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There’s a story behind every great business. We started the podcast, Stories with Soul, to dive into the wins, lessons, and secrets behind the success of heavy hitting leaders, entrepreneurs, and artists in our community. Join host Jamey Ice and co-host Jimmy Williams every other Tuesday to unpack another great story behind Fort Worth’s favorite brands. Brought to you by 6th Ave Storytelling.
00:00:03:04 - 00:00:23:15
Jamey
Hey, I'm Jamey Ice Fort Worth native musician turned entrepreneur and someone who loves diving into the stories behind great brands. In each episode, we sit down with the leaders, dreamers and builders who are shaping our community. Pulling back the curtain on their journey and the real lessons and tactics that got them to where they are today. No fluff, no highlight reels.
00:00:23:21 - 00:00:51:20
Jamey
Just real conversations with remarkable people about what it takes to build something that truly matters. I'm your host, and this is stories with soul. All right, guys, welcome to Stories of Soul. This is a conversation I've been wanting to have for two people in the room from two different spaces. All in the entrepreneurship world. This is going to be a very tactical entrepreneurship conversation.
00:00:51:20 - 00:01:17:18
Jamey
So today we're going to explore what it takes to build a thriving entrepreneurial ecosystem with two leaders for a reshaping Fort Worth startup landscape. Trey Boles, who is a long, long, long time friend. We'll get into the context and history there. Brings over two decades of experience as a serial entrepreneur and is now the leading charge leading the charge as the managing director of Techstars Health and Physical Health Fort Worth Accelerator.
00:01:17:20 - 00:01:26:15
Jamey
From his early days revolutionizing the music industry with his P2P platform Morpheus, which I had and downloaded lots of music very slowly.
00:01:26:17 - 00:01:28:19
Cameron
And it wasn't Murphy's.
00:01:28:19 - 00:01:47:08
Jamey
Fault though, so I could take like an hour to get one song with me. My brother would stay up and we got seven songs. Anyways, we'll go into that. He also co-founded the Dallas Entrepreneur Center, and it's just been consistently at the forefront of innovation and entrepreneurship development in Dallas Fort Worth. You have really changed the game in both our cities.
00:01:47:09 - 00:02:10:06
Jamey
We'll get more into that. Joining him is also my friend Cameron Cushman, who's a Fort Worth native and who's dedicated his career to building entrepreneurial communities. He, after serving in the George Bush administration, which you want to hear a little bit more about and helping launch initiatives like 1 Million Cups at the Kauffman Foundation, Cameron returned home to Fort Worth, where he now serves as the Director of Innovation Ecosystems at Unty Health and Science Center.
00:02:10:08 - 00:02:31:01
Jamey
So I'm excited to dive in. I really want to make this tactical about things. These two guys, you two guys, these guys, these guys, you spend every day helping entrepreneurs to grow their businesses or start their businesses or raise money. You've seen a lot of things that worked. You've seen a lot of things that didn't work. So I want to dive into that.
00:02:31:01 - 00:02:46:03
Jamey
But so before before we get into that, how can you help me want to? I just want you to like Cameron. You got you got pointed at first hand. Can you just give us like your how you got here. Kind of like who you are, how you got here, what you do.
00:02:46:05 - 00:03:01:16
Cameron
Yeah. I have a really weird story that doesn't make any sense. So, I have to explain it. And my own mother doesn't know what I do for a living, so I have to. I always have to start with that. Yeah. Born and raised right here in Fort Worth. Product in the fort with public schools was always very interested in current events, politics, things like that.
00:03:01:16 - 00:03:19:12
Cameron
And so, I was lucky enough to go to Texas A&M, for school and study at the George Bush School, which was brand new at the time and studied political science and stayed in political science. And when you end up with a degree in political science, you really have two choices. You either go to law school or you move to DC or Austin.
00:03:19:15 - 00:03:21:10
Jamey
And you wanted to go into politics.
00:03:21:12 - 00:03:23:02
Cameron
Yeah. I loved it. It was fascinating.
00:03:23:02 - 00:03:24:10
Jamey
Like you wanted to run for office. Was that.
00:03:24:11 - 00:03:40:14
Cameron
Oh, maybe. But I wanted to serve the American people in a totally equal and a totally 22 year old, bright eyed and bushy tailed kind of way. And then you get there, and then the bureaucracy just kind of slaps you in the face. And it is it is. So I moved to Washington, D.C., I sold my car to finance my move.
00:03:40:14 - 00:03:54:14
Cameron
I had an apartment and a roommate and and no job. And, I moved in September of 22, 2002. Sorry. Which I shouldn't have done because it was right before the election and nobody was hiring because they're all waiting to see what the majorities are going to look like.
00:03:54:15 - 00:03:55:07
Jamey
Oh, interesting.
00:03:55:07 - 00:04:13:12
Cameron
So it took me a long time to to get a job. I took a job at the Republican National Committee because they were paying. I get I made 20 bucks a day to change people's passwords, so I was making 100. I was making 100 bucks a week, and my rent alone was $900 a month. So do the math on that deal.
00:04:13:12 - 00:04:38:13
Cameron
And it was rough. And I had a part time job at the Container Store, so I was wearing the Blue Apron. Okay. I transferred essentially from the job I was doing in Fort Worth to the their first ever two story store in Arlington, Virginia, which was fun. Anyway, so I end up getting a job, in literally the mailroom of the white House, the Office of Presidential Correspondence, which was just not on my radar screen at all, but was a great place to cut my teeth and just learn how to work in an office.
00:04:38:13 - 00:04:54:22
Cameron
And it was the largest office in the white House. And I was the sort of executive assistant that managed about 60 different people. As far as like what an E would do. And, loved that, did that for a couple of years. And then, summer of 2004, which was also an election year, I moved over to the Domestic Policy Council.
00:04:55:00 - 00:05:08:20
Cameron
Got to work in the West Wing, which was super cool. And but it was also an election year, and so I didn't know if I was going to have a job. I don't know if we were going to win or lose. It was close race. And so come November of 2004, George W Bush ends up winning.
00:05:09:01 - 00:05:25:09
Cameron
And so I know I have a job and then, stayed on for a little bit, kind of through the transition, then went to the Commerce Department and was doing international trade policy, which I knew absolutely nothing about. What? It was fascinating. And of all the things that got me interested in entrepreneurship, it was working in the federal government, which makes zero sense.
00:05:25:09 - 00:05:44:20
Cameron
Yeah. But I had a boss at the time in the Office of Market Access and Compliance. So we're trying to like open markets for U.S. companies to export overseas. And he was a former internet entrepreneur, really early internet entrepreneur, was one of the first guys to sell cars on the internet. I think he was the first person to sell jewelry on the internet.
00:05:44:22 - 00:06:03:08
Cameron
And so he saw the way that the internet was kind of transforming the economy and saw the way it it enabled people to start new businesses. And so we literally started an entrepreneurship initiative from within the Commerce Department, from within the International Trade Administration made zero sense, but we had a partnership with the Kauffman Foundation. And so we did several different things.
00:06:03:09 - 00:06:23:11
Cameron
We're trying to, we did events in the Bric countries, so five different countries Brazil, Russia, India and China to try to share the secret sauce of American entrepreneurship with the rest of the world. And, and we also did a website called entrepreneurship.gov, which was crazy, like a it was really hard to spell and b getting a.gov was not something you just like went on the internet and registered for.
00:06:23:11 - 00:06:38:03
Cameron
It was actually pretty hard to do anyway. So, administration ends and Kaufman calls and says, hey, we have we have an opportunity out here. Would you want to come and interview for a job? Well, I was all set to go to graduate school. I was going to go study international affairs. I've been admitted. The University of Chicago, that's where I was headed.
00:06:38:05 - 00:06:49:18
Cameron
And then Kaufman called and said, hey, do you want to come interview for a position? So I fly out there to meet with the CEO. And, and he says in my interviews, like, don't go to grad school. He said, come here. You'll learn way more than you ever would in a grad program. And I was like, what?
00:06:49:18 - 00:06:55:13
Cameron
Okay, so move to Kansas City. And, worked for the Kaufman Foundation for about five years, as you mentioned, because.
00:06:55:15 - 00:07:01:05
Jamey
Because you kind of got the bug of like, entrepreneur ecosystems. How do we how do we stir that up?
00:07:01:10 - 00:07:22:18
Cameron
Yes. And what I realized was the government thinks that they can do a lot to help the economy, to help solve problems, and they really can't. It's really up to entrepreneurs and innovators and people who solve problems in new ways. That's where the change happens. That's where the economic growth happens. That's where the job creation happens. And it took me a while to realize that.
00:07:22:20 - 00:07:24:12
Cameron
But and it wasn't that necessarily I.
00:07:24:12 - 00:07:27:04
Jamey
Would I would love to give that an amen.
00:07:27:06 - 00:07:30:07
Speaker 3
Amen. I come on your show, you can do whatever you want. You feel that, right?
00:07:30:07 - 00:07:32:00
Jamey
I cannot agree with that more.
00:07:32:03 - 00:07:50:19
Cameron
And they're the ones who are going to solve our biggest challenges and problems as entrepreneurs. And so it kind of took me going into the belly of the beast, going into the federal government to realize that. And I got to Kaufman and was surrounded by incredible, super smart people, people have been in policy world, people who did the research, people who had been entrepreneurs themselves and wanted to give back.
00:07:50:21 - 00:08:11:12
Cameron
It was really just a fascinating time to be there. So I spent about two years as kind of the chief of staff to the president. CEO got to work with the board, get to work with the investment committee on a $2 billion foundation. It was fascinating. Then they switched over switch me over to research and policy. So I got to work for getting Bob Layton, who was just this absolute expert in entrepreneurship and written 30 books, worked for President Carter, worked for Clinton.
00:08:11:17 - 00:08:26:04
Cameron
It was amazing. Guy, during his tenure as kind of this blew my mind. He was there about ten years. He spent $100 million on research around entrepreneurship of the Kauffman Foundations money. Wow is fascinating because we didn't know much about entrepreneurship. We didn't understand the role that like.
00:08:26:09 - 00:08:28:00
Jamey
What does it do?
00:08:28:02 - 00:08:45:07
Cameron
Yeah. Or like we say, oh, small businesses, the backbone of the American economy. That's true. But somebody's got to start those companies. And nobody really looked at it from like an age perspective. And in the last couple years, I was building the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Kansas City. I went over to the entrepreneurship team, and that's where we started 1 Million Cups.
00:08:45:08 - 00:09:08:07
Cameron
We got to work with Google Fiber, which was the fastest internet in the world that was being wired to homes and very specific neighborhoods in Kansas City. And just really got to move the needle. And this was before we had a term of ecosystem building or anything like that. It just was how do we help entrepreneurs? And, you know, we were sitting in this white tower, this ivory tower of entrepreneurship, and we didn't know any entrepreneurs that were operating in our own backyard.
00:09:08:07 - 00:09:25:08
Cameron
And so we tried to fix that, and then had some personal stuff going on. Left Kansas City in 2013, moved back to Texas, moved back home, which is kind of always my plan and, took a job in the private sector because I was telling people about the work we were doing in Kansas City, and they literally thought I was nuts, like, I don't we don't need that.
00:09:25:10 - 00:09:37:04
Cameron
And, Fort Worth is a great place. Like, I know I grew up here, like, I'm not some carpet bagging Yankee from the north trying to sell you all a bill of goods like entrepreneurship is important. And here's why. And so it took me a while. I took a job in the private sector, did that for three years.
00:09:37:06 - 00:09:51:23
Cameron
That company got acquired not once, but twice in the three years I was there. And so after the second acquisition, they basically fired me and my team, and I wanted to get back into my true love of entrepreneurial community building, because I still feel like I had a lot to offer the city of Fort Worth. It was my hometown.
00:09:51:23 - 00:10:06:07
Cameron
I wanted to grow it. Yeah, I felt like I was growing other people's communities for a long time. And, and there was nobody really doing it that I could tell. And so, Guy recommended I go meet with the head of the medical school, and I was like, dude, I don't think you understand what I'm talking about here.
00:10:06:07 - 00:10:21:10
Cameron
Like, academia is not going to help me. And sure enough, I met with doctor Mike Williams at the Untl Science Center, and I could tell within about five minutes, like, we're going to be fast friends. And so literally, I worked with him and a team to kind of craft this job that I've been doing now for the last seven years.
00:10:21:12 - 00:10:30:12
Cameron
And, it's been really awesome to just be able to talk about and research and understand and do programs and events around the importance of entrepreneurship in and around Fort Worth.
00:10:30:12 - 00:10:33:19
Jamey
And that that job is what.
00:10:33:21 - 00:10:48:23
Cameron
Until mid last year, it was called innovation ecosystems. Now we've kind of switch to a more of a focus on our students and more of a focus on kind of building our own internal startup hub. Yeah. Really focused more on biotech. Before we were kind of building entrepreneur ecosystem writ large.
00:10:49:00 - 00:10:55:06
Jamey
You the past seven years, you have been Fort Worth's entrepreneurship cheerleader.
00:10:55:12 - 00:10:56:08
Cameron
Czar.
00:10:56:10 - 00:11:17:00
Jamey
Star is probably better than cheerleader. But like, you've made all these events and awareness and campaigns and, you know, the almost like a coach, like you just have been an advocate and I feel like it really changed it, put it on the forefront, you know, from the mayor and city council, and it was not really on people's radar.
