THE CUTTING ROOM FLOOR

When you write a book, you try to be as succinct as possible. A lot of the writing gets trimmed away during the lengthy editing processes that any manuscript goes through on its way to the printer. The editor may nix something because it’s too controversial, not relevant to the topic at hand, not politically correct enough, or there just wasn’t room for it in the final pass. As a result, a cache of all the edited material tends to pile up on the side, in its own separate document. We nicknamed this document the “cutting room floor,” and when the manuscript was finished, we realized that some of the best stories were in there.

They hadn’t made the cut. We decided to release this “cutting room floor,” the extra material, to fans and readers of Rock Bottom to Rock Star. What you’ll read here isn’t in the book.

If you want more of these kinds of stories, I’ve included them in the bonus content through my newsletter. You can sign up for the newsletter on my site: ryanblair.com or rockbottomtorockstar.com.

AT WAR: BONUS CHAPTER

You’ve heard me mention Todd Goergen several times in my writing in Nothing to

Lose and in Rock Bottom to Rock Star. Not only is Todd a friend of mine, but he’s also a great business strategist, from a long line of world class entrepreneurs. When I think of a battle tested entrepreneur, and someone who has modeled a winning strategy during a time of

“war,” I think of Todd. I was introduced to Todd by one of my first venture capitalist mentors, Fred Warren.

By 2009, Todd and I were on the board of a company together, and had grown very close.

That February, we decided to take a ski trip to Park City, Utah with some of the investors of the company and spend some time with management. The night we arrived we’d gone out to dinner, and in classic “Todd and I” fashion, we’d had too much to drink. I don’t know if it was the altitude or what, but the next day we both woke up with the worst hang over ever.

The worst. Determined to make the best of it, Todd and I decided to go skiing, and we started out for the slopes. Suddenly, Todd looked down at his phone and said, “Oh my god.”

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

Todd gave me a sobering look, and said, “I’ve got to take this call.” He stepped away.

From where I was standing I could overhear him exclaiming over and over, “What?

You’re kidding me. What?” and then, “He murdered her? In the office?”

Todd had invested in a company called Bridges, a television network out of Buffalo

New York that had been created with a mission to “bridge” Middle-Eastern culture with

Western culture, in the aftermath of 9-11. The morning of February 12th, 2009, Bridges’

CEO, Muzzammil Hassan, had gone into the company’s headquarters and decapitated his estranged wife in the office. Muzzammil then went to the police station and reported her death.

His wife, Aasiya Hassan, who was also the company’s COO, had filed for divorce less than a week before. Hassan had lured her to the office by asking her to drop off some clothes he had left behind at their home after moving out. He assured her he wouldn’t be in the office.

Todd stood there looking at me blankly. I asked, “What can I do to help?” “I don’t know,” he said. Not a second later, both our Blackberry’s went off— notification after notification. It was already a national news story. It was everywhere.

Obviously, this is a horrific tragedy. You cannot imagine something like this happening. It’s something out of a Shakespearian tragedy; gruesome and appalling. Your

CEO is heading to prison for life. Your COO is murdered. An honor killing (something not so acceptable in our culture) has been performed on the grounds of a company whose sole mission was to educate and foster peace between cultures. How do you handle this?

Aside from the sheer human tragedy of the situation, you also have an office full of employees who are traumatized, depressed, and worried there will be no job to go back to.

Todd had to go to war. He took immediate action, creating a plan with the company’s board on all fronts – with the media, employees, customers, vendors, and shareholders. The last proved to be particularly tricky since Bridges had over 150 individual shareholders. The board called a shareholder meeting (including a security detail to protect against potential unrest—they were not going to take any chances), where

Todd stood in front of everyone and said what needed to be said: “We cannot talk about why this happened. We won’t ever understand. We have to find a way to move forward.”

In business I cannot think of a more rock bottom moment; this is as bad as it gets.

