Chris Morton On How To Leverage Culture To Create A Competitive Advantage (#121)

[00:00:00] Jeffrey Feldberg: Welcome to the Sell My Business Podcast. I'm your host Jeffrey Feldberg.

This podcast is brought to you by Deep Wealth and the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience.

Your liquidity event is the largest and most important financial transaction of your life.

But unfortunately, up to 90% of liquidity events fail. Think about all that time, money and effort wasted. Of the "successful" liquidity events, most business owners leave anywhere from 50% to over 100% of their deal value in the buyer's pocket and don't even know it.

I should know. I said no to a seven-figure offer and yes, to mastering the art and science of a liquidity event. Two years later, I said yes to a different buyer with a nine-figure offer.

Are you thinking about an exit or liquidity event?

If you believe that you either don't have the time or you'll prepare closer to your liquidity event, think again.

Don't become a statistic and make the fatal mistake of believing that the skills that built your business are the same ones for your liquidity event.

After all, how can you master something you've never done before?

Let the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience and our 9-step roadmap of preparation help you capture the maximum value for your liquidity event.

At the end of this episode, take a moment to hear from business owners, just like you, who went through the Deep Wealth Experience.

Chris Morton is an operating partner at Orchid Black. Chris launches and accelerates the profitable growth of companies by creatively mapping technology to successful business models and market penetration strategies, leveraging industry partnerships, and securing institutional and strategic investment.

Highlights for Chris include being the co-founder of SkyCross which sold over 750 million antennas and was later acquired by Airgain.

Chris is also the co-founder of Mesh Networks which was acquired by Motorola and has also raised over $85 million in capital. Chris was awarded the GE Doctoral Fellowship and the Cade Prize for Company Innovation and Leadership.

Community involvement for Chris includes being the former Chairman and now Advisory Board for a Grove Florida and a member of the Executive Committee of Orlando Tech Council.

When it comes to business advice, Chris says, know your strengths and limitations. Be open to feedback and new ideas and hire accordingly. Chris's bucket list includes traveling to Egypt, learning about the structure and uses of DNA from experts, and learning to play the electric guitar when he isn't playing the drums. Chris earned his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in Communication Systems.

Welcome to The Sell My Business Podcast. And wow, do I have a terrific episode lined up for you today because I have an absolutely astounding guest. Before I talk about my guests let me ask you this question.

And the question for all our listeners is what's the one thing that your competition with all of their money cannot buy? And I'll give you a hint. It starts with the letter C. And that letter “C” and that word is culture. Culture is so important, not just for your company, but also for the company that you're looking at. Maybe they're going to invest in your company.

Maybe they're going to be buying your company. And we'll talk a whole lot about that, but I'm getting ahead of myself. So Chris, welcome to The Sell My Business Podcast. So excited to have you with us.

[00:03:54] Chris Morton: Great to be here, Jeffrey.

[00:03:55] Jeffrey Feldberg: Chris, thank you that, you know, there's always a story behind the story, Chris, what's your story?

[00:04:01] Chris Morton: My story is one of career transition over time, Jeffrey. I started out as a researcher with a doctorate in communications of all things and at an extremely well-known place, especially at those times called Bell Laboratories. And I've found over time that while working in the same aisle as two Nobel laureates, which I did.

And being in the presence of bright folks, which really stimulated me, it wasn't close enough to the business world. So about 20 years ago, a little bit more than that. I branched out into investing and otherwise turning around businesses, still in New Jersey and back here in Florida, where I have a home to creating new companies that generally focused on, I would say the broadband communication space, either the networks that carry them, the devices that use them, the protocols that the waveforms have to behave in to traverse the network effectively. And the like, and then further as I got into this, I began to realize, as I'm sure your readership has discussed with you.

Is that many of the lessons are independent of the specific either technical or market intent of the business. And so more recently, as I joined orchid black as a partner to help companies maximize their value in a way that I think compliments your podcasts.

[00:05:28] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. That's terrific. And Chris, I can't let the podcast go without mentioning this Bell Laboratories, which is just iconic in terms of the technology that came out of there. I mean, Everything that we're doing today really started there.

[00:05:43] Chris Morton: It did. And even more fundamentally than that, the two Nobel laureates were actually the two individuals that actually discovered the big bang. So, more fundamentally, but it was back around RF radiation. But it was great training. And I was initially in awe, as you could imagine, and I felt very flattered to be asked to join, but over time also realize that you have to apply in your own space in life and mine was elsewhere, but it was great.

[00:06:09] Jeffrey Feldberg: And it sounds like quite, it's not quite the ride, but good for you for recognizing, hey, this is an amazing place, but oh, maybe it's really not for me long-term wise. Let me see where my strengths are and what I can do.