00:11:17:02 - 00:11:26:04
Jamey
But you have you've been kind of an ambassador, like raising awareness. How do we think about it? Why is it important? And rallying rallying the troops behind sort of this, this cause. So.
00:11:26:07 - 00:11:37:03
Cameron
Well, I appreciate you saying that, but I basically stole the playbook that Kauffman was running in Kansas City and started implement it here. And I had a great guy next door in Dallas that I could just see what he was up to. And I just tried to copy him because.
00:11:37:03 - 00:11:52:18
Jamey
You were doing that. Trey was doing that in Dallas. I was, you were. And it was funny. I don't remember. Anyways, I multiple times before like, yeah, Trey's like the Cameron of Dallas or Cameron is like the trey of like I heard that statement so many times.
00:11:52:18 - 00:12:08:15
Trey
Yes, we're very similar. We have a very similar passions and how we want to help build. And the great thing about ecosystem building across the country is that so many people that do it are so willing to share. This is what I've learned. Still this idea. Try this program. Yeah, don't do that. This is how you need to raise money.
00:12:08:15 - 00:12:21:08
Trey
All those different things. We it so successful. We created an organization dedicated dedicated to it called the Startup Champions Network. And so there's a couple hundred ecosystem builders that do what Cameron and I do all over the country that meet, get together.
00:12:21:08 - 00:12:26:01
Jamey
And what a wild ecosystem builder. Like what a wild thing. Yeah.
00:12:26:03 - 00:12:57:18
Trey
I mean it's it's I think it's really just economic development a different way. And so it's, it's exciting to see ways for people to, to figure out how they can, recognize and realize benefit in their cities by helping support entrepreneurship, because the economic development view doesn't think micro like entrepreneurs are. But if you aggregate all of the economic impact from those entrepreneurs, it's way bigger than any ten corporations, right, that you could bring to your city.
00:12:57:19 - 00:12:59:07
Trey
Yeah, it's it's an important part of your.
00:12:59:11 - 00:13:23:13
Jamey
And I would I would argue not even just like finance like there's a financial you add it all up and it's a lot but but I think like culturally culturally it's what makes a city interesting. Like it's the things that give a city its soul. Sure. Like, I think there's sort of this cultural community benefit that I would probably argue out even outweighs, like the financial job creation, wealth creation.
00:13:23:16 - 00:13:44:22
Trey
Well, entrepreneurs are culture shapers. Yeah, right. They're they're the ones that are defining the restaurants we eat out and the clothes that we wear and the music that we listen to and the technology that we leverage or utilize. So, yeah, it's exceptionally important in creating a culture of innovation inside of a city, inside of an organization, inside of a startup.
00:13:44:22 - 00:14:10:09
Trey
Anywhere is really, really important to create and facilitate creativity and problem solving. And one of the most important elements of entrepreneurship, in my opinion, which is, the ability to fail. And celebrating that you need to try, you need to try. It's not going to work all the time. But we'll just keep going, we'll keep going. And once you start to look at failures not failure but education and learning, then you create an environment where you can make all kinds of crazy stuff happen.
00:14:10:09 - 00:14:26:01
Trey
Because the craziest things I've ever been a part of were because we tried something that nobody else was trying. And you know what? The 100 times it worked. Really fun stories. And that's what we talk about. We don't talk about the 99,900 and, you know, 16 where it didn't work.
00:14:26:01 - 00:14:35:18
Jamey
But yeah. And you wouldn't be where you were if you didn't have that. Not at all. It's the it's the school. Well, try give us your give us your quick. Sure. For story version. Yeah.
00:14:35:18 - 00:14:52:09
Trey
So I grew up in Dallas, ended up going to play football at a small school in Alabama and then came back after I, I got hurt, came back and finished at Baylor and got involved in the internet.com boom at that point with one of my friends who had started a company, and he built this company up in eight months, sold it for a bunch of money.
00:14:52:09 - 00:15:11:03
Trey
We moved to Nashville, while in Nashville, I helped start and run that company, and then I ran another company, and then I then I started working at this company called Morpheus. And, the, the then CEO called me and said, hey, I need you to build an online marketing, strategy for us. I said, no problem. Give me two weeks.
00:15:11:05 - 00:15:18:22
Trey
So the first week I went out and researched what online advertising was and how it worked. Second week I wrote the plan and then we went in there, and.
00:15:18:22 - 00:15:19:10
Jamey
I love a.
00:15:19:10 - 00:15:42:18
Trey
Few months later, it was right after Napster had been shut down by the government. So basically, Napster had built the awareness of peer to peer file sharing to about 85 million people, and then went away and we had a company called Morpheus and everybody knew it. Morpheus was from the matrix. And so literally, in the course of a year, about 110 million people moved over to use our platform.
00:15:42:20 - 00:15:49:13
Trey
And it was my sort of getting thrown in the deep end entrepreneur experience. I didn't.
00:15:49:15 - 00:15:50:23
Jamey
Entrepreneur and like tech.
00:15:51:00 - 00:16:07:18
Trey
Tech. And yeah, it was just it was crazy. And so I, I didn't have a sales team. I had three college kids and a high school kid, and that was my sales team. And so I, you know, one call, you know, we would be the, the my high school student would be the senior vice president, North American sales for Morpheus.
00:16:07:19 - 00:16:21:06
Trey
The next call, it'd be the junior marketing. I mean, like, we were whoever we needed to be to sell the stuff that we sell at the end of the summer, they came and said, we're leaving. And I said, what did I do? And they said, oh, no, no, we have to go back to school. I said, I don't shoot, what am I going to do?
00:16:21:06 - 00:16:27:18
Trey
So I went and bought a book on sales, and then I built sales team and then I built. And so everything I did, I was 21, maybe 22.
00:16:27:18 - 00:16:29:02
Jamey
Okay, that's amazing.
00:16:29:04 - 00:16:47:08
Trey
So on one side of the world, we were getting sued by all the record labels and movie studios. We were we were transforming the way the music industry was going to work. And the future of actually content, digital content transmission. On the other side, all my friends in Nashville were artists. Yeah, singers. So, you know, on one side, they thought it was really cool.
00:16:47:08 - 00:16:51:01
Trey
I was building this company on the other side, they said, should we hate you because.
00:16:51:03 - 00:16:53:15
Speaker 3
Are you destroying or are we destroying the industry?
00:16:53:16 - 00:17:04:02
Trey
And so at the same time, I started to manage bands because I came in one day and one of my buddies, had made a, t shirt order and he said, look, I got.
00:17:04:03 - 00:17:04:17
Cameron
I got three.
00:17:04:17 - 00:17:12:09
Trey
Thousand t shirts. And I was like, that's that's why did you buy 3000 t shirts? And he said, well, because there was a volume discount that you get. And I said.
00:17:12:11 - 00:17:13:08
Jamey
To the last.
00:17:13:08 - 00:17:29:19
Trey
Show we played was at Bongo Java for 26 people, and we knew 24 of them, like, well, how are you going to sell these t shirts? And he just was like, I don't, I don't know. And I was like, oh man, these these artists need help. Not not all artists, you know, have that business insight. And so that's that's how I got in the music industry.
00:17:29:19 - 00:17:45:14
Trey
So after we went through Morpheus, we, we won our lawsuit. I ended up leaving, and then I started to travel around the country and just live in different cities that I wanted to live in. I lived in New York. I lived in Los Angeles, San Francisco, DC, a bunch of places, and started to see the country.
00:17:45:14 - 00:18:04:04
Trey
And at those places, like I've started different businesses and did different things. I had stayed sort of involved in the music industry, through a company that we that we had started with a buddy of mine out of Fort Worth and, and then we and then, you know, through this whole process at some point, I moved back to Dallas in 2008.
00:18:04:06 - 00:18:29:20
Trey
And one of the things I realized living in all these amazing cities, these huge global international cities, was that although they had arrived in, there were great things happening there. There was not potential for continued massive growth. Where I saw growth was DFW. And so that's why we moved back here and we thought, man, if I'm going to be in this city, I'm going to help entrepreneurs and I'm going to help build, you know, a region focused on on innovation.
00:18:29:20 - 00:18:44:20
Trey
I ended up, coming back, joining a company, taking it over and selling it. And then at that point was like, what am I going to do? I don't know, I don't have any ideas. You know, it happens a lot as an entrepreneur. You're just like, well, we'll just wait. So interestingly enough, SMU had asked me to build an entrepreneurship department.
00:18:44:20 - 00:18:56:03
Jamey
Oh, wait, I'm pausing you because you skipped over something very important. Trey. Okay, do you know what I'm talking about? You were the first green River ordinance manager. We were we.
00:18:56:03 - 00:18:56:08
Cameron
Were.
00:18:56:12 - 00:19:04:14
Speaker 3
Cherry was. Cherry was my manager. Back in the day, you worked with all these artists? We did. You worked with in the best. The best? Yeah.
00:19:04:16 - 00:19:07:02
Jamey
I, I met you when I was in high school.
00:19:07:02 - 00:19:08:05
Trey
You were 15 or 16.
00:19:08:05 - 00:19:09:13
Jamey
I was 15 or 16.
00:19:09:13 - 00:19:10:11
Trey
So I was like 19.
00:19:10:11 - 00:19:14:13
Jamey
20 and you just started this management company in Fort Worth with Paul Steel and Paul.
00:19:14:13 - 00:19:16:20
Trey
Steel, and we were just and we had it was.
00:19:16:20 - 00:19:20:01
Jamey
Funny you you're working with like Ryan Cabrera and Jessica Simpson.
00:19:20:03 - 00:19:32:00
Trey
We were working with a bunch of different people, the thief guys over in Dallas. Yeah. And Peter Mark. And so we wanted to start this management company to help artist and and I had met Paul, when I was building one of our companies, and you.
00:19:32:00 - 00:19:34:12
Jamey
Were like my Sean Parker, kind of.
00:19:34:14 - 00:19:36:19
Speaker 3
Because you're like, I was the.
00:19:36:21 - 00:19:42:02
Trey
Tech guy here. Yeah. And so, I was telling him when you left, I was like, I probably built your first Myspace page.
00:19:42:02 - 00:19:43:15
Speaker 3
You probably did. But.
00:19:43:18 - 00:20:07:16
Trey
You know, it was this idea of me getting to be involved in the music industry. And I think what made me excited about and enjoy the music industry was that there's some music industry people that really want to be artists, like, you know, your tour managers who go on the road and they're like, hey, if you ever need, you know, I'll tune your guitars, but if you ever need me to pop out on stage, and I had no desire or or ability to do that, and so I really could focus on the music.
00:20:07:16 - 00:20:12:02
Trey
And the thing I loved the most was that as the business person, you can do all.
00:20:12:02 - 00:20:12:08
Cameron
The.
00:20:12:08 - 00:20:32:16
Trey
Work to promote something and get it out there and market it and do all this, you know, tech and internet stuff. But when the time came, when it was time to go on stage, you couldn't do that. Like you, the band had to deliver. And so it made this really interesting partnership, between artist and manager or whatever the, the relationship was.
00:20:32:16 - 00:20:52:02
Trey
And then I was fascinated by how the music industry worked. And then I realized, you know what? I was doing less at Morpheus to screw artists than the music industry was doing screw artist. And the interesting thing about green River was green River was the last one of the last bands that did a non 360 deal and that it was it was before things got really bad.
00:20:52:05 - 00:20:53:07
Trey
Yeah. In the music industry.
00:20:53:07 - 00:21:08:20
Jamey
With 360 record, the 360 record deals like the new thing. Well what, what what happens now where they own your publishing and your merch and your touring and all that. And we just had a traditional record deal, right? Capitol records, that was they owned our music. So anyways, I cut you, cut you off there, but I wanted to.
00:21:08:23 - 00:21:15:21
Jamey
We met when I was 15 and you were our manager and helped us launch our career. But then you you were SMU. I cut you off, and.
00:21:15:21 - 00:21:38:12
Trey
Then I came back. SMU built an entrepreneurship department there, ended up, launching, leadership development organization with the then mayor of Dallas to try to help engage culturally diverse but civically minded young people in the city, to teach people leaders. And at the same time, there was a guy named Steve Case who had, who had, built and sold AOL, and he was doing this, heard of him in that.
00:21:38:15 - 00:21:57:01
Trey
Well, a lot of people in this day and age don't know what AOL is. So, you know, you never know. You have to you have to describe it. But he was doing this initiative across the country to focus on how do we help entrepreneurs outside of the coasts. And so it was called Startup America Partnership. It was a partnership between Kauffman Foundation, the white House under President Obama, and the case Foundation, which was Steve.
00:21:57:03 - 00:22:11:11
Trey
And so he brought these people in all over the country. He had been an informal advisor at my last startup that we sold. And so I was like, the Texas guy. And it was all volunteer. But basically I got to a place where I was doing SMU, I was doing a couple nonprofits. I couldn't build a for profit.
00:22:11:11 - 00:22:29:03
Trey
So I said, I guess I'm just going to do nonprofit stuff for a while. And I dove in because I had promised my wife I would only do nonprofits for five years, and then I would be done. And so I dove in and we built a bunch of other, you know, nonprofits, did a bunch of stuff there, and then at the end of sort of 20, I left after five years.
