Steve Lagomarsino, an accomplished entrepreneur who has masterfully turned vision into substantial growth. Steve, president of TRC Electronics and leader of the Business Mastery Leadership Program, shares his strategic journey from securing an engineering degree to leading his father’s local business to national success.

Key to Steve’s success was his early recognition of the internet's potential, pushing beyond skeptical perspectives to harness SEO and digital marketing, exponentially expanding their customer base. His proactive approach and willingness to embrace change propelled the company from a local entity to a significant player in the electronics distribution sector, boasting $50 million in revenue. Steve emphasizes the importance of continuous personal development and empowering employees to innovate and solve problems independently. His leadership philosophy centers on cultivating an environment where mistakes are seen as growth opportunities, fostering a resilient and proactive team.

Want to learn more about Steve Lagomarsino's work? Check out their website at https://trcelectronics.com/.

Connect with Steve Lagomarsino on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephen-lagomarsino/.

Key Points with Time Stamps

• [00:02:44-00:03:20] Steve discusses the strategy behind understanding client needs to serve them better.
• [00:04:05-00:04:21] The transformative decision to build a website, initiating digital marketing strategies.
• [00:06:44-00:07:23] Steve’s leadership approach to handling business growth and his buyout of his father’s shares.
• [00:11:06-00:11:39] Emphasis on problem-solving and empowering employees to propose solutions.
• [00:14:40-00:15:22] The importance of learning from failures and fostering an environment where employees can grow through their mistakes.

Transcript

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;30;20
Craig Andrews
I was in a coma for six weeks while the doctors told my wife I was going to die. When I woke up, she told me the most fantastic story. My team kept running the business without me. Freelancers reached out to my team and said, we will do whatever it takes. As long as Craig's in the hospital. I consider that the greatest accomplishment of my career.

00;00;30;23 - 00;00;51;10
Craig Andrews
My name is Craig Andrews and this is the Leaders and Legacies podcast where we talk to leaders creating an impact beyond themselves. At the end of today's interview, I'll tell you how you can be the next leader featured on the show.

00;00;51;10 - 00;01;24;01
Craig Andrews
Today I want to welcome Steve Largomarsino Well, that's a mouthful. It's probably why he calls his podcast. the, Steve Lags Unfiltered podcast, just so you have to say, Largo Martino. But hopefully we got that right. Steve is the president of tr c electronics, and he also is, leads a business or the business Mastery Leadership program, where he gives back to, basically gives back.

00;01;24;01 - 00;01;45;08
Craig Andrews
He wants to see leaders succeed. And that's one of the reasons I'm excited to have him here. On Leaders and legacies. He's an energetic guy. He, and he's done well and he's overcome adversity. And so listen in I think there's some, some nuggets we're going to take away today from today's discussion. Steve, welcome.

00;01;45;10 - 00;01;48;15
Steve Lagomarsino
How are you doing, Craig? Thanks for having me here today.

00;01;48;17 - 00;02;07;24
Craig Andrews
I've been looking forward to it, you know, so I grew up. I grew up a little bit south of you. I grew up on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. And I was very disappointed to hear that you don't eat scrapple, but, you know, nobody's perfect. And, but, you know, I read a little bit about your story, I was really impressed.

00;02;07;26 - 00;02;10;27
Craig Andrews
so, like me, you got an engineering degree?

00;02;11;04 - 00;02;12;13
Steve Lagomarsino
Yes.

00;02;12;16 - 00;02;19;17
Craig Andrews
But you decide you didn't want to design things. You want to help serve those who do design things.

00;02;19;20 - 00;02;44;24
Steve Lagomarsino
That's right. Yeah. So when I looked at it, the opportunity. Well, if I can understand the, my clients what their needs are, I'm going to be able to better serve them. So for me, the strategy was, let's go to school, get an engineering degree, and I'm going to serve those clients, a service selling them products that they're going to need, but be able to help them and succeed in their roles better.

