Family Dynamics in Business Together
On this episode of Next Level American Dream, Abigail and Sean are joined by Gary Harper. He began investing in real estate in 2004 and is now the CEO of Sharper Business Solutions, taking his expertise in business systems and process management and developed a program to help real estate investors position themselves to scale their business to new levels. Gary has been an amazing mentor in our business and we were so excited to hear his perspective of how he navigates having family as employees in his company.
Key Topics
The dynamics of working with your family professionally
Roles within family businesses
Tips to make family business succeed
Connect with Gary:
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SUMMARY KEYWORDS
business, people, family, American Dream, wife, helping, work, question, son, employees, person, starts, enjoy, Jacob, dictatorship, manages, Susan, create, life, spent
SPEAKERS
Sean Thomson, Abigail Thomson, Gary Harper
Abigail Thomson 00:01
Welcome to the Next Level American Dream Podcast brought to you by Thomson Multifamily Group. Your hosts, Abigail and Sean, will discuss how you can take your American Dream to the next level, through real estate investing, business practices, and personal development. Join us as we share our experiences as a father daughter duo who are trying to accomplish our goal of financial freedom. We hope you learn more about how to define and achieve your American Dream. Here's another episode of Next Level American Dream. On today's episode of Next Level American Dream, we will be discussing the dynamics of working with family. Joining us is the biggest family man we know, Gary Harper. Gary has been an amazing mentor in our business, and we're so excited to hear his perspective of how he navigates having family as employees in his company, Gary spent 16 years as an executive in a Fortune 500 company where he handled the process of evaluating the company's operation expenses and helped them to reach new levels of efficiencies. He began investing in real estate in 2004, and is now the CEO of Sharper Business Solutions, taking his expertise in business systems and process management and developed a program to help real estate investors position themselves to scale their business to new levels. The way he views leadership, family, and work relationships is truly incredible. We're so happy that we are able to share it with you.
Sean Thomson 01:29
Hi, Gary, how you doing?
Gary Harper 01:31
Good. Good. How are you guys? Good. Good. Good.
Sean Thomson 01:34
Thanks for being on the program with us. We appreciate it. We're gonna just dive right in. If that's okay,
Abigail Thomson 01:40
So Gary, your business is centered around a lot of family. And the main core of what you guys do is educate and help others develop out their businesses, and especially entrepreneurs, so kind of tell me what really motivated you to go on that path and not do something else?
Gary Harper 02:01
Well, I mean, I think it comes from a love of people, you know, I, I want to help as many people as we can, and, and that starts right there in the middle of my center, right? My center being my family, and who, you know, Bible's clear for me anyway, you know, it says, a man that helps the world that doesn't help his own families worse than an infidel. And so for me, I want to truly impact the people that are closest to me, right? Do I want to help other people? Absolutely. But at the same time, I don't want to neglect the people who mean the most to me either, right? And so I hear a lot of entrepreneurs in the world talk a lot about, you know, business and success in business and what that looks like. And I don't think a business is truly successful, if you're not successful within the walls of your home. You know, and I think it's, I think it's just pretending that it's success, because we can have success inside the walls, your home. Really, what success are you having outside the walls of your home? You know, and I know, monetarily, people can call it consider that success. I think success transcends money. And I think money is a very small component riches, a very small component of what success truly is. And so that's why I mean, the answer your question is just a matter of wanting to help others, and starting with people right within my walls first,
Abigail Thomson 03:13
yeah. You're the only person I know that has as many family members in your business. Could you just tell me who all is in your family that is also in your business? And then kind of what roles do they play?
Gary Harper 03:26
Sure. So when the business started was we you know, it's things have evolved. When we first started, it was first and foremost, it was my wife. And my wife and I, and my wife was a teacher for many years. And then she moved into retirement after teaching for over 17 years. And then and then I walked away from real estate, and we started this business. This is actually named after her, it's Sharper Business Solutions. Susan's name is Susan Harper. And so when I was looking at center email one day on her Gmail, and she had S Harper you know, as part of the initial are part of the email and it was more than just that to send the email but I saw that as Harper and thought to myself, man, I spell sharper, right. And it was just a thought I had that time and then actually a good friend of mine suggested that I use it to actually create it as the business name when I was thinking of names for the business. I thought to myself, you know, if if Susan the decision to marry her was the best decision I ever made, why not name the business after right and not knowing that it wouldn't just be named after her she would play an integral role in it as well. Susan does a what we call an integrator within our business and and she integrates the processes systems and the people within the business and and in the honestly keeps me on track to do what I need to do as well. So Susan's a big part of that the other people that are in my business right out the gate was my sister in law by my wife's sister in ci bow she worked for she worked for us for a long time over two years. And she doesn't today she's she's got five young boys are under the age of 16. So all the way down to five and, and so she's trying to integrate her life right now the boys are getting older. And so it worked out really well. And it ended properly right where she just had Easter spent some time with him this past week, good friends of ours and still family. And so she was in our business. My wife's cousin Austin is our CEO. And, and he's in our business. Brandon McCurdy is my house, my wife's cousin and he, he's our chief marketing officer, my son Jacob has owns a business called shopper marketing in our business and does video editing and, and, and content creation, and mass media creation. And as my son, he's a Integrator for that company was going through it. I think, obviously, we have some plays outside of it, but we still consider family. And in the reason I consider them family, Rhonda, for example, Rhonda has been a friend of ours and, and her son has been my son's best friend, since they were kindergarteners, right? So to a degree, I've known her for over 20 years, and very, very, very much family to me. And that can be as hard as having family, right working for you is when you have long life friends working with you. And I put those in the same category as family. We had my father in law, work and my mother in law workforce and God bless her. She's She's recently passed in the last 90 days, but what a honor it was last year to be able to have my mother in law work with us in our business and, and she helped us with event planning, and he did as well. And and things like that now, you know, losing her has been hard on the family and hard on him. So, you know, obviously she doesn't work with us anymore. And Harvey's taken a break from this as well, because of that, and that time as well. So, you know, we've got my daughter, my daughter works and not as actively in our business. She's studying to be a full time nurse and studying to be a full time wife, right? It's just got her to get married. But those two she still does a lot of active duties in our business from filing to organization of files and, and she manages a lot of tasks that we put into Asana, and to a degree she manages the home front. When we're gone. We spent a lot of time on the road three to five times a week. We as we talked earlier, we travel and Amery manages and coordinates a lot of that Homefront activities for us and gets paid to do that. And so there are and that my family's made up before or immediate family members. We have a philosophy it's us for no more. That's that's always been our philosophy. But Amery, Jacob, my wife and I all work very strongly together. And then I believe, I believe that trains true balance, but can I go, can I go back just a little bit before sharper and just say this? Work is not a new thing to my family working together, just because it has a structure and title of a name of a business that generates revenue, doesn't mean that's when it started, right? Like it started when they were young. We've always worked hard together, whether it's a catering job for a wedding that my wife would do when we first started, to housework to yard work to helping other people, you know, we do a thing every Christmas, where we go and give gifts to the homeless, that's hard work, to organize, put that together. And so our families always come together and work hard together, my future son in law, who's marry my daughter in the next five weeks, he works for us, he does some financial accounting stuff for us. And he does that on a tune of about 20 hours a week. And I can tell you that, you know, I know people push away working with family. But I think it's because we don't take time to enjoy family. And we talk about culture in a business, what better culture than the culture that you help create your own family? And I think that people struggle with culture. I mean, people in their family. You know, I think I think they struggle with culture.
