Lance McNeill, MBA, MPAff, Author ofThe Resilient Entrepreneur: The Methods and Mindset to Help You Succeed on Your Entrepreneurial Journey

Today we are interviewing Lance McNeill, MBA, MPAff about his business book “The Resilient Entrepreneur: The Methods and Mindset to Help You Succeed on Your Entrepreneurial Journey.”

Tell us a bit about yourself.

Born and raised a Texan, Lance McNeill wears many hats. An entrepreneur, a teacher, a coach, and a father; he is also a published author. There is no stop with Lance. Whether it was during his time in the Peace Corps in Namibia or teaching at Austin’s Community College he is constantly seeking new challenges, while trying to inspire new entrepreneurs. He holds dual master’s degrees in both business administration and public affairs. 

Lance currently works for the City of Austin’s Small Business Program. When he manages to find the time, he enjoys vacationing with his wife and daughter in the mountains or jamming out on the guitar. Lance’s passion for self-improvement is contagious, often inspiring those around him. 

Lance has written several books and continues to build his reputation with each new release. His latest book, the Resilient Entrepreneur is now available on Amazon and other retail sites. To find out more about Lance and his remarkable career you can follow him on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lancejmcneill/

Describe your book, “The Resilient Entrepreneur: The Methods and Mindset to Help You Succeed on Your Entrepreneurial Journey,” in a few sentences.

What factors help a burgeoning entrepreneur move forward and persevere through the hardships of the startup phase? Why do some entrepreneurs get stuck in the idea stage, while others are able to successfully implement their idea and grow their business? Why do serial entrepreneurs continue to start new businesses even after experiencing one failure after another? What helps existing small business owners weather the storms and bounce back from setbacks? These are some of the questions we explore in the Resilient Entrepreneur.

Resiliency, like entrepreneurship, is a learnable process. It is comprised of three main phases:

1. The adverse experience and absorption of its resulting effects

2. A period of rehabilitation and regeneration

3. Reflection on the meaning of the adversity and lessons learned

Looking at how people navigate these phases, we explore frameworks for better understanding entrepreneurial resilience in terms of emotional, cognitive, and social resources we need to persevere. The practical tools and methods outlined in this book equip new entrepreneurs with the knowledge and confidence they need to take the bold leap of becoming an entrepreneur.

Who do you think would most appreciate this book?

This book is written for the early stage entrepreneur and small business owner, regardless of industry. This book is designed to help them on the early and most turbulent stages of the startup journey. 

What inspired you to write a book to help new entrepreneurs move through the hardships of starting a company?

I’ve been teaching entrepreneurship at the local community college for a few years now and I noticed that my students had the same hesitations around making the leap from working 9 to 5 to becoming their own boss. They cited fear and anxiety about moving forward on an unknown path without support. I wanted this book to give them confidence that they can do it – many have before them and there are so many resources that will help them along the way.

What are some common mistakes new entrepreneurs make?

In my book I talk about a concept I call serial ideation. Plenty of aspiring entrepreneurs never get past the idea stage. When the entrepreneurial journey starts to get a little bumpy, they take the first exit ramp they see. Later they’ll come up with another idea that they will fall in and out of love with all over again. I call the aspiring entrepreneurs stuck in this loop, serial ideators. They’re the window shoppers of entrepreneurship. They adopt and abandon one idea after another without ever moving beyond the idea phase.

Entrepreneurship is hard and can be intimidating. The idea of entrepreneurship can be enticing, but starting a business is a huge investment of time, energy and resources, and the investment is a risky one. It’s estimated that at least 50 percent of all new businesses fail within five years of their inception.274 Other studies estimate that six years after discovering an entrepreneurial idea, approximately 66 percent of aspiring entrepreneurs either give up on entrepreneurship altogether or are still stuck spinning their wheels in the idea or startup stage.ⁱ; Kellogg School of Management Professor, Steven Rogers, says that the average entrepreneur fails about four times before succeeding.ⁱⁱ; If we measured entrepreneurial success using the traditional return on investment (ROI) calculation used by large corporations, 95 percent of all startups would fail to produce an acceptable financial return in a reasonable timeframe.ⁱⁱⁱ 

What does that mean though – that their business failed?