00:22:29:03 - 00:22:49:03
Trey
Like I said, it wasn't I had to come back to fix some things. And then, you know, it's 2019 and I'm like, great, I'm ready to go. I'm going to go build a new company. And then Covid hit and I was watching all of these women and minority small business owners not get access to the peep, which was a low set of loans that the government was giving to small businesses to help them succeed.
00:22:49:03 - 00:23:08:03
Trey
So in Dallas, I launched a fund with a bunch of the business, leaders, and we raised about $4 million to give away forgivable loans to, to small businesses. And so I had always been really in the startup space. But then the small business space. So the other one of the other major things I did during that ten years was I built something called the Dallas Entrepreneur Center.
00:23:08:03 - 00:23:28:18
Trey
It's now called the Dec network, and it was created to help entrepreneurs start build and grow businesses. And so we we've gotten to work with probably 100,000 startups in that decade and, and see what they need and how to help them. You know, as you kind of opened as like the tactical sides of how do you actually take somebody's got an idea and get her to the place where she launches it and to the place where she grows it and builds it.
00:23:28:20 - 00:23:46:01
Trey
And then, after you know, after we did the Covid, Small Business Relief Fund or whatever we called it, Techstars, a friend of mine was at Techstars, who we both knew had worked at the Kauffman Foundation and said, we're launching a Techstars in Fort Worth. You want to come run it in Techstars?
00:23:46:01 - 00:23:46:22
Jamey
This is an accelerator.
00:23:46:22 - 00:24:05:00
Trey
It's a it's a it's a global investment firm that has a bunch of products. One is accelerators, one is Startup Week. When a startup, they've got a bunch. But yes, it's an accelerator 13 week program where, entrepreneurs apply. We have about 30,000 entrepreneurs a year that apply, and a little less than 1% actually make it into a program.
00:24:05:02 - 00:24:22:17
Trey
We bring them into the program, we teach them a bunch of stuff about building business. We connect them to a community of mentors and investors, and then we help them grow over time. And so, Cameron had actually started this concept here and got it going and got it funded. And, and then they needed somebody to run it.
00:24:22:17 - 00:24:36:04
Trey
And that's, that's kind of when I came in and they said, you know, we're going to run this, program and it's going to be focused on health care. And I was like, what? I don't know anything about health care. And they said, well, does that worry you? And I said, doesn't worry me. If it doesn't worry you, I will figure it out.
00:24:36:04 - 00:24:38:17
Jamey
I can get a book about that and read it in a week.
00:24:38:19 - 00:25:02:04
Trey
So we so we started building it and that was three years ago. And we've now invested in 31 companies to this program. I was calculating yesterday. They've raised somewhere in the realm of $20 million. Wow. The past couple of years between those companies, we had 17 countries represented of entrepreneurs who flew to Fort Worth, lived in Fort Worth for three months, many of whom would love to stay in Fort Worth if they could.
00:25:02:05 - 00:25:32:06
Trey
84% of our investments were in diverse founded companies. And not because we were simply trying to be diverse, but I believe diverse founders make the best founders. They make the best businesses. And so, it's been really fun to see not only, what happens when you go out and try to find the most innovative health care founders in the world and bring them to Fort Worth, but how Fort Worth and the people of Fort Worth have responded to having these entrepreneurs here, engaging with them, supporting with them, and helping them grow?
00:25:32:06 - 00:25:35:02
Trey
I think it's added a lot to the ecosystem here.
00:25:35:07 - 00:25:36:00
Jamey
Yeah.
00:25:36:02 - 00:25:50:02
Trey
But it's one component, like we there's a lot of things and I'm sure Cameron will get into this in order to have a successful ecosystem. There's a lot of pieces that you need to have a lot of stakeholders that need to be involved. And, and so it's been fun for us to be one of those stakeholders at Techstars.
00:25:50:05 - 00:26:14:05
Jamey
Yeah. So heavy hitters. I don't know about that. Done a lot got a lot of authority here. So let's I would love to get tactical. I have a bunch of questions. I know how much questions we will get through all of them, but, I just thought, like, man, it's it's kind of like, I don't know, just having, like, a lot of wisdom in the room.
00:26:14:05 - 00:26:23:07
Jamey
I have seen a lot. So I would love to, like, take the gloves off a little bit and be candid. The first question is, can you spell entrepreneur?
00:26:23:09 - 00:26:24:16
Trey
I can, do you need me to?
00:26:24:16 - 00:26:26:07
Jamey
I'm Joe, that's my joke. I'm sorry.
00:26:26:13 - 00:26:27:12
Trey
I messed it up all the.
00:26:27:12 - 00:26:29:13
Speaker 3
Time. I can't spell it. I like needs to.
00:26:29:13 - 00:26:33:09
Cameron
As the guy who started a website called entrepreneurship.gov is a terrible word.
00:26:33:09 - 00:26:34:03
Speaker 3
It's so hard.
00:26:34:07 - 00:26:39:02
Cameron
To spell a French word. It's hard to be an entrepreneurial. It's terrible. We need a new word.
00:26:39:04 - 00:26:41:09
Jamey
We need to start with my joke. That was a bad joke.
00:26:41:12 - 00:26:51:19
Trey
So wait. Yesterday we heard in one of our presentations from one of our founders at Entrepreneur actually means bearer of risk. Oh, interest in that does it does not.
00:26:51:19 - 00:26:52:14
Jamey
Fit like that.
00:26:52:15 - 00:27:10:03
Trey
It fits totally right. Because you're bearing risk when you're being an entrepreneur. You're taking a chance. You're trying to you're trying to do something that you know, you hadn't done before may not have ever been done. So I think that's an interesting little tidbit about because people are like, what is and am I? The thing we hear the most is, am I an entrepreneur?
00:27:10:03 - 00:27:16:17
Trey
How do I know if I'm an entrepreneur? Because until you know, maybe the 80s or 90s entrepreneur wasn't really used like a freelancer.
00:27:16:17 - 00:27:31:04
Jamey
I didn't know about that word in high school or college. And it's like, so people aren't like from a freelance photographer to a pocket, like, yeah, I'm starting an ice cream shop, like even real estate. And so I tell them all the time, like, y'all are entrepreneurs because you were an artist. Yeah. You're doing your own.
00:27:31:06 - 00:27:34:00
Trey
A band is. They're all entrepreneurs.
00:27:34:00 - 00:27:46:22
Jamey
Yeah. Okay. Let's. So first first question is, is what what are the most common patterns you see in successful startups versus those that fail?
00:27:47:00 - 00:27:58:22
Trey
So there's several there's several pieces. First is and probably and this will be a later when your question. So I don't want to get ahead of it. But the most important thing in starting a business is not giving up tenacity.
00:27:58:22 - 00:28:00:00
Jamey
Persistence.
00:28:00:02 - 00:28:21:18
Trey
I would give out that most entrepreneurs that are successful, especially the first time, yeah, would tell you I wasn't better, smarter, faster. I just didn't stop. And then eventually it started to work and then it started to grow. And then something happened that I wasn't really ready for. I didn't really deserve, but I was because I was working so hard and I was in the right place and opportunity came.
00:28:21:18 - 00:28:28:00
Trey
I turned that opportunity. And then after a while, once they do that and they make a ton of mistakes, they start to get good.
00:28:28:01 - 00:28:36:22
Jamey
They grind their way. And why is that good? And to your point, like they don't let mistakes stop them, cripple them or stop them.
00:28:36:22 - 00:28:40:15
Trey
Failure is I just don't like the idea that failure even is a word.
00:28:40:16 - 00:28:48:05
Jamey
Dude, that's so good. I think that's 100% true. Yeah, I agree with you. I don't know if that's where I would have initially gone, but I 100% agree with that.
00:28:48:09 - 00:29:03:05
Trey
So I think so. Back to your question. I think persistence is important. I think, being coachable and by being coachable, I mean listening to people around you that have been there and done that before. The one thing that I think an entrepreneur needs most is the one thing that he or she does not have, and that is experience.
00:29:03:07 - 00:29:23:13
Trey
And because you can't go into a 7-Eleven and say, I'd like four years of experience and, you know, yeah, you know, SAS enterprise, you know, development, you can you can get it in 1 or 2 ways. You can earn it, which takes time, money and a lot of mistakes. Yeah. Most of us don't have enough money to make the mistakes that we're going to make and still be able to build a business because we just run out of money before we get there or two.
00:29:23:14 - 00:29:35:08
Trey
You can learn it by surrounding yourself with people who've been there and done that for. One of the greatest things about Fort Worth is that people are willing to help you. Yeah. If you go to lunch with somebody in Fort Worth and you say, hey, I want to start a business, they don't say, no, you shouldn't do that.
00:29:35:08 - 00:29:44:07
Trey
That's dumb. You can't do that. They say, you should do that. And then they say, how can I help you? And then they do. And so surrounding yourself, being coachable,
00:29:44:09 - 00:29:46:13
Jamey
And I'm sure, I'm sure you see people who are not coachable.
00:29:46:14 - 00:29:49:19
Trey
All the time. Yeah. There's a those are the people that don't make it into our accelerator.
00:29:49:19 - 00:29:56:18
Jamey
And you all see people who, like, have this, mentality of where they beat themselves out like they fail and then they.
00:29:56:18 - 00:29:57:06
Trey
Write.
00:29:57:06 - 00:29:59:06
Jamey
Versus shaking the dust.
00:29:59:08 - 00:30:03:17
Trey
Off, shake it off and keep moving. And so it's a process that they have to learn. But if you're not coachable.
00:30:03:17 - 00:30:04:15
Jamey
Yeah.
00:30:04:17 - 00:30:22:19
Trey
I think surrounding yourself with people that are better than you. I tell founders all the time, if you're the best in your business at more than one thing, then you hired poorly. Yeah, right. You hired poorly. But if you're the best at not one thing in your company, you hired brilliantly. It doesn't matter who runs the company, it matters who owns the company.
00:30:22:19 - 00:30:43:14
Trey
So as an entrepreneur, you should constantly be going out trying to find people that are better and smarter than you to run your own company. Because as confident as entrepreneurs need to be. And that's another element, is that confidence. There is a fine line between confidence in and arrogance or confidence and ignorance, because you have to be ignorant to be that arrogant.
00:30:43:16 - 00:31:15:06
Trey
If you if you were confident and you understood and you could have true humility, you would constantly be one. Recognize that there's somebody better than you. They can run your own business, but two, you would be looking for that person, right? So I think those are some of the elements I think hiring. Well, I think, I think serving your, your employees a good a good entrepreneur's job, a good CEO's job is to empower all the people that work for him or her so that they can do their jobs well, which makes your, your job, and your company more successful.
00:31:15:08 - 00:31:20:09
Trey
So those, alternative those are a couple things that jump out initially in my mind.
00:31:20:11 - 00:31:30:09
Cameron
Yeah. I'll say, and I think we've done a really good job with this in the Techstars companies that we that we invested in is I love it when people are solving their own problem.
00:31:30:11 - 00:31:31:11
Jamey
They how do you mean by that?
00:31:31:11 - 00:31:38:13
Cameron
They have a unique perspective on something and their passion, their tenacity is driven by the fact that this affects me. And I'm going to go solve.
00:31:38:15 - 00:31:39:23
Jamey
Oh, it's it's a person, no.
00:31:39:23 - 00:31:56:19
Cameron
Problem. So like I'll give you a couple. For instance, in this most recent Techstars class, there's two doctors. They were both MDS and they both really struggle with eczema and the dermatology dermatological world sucked. So they were going to go fix that. Yeah. Another guy had a had a pain issue. Nobody could figure out what was causing him so much pain.
00:31:57:00 - 00:32:13:07
Cameron
So he started an app to help with pain management. And so it's people who have it. I think it even translates outside of just the entrepreneurship realm. Our top researcher at HSC is got him, Doctor Sid O'Bryant, one of the top Alzheimer's researchers in the world and if you walk into his office, there's a little picture of his grandma.
00:32:13:09 - 00:32:32:10
Cameron
And she's been gone for a long time. But he has spent his career working on Alzheimer's to help solve what killed his grandmother. And so it's that ability to understand that problem in a unique way, and you're going to do everything you can in your power to solve it because you have experienced it personally, and it could be great for you.
00:32:32:10 - 00:32:36:19
Cameron
Lost somebody could be a problem you encountered in the work world. Something like that versus.
00:32:36:19 - 00:32:39:02
Jamey
Saying, here's opportunity will make me a lot of money, right?
00:32:39:02 - 00:32:39:17
Cameron
Exactly.
00:32:39:22 - 00:32:49:02
Jamey
You're saying the most, most successful ones, increasing the odds of like people who it's a it's a problem that has affected them and they really care about deeply. Yeah.
00:32:49:02 - 00:32:56:00
Cameron
Because they're not going to give up because they're like, you know what? I still have eczema. And my dermatologist never called me back and I can't get in to see them. So I'm just going to go solve this problem.
00:32:56:00 - 00:32:57:01
Jamey
On my own. Yeah.
00:32:57:03 - 00:33:02:00
Cameron
And every time they have an outbreak or whatever, it's going to remind them that they need to go solve this problem.
00:33:02:00 - 00:33:10:02
Jamey
Yeah that's good I agree with that guy anymore. What are what are some other traits or patterns or.
00:33:10:04 - 00:33:28:09
Cameron
Yeah, I mean, I think I think this gets down to the fact too, that you know, what what you mean by being an entrepreneur has a has a really interesting connotation to it because some people think, oh, you got to start a business. You you have to do this. I think anybody can think like an entrepreneur. Anybody can look at a problem and find a new way to solve it.
