I haven’t held a full-time job since October of 1993. That’s when I decided to enter the world of entrepreneurship. I know exactly why being my own boss appeals to me so much and there’s no way I could ever go back to working full-time for a company. It’s just in me to be my own boss. The freedom. The responsibility. The pride of ownership.
I think the desire started when I was a kid. When I was seven, I lived and grew up in Reno, Nevada. I lived in a small house on a huge lot with my Mom and Dad and two sisters. We actually had 72 trees on our property (I counted them). One day, in the middle of the summer, my Dad made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. He says, “Steve, if you pull all the weeds on the back slope, I’ll pay you $20.” Now, at seven years old in 1969, $20 was some pretty good money—let me tell you!
Well, there I was in 90-degree heat staring at a wall of weeds as tall and some taller than me. This was a pretty big slope, too. I’d say about 90 feet wide by 30 feet deep. So, I went to the top left corner and start pulling. Grabbing with both hands. Using my legs. Pulling straight up…as my Dad taught me. I worked for about half an hour and was covered with dust, pollen and sweat. I thought to myself, man this is gonna to take forever. I hadn’t even made a dent. I started getting that sinking feeling, like maybe I made a bad decision and that my whole summer was going to be wasted.
But then suddenly, I had an idea…
If I divided the slope into three sections, I could hire three people to pull the weeds in one section each. Brilliant! So, I hired two of my friends and my older sister. The deal was $5 each for a job well done. They weren’t too happy to see me sitting in the shade on the deck, but someone had to oversee this whole operation. When the last weeds were pulled and everyone was paid, I walked away with a cool $5 profit. I liked it.
Now I know why Jim Rohn says, “profits are better than wages.”
Somewhere along the way though, I think society’s programming took hold, you know, get an education, get a good job with benefits, get married, buy a house, have 2.4 kids, etc. So that’s what I did (except for the kids part). Well, I had pretty much forgotten about my valuable life Lesson 20 years earlier, and was well into keeping up with the Jones’ when my entrepreneurial spirit started to flare up like hot embers.
It was October of 1993. I was working at a southern California ad agency and they had just hired a new controller who decided to handle the way we did estimating a little differently. With each new project, a single estimating sheet was passed around from one department to the next. Everyone was to “guestimate” our hours for the project. The sheet contained job titles, space for estimated hours, totals, etc. And the kicker—it also contained current billing rates for each job position in the agency. Whoa!
When I saw what the company was billing out my time at, I was livid! Right then, I realized that I was now the one pulling weeds and the company owners were the ones sitting on the deck in the shade drinking lemonade.
Wow.
My entrepreneurial spirit was on fire again. It wasn’t long after that when I quit my job at the agency and was in business for myself. Even though, at times, it’s been a roller coaster, I’ve never had to hold a 9 to 5 job since.
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