Welcome back to the show my fellow extraordinary Americans. For today’s guests, we have Otis McGregor. He is an entrepreneur, leadership expert, author, speaker, podcast host, project management trainer, and a rugby coach. He was also a retired U.S. Army veteran and was part of the US Special Forces, AKA the Green Berets. In 2009, he founded LTO Enterprises LLC to help businesses win government contracts. In 2021, he rebranded LTO to become Tribe plus purpose, which focuses on creating better leaders to lead high-performing teams. 

His passion rises for helping people succeed and creating better leaders, he believes that better leaders create better organizations, better organizations create better communities and better communities create a better world. 

Some of the brands that his company has helped empower include Atlas Advisors, NTT Data Commit Foundation. And Green Beret Foundation, citizen sports, and Estero River Outfitters. He’s also a certified business performance coach and certified project director and trainer at the Institute of Project Management. Otis is an extraordinary American and I’m glad to have him on the show. Hey, Otis, are you there? 

Yes, I am Cosmo. Good to see you, man. 

Good to see you too. I’m really excited to have you on this show because you have, like, quite like quite a resume, including being in the military and all of that. 

Yeah. Yeah, it’s quite an experience I’ve had. I just have to say it was quite an honor to get to do some of the things I’ve gotten to do.

So, Otis, I know you’ve been in the military, you’ve been in a special force that you’re an entrepreneur, and you’re also the founder of Tribeless purpose. 

Can you tell us and the audience a little bit more about how you got started, like a little bit more about yourself and your back? 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I joined the army… I’ll take it one step back. I went to Texas A&M. Always got to make sure everybody knows that I’m. 

I went, I went to UT Austin, so I know how Texas A&M and UT are, just like they’re just like butting heads all the time. But yeah. 

That’s right. That’s right. Like two brothers, right? While I was there, I was in the Corps cadets, and I enlisted in the National Guard to get some experience about being a soldier before I became an officer. I was commissioned as an engineer and took my beautiful Texas bride with me to our first duty station, Fort Wayne Wright, Alaska, and learned a whole lot of environmental and life lessons in the arctic. 

It must be freezing over there, right? 

In the Arctic, a lot of weird things happen in the extreme cold. You know, the old everybody always talks about, you know, throwing the coffee up in the air and it freezes before. That’s nothing. I mean, I watch steel break in extreme cold, so I am quite experienced in building Ice bridges too. Whole other War story about that. But while there, I volunteered for special forces, and I spent the next 17/18 years as a green beret. 

I got to tell you, I deeply respect that, because I like to get to the green barrette, I have some friends in the military, who told me it’s. One of the hardest things to do. Like it requires a lot of great determination, and a lot of people even drop out. Most people cannot even do it. That’s a huge amount of respect. Like, I don’t know how you did it. But you must. Have a lot of toughness in you to like get that. 

Yeah. And then a lot of no quit in me too, if you want to get in the stall, JIC, there’s a great, great song that was written by staff Sergeant Barry Sadler in the late 60s I believe. It’s called the Ballad of the Green Berets. In that, in one of the courses, he says 100 men will test today, but only three will wear the green beret. 

Yeah, that, I mean, I don’t know what the ratio is, but it is really hard to be over there so. So, kudos to you. 

Yeah, it was a great experience. I got to work with the best of the best from the US and truthfully our partner nations because I did a lot of work with our other partner nations in Europe and some other places. 

And it was an amazing experience getting to work with the best of the best. You know, they would challenge me to always be better because they were so good at their job. I had to be good at my job. That’s where I really formed my leadership style. My understanding of how to lead my planning, my vision and those sorts of things have enabled me to do what I do today.

And you know to fill in a little bit of the gap. When I retired from the Army, one of the things I did before joining the army is I knew what I wanted to do in the army. I knew what kind of career I wanted to have. I wanted to be a Lieutenant Colonel for 20 years and then retire. Retire from the army, which is a fairly standard thing. Pretty decent career. 

Now I did that and when I retired, my only plan was to get a job and that’s…. That was a tough life lesson that I learned, and I like to refer to that, as a part of my life. I was wandering the job desert because I bounced from job to job quite literally. I never stayed with a company for more than a year. That period of my life lasted 7 years.