Abigail Thomson 08:48
Yeah, and I love the way you put those, a lot of people kind of dismiss the idea of working with family because they don't see it the way you do. And I love how your perspective of you guys have worked together, even in the small activities of cleaning up a household. They're not going to translate into how you develop and run your business behind that too.
Sean Thomson 09:15
Sorry, just tell me a little bit about so you have so many family members in your in your business now. How do you decide if that's a good idea? And and sort of how do you figure out okay, so we need this help in our business. We think this person in our founder can do that job. And then how do you kind of go through that process of deciding that it's a good idea and then what roles to put them?
Gary Harper 09:37
Yeah, you know, first question is how do you decide I decide this decision starts with you? It starts with you evaluating you. I think that's where a lot of things in life start starts with us. The first person you have to ask if you can lead isn't your sister isn't your brother isn't your wife isn't your daughter is in your son? It's you. Do you lead you well? Right. Are you disciplined? Enough to discipline you? Are you disciplined enough to lead yourself? And? And I'm going to tell you, I think if you could you can answer this question of whether or not you should have family and your business relatively easy. And it's answering it in a way of answering. The question is, are you a dictator? Or are you a leader? Okay, dictatorship is about you. It's about people doing what you want done. That leadership's not about you. It's about it's about helping other people achieve a common goal.
Sean Thomson 10:31
And so, the core mission is critical. So a core mission being, like you said, as a dictator, you're just like you said, it's about you. But as a leader, it's about a mission, right?
Gary Harper 10:48
Yeah, honestly, they're both they're both towards a core mission. It's just how you're getting people to that core mission is dictatorship versus leadership. Are you pulling people towards a core mission? Are you lifting them up towards that core mission? Right? Are you helping? Are you helping to imbalance are to embrace their balance? Or you're helping to embrace their core strengths? Are you trying to use them to get you stronger? Right, so it's a statement I say all the time? Are you using your business to build your people? Are you using your people to build your business? Which one do you want? You either use people to build a business or use your business to build people? You don't? You don't have both? You can't do both? And so you have to answer that question. Like, from a family perspective, if I am using my family to build my business, they're not going to work for you very long. They're gonna get sick of it, they're gonna move on. But if you're using your business to build your family, that's a whole different thing. Yeah, I sit down with Jake, I sit down with amarin sit down with Susan, I asked him, What do you want to get out of this? What's your goals? What do you want to accomplish? Where do you want to be in three to five years? I don't sit down with them. And I say, this is a company's goals and vision, can you make that happen, because that's using them to build my business, if you sit down with them and say, I would like to know where you want to be, and then get those people to align with a common goal to that you can, you can both win. In other words, if they're, if they're driving to their goal of life, by getting to the goal, the business, then they're going to want to be a part of that. And if they're not, and they're just being used to get to a common goal. They'll do that for a while, but it's gonna fray the relationship, it's going to fray their attitude on it, and they're not going to give it their all. And so I think you got it, you know, you can a guy can look a woman, gentlemen, whoever they look at the way they run their family the same way they could look at it very quickly and go, do I do I develop my people, my kids, my family? Or do I am I trying to always constantly push them to get something I want done? Yeah, because dictatorship doesn't know boundaries. Right? It doesn't know boundaries, it doesn't stop just because of the business. You know, that, oh, we're in a business. So dictatorships here, but it's not at home. If there's dictatorship at the office, there's dictatorship in that person's home. And it's usually that mentality that drives kids away. It's usually that mentality, it dries, relationships, the fray that because it's a very, it's a very taker mentality. And people don't do well with being taken advantage of for long periods of time. Right.
Sean Thomson 13:26
Yeah, that leads into my next question. So you know, hiring and firing at salaries and, you know, all those conversations that you have to have with people that you're that you're bringing into your your business employees. Those are complicated conversations to have but just an employee, that isn't part of your family. What do you do differently when you're having those conversations with a family member versus, you know, an employee that you're bringing in? Is that how do you handle those those difficult issues?
Gary Harper 13:52
Yeah, I think that's the problem. People think there is a difference. And I don't see it any different, whether your family or the person coming off the street working for me, I'm still sitting down going, what are your goals? Where would you like to be? How do you see working here and you get to where you want to be? You know, and then by the way, here's what this business needs in order for be successful? And does that align with what your needs are? If this business needs are for you to work 40 hours a week, but you can only work 30 is that in the best interest of that person? And
Sean Thomson 14:25
it's not. Right, you could have pretty much the same it's a core philosophy. Yeah, that you apply to both family members or non family members that you're bringing into your business. Oh,
Gary Harper 14:36
yeah. And because when you're truly making a decision based on value versus profit, then you're going to evaluate people the same way. Now, I will tell you in the years of doing this that I haven't mixed, the two are got, you know, my mind set off at times and, and got more profit driven than people driven, but it's it's a rebalancing that needs to happen and anytime I've ever worked at somebody work for me that they walked away and they were mad. And it didn't end well is because I put profit over value for them. Right? For sure, you know. And so like, that's why I say success isn't measured by just money. It's measured by many other things. And it starts with value and success of value, you know, whether Shawn Will you know, me whether it's working with a new client, or helping my family, like, if I have a new client come in, I don't want one of these, I do this. So I stay away from the whole guru title. But if a client hires me, I don't ask for payment until we're done. Right, like my big ticket price. I know my power days, like I asked for a seat deposit so that I don't lose, you know, they don't walk away the day before, and, and then we lose the opportunity to help somebody else. But outside of that, I don't. And that's only, you know, a percentage of the whole thing. I don't ask for the final payment until I've actually delivered the product. The risk is all on me. Because it's a mindset of like, did I deliver value? Yeah. And honestly, I feel this so strongly, Shawn, that if you don't deliver value, you have no right for payment. And same thing goes to your employees, if you don't deliver value to your people, then you have no right? To ask them to work on labor for you. Right? You just don't. And that starts with us that starts with us first, right? We have to lead us in that mindset properly. Or we have no right to hire people. Not everybody, by the way is meant to be a leader. And it's okay to have a small business. It's okay. You know, we talked about scaling, and we talked about growing your business and all those things. But listen, if you haven't led you your family's not right, your finances All right, you really don't have the right to hire and scale of this yet.
Sean Thomson 16:45
I struggle with some of them, and you know me pretty well. And I like working with Abbie and I like having my wife around and things like that. I'm not a big manager, like I just don't like to manage other people, I, I'm a little bit of a dictator, like you said, You know, I just sort of say, here's your job, you know, go to your job and things like that. But I am a very value driven person. So I, I'm always trying to conceive of what value am I bring it to every situation. And I've never really thought of it the way you're describing it. Now. When it comes to dealing with employees, I tend to see employees as not helping me get to where I want to go. But I don't necessarily think that employee and and my goals align all the time. So it's sometimes I struggle with that. So I can, I can see how that would be a good core element to starting that conversation with anybody. But you know, it's difficult. I think that's a difficult thing to do sometimes, especially for me anyway. But yeah, that's a good way to look at it.
Gary Harper 17:37
I appreciate the fact that I do feel like I know you, but I'm gonna disagree to a degree because I think that you do seek value in people first, right? Like, I think you're always looking to how can I deliver? How can I help? How can I help? And I honestly, it may not transcend into employees quite yet. Maybe that's a mindset shift you have to make, because, you know, I, we haven't had a relationship together. We had a lot of employees working for you. I have not seen that side. But I can I can say for example, with you, your wife, me, I can only really I don't know, obviously the depths of your relationship with your your immediate family. But I know me personally, it's always seeking to see what value you can bring to me. And so like, I think that you do that very well. Actually, I think that's probably more natural than you give your credit. yourself credit for.
Sean Thomson 18:25
I agree. Well, thank you. I appreciate that.
