Neuro-Business Wellness: Navigating Growth & Clarity - Season 5, Episode 10

Join us as we discuss into the intersection of neurological and business health and wellness, exploring strategies for navigating both realms.  Today, we explore the journey of mental reintegration following a recent spiritual retreat, delving into practical steps to re-engage with the world and foster personal and business growth. 

A heartfelt thank you to our Patreon supporters Wayne, Sean, Kyriaki, Rachel, and Brian, whose unwavering encouragement fuels our podcast and the different ventures that are taking place here on the homestead at York Meadow Farm. 

Discover the entrepreneurial operating system that I learned about yesterday and anticipate using to shape the vision and mission of our Natural Ferments business, rooted in our core values.  Establishing these foundational elements will serve as a compass for future decisions, propelling the growth and prosperity of not only this business, but eventually the York Meadow Farm co-op that is in its infancy. 

Uncover insights into the EOS Model, unveiling the Six Key Components crucial for organizational success, along with practical tools to fortify each aspect of it.  In today's discussion, we'll demystify strategic planning with a straightforward approach, streamlining the process for clarity and effectiveness in our lives.   

Tune in for invaluable tools featuring guiding questions to simplify strategic planning, distill your vision into actionable steps, and translate ideas from mind to paper. Whether grappling with epilepsy or other life challenges, embracing streamlined processes in both personal and professional spheres sets the stage for future success. 

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Discussion Links:


Electroencephalogram (EEG)

Harvesting Change: The Evolving Story of York Meadow Farm - Season 5, Episode 4

Balancing the Books: Unveiling Natural Ferments' Financial Journey and Deliberate Living Systems' Decade of Mistakes - Thanks to the Patreon Subscribers!

Ep. 516 - Charting Growth: Reflecting on The Introduction of The All Around Growth Podcast

Ep. 507 - From Trials to Triumph: Rebranding, Regeneration, and Goal Setting for Personal and Business Growth

QuickBooks vs. Quicken: What's the Difference?

EOS - Entrepreneurial Operating System for Businesses

The EOS Model

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:00

If we stand together, we'll never fall.

unknown 0:08

We can make a deal.