Ottis, you know, like there’s a lot of saying that our country does not do enough to help veterans like the transition from the military to everyday life. So, I don’t know how you feel. About like, whether that’s just or, that’s just like something that they say or if there is truth to it, you know. 

Yes and no. Here’s my thing. So, because I had so many problems and that’s why I started one of the reasons I was able to find a driving purpose. It’s because of that struggle that I went through for seven years. 

But what I do now is giving back to those soon-to-be veterans. Fellows is one of the groups that call them guys getting on active duty and help them develop their plan for what they’re going to do when they take the uniform off the transition. 

Yes, when I transitioned there was, there was really nothing. Now there’s no, I mean, I quite frankly, I call guys out. There’s no excuse because there are a lot of programs out there and there are probably 20 different programs at least; there are probably 30 really 30 different programs. For individuals leaving the service and depending on where you are and what your career field was, to help them develop a plan. 

Because I am, I am passionate about nobody making the same mistakes I did and what I like to help them do. Is to make a plan for their next adventure in life so that when they get out of the servers, when they take their uniform off and they no longer have that identity, they no longer have that mission. I help them identify that. Help them shift so they can live their life with intention and pursue their purpose to achieve their success.

But without doing what I did, which was OK. Now it’s time to get a job. It is about moving forward with intention. In a direction that you believe at the moment is correct for you. And nah man, I get fired. You can tell my voice right now. It’s a good thing I’m at my standing desk because I get fired up about this cause I’m so passionate. 

If I meet a veteran that raises his hands, is nobody helping me with the transition? I just. Smack them upside the head because their woe is me. Look at me. Look at all the problems. Shut up. There are programs out there that will help you, veterans figure out what you want to do, and how to translate your skills because they’re skills that fit into industries and communities. You just got to learn how to translate. 

And one of my favorite things to tell guys to do if you have all the skills and understanding of how to be successful. And your next life and your next adventure. But what you gotta do is learn how to translate it into that industry, language, and culture. No different than we did as green berets. When we go to Iraq, Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uganda, you name the country around the world where green berets operate. 

And the one thing that green berets bring to the table is an understanding of the language and culture of the people that they work with. It’s that same skill set that we have to use when we take the uniform off and we step into the IT industry into the manufacturing industry, medical, you name it. That’s what we have to do. We have the skills, but we have to learn to translate them and believe in ourselves that we do have those skills. 

Ottis that is amazing that is pretty inspirational it is. It is kind of one of the things I wanted to ask you and like for the audience to know, right? So you know, can you tell us the mindset and the personality required to succeed in becoming part of the green brand and how it can be applied to our practical life because?

I think a lot of the Audience can get a lot of insight into how to do that in their own life, because you know, in today’s society everybody’s complaining and whining. 

But I mean If you’re going to be part of the green beret. And you have. That mindset can be applied to. The real world. Could you share a little bit about that? 

It never quits and always accomplishes the mission. Those two things right there are key elements. And then how to be a good team leader. I like to use the phrase pick up the shovel. If a hole needs to be dug, then you ought to pick up the shovel, even if it’s not your job. It’s your team’s job to dig a hole. Let’s lend a hand. Let’s. Hey, it’s my turn. I’ll dig for a while. Give me the shovel so you don’t get worn out. If there’s only one shovel, it’s about being part of a team and leading A-Team. And it’s about getting things done without having to be told that they need to be done. 

My favorite example or not example but metaphor, if you will, of what it was like being a green beret and on a team was Monday morning we would show up and say all right, I’m the leader here on this team. So as a leader, I said all right guys, hey, this week we need to get a few things done. This, and this we’re getting some training over here. We’re going to do this, and I need 3 bags of blue powder by Friday. Wednesday afternoon I have 5 bags of blue powder. And I never had to do any follow-up. I never had to say hey, how’s it going? 

Here’s the other thing. Wednesday afternoon. That guy that is getting the blue is in charge of getting the blue bags. Only two. He’s going to come to me. And say hey Sir I got 2 bags. I’m having a little trouble with the third bag. I’m going to keep looking. I’m going to push for it. I’m just, I think I’ll get it by Friday. As you said it is close to business on Friday. But I’m not 100% certain. And then Thursday afternoon, it’s like, yeah, it’s not looking good. Friday, before the deadline, he comes to me and says, you know, Sir, it’s about a 5% chance I’m going to get this other bag. We’re going to have to do something different. That whole time he is coming to me and telling me and giving me updates as opposed to what I see in business now is as a manager, you got to go down and say, hey, what’s going on? Are you going to get that done? Let me know if Is it… How’s it coming? Can you give me an update? 

