Why staying small is the next big thing for a business with Paul Jarvis

Designer, author and creator – Paul Jarvis

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I’m trilled to have Paul Jarvis on the show. Paul Jarvis is an author, entrepreneur and designer. He is the author of the book, Company of One. He also teaches popular online courses, hosts several podcasts and develops small but mighty software solutions. In this episode, Paul Jarvis talks about why staying small is the next big thing for business and some details on the Company of One.

Few things you will learn from this episode

• Why staying small is the next big thing for a business
• Should business owners hire or not
• How to know if you are good in managing people and grow that way
• How to find your strengths
• How to decide on the gray areas of your business
• How to understand the roles you need in your business
• How to understand where to put your resources
• How to mitigate your current needs and your future needs

Paul’s Website:

OfOne.co

Transcript: Download

Video Transcription provided by GMR Transcription Services.

Jaime:	Welcome to Eventual Millionaire. I am Jaime Masters, and today on the show, I have Paul Jarvis. Now, Sol Orwell, a very good friend of both of ours, told me I had to sign up for his email list, and I had to have him on the show. 

	He?s coming out with a brand-new book called Company of One. Why staying small is the next big thing for a business. 

	Thanks so much for coming on the show today.

Paul:	Yeah. Thank you very much for having me.

Jaime:	You are a contrarian apparently, because everybody?s talking about scaling and how cool it is. So, tell me a little bit about why you want to stay small.

Paul:	Yeah. So, I think the main thesis that I have is that growth isn?t necessarily bad, but it should be questioned. So, even for ? and the book is kind of ? it?s a funny title, because it sounds really good, and my publisher and agent love the title, but it isn?t a literal like I don?t have a one-person business. I have a bunch of people that work for me and with me at all times. Otherwise, I would be able to get it done, but I think ? the point of it is that the byproduct of business success isn?t always growth.

	It can be, and it can be smart to do it that way sometimes, but I think we need to think about it just a little bit instead of just the hockey-stick chart of always going up and to the left in all areas at all times.

Jaime:	Thank you so much for that clarification. Because in my head, I don?t really want to do all the pieces in my business, thank you, so I don?t want to be just me. But the clarification makes a huge difference. It reminds me of the tiny house thing. We don?t need something so massive that we have to clean it all. That sucks. I want a nice house that is efficient and effective, right?

Paul:	Exactly. I like a big house with very little in it. That?s my ? I couldn?t ? I'm still claustrophobic, and although I'm kind of a minimalist, in a small space, even in tiny hotel rooms, I?m just like this is too much for me.

	So, I would rather have a big space with like three nice pieces of furniture than a tiny space.

Jaime:	I love how we get on this tangent. I think that?s amazing. And I'm not ? no. But so that?s the point. Right? So, everybody that?s like scale, scale, scale, what has a tendency to happen, and this is sucky, but ? especially if they?re bad at hiring, they start growing and growing, then their cash flow goes to blgh, and then, they?re all worried about paychecks and then they can even be the business owner that they want to be, because they?re trying to just do what they can.
	
	I call it ? they?re like tripping and running at the same time and about to fall on their face every second, which is a little not fun to live in, right?

Paul:	No. It?d be hard to win a race doing that.

Jaime:	Correct.

Paul:	It?d be hard to in a race doing that.

Jaime:	So, tell me more about that idea. Should we not hire when we?re supposed to? Tell me what your thoughts are?

Paul:	Yeah. I think, for me, I've never wanted to ? basically, there?s a tendency in the corporate world, and even some of bit in entrepreneurialism, where as you get better at what you do, you?re rewarded with promotions into management and managing other people, which is awesome. 

	I know some people who are the best at managing people. I?m not good at managing people. So, in my own business, I never wanted to promote myself out of the job that I like and that I love.

	So, when I was doing web design, I always had a full client roster. I was booked months in advance. I kept increasing my rates, and people kept hiring me. And people were always like make an agency and hire people. And I'm like if I hire people, then I'm going to managing designers and managing people managing clients. I don?t want that to be me.

