially the big decision, it needs to flow through them. And so when you bring in the next CEO, so you're the founder, you're going to be stepping aside as you should. You really do want the business to run without you because as with your private equity hat, the last thing that you wanted was a new second full time job, otherwise known as running this company that I just bought because the founder's nowhere around and the company's falling apart, you're not going to do it or you're going to put a significant discount on it.

Most founders, business owners, they have no idea how to set that up or what to do. So from that perspective, and I know everyone's journey, Matt is different and they go through their own unique trials and tribulations, but generally [00:12:00] speaking, whereas founders, are we getting it wrong when it comes time to step aside and have a CEO or a hired gun step into the company?

To really relieve ourselves from that role and hopefully do it better than us, what aren't we getting?

Matt Sharrers: yeah, it's it is the question, Jeffrey. I mean, number one is. Lack of self awareness founders or founders. Because they have this unique ability to get something off the ground. And get it to a point where it actually can scale and with that comes. A lot of people who follow them, who believe in them, and a founder starts to believe their own press clippings that they're kind of a big deal.

Same thing happens when you're a CEO, right? Like you all of a sudden go, Huh, I'm pretty important. And when I jump on the Zoom call, everybody stops. And when I walk in the room, they wait for my voice. And I approve final bonuses and I get to sort of play this night and shining armor. Well, [00:13:00] that does a lot on the psyche where a founder can't let go.

So where number one people get it wrong is low self awareness and a lack of humility. Number two is. looking at the business objectively and saying for this business to go from 100 million to 300 million, here's the scorecard of the CEO. And I, as a founder, if I look at that scorecard, I look at those competencies, am I really the person?

To take that business, put in operating systems, run high rigor, do talent management. No, I'm an idea person. I like to ignite things. I like to make hard left turns. And when you're scaling a company, it's about process, repeatability, high discipline. One's not better than the other, but they are different.

So I think those would be the two big things that I would look and that we did look at in the research with the book and really classifying these different types of transitions where you have a founder who goes out all the [00:14:00] way. And they're gone. Versus a founder who goes to the board, takes some liquidity off the table.

Versus a founder who might go, hey put me back in an operating role. I like to just develop products. Or I just like to deal with clients in a professional services business. I'm so good face to face and let somebody else run the business.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Absolutely. And I know you talk a lot about in the book accelerating scale and I'm going to get to that in just a moment because I love that of how you put that out there and that as a strategy to follow. But on a personal note, when you were going through this, Was there one particular part in your journey that as a second CEO originally threw you for a loop?

Hmm. Never really thought of it that way. I better learn how to deal with this or work around this or work with this. Anything that you can share?

Matt Sharrers: Yeah, I didn't recognize that I was being inauthentic in some of my interactions with the company in the first year because I was trying to mirror Greg's [00:15:00] leadership style on certain things. And as opposed to being the best version of Matt, because I felt like our firm worked because of these elements that Greg brought to the table, instead of going, hold on, if we're going to do what we need to do, which is going to be a different, next 5 to 7 years, I have to show up as the CEO, not as the person who'd quote, been on the journey.

So it required me a having somebody come in and do an assessment on me and I hired GH smart. They were amazing and say, Hey, can you guide me on like, what should the scorecard be for the CEO for this company? I happen to be it now because we've already made the decision. then tell me where my weak spots are and my strengths.

And then I took those and I posted them on the company intranet for the entire firm to read and said, this is me when I'm good. This is me [00:16:00] when I'm not. And this is what I'm working on. And that was my way of sort of having high vulnerability and creating a culture where people go, okay we can be really authentic with each other.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Yeah. I love the GH smart and my goodness takes me back to the A method for hiring and the scorecard and everything else. Absolutely love that. Did that myself, but I'm wondering because you bring up something that to me, it can easily turn into a slippery slope. So you have the founder's legacy, you have their style, it's now baked into the culture and on the one hand, to your point, well, I'm really showing up as I should be showing up, for me, that's why they brought me on board, not to be another transcriber.

Local like, but at the same time, I don't necessarily want to upset the apple cart as the saying goes. I don't want to be disrespectful. So it's a tug and a pull. How do you balance that? Particularly early days, the first 90 days, first a hundred days into the position, what's going on there.