[00:06:20] Chris Morton: Yeah. And it was in that setting that I began to realize some of the elements of experience that you touched on in the introduction, and that has to do with things less visible than technology, less visible than financials.

But it has to do with the mating of cultures and the mating of what I will call the orientation when companies get together, for whatever reason, choosing an investor, buying a company, selling a company, and all of that. And by the way, like a lot of people, I learned by doing good things and not-so-good things along the way.

[00:06:57] Jeffrey Feldberg: Well, let's talk about that because on the one hand, success is not random is not an accident. It's very deliberate, but so, has failure. And so knowing what not to do is just as important as knowing what to do, but let's start out maybe on the not-so-great side on the failure side. And I'd be curious when you think back over your career and the companies that you've been involved with and the ones that you've help. And you think of those companies who just didn't get it on the culture side. Maybe it was a toxic culture. Maybe that culture inhibited their growth or their strategy. Are there common patterns that you've seen over the years that you can share with us that if we know what those are, we can avoid?

[00:07:42] Chris Morton: Yes, I can. These were not fortunately necessarily the ones that I created but there are a couple of common elements. One is that their market success and their customer is not their top priority. And I did bigger companies before I started creating my own. And in one case I won't name names if you don't mind Jeffery, but in one case they had a captive customer base.

And so what you find in a case like that is that most of the energy and all companies in my view have fixed energy. The people do the management, the people's connection to the manager. There's fixed energy to be spent. Most of that energy was spent sadly on one-upping each other, and trying to get the next promotion within this organization.

And so, with that is sort of the fundamental mistake from it comes a lot of other bad behaviors that I think a lot of the listeners will have seen things that don't optimize the experience or the customer projects that are underfunded or not focused enough because they have not heard the customer clearly enough. Ultimately wasted financials because of that.

So I think a lot of things obtained from that, but that's probably the most fundamental one.

[00:08:56] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. So when you look at that and you've seen that for better or for worse, in-person, inaction, really this selfishness that's what's going on and it's everyone out for him or herself. And forget the company, forget the customers, forget the marketplace. I'm just going to do what's good for me.

I would imagine that had to come from somewhere, it didn't just show up that attitude one day., What would have led to that in the company itself that would be okay.

[00:09:22] Chris Morton: An interesting question. I think in the examples that I've seen one which was an extremely large company, but I was still young. It was embedded before I got there. And so there was certain inertia to it and I'm not sure I'm qualified to talk about it, but another was that it was a company that was so large that it was guided by not only a captive customer base, or at least they thought so. Unfortunately, it was to their demise later, but they thought so, but also one in which this organization was feeding field operations that was very quite candidly Jeffrey and old boy network. And so I think over time, they shaped themselves to a degree into that culture and it rubbed off on them.

[00:10:09] Jeffrey Feldberg: And so Chris hindsight is always 2020. And as you look back at that culture, however, it got to where it got to. I'll just use the word toxic because it wasn't in the best interest of the company. It was toxic to the customers and the marketplace in general, if there are some listeners who are saying, you know what, I didn't realize it.

But Chris, now that you mentioned that, that sounds an awful lot, like where I am right now. That's my company that you're talking about. It just a different time, different company name. So if our listeners are saying, hey, that's really me. What could a business owner do to begin that process of unwinding that toxic culture and getting it back to not just a normal state, but a healthy, thriving kind of culture that does support the client base as doing what's best for the business and the marketplace?

[00:10:58] Chris Morton: I have a couple of strong views on that. I will say by the way that the organizations that I was referring to for me were extremely large ones. And so the business owner was sufficiently removed, but I have no doubt that she or he at the time set the tone. So with respect to business owners of the kind we're probably going to talk about here, there are a few things. And one of them is to ensure that people see you with the right attitude toward customers and the right attitude and respect for other employees. Because my experience is that it is the culture at the top that will spin out because human beings have a natural desire to want to please and fit in. So I think that's one key one.

The other is be sure when you have points of success, especially that you share that. And when you're talking to people other than your own team, for example, make sure that you recognize the effort of the many that really made it happen. It's amazing how far that will go. And the other is to listen.

I have seen a number of cases where leadership may think they know what the particular good and bad is of the organization or their baby that they've created, but they may not really. And people are, especially in times like this, not necessarily coming forward with their true feelings, unless you develop a culture in which they feel it's okay to tell you and they'll feel okay if you do listen.