Never that way on the teams. Never that way, the guy would bust his **** to get it done. And if he’s having trouble, he would go and ask other team members. Hey man, you got any more blue bags? Can you help me out with that and would provide me updates, without me even having to ask? And only the updates and not in an annoying way, you know that too much information, e-mail sort of things like putting you on the CC line. Not in that way. In the critical points and decisions.

I’ll share with you another story of what it was like being a green beret and a special operator. This is when I was very senior in my career, and we were doing some… I was doing some operations with NATO Special Operations headquarters in Afghanistan. And my boss at the time was Admiral Bill Mcraven. We were building a coalition which was simple. 

And we had gone to Afghanistan with a bunch of commanders from other nations and our NATO special OPS headquarters. And towards the end of the time, we’ve been there for two days, towards the end of the time, the Admiral says Otis, I want you to stay here and un F this place. And I said Roger that, Sir. And when it came time for everybody to leave, everybody got on the plane. And it was at the bottom of the stairwell the ramp. It was the Admiral and myself, and he told me the same thing. I want you to UN F this. Don’t F it up, and if you have problems, call me. 

I knew exactly what to do. I knew exactly how to solve the problem. I knew what my mission was because he and I had worked together for the last two months in preparing this, and I understood everything that I needed to do. 

And that was all the guidance I needed. Go execute. You know what to do. Go execute. Call me if you need help. And I did a couple of times during that. Right. But it wasn’t this. It wasn’t this here. And I need you to do this, this, this and this and this and this and this and this. And don’t go past this without calling me because I want to check, and make sure you did all these. No. He trusted me. Had 100% trust in myself and what I was capable of doing and how I could fix things and get the job done. 

And he also knew that there might be barriers that I may not be able to overcome myself so I could call back to him for help. That’s leadership. That’s what leadership is. It’s not. Do this, this way. Go fix this, solve this problem. Bring me solutions, show me opportunities. Don’t come to me whining and complaining. 

I mean, no, I agree with you, in today’s society, there’s almost like a defeatist culture when it comes to business, especially if you’re trying to transition from the 99 to 1%. 

People have a lot of excuses, so the question for you would be how the 99 Percent would… Let’s say they want to start a business. But they’re afraid of failure altogether. How would they go about doing business and, like, get rid of all the excuses… Out of their head.

That’s a big question. First off, I don’t believe in failure. Failure is death. This BS that’s out there. Fail fast, fail forward, fail often. That sounds really pretty. Here’s the world that I came from. Failure means somebody’s dead, so I don’t believe in failure. 

I believe in moving forward and adjusting my target, not adjusting my targets, or adjusting fire. So, I’m going to teach you a little bit about artillery. Big, big bullets, right? They go up in the air and they’re ballistic. They’re not guided. They just kind of some guy way back there, 3 or 4 kilometers behind me pulls this lanyard, and this bullet, that’s this big around goes flying through the air towards the target that I’m calling for. 

And that lands; and I look at it and I go adjust fire and add 200. And he changes the mill setting on the gun, and he fires in another, and he gets really close to the target and I say adjust fire. Drop 100 and that puts them right on the target. That’s a fire for effect. That’s what success is like. 

What’s my target? Do I have clarity and what my target is? Do I know what I’m trying to achieve, what my vision of success is for myself and my business? And then I adjust my path to get there and adjusting it means OK, that didn’t work. Let’s try this. Oh, that didn’t work. Let’s try this. Oh, let me shift here. Let me try this. Let me adjust where I’m going, let me change my mouth a little bit. Let me increase the speed. Let me decrease the speed. That’s what I’m talking about. It is adjusting things. It’s not failure fear. 

Fear of failure. Keeps people from moving forward. They’re unwilling to try things, but if you don’t try things, you can never learn and improve. And I, like I said, I just don’t like the word failure because it’s a weakness. People fail and quit. I won’t fail. I adjust Fire until the rounds are on target and then that’s the whole battery coming at it and I’m running hard and hitting it hard. 