Matt Sharrers: Yeah the 1st 100 days and something we talk about a [00:17:00] lot in the book is if you come from the inside, you have to act like you came from the outside. And the problem when people get promoted, especially from. The two slot to the one slot internally, they're like, Oh, we need to do this. And we need to do that because they have this view of other functions and the company, but they have that view from their seat as a functional leader or a geographic leader or practice leader, not as the CEO.

So, in the first 100 days, if you're from the inside, act like the outside. And if you're coming from the outside, do your classic, listening tour. Ask a lot of questions and don't make big sweeping changes in the first hundred days. Instead, be really thoughtful about your hypotheses and act like you're a consultant from the outside and you've got to produce a deliverable.

So you have structured thinking. And you have a good way of dimensioning where the commonality is. And that was something that right now, [00:18:00] that is a big thing that I try to help other CEOs and private equity firms with when they're making these transitions is what's the level set for the company right now?

Jeffrey Feldberg: And for the founder who's listening to this, because I know putting myself back in that position, I remember I realized, okay, Jeffrey, you're not really the best person to take and been at my e learning company to the next level. Yeah, you got it here. You probably could do the next step, but it's not you're likely not going to enjoy it, and you're likely not going to be as successful, but the thought of bringing somebody else in, it was daunting, and so really a two pronged question.

Let me start with the first one. For the founder in DeepWealth Nation who's now hearing this, and they do realize, okay, the business does need to run without me, I do want to scale it, I'd like to get that lifestyle that I started the business for, I want to lose the golden handcuffs. What would be some telltale signs to either run as fast as you can in the other direction to a candidate that you're speaking to because they're just not a fit or, hey, lock this one up right now.

This is a terrific candidate. Let's just go. Any insights [00:19:00] into that?

Matt Sharrers: Yeah. Number one is everybody's replaceable, including you as the CEO. And I think the founder needs to recognize They play two roles, founder, which can never be taken away from them. They'll always be the founder. And God bless them. CEO, which is a job description. You play another role on the executive team with a different set of responsibilities.

And that's okay to transition that one. So that's the first thing I would tell them. The second thing I would tell them is think like an investor. Don't think like a founder. If you looked at the business objectively and you had one or two other people look at it, and we'll just use easy numbers. Jeffrey, if I'm a hundred million dollar business with 20 million in EBITDA.

And I want to go from 100 to 250 and 20 in EBITDA to 60 in EBITDA, and I want to do acquisitions, and I want to launch a new product and debate a new [00:20:00] geography. When I look at that job to be done, and I say, let me go future back, 250 and 60 in EBITDA, what is that job description? And who would do that?

What are the competencies that get us there as opposed to the who? A lot of people start with the person. Oh, yeah, Mike could do it. Oh, yeah, Sharon could do it. It's like time out. What are the skills and competencies in the leader who can go and two and a half X the revenue, two and a half X the EBITDA, go and do acquisitions.

Let's get that. And then objectively look at a couple people internally and a couple people externally against that and try to make an objective, unemotional decision.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Yeah, so much going on there. And while we're doing that, because on the one hand we have to think of it as, okay, this has got to be good for the company. They got to take it to the next level. And you're talking three X numbers. I'd even put out there. Hey, how can we 10 X this and get there a whole lot sooner and quicker, but now putting your [00:21:00] private equity hat on.

You're now coming into a company. Maybe they've been fortuitous enough and smart enough to already have a leadership team in place that the founder can say, Hey, Matt and team, look at this. The business really does run without me. Here's the team with your PE hat on. I'm sure you've seen situations.

You're looking at that CEO saying, What were they thinking? This is not a fit. This is actually hurting the company. It's going to hurt my value for the enterprise value. I'm going to penalize them. Or you're looking, wow, yeah, they did a really terrific job. You couldn't have done it any better myself. What does that look like from your perspective?

What are you looking to see, or in this case, not see?

Matt Sharrers: So I think in a situation like that, when you do walk in and Jeffrey, what you're saying is, The transition's already been made between the founder and the second CEO, and you're walking in and you sort of, get a level set. Okay, so in a case like that, then it is time with that founder and anybody else who is involved in the decision, if they happen to have a couple board members, to say, Hey, walk me through, like, when you guys were [00:22:00] replacing you, the founder, how were you looking at the job description?