[00:12:28] Jeffrey Feldberg: Chris what's interesting. And for our listeners out there, what you've shared with us at the surface, it sounds simple. And it doesn't cost a lot of money, be the change that you want to be, or be the change that you want to see in those around you. You be that change and share your success, not only with your team, but with everyone in the company who contributed to that, celebrate that, and then listen. But all too often, it's so easy to confuse. Simple with simplicity.

[00:12:56] Chris Morton: It's not simple at all.

[00:12:57] Jeffrey Feldberg: Exactly. Those three things sound simple, but to execute on that to your point is not so simple at all. So going along our narrative here of a business owner saying, okay, yes, I recognize there is a toxic culture.

Chris, you got me at hook, line, and sinker that I'm going to be the change for other people of what I want to see and I'll do the celebration and the recognition when we have success. And I'm going to listen. Practically speaking though, where do you start with that?

[00:13:26] Chris Morton: I have a couple of suggestions before I do to the point of the fact that it's not easy and it actually takes courage to, and here's what I mean by that. And then we'll get into some solutions, I think. You've just landed from a trip. You realize there's a problem in some particular part of your country.

 Your board of directors, God love them is on you for something and they have a right to hold you accountable. And are you going to take the responsibility for it and then teach the team later? Or are you going to try to somehow pass that buck? It's very easy and those are two great examples of how it's easy to slip into, you know, I'm great if it wasn't for the bozos that worked for me.

And so I think that it does you're right, take culture and time and effort. To the question about change though, I think is often related to baby steps. And what I mean by that is to, first of all, create a mechanism. I can imagine that some of you and your listeners and yourself may not have touched on this, but you know, channels by which at least some of this can be aired, could be all-hands meetings.

It could be something that's more anonymous. And pick one work on it and let it be clear to your team that you listened and actually made a couple of changes because what that'll do is to ensure that if something was brought up, that they thought valuable, but it began to get acted on.

And also there are tough conversations in both ways. And what I mean by that is. It's also something that you and the team have to work on together. You know, there's a delicate balance here between a toxic culture from the top down. And the fact that some employees may wait for it all to be fixed. And in fact, it's a collaborative effort for sure.

One other element, Jeffrey that we didn't talk about here, but it relates heavily is the issue of knowing what you're good at as a leader. Listen and hire accordingly to people that have complementary knowledge, experience, or even capability to you. It's a common problem that I see. And why would I raise it here?

I would raise it here because if in the process of getting to where you are, even if there's a blind spot that you have, and there's a culture issue, maybe not a broad culture issue, maybe even a specific one. If there's a cultural issue and you have people that have complementary strengths and you realize it.

Maybe in your management team, you can seek their advice, and have them act as intermediaries and it sets the tone a little bit different. So I wanted to raise that as well.

[00:15:50] Jeffrey Feldberg: I really like that and it gets to this whole vulnerability movement that we've been seeing as of late in leadership where a leader, as smart as he or she may be as talented as he or she may be, is out there saying I don't have all the answers. And in fact, when it comes to this area, I'm really not that great at it. But Sally I've noticed you're terrific. Can you help me with this? Here's what's going on I'd love your input.

[00:16:16] Chris Morton: Gold it's gold and speaking of journeys, that's one thing for sure that's been part of my journey to be able to do that, to have the comfort to do that. And it so invokes people it's magical actually to do so. Or even to stand up literally or fiddly and say, I screwed that up and I need your help to fix it.

[00:16:37] Jeffrey Feldberg: And again, I don't want to cross any kind of lines that are out there. I will share it from my own experience. I think for males, at least for myself as a male the way social programming is, I think it's harder for male leaders to stand up and say, you know what? Not only am I not great in this area, but I really screwed that up. Can you forgive me? Can we figure this out so that it doesn't happen again? Let's do this together.

And it's perhaps stereotypical. I found that to be true, at least in my case. And perhaps even with yourself, Chris.

[00:17:06] Chris Morton: I've seen it over time and it can be insidious because there are good people. There are not good people in that regard, frankly, but they're even good people that need to have a pointed out to them. I have two daughters that are professionals, one in education, one in tech, and I not only loved them, but I respect their capability.

And from time to time, they feel very empowered, and from time to time they don't. And so I see the other half of that for people that I deeply care about.

[00:17:34] Jeffrey Feldberg: Must be interesting just to see that other world through your daughters, who you do care deeply about. And now you're seeing also some of the biases that still exist in the corporate world.

[00:17:44] Chris Morton: It's true. And one is in Silicon Valley tech. And again, I'm not going further name-wise, but it has frankly, both dynamics at work. Good and not so good

[00:17:54] Jeffrey Feldberg: And so Chris I'm interested, we were going down the path of the not-so-good stuff when it comes to culture and how that impacts strategy and just doing what's right for the business and the marketplace and customers. But let's flip that because I know that you've been involved with your own ventures and with other companies.