	So, that?s kind of always been the thing for me where I don?t want to grow in that way, but hiring an accountant? Heck yeah. I don?t want to do my books. I'm really good at making money. I?m not good at organizing my money in a way that I pay the government the least amount as possible, which is the job of an accountant.

	Same with the lawyer. I don?t how to be a lawyer. So, same with copy editing, podcast production. There are so many things that I hire out for, but the caveat for hiring out for me is I only want to hire A players who one, I'm going to pay more for, but two, I don?t have to manage them. They know how to do their job. 

	My copy editor and I literally communicate in emojis. So, I?ll put a file into a Google doc that?s shared with him. He?ll send an emoji of thumbs up. And then, he?ll send an emoji of a pencil when it?s finished. And then, I?ll send a thumbs-up emoji when I?ve gone through his edits. I don?t have to manage that. He?s just good at what he does. I pay him more than normal copy editors, but I want to, because I want him to be able to do that.

	So, I think that kind of relates back to what we were talking about at first where growing a business doesn?t always make sense, but it makes sense when you kind of figure out what you ? like what do you want your daily life to be? If it?s managing others, I would hate my life. I don?t want ? and if I?m the boss of my business, then it?s my fault if I hate my job.

Jaime:	A million times over. Okay.

Paul:	Yeah.

Jaime:	So, this is why I'm like I never want to be an agency. Everyone beforehand, like that?s the way to growth. That?s a way to higher revenues. You know, like yeah, but ? I?m not a fan of managing people either.

	The question is that how do people understand if they?re good or not at managing people? Because I end up chatting with people, and I?m like do you even like doing that? They?re like oh I hate that part. And they just assume it?s part of it. 

	How do they know whether they?re good or they?re not good or to make that decision on if they should actually manage people and grow that way?

Paul:	Yeah. That?s a good question. Because I think a lot of times, we?re scared of the unknown. So, we could be scared of doing something just because we haven?t done it before. That?s kind of a bad reason not to do something. Like if I?m just scared of public speaking, I probably shouldn?t avoid public speaking. If I know I just don?t like public speaking, I don?t do well in groups or in front of people, then public speaking isn?t like ? personally, I don?t do public speaking. People are always like oh you should come speak at this event. I?m like I don?t do public speaking. It?s also really good to just have it as a rule so then it?s never personal with people. It?s just my rule. It?s just not public speaking.

	So, I think for one, you have to consider is this a fear-based decision or is this based in reason. Right? So, I think sometimes you can just try it. Because I?ve worked for myself for probably about 20 years now, but before that, I was working at an agency, and the agency got successful and started to grow, and then I went from being the designer to the creative director and managing other designers. I was like oh this is so ? like I've tried this, I know this is not what I want, this is not for me, so when I do things on my own, I don?t want that to happen.

	So, I mean for me, I?m not smart enough to know how to do things without trying them first. I buy a lot of things and then return them. I just bought an Apple watch last week, because I thought I wanted it, and then I had it for a week and was like I don?t ? this isn?t good. So, for me, it?s experience. It?s trying, seeing how something fits with me, and see how something fits with my life, and then decide maybe this isn?t the right business decision for me. Maybe I can scale back or look at other ways to scale revenue without scaling all areas of my business.

Jaime:	That makes a lot of sense. And that?s the funny thing too. So, everyone talks about leveling up on your strengths. And then, the question becomes I don?t know what my strengths are. 

	And so, testing is great. And I had project management experience before hand; realized did not want to do any of that stuff, but how do people test that if they don?t know, right?

	So, how do we know which things we?re good at and finding our strengths?

Paul:	Yeah. I think small iterations. You can bring somebody on ? like if your business is doing well enough that you?re deciding whether or not you want to hire an employee, bring on a freelancer for a month or two just to see if that?s something that makes sense for your business.