How were you looking at the role? And why did you pick, insert name for what's their background. What have they proven in the past? What was it about them? They gave you all this conference. So first off, I want to understand how they decided as opposed to what they decided. And a lot of people focus on what's been decided as opposed to the how and the how these clues.

To tell you where the decision potentially was right or wrong. So that's the first thing. And then the next thing is get the lens from that CEO and the executive team. Hey, based on what you were hired to do and based on where we are, how do you think it's going? Share with me the value creation plan, share with me what you thought you were brought here to do.

And I would compare that with what the founder and the board told me. And then my last lens would be the executive team say, Hey, how's it going? You guys have been through a transition, right? Sharon [00:23:00] took over for Jeffrey. How's it working? You guys feel like you're tracking to the North Star? Give me a couple of reasons why you think it's on track.

Give me a couple of things you think that are holding us back. And how might we accelerate? And that would be my sort of Venn diagram of of getting clear view.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And for the listener in deep automation, who's hearing this, because oftentimes So many business owners, if they're not going through the DeepWealth Mastery Program, a shameless plug, I know but they're making all the mistakes. They're probably going to be 90 percent of liquidity events that fail, or even worse, leaving 50 percent to over 100 percent of the deal value on the deal table.

Can you explain, Matt, with your entrepreneur hat, your founder hat, but also your P. E. hat? Why it's so important to have that management team in place, not six months before the liquidity event, ideally years before, three years, five years, as long as possible before you're ever speaking to an investment banker.

Matt Sharrers: Yep. Because investors back teams and they back CEOs. And there's a term like, [00:24:00] literally having been in hundreds, probably over 1000 diligence assignments in my career. A question is always asked. Is he or she a backable CEO and is this a backable team? And the reason is private equity firms are not operators and they will tell you that, right?

Yes, some may have operating partners who come in and give you a perspective on product and tech or give you a perspective on go to market or have some ability to help you think through M& A, but you're going to deliver the thesis based on one thing and one thing only, your team. So Jeffrey, you're spot on.

I mean, three rules for the CEO, culture, strategy, and team. Those are the three things you own. Everything else, your team owns, but if your team owns, they got to have clarity and they have to be people that can run a function. At scale.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so all of that said, and we've been doing a little bit of the [00:25:00] foundation and thank you for being so patient with my newbie questions I've been throwing at you. Let me ask you this though, when we're now bringing in the second CEO, which is really the first CEO from the perspective of it's a hired guy, it's no longer the founder.

It's no longer someone who's been with the company from the beginning. So from a cultural standpoint, okay, granted it's a fingerprint likely of the founder, but what needs to be in a culture? To have a second CEO, not just succeed, but brilliantly succeed and take the company to the next level.

Matt Sharrers: Yep. Number one is clarity of purpose, right? And why employees get excited when they feel like there's something bigger than them and bigger than just quote more revenue and why the company exists. So one is purpose. Two is a compelling North star and vision of what's the art of the possible. What can we become?

And what is the unique differentiation we bring to the marketplace? [00:26:00] That allows us to be different and also allows that employee to look and go, man, I can reach my full potential or get much closer if I'm here in this company, bringing my skill set then I think the last one is values, how people behave and not the values that are on the plaques on the wall that nobody talks about.

I'm talking about the daily values and the behavior and the 4 to 6 guiding principles that you use. To say, this is how employees behave when they work here. We hire these values. We fire to the values. We do reviews, to these values. We give awards to people who are exhibiting them. Like they're real.

And that's an environment that I think an employee can say, I like the why I like the vision of what it can become. And man, I love how people behave here to me. Those are the bedrocks of culture that you can define more so than just our culture makes us unique. Everybody says that it's dude, break it down.

[00:27:00] So,

Jeffrey Feldberg: Yeah. I love what you're saying there, Matt. It reminds me of that Glassdoor survey where they asked what's either keeping you in your position. So these were not founders, these were employees or as we like to call 'em, the deep default team members, leadership team, frontline people, you know, what's keeping you there or why did you leave your last position to go to this new company?

And to your point, Matt, at the top of the list, it wasn't money, it was. What's the vision of the company? Does this get me excited? If I'm spending more time with the people at the office than I am with my family, do I like it here? What's the culture like? What's the leadership like? How am I feeling? And so I suppose it's like that Maya Angelou quote, it's not what you say, it's how you make people feel.