A failure in business often means that you gave up and quit or you were unable or unwilling to learn and pivot in a new direction. In fact, not pivoting quickly enough away from a suboptimal decision (misaligned product-market fit, poor hiring, etc.) was cited as one of the top reasons why startups dissolve.^iv 

Yet, despite the high failure rate, the path of entrepreneurship can be exciting and liberating, and for many, a journey worth pursuing. Entrepreneurs get the unique opportunity to blaze their own path – to write their story of self with a sense of control and ownership that few other professional endeavors allow. Despite the high failure rates, there are still millions of entrepreneurs who have found a path to success.

Resiliency is the main theme of your book. How difficult is resiliency to learn? What are some of the steps that new entrepreneurs must take to become more resilient?

Resilience is something we can learn and measure. We can become “conditioned to cope”. For example, let’s look at how helpful support networks and resources make us more resilient. Of all the research on resilience, the most consistent finding is the relationship between the number of high-quality relationships in our lives and our ability to overcome adversity.  

Immigrant communities are a great example, as they regularly access diaspora and familial networks to support one another’s entrepreneurial endeavors.12 Research conducted by Dr. Rocio Rosales, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of California Irvine, highlights one such community in Los Angeles. Dr. Rosales estimates that there are more than 1,000 fruit vendors or fruteros operating in Los Angeles County - many of them self-employed immigrants. 

These fruteros often operate their businesses illegally because local permitting regulations and ordinances restrict their commerce due to concerns about health, public safety, and the right of way. Setting aside the various policy debates about immigration and local permitting regulations, what intrigued me most about these entrepreneurs is how they came together to overcome their shared challenges. Dr. Rosales refers to their coping mechanisms as survival strategies.

Ricardo is one of the fruteros she discusses in her study. When Ricardo’s fruit cart was seized by the local health department regulators, he borrowed $1,000 from his cousin to purchase a new one. This new cart was again seized about two weeks later, and again his cousin lent him the money to purchase a new one. When this cart too was eventually seized, the same cousin who lent Ricardo money twice, hired him as an employee in his own business. While working to pay off his debt, Ricardo moved in with his cousins to save on rent and other living expenses. The responsive support offered to Ricardo is typical of many immigrant communities. We can learn from Ricardo’s resilience by identifying our own support networks that we can call on during times of need.

What advice do you have for new entrepreneurs?

Your entrepreneurial journey will often begin with the recognition of a challenge or opportunity followed by an idea about how to solve it. The idea emerges in your mind and you begin to pursue an implementation plan. You initially set off on this quest alone – one person with a grand vision. 

The challenge is this journey is new to you and the outcome is unpredictable. That novelty and unpredictability, according to Dr. Sonia Lupien, Director of the Center for Studies on Human Stress, are two prominent drivers that can lead to toxic stress.  Higher levels of resiliency are required to cope with the stress of starting a new venture.

Entrepreneurs are more likely to be successful when they’ve built up resiliency to face the obstacles and adversity that comes with starting a business. It’s those entrepreneurs that are more quickly and frequently able to access supportive resources and implement the techniques laid out in this book that will be more resilient.

One of the strengths of your book is you break down entrepreneurial resilience in an easy-to-understand framework. Was it challenging to write about such a complex topic in an approachable, concise manner?

This is a really interesting question. When the idea for this book first started emerging, I saw some meaningful connections between resilience and entrepreneurship. It wasn’t until I dove deep into the research that I learned just how critical the concept of resilience is in business startups. The more I read and researched the topic of resilience, the easier it became to see those connections clearly and the roadmap for the book sort of emerged from there.

Are there any entrepreneurs who stand out as a good example of entrepreneurial resilience?