Gary Harper 18:29
Yeah, I definitely see that.
Abigail Thomson 18:30
something that I have and I have struggled with, especially in the past couple of weeks is finding when to stop talking about the business. So do you have any ways of compartmentalization? Do you think that sometimes having family in your business can almost impact your personal relationship with them? If you talk too much about the business or vice versa?
Sean Thomson 18:57
Your methods for separating the two?
Gary Harper 18:59
well, I do I think there's they definitely I think there's boundaries that you should incorporate in your life and your business and things like that. But part of me ask the questions why why why why does that become an issue? Why is that become a problem? And I think obviously it can become unhealthy. I think anything of anything too much can become unhealthy. We eat too much good food which unhealthy, right? We we spent we I ride a roller coaster too many times at some point. It's not gonna be healthy for me to begin to. You're right, right. So like, even the fun things of life could be unhealthy. I want to drive more at the root cause of why we're asking for a balance. Okay. And and so there there usually is an underlying symptom there. Okay, that's causing someone to go listen if that's enough, right, like, and that's typically goes more towards the fact that for one person, it's more relevant, more fun, more helping them achieve their goal versus the other person in the family. It's it's like this is fine. And to some degree, but I don't want it to be everything. In other words I was saying to you is it's not there. It's not their driving force. It's not there. It's not there, why? It's not who they are. They're doing it and more times than not, they're doing it for somebody else in the family, they're doing it to help that person. And their Why is more that person than the cause, if you will, where we find somebody that doesn't want to let go of something that are constantly working, it's because that thing they're talking about, is there, why it's there. It's their purpose. It's, it's why they do what they do. It's their love of life, if you will, while the other thing is more the person that's driving or to why they're helping them because it's that the person they love is why. Right? And so again, it goes back to that initial question like, how do we make this activity we're doing to help you accomplish your purpose, your why. And so many people think that they have to have only one Why? Like, it's this is company wine. If everybody is on board with that one, why then then Shame on you. And that's, that's not realistic. Nobody's built the same. You got your house, your son or daughter, or dad and daughter, and you guys aren't built the same way. Right? You're gonna have different perspectives, you're going to have different purposes, you're going to have different drivers and different why it's activity work is just activity. That's all it is. And the question is, is this activity helping you reach your purpose, and it only becomes a problem for one party when the activity doesn't help the other person or purpose? Yeah. Now they're like, this is all we talk about. Now, even with that said, this is 100% My purpose in life, I will wholeheartedly believe that what I do is my purpose. But I have to create boundaries and everything I do too much of anything, is that healthy. So just like anything in life, time blocking is a relatively important thing. Right? You know, you have to know when to turn it off. And when not, it can be also the shot even. I'm not just talking about like having a conversation with your your daughter or your wife or a family member me my son. I have to turn it off here. Yeah, yeah. Like, because it's just unhealthy. That can become obsessive. I mean, like the point, that's all I think about, right? Like, so it's not just, you know, you're asking a question like, do we create boundaries within the walls of each other with each other? No, no, no, you don't start there. You start here. You create your own boundaries in your own head to say, I need to not think about this, from this time to this time. I need to have other acts on you to this morning, you went out on a bike, ride your bike. Yeah. And you enjoy that time and you enjoy clarity and you enjoyed the scenery and you enjoyed the exercise, and the heart rate getting up right that you enjoyed it. And you as you should, hundred percent, but you have to figure out times that aren't just riding a bike that you shut it off from here, if it shut off from here, it won't impact the lives of the person next year.
Sean Thomson 23:00
So you say time blocking, do you find that? Like we're all stuck in houses right now? Because we're the shelter in place. But so do you find that, hey, at five or six o'clock in the evening, we're just going to it's just going to become family time? Yeah, we may talk about business here and there. But the focus is going to be on spending quality time with you know, with the families that is that kind of how you do it. You say, Okay, this is this is work is over with let's move to family time, and you kind of make sure that you that's, that's a specific time family.
Gary Harper 23:28
Yeah, my seven because my whole family enjoys working. But from seven to 1011 o'clock at night, it's done. Yeah. And honestly, it can move up a little bit. It's when somebody whoever it is in the family decides This is what's my mate for dinner, and says, Hey, we're eating dinner at 530 it's done. We're done. Yeah,
Sean Thomson 23:49
it's time for family.
Gary Harper 23:50
Dinner time is the cutoff. Am I honestly my wife does a really good job. If she feels like I'm consumed for the day. We haven't had any time. No breaks at all. And it's been back to back to back to back to back all day. She's Joe holler down say, hey, Gary wearing dinner tonight. Six o'clock. Yeah, you know what that means?
Abigail Thomson 24:09
Stop working? Right?
Gary Harper 24:10
That we're done. No Turn, turn it off. And even if a conversation comes out, she'll and here's the thing because we both enjoy it conversations. So come out of time and she'll give an answer and show us like, we have to remind ourselves sometimes this will follow because we do enjoy what we do. We'll fall back into a trap of talking about something and sometimes it's her sometimes it's me and we'll just go Hey, let's let's let's table that tomorrow. How do you feel about that? Yeah, that's good. say well go back to watching the TV go back to playing him card game. You know we were playing a game late the card game lately called was it game called Jake. nine holes or golf? Is that let's go. And so hey, Jake wants you right over here call Ricardo. So this year for your chair. My son Jake is with us today. So I'm gonna just turn it on over might as well right. He sitting here listening. You know, and I think I think that's definitely a good big part of it is just time blocking the time so that you do enjoy. So you do enjoy the time. That's, that's not work. Right, right. Yeah. And so for so my routine is simple. I get up in the morning, I spent some time reading in the morning I say, time meditating more, my wife does the same thing. We do it in two separate parts of the house. Right from the go, like soon as she gets out of bed, she has she usually take shower night, I take a shower in the morning. And then we create our we have a routine in the morning, once we get up, we immediately go to work. Like immediately, like one of the first things we say to each other is work related, after we're out of bed in the morning, right? Because we need us time. Right? And so I have my time she has her time we start work at eight o'clock, we come down, we have a designated room in the house, the designated office area that we go to, we don't turn our kitchen into a work, we don't turn our living room into a workplace. We don't turn our bedroom into a workplace, we turn our office into a workplace, okay? And that's where it stays stays in that, that office, we get dressed. We don't stay in our jammies, we come downstairs, we work my work my wife got this morning, put makeup on, just like she was going to an office. And we come downstairs and we work. And we work and then we take breaks, you know throughout the day. And we take lunch sometimes together, not all the time sometimes. But as soon as she says, Hey, bring dinner at six o'clock works done. laptops are close. We're done for the night. And then we spend time with the family we played the we play golf a lot is that lets coke off and gave me a job like to play together. So that that's my thought there like time blocking is so important to me. Now will scope creep happen? Sure. But it happens in the office too. Right? Because, you know, people come downstairs or Hey, what about this? And what about my shower that I'm going to take our What about the gifts? And what about the wedding? And you know, things like that there's interruptions on both sides. But I think I hopefully that answered your question.
Abigail Thomson 27:00
Yeah, that was great.
Sean Thomson 27:01
Guys, I think we do a pretty good job of that. fxi for us, you know, and yeah, we sometimes you just get a little bit tired of one or the other either work or personally like, okay, you know, this is just shifting gears. Sometimes it's a, it's a big struggle, but I think we do a pretty good job. Our our processes is similar to what you were saying just now. So as long as I think as long as people can find a way to sort of designate Hey, like you said, dinnertime, that's it, we're going to let you know, work stops, we're going to start having personal family time. That's I think that's a good way to do it. So, Gary, tell me, are there advantages to having family members in your business? I already know your answer, probably. But that are there. Do you think there's, it's more advantageous to have family members in certain ways in your business?