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Hello there. Good morning, good afternoon, or good evening, whatever the case may be, wherever you are. Welcome back to another episode of the All Around Growth Podcast. My name is Rob Kaiser and I am your host. Today is Tuesday, March 12th, 2024, and this is season five, episode 10 of a show where the only constant in life is change. In last week's show, we had a show titled Patreon Perspectives Unveiling Growth. And that was a show where we talked about a number of topics that were suggested by our dedicated Patreon audience. And real quick side note, we do have a Patreon crew, and I would like to give a big shout out to all of those who are Patreon supporters. And that's Wayne, Sean, Kiriki, Rachel, Brian. You guys are the ones who help drive this show, keep me inspired, and contribute to a lot of the content, specifically the content in last week's show, where we talked about dynamics of life on the homestead, exploring the stress of change, and some of the newfound confidence driving us forward. Now, as we unpacked and talked about some of the uncertainties lying ahead and confronting some of the fears that I have moving forward in life, you know, it it was kind of a great episode because the reality is that episode that was released last week on March 5th was actually recorded the week prior. What I did last week for the show was I did a special episode on Wednesday titled Journey to Transformations, which was my reflections on the Ancient Faith singles retreat, which I attended not last weekend, but the weekend prior, Thursday, February 29th through Sunday, March 3rd. Last week I spent the entire week, for lack of a better term, reintegrating into the world and trying to wrap my head around what is happening in this world in my life based on, like I said, those reflections from that retreat. If you're interested in what happened during that retreat, then by all means check out last week's bonus episode titled Journey to Transformation: Reflections on the Ancient Faith Singles Retreat. I'll link to that in the show notes. But today, in an effort to continue this re this mental reintegration process, um, I'm I'm just simply going to share a little bit with you about my life and what's going on recently. And the reality is it involves a lot of acronyms: EEG, EOS, you know, VTR, and you know, a number of different things. So let's get into that and I will share with you what I'm talking about and what I mean. So yeah, the long and short of it is yesterday I had to return to the Cleveland Clinic and have an EEG performed, an electroencephalogram. And for those of you who aren't aware, um an EEG or an electroencephalogram, easy for me to say, measures your brain's activity. Brain activity can help your health care provider diagnose and monitor brain-related conditions like epilepsy. Your health care provider may order an EEG if you have symptoms such as seizures or confusion, which I do. Uh yes, I have seizures and I most certainly have confusion, especially as of late. If you are listening to the show, you will understand why, which is why I introduced the show as one where the only constant in life is change. We've done over 500 episodes at this point, and the show has undergone a tremendous amount of change. Um we have done some some shows where you know we we we we talked about that, and I will you know link to some of those shows in the show notes where we talk about the history of the show and and some of the change that's taken place. Uh I'm not going to get into that right now, but check out the show notes for some links to what I'm going to talk about today. But in short, I made the proper preparations for the EEG. And um again, what what this is is it it measures and records your brain's electrical signals. And so what happens during this process is a technician places small metal discs, little electrodes all over your scalp, approximately 25 of them or so. And these electrodes attach to a machine that gives your healthcare provider information about your brain's activity. Brain activity can help the provider diagnose and monitor conditions that affect your brain. So these tests are used to check the brain status of not only people with epilepsy but different neurological conditions like Alzheimer's, uh, dementia, brain injury, um you know, all types of neurological things. Now, this was um there are different types of EEG tests. Uh you know, there's routine EEGs, uh prolonged EEGs, and ambulatory ones, video ones, sleep EEGs. I had what was called a prolonged EEG test. It took about an hour and 15 minutes, and this is a type of test that also uses video. So during the test, um, I am also being recorded so that the my neurologist will be able to see what I was actually doing physically while monitoring the scans. And um it's we'll we'll see what happens, but as far as I can tell, the the the tests showed nothing new or abnormal based on the results that I saw posted yesterday. Uh I did not experience any seizures during the test, thanks be to God. And if anything, the activity that resulted from the test simply validated and confirmed information that I already know. A that I have epilepsy, b that it the the the the cause, the location of the part of my brain that contributes to the epilepsy that I have is located specific to my frontal uh my my frontal lobe, my my um the frontal c lobe of my cortex. I I'm I'm I'm drawing a blank on the specific name, but I I actually have some brain damage. There there is a part of my front temporal lobe that is is dead. It's it's effectively calcified, and what we do not know at this point in time is whether the brain damage that I have sustained is a result of decades of experiencing periodic seizures, or if the calcified part of my brain in the front temporal lobe is a result of being in a coma for a few days, approximately ten years ago. That's when it was first discovered, and it has not changed. Once part of your brain dies or or is calcified, there is no regeneration of that part of your brain. It it is gone. So that that is that is that's that's part of my story. That's why I had an EEG. And for people who know me and and are actively involved in my life, when it seems like I have trouble remembering things or processing information in certain ways, it is because of that. Uh, there's part of my brain that's literally dead. Now, these tests are somewhat challenging. I have to, or it is suggested in