00;02;44;26 - 00;03;01;25
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. And so you're your business. You're a distributor. So you you don't manufacture the products, you take products other people manufacture from all different companies. And you basically find engineers that need those products and you connect them with the products.

00;03;01;28 - 00;03;20;16
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah. That's right. So, you know, you're going to find an engineer that's designing a new, new product, and they're going to need a power conversion component. That's what we sell. And we're going to guide them through the selection process to make sure they, select the ideal component for their design from a technical McCann, electrical, mechanical, commercial aspect.

00;03;20;19 - 00;03;21;22
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah.

00;03;21;25 - 00;03;29;07
Craig Andrews
Now, one of the things I saw that that was really interesting when, you know, so you graduated college in 97, is that right?

00;03;29;10 - 00;03;31;18
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah. December 27th.

00;03;31;21 - 00;03;49;29
Craig Andrews
December. Hey, I'm in December grad, so, but the but one of the things. So you get to work in 98, right? And people are just figuring out the internet. and you jumped in and you're like, there's something to be done with SEO and pay per click and all this stuff.

00;03;50;02 - 00;04;05;02
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah. It's, you got to be able to, like, in business leadership, you got to be able to have a vision. You have to be able to see the future a little bit. And when I came in, the business was working with my dad at his college, but my dad had a small business, a couple million dollars in revenue, and it was all local customers.

00;04;05;04 - 00;04;16;25
Steve Lagomarsino
And I said, dad, I think we create a website. We're going to be able to reach customers all across the country. He's like, I don't know about that. I was like, all right, I'll I'll just learn how to do it. I'll do it at night. Since you're not on board.

00;04;16;27 - 00;04;21;16
Craig Andrews
Wow. So there was no website when you joined the company? There was no website.

00;04;21;22 - 00;04;45;13
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah, we had no website. And. Well, well, the truth is that was com and a lot of businesses didn't have a website yet. They were just starting to, you know, even in my senior year, I and one of my papers I wrote that every business is going to need a website. I got an E minus on the paper, but the professor questioned whether at that time whether that was actually a legitimate case or not, whether every business was truly going to need a website or not.

00;04;45;13 - 00;04;48;01
Steve Lagomarsino
He wondered if that was really the case.

00;04;48;03 - 00;04;57;29
Craig Andrews
Oh, wow. Yeah, well, I guess there are some professions. Maybe the world's oldest profession doesn't need a website, but even psych sectors of that business have websites.

00;04;58;01 - 00;05;00;10
Steve Lagomarsino
You got to be on the internet. Yeah.

00;05;00;12 - 00;05;02;25
Craig Andrews
Wow, wow.

00;05;03;02 - 00;05;20;02
Steve Lagomarsino
So we took our first website, six pages. It's just simply getting on a map and then getting people there. how do I get people here? Oh, wow. They have all these paper clicks. It costs a penny a click. Wow. And my dad's. I said, that's a penny a click. I'm going to spend 100 bucks. Oh go ahead.

00;05;20;02 - 00;05;24;22
Steve Lagomarsino
No big deal. No risk. just go for it.

00;05;24;24 - 00;05;28;11
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. No longer a penny a click.

00;05;28;13 - 00;05;36;05
Steve Lagomarsino
now you're like, you know, you can be between like, 5 to $100 a click, depending on, on the type of search.

00;05;36;08 - 00;05;54;13
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Well, outsource software, you know, if you're in that space and you're trying to run pay per click, pay per click campaign for outsource software, you have some keywords. You're going to pay 300, 350 bucks per click. I believe in words. Yeah, insane.

00;05;54;19 - 00;05;59;00
Steve Lagomarsino
You've got to have a sales system ready to handle those leads and not waste those leads.