Gary Harper 27:46
I think it's easier to get to the purpose quicker. You know, which is the ultimate reason for why we're doing what we're doing anyway. You know, I mean, if the reason you're doing what you're doing in life is to help you with your family. I mean, that's why I don't understand why people make that distinction or distinction. Like Well, my purpose in life, spend more time with family. So we'll bring more I mean, that's, that's far. Okay. AJ, you've, you've been working with me since How long? I mean, 12 months? It's been it's been a year. Yeah. Everybody in life in general. We've we've always worked together. Yeah. Right. I mean, that's been something we just enjoy doing. Matter of fact, most of the time when Jacob wants to spend time with me, it's like, Hey, can we go do this though? Some type of work related thing together. You know, he likes doing a lot more craft and building stuff and stuff with his hands and I more enjoy, but, you know, but even still, he's usually inviting me in. I think, I think honestly, you know, you asked that question about, like, time blocking. I think for me, it's actually sometimes the opposite. You know, where most of the time it's like the dad, the visionary, the leader, mom or dad. And, you know, the kids are like, Dad, no, we're shutting this down. Well, I mean, like, I'm resting and, you know, Jake comes up to me today. Hey, Dad, I just finished this on the computer. I want to show it to you. You know, like, my bro. I'm Rusty. He's like, Can you take a minute? You know what I mean? Like, so? It can be you know, Jacobs probably the one the family never stops. Yeah, he's the one that even at 1011 o'clock at night, I see him working on something. I'm like, What are you doing? I'm, I'm editing this video. Why? It's a lot. I don't know if I want to get because he enjoys it. Right? Yeah, that's perfect.
Sean Thomson 29:32
Yeah. So like, if you're enjoying your work, that's great.
Abigail Thomson 29:35
Yeah. And that's a great mentality to have.
Gary Harper 29:38
Yeah, you did a wedding and Saturday, right? We're not a wedding agent photo engagement photos. Right. And, and so I was done on Saturdays. My window is shorter. Okay, I'm done by wildfire. One o'clock on Saturdays. I don't work till five on Saturday. It's this timeframe and that's it right. So and so that's that's that timeframe. But what what when we when you come into liver and wanted me to look at pitcher by like nine o'clock? 10 o'clock? Yeah. And I'm like, bro, it's 10 o'clock. I'm not working, you know? And yeah, he's still gone. You know, he has a lot more energy at 20 years old than I do. Right. So like, it's a little different. But you know, I think it's just that mentality of enjoying what we do, you know? So are some kids, their kids come home and say, Hey, Dad, would you play video games? Nothing? Would you? Would you go hit the ball with me? Did we do that? Absolutely. We've done that. But now I've changed Jacobs order. He's not hitting the baseball anymore. He's editing videos, he's taking pictures, he's creating media. And so I have to still take time, like I did when I go to baseball time, and take time to willing to go spend time with him, enjoying what he's enjoying, right. And that's work. Really, that's perfect.
Abigail Thomson 30:50
So a big theme of our podcast is the American Dream and taking that to a new level. And so we like to ask all of our guests, what are you doing to take your American Dream to the next level?
Gary Harper 31:03
Well, we have a philosophy on the wall over there. And it says we rise by lifting others. Right. And so that's my goal, my goal, my to my American dream, is to help as many people as we can humanly help and actually bring value to. And so you know, I think they met. And I think the next question you might be sure to ask prior to that is define what the American Dream is for you. Right? Because what I think is my American Dream might be completely different than maybe even Jacobs, American dream, what he wants to accomplish in life. And so you start off by asking the question related to like success, and things like that. And I said, well, success, to my mind is bringing value and helping other people. And so my true American Dream is being able to do what I want, when I want with whomever I want to do it with. And fortunately for us in life, I feel like we're already there. Right? I feel like we already live the American dream, as I perceive it. Does that make sense? Yeah. So, you know, my goal is to be able to give $2.6 million back by 2026. And through helping other people and and there's certain causes, often that I wish I want to do that with, but I think that's truly the American dream. For me. I think we're very privileged people to live in America. You know, we talk we think about this pandemic that we're living through right now. And, you know, there's we can find a lot of fault in a lot of different things that are not done and not done, and a lot of people are dying and all that. But you know, the truth be told, I'd rather get this pandemic living in America than in a third world country. Yeah, chances are chances in third world countries aren't very good. And, you know, we have we have resources, we have intelligence, and we have, we have experiences here that are that can't even be measured, or even thought of, or dreamed of, in other countries. And so I, you know, I think we all have a responsibility to live out the American dream, to the fullest extent we can. And, you know, I think it's really important that we create a game plan to do just that. So I love what you guys are doing. And the questions are asking. I think it probes intelligence. I think it probes thinking, you know, the highest paid activity in the world's thinking. And hopefully, this is pro people to do that today.
Sean Thomson 33:24
Well, thanks, Gary, we, you know, we didn't need to touch on your core business. I appreciate you coming on talking about family. That's, that's a important topic to me. And I know it's important to you. So I wanted to have you on to talk about that. So if it's okay, I'd like to have you back to the talk about business processes and systems and those things you're helping people do to help them achieve their American dream and do better than their business. So we'll have you back to talk about those things at some point, too, if that's okay.
Gary Harper 33:50
Yeah. And you know, one of the things I think it would be really good if you guys are open to this, Abigail, I think, obviously, you're you're a young entrepreneur, professional as well. Jacobs the same I think, I think, you know, some type of a podcast off one one topic off on today's youth and entrepreneurship, and today's youth are the right mindset would be really good. I think. I think young people need to learn from solid well balanced, well rounded young people like I feel you and Jacob are. And so Sean, I think at some point here, maybe mean you step out of the podcast and and let them interview and and go through helping how today's today's entrepreneur might be a really good topic as well.
Abigail Thomson 34:29
Absolutely. That sounds fantastic.
Sean Thomson 34:31
That is a great idea. Great idea.
Gary Harper 34:34
I appreciate your guys's time.
Sean Thomson 34:39
so good, I guess tell the listeners how they can kind of reach out to you guys and learn more information about what you have going on.
Gary Harper 34:45
So if you're if you're looking for business coaching, if you're looking for vision planning, obviously we're on time right now change if you're not going to now know how to navigate those waters of change, and you're wanting to grow through this time. I work with one type of person right now. And that's type of person I want to work with right now is a person who wants to punch this thing in the face and not sit back and let it take control. My my statement I say I've been saying a lot over the last two weeks is if you're wanting to be a true leader and lead through this, then I want to work with you if you don't and you want to be led, then there's probably somebody else for you because you either lead or you are lead and there's no in between. So I want to help lead leaders through this been through these hard times and navigate the waters if you're it's interesting to you and how you want to navigate your business through this time, then you could go to www.sharperprocess.com or you can find us at a Sharper Business Solutions on Facebook. Or you could just reach out to me personally at gharper@sharperprocess.com.
Sean Thomson 35:41
Okay, we'll be sure to put those links to in the show comments. Absolutely. And so people can get to you. I know the work that you do is nationwide and you help a ton of people really refine their business and take it to the next level. So that's you know, that's something that we love about what you do. Well, thanks, and and Jacob now to thank you. Thank you, guys. Thanks for coming on. We appreciate you taking the time to be on our show. You know, we're just getting started. And to have someone of your caliber to come and be on the show. We really appreciate it. Yeah, guys, thanks a lot. Thanks so much.