You got it right and the culture is rich and it's thriving and it makes it an easy and desirable company and motivated to say, yes, I want to either invest in that company. I'd like to buy that company. But again, success is not an accident. So when you look at the culture, in those instances, are there certain patterns that are common across the different companies that hey, if all you business owners out there, if you do this you're well on your way to really encouraging a rich and thriving culture?

[00:18:45] Chris Morton: Let me think about that. I think that to edge into it there are a couple of tiers to it if you will. One of them is internal to the company before it ever engages its investors, channel partners, customers, or suitors you'll have to do things that are quite the opposite of the wrong examples.

And I think we don't have to go back and re-examine what we just talked about. But if you imagine that discussion doing what was necessary as opposed to wrong. You can imagine that which takes us then to the second piece, which is how do you engage the outside world in an effective way? And of course, table stakes are that you have a reasonable plan with the products that people wish that's a different discussion.

At least at its basic level. But then you get into the level of how do I fund those activities, therefore investors? And the second is how do I reach out around the world these days, which is table stakes, almost for so many markets, so many businesses, and engage people that will help your business grow?

So do you maximize your value? Which is one of your themes that I've already appreciated when I've seen your mailings and your podcasts. So let's talk about that a little bit. Starting with investors, needless to say, there are things that you have to understand about what investors are looking for.

 Again, I imagine that you all have had discussions about it but part of the things that any investor will look for beyond the fact that they think that they can make money on you is the fact that they can trust you. And what I mean by that is not only your initial claim have some reasonable probability of coming true.

Although all businesses and all business plans get modified over time. And in fact, the best companies have to do so. But also is it, they are looking for individuals on the investor side who will be candid about issues so that you can work with them together to solve them as opposed to cover it up or blame somebody else, et cetera. So part of when I believe an investor is reading CEOs, their assessment that this is a real and regular person that they can deal with in a straightforward way. Not all news will be good news. If it was all that easy, you could make a lot of money when you create a startup.

That's simple. It ain't easy. And that's why, but there's the other half of this that I think is often overlooked and that is looking back at candid data. And any good business owner that may be seeking investment of any kind, wants to find ones that best match his or her business plans and his or her company culture, even at, as an investor.

For example, there are investors that are simply money managers who will manage the numbers and the patterns of your work. And they have 50 other companies, perhaps billions, under management. I have great respect for them, but that's a very different style of investor than for example, what's called a strategic who's not ready to buy you, but may actually invest in you because they have a business interest in your success.

You may have a piece of the puzzle they don't have. You may have a customer set that they don't have. And those two examples and realizing what each of them represents to you from the company looking outward is a key issue, extremely important issue. And it's often, honestly not done well. Now if you have a single investor and you really need money in 90-days perhaps you'll be more flexible, but if you're doing well and you have a choice among a few of them, it's very important to clearly understand your own criteria.

In the past, I certainly have used both kinds to raise a lot of money over time. I will say that smart money that is to say money that has been invested in business interest in what you're doing can be very attractive. Why? Because they can be your channel partner initially. They are a big channel and already sell 17 other devices that are not yours.

And you would be complementary or they're part of the world that you're not. But also they can be suitors down the road because you've come up alongside each other and you've got to know each other, hopefully, developed a good relationship. So that's on that side. On the channel side, that is to say just strategic partners for young companies, youngish companies. That's a whole interesting area that I also have a bias. I think that people can often miss the value of strategic partners or choose the wrong one when you're relatively small in the sense that what you would like is a powerful channel partner that sees value in you.

I'm separating that from investment, but can do and help you get into channels that you could not yourself. It isn't that I would never undertake a partnership with another young company, I might. But those that are larger. If I had a new medical device, I might really value participation, either investment or a channel with a large healthcare system. It may help them. It certainly would get my company in places where I could not.

[00:23:52] Jeffrey Feldberg: Chris, I really like where you're going with this. And at Deep Wealth in our 9-step roadmap of preparation. Step number three is all about the future buyer. And how do you master the art of thinking like a buyer? And let me make a qualifier. When I use the word buyer, I'm going to say it could be a buyer to outright buy a company.

Or it could be an investor who's investing in a company, but ultimately they're buying into the company, whether through a hundred percent acquisition or a partial investment in the company. And so we focus a lot in the Deep Wealth Experience of when you stop being selfish as a business owner and only think about me and me.

And you start thinking like an actual buyer. Your viewpoint of the world changes and it actually makes for down the road a better liquidity event. And so let's circle back to something that you said and part of your thesis here, and this is where you said, you know what, it's not really being done well, as being done poorly, particularly when it comes to the strategic side of things.