00:33:28:09 - 00:33:53:03
Cameron
And it doesn't necessarily have to be this de novo. Something's never been invented before. It's a slight, tweak to the innovation. It's a slight improvement. It's an efficiency improvement. It's making it better, faster, cheaper. That's what it's all about. And thinking like an entrepreneur is not really that hard. Everybody can do that. Not everybody's going to take on the risk to become a Techstars founder and, you know, check all their assumptions at the door, mortgage, their house and all that kind of stuff.
00:33:53:05 - 00:34:09:20
Cameron
But just making simple changes and bringing something a little bit new to the market is can be hugely impactful as well. People try to become the next Steve Jobs or the next Zuckerberg. That's not what it's about. It's about Kerry Crowe starting a new kind of ice cream shop, and that has been hugely successful. She didn't give up.
00:34:09:22 - 00:34:21:15
Cameron
And, and she's brought something really cool to Fort Worth. I could go down the list of so many different examples of people who have done that, because she didn't invent ice cream, she didn't invent the ice cream shop. She just did it in a unique and different way.
00:34:21:18 - 00:34:38:03
Jamey
Yeah, that's good and very true. What are some mistakes that you see regularly, like, like from your work with thousands of. Oh, also, you never mention it. Cameron also has a podcast. Yes. You have interviewed one.
00:34:38:03 - 00:34:56:04
Cameron
Hundred, 140 plus innovators. Yeah. Because we don't know these stories. We don't we don't know who these people are that are doing really cool things in our own backyard. And, you know, I'm a big believer. And this is kind of a core principle of entrepreneurial ecosystem building. If you don't know who the entrepreneurs in your own community are, then you won't know how to help them.
00:34:56:06 - 00:35:17:01
Cameron
So we started this podcast just to say like, let us tell your story for you. And I'm fascinated by some of these people, and they're in large part they're solving their own problem, solving a problem. They see in the world. And, there's also this kind of classic advice about entrepreneurship, you know, fall in love with the problem and not with the solution, you know, so really understanding your problem, you know, what is driving what is the problem that I'm trying to solve.
00:35:17:01 - 00:35:35:05
Cameron
Really understand that from your customer perspective, from anybody who would ever use a product, what is their pain and how do you kind of investigate that. And then you can get better at coming up with the solution and not being so committed to your solution that you're not willing to pivot and change. And a new piece of data comes in from a new potential customer.
00:35:35:05 - 00:35:51:19
Cameron
And you say, you know what, I thought my target market was over here, but actually it's over here. And this is actually a better opportunity or a bigger opportunity or an opportunity where I can crack into the market a little bit easier. But to your point about mistakes, I mean, you know, so many different things can scuttle a startup, right.
00:35:51:21 - 00:36:10:19
Cameron
It can just be timing. It can be you have the wrong team. It could be you made a bad hire. It could be interest rates shift and you kind of get in trouble. You know, there's all these kind of different things that can happen. So you got to have a lot of luck, frankly. But I think one of the biggest mistakes I see is that people, they sort of wake up with an idea and they just assume they got to go raise a bunch of venture capital for it.
00:36:10:21 - 00:36:27:01
Cameron
Okay. And there are so many different ways that you can fund a startup that you can gain traction, that you can sort of build with cash flow. Imagine that you don't have to give away any equity. There's also a great, a whole number of grants you can win and programs you can win that are non dilutive funding.
00:36:27:03 - 00:36:38:15
Cameron
I mean, a least Dickerson here in Fort Worth, like she literally won a business plan competition to do a clinical trial. So she set her mind to winning this business plan competition I think was 50,000 bucks. Right. It was.
00:36:38:15 - 00:36:39:02
Trey
Our business.
00:36:39:02 - 00:36:44:22
Cameron
Plan and that and that was and that was her startup capital. So she did it. Yeah. And that's what you do is you.
00:36:45:03 - 00:36:49:18
Jamey
So you see people make the mistake of going and raising a bunch of money day one.
00:36:49:20 - 00:37:00:15
Cameron
Are they think they have to. And so they put all their energy into how many VCs can I get in front of? How many banks can I go talk to when really they just need to go build the business and start and understand who their customer is. So they.
00:37:00:15 - 00:37:03:22
Jamey
Get caught up in like this preparation, thinking business plan.
00:37:03:22 - 00:37:06:14
Cameron
World, correct? Start simply and simply start right.
00:37:06:16 - 00:37:13:23
Jamey
And then and then is the problem that they don't get the funds or that they do get the funds, or they just they don't have a product or like.
00:37:13:23 - 00:37:20:01
Cameron
Well, all the above. And and they don't end up understanding their customer, so they build the wrong product or they build a product, they.
00:37:20:01 - 00:37:21:18
Jamey
Have an assumption they haven't tested.
00:37:21:18 - 00:37:24:07
Cameron
Bingo. Yeah. Okay. And testing is so important.
00:37:24:07 - 00:37:35:08
Jamey
And so you've seen people with a problem or solving and a assumed solution go raise a bunch of money. And their assumed solution in business was actually a bad. It didn't make sense.
00:37:35:08 - 00:37:50:04
Cameron
So I've seen that. But I think what cripples more of them is that they just they have this assumption they got to go raise a bunch of money and then they just get paralyzed. Well, the VC said, no, we'll go knock on another VC or no, call your rich uncle and see if he'll give you ten grand to buy your first round of product.
00:37:50:04 - 00:37:58:07
Cameron
Right? Or apply for an SBIR grant from a federal government agency that that can be non dilutive. And oh by the way, you can even pay yourself 7% profit.
00:37:58:07 - 00:38:04:08
Jamey
Do you think it's because we kind of have romantic asides. The Silicon Valley tech thing.
00:38:04:10 - 00:38:18:02
Cameron
Yes. And that worked really well in Silicon Valley. Yeah. But guess what. You can't repeat Silicon Valley. And what we're should never think. It can be the next Silicon Valley. We need to be Fort Worth on Fort Worth's terms. We're not going to be New York. We don't we're not the financial capital of the world, right? We're not going to be even Austin.
00:38:18:02 - 00:38:34:23
Cameron
We shouldn't try to be those cities. And there aren't there is not a lot of that kind of investment here. There's very few venture capital firms here. Now. Can you get an investment? Sure, absolutely. But probably means you're flying to one of the coasts or you're running into a guy like Trey Bowles who can help connect you to a Techstars type of program.
00:38:35:01 - 00:38:42:06
Cameron
And so it's not even that they don't raise the money. It's that they spend all their time and energy trying to raise the money instead of doing the stuff that really just.
00:38:42:08 - 00:38:44:20
Jamey
Freaking get to work. Yeah, make something, get.
00:38:44:20 - 00:38:52:16
Cameron
A prototype done, you know, scrape it together, rub, rub two nickels together to to get your first run of product or your first prototype or whatever it is.
00:38:52:16 - 00:39:09:19
Jamey
Yeah, I, I would agree with that. I would say I see that, I would say I, you know, entrepreneurs call me message me, email me all the time marketing stuff. And, and occasionally I get someone who's like, I have this idea for a business, and I want to do this. I want to see how much more.
00:39:09:19 - 00:39:28:04
Jamey
And I'm like, and I always tell them, like, you're focused on the wrong thing. Go make the thing you're talking about, making a set of worrying about how, you know, this one year marketing plan and how much it's going to cost, and raising it like, just get to work and make something and sell something like go sell it.
00:39:28:08 - 00:39:29:09
Trey
Right.
00:39:29:11 - 00:39:45:06
Jamey
Then work on that. So yeah, 100%. Yeah. Alignment I would say, well, I want to talk about this more in a little bit like bootstrapping versus raising money because I have only bootstrapped. Like I didn't even know raising money was an option. It was wasn't a radar. I didn't know how to do it. I still don't really know how to do that.
00:39:45:06 - 00:39:50:14
Jamey
I kind of want to do that at some point. But yeah. So Trey, what would what would what are some mistakes?
00:39:50:17 - 00:40:08:12
Trey
So I think you guys covered a lot of them. I think the thing I would say in addition to that is, and you guys said it, you got to go. You got to start. Founders are super worried about putting their product out in the world, right? We often say it's kind of like a baby, and you have this thing, you put all your time and effort into.
00:40:08:12 - 00:40:25:09
Trey
It's this that's your baby. And you don't you don't want to put your baby out there. Because what happens if you put your baby out there and somebody says, your baby's ugly? Yeah. And so they're they're reticent to, like, actually put a product out, right. Because they're worried. And I tell them all the time, oh my gosh, if you're don't be worried about people thinking your baby's ugly.
00:40:25:11 - 00:40:27:02
Jamey
So you see people are like.
00:40:27:04 - 00:40:28:12
Trey
Lots of people are going to think your baby is.
00:40:28:12 - 00:40:30:05
Jamey
Ugly. You see people that are crippled.
00:40:30:07 - 00:40:32:18
Trey
Oh, they won't they won't ship a product. They won't ship a product.
00:40:32:18 - 00:40:33:17
Jamey
They want it to be perfect.
00:40:33:17 - 00:40:55:18
Trey
They want it to be perfect. Right? So you hear about this minimal minimum, minimum viable product you hear about like my argument is two things. You know what doesn't cost money? Calling somebody on the phone and asking them questions about their problems and what what what what what the problems are experiencing. You know, it doesn't cost money. Asking them what they would do to solve it when else doesn't cost money is asking them if a certain solution would be a good fit for them if they pay for it.
00:40:55:18 - 00:40:57:23
Trey
You know what else doesn't cost money? Asking what they pay for it.
00:40:58:04 - 00:41:01:22
Jamey
That's you're meaning customer research and customer discovery.
00:41:01:22 - 00:41:04:02
Trey
I'm calling like figure out if there's a market, how.
00:41:04:02 - 00:41:05:02
Jamey
Many people actually do that.
00:41:05:02 - 00:41:21:18
Trey
Not because again, they don't want they don't know how to do it. They don't want somebody to say no. Yeah. But if you. So when people talk about raising money and how do I spend the money and how much money, how much money do I have and how much runway. My answer is you don't need any money to call people on the phone and prove there's a market.
00:41:21:19 - 00:41:39:10
Trey
Yeah. And then you know what? You got to take this product. You got to build it, and you gotta put it out there. Because lots of people are gonna think your baby's ugly. But some people are gonna think your baby's cute, and you won't figure out who that is. Even our founders this week, I told them, and we had three different people come in and talk, and they said, there's no shortcuts to sales.
00:41:39:12 - 00:41:53:17
Trey
It's super hard. And these are expert, lifelong, extremely successful salespeople that are like, I pick up the phone and I call somebody, I send emails and I set up meetings, and people don't want to do that because it's hard. It's super, super hard.
00:41:53:17 - 00:42:02:20
Jamey
Do you think that's a modern day kind of Gen Z, late millennial? I feel like old, like Gen X and boomers.
00:42:02:22 - 00:42:03:09
Trey
I have that.
00:42:03:09 - 00:42:06:10
Jamey
Problem, don't have that problem. Would you say that's true or not?
00:42:06:10 - 00:42:09:22
Trey
I would say that people never like to go out and do that.
00:42:09:22 - 00:42:12:03
Jamey
Piece and just call, cold call?
00:42:12:04 - 00:42:26:19
Trey
No. Yeah. I think it's just hard. Especially for some. I and I told the founders yesterday, I said, look, guys, some of you aren't salespeople, some of you aren't. I don't really like calling people and making these calls. Some of you don't want to go out and ask somebody, buy your product. Tough luck.
00:42:26:19 - 00:42:27:07
Jamey
You got it.
00:42:27:07 - 00:42:40:23
Trey
That's what you signed up for it. Like, yeah, we had a founder a couple weeks ago tell us he personally sold the first $6 million in his business personally, he said, because he had to write. So you've got to get out there and make those calls. And if you don't, your business isn't going to work.
00:42:41:01 - 00:42:45:08
Jamey
With all of those. It's fear. Fear keeps you from launching your product. Fear keeps you from calling.
00:42:45:08 - 00:43:00:02
Trey
For lack of any experience or not. It's it is. It's fear. And you don't want somebody to tell you that your idea is bad. Like what? That stinks. What happens if somebody you know, but it happens when you made your first record? If you put that you put your demo out there and somebody said, man, you guys suck as a band, you you don't want to hear that.
00:43:00:02 - 00:43:07:20
Trey
But you know what? Eventually people start to say, well, I like your band. And then you get start playing live shows and then you go start booking tours, and then all of a.
00:43:07:20 - 00:43:28:09
Jamey
Sudden it's so much that those having. Are you familiar with Carol Ducker? I think that's her name. Yeah. A new growth mindset. Just fantastic growth mindset versus fixed mindset. It's just like not being afraid of mistakes, right? You are constantly growing in the way you grow. And and I would say not not to be like, look, look, look at me.
00:43:28:09 - 00:43:46:08
Jamey
But I think one of part of my success as an entrepreneur was, I can't tell you how many things I have sold that did not exist, or I had zero idea, like I just had an idea and I'm like, going to go pitch this. I'm going to make a proposal for it. Because I have this belief in my mind.