Abigail Thomson 36:14
Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level American Dream. If you would like to learn more about what we talked about today, want to contact the team directly, or are interested in passively investing and being a part of our deal room, head over to our website at www.thomsonmultifamilygroup.com Before you go, please leave a review! Your comments help us create more episodes for you to enjoy.SUMMARY KEYWORDS
business, people, family, American Dream, wife, helping, work, question, son, employees, person, starts, enjoy, Jacob, dictatorship, manages, Susan, create, life, spent
SPEAKERS
Sean Thomson, Abigail Thomson, Gary Harper
Abigail Thomson 00:01
Welcome to the Next Level American Dream Podcast brought to you by Thomson Multifamily Group. Your hosts, Abigail and Sean, will discuss how you can take your American Dream to the next level, through real estate investing, business practices, and personal development. Join us as we share our experiences as a father daughter duo who are trying to accomplish our goal of financial freedom. We hope you learn more about how to define and achieve your American Dream. Here's another episode of Next Level American Dream. On today's episode of Next Level American Dream, we will be discussing the dynamics of working with family. Joining us is the biggest family man we know, Gary Harper. Gary has been an amazing mentor in our business, and we're so excited to hear his perspective of how he navigates having family as employees in his company, Gary spent 16 years as an executive in a Fortune 500 company where he handled the process of evaluating the company's operation expenses and helped them to reach new levels of efficiencies. He began investing in real estate in 2004, and is now the CEO of Sharper Business Solutions, taking his expertise in business systems and process management and developed a program to help real estate investors position themselves to scale their business to new levels. The way he views leadership, family, and work relationships is truly incredible. We're so happy that we are able to share it with you.
Sean Thomson 01:29
Hi, Gary, how you doing?
Gary Harper 01:31
Good. Good. How are you guys? Good. Good. Good.
Sean Thomson 01:34
Thanks for being on the program with us. We appreciate it. We're gonna just dive right in. If that's okay,
Abigail Thomson 01:40
So Gary, your business is centered around a lot of family. And the main core of what you guys do is educate and help others develop out their businesses, and especially entrepreneurs, so kind of tell me what really motivated you to go on that path and not do something else?
Gary Harper 02:01
Well, I mean, I think it comes from a love of people, you know, I, I want to help as many people as we can, and, and that starts right there in the middle of my center, right? My center being my family, and who, you know, Bible's clear for me anyway, you know, it says, a man that helps the world that doesn't help his own families worse than an infidel. And so for me, I want to truly impact the people that are closest to me, right? Do I want to help other people? Absolutely. But at the same time, I don't want to neglect the people who mean the most to me either, right? And so I hear a lot of entrepreneurs in the world talk a lot about, you know, business and success in business and what that looks like. And I don't think a business is truly successful, if you're not successful within the walls of your home. You know, and I think it's, I think it's just pretending that it's success, because we can have success inside the walls, your home. Really, what success are you having outside the walls of your home? You know, and I know, monetarily, people can call it consider that success. I think success transcends money. And I think money is a very small component riches, a very small component of what success truly is. And so that's why I mean, the answer your question is just a matter of wanting to help others, and starting with people right within my walls first,
Abigail Thomson 03:13
yeah. You're the only person I know that has as many family members in your business. Could you just tell me who all is in your family that is also in your business? And then kind of what roles do they play?
Gary Harper 03:26
Sure. So when the business started was we you know, it's things have evolved. When we first started, it was first and foremost, it was my wife. And my wife and I, and my wife was a teacher for many years. And then she moved into retirement after teaching for over 17 years. And then and then I walked away from real estate, and we started this business. This is actually named after her, it's Sharper Business Solutions. Susan's name is Susan Harper. And so when I was looking at center email one day on her Gmail, and she had S Harper you know, as part of the initial are part of the email and it was more than just that to send the email but I saw that as Harper and thought to myself, man, I spell sharper, right. And it was just a thought I had that time and then actually a good friend of mine suggested that I use it to actually create it as the business name when I was thinking of names for the business. I thought to myself, you know, if if Susan the decision to marry her was the best decision I ever made, why not name the business after right and not knowing that it wouldn't just be named after her she would play an integral role in it as well. Susan does a what we call an integrator within our business and and she integrates the processes systems and the people within the business and and in the honestly keeps me on track to do what I need to do as well. So Susan's a big part of that the other people that are in my business right out the gate was my sister in law by my wife's sister in ci bow she worked for she worked for us for a long time over two years. And she doesn't today she's she's got five young boys are under the age of 16. So all the way down to five and, and so she's trying to integrate her life right now the boys are getting older. And so it worked out really well. And it ended properly right where she just had Easter spent some time with him this past week, good friends of ours and still family. And so she was in our business. My wife's cousin Austin is our CEO. And, and he's in our business. Brandon McCurdy is my house, my wife's cousin and he, he's our chief marketing officer, my son Jacob has owns a business called shopper marketing in our business and does video editing and, and, and content creation, and mass media creation. And as my son, he's a Integrator for that company was going through it. I think, obviously, we have some plays outside of it, but we still consider family. And in the reason I consider them family, Rhonda, for example, Rhonda has been a friend of ours and, and her son has been my son's best friend, since they were kindergarteners, right? So to a degree, I've known her for over 20 years, and very, very, very much family to me. And that can be as hard as having family, right working for you is when you have long life friends working with you. And I put those in the same category as family. We had my father in law, work and my mother in law workforce and God bless her. She's She's recently passed in the last 90 days, but what a honor it was last year to be able to have my mother in law work with us in our business and, and she helped us with event planning, and he did as well. And and things like that now, you know, losing her has been hard on the family and hard on him. So, you know, obviously she doesn't work with us anymore. And Harvey's taken a break from this as well, because of that, and that time as well. So, you know, we've got my daughter, my daughter works and not as actively in our business. She's studying to be a full time nurse and studying to be a full time wife, right? It's just got her to get married. But those two she still does a lot of active duties in our business from filing to organization of files and, and she manages a lot of tasks that we put into Asana, and to a degree she manages the home front. When we're gone. We spent a lot of time on the road three to five times a week. We as we talked earlier, we travel and Amery manages and coordinates a lot of that Homefront activities for us and gets paid to do that. And so there are and that my family's made up before or immediate family members. We have a philosophy it's us for no more. That's that's always been our philosophy. But Amery, Jacob, my wife and I all work very strongly together. And then I believe, I believe that trains true balance, but can I go, can I go back just a little bit before sharper and just say this? Work is not a new thing to my family working together, just because it has a structure and title of a name of a business that generates revenue, doesn't mean that's when it started, right? Like it started when they were young. We've always worked hard together, whether it's a catering job for a wedding that my wife would do when we first started, to housework to yard work to helping other people, you know, we do a thing every Christmas, where we go and give gifts to the homeless, that's hard work, to organize, put that together. And so our families always come together and work hard together, my future son in law, who's marry my daughter in the next five weeks, he works for us, he does some financial accounting stuff for us. And he does that on a tune of about 20 hours a week. And I can tell you that, you know, I know people push away working with family. But I think it's because we don't take time to enjoy family. And we talk about culture in a business, what better culture than the culture that you help create your own family? And I think that people struggle with culture. I mean, people in their family. You know, I think I think they struggle with culture.
Abigail Thomson 08:48
Yeah, and I love the way you put those, a lot of people kind of dismiss the idea of working with family because they don't see it the way you do. And I love how your perspective of you guys have worked together, even in the small activities of cleaning up a household. They're not going to translate into how you develop and run your business behind that too.