00;05;59;03 - 00;06;21;25
Craig Andrews
Yeah, and you better have, like, a killer message, you know that when you're paying for that click, it better be a, absolutely killer message killer landing page that converts them quickly. Yeah. Wow. So, I mean, that obviously was kind of visionary. I mean, what, you had your professor that doubted you, you had your dad that doubted you.

00;06;21;25 - 00;06;25;12
Craig Andrews
What did you see that you felt like there were missing?

00;06;25;14 - 00;06;44;04
Steve Lagomarsino
well, he said, hey. So I got my first job with sales. I was basically a sales engineer, and my dad said, just call these customers. And I said, okay, I'll go call on them. But wasted, really inefficient, calling these people and, like, how do I get them to come to me? Well, there's a way, like, what's a market better?

00;06;44;04 - 00;07;04;03
Steve Lagomarsino
And let's get a website and bring to the website and have them call in, and convert that way. And then, you know, that just was just a domino effect of steps that needed to be taken in order for that to work. And I was able to do that. And as things worked, I built. But my dad built, grew confidence in me.

00;07;04;03 - 00;07;23;04
Steve Lagomarsino
And so then he was like, give me the green light to the next thing. Next thing I just kept, you know, maybe in like ten years, my dad's running the company and maybe take it from, 2 million to about like $8 million and, but in a very profitable manner without taking any big, risks that were going to jeopardize the business.

00;07;23;06 - 00;07;28;17
Craig Andrews
and so this is basically since college, this is your only job.

00;07;28;20 - 00;07;38;29
Steve Lagomarsino
That's right. Since college, I had, multiple jobs in college, but this was my only job out of college. So I've been doing this, you know, since 19th January 1998. Full time.

00;07;39;02 - 00;07;46;06
Craig Andrews
Wow. That's cool. Yeah. And so when did your dad exit the business?

00;07;46;08 - 00;08;07;17
Steve Lagomarsino
So that was, my dad exited the business about 14 years ago. 13, 14 years ago. I exited my dad from the business. And what happened there was, you know, in leadership, we call something the leadership led, right? The whoever. If when you're in a leadership role, if you're the one running the organization, you are the lid of the organization.

00;08;07;17 - 00;08;27;10
Steve Lagomarsino
If you're not growing and developing, you kept everybody there. And what happened with my dad? My dad was was very proud of what he did with the business. He was very satisfying, was getting close to retirement and he didn't want he stopped growing and developing, and he and I kept hitting him with new ideas and new ambition to go to the next level.

00;08;27;10 - 00;08;43;04
Steve Lagomarsino
And he was he wasn't ready to do that. And he kept me. And so I had to say to my dad, hey, dad, listen, either I got to go on and do my own thing because I can't be held back, or I can buy the business from you, and then you guys can get a good retirement and exit.

00;08;43;06 - 00;09;09;15
Steve Lagomarsino
We'll get it. Value. we'll get an appraisal on a business by you for the true value of it, and we can work it out that way. Now. Sounds really logical, but was family to dad, and you got all these family members involved. There's a lot of emotion involved in that process. and then long story short, my dad sold me the business, and then we took it from 8 million to 50 million, because I was able to keep growing, develop myself.

00;09;09;17 - 00;09;29;20
Steve Lagomarsino
But the true lesson here in leadership is you're you're always the lead of the people that you're leading. You'll never produce somebody in a current role better than you unless they move on from you. You're always going to cap them. So you've got to be growing and developing as a leader. So the people you're, you're leaving room for them to continue growing and developing.

00;09;29;22 - 00;09;45;06
Craig Andrews
Yeah. Yeah. You know, Jack, she used to say that, he didn't want managers. He wanted leaders and he wanted leaders that were leading in a way where they they were running fast just so they could stay ahead of the people that they were leading.

00;09;45;08 - 00;10;06;11
Steve Lagomarsino
Great. And and I hate the word managing. You manage systems and processes and you lead people, and you can let systems in and you can let metrics manage the people. But you, like leaders need to develop and lead and coach people not and be a manager. You know, most leaders in corporate and corporate world right now are just glorified.