So what can we do as business owners if we know this today, that we can adapt and we can change and as we march towards a liquidity event, whether that's a year from now or 10 years from now, what advice would you have for us that we should keep in mind for today that will help us down the road?

[00:25:13] Chris Morton: Well, you know, there's some real elbow grease involved here first, and I'm getting away from culture, but just as preparatory to the real interaction. You have to understand by good old, real work to understand where your customer is. That is to say in the market who they are and how can they be reached? Can they be reached by a distributor, which a mechanical hands-off?

Can they be reached by and I'm speaking more of my own world at heavy tech and communication networks, but can they be reached by systems integrators that will use your product to actually please that end customer, et cetera. And then, what you have to do is to start with the ultimate end customer that you wish. Understand what those customers' needs are.

It sounds platitudinous, but what are they looking for? Let me use more examples here as we get into more of this and perhaps even some of the international stuff, time permitting. I am a carrier and I want to put in networks, and again, these are going to be examples specific to some of the things that I have, or even currently in the middle of, but if you're a carrier and you want to build out a huge campus by a healthcare system in someplace other than Mountain View. You're going to actually turn that over to a large integrator who will, in turn, create a plan, construct it all and use particular products. If I'm a person that wants to sell those products, ultimately and please the carrier, whatever they may be.

My products are probably a minuscule portion of the total bill in many cases because the total bill is large. This is definitely an example of making a point, Jeffrey. So what they're looking for in that particular example is dominated by performance and reliability. Unless I'm selling something that's a dominant piece of the particular total cost of goods.

What is my end-user the carrier really seeking case like this? They see credibility with a customer and they seek a system that they've installed that will enhance the credibility and retain that customer as opposed to, you know, I'm selling pencils to a big box store and a fraction of a penny off is going to be the determinant of how well a pencil works if you want.

And then you have to go backward toward yourself and look at those channels and see how I'm going to reach that customer. And what their needs are. So not just the customer, first of all, I'm not egocentric here on learning what the customer wants, but who's going to reach them with what bias? So in these examples that I'm giving they will be pleased by a set of intermediaries that carrier will hire to put in this network.

And again, what do they seek? They're driven partly by their customers, but now they want to make a profit which is more important because these integrators are smaller companies. They're not Verizon. Again, to go with this analogy. And so what they want is price and performance, and therefore what they want from you fits into a particular category.

They want to know your website. They want to see your datasheets. They want to see your cost sheets. So in this very narrow example, I'm hoping the listener can translate this to their own. We've gone from what the end customer wants to what it will cost that is to say what it will take to get the channels to appeal to that customer, using your products. And then what that channel wants to say. So you're going way to the end and backing out toward yourself.

[00:28:38] Jeffrey Feldberg: Chris what's really interesting about this and whether it's a high-tech in terms of communications and all these carriers to low-tech. Pencils in a big box store. You've identified two areas, price, and performance. And sometimes it's going to be both. Sometimes it's going to be one or the other.

But if I back out of that, one of the things that you shared, whether it's price, whether it's performance and this goes directly back to the culture. So here's where we can really tie it all back together. One of the things that you astutely said was there's gotta be trust. And if there's not trust, it doesn't matter what kind of price you're coming with.

What kind of performance you might be able to do. If the trust isn't there, trust is really the currency, whether it's a liquidity event and you're dealing with your future buyer, whether you're looking to expand your company with a new client contract, if the trust isn't there.

[00:29:30] Chris Morton: Any of those.

[00:29:31] Jeffrey Feldberg: It's just not going to happen.

And so it's interesting, we've now gone full circle back to culture with trust as really one of the foundational elements of the culture.

[00:29:40] Chris Morton: Yeah. And what I have seen often happen is that, and it's the classic mistake of culture that creates distrust, or at least a lack of legitimacy in the eyes of the channel or the end customer. Assuming there is not an understanding of business. And what I mean by that is that to the extent, for example, that there's an innovative product to be discussed, whether it's tech, whether it's a software application doesn't matter. A classic example that would cause distrust based upon if the opinion that you don't know enough about the business is to say, it's a great product. And you're going to love it. And it's better than anybody else's with no further questions of them about what kind of pricing do you need? What sort of datasheets do you need? What do you need from me? As opposed to the view that this interesting technology will carry the day because it's interesting.

No one ever bought anything because it's interesting. People buy things because it fills a need better than somebody else. Full stop. It's as simple as that. So if you come in with that trust-based also on, you know, legitimacy of your experience in a sense, then you'll create the trust and you'll get the feedback you really need.