That's what they remember. There's so much going on with that and with what you've been sharing and with what you've been doing. So, couldn't agree more in terms of all of what's there. So, all of that said, as we've been going through this, I'm wondering Matt, when it comes to really hitting it out of the park, what would be, again, either one [00:28:00] thing, Hey Jeffrey, don't do this, no matter what, or Jeffrey, you absolutely want to do this, when we now begin to pull all of this together, and it's now, okay, let's do some execution.

Let's do some strategy here. With all your different hats on what's coming to mind with that.

Matt Sharrers: Yeah. I mean, often a second CEO will be a little too deferential to either the private equity firm or the historical, like the way things used to be. And they don't trust their instincts, especially if they're a first time CEO. So something I work a lot with the CEOs I coach is. Listen, you are in charge like this is your ship and a private equity firm.

They're investors. They're not operators. So when you feel something and they're giving you a recommendation, you got to push back when you know in your heart of hearts. They're incorrect. So that's one. Two is we talk, obviously, about culture, strategy, and team. And those three [00:29:00] bedrocks to me, inside of 18 months, you need to feel like, okay, I know this culture and I've sort of set a tone of what works for this business with me at the helm.

Strategy. Defining where we play and how we win. We have defined that. It's clear. And the company knows it. And then team. I've changed out a couple leadership roles. I probably have eyes on one or two more changes, but my team, not the team, my team is now formed, and we can go the next 2. 5 to 3. 5 years and really make hay.

And if you have those 3 things in places, you're kind of cresting over that 18 month timeframe, you're in position to probably have a pretty good run.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And so with that now in play and all the other things that you've been sharing with us, let's go now to accelerating scale, because to me, the way that you've laid this out and that you've positioned it, this is really a game changer for someone who hasn't [00:30:00] yet read the book. And again, default nation, go to the show notes.

Pick up the book. The link is there. The second CEO accelerating scale when following the founder, what do you want us to know about the accelerating scale

Matt Sharrers: It's very unglamorous, Jeffrey, It's almost like when you meet somebody who's in really good physical shape, or you meet somebody who's a great author, or you meet somebody who's a great pianist, and people marvel at like, I could never do that, or etc. Well, if you look beyond where that person is, and you unpack one thing, which is their habits, all of the clues to brilliance lie in the habits of that person. So what do I mean by that with the CEO? What's the operating rhythm of the CEO follows? Is there a regular Monday staff meeting that starts and ends on time with the right agenda where we debate and discuss and then we make decisions? Does everybody on the leadership team have a scorecard that defines their role?

Does everybody [00:31:00] have a single KPI that they own relentlessly and are accountable to the rest of the leadership team to deliver on that? And so on. Having those operating norms and that cadence. That matters. An accelerating scale comes down to doing unglamorous things in a relentlessly predictable way.

Jeffrey Feldberg: and big picture, Matt, as you're talking about this, and now I'm putting myself back in the shoes of a founder, what would be the simple narrative for a founder when they're looking for that second CEO to come in effectively? To be blunt, I'm firing myself. I'm taking myself out of this position. Yes, I'm world class in some areas, but I'm certainly not in other areas.

And the goal is what's best for all stakeholders and grow the company, go into new areas, create market disruptions, create new enterprise value, all those good things. What's the narrative I should be thinking about as the founder.

Matt Sharrers: You need some objectivity to help you define what that second CEO should be. And that's, you should pick up the phone and there's [00:32:00] lots of people they can call. They can talk to you, they can talk to me, they can talk to my friends at GH Smart. You just need somebody else. To help you objectively say from X to Y.

This is the vision I see and the founders really good at laying that out. I'm not the CEO for it. I'm still the founder. I'm still going to evangelize. So I think that's one. The second one I would tell you is if a founder has not sold a majority stake in the company and they haven't taken some liquidity off the table to like you said early, Jeffrey, sort of.

Reflect their own golden handcuffs, but to reward them for what they've built. I would seriously look at doing that because it's going to allow the purity of decision making for the business to be cleaner because when a founder is gambling their own money. It's a hard thing when you go, Hey, we want to do an acquisition and it makes all kinds of sense, but we got to lay down a seven figure amount of money to buy the existing business.