00;10;06;12 - 00;10;10;17
Steve Lagomarsino
They're just glorified managers and they're really not leading, developing people.

00;10;10;20 - 00;10;33;07
Craig Andrews
Yeah. You know, I've got somebody that works for me named Elena. And, years ago she came up to me and started talking and I listened. And, once she got done talking, I said, Elena, let me see if I got this right. There was a problem. You identified the problem, you fix the problem, and you're just here updating me.

00;10;33;07 - 00;10;45;23
Craig Andrews
So I know that that happened. She's like, yeah, why? Bless you. It's like, that's what we dream of, right? You know, you don't want to be involved in every decision.

00;10;45;25 - 00;11;06;22
Steve Lagomarsino
No. Yeah. So the, the the goal as a leader is to coach people and, and teach them how to think, not what to think, how to problem solve. So when someone identifies a problem, nobody is permitted in my organization to come in and just tell me about a problem. What? Okay, you've acknowledged and accepted that there's a problem.

00;11;06;22 - 00;11;39;27
Steve Lagomarsino
That's great. But every person's responsibility is come to me with three, three possible solutions that I that we can choose from, from that problem. And then which solution do you like best and why? And then when I hear that what I can do is work with them and, and, dissect the thought process on how they either came to a great conclusion or maybe not the best conclusion, and then I could train them on that, thinking that they had that maybe they missed one part of the equation and we could figure that out so that I'm ultimately empowering them to solve these problems.

00;11;39;29 - 00;11;57;20
Steve Lagomarsino
And when you're empowering them, you're allowing them to add more value to the organization and to the world, and then allows them to be more valuable, and they'll receive that value in a world. And then you're also going to be able to help other people solve problems, do the same thing, and repeat it over and over again.

00;11;57;22 - 00;12;19;21
Craig Andrews
You know, I we talked about Stephen Covey, I think back in the green room. And I actually got to hear him speak, and small theater, you know, when he was still rising up and, I got the chance to ask the question and I asked him, question him something like, wasn't it my job to, to solve problems for my team?

00;12;19;23 - 00;12;36;24
Craig Andrews
And he just laid into me, he's like, no. Yes. Absolutely no. And he described this horrible, you know, scenario where basically my team's out spending time with their family, you know, grilling burgers on the weekend while I'm in the office working because I never empowered them to solve problems.

00;12;36;26 - 00;12;59;27
Steve Lagomarsino
Yes. Right. And that's the key word is empowering them. You know, we're not abdicating it. We're we're developing them so that they can learn how to do that. But also in a business, I was in the same spot. I there was a point where it was a revolving door in my office, and I was the guy I was I was like, the problem solver, I was every problem come in, oh, this is what you do.

00;12;59;27 - 00;13;22;08
Steve Lagomarsino
This is what you do. But the truth of the matter is, I was hurting everybody that was leading when I was leading that way, because it's not leading. I was just simply fixing everything, and I was robbing everyone of the opportunity to be able to learn and ultimately add more value to the organization. And what if something happens to me and, and I disappear, like, well, who's going to solve a problem?

00;13;22;08 - 00;13;30;19
Steve Lagomarsino
How does that work for the organization and my clients? Ultimately, in a team members that are working in the in the organization, Steve's gone. We're all left. We're in trouble.

00;13;30;22 - 00;13;40;07
Craig Andrews
Yeah. So how did that change? I mean, how what happened that turned you from the constant problem solver to the one that empowered mentorship?

00;13;40;10 - 00;14;18;25
Steve Lagomarsino
It's finding the right mentor. Like, first acknowledge you. You got to acknowledge you. Recognizing acknowledge the fact that, like, I'm stuck in something is not working as well as it should. And I'm struggling in this leadership role, and I could be doing better. And, you know, when you're in that leadership role, you it's a huge responsibility when you're running a business, especially if you have 40, 50 people, 500 people, whatever you have in a business, if you have ten people, five people, you're what you decide to do and how you handle it as a leader and developing yourself as a leader affects everybody's livelihoods that are in that organization and ultimately your clients.