order to get optimal results that you go into the test with approximately three hours less sleep than one would normally get. So I stayed up very late Sunday night to go into this test and refraining from drinking any coffee or any caffeine the morning of the test, so that I can go in and during this test be able to experience and enter into different kinds of sleep so they can obtain results while I'm awake, while they are doing certain tests with light sound and then sleep monitoring when I go into sleep, the different phases of sleep, and ultimately monitoring when I come out of sleep, right? So um after this test is when I had a discussion with somebody where we talked about EOS and a number of other acronyms like VTO and things that I wasn't aware of, but I am learning about. And this is interesting because I am at a point with the growth and development of my business where I am experiencing certain challenges, and the growth and development of the business is a result of changes to the family business that occurred when my father passed away last year. Because previously, the way that I had interacted with the family business was simply as a contractor, a 1099 employee for the family business. Family business paid my business, of whom I am the sole employee of, and I paid myself. So, regardless of the sales or the outcome or whatever was taking place in the business, I received a steady and modest paycheck last year, which made things relatively easy for me to manage. All I needed to do was ensure that we were able to keep up with sales and production of the products that we made and sold. And if there was a slow time or a slow season, it you know, yes, we were driving toward um new new ventures, new accounts, and things like that. And and basically I was trying to reestablish previous retail accounts that we had while trying to grow things more. Toward the end of the year, this is 2022. I began to operate in a capacity that was a little bit different, trying to be a good manager of the business, determining costs of manuf, determining manufacturing costs, and making some adjustments to the prices of the products that we sold. And I tried to engage my father with the information that I had gathered and the reports that I had put together, but he wasn't really interested in discussing these at great lengths because, unbeknownst to us, by the end of 2023, he had already been experiencing the onset of cancer, which was to be officially diagnosed in March of 2023. Towards the end of 2022, rather, he had already begun experiencing symptoms of the cancer that was to be diagnosed in March of 2023, only to pass away less than 60 days after that initial diagnosis. So for the remainder of last year, 2023, it was simply a matter of getting reestablished at market, keeping up with the demand for products, trying to meet the demand of new retail locations, retail locations that had reached out to us based on feedback from the community and searching for new vendors of fermented foods. And all during this time, we also began the process, or you know, formally began the process of rebranding, which was a discussion that had been taking place since mid-2022 when I first started working with Dad, and we saw the need to grow and diversify uh the product lines that York Meadow Farm was selling. And this was also this also included some restructuring that was to take place after the fact. Uh, but we began the process of rebranding the fermented foods to Natural Ferments, which is the name that we had agreed upon previously, with the official business restructuring taking place towards the end of last year and the beginning of this year, winter of 2023-2024. So, like I said, previously my role with the family business was strictly limited to sales and operation or production and sales and certain aspects of the operations of the farm, um, like the lease with the tenant farmer and things like that, or at least the preparation of it, finalization of it, the signing of it, you know, payments received, things like that were handled by dad. But at this point in time, I am wholly responsible for the natural ferments business, not only from a production and sales standpoint, but in administrative capacity, uh, marketing, which is something that I had previously done as well, and just the overall management of the business in its entirety while assisting with York Meadow Farm in certain aspects of that business, right? So one of the biggest struggles as of late, and we've talked about this in past episodes, uh, specifically um, you know, an episode in October, October 21st of 2023, Wealth Beyond Finance, unpacking the emotional terrain of money, um talking about you know financial fortitude and um you know navigating business bonds and personal triumphs back in January. Uh lots of discussion about you know money, bookkeeping, you know, things like that. All episodes that I will link to in the show notes and the big Yeah, episodes that I'll link to in the show notes. I'll just leave it at that. But there were one one of the systems that's critical to business operations is the accounting system, and that is something that I do not have a very good handle on right now. Like I said, in the past it was easier. I was a contractor, I had um one customer, basically, and that customer was York Meadow Farm. Now I have you know uh four different customers, and and I guess it depends on how many private sales I'm making outside of market or retail. So that could be it's it's more like you know, dozens of customers at this point, um you know, half a dozen suppliers, um so on and so forth. And and so we had a discussion. I was introduced to a friend of a friend who is very well off and is a successful businessman. He helped his own family build a business from that that began in the garage, like so many successful businesses do, that went from a garage to a 1,500 square foot warehouse to four different locations throughout the Cleveland metropolitan area, ultimately ending up being housed in a 2,000 square foot facility in the Medina County area to be built and developed alongside his brother, which was eventually sold a couple of years ago, and from a garage, this man and his family turned this business into an $80 million business. And I was introduced to him by a friend of mine because we were talking about business and challenges and what I'm experiencing and what I'm trying to do, and you know what my goals and objectives are. And