So you have to be able to say to somebody, look, your channels are new to me. Yeah, your channel is new to me, I'm experienced over here. What do you guys need in order to make a successful relationship with us? We'll give it to you because we believe in what we have of course, but tell me what you need and we'll make it happen for you. And then make very sure that the first couple of experiences they have beyond your words, match your promise. And that's a culture. That is a culture to do that.

[00:31:26] Jeffrey Feldberg: Didn't invent this model, management consultants invented this model. When you look at diamonds, you have the four points of clarity for a diamond. And the clearer, the diamond is the more valuable that it is. And that was then transposed onto a business. And one of the four points of clarity when it comes to a business is the transparency of being able to go internally and say, hey, what is it that you need?

Sales department, marketing department, what do you need from the technical support department or vice versa? What do we need as a company to be able to go out there and do that? But then to do what you said to go to a prospective client, hey, I can tell you why we're the best thing since sliced bread, but we may not be tell me what you need, where you're at, and what you're looking for?

And then let me tell you if I think there's a fit or not. And I don't think it's too much of a stretch to say that if your culture isn't supporting that internally, you're not going to have that uniform experience externally when you're dealing with prospective clients.

[00:32:24] Chris Morton: And a couple of key points or extensions of that. Another way to express this engagement with channels or customers or both is to ask them, how can I make you successful? Whether it's delivery, quality, price, performance, and all the normal stuff that all of us love to talk about.

How do you win with me? And the second comment is as a business grows, it's not going to be the owner-manager, founder that gets to do this. So to the point of culture that has to exist inside the company, soon, it won't be you. It will, may not even be one of your VP. It'll be one of your, you know, on the ground salespeople that still needs that same attitude that you would have expressed when you were small.

[00:33:07] Jeffrey Feldberg: Again, it all sounds so simple. It really isn't, don't confuse simple with simplicity, but, and this is the big one. When you're able to do that, really all of these things, they really support one after the other is one plus one doesn't equal two. It doesn't even equal three or four. It equals maybe 10 or 20, but when you're able to do that, it just all gels together.

And I don't think I'm out on a limb when I say this, culture is the foundation for all of this to happen. That, when you support that and you have that internally, you have that comfort level. May I even use the word courage to be able to do some of these things, both in the company and outside the company?

[00:33:48] Chris Morton: Yeah, In fact, we use that word early in our discussions. It's sometimes it takes courage because you're tired or it isn't easy or you're getting beat up all the things that would make you want to slip the problem. The question is, do you fall prey to that or do you stand your ground and keep your culture alive?

[00:34:05] Jeffrey Feldberg: And for listeners out there. I know some of you're thinking, hey, this is great for a really large corporation, Fortune 10, Fortune 100, Fortune, 1000. That's not me, but I want to remind you that Chris, at the very beginning of the conversation said, this is going to also be for really most business owners out there, smaller businesses, big businesses, enterprises.

[00:34:29] Chris Morton: Just to reiterate where I got started was the start of the journey. But a lot of those experiences come from creating my own, three of us in a room to the better part of a thousand people in five countries, for example, in my case. So absolutely, in fact, it's even more pervasive and your chance of correcting it is easier when you're smaller, because if you get the right people around you and you behave in the way we talked about early in our discussion, then it's that kind of cultural grow organically by the people you hire and the people that are interviewing the people you hire already of the culture that you wish.

So you're growing it from the seed. And not that it's easy on any of this stuff, but it's easier when you have full control over it when it's smaller and it's your baby.

[00:35:13] Jeffrey Feldberg: And so Chris for you, and this is more at the personal level now you came from big corporate and you took their best practices and you began the process of adopting them in your startup. What was that like for you in terms of finding your secret sauce? Because I'm sure there were some things that, hey, this might be great for big corporate, but it's really not good for me. Let me adapt and change. Where there are certain again, patterns that we'll circle back to that really worked well in a startup or smaller business kinda mode?

[00:35:46] Chris Morton: Yeah, I think Jeffrey that there are certain things that are invariant and certain things that must change. What is invariant about it is that you have to sound so damn simple and like a platitude, but you have to know enough about your business as we spent some of the last hour talking about what people are looking for and how it's going to make them successful.

And it doesn't matter if you're Intel or pick a large corporation, Google or anyone else Or it's you and the first five people that you've hired, you better know that. The question then becomes one of focus and I think here's what I mean by that. In a larger corporation, you, especially one that's generally successful.

You can't throw 10 things against the wall but you do have a little more flexibility in trying a few products among them where you don't have that luxury necessarily in a smaller company. So I guess it's not in the category to your question about what to take and what works.