	And I think businesses is such an experiment anyways. There isn?t just here?s the one way you do business, because then everybody would do business in that way. So, it?s just an experiment. And even people who do well, they?ve just got really good at experimenting, and typically those experiments are things where, if the experiment fails, it?s not over for your business.

	It?s hard to take risks that big and stay in business. And I think a lot of people think entrepreneurs are inherently risky. I?m so not ? I?m not a risky person at all. I?m so risk-averse with everything that I do.

	And so, I think doing small steps and doing small iterations on experiments for, is this something I want? Maybe it is, maybe it?s not. It?s just like when people say oh I'd love to be a published author. I?d love to write a book. And I?m like do you write articles that can be written like a 600-word piece, and if they?re like I hate doing that, I'm like maybe writing a like 70,000-word book or more isn?t the best thing.

	So, I think just taking tiny steps and just taking little leaps, little experiments can go a long way to figuring out is this something I want to do or not?

Jaime:	Okay. Because I love this. And it?s all about data for me too, right? 

Paul:	Hm-mm.

Jaime:	So, when you test in analytics, or split test, you get data back and you go oh I can read this? The problem that I have with things that are way more vague is that everything seems to be a gray area. You?re like I don?t know if I just hired the wrong person or I suck or this or that or if I even liked it. Like I didn?t like it while I was in it, but later I felt better. Right? So, we?ll drive ourselves crazy with gray.

Paul:	Yeah.

Jaime:	How do you do that?

Paul:	So, I think for me, it?s always if I'm unhappy with where things are currently at in the present, am I unhappy but I?m still moving towards something that I ultimately want? If the answer is yes, then ? when I was just a web designer 10 years ago, I would have days where I wanted to ? I was very unhappy with either my clients or myself or my job, but ultimately I knew that the job that I was doing I really liked and for the most part, I loved my clients. Sometimes they would piss me off, but who doesn?t get pissed off by people every now and then.

	So, it was always the end justified the means. My purpose for business was still towards me being happy most of the time. So, a couple off days or hiring the wrong person or whatever it was, if it was an end to a means that I still liked, it was worth it for me.

	If it wasn?t, then it was like this probably isn?t a good fit. And when we?re talking about things like scale or growth or more, I think we need to ? a lot of that?s introspection. A lot of that is thinking what do I actually want, and a lot of it comes down to I think what enough is.

	People don?t think about this, because we start our businesses, right, and we don?t have enough because we just started. Unless you?re super lucky and you start your business day one and you have enough revenue, enough clients, enough everything, but we start in this pre-enough stage. 

	And so, we?re always in that stage. We?re always working towards more, because we need more. We literally need more in our business. But where people kind of don?t have the interest backs and is when maybe you've reached enough, but you?re still in that mindset of more, more, more, because in the past, you've needed more. 

	So, I think the point of Company One and the point of why I wrote the book is to just have people stop for a second and be like is this enough for me? Is this enough for my business? Is this what?s right for the long-term feasibility of things? Does this serve my customers the best?

	And for me, that?s always kind of been the guiding force of is this enough or do I actually need more? Or maybe it?s just my ego saying hey you need more, guy.

Jaime:	Seriously.

Paul:	Yeah.

Jaime:	Well, and the different phases make a huge difference, because if you listen to Gary V. and you?re not a beginner or starter, then hustle will make you nuts. Right? You?re like I don?t ? no. I need to chill out a little bit. I need to stop being in my business and in everybody?s stuff and trying to hustle so hard, because there are different phases.

	But when we have that one-size-fits-all, you?re just supposed to grow. You didn?t know that? The bigger the house the better. The more everything the better, right? Then you have to clean it. And you?re like darn it. I don?t like this either.

Paul:	It always comes back to; the number of bathrooms is the number of bathrooms that need cleaning.

Jaime:	Oh my goodness. Yeah. And to me, that?s the funny thing. How do you understand though what roles you need? So, even if you think of the house metaphor, it?s like how many bathrooms do you literally need?