But Todd didn’t spend any time thinking about how it happened or why it happened. There would be time for that later. He didn’t waste valuable energy fighting with the wrong mindset; he rallied from the depths, maintained a cohesive board, and did what was necessary to salvage the company. In the end, with the invaluable help of Hunaid Baliwala from Bridges and Teddy Stofer from Ropart, Todd and the board were able to stabilize the business and execute a successful sale of the company within two years. I have a tremendous amount of respect for him for that. In my opinion, Todd is a business war hero.

REALITY BRIDGE

As the old saying goes, perception creates reality. Therefore, everyone has different realities, based on their perceptions. In its extreme form, the inability to see or understand another’s view creates actual wars, as in the situation you just read about. Communication can be difficult to navigate for anyone; individuals trying to find resolution; businesses or business partners; companies; competitors; countries; races. So, anytime I negotiate, I’ve learned to use a technique called a reality bridge, a concept that originated from Tony

Robbins, to create a situation where both parties are on the same page.

Let me give you an example of what normally happens when people try to communicate from different realities. I was sitting in a public relations meeting one time, listening to a PR firm pitching me on a $25k per month spend for ViSalus, and I said, “What would Apple do?”

Her response was, “You’re not Apple.” (Said in a cynical way.)

I stood up and said, “That wasn’t my question,” and left the room.

After I cooled down I told the Vice President in charge of public relations to fire every one of them. It wasn’t about the fact that she argued with me, it was the fact that I wanted to work with people who were going to say, “Here’s what Apple would do,” or

“Here’s how we get you to have a brand more like Apple,” and I didn’t want to hear someone who was going to tell me I’m not Apple—I know I’m not Apple. I pay people to tell me what I don’t know, not what I do know. If this PR rep had known the story of Apple, like I do, she would know that once upon a time they were the laughingstock of the technology industry. They called Steve Jobs a has-been. They mocked them for even showing up at tech conferences. That’s how bad his reputation once was, compared with today, where both Steve Jobs and his brand are immortalized. Apple is the best in the world at PR. So, when somebody tells me we’re not

Apple, I know that we’re not and we may never be, but I’m going to set myself to the highest standard I possibly can. And Apple is that standard.

Now, obviously you shouldn’t lose your cool and yell at everyone like I did—I regret not exercising restraint—but this is a great example of how two people with very different belief systems failed to connect. Her belief is that we aren’t Apple. My belief system is that we’re not Apple…yet. If she had wanted to match my belief system, and keep me as a client, she should have said, “Well, we’re not Apple yet, so let’s take this step,” as opposed to

“You’re not Apple.”

This technique is a reality bridge.

This is how it works. I recently attended a board meeting with a company I’d just invested $500,000 dollars into a week ago, and a week later they’re broke. Obviously, I wouldn’t have put money in, if I had known they would run out of money in a week. They were incredibly worried about my what reaction would be. And I could have raised a lot of concerns. I could have said, “You should have disclosed this.” But, as we all know, attacking someone’s defense, only makes them fortify their defense. Instead, I had to build a reality bridge.

I said to them, “Look, I may be imagining things, but I thought I heard you say that you had several months’ cash in the bank. Turns out you don’t.” Now, instead of the discussion devolving into a he-said-she-said stalemate, I’ve let them off the hook by using the words, “imagining things.” I’ve made it clear in a non- confrontational way that I see what’s happened as a problem, and now that they know my expectations—let’s talk about a solution.

It’s easier said than done, but you can apply a reality bridge to business negotiations, to a discussion with your spouse, to a meeting with your child’s teacher— anything. The best negotiators are those that are able to elegantly bridge realities without creating conflict.

So, whenever you hear someone blaming, minimizing, or denying—don’t fight. Your job is to build a reality bridge. Whenever someone thinks they are being criticized, or disrespected, or that you don’t appreciate what they’ve done—build a bridge. And keep building that bridge until you’re both standing on it.

THE WAR OF ATTENTION

Right now, we are at war. Just pick up a newspaper— technology, religion, terrorism, corporate, environmental, political, racial—so many wars. The volume and speed at which information (and misinformation) reaches us these days is unprecedented.

