BYOB: Build Your Own Business, Be Your Own Boss

By Brian Scudamore and Roy H. Williams

You hold in your hands what might be the most intensely packed book of business advice ever compiled. This book includes what young Brian Scudamore learned from a series of private chats with a man who took $1,000 and turned it into a personal net worth of $3.5 billion. It includes what Simon Sinek told Brian the night he slept on his sofa. You'll meet an NBA superstar, a past president of Starbucks, a British advertising tycoon, and a winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics as they wander on and off these pages like movie stars on the red carpet at the Academy Awards.

Wait! Do not read this book unless you are ready for change, because when you get to the end, you will be a significantly different person. You have been warned.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Apr 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9781544527352

Book preview

Contents

Advance Praise

Introduction

1. Vision

2. People

3. Systems

4. More about Systems

5. Company Culture

6. Uh-Oh

7. Company Story

8. The Moment the Universe Conspired to Assist Me

9. How to Create Your Own Painted Picture

10. Customer Experience

11. Quit Adding. It’s Time to Multiply.

12. You Want to Start with a Blank Sheet of Paper? Okay!

13. How to Choose a Business to Start from Scratch

14. Amazing Things Happen When You Find Your Yoda

15. Know When It’s Time for Plan B

16. Another Example of Knowing When It Is Time for Plan B

17. What to Do When Plan B Doesn’t Work

18. Failure Is Not a Permanent Condition

19. Look at Your Business from the Customer’s Perspective

20. Twenty Years In, I’m Still Learning

21. Another Guide, Another Path

22. Making Meaning versus Making Money

23. Inspect What You Expect

24. What Happens When You Fail to Inspect What You Expect

25. The Power of Asking for Help

26. What Kind of Entrepreneur Will You Be?

27. Starting from a Blank Sheet of Paper, Step by Step

28. Panic Can Be Your Friend

29. Don’t Read This Chapter until You’ve Done Your 101

30. Do You Want to Be King or Do You Want to Be Rich?

31. Bigger and Better Together

32. What a Little Company in Denmark Taught Us

33. How to Choose the Franchise That’s Right for You

34. Identity, Purpose, and Adventure

35. Focus, Faith, and Effort

36. Let’s Talk a Little Bit More about Focus, Faith, and Effort

37. Your Chapter

Appendices

I would like to dedicate this book to my O2E Brands family, to the hundreds of franchise partners across 1-800-GOT-JUNK?, WOW 1 DAY PAINTING, and Shack Shine. Your endless passion, grit, and enthusiasm have turned O2E Brands into a globally recognized brand, where we turn ordinary services into exceptional experiences for our customers every single day. Thank you for believing in growing bigger and better, together. Here’s to you!

Introduction

RSVP: YES!

I wrote this book to encourage you.

I often hear people refer to business ownership as Living the American Dream. While my home is in Canada, I definitely feel like I am living the dream!

After thirty years in business, it’s become crystal clear to me that I’m on a mission. A mission to inspire others to live the dream too, and to start, build, or be a part of the wonderful world of entrepreneurship.

Before you start this book, I need you to do something.

This book is called BYOB (because you’re invited to join the party). It’s a conversation, a sharing of lessons learned, a journey…best enjoyed with a beverage of your choice. So, go grab a beer, an iced latte, a fizzy drink. Whatever you’d have while chatting with a friend.

You’ve picked up this book and RSVP’d yes. I’m hoping it’s because you have the same dream I did.

How you start your business doesn’t matter. What matters is that you have a fire burning inside to Build Your Own Business or to Be Your Own Boss. You just haven’t taken the leap—yet.

I’d like to encourage you, give you a shot of confidence, and present you with two equally awesome choices for starting your own business. I want to give you a healthy little push :)

We have ninety minutes together.

Ready?

Let’s do this!

Cheers,

Brian

1

Vision

When you have a vision burning deep within you to:

invent an entirely new business model, or

birth a business no one has ever seen, or

create a category that has never existed

you’ll need to start with a blank sheet of paper. By using the power of your vision and going into extreme detail, that blank piece of paper will become your Painted Picture—a crystal-clear snapshot of where you’ll be in the future.

Your mind works consciously and unconsciously 24/7 to bring into reality the things you see in your imagination. You are limited only by the clarity of your vision.

It’s almost as if, at the moment of commitment, the universe conspires to assist you.

Starting a business from a blank sheet of paper requires a high degree of creative vision and the financial and emotional staying power to survive the learning curve. The upside of the blank-sheet startup is that you get to say, I did this, all alone, by myself.

Entrepreneurs like my friend Shaquille O’Neal don’t feel the need to say, I did this, all alone, by myself. Shaq didn’t win four championship rings by inventing basketball. He won them by playing an already existing game in an exceptional