00:43:46:08 - 00:43:59:11
Jamey
I can figure out how to make it right. And I do think I see people with businesses and ideas or talent or whatever product, and they want to get it right and perfect, and I'm like, just freaking go sell it. And if you sell it, then you know it'll pay for and then figure out how to do it and.
00:43:59:11 - 00:44:00:00
Trey
Then fix it.
00:44:00:00 - 00:44:00:10
Jamey
Fix it.
00:44:00:10 - 00:44:00:21
Trey
For it.
00:44:01:00 - 00:44:04:22
Jamey
Lean Lean Startup is a great book about that idea.
00:44:04:23 - 00:44:18:15
Cameron
And I would even take what Trey said a step further. And I would say, you want to find the people who are going to tell you your baby's ugly. Yeah, yeah, because they're gonna give you way better feedback than your mom. Yeah, there's a great book out there called The Mom Test, and it's like, your mom is always going to buy your product, right?
00:44:18:15 - 00:44:22:04
Cameron
Your mom, you know, is going to love you, and she's going to be one of your first customers.
00:44:22:04 - 00:44:25:12
Jamey
Yeah. Although my mom, my mom shoots me straight, she is like.
00:44:25:15 - 00:44:35:10
Cameron
And on their mom, their moms that do that too, right? But the point is, is like, don't just go to people who love your product, because then all you're going to hear is, and this is where we have trouble with social media, right? Yeah. Oh my gosh.
00:44:35:13 - 00:44:36:04
Jamey
Vacuum chain.
00:44:36:04 - 00:44:49:20
Cameron
I'm a I'm a Democrat. All I see are Democratic feeds. And then I get more. Then I get more crazy. I get more liberal, I get more whatever. I'm a gun owner, and then I all I see is gun content, right? Don't do that. You need to seek out the people who kind of give you that opposite perspective.
00:44:49:22 - 00:45:08:00
Cameron
I did sales for a living for a while, and there's this notion in sales about, removing objectives. So somebody has an objection or an objection to your to your thing. Well, it's too it's too expensive. It doesn't do it. It doesn't have this feature that I really want or my, my team will never go for it. And to really get to those objections and try to figure that out.
00:45:08:03 - 00:45:25:06
Cameron
Yeah, you get that through sales calls and so, so many those sales calls are so valuable. This is why I love the notion that the CEO or the founder or whoever that person is, actually does them themselves because they're going to learn so much. Oh yeah. It doesn't matter if you don't ever make the sale, as long as you kind of have that continual growth mindset, you're trying to learn from that sales call.
00:45:25:08 - 00:45:41:11
Cameron
That's going to be hugely influential in whatever it is. The conversation that you're having. And so have those sales calls. The toughest ones are sometimes the best. Those are the best opportunities for growth. You know, there's a lot of ways you can say that, but I think it's, it's really the best way to go.
00:45:41:12 - 00:45:42:00
Jamey
100%.
00:45:42:02 - 00:45:59:14
Trey
We used to tell people the music business, we, I used to say, look, go, go out on tour for three years and, and in three, if you are still touring in three years you'll be able to support yourself. But in three years you'll either quit because this is not for you or you will start to build up an audience.
00:45:59:14 - 00:46:16:21
Trey
You'll start to build up a fan base, but that's what you have to do. So if I told you in order to be able to do music for a career, you need to go tour for three years straight and nobody knows what that kind of touring feels like better than you. It's not easy. Can you, can you do it?
00:46:16:21 - 00:46:28:07
Trey
And so it's just a, it's that persistence and it's getting out there and it's finding their market. It's iterating, changing things. Most most companies, most businesses, whatever your initial idea is, is not what your final product.
00:46:28:07 - 00:46:29:19
Jamey
Is 100%. Yeah.
00:46:29:21 - 00:46:37:01
Trey
And so you only way you get there and you're going to get there a lot quicker. If you have people tell you why they don't like it or why they wouldn't pay for say, they need.
00:46:37:01 - 00:46:38:00
Jamey
To say no to it, they.
00:46:38:00 - 00:46:38:15
Trey
Need to change.
00:46:38:16 - 00:46:42:22
Cameron
And I'll tell you one of the best ways to do this. You really want to get tactical and practical. We just had to.
00:46:43:00 - 00:46:43:11
Jamey
Give it to.
00:46:43:11 - 00:47:01:10
Cameron
Me. We just had an event in Fort Worth, and it's a Techstars program called Startup Weekend. Yeah. And you literally spend a weekend working on a startup idea. It starts over like one minute pitches, informal pitches over pizza and beer. On Friday night. They kind of self-select into 5 to 10 different teams. They work on that over a 54 hour period over the weekend.
00:47:01:12 - 00:47:13:23
Cameron
And then on Sunday night, they present to a panel of judges. Now, it doesn't really matter if your own idea doesn't get selected. If you do have an idea and it gets picked by the group, then great, you get to work on your idea. But if not, you're going to learn so much about how to do this in a really short amount of time.
00:47:13:23 - 00:47:31:09
Cameron
And oh, by the way, you're probably gonna meet people you never would have met otherwise. And then you have to go through all of these. It's like, it's like a startup on steroids. You got to do all this stuff so fast. You got to do some customer discovery. You got to put a marketing plan together. Maybe you have to build an app, or you have to build a website, and you have to, figure out if you can sell it.
00:47:31:09 - 00:47:50:07
Cameron
Some people actually turn revenue in the course of a weekend, which is just shocking, like they build a prototype on Saturday and then somebody put it on the internet. Somebody buys it on Sunday. I mean, it's just shocking. And so it's a great way to validate and really great way to practice that. And what I would say about Startup Weekend is you wake up on Monday morning and you really have one of two reactions, and both are 100% legit and good.
00:47:50:09 - 00:48:01:03
Cameron
One is you wake up and you say, you know, that was an awesome weekend, but I'm not cut out to be an entrepreneur. And I'm so glad to go back to my day job. And that's great because you just figured out that you're probably not cut out to be an entrepreneur. You're not willing to take that risk or you're not.
00:48:01:05 - 00:48:18:18
Cameron
You're not oriented in that way. You don't have those kind of skills. The other one is that was, there was a really good weekend, and I do not want to go back to my day job because I want to go work on that thing. Yeah. Addictive. And that tells you so much. And if all you had to spend was 54 hours to figure that out and maybe 100 bucks or whatever, the typical ticket prices, that's a huge.
00:48:18:18 - 00:48:37:03
Jamey
Win. Yeah, I, I think what's interesting about that is the time constraint. Yes. One of things I loved about the Elon Musk book that just came out, I don't know if you have read that the Walter Isaacson one, you know, so much of his success, he would just make these arbitrary, crazy, stupid deadlines and be like, we are doing this by this day.
00:48:37:03 - 00:48:56:09
Jamey
And his team would be like, that's impossible. He's like, if you think that's impossible, accept your resignation. Now it's like, but it's like it. It breeds innovation. I think part of one of the benefits of bootstrapping, bootstrapping is it comes with its many downfalls, such as not having money. But one of the benefits is like, you don't have a runway, you don't have money.
00:48:56:09 - 00:49:21:23
Jamey
You better go sell. Right? You gotta go sell it. And so I think to your point, there's something to that short amount of time you got to do it like forces creativity and innovation and and hustle. When you're evaluating startups, which both of y'all like, you know, he's at 3000 people applied for Techstars and you take 12 or however many.
00:49:22:01 - 00:49:29:06
Jamey
What are some red flags you look for when evaluating? Or it's like, nope, that.
00:49:29:08 - 00:49:48:09
Trey
So at the stage that we invest, which is pre-seed, which is really it's like a little bit more than an idea. You can't base your decision on how successful the company has been to date. Yeah. So you really can you can really focus on a couple things. The first one is the founder, the team. Like do you think that they have the ability to do this?
00:49:48:09 - 00:50:03:13
Trey
Do you think they have the experience? Do you think that they have the fortitude and the perseverance to stick to it? Do they have the personal conviction like Cameron talked about? Like is there some sort of connection to the problem? So we spend a lot of time on that with the person. Then we look and say, is there a market?
00:50:03:13 - 00:50:22:14
Trey
Because our job as investors is to create outsized returns. That's what you do in the venture space. And so we want to make sure that this not only is a business that will work, but this is a business that will work in return. Massive, massive returns to the to us and there other investors. Then we kind of look at what have they accomplished.
00:50:22:14 - 00:50:33:13
Trey
Right to to my point earlier when I said it doesn't cost any money to call a customer and and see whether or not they'd buy something or what prompts, I'd have. If you're coming to us and you haven't done that already.
00:50:33:15 - 00:50:34:07
Jamey
That's a red flag.
00:50:34:07 - 00:50:48:09
Trey
You're not ready. And it's most of the time because you just didn't know. That's the process that you should do. You didn't realize it was that easy to do that or you didn't know how to do that. But yeah, that's that's a red flag. If you're not coachable, if you're not taking feedback.
00:50:48:09 - 00:50:50:00
Jamey
Can you tell that pretty quickly.
00:50:50:01 - 00:50:50:16
Trey
Absolutely.
00:50:50:16 - 00:50:52:06
Jamey
Like just how they enter.
00:50:52:06 - 00:51:07:19
Trey
In or how they answer. We always ask them why would you, why do you want to do Techstars and some they're like well I want the logo on my website. Some of them are like I need I'd like you the money that you invest, we don't invest enough money to make a decision off an accelerator just because the money that we give you.
00:51:07:19 - 00:51:25:12
Trey
So, if you feel that a lot when you give them suggestions, you ask them questions, you probe something, and they and they bristle. You can see that, not always we have we've had a couple circumstances out of 31 companies that we've invested in Fort Worth, where we didn't realize the founder wasn't coachable until they got here.
00:51:25:12 - 00:51:40:18
Trey
They faked us out. Right. Because it's we're very clear in all of our stuff that you have to be coachable to get in, see, so anybody can fake it for a little bit. But, but we look for that the other are simple things like, we have a really short application you have to fill out to apply for Techstars.
00:51:40:20 - 00:51:56:06
Trey
If you don't fill out all the questions in the application. I don't feel like you're really committed to this. If you, you know, if the things that you do in the answers you put aren't thoughtful. I mean, it's it's simple things like this, how much are you willing to invest? And then when we ask questions and we push back, how do you respond to that?
00:51:56:06 - 00:52:18:03
Trey
When I ask for more information and more of an explanation on something here. There what? I want to talk to other investors. And you say, no, that that's a part that's part of the process. But I mean, when you're looking at 3 or 4000 companies to to go down to ten, it's just really hard ultimately, like fortunately, I feel like we've gotten really lucky and we've got some great founders and some good companies.
00:52:18:05 - 00:52:39:12
Trey
But like Cameron said, it's still so early. There's so many things in the early stages of a business that can make it fail, that don't have to do with your work ethic, your ability, your background. There's just I always tell people, if Mark Cuban didn't have any money, was a startup, he'd he could fail to not because he's not experienced, but because there's factors outside of our control that can take you out.
00:52:39:12 - 00:52:58:06
Trey
One of the biggest ones is, and one of the biggest questions we ask is why can't Google build this? Why can't somebody that's already in this space, that's already doing this just say, oh, that's a that's a cool feature. We'll just add it on. And that's an important thing to think about. Are we are we seeing companies that are changing marketplaces.
00:52:58:08 - 00:53:10:05
Trey
Which in health care super important right now, or are we seeing people who are building features? We always ask. We always ask the entrepreneur. We really need to figure out, or is this a great idea or is this a business?
00:53:10:10 - 00:53:11:00
Cameron
00:53:11:02 - 00:53:13:12
Trey
Because if it's a great idea and not a business, you shouldn't do it.
00:53:13:16 - 00:53:14:05
Jamey
00:53:14:07 - 00:53:19:09
Trey
And one of the best things you can learn is this. But there's not a market out there. There's nobody who's willing to buy.
00:53:19:10 - 00:53:23:01
Jamey
Yeah. How do you differentiate between a great idea and a business. Like what do you mean by that.
00:53:23:03 - 00:53:45:16
Trey
A great idea is would be something that somebody says that's awesome, but I'm not going to pay enough money for it that you can build a business off in businesses. You can create a sustainable enterprise and grow that based upon the margins you create how much it cost to create something, how much you can sell it for, how you can, how long you can keep a customer, and grow it from there.
00:53:45:16 - 00:54:03:04
Trey
But, we say this all the time, and I believe this. I think that building a business is simple, right? It's not easy, but it's simple. You gotta create a product or service. You gotta sell the product or service, and you have to serve your customer. And if you do that, you will have a business that works.
00:54:03:06 - 00:54:22:03
Trey
It may not be humongous but you don't need you don't. I'm also a big believer in an entrepreneur. The best entrepreneurs isn't the people who have the biggest businesses or the most amount of money. I love anybody that wants to go out and build a business that creates enough economic freedom for themselves that they can live and support their family.
00:54:22:04 - 00:54:38:04
Trey
Right. That I think is admirable and I don't think entrepreneurs are better than non entrepreneurs. I think they're crazy crazier than non entrepreneurs. But they're not, they're not better. And so you need to figure out which is why I think it's so important. We tell this at the school a lot of times people ask can you teach entrepreneurship.
00:54:38:04 - 00:54:53:02
Trey
And they're very skeptical in that. And you know, why would you have an entrepreneurship degree? That doesn't make sense. And my answer is, every day in the first day of class, I ask my students, how many of you want to be entrepreneurs? 95% of them raise their hand. On the last day of class. I ask, how many of you want to be entrepreneurs?