And we've got to backstop it and we need debt. [00:33:00] Like That is why a private equity industry exists. And that's why they have a track record of doing this. So as a founder, think like an investor, take some happily ever after money off the table. Leave some in to roll with the next investor and off you go.

And I, you truly can have your cake and eat it too.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And Matt, as you're sharing this, this is not textbook. This is not theory. This is from the trenches. You've been through this. This is part of your journey. So you're actually talking to talk. You've walked the talk. As the saying goes, when you look back to your journey, was there a particular, if I can use another F word offline, we're talking about having some fun.

Another F word is failure. And we don't like talking about that as entrepreneurs. Was there a failure or a so called failure or a setback in your own journey? That helped you get to the outlook and the philosophy and the strategies that you're sharing with us today.

Matt Sharrers: Yeah, I mean, I'm trying to pick which one you want to go with. I got a ton of them. I would say, one [00:34:00] was when I was a professional hockey player, I got focused on the wrong things. And while it all worked out from a business career standpoint after, I learned that my decision making and how I was thinking short term versus long term was flawed.

Talking to other people who had been through it before going through it. And I think when we did our first transaction, we were very myopic about what was happening. I had a better sense of what life post transaction still running the company, having some partners leave a reconstitution of the leadership team.

I had a much better sense of that. So, I wish coming up to the 1st 1, I would have got better outside counsel and outside mentorship of really what it was going to look like.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And as you're sharing that, curious, and I'll throw this out there, you do come from, before the arena of business, it was the arena of sports. Being that professional hockey player, being [00:35:00] involved, being out there, how much of your business success would you attribute to what you learned in the sports arena that you took with you to the business arena?

Matt Sharrers: Yeah, I would say quite a bit and the things I took from sport. Is the discipline and like intense intentionality of being an expert at your craft, whether you are a football player, a swimmer, I was a hockey player for you to be one of the best sentiment or left wingers. in a game that's so competitive.

you have to be willing to do things that other people are unwilling or unable to do. And you have to keep that warrior mentality when you move into business. Because if you don't, somebody's going to take it from you. And then the other component is the habits you have around yourself, around business, whether it's some mindfulness time, what you do to work out physically, the peer group you run with, [00:36:00] do you have a coach?

You've got to surround yourself in a winning environment, because to just say, well, I'm going to have all this chaos in my life. But when I jump into work, I'm this like other person. You can't do that. Your true self shows up at work. We can only be who we are. So you have to take a full cycle lens at how you approach the role.

And I learned a lot of that in hockey watching coaches that I played for with how they prepared us. Number one, guys I played with who were incredible. And consistent number two, and then just going through my own journey, both things that went well and areas where I, didn't do as well as I should have.

Jeffrey Feldberg: And it's not so much on the science of business. It's now on the art side of business. How in the culture, Matt, can we foster, can we create that competitive spirit, that team spirit that we see so much in sports now, not only in the boardroom, but with our frontline team, all the way [00:37:00] through to our executive team.

And

Matt Sharrers: think part of it is the awareness that you don't have a team just when you have 6 people that happen to work for the same place in the same department. That's a collection of individuals. You need to turn the collection into a collective. And how you turn people from a collection of individuals into a collective.

Is number one, uniting around a shared vision, shared goal, and the principles like we talked about earlier. So purpose, vision, and values. Two is the self awareness of what role do I play for the team and what's my unique value to each teammate. So whether you use a Hogan assessment or disk or whatnot, it's like. jeffrey, you have different skills and things than I have. Together, you and I are probably better than we are apart. There's areas where you can pick me up and help me get unstuck on certain things. I gotta know how to leverage my teammates, and the only way I do that is I'm vulnerable. So I think the shared vision, big the [00:38:00] values, how we behave, and then understanding that individuals don't make a team, it's that collective unit and vulnerability that does.

Jeffrey Feldberg: mentioned vulnerability and the irony of the vulnerability. So many people think, well. A weak person is vulnerable. Actually, it's the opposite. It's a strong person that's vulnerable. And even earlier on, you shared with me, well, Jeffrey, when I became that second CEO, I didn't show up as me. I was trying to be somebody else and wasn't authentic to those around me.