00;14;18;28 - 00;14;40;19
Steve Lagomarsino
So I knew I had, some opportunities to improve that. And it's okay. What am I looking for? I need to find a mentor. And what what what when the problems I'm trying to solve. And how does that look in, in another person? Like, what would they represent? And being able to visualize that. And at first I'm like, this is a unicorn.

00;14;40;19 - 00;14;50;26
Steve Lagomarsino
I'm never going to find this person. But then ultimately you track it into the world. If you keep thinking about it, you talk about it. You're going to do the things you need to do to bring that person into your world, and it ends up happening.

00;14;50;28 - 00;14;58;26
Craig Andrews
But inevitably, people make bad decisions when you let them make decisions. When you empower them to make decisions, they're going to make bad decisions.

00;14;58;28 - 00;15;22;26
Steve Lagomarsino
Yep. That's right. So John Maxwell says, what's your return on? Failure is just getting a return on failure. You only fail in life if you quit. But if you never quit, you'll never fail and you're going to fail in moments. You cannot lose games, you're going to lose a battle. But the war will never end in. You'll win the war if you just simply never quit.

00;15;22;28 - 00;15;41;17
Steve Lagomarsino
So you. This is important. As a leader, though, you have to accept that they're going to, make bad mistake. bad, bad decisions at times, but make sure that they're thinking or not. It's not reckless. Like, okay, I had a thought process and how I did it and it didn't work out okay, great. Now, what did you learn from that?

00;15;41;19 - 00;16;00;28
Steve Lagomarsino
Okay, I learned x, y, z and next. Okay. And what will you do next time or next time? I'm going to change this when I do this. Perfect. Now if someone's making the same mistake over and over again, now they're not learning and repeating it. That's not learning. But if they're learning from their mistakes and they get a return on their failure, and then they're getting better, that's a really great thing.

00;16;00;28 - 00;16;02;21
Steve Lagomarsino
That's what's called growth.

00;16;02;24 - 00;16;08;09
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. And that's.

00;16;08;12 - 00;16;19;25
Craig Andrews
That's the hard thing. You know, when when you see a failure emotion about a mistake emotion and you know, you could stop it. Right. Think that restraint to not stop it. Well yeah.

00;16;19;25 - 00;16;36;15
Steve Lagomarsino
It depends on the severity of it. Right. Know the impacts can be you know there's things that are going to hey, this is not going to be very impactful. Let's let them go through that experience. And you just watching it and you just they need to experience it. You experienced this. Let this happen. But if if you know that okay, this is going to have a severe impact.

00;16;36;18 - 00;16;51;19
Steve Lagomarsino
beyond like what we really need to okay, I got to step in and say, okay, hey, let's just take a break here. This is we're going to make it work. I'm going to make an audible right now. We're going to pivot a little bit here because this is what's happening now. Let's learn from this. Right now we have an opportunity to learn from it.

00;16;51;21 - 00;16;53;14
Craig Andrews
You know.

00;16;53;17 - 00;17;22;25
Steve Lagomarsino
But as a leader this not being emotional. The irony is business owners make a million mistakes. I watch the business owners like make mistake after mistake after mistake over and over again. Most business owners need more mistakes than any of their employees will ever make in their lifetime. You know, because you're a risk taker and you're an entrepreneur and it's just having that understanding and not bringing emotion into the equation and understand that, hey, your job there is to bring logic into it and just to help them learn from it.

00;17;22;27 - 00;17;28;15
Steve Lagomarsino
And most of the employees, they beat themselves up enough. You don't need to make them feel any worse than they already feel about it.