So, a quick question I would have for you is like what you’re saying: failure is death is really applicable when you’re in the military, you’re in the war zone and a mistake could lead to the death of your comrades and all of that. 

So, a lot of people would want to know how you stay calm in a high-stress situation because that’s what the green Berets would have to do. Because they have to do some of the most stressful stuff out there. But you have to be calm, because if you’re not calm, you’re more likely to mess things up, right? 

So how would you advise somebody to be calm in their practical life when it comes to business? Cause if you can do it on that level, you can do it in everyday life, right? 

Well, first off, you got to understand that stress and chaos, perception of chaos are all self-induced 100%. It’s all up here in your head, and once you understand that, then you can change your mind and say, I’m not stressed about anything. You can shift your mindset. 

And what I always tell people is when you find yourself in chaos, you find yourself in a stressed-out environment. As you know, we used to call it hair lighting in a ceremony, right? You spray lighter fluid on your hair, and you light it and you run around because your hair is on fire. Literally, right? Well, first thing, you’re doing your hair on fire, is. Smother it and cover it upright. You can survive hair, being on fire happens you know. Well, I guess you probably. 

Most people would just freak out on us. I’m. I’m just being honest with you. Most people would just not know what to do with their hair on fire. 

And you know, it’s the old stop, drop, and roll. Right. These are the things. That we have to realize and understand. So, when, when you find yourself stressed out, it’s like, all right, stop, pause, take a moment to pause and say, all right, what is stressed? What up? Why am I stressed out? 

What are these things that I’m telling myself? I have a fear of. Because that’s where stress comes from. We have a fear of something. We have a fear of the Sabertooth tiger around the corner. So, we’re stressed out. We don’t want to leave the Cave, that sort of thing. So how do we handle that? 

And it’s true that I pause. And when you pause. You take that moment. To just say, all right, what’s going on here; and you can assess the situation. When you assess the situation, you collect the information, you see it more clearly because we only see… Let me see. Let me do the math. I can’t think of the math right off the top of my head, but when we’re stressed out. We’re in fight or flight mode. That’s really what’s going on inside our body, it’s. It’s to run away from the problem or hide from the problem right? That’s literally what’s going on. 

So, if we pause. Then we can start to see other options, other opportunities. In it all. Right. Is it really that bad? We really hemorrhaged capital that bad in the. Company. Yeah, maybe. All right. Well, how do we fix it? What are some options? Because as long as I’m stressed out, I lose sleep. As the leader of the business, I’m not able to think at my best right performance. Our performance is affected by the lack of sleep, which is affected by the stress in her life, which is a choice that we make. That’s the stress that we make.

So, if we pause. And then assess the situation. Then when we assess the situation, we collect the data. When we collect the data, we can formulate some options of courses of action and then we can take those courses of action and we can analyze those and say, all right, this is the best one and we can put the plan together and move forward with that plan. 

And then continue to collect the data and continue to assess the situation. That’s how you handle it. It’s the same way you handle chaos. When you realize that things are falling apart if you just stop and breathe and take a pause and realize, is it really that bad? Is it really that bad if? My house is burning down right now. And I go, oh my God, yes, this house is burned down. I gotta get out. Right. So I step outside and what do I do? I pause and assess the situation. Oh. Crap, I need to go get my pistol. My favorite pistol. I got to go back and get it. Can I get it. Or can I not? Is my wife out? All the kids out, whatever, right, all those sorts of things, we must assess it. 

But if we’re in panic mode, which is also stress, stress, panic, fear, these things, that’s what happens. Now I’m going to take you a step back. And how did we handle it? As green berets? Those stressful situations? Training, preparation. Because when you prepare and practice for things, even if it’s not the same scenario. 

You’ve practiced enough for the known risks that when the unknown risks show up, they’re not as bad. But if you don’t prepare for the known risks, you don’t have contingencies and risk mitigation that you’ve put in into your business, and then you have a Katrina or the floods that are going on in California, you name a natural event or the Rona pandemic… you name a natural uncontrolled event that happens to your company, if you haven’t done preparation beforehand, then that is 10 times worse. 