00:54:53:07 - 00:55:14:14
Trey
5% raise their hands and I say, well, lucky for you, this wasn't a class for entrepreneurs. This was a class to teach you the entrepreneurial mindset which will benefit you no matter what you do. Which is creativity and problem solving and creating a new perspective on failure and a perspective on success that will benefit you whether you're a barista, a mid-level manager or an entrepreneur.
00:55:14:14 - 00:55:28:12
Trey
And so I think we we have to recognize that even if you're not an entrepreneur at this world, this concept is valuable to all of us and can make all of us better, no matter where we are.
00:55:28:14 - 00:55:32:03
Cameron
So I'll take it from the sort of biotech and science perspective. Health care.
00:55:32:04 - 00:55:33:12
Jamey
Yeah. Just.
00:55:33:12 - 00:55:51:15
Cameron
Because I think it's a, it's a totally different industry. The first thing is, most of the people I work with or researchers, scientists, PhDs, doctors, nurses, whatever, and they go straight to the science when they try to tell me what they're working on. I can't understand what they're even talking about. I got a B.S. and B.S..
00:55:51:15 - 00:55:54:05
Cameron
You got to dumb it down for the political science major here, okay?
00:55:54:05 - 00:55:54:16
Jamey
Okay.
00:55:54:16 - 00:56:13:18
Cameron
And so you can't use a bunch of jargon. You got to use something like, I'm kind of the litmus test for. If I can understand what you're working on. Yeah, then you can probably explain it to just about anybody. But if you cannot explain what you're what you're working on, the problem you're solving, your your secret sauce, your specific solution in a way that I can understand.
00:56:13:20 - 00:56:16:10
Cameron
That's going to be a big problem. And that's a big red flag for me.
00:56:16:10 - 00:56:19:00
Jamey
There's a sales and communication aspect.
00:56:19:03 - 00:56:44:03
Cameron
Yeah, I don't even know if it's a sales aspect. It's just a like I got to talk about what I'm doing right. The second thing is I think what I look for in a biotech startup is multiple shots on goal. And by that I mean there are a the world is littered of pharma and treatments and other things where they literally had raised tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars, gotten all the way through a clinical trial.
00:56:44:03 - 00:57:10:10
Cameron
They get to phase three and it doesn't work. And if it doesn't work because the FDA doesn't approve it, or it killed some people or it didn't place clinical trials, it didn't show efficacy. Whatever it was, there's they're done. There's nothing else there. But if you can take that technology, that core technology, whatever it is, that research and apply it in multiple different ways, multiple different diseases, that decreases my risk as an investor because I know that you have multiple shots on goal.
00:57:10:12 - 00:57:11:14
Cameron
And and I also think.
00:57:11:14 - 00:57:14:20
Jamey
Some sense of meaning there's multiple applications.
00:57:15:01 - 00:57:24:15
Cameron
Correct. There's multiple diseases that you can tackle. There's indications, you know, and then there's, you know, in medicine there's this whole idea of like an off label use, you know.
00:57:24:15 - 00:57:24:23
Jamey
00:57:24:23 - 00:57:40:03
Cameron
GLP one, you know, that's all the all the hot thing. Ozempic now, you know, that that was those were all developed as diabetes drugs. Well that's great. But then they figured out oh by the way, if you start taking these you lose a lot of weight. So whether you have diabetes or not doesn't matter. People are taking them because they're losing weight.
00:57:40:05 - 00:57:48:12
Cameron
So what a great way that if if the diabetes thing didn't work out then we could just go back to let let's help people lose weight, right? Because that's going to make them more healthy.
00:57:48:12 - 00:58:05:08
Jamey
So so you're approaching it as these sort of medical farmers you've got like it's expensive to produce because you had to go through all these trials. And if there's not potentially other applications, then you could spend a lot of money. Yeah. Yeah.
00:58:05:08 - 00:58:26:01
Cameron
And I'll give you like a specific answer. There was there was a period about 20 years where there were over 150 Alzheimer's related drugs that just failed. And the big pharma companies spent billions of dollars developing those, and they acquired some startups along the way. They bought up a bunch of different technologies and for whatever reason, they didn't work.
00:58:26:04 - 00:58:41:15
Cameron
And it's a lot of different reasons. And there's there's a whole slew of research and theories on why that didn't happen. But we wasted a lot of time and money on things that didn't work. And I want to be able to take technologies that if if the if plan B doesn't or if plan doesn't work, there is a plan B and maybe a plan C and maybe a plan D.
00:58:41:17 - 00:58:50:19
Jamey
That so so there's a there's also kind of a pivot. Yes. Like the ability like is it a person or a company that has the ability to be nimble and pivot.
00:58:50:21 - 00:59:05:15
Cameron
Yep. Absolutely. And that's really hard in science sometimes. Or in these kind of venture. Yeah. Venture backed, you know, big pharma type of companies. But I think, I think the, the testament can apply anywhere. Like if plan doesn't work, how do you get to plan B?
00:59:05:15 - 00:59:21:16
Jamey
Yeah. N goes back to how do you handle failure. Yep. What's crazy is like almost everything we have discussed so far is mindset oriented. You know, versus like Uber tactical business plan. Right.
00:59:21:18 - 00:59:23:01
Trey
Plan with these six points.
00:59:23:01 - 00:59:47:09
Jamey
So so much of it is like how how do you your mindset for how you handle approach things. Which is just an interesting observation. You guys been doing it for a while. Is there any is there any has your advice changed over the years? Were there any like, assumptions you had early on that you're like, I was totally wrong about this.
00:59:47:11 - 00:59:51:18
Jamey
Or that you've pivoted from or.
00:59:51:20 - 01:00:10:01
Trey
I think that when you when you look at failure as though it's not failure, then you don't, then you then that you don't think about those early things. So I'm sure there's a ton of things that I did that I wouldn't do now, or tons of advice that I wouldn't give now. But what I, what I, somebody asked me the other day, what's the biggest failure ever had?
01:00:10:03 - 01:00:26:08
Trey
I was like, well, I mean, up until recently I never had a business fail. And I was like, well, I don't that sounds kind of arrogant. So but I went back and I started looking at the Dallas Entrepreneur Center, and I started looking through all our old folders, and I and I saw hundreds of initiatives, projects, events that we don't do anymore.
01:00:26:10 - 01:00:47:14
Trey
And it hit me and I was like, oh man, those are all failures. If you believe in failure, right? So I've lots of failures, but to me they're not. They're stepping stones to get better at what I do and how I do it. So I haven't changed. I think the only thing that's really changed from when I was 20 to when I was now, if somebody asked me, what is your what is your advice for somebody who wants to be an entrepreneur?
01:00:47:17 - 01:01:12:18
Trey
It's different now. And my advice now is unequivocally, without exception, in every single case, don't do this. Like just don't. It's it's harder than it's harder than you ever thought it would be. Anybody who has a job, anybody who works hard, I respect that. But until you have a business where it consumes where you are 100%, the ability for it to succeed or fail, you don't know what it means to to work hard.
01:01:12:18 - 01:01:22:09
Trey
And so, so you shouldn't do it. And then the second thing I say is, if you're not going to build a business because some guy told you not to do it, you don't really want to do it anyway. So it's.
01:01:22:14 - 01:01:24:23
Jamey
It's a good it's a good litmus test, but it's super.
01:01:24:23 - 01:01:36:06
Trey
Super different. Like when I was young, I would have said, oh yeah, you should try this, you should start this. But, you know, when I was young, it cost me $2,000 a month to live. Yeah. And you could do that working part time at container Store.
01:01:36:07 - 01:01:38:00
Jamey
Container Store in the U.S government.
01:01:38:02 - 01:02:02:12
Trey
Right. But so I think, I think overall nothing has changed to my advice, to the advice I give people. I just have a lot more stories behind it to to just to warrant why the advice that I give, is the right advice. And frankly, this is why I quit reading a lot of business books is, I think all business books say the same thing and just in different vernacular.
01:02:02:14 - 01:02:22:17
Trey
I don't think my advice for entrepreneurship is better than yours or yours there. For those of us that have done it, it's all the same. We just have different words for it or different experiences, or we focus on a different component or a different industry. But but overall, I think it's pretty consistent. That it's about execution.
01:02:22:19 - 01:02:41:13
Cameron
I think for me it is. And I'll take your comment a little step further. I think starting a business is probably the hardest thing most people do in their entire lives. It is extreme, difficult. And you're right, I try to talk people out of it all the time as well. I think one of the things that I've noticed that that's changed the most for me is I give the advice a lot.
01:02:41:13 - 01:03:01:00
Cameron
I sort of underestimated the power of community, and I have seen the way that a community can wrap its arms around a startup, a concept, a founder, connect them in new ways. There's this notion that you need to operate in these like thick networks, right, of there's a there is a thick network of biotech entrepreneurs. And if you're not in that network, you need to get into that network.
01:03:01:00 - 01:03:17:09
Cameron
You need to go figure that out because those people can help you. They can connect you to capital, they can connect you to staff or and future hires. They can connect you to research opportunities you maybe didn't exist. Things like government grants that that exist, a good banking relationship, whatever that may be. And you have your own network, right?
01:03:17:09 - 01:03:38:06
Cameron
Because you grew up in a neighborhood, you went to a school, you have certain things, but nobody has access to all of the network. And if you can access the network to find the missing pieces and the gaps in whatever it is you're trying to solve your startup, your your idea, your customer discovery. If you can access the network that exists in a community in a place like Fort Worth that's super friendly.
01:03:38:09 - 01:03:48:05
Cameron
Yeah, and willing to help. I think that that has really surprised me over the years, and I've done more of that than just about anybody. I'm trying to trying to build the community around this and trying to trying to.
01:03:48:06 - 01:03:55:03
Jamey
But because the communities out there, you just people don't know about it or don't pick up the phone or put themselves out there to join it, as I.
01:03:55:03 - 01:04:07:23
Cameron
Was saying, or they have their own access points to the network. Yeah, but the network is way bigger than whatever they can access, and you could be the most connected person in Fort Worth, and they're still a part of the network you don't know about, because we're a big city. If I lived in a rural community, that wouldn't be the case.
01:04:08:00 - 01:04:09:17
Cameron
Yeah, but we're in the 12 largest cities.
01:04:09:19 - 01:04:13:01
Jamey
So how do you bridge that gap like how how would you?
01:04:13:03 - 01:04:32:19
Cameron
So one of the things we did was we started an organization called Spark Yard, and it was based on this technology out of Kansas City by the parent organizations called Source Link. And this was all they did was try to connect the resources and make them available to the entrepreneurs at the right time in their development. And the timing is key, too, because, like I said, a lot of people wake up and they have an idea and they got a good reason.
01:04:32:20 - 01:04:46:15
Cameron
Venture capital know you got like 17 steps to go before you want to get to that point, before you need to get to that point. You may never get to that point. And so spark was an effort to try to find as many pieces of the network as we could and try to put it all in one place and then make it navigable.
01:04:46:15 - 01:05:11:06
Cameron
Right. We've got the Trinity River, but it's not navigable. You can't, like, take goods down it because it's just not a good river. Right? So it's there. But you have to then know how to navigate that in order to make it work for you and your startup. And every industry is different. Every problem is different. Finding that right person, that right institution, that right program that can help you in the in the most efficient way possible can be absolutely transformative for startups.
01:05:11:06 - 01:05:16:12
Cameron
And it's all here. You nobody knows where all of the network is.
01:05:16:14 - 01:05:40:04
Jamey
I love the phrase thick network. You need a I think that's really good. But I also think that goes back to that humility. Yep. Piece, you know, curiosity, piece of like, willing to take advice and, and not only take advice but to seek it out, you know, to get because and I do think that you I've mentioned it several times, but the thing you need thinking about for this people will help you, but you kind of got to ask, you got to put yourself out there.
01:05:40:05 - 01:05:48:19
Cameron
And you have to be willing to share a little bit about what it is you're trying to work on. You know, I tell you one thing drives me crazy. You don't see this in Fort Worth as much, but these people are like, oh, you got to sign an NDA.
01:05:48:21 - 01:05:49:04
Jamey
Yeah.
01:05:49:04 - 01:06:06:14
Cameron
No, I'm not going to sign an India because, yeah, we're going to university and it's going to take me three weeks and five lawyers to figure that out. Yeah. And B, if you can't describe to me the problem you're solving or your solution without using anything confidential, then you need to go figure that part out because there's a that's a good word, Cameron.
01:06:06:20 - 01:06:19:20
Cameron
There's absolutely ways where you can figure out I'm curing cancer, and I'm going to do it through these kind of, you know, nanoparticles or whatever it is. And here's my delivery mechanism. Explain to me what that is without using anything confidential.
01:06:19:20 - 01:06:20:07
Jamey
Yeah.
01:06:20:09 - 01:06:22:07
Cameron
If I'm about to. So that's a red flag.
01:06:22:09 - 01:06:23:01
Jamey
That's a red flag.
01:06:23:02 - 01:06:35:09
Cameron
That's a huge red flag. Yeah. And if I'm about to invest yeah I do want a site in India. And I want to go really deep on whatever dude your solution is. But if you can't just tell me what you're working on in a five minute conversation, introduce yourself in a place like 1 Million Cups or Startup Grind or something.
01:06:35:15 - 01:06:38:02
Cameron
You're you're going to you're really going to struggle.