Sean Thomson 09:15
Sorry, just tell me a little bit about so you have so many family members in your in your business now. How do you decide if that's a good idea? And and sort of how do you figure out okay, so we need this help in our business. We think this person in our founder can do that job. And then how do you kind of go through that process of deciding that it's a good idea and then what roles to put them?
Gary Harper 09:37
Yeah, you know, first question is how do you decide I decide this decision starts with you? It starts with you evaluating you. I think that's where a lot of things in life start starts with us. The first person you have to ask if you can lead isn't your sister isn't your brother isn't your wife isn't your daughter is in your son? It's you. Do you lead you well? Right. Are you disciplined? Enough to discipline you? Are you disciplined enough to lead yourself? And? And I'm going to tell you, I think if you could you can answer this question of whether or not you should have family and your business relatively easy. And it's answering it in a way of answering. The question is, are you a dictator? Or are you a leader? Okay, dictatorship is about you. It's about people doing what you want done. That leadership's not about you. It's about it's about helping other people achieve a common goal.
Sean Thomson 10:31
And so, the core mission is critical. So a core mission being, like you said, as a dictator, you're just like you said, it's about you. But as a leader, it's about a mission, right?
Gary Harper 10:48
Yeah, honestly, they're both they're both towards a core mission. It's just how you're getting people to that core mission is dictatorship versus leadership. Are you pulling people towards a core mission? Are you lifting them up towards that core mission? Right? Are you helping? Are you helping to imbalance are to embrace their balance? Or you're helping to embrace their core strengths? Are you trying to use them to get you stronger? Right, so it's a statement I say all the time? Are you using your business to build your people? Are you using your people to build your business? Which one do you want? You either use people to build a business or use your business to build people? You don't? You don't have both? You can't do both? And so you have to answer that question. Like, from a family perspective, if I am using my family to build my business, they're not going to work for you very long. They're gonna get sick of it, they're gonna move on. But if you're using your business to build your family, that's a whole different thing. Yeah, I sit down with Jake, I sit down with amarin sit down with Susan, I asked him, What do you want to get out of this? What's your goals? What do you want to accomplish? Where do you want to be in three to five years? I don't sit down with them. And I say, this is a company's goals and vision, can you make that happen, because that's using them to build my business, if you sit down with them and say, I would like to know where you want to be, and then get those people to align with a common goal to that you can, you can both win. In other words, if they're, if they're driving to their goal of life, by getting to the goal, the business, then they're going to want to be a part of that. And if they're not, and they're just being used to get to a common goal. They'll do that for a while, but it's gonna fray the relationship, it's going to fray their attitude on it, and they're not going to give it their all. And so I think you got it, you know, you can a guy can look a woman, gentlemen, whoever they look at the way they run their family the same way they could look at it very quickly and go, do I do I develop my people, my kids, my family? Or do I am I trying to always constantly push them to get something I want done? Yeah, because dictatorship doesn't know boundaries. Right? It doesn't know boundaries, it doesn't stop just because of the business. You know, that, oh, we're in a business. So dictatorships here, but it's not at home. If there's dictatorship at the office, there's dictatorship in that person's home. And it's usually that mentality that drives kids away. It's usually that mentality, it dries, relationships, the fray that because it's a very, it's a very taker mentality. And people don't do well with being taken advantage of for long periods of time. Right.
Sean Thomson 13:26
Yeah, that leads into my next question. So you know, hiring and firing at salaries and, you know, all those conversations that you have to have with people that you're that you're bringing into your your business employees. Those are complicated conversations to have but just an employee, that isn't part of your family. What do you do differently when you're having those conversations with a family member versus, you know, an employee that you're bringing in? Is that how do you handle those those difficult issues?
Gary Harper 13:52
Yeah, I think that's the problem. People think there is a difference. And I don't see it any different, whether your family or the person coming off the street working for me, I'm still sitting down going, what are your goals? Where would you like to be? How do you see working here and you get to where you want to be? You know, and then by the way, here's what this business needs in order for be successful? And does that align with what your needs are? If this business needs are for you to work 40 hours a week, but you can only work 30 is that in the best interest of that person? And
Sean Thomson 14:25
it's not. Right, you could have pretty much the same it's a core philosophy. Yeah, that you apply to both family members or non family members that you're bringing into your business. Oh,
Gary Harper 14:36
yeah. And because when you're truly making a decision based on value versus profit, then you're going to evaluate people the same way. Now, I will tell you in the years of doing this that I haven't mixed, the two are got, you know, my mind set off at times and, and got more profit driven than people driven, but it's it's a rebalancing that needs to happen and anytime I've ever worked at somebody work for me that they walked away and they were mad. And it didn't end well is because I put profit over value for them. Right? For sure, you know. And so like, that's why I say success isn't measured by just money. It's measured by many other things. And it starts with value and success of value, you know, whether Shawn Will you know, me whether it's working with a new client, or helping my family, like, if I have a new client come in, I don't want one of these, I do this. So I stay away from the whole guru title. But if a client hires me, I don't ask for payment until we're done. Right, like my big ticket price. I know my power days, like I asked for a seat deposit so that I don't lose, you know, they don't walk away the day before, and, and then we lose the opportunity to help somebody else. But outside of that, I don't. And that's only, you know, a percentage of the whole thing. I don't ask for the final payment until I've actually delivered the product. The risk is all on me. Because it's a mindset of like, did I deliver value? Yeah. And honestly, I feel this so strongly, Shawn, that if you don't deliver value, you have no right for payment. And same thing goes to your employees, if you don't deliver value to your people, then you have no right? To ask them to work on labor for you. Right? You just don't. And that starts with us that starts with us first, right? We have to lead us in that mindset properly. Or we have no right to hire people. Not everybody, by the way is meant to be a leader. And it's okay to have a small business. It's okay. You know, we talked about scaling, and we talked about growing your business and all those things. But listen, if you haven't led you your family's not right, your finances All right, you really don't have the right to hire and scale of this yet.
Sean Thomson 16:45
I struggle with some of them, and you know me pretty well. And I like working with Abbie and I like having my wife around and things like that. I'm not a big manager, like I just don't like to manage other people, I, I'm a little bit of a dictator, like you said, You know, I just sort of say, here's your job, you know, go to your job and things like that. But I am a very value driven person. So I, I'm always trying to conceive of what value am I bring it to every situation. And I've never really thought of it the way you're describing it. Now. When it comes to dealing with employees, I tend to see employees as not helping me get to where I want to go. But I don't necessarily think that employee and and my goals align all the time. So it's sometimes I struggle with that. So I can, I can see how that would be a good core element to starting that conversation with anybody. But you know, it's difficult. I think that's a difficult thing to do sometimes, especially for me anyway. But yeah, that's a good way to look at it.
Gary Harper 17:37
I appreciate the fact that I do feel like I know you, but I'm gonna disagree to a degree because I think that you do seek value in people first, right? Like, I think you're always looking to how can I deliver? How can I help? How can I help? And I honestly, it may not transcend into employees quite yet. Maybe that's a mindset shift you have to make, because, you know, I, we haven't had a relationship together. We had a lot of employees working for you. I have not seen that side. But I can I can say for example, with you, your wife, me, I can only really I don't know, obviously the depths of your relationship with your your immediate family. But I know me personally, it's always seeking to see what value you can bring to me. And so like, I think that you do that very well. Actually, I think that's probably more natural than you give your credit. yourself credit for.
Sean Thomson 18:25
I agree. Well, thank you. I appreciate that.
Gary Harper 18:29
Yeah, I definitely see that.
Abigail Thomson 18:30
something that I have and I have struggled with, especially in the past couple of weeks is finding when to stop talking about the business. So do you have any ways of compartmentalization? Do you think that sometimes having family in your business can almost impact your personal relationship with them? If you talk too much about the business or vice versa?