Otherwise, if you’ve prepared and you have one of my favorite phrases in a great book, I can’t remember who wrote it, Black Swan. If you have a Black Swan event. And you’ve done all this preparation for known risks and you have an unknown Black Swan event happen. Guess who gets to take advantage of it first? Businesses and the people that are prepared. 

No, it’s still pretty true actually. I would have to add that like a sense of non-attached. Like freedom from outcome. Try to have logical situations like answer strength but also to be free from out because a lot of people are stressed when it comes to their finances going up and down. Whenever they lose money, they freak out. What you’re saying right now can be applied to that situation. 

Oh yeah and think about it in preparation. If I’m in a business that is cyclical, and I’ve got a good friend of mine who does house appraisals. And let me tell you, it was a year and a half or so ago, that guy had more work than he could do. I mean, he could. He could be working 80 hours a week easily and still not filling all the tags he was getting pushed. 

But he did something really smart and he banked it at the High Times. And even now. He’s it. It’s slowed way down, right, so he’s doing. He’s barely making the minimum that he wants to make each month. He’s barely there, but because in the high times, he planned ahead and he prepared for a known risk coming that the interest rates were eventually going to go up and the economy was going to slow down and people were going to slow down, they’re selling slow down, they’re buying slow down their refi. 

He planned for that and because he planned for that, he’s not in crisis mode because he took just a little bit off the top each month so that he’s got, he’s got a runway for the next year and 1/2. Because he did that. He planned for those peaks and valleys. And his business. 

So, if you’re in a business that does that. That’s one way of fixing it right there. If it happens, unpredictable. Like we’re in high times and then suddenly, whatever, you know, the government cancels that program that, you know, solar, solar panel installation in homes where the government canceled this big tax break that everybody got. Now my business is going down now, you know?

Those things are going to happen. So, what do you do? You slow down, you stop, you pause. You bring in your team, and you say, all right, what can we do to make this right? What can we do to continue on a path, get back on a positive path instead of a flat line or drop path of our revenue? 

It reminds me of what happened… Dave Ramsey told this story to me and about 100 other people that were at this event. And what he said was when, when the Rhona happened and everything got shut down, he brought in the team and said, all right, how do we handle this? What do we do? 

And they, he said, spent three days in the conference room, 3 days straight coming up with ideas and plans and different ways of approaching it and they didn’t panic. They didn’t go. Oh, my God. Throw their hands up in the air. They didn’t panic. Cause panic again… Remember you panic when you stress out, fight or flight are your only two options. And that’s not. 

The funniest, funniest part about 2020 when the Rhona happened was people were panicked, but not necessarily for the businesses but for toilet paper of all of the things you had to panic about that it was so ridiculous. 

Yes. Oh yeah. And you know what that was? That was well…. What are they doing? Why are they buying toilets? Oh, well, then I should buy toilet paper. And then and then you see me buying toilet paper and you’re. Like why is that guy over there? He’s got three of the Big Costco bags of toilet paper. Why is he? Buying toilet paper. 

Yeah, it was so absurd and ridiculous like I was. It was crazy, you know? But Ottis, on a different note, says that America is the land of the free and the place where dreams are made. Do you agree or disagree with that? 

Why are you even asking me that? Damn, right I agree with that. That’s why. That’s why I’ve raised my right hand. I don’t remember how many times I did, but it raised my right hand to support and defend the constitution of these great United States. 

That’s… I did that to put my life on the line because I believe in the American dream. I believe that anybody in the US, with the right edge, sees stories about this all the time. Heck, what was the kid’s name? The quarterback for Georgia. They just won the national championship. They walk on. A walk on. Oh, by the way, walk on, the kid that showed up as a freshman, right? Walk on. Go play for this JUCO over here for a year or two and then maybe we’ll talk to you. So, he walked back on. And earned his starting position. Finish the year up as a Heisman candidate who wins the national championship. How many touchdowns do these four throw passes for, or 4? Going to go off to the NFL. 

That right there tells you that this is the land of opportunity. That is just one example. How many others are there? Man, now I can’t think of the guy’s name…  the clothing guy who started sewing clothes in his mom’s kitchen. I’ve got his book over here and I’m not going to take the time to turn around and try to find it, but you know. He’s got this huge… FUBU! Fubu’s a huge brand, right? That he created. 