	When you start looking at what roles you have to do and what roles you want to do, it sounds like you said well, I need other people to facilitate, right? But how ? if you?re the guy that everybody comes back to, how do you not have an org chart where you?re in the middle and everybody else is just coming at you all the time? Because that seems chaotic also?

Paul:	Yeah. It definitely does. And I mean I've always kind of looked at ? I?ve always wanted, and I continue to want, a simple business. I want to business that is easy to run. If there are 50 steps for every process in my business, I can?t remember. If I can remember the steps required to do most of the things in my business in my head, then it?s simple enough. And I?m not that smart. So, there are not very many steps for me to remember them.

	And I think what?s important to consider here is the maintenance cost of opportunities. It could be an opportunity to have enough revenue to hire more employees, but was a maintenance that?s going to be required of you to manage them?

	It could be a great opportunity to add a new product or add a new service to your business, but how are you going to support that in the long term? And I think a lot of times, opportunities are really just ? they all have costs. And so, opportunities are just wearing nice masks where it seems like oh every opportunity is great. I can say yes to everything. I can grow in every direction. And then, it?s like now I?m left with a business that I don?t necessarily like the day-to-day grind of, and then it becomes difficult.

	So, I think, thinking about how we maintain things ? because a lot of entrepreneurs have tons of ideas, right? We?re really good at ?

Jaime:	Too much.

Paul:	Aw. This would be such a great product. This would be such a great service. This would be such a great thing to offer clients or that I could do to grow my business, and we don?t think about the operations. We entrepreneurs don?t really have operational brains a lot of the time.

	And I think we need to kind of foster that and even just think about it. Like even if we?re not going to be in charge of operations, we?re still going to be ? it?s still our role as the person in charge to think about what the maintenance costs are to saying yes to things or to start things.

Jaime:	A million times over, right? This is ? with my clients, I'm always like oh you have a new idea. Prove it. Right? And they?re like well, it ? because it ? don?t get me wrong. I don?t ever want to squash the idea thing. That?s why we are who we are, and I think it?s amazing. And I think exploring that is really interesting verbally. But, sending your team to run in one direction and then sending them to run in another direction, not so good.

	And so, mitigating that long-term strategy, I agree with a million times. Now, how do you though understand where to put your resources, especially when you ? like I said, it all hinges on you, especially if you?re technically a company of one, right? Then everybody else comes to you when you enact a new whatever it is. Or even if you keep it small and you don?t enact a new project, that?s still a lot of maintenance on you, right?

Paul:	Yeah. There are ? different things have different maintenance costs, right? So, if you think about even just a couple examples. Like if you have ? so, I started a software business about five years ago that was profitable, but the amount of support required to generate that profit was not worth it.

Jaime:	Probably to someone else potentially, but not to you.

Paul:	Well, even if I hired somebody to do that, that would cut into the revenue so much that it would be ? like it would gross a lot but not net a not, which a lot of people get starred eye emoji about like gross numbers.

Jaime:	I make a million. A make a dollar net, but I make a million dollars.

Paul:	Exactly.

Jaime:	Yep. It?s lovely.

Paul:	It cost me 990,000 dollars to make that million dollars. I would rather find the easy wins for net. So things like ? I have some software that requires almost no support, which is great. I have online courses where I spent so many years working at the on boarding process for those courses that I?ve pre-thought of all the questions a new student might have, answer them before they can email me ?

Jaime:	Yeah. That?s awesome.

Paul:	? and they require nothing. They all run on automation sequences with segmented funnels, and that can run where all I need to work on is making those funnels better or the course material better, or interviewing people for more success stories, and I don?t have a ton of work answering similar questions all the time with a product that required so much support. 

	Or even ? the same with marketing. I only want to build products now that have traction that?s easy. I don?t want to have to spend of ton of time convincing a market that they should buy the thing. 

	So, even the latest software product that I launched, I only launched because I drew a mockup of it for an hour. I tweeted it, and there were over 500 people that retweeted it and favored it and were interested in it. And I was like it seems like the traction is there. And then it was number one on Hacker News, number one on Product Ton. 