The media wants to sell news, not necessarily report the facts, politicians want our votes, advertisers want to keep us consuming at all costs, and god only knows what the government is doing to us. I am not much of a conspiracy theorist, but the truth is that there are some major players invested in controlling the flow of information being distributed to us. Because of this, being successful in business is harder than ever right now. You’re literally at war for your consumer’s attention. Imagine, you’re reading this book right now, and somebody out there is spending thousands if not millions of dollars to target you, and get you to stop reading my book, and start reading theirs. Some of the world’s smartest minds have been hired by Google,

Microsoft, Facebook, and others, all working toward one goal— to distract your customers and employees from you, to them. Every time a banner ad pops up somewhere during your online experience, another marketer from my competition is trying to sway you away from my brand to theirs.

The shame of it is that these companies don’t really care about your goals, or who you are, they only want you consuming their goods. And this might not be the healthiest thing for you to do. And likewise, if you can’t reach your customers, or retain your employees, this might not be the healthiest thing for your business.

So, how do you win this war, let alone compete? You’ve got to learn to filter out the unscrupulous agendas and misinformation, and become a master at steering the conversation in your direction. You have to hijack the story.

HIJACK THE STORY

Years ago, I was invited to the Los Angeles Athletic Club by my former publicist to meet an individual I’d only known from his radio personality. He was a shock jock, one of the most popular at that time, right up there with Howard Stern. I wasn’t a huge fan of his show—it was misogynistic at worst, and at best it was low-level locker room banter. His name was Tom Leykis.

I showed up to dinner more than a little hesitant. When I shook hands with the man,

I was shocked to find that Tom was a calculated and intelligent individual that didn’t resemble his on-air persona whatsoever. He was a smart businessman who had found a great niche for his content, and had monetized it to the tune of millions of dollars. So, after

I’d gotten over my initial barrier of thinking, do I even want to be associated with this guy? I started asking questions. During our dinner conversation, Tom told me that he’d made his entire career out of hijacking the media.

His motto was “hijack the story.”

For example, during the Kobe Bryant scandal, Tom Leykis, motivated by a sense of justice, found out the identity of the victim and released it to the media. It was such a bold move, and outraged so many people, that the media started bringing up Tom Leykis’s name in conjunction with Kobe Bryant’s. The national news headline went from “Kobe Bryant

Accused of Rape” to “Tom Leykis Releases Name of Kobe Bryant Alleged Rape Victim.”

Eventually the alleged victim did indeed retract her statements and admitted to lying about the assault. As a result, Tom’s work turned out to be important for Kobe being exonerated for rape, but obviously not for adultery. I can’t imagine Kobe having a bigger rock bottom moment than this one. Kobe finished his career scoring 60 points, and making the final shot in his last game. He did go from rock bottom to rock star.

Tom went on to tell me another instance where he had done a similar thing to Cat

Stevens, who had defected from the US and openly condemned other artists and authors for coming in conflict with his deeply held religious beliefs. Leykis held a rally for fans and journalists, donned a hard hat and a bullet proof vest, and ran over several hundreds of Cat

Steven’s records with a concrete steam roller in protest. The story was now about Tom

Leykis. He hijacked the story.

After our meeting, I started asking myself, how do I hijack the story? It became very clear to me that any time there was a story circulating about me, or a rumor being spread (negative or positive), it was an opportunity for me to voice myself, and turn the conversation to my interest.

For instance, recently, I was asked to come onto Fox Business to talk about Pope

Francis, who had just visited the United States for the first time. Now, did I really want to talk about the Pope? No. I mean, I’m a big fan of the Pope, but what I really want to talk about is my company, ViSalus, and my interests. So, I got on Fox Business and hijacked the story. Pope Francis had made a comment in the media about capitalism—ViSalus is capitalism, and therefore is connected to the Pope. I started out talking about His

Eminence, and ended up talking about my viewpoints on capitalism, and how I believed that capitalism is good, and I cited the amount of taxes ($90M) that ViSalus has paid