But I think you have to very early on realizing that you have to have a clear view of what will sell best and if it's not working, you have to have the courage. There's that name again and the openness with your team to say, you know, we need to pivot here either wholly, partly who knows.

It depends on the company and take it forward. Frankly, I think other than knowing your market and creating quality products, a lot of it has to do with what's inside you, quite frankly. It may be why you don't stay with a bigger company and why you want to go out on your own. Sadly in some cases, people think they can go out on their own, and maybe they're not well matched to that. So you honestly see both, that's how I think about that.

[00:37:27] Jeffrey Feldberg: That is incredibly sage advice that you're sharing. And as I like to say here on The Sell My Business Podcast, Chris, that's not gold in terms of advice that's platinum with what you're sharing. And one of the things for all the listeners out there, we talk a lot about this in the Deep Wealth Experience.

And you heard it from Chris. You can hire as a business owner, the most successful, the most expensive consultant around, but he or she will never know your business as well as you. And it's really as a business owner, it's our responsibility to know every nook and cranny of our business and of our industry. And you know what you don't realize it, you actually have all the answers. You just may not have all the questions. And that's where someone like Chris can come along and help you out with that, or that's what we do in the Deep Wealth Experience to have you look at things perhaps in a different way. Ask those questions. And from there, anything's possible including a market disruption, and Chris, the second thing that really stood out, and I want to share this with the listeners, is what you're talking about, and I'm going to put the general term best practices.

On all of the strategies that we spoke about today, the ones that don't work, which we can reverse engineer to have them work. And the ones that do work what's beautiful about them is they stand the test of time. And whether it's a pandemic, like what we've been through, whether it's boom, whether it's bust.

Follow those best practices. Let those be your North Star and you'll get to where you want to get to. And it's just so wonderful that you have something that we can trust and rely on to help get us there.

[00:39:04] Chris Morton: And the beautiful thing about that is that there are examples everywhere that show it to be true. We shared some by example, but I'm sure that your cadre of listeners will immediately recognize the events in their own business lives that match to these good or bad, by the way. And it's okay because if you recognize them, you can change them and move forward.

Heaven knows nobody, including me for sure does this right every time. Many of these calls are 51 49, but if the North Star is pleasing customers and being open with your team and using them as partners, then you have the highest probability of success.

[00:39:47] Jeffrey Feldberg: I'll take that. And I would rather be lucky than smart.

[00:39:50] Chris Morton: Takes a little of both.

[00:39:52] Jeffrey Feldberg: You never know where it goes. You know, Chris, I could talk with you for days at a time in each of these areas that we're talking about, but I find that we're bumping up against some of our timing here.

So as we begin to wrap up the episode, we're at the point where I get to ask my favorite question. Here's the question for you, my favorite question is this. Think of the movie, Back to the Future, and in the movie you have that magical DeLorean car that will transport you to any point in time of your choosing.

So now imagine it's tomorrow morning, you look outside your window and there it is. The DeLorean car is there. The door is open. It's waiting for you to hop on in. Chris, you go into the DeLorean car and now you can go back to any point in your life. Chris, as a child, teenager, young adult, whatever it would be, what life wisdom insights, hey, Chris, do this, don't do that. What would that look like for you?

[00:40:50] Chris Morton: I think I can answer quickly. I'd go back to my, oh, I don't know myself in graduate school or something, some such thing, and say be more self-aware now about what really pleases you about the world. Technology, yes, but it's applying technology to business that excites me the most.

And if I had one thing to change, I would come to that realization sooner and therefore make other decisions early on. I valued them early on and the example we shared an hour ago about being invited to the hottest think-tank around was pleasing for sure. But even more so to realize that there's a real joy and figuring out the solutions to people's problems with the technology and therefore be close to the customer. Therefore, I spend my energy in pleasing customers, not just internally.

[00:41:40] Jeffrey Feldberg: Chris. I love that. And I don't want to take this in a different direction. What I want to say is based on what I heard, it sounds as though what you're saying is, and these are my words, but hey, if I can go to my younger self and say, Chris, you have the superpower and here's what this is, you know, know this, follow it, enjoy the process, take it out to the world, take your gift to the world and let it see where it takes you. That was my read of that.

[00:42:05] Chris Morton: At its core. Yes, for me, it was that combination of human interaction and technology.

[00:42:11] Jeffrey Feldberg: And it's such a powerful takeaway for our listeners of each of you. You're all unique. All of us are unique. We're born with a superpower, but we don't know it. And our mission in life hopefully sooner than later is not only to find out what a superpower is, but it then becomes our responsibility to take that superpower and share that gift for the benefit of the world and wonderful things begin to happen.