From his little humble beginnings, his mom worked three jobs, barely ever seeing her. But he had a vision. For success and we can all do that if we’re all clear on our vision for success. If you go through the motions in life, you will only get mediocre. Just the motion showing up, showing up and just doing the nine to five, the Dolly Parton complaining about, you know, can’t wait till it’s 5:00 o’clock. Can’t wait till Friday night. All every country song that was ever written, right? If that’s the life you want to live. Good luck. You’re going to be that guy driving to beat up old trucks drinking beer. And handed Joe your beer and said, hey, y’all, watch this because that’s the only way you get a thrill in your life. 

But if you change your attitude, take charge of your life, live with intention, have clarity in your purpose, and know what success looks like. What does right look like for you? Nothing can stop you. Nothing can stop you, because when you’re clear on your purpose, your purpose is the fuel that’s in the engine that drives you to your success. That is powerful. A powerful place to be. You’re getting me all fired up again. I’m going to start breaking a sweat here like a good Southern Baptist. 

Otis That is awesome.

And like the next question I wanted to ask because it is important for most Americans, right? Most Americans are right now trying to attain the American dream, but they feel that it is out of their reach. So from your experience in the Green Beret and also as the founder of triple purpose, how could we apply the principle that you learned from there with regard to Americans trying to realize the American dream? 

Well, first off, make sure that there’s the big umbrella of the American dream, right? Your dream. Understanding what your dream is critical. When you understand what your dream is and have clarity in your dream, then you can create a plan and when you create a plan, you can have goals and goals broken down into objectives, and objectives break down into daily tasks. What are you doing today? How are you moving closer to achieving your dream? That’s really the American dream. This is a great, big, beautiful thing, right? But the only way that you can have success is to pursue your dream, not the American dream, Your dream. What do you want to achieve? Have clarity in that Build a plan to achieve that and then do something to achieve it. Don’t just talk about it, don’t talk about it over beer and say I wish I would have. I wish I could have. Don’t be all over yourself. Go do something to achieve your own success and your own dream. 

Otis. This is amazing because you’re basically giving a solution for most people because most people are relying on the system or politicians to help solve their issues. And they’re getting angry on things that do not affect their life personally. But for what you’re saying, it’s like, you need to focus, prioritize your own dream and your own purpose and your own clarity and result. But most people don’t have that. They are looking for others to give them that. So, on and off from a national perspective. 

What would you tell most Americans how to go and focus on their own purpose? 

Have clarity in it. If you don’t know what your purpose is, experiment. Take a guess. Remember that giving is living. 

Right. 

And if you think about that in that sense, how can I as an individual have an effect on the rest of the world, what can I do to make a change? It’s not what can the government do for me? John F Kennedy ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. 

I was thinking that right now. Yeah, I mean. 

It doesn’t get any simpler than that. There’s your direction. If you are struggling with what to do if you’re sitting around waiting for somebody you know, the government check to come in. OK, if you’re satisfied with that kind of life, you go ahead. Keep doing that until the government checks run out and you keep voting for those people that will keep your checks coming. 

The rest of us are going to focus on what we want to achieve. And not in a narcissistic, selfish way. But how can I have an effect and give so everybody can succeed like my purpose? You mentioned part of my purpose early in the intro. Creating a legacy of leaders. Because great leaders create great organizations. And great organizations create great communities with great communities around the world. We will have a better world. Not for me, but for my children and my children’s children, and so on down the line. 

That’s what I believe. Create that impact, create a legacy for yourself by serving others, helping others succeed. That’s a success. Don’t sit around and wait for a damn government check to come in the mail. 

No, it’s, I mean it’s part of like extraordinary America is about us getting the motivation to like, you know, become financially free. But by going into the identity, the American identity of freedom, it seems like a lot of people have forgotten who they are Americans. You know that they were born to be free, and they did. Like, they’re born to take advantage of the opportunity for a better life. To pursue happiness altogether. 

But like, it’s pretty important to know your purpose. When it comes to the pursuit of happiness, and that is why I’m asking you this question in the 1st place, because without your purpose knowing who you are, and what you’re meant to do in this world, how are you going to pursue happiness altogether, you know. 