Another example is when I attained a certain level of notoriety as an author and entrepreneur, my PR strategy was to simply tell my story. Now of course I’ve told my story thousands of times and I’m tired of being a “former gang member.” But the fact that I was a gang member will always be with me, and I’ll never be able to hide it. I will always be a beacon out there for people who have made poor choices in their past. So, now if someone approaches me and starts a conversation with, “What was it like to be in a gang?” I hijack the conversation. I’ll say, “It was a really difficult upbringing, and that’s why I’m so passionate about the charity that I’m here to talk about today.” Or if someone asks me,

“How did you overcome your past?” I’ll say, “Well, I learned about entrepreneurship, and that’s why I’m here to tell you about what we do at ViSalus.”

Now, my business success, my literary success, and my philanthropic work overshadow my past, but I don’t let others limit me, or define my story, and neither should you. And if you don’t like the current story, I suggest you find a new analogy. WHAT’S YOUR ANALOGY?

So often I hear people complain that their chosen profession just isn’t one where they can make a lot of money. Bullshit.

Let’s say you’re a middle-class person with an average middle-class corporate job.

You go to work every day and think to yourself they don’t want to do what you’re doing all your life. You don’t want to start your own business, and you don’t necessarily want to teach others how to do your job either. Ok, so how do you take what you know and double or triple their earnings? The question you have to ask yourself is: What is my analogy?

What skills do I have right now that I could find analogies for in other industries or other companies?

For instance, if you don’t want to start your own company, you could take your knowledge and work as a consultant. Some analogies allow you to skip laterally, so that you can eventually make a big vertical jump. I‘ll give you an example. I let Kasie, my son’s mother, plan a scotch tasting party at the house and it ended up being a great event. It also gave the guy running the the tasting parties a chance to create an analogy for his business.

Let’s call him Scott for this story. Scott told me he used to work for a scotch company and he would have to go to trade shows and teach people about the different types of scotches. Or they’d sometimes send him to a local grocery store like Albertsons or

Costco and have him educate people on scotch and give out tastings in hopes that they would buy a bottle. He made what I’m assuming was an average middle-class living, working hard to make someone else money.

Scott thought to himself, why don’t I create a scotch tasting menu and party concept? This way he made an analogy of his current job description and found a corresponding career in which he could be an entrepreneur, and not put a cap on his earnings. Turns out he had a winning idea. I invited all my boys over for the scotch tasting, and we ended up buying $5,000 worth of liquor. As an entrepreneur, not only did Scott have the time of his life teaching us in a much more fun environment than Costco or a trade show, but he was also making a lot more money. He probably made about $50,000 a year doing trade shows for a scotch company, and now he’s likely making $200,000 a year or more teaching people the nuances of fine scotches in their homes. He’s doing the exact same thing, but because he thought about doing it a little bit differently, he now has a lucrative business on his hands.

It works for every profession. Let’s say you are a creative type who is a master in your discipline, but you find yourself just scraping by in between big projects or commissions. Let’s say you are a writer, for example, who gets paid to write articles for magazines or websites, or you write books or poetry, or whatever. If you took your skills and marketed yourself properly, you could find 100 people willing to pay $250 a day for a weekend seminar on how to get started on your first book. Over a weekend that’s $50,000, which may just double your annual income. Tim Ferriss, the author of The 4-Hour

Workweek, uses this analogy brilliantly. He hosts seminars and charges significant amounts of money teaching others how to write books, instead of just cranking out books and selling them.

Never stop looking for new analogies for what you do.

There’s an old lecture from Russell Conwell called “Acres of Diamonds” about an

African farmer who heard about diamonds on the other side of Africa, so he sold his farm in search of these diamonds. As it turned out, the farm he sold was literally on the largest diamond mine in the world. He didn't know how to spot opportunity when it was right in front of his face. Don’t ask yourself where there are greener pastures when you are already sitting on a diamond mine. Like the scotch guy who was likely sitting stagnant in a job that sucked, redefine what you do with a new analogy, and you might realize that you’ve been sitting on acres of diamonds all along.