01:06:38:05 - 01:07:00:15
Jamey
Yeah. That's funny. Let's talk about scaling. So someone we talked a lot about starting and getting off the ground and getting a product. So someone has a product, they're selling it. They're like I personally me like one of my job, like getting things off the ground. King of that now taking it and seeing it is a different thing.
01:07:00:15 - 01:07:18:18
Jamey
It's a different skill set. Skill set. Can you get get either about mistake cause you see people make they have a successful first location or successful first product or mistakes they make to scale it, or things that you should do when thinking about scaling and teams and all of that.
01:07:18:20 - 01:07:35:18
Trey
Sure. So I think of one mistake that they make is they forget what they did the first time. They don't repeat the customer discovery process. They think, oh, I built a company, it's SAS successful. I just need to put it in another location. It's going to be successful at that location. They didn't look at and think about, you know, location specifically.
01:07:35:18 - 01:07:50:22
Trey
If we're talking about retail location is so important for for things like that. But understanding the space and the people around there and how do they differ from the people around here. So a lot of it is just you assume and we find this a lot in investors like angel investors, they assume, oh, I built a successful biotech company.
01:07:50:22 - 01:08:12:00
Trey
So now I can go invest in and help run a marketing company. Because I'm successful it doesn't translate. It takes it takes investors a while to learn. I mean I really need to stick to investing in the areas that I know. But I think as you scale, the first problem is, is not thinking thoroughly through it as you grow.
01:08:12:00 - 01:08:32:08
Trey
I think second problem is, how do you build the team to do that? How do you change the culture in the structure of your business to make that happen? How do you finance that and fund it? How do you develop a scenario that can handle the additional resource, you know, requirements of two locations, three locations, five locations?
01:08:32:10 - 01:08:51:19
Trey
How do you do that in a way that doesn't, forget or or, not focus on your current customer base like so. So it's, it's a bunch of different steps. It's it's another side of it. And in some cases, to your point, you said I'm really good at, you know, getting it off the ground. I'm not good at scaling it a lot of times it's talent.
01:08:51:21 - 01:09:07:08
Trey
It's finding people that can come in that have done that before, specifically in that space, and say, hey, look, I know how to I know how to grow this. I know how to build this. So it's it's a I think it's a bunch of different factors. But I think, you know, and then there's different ways you can scale by organically growing.
01:09:07:08 - 01:09:23:12
Trey
You can scale by acquisition. That's a great way to grow is find companies that do similar things to you, buy them and then and grow that grow that way. It depends on what your exit strategy is. It depends on a lot of different pieces, I think. But I think the key is it's still about people, it's still about customers.
01:09:23:12 - 01:09:24:20
Trey
It's. And so you can't forget that.
01:09:24:20 - 01:09:25:13
Jamey
Don't lose sight of that.
01:09:25:13 - 01:09:45:13
Trey
One of the things that Steve Case told us when he was talking about the biggest mistake they made in the. So AOL acquired, Time Warner. It wasn't the other way around AOL or acquired Time Warner. And he said, look, that's the only thing. We were so big. We were growing so fast. The only thing we could do is buy Time Warner.
01:09:45:14 - 01:10:07:23
Trey
Like, that was our only growth opportunity. But he said the biggest mistake we made was not that was a bad business decision. It was economically inadequate or incorrect, he said. We didn't we couldn't scale our culture with as fast as it growing. We were hiring so many people every day, all the time. We lost who we were and we couldn't maintain the culture that we wanted to build.
01:10:07:23 - 01:10:28:08
Trey
And that's what caused us the biggest problem. So the other side of it is, as you interesting as you go from five people to 25 people to 50 people to 200 people, you know, are you doing that with the right culture? Are you building into your employees in such a way that they're facilitating the ongoing growth and strategy of your business?
01:10:28:08 - 01:10:48:06
Trey
Herb Kelleher used to say, all the time, my job is to invest in my employees because they'll invest. They'll handle the customers, not the customers. The most important person, my employees. So your employees being important, understanding and equipping them to be an extension of the vision that you have, the customer service scenario and relationship you have, I think that's a fundamental piece of the growth.
01:10:48:06 - 01:10:49:20
Trey
So there's a management piece too.
01:10:49:22 - 01:10:50:20
Jamey
That's good.
01:10:50:22 - 01:11:10:06
Cameron
And I would say I think it's a series of questions that the founder or the founding team needs to continue to ask themselves, which is one you can be really good at starting something. And some people are really good at starting things. Some people are really good at growing things. Some people are not good at starting things. Those are two very different things.
01:11:10:08 - 01:11:35:03
Cameron
And so I think the founding team has to ask themselves that fundamental question am I a starter or am I a grower? The second question I think you have to ask, and you see this in like the big corporate CEO world all the time. There's sort of two kinds of CEOs. There's builders and there's cutters, right? There's people who really want to grow and build things, and then there's people who want to come in and fire 10% of the workforce and make the company more profitable and look for maybe those M&A targets, things like that.
01:11:35:03 - 01:11:37:08
Cameron
Not right or wrong. It's just two different approaches. Right.
01:11:37:08 - 01:11:37:20
Jamey
Interesting.
01:11:37:20 - 01:11:53:10
Cameron
Yeah. The third thing I would say, and this is a there's a great book by a guy named Noam Wasserman called the The Founders Dilemmas. And he talks about how when you do a startup, you can, you know, you have to decide fairly early on, do I want to be rich or do I want to be king?
01:11:53:12 - 01:12:09:05
Cameron
Because those are two very different things. Right. And Mark Zuckerberg is one of the few examples where he was rich and he was king. Steve Jobs was both right. You're going to come to a point where somebody is going to offer to buy your company, and you're gonna have to decide, you know, what, do I want to keep building this because I want to be the king of the company?
01:12:09:07 - 01:12:23:20
Cameron
Or do I just want to take the money and run and go be Instagram and sell for $1 billion after a year? And again, those neither of those are right or wrong choices. You just you have to kind of ask yourself am I, do I really enjoy starting things or do I really enjoy growing and managing them.
01:12:23:21 - 01:12:35:05
Cameron
I'm a starter. I love starting new things. But when you get me to year two or year 3 or 4 and all we're doing is just maintaining spark and and doing the same thing over and over again. I kind of get bored. I kind of get tired. I want to go start the next thing. So I know that about myself.
01:12:35:05 - 01:12:40:17
Cameron
I want to start something, prove that it works, and then get someone else to grow it, get someone else to run it.
01:12:40:23 - 01:12:59:20
Trey
And in the true measure, in my experience, the true measure of whether and how good of a company you built is how how well it succeeds after you're gone. Yeah. If a company cannot exist with you out without you being there. You did a bad job. My my vision and hope is that when I leave the company, it only exceeds what I was building.
01:12:59:21 - 01:13:20:05
Trey
What I could even see for it. Because then you built a good foundation that was ripe for somebody else to come and grow it. It wasn't about you, wasn't connected to you. And that's an important piece. As you're building a company to and to think about. Yeah. How do we create an environment where because we're all expendable and we don't all like to hear that or see that, but everybody's expendable.
01:13:20:06 - 01:13:21:03
Trey
You know.
01:13:21:05 - 01:13:35:08
Cameron
Even the top guys, the top people, the founders, they are expendable. It is really. It took me a long time to realize that as well, that, somebody could do things better than you can. They can take what you've built and take it to the next step, because you may not be the right person to do that.
01:13:35:10 - 01:13:36:03
Jamey
Man, it.
01:13:36:03 - 01:13:37:14
Cameron
Takes a lot of humility to admit that to.
01:13:37:16 - 01:13:55:12
Jamey
Dropping some good nuggets. I have a couple more questions. And then Kevin, I know you got, you got to lunch. You got to get to. But this is I feel like we could do this for like an hour. Yeah. Or, and I feel like we're just scratching the surface. Let let's talk about marketing and branding. Kind of what?
01:13:55:13 - 01:14:14:23
Jamey
What separates, you know, founders who build a strong brand from those who struggle, what marketing mistakes do you see people making? Like, how do you how do you see businesses, founders, entrepreneurs, startups approach marketing and branding in a good way that wins, or an A where they flop.
01:14:15:01 - 01:14:32:13
Trey
So I think, I think you can make some mistakes. I think, some founders approach marketing and depending on the background, if the founder has, an engineering or technical background, they tend to throw all of their money in marketing because they don't understand it. Just like a marketing person is going to throw all their money at engineering because they don't understand it.
01:14:32:15 - 01:14:51:16
Trey
I think a mistake you can also make is, again, we talk about the confidence necessary in being an entrepreneur, and sometimes we allow that confidence to on the side of arrogance. Some people want to make the, the brand about themselves. And some people want to make the brand about the company. And in some cases the brand should be about themselves.
01:14:51:16 - 01:15:08:15
Trey
Right. That they are the brand and that's, there's nothing wrong with that. The other side of it is that it's not about them. And they end up going down a road where they're creating duplicity or confusion in amongst a brand. So the first the first thing is to we need, people to simplify. Simplify.
01:15:08:16 - 01:15:10:09
Jamey
What do you mean by that? Simple.
01:15:10:11 - 01:15:12:23
Trey
This is what my product or service is. And this is what?
01:15:13:01 - 01:15:15:12
Jamey
Oh, you mean how they communicate, how they.
01:15:15:12 - 01:15:18:02
Trey
Communicate, how they communicate, who they are and what they're.
01:15:18:02 - 01:15:21:15
Jamey
Doing. What what's the pitch? What's right? What's the.
01:15:21:17 - 01:15:21:23
Trey
What is.
01:15:21:23 - 01:15:22:18
Jamey
Your business? Yeah.
01:15:22:22 - 01:15:25:09
Trey
What's your one liner if you if. Well.
01:15:25:11 - 01:15:26:05
Jamey
That's a good word.
01:15:26:07 - 01:15:43:08
Trey
I think the other side of it is, finding the effective avenue for, for how you market. We did something called the, a couple of years ago. I built this knowledge, based graph that was essentially saying, all right, how do we how do we test different marketing channels? We're going to test it in this way.
01:15:43:08 - 01:16:03:10
Trey
We're going to we're going to test it. We're going to review and we're going to make decisions on when we spend our time. Most companies don't have the time, experience or money to afford to create a comprehensive omnichannel marketing strategy. Right. And that's why you that's why those are one of the things that you bring in, you know, an outside group like Sixth Avenue, like you bring somebody in that can really do that.
01:16:03:12 - 01:16:22:02
Trey
But I think fundamentally, I think you guys just do really well in the process by which you originate a contract with it, with a company. When you ask us all those questions around who we are. And so you're trying to understand that so you can effectively tell that story. I think that's a process that that somebody needs to go through as well to understand.
01:16:22:02 - 01:16:45:12
Trey
Because if, if you're I tell this to companies all the time, you have a mission statement or goal, you have something that you're building. If every single thing that you do needs to be measured against that, what is your product? What is your service? What is your mission? And if it does not fit in there, you either a should not do it or B should change the mission to fit the fact that you're completely changing or augmenting whatever, whatever it is you may do.
01:16:45:12 - 01:17:09:18
Trey
And so I think part of that is understanding who you are, effectively communicating that internally, and then figuring out how to utilize different channels that exist to build awareness, to draw leads or attraction. Like what is it about that, process that you that you need to use because that as the public face of your brand, of your culture, of your values to the world.
01:17:09:21 - 01:17:10:09
Jamey
01:17:11:05 - 01:17:24:21
Trey
And so that's how I think about it a lot with early stage stuff. Some, some people say, well, I've got to get it, you know, I've got to get a PR company to write me a press release. I personally for startups, I don't think press release press releases don't do a lot of value. They have not for my companies.
01:17:24:21 - 01:17:42:11
Trey
That doesn't mean they aren't valuable. It just means, you know, it's not as much there. And so you got to figure out those elements to make sure that you're you're developing an advertising and marketing strategy. And then I would say the second and probably more important thing is whatever that is, be consistent with it.
01:17:42:13 - 01:17:42:20
Jamey
Yeah.
01:17:42:20 - 01:17:47:12
Trey
That's good. You can't post today. And then six months from now, like whatever you decide you're going to do.
01:17:47:13 - 01:17:48:05
Jamey
Consistent.
01:17:48:05 - 01:17:49:08
Trey
Doing it. Yeah.
01:17:49:10 - 01:17:57:23
Jamey
Similar to all the other advice about three years of touring. You got to stack some hours. You got to just do it and do it and do it and do it and do it.
01:17:58:01 - 01:18:12:04
Cameron
Yeah, I would, I would echo a lot of what Trey said. It's it's keep it simple. If I can understand what you do then that's a win. Even if it's super technical, you got to dumb it down to where I can basically understand you. The other thing too, is there a lot of times I see gaps in people's marketing strategy.
01:18:12:04 - 01:18:30:00
Cameron
So we run 1 Million Cups, which meets every Wednesday at 9 a.m. right up the street from where we are recording right now. And it's a great way to just like, get in front of people and share your pitch, show them what you're marketing, show them what you're doing, and if those people don't understand it and they have questions, you have to seriously take that feedback and say like, well, that guy didn't understand.