When we think about untiring, persistent entrepreneurs, who comes to mind? We might typically think of the all-stars of entrepreneurship: Elon Musk, Sara Blakely, Steve Jobs, Lori Greiner, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Michael Dell, Sir Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos, etc. Yet, there are so many more and in my book I share anecdotes from these superstar entrepreneurs as well as inspiring stories from entrepreneurs who you’ve probably never heard of.

More Information

Buy book on Amazon. 

References

i. Reynolds, PD. Entrepreneurship in the United States: The Future is Now. New York. Springer. 2007.

ii. Maxwell, John. C; Wooden, John. Sometimes You Win - - Sometimes you Learn: Life’s Greatest Lessons Are Gained from Our Losses. Center Street. 1 Sep. 2015.

iii. Gage, Deborah. "The venture capital secret: 3 out of 4 start-ups fail." Wall Street Journal 20 (2012).

iv. CBInsights. Top 20 Reasons Why Startups Fail. https://www.cbinsights.com/reports/The-20-Reasons-Startups-Fail.pdf?utm_campaign=Report%20-%20Content%20Emails&utm_medium=email&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-_UAWhs4peZ1801pJOxPYX6MnCm0A7FO-jTZtpoVeMAY1za7xPTN1NzFFOIaJZ89K9ZNJWHj9xLZr-a__j3r8yNhYZgD9pOjOFplpFa6MgcZYDXCKc&_hsmi=24695183&utm_content=24695183&utm_source=hs_automation&hsCtaTracking=61ab122e-019b-4f59-8699-c9c960ead242%7Cfed300a8-9488-4239-92b3-bb641191e0d0

Eric Henry, Author of Hunt or Fail

Today we are interviewing Eric Henry, author of the network marketing/business book "Hunt or Fail."

Tell us a bit about yourself.
I’m an investor. My field is commercial real estate. Prior to this I worked in distribution and import/export splitting my time across Washington, D.C., Miami, FL and Africa. I am extremely driven, but it’s not out of greed… it’s because I’ve seen what can happen when people don’t think money is important.

Describe the purpose of your book in a few sentences.
We really wanted to jump into the debate about network marketing. There is a huge section of business people who make fun of beginner network marketers and call them spammers or scammers… but then on the top you have hedge fund managers investing billions into these companies and even fighting over the ethical issues and shorting the companies… it’s quite a spectacle. So we really wanted to add our insight into it having been pitched by a top performer in the industry.

What was exposed was a key that anyone can use in order to get wealth. This is a secret to success and happiness. If you follow the advice in this book you will have no choice but to grow and begin to become a hunter. You’ll see the world differently after following the advice in this book.

Who do you think would most appreciate this book?
That’s an interesting question. On one end there are the people who are actively practicing what we say to do in this book… these people have mansions, supercars, time freedom, awesome relationships... and then you have a larger group who want to be wealthy but are paralyzed by fear or lack of training, but will still join the network marketing companies. Unfortunately a lot of them are fed magical-thinking books that keep them in a state of consumption of the products, but keep them from producing. We give the solution to this in the book.

We wanted to reveal what no one’s talking about.

What inspired you to write a book about network marketing?
We were at a nightclub in Miami where people go to show off their wealth… typically someone will purchase tables in bulk and then flip them to other wealthy people. A $10k table will even be bid up to $30k sometimes depending on the event. There’s this big secondary market for this… their game is all about proving their worth by showing how much money they can spend. The network marketing team we met were making so much money that they were free to do this and meet other people succeeding as well.

We were in a company with members from South America who lived by this code… completely spoiled, hundreds of thousands at their disposal (and multi-millions at their parents disposal), little attachment to reality… and no successes under their belt. We tried bridging the gap between their fantasies and the real opportunity we saw right in front of us, which was one of the most challenging tasks we’ve ever taken on and in hindsight, too charitable.