I mean, wow. Talk about being vulnerable. That is not easy to hear and certainly not easy to get that kind of feedback from. But that vulnerability, it sounds like it's again, it's more on the art side. It's not going to show up on a balance sheet or a P& L statement, but it's certainly a key trait that we should all have.

And Matt, let me ask you this before we go into wrap up mode. I know there's so many questions I didn't have a chance to ask. Is there one particular question that sends out or is there a message to the deep default nation you'd like to get out there? Or even a topic that we haven't covered that you'd like to share before we go into the wrap up [00:39:00] mode?

Matt Sharrers: The intersection of head and heart matters more than you think it does. And what I mean by that is, remember my dad telling me like, if you're coaching somebody and they quote, work for you,

And if all you talk about is work, you're only going to get a very small part of who that person is. You have to coach the whole person and to coach the whole person.

You got to know the whole person and a funny story, Jeffrey, to illustrate this. Every time when I was in the CEO seat, I would sit down at our quarterly offsite with the executive team. They knew something was coming, some sort of a question where I would look at someone and say, Hey, Eric, tell me the names of your direct reports, the names of their spouses, and the names of each one of their children. And if you didn't know that, dude, you're a shitty coach. And that would be the message or the next quarter. I might say, Hey, what's the personal thing that each one of your direct reports are working on away from work, learning a second language, training for a marathon, going to go [00:40:00] hike Machu Picchu, like it doesn't matter.

You have to know the whole self. So that would be my advice to everybody.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Yeah, I love that. And before we go into wrap up mode for someone in Deep Default Nation who is thinking, yeah, Matt, I hear you. And that's a nice to have for me, but man, I'm way too busy. I don't have time to do the chit chat and do the social thing and find out what people are up to or their families or anything else.

Why is this important? Why would you stop that person in the tracks and say, Hey, if you don't have the time, you better find the time because of a, B and C what's going on there.

Matt Sharrers: You might get to where you're going, but it's going to take you a hell of a lot longer and you're not going to have as much fun.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Yeah. And, going back to what we're talking about earlier on the leadership side. You're right. I mean, we can't just be a, an effective leader. We just can't be a leader period. It's not just about the business. We've got to be a leader for the whole person because as I often like to say, whoever said that business isn't personal was either never in business or never ran a business or a little bit of both.

Everything is personal because if we cut something on the personal side, that is just [00:41:00] keeping us up at night. It's really bothering us. It's gonna spill over from the personal side onto the business side. So we're a whole person, a whole entity. So that said, some great advice there. Let's wrap it up with some terrific advice.

And it's a tradition here on the podcast is both my honor and a tradition and really my privilege to ask every guest the same question. So here's the question. It's a really fun one. Let me set this up for you, Matt. When you think of the movie back to the future, you have that magical DeLorean car that will take you to.

Any point in time. So Matt is tomorrow morning. And here's the fun part. You look outside your window. Not only is the DeLorean car curbside, the doors opened is waiting for you to hop on in what you do, and you're now going to go to any point in your life, Matt, as a young child, a teenager, whatever point in time it would be, what would you tell your younger self in terms of life lessons or life wisdom, or, Hey, Matt, do this, but don't do that.

What would it sound like?

Matt Sharrers: Don't focus on external achievement to worry about what other people think of you focus on [00:42:00] achievement. Cause what it does for you internally and the peace that it brings you.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. So not looking externally, really looking within. You be your own judge, go within and it's a competition with yourself, not anyone else. How am I doing with that?

Matt Sharrers: That's it.

Jeffrey Feldberg: Love that. Well, Matt, that said, congratulations. It's official. This is a wrap. And as we love to say here at deep wealth, may you continue to thrive and prosper while you remain healthy and safe.

Thank you so much.

Matt Sharrers: Thanks, Jeffrey. Appreciate you having me on, man. 

Jeffrey Feldberg: So there you have it, Deep Wealth Nation. What did you think? 

So with all that said and as we wrap it up, I have another question for you.

Actually, it's more of a personal favor. 

Did you find this episode helpful? 

Have you found other episodes of the Deep Wealth Podcast empowering and a game changer for your journey? 

And if you said yes, and I really hope you did, I have a small but really meaningful way that you can actually help us out and keep these episodes coming to you.

Are you ready for it? 

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God bless.