Yeah, yeah. And you know what? People tell me  What if this isn’t my purpose and you want to say well? What if it is? Wouldn’t you rather? Wouldn’t you rather try something as your purpose and find out it’s not than to never try at all? Think about that. Think about that, wouldn’t you rather? Think that hey, I want to be a rock’n’roll star, so I’m going to pick up the guitar and start playing the guitar. And find out that. That’s kind of fun. That’s not my purpose. 

You know, Otis, it’s interesting you say that because a lot of people tend to find their purpose to like celebrities by following celebrities rather than following their own passions and dreams. Like they want to live vicariously to other people. It’s just something I noticed in today’s society, but I think it is more meaningful if we have our own purpose altogether as you’re mentioning. 

Know well it’s no different from toilet paper. Right, my dear boy, buy toilet paper. Why did we run out of freaking toilet paper? Do you know why we ran out of toilet paper? Not because people were pooping more in their homes. That’s not why. We ran out of toilet paper because everybody is looking at everybody else buying toilet paper and therefore, I should be buying toilet paper.

Is somebody going to Walmart? And come out with a cart full of pork and beans. Guess what? If another person did that, everybody is like, oh, I got to buy some pork and beans. We got to buy pork and beans because everybody else is buying pork and beans. 

You know that old saying, keeping up with the Joneses? As long as you are comparing yourself to others, you can never be happy as long as your happiness rests in the opinion of others. You will never be happy. You are the only one that can control your happiness. You are the only one that can be the judge of your success. If you walk around in your life wondering what so and so thinks about you and what you’re doing, what you’re wearing, and how you’re acting. You want to impress them, you want them, you want them to, you know, be part of you. You know you can’t. You can’t wait to see what Bobby thinks about how I did this. 

Man, the like button. Is that like a button? Yeah, it helps. It helps in an algorithm, you know, business and information sharing out there. But if you’re putting things out there. And going man, I hope everybody likes this. Then your happiness is dependent on whomever everybody is. Don’t live that life. 

Amen. Otis Amen. 

Yeah, I agree. It’s pretty true. So, Otis, can you tell me in the audience a little bit more about tribe plus purpose and the premise of how it got started and what it does and all of that? 

So, Tribe and Purpose are focused on helping business leaders get clarity and their purpose and build a tribe around it because you can’t do it alone. There’s a great African proverb you want to do, go fast, go alone. We want to go far, go together and that’s that, right there is why we as humans. It’s in our genetics Species makeup is to be part of something. 

That’s what a tribe is about. Being around others who want you to succeed, and you want them to succeed. And we work together to succeed. That’s what the tribe is. 

And the purpose is just like we were talking about. Most people are going through the motions in life, business owners, employees, you name it, they’re just going through the motions in life. I got to do these things in order to make payroll this week. I got to do these things in order to get my Paycheck by Friday. They’re just going through the motions. I show up once the timecard does my things, and then they then go home. They don’t have any association with the business. They don’t have an association. They’re not tied to it. They’re not passionate about it. It’s not even your job. 

The thing that puts a paycheck in your bank account is not even giving you the opportunity to go and do what your purpose may be, because not everybody can get paid for their purpose, or fulfill their purpose. You can be paid to do something and be passionate about it and perform it and use that paycheck to Fulfill your purpose. And create more. And it’s that sort of thing. So, what we go back to, sorry, I was about to get in on another diatribe, what we do at driving purpose is help those business leaders get clarity in their purpose. 

Create a vision for what they want to achieve. Build a plan to achieve that vision. Build a team, their business team around that plan, and get them bought into it so that they see themselves in that vision of the business success. 

And then one of the other things I love to teach people about is that life is managed. There is no such thing as work and life balance. It’s all life. And because it’s all life, we have to manage it. We have to understand who we are. What are my categories? What’s the priority this week? What’s the priority next week? What’s the priority this month? What are my goals in this category? It’s all life. There’s no magic, there’s no work Otis and home Otis. It doesn’t exist. It’s all Otis. 

So, we teach that to businesses, and we do this. Through a program that I call team unity. And they learn the people that go through this, this program, learn how to do those things. They learn how to plan. They learn how to vision, create a vision for their business, create a vision for themselves, and make sure they’re aligned. 