01:18:30:00 - 01:18:52:06
Cameron
Slide seven. What's wrong with slide seven? Why do I need to fix that? Why did he have that question? And you really have to ask yourself that question so that you can better explain it so that you can better understand it. The other thing I would add, too, about social media is that's all free. Like, yeah, you can buy ads and you can hire Sixth Avenue and there will be a point where you're going to need to do all that stuff, but early on, just start putting content out there and see what sticks.
01:18:52:12 - 01:19:09:03
Cameron
I'm a huge fan of the AB test, you know, run the same ad, you know, for 100 bucks. Here's 20 bucks there, whatever it is, and just run it with a red background in a blue background and see which one gets more clicks. Posted at 9 a.m. versus 9 p.m.. Who knows. Just test it. Yeah. And then ask for feedback.
01:19:09:03 - 01:19:25:08
Cameron
Right? Go to a thing like 1 million Cups. Share it with your mom and your uncle and whoever else. Hey, does this make sense to you? No, I don't understand what that word means. Okay, that is really good feedback. I need to either find a different word or describe that word. To find that word, do something different to make it easier to understand.
01:19:25:09 - 01:19:26:12
Trey
What do you think? You're the.
01:19:26:12 - 01:19:28:07
Cameron
Expert. Yeah, I was going to say you're asking us.
01:19:28:09 - 01:19:38:20
Jamey
Well, I, I think you are right on. I am a big believer like the the story and the pitch is the most fundamental thing.
01:19:38:20 - 01:19:39:12
Cameron
Totally agree.
01:19:39:12 - 01:19:54:17
Jamey
And which is that you all have essentially what you all have said, like I think I think branding is really important. Like it's huge. It's very important. The look and feel and the color is all the stuff. But that's what people tend to think of first. And I'm like, how do you sell it? Because words are what sell things.
01:19:54:19 - 01:20:13:22
Jamey
And I see businesses all the time and it's just confusing and didn't make sense. There's no hook. It's not motivating. I got entrepreneurs to come to me and I go to their website. I'm like, I don't even know what you do have a new client. It's about to do some work like and like go to work. I'm like, I have no idea what you do.
01:20:14:00 - 01:20:22:17
Jamey
Because they don't know how to sell it. And so, yeah, I think that, you know, that's why story matters. And that's what I mean by storytelling. It's like, how do you pitch it and talk about it?
01:20:22:17 - 01:20:38:07
Cameron
So and this is what I love about what Techstars does too, is that these guys are working on their pitches all all 13 weeks of the program. Right. And these are really smart people. But you're right. They don't know how to tell the story. Yeah. And my favorite ones are the ones that start with I had a chronic pain issue that I couldn't figure out for three years.
01:20:38:07 - 01:20:38:18
Cameron
Problem.
01:20:38:18 - 01:20:39:14
Jamey
Start with problem.
01:20:39:14 - 01:20:55:06
Cameron
I got it. You're in pain. Your hip is in pain. Your leg is in pain. You have eczema. Yeah, your eyelids are gross, whatever it is. And then I'm going to go, well, that's actually that's not a joke. That's actually one of our startups. But it's a really compelling thing, right? You're going to be talking about how gross your eyelids are after you hear this guy pitch.
01:20:55:08 - 01:21:06:13
Cameron
And that's what you want is something that sticks, something that's personal and something that is a story, right? People don't buy products, they buy from people and they buy stories. And I think that's super important. That's what's memorable.
01:21:06:13 - 01:21:12:02
Jamey
Yeah I agree, okay, we got it. We might need to do round two of this at some point.
01:21:12:08 - 01:21:13:21
Cameron
All right. What time? What time is it? I'm.
01:21:13:23 - 01:21:17:14
Jamey
It is 1109 1110.
01:21:17:17 - 01:21:21:16
Cameron
Okay. We can go about ten more minutes. Ten more minutes, maybe 15. Well.
01:21:21:17 - 01:21:22:03
Speaker 3
He's all right.
01:21:22:03 - 01:21:25:04
Cameron
Oh, it's very short here. So that's why I'm having lunch with Gary.
01:21:25:04 - 01:21:27:15
Jamey
I'm sorry. We're going to. We're going to make them anyway.
01:21:27:17 - 01:21:28:20
Trey
01:21:28:22 - 01:21:55:15
Jamey
I had a few questions, but I think, okay, let's just let's just what this will be like. Kind of a final question. If you could give, like, just one bit of advice and maybe you're thinking of, like, if you could go back to yourself 20 years ago or Cameron 20 years ago, or you have like, you know, young 22 year old, if you could just like grab them by the shoulders and shake them and be like, do this one thing.
01:21:55:18 - 01:22:10:01
Jamey
What what would that you know, whether it's going back to your younger self or your you know, this is your son who wants to start a business and you're like, I'm Solomon and I'm giving you my proverbs. What would that be?
01:22:10:01 - 01:22:28:23
Cameron
So I would say, if you're if you're 22, yeah, now's the perfect time. You don't think it is because you don't have money. You maybe haven't finished your college degree or whatever. There's all these things that you can say that can hold you back. Yeah, but I'll describe what you don't have. You probably don't have a mortgage. You may or may not have a wife and a family and kids that you got to take care of.
01:22:29:01 - 01:22:54:00
Cameron
And it's really just taking care of you. And it's a great time to learn. And when you're still a student, you have so many university resources at your disposal that most people just don't even realize. And if you go in and you say, I'm a college student, will you help me? People will help you 99% of the time if you go in and you say, I'm a startup that just graduated college last week, you're just you're not as people don't help you as much.
01:22:54:00 - 01:23:00:21
Cameron
It's kind of a weird psychological thing. People love helping students. They won't help people who are just a normal, everyday Joe who graduated last week.
01:23:01:00 - 01:23:01:17
Jamey
A 40 year old.
01:23:01:17 - 01:23:25:23
Cameron
Guy. Exactly. And so I think people think that they cannot start companies when they're that age and at that at that rate. But even if that first startup is not a success, it doesn't really matter. And here's what some research at the Kauffman Foundation showed us, which kind of surprised everybody. The average age of a successful entrepreneur is between 39 and 41, depending on what what, what thing you look at, what study you look at.
01:23:26:01 - 01:23:47:19
Cameron
But getting that experience when you're in your 20s, when you're right at a school, when you're still a student is hugely valuable. You may go take a job in corporate America, and you may work for 10 or 15 years, and that's great. But when you get that, when you have that mortgage, when you have those kids, when you get that severance check because you just you get fired in a, you know, reduction of force or whatever that may look like.
01:23:47:19 - 01:24:03:18
Cameron
Yeah, that can be your startup capital. But to have that experience when you're early in your, in your career, doing all these different things and I'll kind of add to it, intern with a startup company, you're going to wear ten different hats when you're an intern a startup company. Right. And you're also going to find out, you know what?
01:24:03:18 - 01:24:19:15
Cameron
This is not for me. Or wow, this was exhilarating. I can't wait to do this work in a startup, find a way to connect with startups and just get that experience that's going to be so transformative down, down the line versus an internship where all you do is change someone's passwords all day long, or you just sit in crunch numbers like, that's not fun.
01:24:19:18 - 01:24:27:19
Cameron
Yeah, for some people it is, but that's not fun. And you need to get exposed to many different things early on as your career as, as you can.
01:24:27:21 - 01:24:33:04
Jamey
So to summarize, it would be like go for it now. You can do it now. Don't wait.
01:24:33:04 - 01:24:48:21
Cameron
Yes, because you don't have the capital because you're probably a broke college student or you're right out of school. Yeah, but you have time. And there's so much you can do that doesn't cost anything or cost a minimal amount of money. Yeah. And, and it flips as you get older. Yeah. You have more money but then you don't have the time.
01:24:48:21 - 01:24:51:10
Jamey
Get way more cautious. Yep.
01:24:51:12 - 01:24:58:17
Trey
I would have said to myself when they ask you to be the third partner in Skype, you should say yes. Yeah.
01:24:58:19 - 01:24:59:11
Jamey
Is that a true story?
01:24:59:11 - 01:25:00:22
Trey
That's a true story.
01:25:01:00 - 01:25:01:18
Speaker 3
And you said no, I.
01:25:01:18 - 01:25:02:17
Trey
Said no, but.
01:25:02:17 - 01:25:03:07
Jamey
Why do you say.
01:25:03:07 - 01:25:21:21
Trey
No? I said no because I was young and I was, I was dumb, I, I basically said, I said, you want to build this voice over IP company that I've spent a lot of time in this, like nobody's going to do that for three years. I said, second of all, your name is dumb. Third of all, you're going to get sued for copyright infringement because people are going to use the product to steal.
01:25:21:21 - 01:25:38:11
Trey
And the funny thing was, I was right in all three areas, the problem was I was 22, I had no perspective, and I thought three years was a long time. The first company I worked for sold for a bunch of money in eight months. First company I built was the fastest growing company in the history of the internet.
01:25:38:12 - 01:25:44:00
Trey
In 12 months I didn't. I had no perspective on what real, real world was. Yeah.
01:25:44:02 - 01:25:44:17
Jamey
Two funny.
01:25:44:17 - 01:26:04:14
Trey
But I would say two main things. The first thing I would say is go find somebody that can help you. Go ask for help, go find coaches, mentors, go find people that have been here and done that before and listen to them. They will save you time. They'll save you money. The second thing that I would say is you need to define what success looks like for you.
01:26:04:14 - 01:26:27:00
Trey
I think one of the biggest mistakes we make in the world is that we work in. We were we were taught that success looked like this, right. And business success is numbers number, money in the bank. When I was 21, if you would ask me what success would look like, I would have said, if I have $1 million by the time I'm 30, I'll be successful.
01:26:27:02 - 01:26:27:19
Jamey
01:26:27:20 - 01:26:43:03
Trey
I didn't realize that you can't live on $1 million for the rest of your life. I didn't know, I just thought that was my goal. And then when I went through several experiences, including, you know, Morpheus, which I told the board we should have sold Morpheus and it would have sold for a lot of money. They didn't listen.
01:26:43:03 - 01:27:11:16
Trey
They said, you don't know what you're talking about. And a lot of the other things that I went through, I realized success to me is not about how much my company sells for or how many businesses I build that reach, or how many magazine covers I'm on. Success for me was only determined by myself. I wanted to feel like I was accomplishing the visions that I was building, and that was what was important to me.
01:27:11:18 - 01:27:34:17
Trey
And if that's what was important to me, that's what I wanted to spend my time on, because I realized that I could not control the outcome of my business. I could only control my contribution to the process. So what I would say is focus on the process. Give everything you possibly can there and realize within that is success, contentment, and and satisfaction.
01:27:34:17 - 01:27:40:03
Trey
It's not just when you sell it, because I've had companies that have sold and now I've had companies that have not worked.
01:27:40:08 - 01:27:40:17
Jamey
01:27:41:08 - 01:28:03:02
Trey
I've had a lot of companies that I left after a while, but the reality was success to me, when I learned at that young age was about the contribution to the process. It's made everything that I've done successful in my mind. And I think that's important. I think creating that perspective. And if your definition of success is numbers in the bank, then know that too and go off that.
01:28:03:02 - 01:28:28:20
Trey
But don't let somebody tell you that success is one thing, when it can be something different for everybody else. And I think that perspective, that adequate and right perspective will help you as you continue to build and grow and have things not work. And if the worst thing in the world that can happen, to your point, at 22, if the worst thing in the world that could happen to you is that your idea doesn't work, that's the worst thing, and you can get okay with that.
01:28:28:22 - 01:28:30:11
Trey
You have nothing to lose.
01:28:30:11 - 01:28:31:21
Jamey
Yeah, nothing.
01:28:31:23 - 01:28:34:04
Trey
Just go do it. It didn't work. Okay, well, when you do, your.
01:28:34:04 - 01:28:35:17
Jamey
Fail proof, essentially. Yeah.
01:28:35:17 - 01:28:36:13
Trey
If I go get a job.
01:28:36:13 - 01:28:54:20
Cameron
Okay, go get a job. Yep. Mr. Kaufman's failed one of his, one of Mr. Kaufman's famous sayings was, make a job, don't take a job. But your job is always. You can always go take a job. Somebody will hire you. Especially if you're right at a school and you're still relatively cheap. The cost of failure is so much lower at that point.
01:28:54:22 - 01:29:05:11
Jamey
Fellas. Good stuff. Thank you. Good stuff. I do think we need to do round two, because this would be this is this was a lot. So many nuggets in here is really good. Love what y'all are doing.
01:29:05:13 - 01:29:06:21
Cameron
Trey makes me sound smart. So that's.
01:29:06:21 - 01:29:07:20
Speaker 3
Good. No, man.
01:29:07:20 - 01:29:13:09
Jamey
Y'all both the both of you guys. This was a lot of gold. So thanks guys. That's it.
01:29:13:10 - 01:29:14:22
Cameron
Thanks for having us. Yeah. That's fun.
01:29:15:01 - 01:29:34:05
Jamey
Congratulations. You made it all the way to the end. Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of stories with. So if you enjoyed the interview and like what you heard, please help us out and share, subscribe. And like anywhere you listen to podcasts, when you share and subscribe, it is insanely helpful and allows us to keep producing new episodes.
01:29:34:07 - 01:29:54:21
Jamey
You can always join us directly in the studio by watching the video version on our website. Sixth Ave storytelling.com stories with soul is brought to you by six App Storytelling, an organic marketing company building standout brands on the foundation of story. You're obsessed with your business, and we want to make the world obsessed with to. Thanks for listening.