Their parents kept them at a distance so they’d figure it out on their own which was understandable, but it turned out to be a big mistake because they ran from the best opportunities and ran towards the terrible ones. To make a long story short, people would approach us all the time with business opportunities. One the most prominent occurred at the nightclub when the network marketer started talking to us. Turned out he was a leader in one of the biggest MLM companies. By the way… we left the name of the MLM company out on purpose, because we didn’t want to have a bias. The approach we detail in the book can be used by any network marketing company and many businesses, in fact.

The network marketer wanted to expand to South America and needed our help to do it. We met him later on and he explained to us the real business model… how the top really view their sign-ups. He covered the mindset and the skills needed to succeed. It was jaw-dropping.

Tell us a bit about your experience working with a network marketer you met at a club in Miami.
They were professional and their confidence was inspiring. They gave us a presentation at this mega office in Coconut Grove… right on top of a supercar dealership. They already did their homework on the culture they wanted to market towards and knew it was very hierarchical. They also knew the average person was typically uneducated. If the “high society” people did something... they expected a huge percentage to jump in. What they offered was for us to sign up beneath them and funnel all the expansion directly under us… so in essence, for little work we’d be guaranteed to be at the top of the pyramid. They did, however, need our boss's collaboration and presence in the marketing. 

Our boss was very interested initially but then backed out completely once he realized he had to do work.

Every few months we'd get contacted by the network marketer asking us if our boss was still ignoring talking about it… it was hard telling him he was more interested in video games than work and was rotting in his room with coca cola bottles everywhere.

What was your understanding of network marketing like prior to meeting this network marketer and his inner circle?
We had done one in high school for a few months and it really helped our conversational skills, cold-calling, approach anxiety, management skills, humility, confidence and salesmanship but we were too young to really get what it was offering and too afraid to put ourselves out there. It is scary. You’re getting so much rejection and losing most of your friends in the process. I mean, that’s the case no matter what success you have… it’s like crabs in a barrel… the fisherman don’t need lids because when one tries to escape the other crabs grab their legs. It’s not even personal… it’s just most people don’t want to have your success show their failure. Ever wonder why so many lottery winners wish it never happened to them? They weren’t forced to grow as a person in order to handle that power, as people do who create their own wealth. 

What do you think are some of the biggest misconceptions people have about the network marketing industry?
I’d say first is that it’s a pyramid scheme. It’s completely legal. Also working 40 hours a week selling your time at wholesale to an employer is somehow better and somehow less of a scam? How is a corporate ladder not a pyramid scheme? You’ve got the board, a CEO, top management, middle management, supervisors and employees.

You could write a book on this topic itself on how corporations exploit people’s time and money. They are the actual pyramid schemes. And the courts ruled what they did regarding network marketing… it’s legal. For many, however, they will be more comfortable working jobs and leaving the harder psychological work to their higher ups.  Our book is for the people who know corporations are a scam, don’t care about the inevitable shakeup to the power structures of their friends and family, and want to be their own boss already with little to no risk involved. The risk in network marketing is from not knowing the mindset in our book… it’s that black or white. 

How do you think reading your book will impact people?
Our hope is that it is going to help people and make them stronger. The business world is brutal and unforgiving… you have to be tough. We worked hard to create a step-by-step approach that can be modified in unison with a network marketing team leader and yourself so that the process is duplicatable. Our intention here is to help create giant downlines for network marketers. This book will do that.

What do you have in mind for your next writing project?
We are working on a few self-help guides and motivational books. Our prized book in development shows all the things one should NOT do in a business start-up, using many examples from numerous companies we have been in. Sometimes studying what not to do is just as valuable as studying what you should do. We see a clear lack of these books in the marketplace right now. We have multiple contributors on this project so it will be about a year until that one is finished.

Is there anything else you'd like potential readers to know about your book?
If you really want success in network marketing… this book is the key. Once you read the book you'll see there's really no other choice.

More Information
Buy "Hunt or Fail" on Amazon