	If none of those things had happened, I would?ve scrapped the idea. I wouldn?t have built it. Because I want something that ?building a business is hard. Running a business is hard. I want to find all of the easy wins I can, because I know everything else is going to be difficult.

	So, if I could find just a couple of those easy wins, I'm like that?s the thing that I want to build. And I've scrapped ideas, because they didn?t take off right away. They didn?t take off with just a small amount of work at first, and then I knew if it took that much work to get it just a little bit of traction and a couple customers, how much work would it take to get more?

	So, I?m like this isn?t worth it. I can see the margins on this being great, but the amount of effort. I would probably have to relate to ? I would probably have to go to paid acquisition, which again is something I don?t want to have to do or have to manage.

	So, it?s different for everybody, but I want those easy wins. So, that?s what I look for.

Jaime:	So, you?re making those decisions on the upfront, on the business model side. Things that a more passive and able to be automated and systemized a lot easier without any person getting involved. 

	So, having a service-based business would not really be down this Company of One idea as easily. Correct?

Paul:	Yes and no. I mean there?s definitely some services that ? like when I was doing web design. I could charge a ridiculous premium ? not ridiculous. It was valuable, a valuable premium, and I had to do no marketing or promotion, because word-of-mouth was so strong.

	I could make a great living doing that, because all of the parts that could be easy were easy. I had such crazy ? I'm such an operations guy that I had such crazy processes and systems in place so clients ? all I had to do was the creative problem solving in that service-based business.

	All the rest was automated for me. I had drip campaigns for a service-based business. Who does that?

Jaime:	Okay. So, tell me more about this. Because I work with a lot of service ? and that?s what we ? so, my new program is all about doing that. Because ? 

Paul:	Cool.

Jaime:	Because I don?t think that people that understand that, they have service-based businesses that they can do a lot than they think. Right? Because they are not ?

Paul:	Yeah.

Jaime:	No offense. Like you said, they?re not really operations people. So, they don?t understand what is capable either, but what I thought was interesting what you said was you said but I made a great living.

	And that?s sort of what the point of is of the book. And I'm sure it?s different for everyone, but how do you figure out what that actually is. Especially like ? the reason why I started Eventual Millionaire back in the day was because everybody needs to be a millionaire just to retire, because Social Security might not be around. Right?

Paul:	Hm-mm.

Jaime:	So, if you?re a web designer, and you?re going along okay, and you?re making a great living, but to whatever standards are, and you might have a big house, because you have issues like you know Paul. I love it.

Paul:	Exactly. Because you?re claustrophobic.

Jaime:	Exactly. Lots of people are. My son is. That?s fine. But when you look at what that is, it starts to go ooh. I feel like I'm supposed to be doing more for my future. And I feel like growth is supposed to be a really big deal.

	How do we mitigate the great living now and the, crap, I?m going to need money when I?m old?

Paul:	Yeah. I mean I've always been a squirrel with savings. I?ve always saved a lot of my revenue. And I?ve always kind of earmarked at least half of my revenue for savings, because I?ve always been I guess scared is a good word, I guess neurotic slightly, where I know things are good, and like I've been pretty lucky that I?ve had a really great career, but I?m always like what if things change. What if things change in the future, and I'm always like well I'd rather have a lot of savings where if things go wrong ? like I've always had a buffer, like even a liquid buffer of like if I have a slow month, then I'm covered the next month.

	And I?ve always paid myself a very set salary as well, where even when I doing services, doing products, it doesn?t matter. I?ve always had ? I pay myself the exact same every month, because that helps me budget. And I?ve always made sure that I have much more where I can put into savings and have something for the future.

	Because I love doing what I do, but I also love the idea of not having to do it. And I don?t even ? like I have a general idea of what that is for me, but I still can't imagine myself retiring either. I can imagine myself being like just not going to work, again, because I like work. I really like the work that I do.