00;17;28;18 - 00;17;55;23
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. How so? When you're when you're mentoring somebody. How long does it take? And what does it take for them to realize that when they make a mistake it doesn't it's not the end of their job. You know, they're not going to get fired. But it's a learning experience. What do you find that you have to do to get them to that point of comfort?

00;17;55;25 - 00;18;20;02
Steve Lagomarsino
Well, everybody's unique in different. So it looks different for everybody. And you know it really depends on what are, you know, how resilient are they. You know, what's their level of resilience. Because that's going to determine how fast they can really move through that. people that lack resilience. Well, now we're we got to be building resilience that can handle that failure experience and understanding that ultimately it is part of success.

00;18;20;06 - 00;18;45;21
Steve Lagomarsino
There's no success without failure. So everyone's different. And when you're learning about, the person that you're leading and you're connecting with them, you start learning about their story. Over time, you can really connect the dots about like where it's really from. And as you earn your trust and respect as a leader, and it takes a little bit of time, but once you start earning trust, respect, they'll be they'll let you in a little bit more and give you a better understanding.

00;18;45;26 - 00;18;59;12
Steve Lagomarsino
And then you can start identifying what it takes to, to develop that to so that they can move forward and grow through it. But it's different for everybody. Some people like they just need one person to tell them that in a band they're good. But most people, it takes some time.

00;18;59;14 - 00;19;27;02
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. You know, one of the things when I'm working with somebody about when talking about, you know, marketing and sales, you know, one of the things I say is when you're talking to an owner, you have to talk to them differently than you talk to an employee, because they make different. They make decisions differently. And I think we would all like our employees, to make decisions as if they were owners.

00;19;27;04 - 00;19;28;00
Steve Lagomarsino
Right.

00;19;28;03 - 00;19;32;03
Craig Andrews
Do you have any any thoughts there? How to how to make that happen?

00;19;32;05 - 00;19;54;02
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah, there's a couple of things. One about how you communicate, people you know, you can use like a risk assessment driver analyzer, stabilizer. yeah. Driver analyzer, stabilizer influencer. So everyone's like unique and different. Most business owners are drivers. Hi drivers go go go. And it's only 3% of the population. But that's most business owners. So it can be a lot very direct.

00;19;54;04 - 00;20;16;28
Steve Lagomarsino
But in terms of that ownership, it's when you look a company is not this thing. A company is a team. It's a team of people. A team of people has a culture and a team of people. That systems and processes, which are the plays they run, and they have an identity based on their history and how they show up in the marketplace on game day to gain from day to day.

00;20;17;00 - 00;20;36;29
Steve Lagomarsino
So first, it's how do you create that team environment you need to get them to so that they feel pride in the team that they belong to, not just like thing to see. That's different, but we're not. That's different than what we are. That's number one. And number two is you is getting ownership and so ownership to to solving a problem.

00;20;36;29 - 00;20;57;23
Steve Lagomarsino
So we just talked about ownership to projects. How do you develop a sense of ownership. And you work that into development and you create ownership. Hey you own this. This is your project and empowering you to do it because I believe that you're going to that you're you have the ability to succeed in this. And with the here the targets for the project.

00;20;57;26 - 00;21;19;04
Steve Lagomarsino
And I know you can do this and, you know, and now you give an ownership to them and you're not abdicating it, forgetting that you're developing them and working alongside them when you're doing that. So a lot of people in business have a hard time with with that, because they're not working on making sure the team members have ownership to the success of the organization's success, to the team.

00;21;19;06 - 00;21;20;03
Craig Andrews
Yeah.

00;21;20;06 - 00;21;38;26
Steve Lagomarsino
It's like in a sport, you know, we play, we watch sports. Most people will root their ass off on Sunday for their favorite football team, but then show up to their own job in the team that they play on and not read at all. Well, that's because it's leadership right now. It's a broken mindset. But that's their that's that's their team they're on.