Sean Thomson 18:57
Your methods for separating the two?
Gary Harper 18:59
well, I do I think there's they definitely I think there's boundaries that you should incorporate in your life and your business and things like that. But part of me ask the questions why why why why does that become an issue? Why is that become a problem? And I think obviously it can become unhealthy. I think anything of anything too much can become unhealthy. We eat too much good food which unhealthy, right? We we spent we I ride a roller coaster too many times at some point. It's not gonna be healthy for me to begin to. You're right, right. So like, even the fun things of life could be unhealthy. I want to drive more at the root cause of why we're asking for a balance. Okay. And and so there there usually is an underlying symptom there. Okay, that's causing someone to go listen if that's enough, right, like, and that's typically goes more towards the fact that for one person, it's more relevant, more fun, more helping them achieve their goal versus the other person in the family. It's it's like this is fine. And to some degree, but I don't want it to be everything. In other words I was saying to you is it's not there. It's not their driving force. It's not there. It's not there, why? It's not who they are. They're doing it and more times than not, they're doing it for somebody else in the family, they're doing it to help that person. And their Why is more that person than the cause, if you will, where we find somebody that doesn't want to let go of something that are constantly working, it's because that thing they're talking about, is there, why it's there. It's their purpose. It's, it's why they do what they do. It's their love of life, if you will, while the other thing is more the person that's driving or to why they're helping them because it's that the person they love is why. Right? And so again, it goes back to that initial question like, how do we make this activity we're doing to help you accomplish your purpose, your why. And so many people think that they have to have only one Why? Like, it's this is company wine. If everybody is on board with that one, why then then Shame on you. And that's, that's not realistic. Nobody's built the same. You got your house, your son or daughter, or dad and daughter, and you guys aren't built the same way. Right? You're gonna have different perspectives, you're going to have different purposes, you're going to have different drivers and different why it's activity work is just activity. That's all it is. And the question is, is this activity helping you reach your purpose, and it only becomes a problem for one party when the activity doesn't help the other person or purpose? Yeah. Now they're like, this is all we talk about. Now, even with that said, this is 100% My purpose in life, I will wholeheartedly believe that what I do is my purpose. But I have to create boundaries and everything I do too much of anything, is that healthy. So just like anything in life, time blocking is a relatively important thing. Right? You know, you have to know when to turn it off. And when not, it can be also the shot even. I'm not just talking about like having a conversation with your your daughter or your wife or a family member me my son. I have to turn it off here. Yeah, yeah. Like, because it's just unhealthy. That can become obsessive. I mean, like the point, that's all I think about, right? Like, so it's not just, you know, you're asking a question like, do we create boundaries within the walls of each other with each other? No, no, no, you don't start there. You start here. You create your own boundaries in your own head to say, I need to not think about this, from this time to this time. I need to have other acts on you to this morning, you went out on a bike, ride your bike. Yeah. And you enjoy that time and you enjoy clarity and you enjoyed the scenery and you enjoyed the exercise, and the heart rate getting up right that you enjoyed it. And you as you should, hundred percent, but you have to figure out times that aren't just riding a bike that you shut it off from here, if it shut off from here, it won't impact the lives of the person next year.
Sean Thomson 23:00
So you say time blocking, do you find that? Like we're all stuck in houses right now? Because we're the shelter in place. But so do you find that, hey, at five or six o'clock in the evening, we're just going to it's just going to become family time? Yeah, we may talk about business here and there. But the focus is going to be on spending quality time with you know, with the families that is that kind of how you do it. You say, Okay, this is this is work is over with let's move to family time, and you kind of make sure that you that's, that's a specific time family.
Gary Harper 23:28
Yeah, my seven because my whole family enjoys working. But from seven to 1011 o'clock at night, it's done. Yeah. And honestly, it can move up a little bit. It's when somebody whoever it is in the family decides This is what's my mate for dinner, and says, Hey, we're eating dinner at 530 it's done. We're done. Yeah,
Sean Thomson 23:49
it's time for family.
Gary Harper 23:50
Dinner time is the cutoff. Am I honestly my wife does a really good job. If she feels like I'm consumed for the day. We haven't had any time. No breaks at all. And it's been back to back to back to back to back all day. She's Joe holler down say, hey, Gary wearing dinner tonight. Six o'clock. Yeah, you know what that means?
Abigail Thomson 24:09
Stop working? Right?
Gary Harper 24:10
That we're done. No Turn, turn it off. And even if a conversation comes out, she'll and here's the thing because we both enjoy it conversations. So come out of time and she'll give an answer and show us like, we have to remind ourselves sometimes this will follow because we do enjoy what we do. We'll fall back into a trap of talking about something and sometimes it's her sometimes it's me and we'll just go Hey, let's let's let's table that tomorrow. How do you feel about that? Yeah, that's good. say well go back to watching the TV go back to playing him card game. You know we were playing a game late the card game lately called was it game called Jake. nine holes or golf? Is that let's go. And so hey, Jake wants you right over here call Ricardo. So this year for your chair. My son Jake is with us today. So I'm gonna just turn it on over might as well right. He sitting here listening. You know, and I think I think that's definitely a good big part of it is just time blocking the time so that you do enjoy. So you do enjoy the time. That's, that's not work. Right, right. Yeah. And so for so my routine is simple. I get up in the morning, I spent some time reading in the morning I say, time meditating more, my wife does the same thing. We do it in two separate parts of the house. Right from the go, like soon as she gets out of bed, she has she usually take shower night, I take a shower in the morning. And then we create our we have a routine in the morning, once we get up, we immediately go to work. Like immediately, like one of the first things we say to each other is work related, after we're out of bed in the morning, right? Because we need us time. Right? And so I have my time she has her time we start work at eight o'clock, we come down, we have a designated room in the house, the designated office area that we go to, we don't turn our kitchen into a work, we don't turn our living room into a workplace. We don't turn our bedroom into a workplace, we turn our office into a workplace, okay? And that's where it stays stays in that, that office, we get dressed. We don't stay in our jammies, we come downstairs, we work my work my wife got this morning, put makeup on, just like she was going to an office. And we come downstairs and we work. And we work and then we take breaks, you know throughout the day. And we take lunch sometimes together, not all the time sometimes. But as soon as she says, Hey, bring dinner at six o'clock works done. laptops are close. We're done for the night. And then we spend time with the family we played the we play golf a lot is that lets coke off and gave me a job like to play together. So that that's my thought there like time blocking is so important to me. Now will scope creep happen? Sure. But it happens in the office too. Right? Because, you know, people come downstairs or Hey, what about this? And what about my shower that I'm going to take our What about the gifts? And what about the wedding? And you know, things like that there's interruptions on both sides. But I think I hopefully that answered your question.
Abigail Thomson 27:00
Yeah, that was great.
Sean Thomson 27:01
Guys, I think we do a pretty good job of that. fxi for us, you know, and yeah, we sometimes you just get a little bit tired of one or the other either work or personally like, okay, you know, this is just shifting gears. Sometimes it's a, it's a big struggle, but I think we do a pretty good job. Our our processes is similar to what you were saying just now. So as long as I think as long as people can find a way to sort of designate Hey, like you said, dinnertime, that's it, we're going to let you know, work stops, we're going to start having personal family time. That's I think that's a good way to do it. So, Gary, tell me, are there advantages to having family members in your business? I already know your answer, probably. But that are there. Do you think there's, it's more advantageous to have family members in certain ways in your business?