	So, I think more it?s just ? for me, it?s just security. It?s like if I have enough money ? I think it was J.L. Collins or maybe some other personal finance person who was like you need to build up the FU fund. So, you can have enough money that if the work isn?t good, if the clients aren?t good, if the customers are good, you can be like FU. I don?t need this money, but I like doing the work, so I?m going to do it, but I still have that security blanket.

	And I think that that?s possible in a few ways if you?re doing services, because I think that; one, you need to compete at the top of market instead of the bottom of market. You?re not going to make a ton of money even if you?re the best person on Upwork or sites like that. There?s just no way. 

	And at the bottom end, you?re competing like nickel and diming, whereas on the top end, a few things need to happen. So, one, you need to be a domain expert in a specific niche. It?s real hard to be top of market and not have a specialization. You don?t have to start with a specialization, but you need to be moving towards that.

	And you also need to compete more on value than on an outcome than on just I charge $100 an hour or $30 an hour or $5,000 an hour. You need to compete more on this is the value of the product or the service that I offer that it brings to your business.

	It?s just easier to do that, and it?s easier to frame that too. Except I told somebody like oh the website that you want from me is going to cost $20,000. If they think of that as an expense, that?s a lot of money to swallow.

	If I frame it more in terms of like it?s going to cost $20,000, but these are the outcomes that we?re going to be aiming to achieve in your business, and by the way, here are a bunch of case studies where I worked with clients in the past. Now their revenues have increased exponentially because of these steps that we took. Here?s some case studies proving the work that I?ve done, proving that I?m not only good at what I do but also that I'm good at figuring out how to solve problems, because it?s hard for a web designer to make a ton of money and be the best ? like I don?t know how to be the best web designer in the world. I know how to be a pretty good web designer who can understand somebody?s business and what is lacking and solve that through design. 

	And so, if I position myself as a business expert who knows how to design, then I'm going to fill my client roster in about 15 minutes ?

Jaime:	Seriously?

Paul:	? charging $20,000 ?

Jaime:	That?s ?

Paul:	? a website.

Jaime:	? rare. Ridiculously rare. I used to do web design a long time ago. It?s so rare. People are like oh it looks pretty. It doesn?t convert at all. Hey, you know, that?s okay. You paid for it. I'm running away now. Right? Yeah.

Paul:	If you talk about business outcomes with them and about how the decisions you make in design will affect their business, that?s more of an investment than an expense for any business.

Jaime:	And the good thing is that if you have a very small team, then you can actually. So, if you?re spending ? if you?re getting $20,000, but you can actually squirrel away 10, that makes a huge difference comparatively if you had a big old agency and you had to get a bazillion 20,000 clients so that way we could just pay the people. 

	We?re just working on paying the people. And then, you become that cycled business owner. I feel like that?s the riskiest part. And I don?t think people understand that is that when you don?t have the savings, then you make decisions from a scared place, and that scared place is the riskiest thing that you can really come from, right?

Paul:	Totally.

Jaime:	And your book is really talking about saving yourself from that gosh darn place.

Paul:	Yeah. It?s tough and it?s really hard to have the confidence to command the top of market when you?re in that scared place. Like it?s easy for me to be confident with that even though I?m not a very competent person, because one, I?ve had probably 5, 600 calls talking about budget with people.

	Like in the beginning, it was scary for me to bring up money for people. Even when I was charging like $500 a website. Fast-forward 10 years, and I'm charging like 10, 20 grand a website. It?s just a conversation, because I?ve had the conversation so many times, but I needed to get through that fear to get to that place. 

	And the other thing, like you were saying, it?s hard to approach sales when it?s do or die. Like it?s hard ? and I was talking about this earlier too. It?s very difficult when the risk could break you, which is why hate taking risks in business where a negative outcome would wreck my business.

	I don?t want anything to ever wreck ? like I?ve been doing this 20 years. I want to do this another 20 years or more, depending. Maybe there?s like some cryo freezing that I could come back as like a brain like in Futurama.

Jaime:	Oh yeah. We?ll talk later. I know all about that. Yeah.