00;21;38;26 - 00;22;01;07
Steve Lagomarsino
And how do you inspire them to something bigger. And you know, if a lineman misses a block hey I take ownership for that. I missed the block and that's why the quarterback got sacked. Well you need to make sure everyone understands their roles and responsibilities and you own this piece. And we all ultimately own whether we win the game or not, at the end of every single day.

00;22;01;10 - 00;22;28;21
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. That's good. That's good. so it's it's been kind of an interesting economy. different people argue about whether we're in recession or not or what have you, but let's just say it's been interesting. how are you? How are you making decisions in this economy? And what would you recommend for others? Right.

00;22;28;23 - 00;22;50;13
Steve Lagomarsino
Well, first, the idea is that give me a true story. What's happening in the economy. You speak to any type of accounting specialist, you speak to business owners, and you get a good broad view of it. And the economy's not pretty right now. but you control, you focus on what you can control and you cannot control. We as business owners or leaders cannot control the economy.

00;22;50;15 - 00;23;19;05
Steve Lagomarsino
And if we're putting our energy focus on that part of it that we can't control and it's all we talk about, oh my God, the economy sucks. If that's what you're experiencing and you're you feel you're seeing, well, now you're getting yourself, off track interview off target is how do this if there's an opportunity here in the worst economy, some of the most successful businesses like either were born or they, they use it to launch into complete successes in the future.

00;23;19;07 - 00;23;40;07
Steve Lagomarsino
So what's the opportunity right now? What do we have control of? How can we get better and how can we grow even if we might not see the short term results? But if we're playing the big infinite game here in business, it's not a finite game. Just just today, just this month or just this year. Like we're playing an infinite game when we have to be able to zoom out and see the really big picture here.

00;23;40;12 - 00;23;54;19
Steve Lagomarsino
And what does it look like in the future? And so you got to focus your energy on here, and you have to have a high belief in and have a vision of where you want to take your business. Otherwise you're going to stress like crazy about what's not working in a moment.

00;23;54;21 - 00;24;16;03
Craig Andrews
Yeah, yeah. And I like what you said about there's opportunity. There always is. You know, Walt Disney Corporation was founded during the Great Depression. The time when people were absolutely broke. It was a business. It was an entertainment business. They weren't selling food. They were selling entertainment. That's right.

00;24;16;05 - 00;24;52;10
Steve Lagomarsino
It's crazy. Right? I, if I'm not mistaken, the Empire State Building was also built in a Great depression. You know, you just these things, amazing things happen in the worst of times. It's a mindset. They know you've got to have to maintain a right mindset and have that like that mental health. And what am I focusing on and like if I'm going to look back, so say that I'm going through a tough period in my marketplace today, five years from now, ten years from now, when my future self looks back on it, what do I want to say about how I responded during that time when I know my business is going to

00;24;52;10 - 00;25;10;02
Steve Lagomarsino
be so much bigger and so much more successful, we're getting there because I'm never going to quit, and I'm going to keep investing myself in my people and in my business. What I want to or how am I going to look back at it? I might laugh at it like, wow, that was so. It was so interesting how I was stressed about it when it was just like a little blip on the radar.

00;25;10;05 - 00;25;16;23
Craig Andrews
Yeah. All right. last question. You've got a stack of books on the shelf behind you.

00;25;17;00 - 00;25;18;00
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah.

00;25;18;03 - 00;25;21;25
Craig Andrews
If you had to tell somebody to read one of those books, which book would it be?

00;25;21;27 - 00;25;44;19
Steve Lagomarsino
Oh, which one would be the best? That's a tough question. Here. I'd say be obsessed or be average, especially if you're a business owner. So Grant Cardone book Be obsessed or Be average. When I read that book, it impacted me tremendously because all my life everybody's been telling me off, Steve, you work too much or you know you're good enough.