Gary Harper 27:46
I think it's easier to get to the purpose quicker. You know, which is the ultimate reason for why we're doing what we're doing anyway. You know, I mean, if the reason you're doing what you're doing in life is to help you with your family. I mean, that's why I don't understand why people make that distinction or distinction. Like Well, my purpose in life, spend more time with family. So we'll bring more I mean, that's, that's far. Okay. AJ, you've, you've been working with me since How long? I mean, 12 months? It's been it's been a year. Yeah. Everybody in life in general. We've we've always worked together. Yeah. Right. I mean, that's been something we just enjoy doing. Matter of fact, most of the time when Jacob wants to spend time with me, it's like, Hey, can we go do this though? Some type of work related thing together. You know, he likes doing a lot more craft and building stuff and stuff with his hands and I more enjoy, but, you know, but even still, he's usually inviting me in. I think, I think honestly, you know, you asked that question about, like, time blocking. I think for me, it's actually sometimes the opposite. You know, where most of the time it's like the dad, the visionary, the leader, mom or dad. And, you know, the kids are like, Dad, no, we're shutting this down. Well, I mean, like, I'm resting and, you know, Jake comes up to me today. Hey, Dad, I just finished this on the computer. I want to show it to you. You know, like, my bro. I'm Rusty. He's like, Can you take a minute? You know what I mean? Like, so? It can be you know, Jacobs probably the one the family never stops. Yeah, he's the one that even at 1011 o'clock at night, I see him working on something. I'm like, What are you doing? I'm, I'm editing this video. Why? It's a lot. I don't know if I want to get because he enjoys it. Right? Yeah, that's perfect.
Sean Thomson 29:32
Yeah. So like, if you're enjoying your work, that's great.
Abigail Thomson 29:35
Yeah. And that's a great mentality to have.
Gary Harper 29:38
Yeah, you did a wedding and Saturday, right? We're not a wedding agent photo engagement photos. Right. And, and so I was done on Saturdays. My window is shorter. Okay, I'm done by wildfire. One o'clock on Saturdays. I don't work till five on Saturday. It's this timeframe and that's it right. So and so that's that's that timeframe. But what what when we when you come into liver and wanted me to look at pitcher by like nine o'clock? 10 o'clock? Yeah. And I'm like, bro, it's 10 o'clock. I'm not working, you know? And yeah, he's still gone. You know, he has a lot more energy at 20 years old than I do. Right. So like, it's a little different. But you know, I think it's just that mentality of enjoying what we do, you know? So are some kids, their kids come home and say, Hey, Dad, would you play video games? Nothing? Would you? Would you go hit the ball with me? Did we do that? Absolutely. We've done that. But now I've changed Jacobs order. He's not hitting the baseball anymore. He's editing videos, he's taking pictures, he's creating media. And so I have to still take time, like I did when I go to baseball time, and take time to willing to go spend time with him, enjoying what he's enjoying, right. And that's work. Really, that's perfect.
Abigail Thomson 30:50
So a big theme of our podcast is the American Dream and taking that to a new level. And so we like to ask all of our guests, what are you doing to take your American Dream to the next level?
Gary Harper 31:03
Well, we have a philosophy on the wall over there. And it says we rise by lifting others. Right. And so that's my goal, my goal, my to my American dream, is to help as many people as we can humanly help and actually bring value to. And so you know, I think they met. And I think the next question you might be sure to ask prior to that is define what the American Dream is for you. Right? Because what I think is my American Dream might be completely different than maybe even Jacobs, American dream, what he wants to accomplish in life. And so you start off by asking the question related to like success, and things like that. And I said, well, success, to my mind is bringing value and helping other people. And so my true American Dream is being able to do what I want, when I want with whomever I want to do it with. And fortunately for us in life, I feel like we're already there. Right? I feel like we already live the American dream, as I perceive it. Does that make sense? Yeah. So, you know, my goal is to be able to give $2.6 million back by 2026. And through helping other people and and there's certain causes, often that I wish I want to do that with, but I think that's truly the American dream. For me. I think we're very privileged people to live in America. You know, we talk we think about this pandemic that we're living through right now. And, you know, there's we can find a lot of fault in a lot of different things that are not done and not done, and a lot of people are dying and all that. But you know, the truth be told, I'd rather get this pandemic living in America than in a third world country. Yeah, chances are chances in third world countries aren't very good. And, you know, we have we have resources, we have intelligence, and we have, we have experiences here that are that can't even be measured, or even thought of, or dreamed of, in other countries. And so I, you know, I think we all have a responsibility to live out the American dream, to the fullest extent we can. And, you know, I think it's really important that we create a game plan to do just that. So I love what you guys are doing. And the questions are asking. I think it probes intelligence. I think it probes thinking, you know, the highest paid activity in the world's thinking. And hopefully, this is pro people to do that today.
Sean Thomson 33:24
Well, thanks, Gary, we, you know, we didn't need to touch on your core business. I appreciate you coming on talking about family. That's, that's a important topic to me. And I know it's important to you. So I wanted to have you on to talk about that. So if it's okay, I'd like to have you back to the talk about business processes and systems and those things you're helping people do to help them achieve their American dream and do better than their business. So we'll have you back to talk about those things at some point, too, if that's okay.
Gary Harper 33:50
Yeah. And you know, one of the things I think it would be really good if you guys are open to this, Abigail, I think, obviously, you're you're a young entrepreneur, professional as well. Jacobs the same I think, I think, you know, some type of a podcast off one one topic off on today's youth and entrepreneurship, and today's youth are the right mindset would be really good. I think. I think young people need to learn from solid well balanced, well rounded young people like I feel you and Jacob are. And so Sean, I think at some point here, maybe mean you step out of the podcast and and let them interview and and go through helping how today's today's entrepreneur might be a really good topic as well.
Abigail Thomson 34:29
Absolutely. That sounds fantastic.
Sean Thomson 34:31
That is a great idea. Great idea.
Gary Harper 34:34
I appreciate your guys's time.
Sean Thomson 34:39
so good, I guess tell the listeners how they can kind of reach out to you guys and learn more information about what you have going on.
Gary Harper 34:45
So if you're if you're looking for business coaching, if you're looking for vision planning, obviously we're on time right now change if you're not going to now know how to navigate those waters of change, and you're wanting to grow through this time. I work with one type of person right now. And that's type of person I want to work with right now is a person who wants to punch this thing in the face and not sit back and let it take control. My my statement I say I've been saying a lot over the last two weeks is if you're wanting to be a true leader and lead through this, then I want to work with you if you don't and you want to be led, then there's probably somebody else for you because you either lead or you are lead and there's no in between. So I want to help lead leaders through this been through these hard times and navigate the waters if you're it's interesting to you and how you want to navigate your business through this time, then you could go to www.sharperprocess.com or you can find us at a Sharper Business Solutions on Facebook. Or you could just reach out to me personally at gharper@sharperprocess.com.
Sean Thomson 35:41
Okay, we'll be sure to put those links to in the show comments. Absolutely. And so people can get to you. I know the work that you do is nationwide and you help a ton of people really refine their business and take it to the next level. So that's you know, that's something that we love about what you do. Well, thanks, and and Jacob now to thank you. Thank you, guys. Thanks for coming on. We appreciate you taking the time to be on our show. You know, we're just getting started. And to have someone of your caliber to come and be on the show. We really appreciate it. Yeah, guys, thanks a lot. Thanks so much.
Abigail Thomson 36:14
Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level American Dream. If you would like to learn more about what we talked about today, want to contact the team directly, or are interested in passively investing and being a part of our deal room, head over to our website at www.thomsonmultifamilygroup.com Before you go, please leave a review! Your comments help us create more episodes for you to enjoy.