he said, I know a guy, and I'm going to reach out to him and see if he's willing to talk with you. And not only was he willing to speak with me, but we met personally, and despite the fact that I didn't really want to meet with him after the EEG yesterday, it was convenient for him. He's a busy man, he's got a lot going on in his life, and that's what worked. So I decided to meet with him, and that is where he introduced me to concepts like EOS, which is the entrepreneurial operating system. And it was that system that would allow me to prepare a strategic plan for the business, and utilizing those principles outlined in this entrepreneurial operating system, it would also allow me to identify the vision or the mission of the business, identify the values that I have. For example, one of the values being giving back to Institutions and entities that helped support me and everything that contributed to where I am today as a human, as a business owner, and as an entrepreneur, which previously sounded a little bit strange for me to say because I always viewed other people as being entrepreneurs. I always viewed other people as the ones that were actually engaging in the hustle and the grind. But the reality is I have become that person, and right now what I need to do is focus in on and hone my operations so that I can grow more efficiently. So not only is he going to work with me in the development of this operating system for entrepreneurs, he's going to help me and provide me with some tools to identify what my vision and mission is, what my values are, so that moving forward when it comes to making big decisions, I can refer to those values and that vision and mission so that I am making sound business decisions that are in line with and appropriate for the company. He also suggested that I work with a close friend of his, a CPA, that will get me set up with an accounting system to make sure that as I begin moving forward, it not only is set up appropriately for the current business structure that I have, which is effectively manufacturing, and ensure that I'm set up for growth and development of that business based on whatever goals that I have, manufacturing and sales. So I look forward to the conversation with him, and after recording this, I will be reaching out to him and we will be discussing what steps need to be taken in order to get that established. The long and short of it is I will probably be moving away from using Quicken home and business to operate the accounting and bookkeeping of the business. I will probably continue using Quicken for personal reasons, but I will likely use QuickBooks for the business just because of its ease of use, reporting, invoicing, and things of that nature. It seems to be the most appropriate choice. My reluctance to use it in the past was because of its cost, but I suppose this is the cost of doing business, and the more time I spend procrastinating on making a decision, the more time I waste, and the more time I'll spend playing catch up down the road. So spending time on this now, getting established with all of this now is going to be critical in moving forward and making sure that I can actually grow this business and grow this appropriately. This entrepreneurial operating system, but in short, the the the model of the entrepreneurial operating system, this EOS, consists of six key components and the tools and disciplines that help us as business owners strengthen each component. So the the six key components of any organization or business is the vision, the which is you know outlined and and helped it comes to fruition by eight questions, and the vision is shared by everyone within the organization. We've got the data of the business, the measurables, the scorecard, we've got the process, making sure that everything is documented and followed by everyone in the organization. We've got traction, things that are, you know, rocks in the in the meeting pulse. And I'm not there yet because I'm the only person, but nevertheless, I need to prepare for that. And based on the conversation with this man and how he implemented it with his own business and experience the growth and development that he did, I believe that this is a solid foundation upon which to build. In addition to the vision, data process traction, we look at the issues, the issues that are you know keeping us from getting to where we want and need to be, and ultimately the people, ensuring that we have the right people, filling the right positions within the company, and all of those things, the vision, data, process, traction, issues, and people, that is what makes up the business. So other tools are going to be the vision and traction organizer, helping us identify the core values, the focus, the long-term targets of the business marketing strategies, three-year pictures, one-year pictures, you know, and breaking this down into simple, measurable uh items that can be addressed easily. If because this is a simple, these are simple, simple tools, simple techniques. So maybe easy isn't the right word, but if I've got a simple framework there that I can use and I can do the work, it may not be easy, but it's simple. But having this foundation and framework in mind is going to make it easier. So, guys, that is what is on the agenda for today and the near future. I look forward to sharing more of this with you because yesterday, well, it contained some challenges with regard to medical issues that I deal with, like epilepsy. Um, you know, being connected with people in the community who have a proven track record of success, growing, developing, and selling businesses that want to work with me and help me grow is something I am eternally and will be eternally grateful for. And I look forward to the day in the future when I am the one who is working with someone else to grow their own operation, establish their own vision and mission, and what their values are. Because if something is being so freely given to me and shared with me, it is only right that I put myself in a position to share that moving forward. And maybe this podcast, this way, is just one way that I can do so. So, guys, I hope that you enjoyed today's show. I look forward to catching you next week. And for all of you Patreon subscribers, I am hopeful that I will have something special for you this week. So stay tuned for that. This is Rob Kaiser. Thank you, and God bless.

SPEAKER_01 29:58

What can I do? The needs are many answers.