[00:42:36] Chris Morton: How true, how true.

[00:42:38] Jeffrey Feldberg: So, Chris, as we begin to close out this episode if any of our listeners would like to reach you online, what would be the best place?

[00:42:45] Chris Morton: I think the best place it's cm [at]orchid [dot]black and that won't get also lost in a blizzard of other emails and a couple of the companies I have an interest in. So that's your best way. And I'll be happy to talk to anyone who wants to.

[00:43:00] Jeffrey Feldberg: Well, Chris, talk about being courageous. You put your email out there, so that's wonderful. Thank you. You're baking what you eat and for our listeners, we'll put all of that in the show notes. So it'll be very easy for you to reference it and to find, and to reach out to Chris.

Chris, as we officially close out this episode, a heartfelt thank you for taking part of your day and spending it with us here on The Sell My Business podcast. as always, please stay healthy and safe.

[00:43:24] Chris Morton: Thanks and good luck to everyone out there, Jeffrey. I love what you do. So thanks for having me.

[00:43:29] Sharon S.: The Deep Wealth Experience was definitely a game-changer for me.

[00:43:32] Lyn M.: This course is one of the best investments you will ever make because you will get an ROI of a hundred times that. Anybody who doesn't go through it will lose millions.

[00:43:42] Kam H.: If you don't have time for this program, you'll never have time for a successful liquidity

[00:43:47] Sharon S.: It was the best value of any business course I've ever taken. The money was very well spent.

[00:43:53] Lyn M.: Compared to when we first began, today I feel better prepared, but in some respects, may be less prepared, not because of the course, but because the course brought to light so many things that I thought we were on top of that we need to fix.

[00:44:09] Kam H.: I 100% believe there's never a great time for a business owner to allocate extra hours into his or her week or day. So it's an investment that will yield results today. I thought I will reap the benefit of this program in three to five years down the road. But as soon as I stepped forward into the program, my mind changed immediately.

[00:44:31] Sharon S.: There was so much value in the experience that the time I invested paid back so much for the energy that was expended.

[00:44:42] Lyn M.: The Deep Wealth Experience compared to other programs is the top. What we learned is very practical. Sometimes you learn stuff that it's great to learn, but you never use it. The stuff we learned from Deep Wealth Experience, I believe it's going to benefit us a boatload.

[00:44:55] Kam H.: I've done an executive MBA. I've worked for billion-dollar companies before. I've worked for smaller companies before I started my business. I've been running my business successfully now for getting close to a decade. We're on a growth trajectory. Reflecting back on the Deep Wealth, I knew less than 10% what I know now, maybe close to 1% even.

[00:45:13] Sharon S.: Hands down the best program in which I've ever participated. And we've done a lot of different things over the years. We've been in other mastermind groups, gone to many seminars, workshops, conferences, retreats, read books. This was so different. I haven't had an experience that's anything close to this in all the years that we've been at this.

It's five-star, A-plus.

[00:45:40] Kam H.: I would highly recommend it to any super busy business owner out there.

Deep Wealth is an accurate name for it. This program leads to deeper wealth and happier wealth, not just deeper wealth. I don't think there's a dollar value that could be associated with such an experience and knowledge that could be applied today and forever.

[00:45:59] Jeffrey Feldberg: Are you leaving millions on the table?

Please visit www.deepwealth.com/success to learn more.

If you're not on my email list, you'll want to be. Sign up at www.deepwealth.com/podcast. And if you enjoyed this episode of the Sell My Business podcast, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Reviews help me reach new listeners, grow the show and continue to create content that you'll enjoy.

As we close out this episode, a heartfelt thank you for your time. And as always, please stay healthy and safe. 

This podcast is brought to you by Deep Wealth. 

Click here to subscribe to The Sell My Business Podcast to save time and effort. You’ll automatically receive the latest episodes in your favorite podcast app.

Your liquidity event is the most important financial transaction of your life. You have one chance to get it right, and you better make it count. 

But unfortunately, up to 90% of liquidity events fail. Think about all that time, money and effort wasted. Of the "successful" liquidity events, most business owners leave 50% to over 100% of their deal value in the buyer's pocket and don't even know it.

Our founders said "no" to a 7-figure offer and "yes" to a 9-figure offer less than two years later. 

Don't become a statistic and make the fatal mistake of believing that the skills that built your business are the same ones for your liquidity event. 

After all, how can you master something you've never done before? 

Are you leaving millions on the table? 

Learn how the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience and our 9-step roadmap helps you capture the maximum value for your liquidity event.  

Click here to book your free exploratory strategy session.

Enjoy the interview!