Paul:	So, yeah. I just wanna reduce the amount of big risks and take lots of little risks. I think little risks can move us forward and make us grow as people, but the big risks, if they can potentially break us, is tough. It?s tough to be in that place.

Jaime:	It sounds like you mitigate your risk before you even start the business on where we were at the beginning. So, then you?re like okay. Well, I ain?t doing that. I ain?t going down that rabbit hole. That?s not worth it.

Paul:	Yeah. And I mean that brings up a good point. Like when you?re starting, if you?re starting, and your vision is huge and it requires a ton of capital or time investment to make it, maybe your idea is too big. Right? Like maybe the idea that you have could be scaled back and be started ? and I mean that?s the beauty of starting one with services and starting with a smaller idea, is you can get to market faster. You can start testing faster. You don?t have to have a buffer of six months in your bank account to live off of before you can launch this big idea.

	You can ? like a friend of mine, Alex Franzen started working for herself by emailing people the day after she left her job saying hey I'm a writer. Do you need writing are does anybody else need writing? She just emailed 60 people she knew, and she could start that day.

	And then, she ? her waiting list I think is a year long. It?s just ridiculous how long her waiting list is now. But she started with something that could just be started like instantly instead of building a flagship course or some crazy software solution, it?s just like what can I do tomorrow to make money from one person?

	Then you can build on that. But make some money. Make some money fast. It?s good. It also feels really good to make money quickly. [Inaudible ? talking over] [00:28:23]. 

Jaime:	But also, I think that ? that most of ? that?s the antithesis of what a lot of things happen as far as when you?re first in business, you?re like oh now I have to make my website, and then I have a plugin, and then I have to do ? I?m going to change all these things. Eventually, I will ask for a sale. One time. In probably three months, because I?m scared to let go [inaudible] [00:28:38], right? 

	So, you start ? I remember what that was like. I avoided all the stuff that was really tough, but in reality, you can make money in a day. You can make a lot of money in a day if you?re willing to go outside your comfort zone. But again, that?s still a small risk like you were saying. It is not a huge one, and we?re not putting up your house up for sale because of that stuff. And that?s where it starts to get really, really scary. So, that?s the point. Okay. I love that.

	I know I have to start wrapping up in just a second. So, I want to ask you, before I ask the last question, I know it?s called Company of One. When we actually talk about Company of One, what do you recommend as far as how ? and we were talking about the roles before, what roles do you actually have, and how many people do you have around you?

	Because you make really good money, and I want to know how you actually structure it.

Paul:	Yeah. So, it?s ? I like ? the type of work that I like to do is by myself here in my office. So, most of the work that I do is still design, except I don?t design for clients anymore, I design for the products that I do in writing.

	So, I?ve kind of built my business around the things that I like to do and the things that I know are going to make me money. If writing a design did make me money, I wouldn?t do those things. Like I did ? it pisses off a bunch of writers where like ? I didn?t grow up wanting to be a writer. I didn?t want to be a published author. It?s just this is an avenue that I one, like doing, two, it resonates with people, and three, makes decent money. So, it?s like I?m a writer now.

	So, I would rather do things that are going to provide value to people but also pay the bills. So, for me, it?s like I want to find the things that I?m not good at, that I know I?m not good at that I don?t want to get better at.

	Like I got a bit better at writing, because I really liked writing and writing was something that I could do, but I don?t want to get better at lawyering or accounting-ing.

Jaime:	Accounting-ing.

Paul:	Because I don?t want to like ? accounting-ing. I don?t want to do those things. So, I would rather push off all of the things that I don?t like to do two other people. So, I have a lawyer, an accountant, a copy editor, an editor, an agent, a podcast editor, and then I have a couple partners on a few of my software products.

	And that?s about it. It?s a small team. Some of them I talk to almost every day. Some of them it?ll be a month before I talk to them, because we don?t have anything needing, but I like to structure my business in a way where I don?t need anybody all the time. 