00;25;44;19 - 00;26;09;08
Steve Lagomarsino
Why are you so obsessed about being successful and helping other people? You get like, hit by this because you're making a lot of people uncomfortable about the massive amount of energy and activity you do. But that book gave me permission to be obsessed about positive things. Everyone you love. Being obsessed is a good thing, as long as it's you're putting it in a positive way where it's going to help other people and drive impact in this world.

00;26;09;11 - 00;26;33;15
Craig Andrews
That's awesome. You know, there was, there was a political ad here in Austin that got nationwide coverage, and it was this, local county commissioner who was going around, and he was just badgering his wife, you know, hey, if we could do this, he was talking about all these things, and his wife would come in front of the camera, and she's like, please reelect Gerald, please.

00;26;33;17 - 00;26;36;06
Craig Andrews
Yeah. It was just playing off that obsession.

00;26;36;10 - 00;26;37;16
Steve Lagomarsino
Right there. Yeah.

00;26;37;16 - 00;26;57;07
Craig Andrews
It was such a creative commercial that it resonated across the country. It got national coverage because people appreciate that. Yeah. I mean, okay, maybe our spouses don't appreciate it, you know, when we're obsessed. But as a leader, it communicates people that you're all in.

00;26;57;09 - 00;27;16;01
Steve Lagomarsino
Yeah. But also your spouse. You get your spouse aligned. If a lot of marriages don't work because people aren't aligned and with the kind of life they want. My wife, we knew this early and we're very aligned with it, and she supports it. And she wants she, she, she she knows the brilliance of it. And with my kids, we talk about all the time.

00;27;16;01 - 00;27;31;03
Steve Lagomarsino
So it's we we've maintaining alignment. You create alignment in a relationship and you maintain that alignment. And like where are we going? Why are we doing it? So as long as there's that purpose then you can stay aligned in it. And yeah, sure, I aggravate the shit out of my wife from time to time because I'm a nut.

00;27;31;03 - 00;27;39;28
Steve Lagomarsino
I'm an entrepreneur. Yeah, that's that's fun though. We we can look back at it and I can we can joke around about it and have some fun with it.

00;27;40;00 - 00;27;47;09
Craig Andrews
That's awesome. Hey, Steve, I'd love to keep going, but, we need to wrap up how did people reach you?

00;27;47;12 - 00;28;19;05
Steve Lagomarsino
a couple ways. so thanks for mentioned in my podcast earlier, which is Steve Lyons Unfiltered. You also can, can connect with me on social media, which, in, in, for instance, Instagram. I'm very active there and transparent with my life. Steve A is my handle on Instagram. And, if you guys wanted to send out an email to me to reach me about leadership coaching or a business mastery leadership, training program, you can email me at Steve at Steve wagner.com.

00;28;19;08 - 00;28;22;10
Craig Andrews
Steve that's awesome. Thanks for being on Layers and Legacies.

00;28;22;13 - 00;28;26;22
Steve Lagomarsino
And buddy I appreciate it. Love being here.

00;28;26;22 - 00;28;55;18
Craig Andrews
This is Craig Andrews. I want to thank you for listening to the Leaders and Legacies podcast. We're looking for leaders to share how they're making the impact beyond themselves. If that's you, please go to Alize for me.com/guest and sign up there. If you got something out of this interview, we would love you to share this episode on social media.

00;28;55;20 - 00;29;19;02
Craig Andrews
Just do a quick screenshot with your phone and text it to a friend, or posted on the socials. If you know someone who would be a great guest, tag them on social media and let them know about the show, including the hashtag leaders and legacies. I love seeing your posts and suggestions. We are regularly putting out new episodes and content to make sure you don't miss anything.

00;29;19;04 - 00;31;29;16
Craig Andrews
Please go ahead and subscribe your thumbs up! Ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show. It means a lot to me. It means a lot to my team. If you want to know more, please go to Alize for me.com. or follow me on LinkedIn. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.