What’s their purpose? Understand who they are. Oh, by the way, the GPS on your phone. That works really cool. And it’s really fun. And everybody uses it because it makes life so simple. It doesn’t work unless it knows where it is. That’s the same thing for you and your life. You cannot get to where you want to go. To achieve that success, unless you know who you are today. Who and what and where you are today is critical for you to create a vision for who, what, when, and where you want to be in the future so that you can connect the dots with the plan. That’s what we help them do. 

That is awesome. I would definitely recommend my audience to take a look at this because a lot of times people, it’s simple, it’s easy enough to say right? But it’s difficult to do like a lot of people need to know what their purpose is, like what their vision and all of that is. And most people don’t have the endpoint. You know where the GPS can go at all. So. 

Yeah, and a lot of people try to do it on their own. And you know what? More power to you! I’ve played that game myself. I’m here to tell you. You can figure it out on your own. Or you can be part of a tribe. That will help you accelerate to that success. 

That’s a pretty awesome thing because you know what, when you’re with a group of other people that are thinking the same way that you do and that desire to succeed in that desire to help you succeed. They’re going to have thoughts and ideas that you can exchange with them, and you’re going to have thoughts and ideas for how to help them. They’re going to have experienced things that maybe you haven’t experienced yet and share with you those lessons learned. 

So, then you don’t make the same mistakes they did. So that is that thing they struggled with for 18 months, guess what? You solve it in 30 days. And think about that. Think about that. You struggle by yourself. 18 months. Put your hand on your hips. I’m a ******. I figured this out. I can do this.  I’m an alpha male, right? Don’t need to ask for directions. Figure out. Can anybody help me, or can you move on to the next? Things because yeah. Joe Bob was telling me about that. He dealt with something just like that three years ago. He showed me this, this, and this. Here are the indicators I saw. I learned from Joe Bob. I saw those indicators. I put this plan together. Solved it in 30 days or less. 

And I’ve moved on and accelerated the growth of my company and accelerated the number of people that I’m bringing together and helping provide them with an opportunity to pursue their purpose and achieve their success. Man, that’s pretty cool. 

No, that’s awesome. Otis is there any project that you’re working on right now that you want the audience to get a glimpse into? 

Yeah, I’ve. I’ve got it. I’m going to share it with you two. I mentioned team Unity, which is the program that I do. So, I run that for business leaders. As I said, business leaders whose businesses are flat lined or losing revenue and we help them get their team back on board and get their revenue back on a positive slope. 

The other program I’ve got is my son running at Camden. He’s one of my coaches in the driving purpose team and it’s called next is best and next is best is focused on division retire Division One Athletes. Think of college athletes whose career is over. And they want to, they’re not sure what to do with their life. They think they want to be an entrepreneur. This is the program for them because it helps them get clarity on their purpose and how to become an entrepreneur. 

How do they not just go through and live life in Cube land for the next 30 years, but pursue something that they want to pursue and use that same energy they used as an athlete as a high-performing athlete? Into their new business. So, I’m pretty excited about those two things, those two programs. 

That is an awesome Otis. So Otis, where can our audience go to connect with you and get to know more about you and your work? 

Yeah. So the best place is tribe-purpose.com. So, you can go to tribe-purpose.com in the top right-hand corner is the get started button. You click that get started button, the first step you’re going to do is you’re going to sign up for the Monday moments newsletter.

 Monday Moments newsletter are my lessons learned from this week so that when you kick off your week next week, you’ve already got all right. Don’t do that… What Otis did. Those sorts of things and a couple of other Nuggets that you’ll really that will really help you move forward with the week and get you fired up to have, you know, move towards your success. 

The other option there is you can sign up for a call with me, do a quick call, and see if you are a good fit for team unity or possibly next is best. It’s about. It’s about helping people succeed. I want people to have success. That’s such an important part of life. Don’t go through the motions in life, man. Go to tribe-purpose.com and click the get started button. 

Otis that is exactly what makes it extra American that you want other people to succeed, and that is what this is about altogether. So yes, I really appreciate you coming to this show and I do hope that at a future time you come, you come back. It is basically an honor to interview Ottis. 

That was great. I had a blast. Cosmo, I appreciate the time and opportunity to share. 

And I want to conclude this interview by telling my fellow extraordinary Americans that, hey, there’s an extraordinary with each and every one of us. And it’s our duty to awaken it. And unleash it. For next time, bye for now.