	So, I'm just going to pay those people for the time that I need from them. And then, if I don?t need them, they have other clients. They?re happy to work with other clients. They wouldn?t want to work for me full-time, just like I don?t want to hire them full-time.

	I like these people who are so good at what they do, they would rather just do it for a bunch of clients freelance, and then I can just hire them as freelancers. I don?t have to do any HR stuff. I don?t even know how that works. I?m not interested in that..

Jaime:	Or managing all of the people. We don?t want to manage the people. No. It makes a lot of sense because of the way that you structured everything with the business model that you have is that it doesn?t take a lot of effort to maintain, like you are saying, therefore we just have the core basics of what you need for a business around the outside, which you?ve got, and then you can sort of be flexible and play with whatever you want with new business ideas.

	Everyone?s jealous now. They?re really annoyed. They?re like thanks. That?s easy for you Paul, but I already built a really big agency. Now, I?m screwed. No. 

	But get your book, and that way I'm sure there?s decision-making processes too, because sometimes you might find yourself in a way going crap, I really don?t like this. Now, what do I do? Right?

Paul:	Yeah. And there?s a lot of stuff in the book for people who work in bigger companies or have bigger teams where it?s more ? like the Company of One is more of a mindset than a blueprint. So, it?s more just how you can restructure the way you think about growth and scale to be more beneficial to your business.

	Because I don?t want ? I'm not anti-capitalist or anti-money. I love money. I just think that we could make smarter decisions about making it.

Jaime:	I totally agree. It?s more about what we actually care ? enjoy every day, because if you?re miserable, the money and with it, and that?s the whole reason why started this podcast, right?

	I'm going to as the last question that I always ask. So, what?s one action listeners can take this week to help move them forward towards their goal of a million?

Paul:	Yeah. I think the biggest thing to do, and this is such a me answer, is to have some introspection around what enough is for your business. How will you know when you get there? And what should change in your business once you do?

Jaime:	Ahh. Everyone?s like man, I have to look inside myself? How do I ? I bet your book will help facilitate that though too, right? Because there?s a lot ? it?s hard to sit in your own stuff and be like okay let me think.

Paul:	It is.

Jaime:	Right?

Paul:	There was a study done at a university where people ? they didn?t tell them that this was the experiment, but the experiment was seeing how long they could sit without any devices or anything without ? and there was a buzzer that was connected to electric shocks on them. 

	And people ? so, more men than women, I will say this, this is very interesting. More men than women wanted to shock themselves instead of sitting alone with their thoughts. So, they would rather have a tiny bit ? and it wasn?t like a ton of pain, but it was still like ? they were just sitting there ? because they just wanted something to do.

	They were so scared to be alone with their thoughts that they would rather shock themselves than sit there with the thoughts, which is telling I think, but also I think it?s important. 

	And important work is tough to do. And I mean you mention this as well. The important things we need to be working on, we sometimes push aside to just get like the easy stuff done, because it?s easier. We all want to just have easy stuff, but I think it?s important to sometimes focus on the hard things. Yeah.

Jaime:	Take him up on his challenge. If you?re listening right now, don?t shock yourself; sit alone for a little while and actually do some introspection.

	Where can we find the book online and more about you?

Paul:	The book is available pretty much every major retailer online and bookstores, called:

	Company of One. Why staying small is the next big thing for business.

	And the website is OfOne.co for the book. 

Jaime:	Everyone, go check that out. Next year?s going to be an amazing year, but it depends on what you want to make of the year instead, right?

	Thank you so much for coming on the show today, Paul. I appreciate it.

Paul:	Thank you very much for having me.

Tags: Business Owner, business roles, Company of one, entrepreneur podcast, eventual millionaire, how to find your strengths, jaime masters, millionaire entrepreneurs, next big thing, Paul Jarvis, podcast, start-ups / startups, startup entrepreneur, top entrepreneurs

Categories: All, Business, Entrepreneurship, Featured Millionaire Interview, Millionaire Interviews, Mindset, Strengths

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