Just Add a Zero: Remove the Film, Outperform Your Competition, and Grow Exponentially through Collaboration

By Chad T Jenkins

What if you could add a zero?

If you had the ability to add a zero to any area of your life, where would you place it? Time? Family? Money? Health? The truth is, you're much closer to that reality than any other time in history.

The world has changed. Competition used to define the marketplace, s

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ethos Collective
• Release date: Oct 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9781636801988

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Just Add a Zero: Remove the Film, Outperform your Competition, and Grow Exponentially through Collaboration

© 2023 by Chad T. Jenkins.

All rights reserved. 

 Printed in the United States of America

Published by Ethos Collective™

PO Box 43, Powell, Ohio 43065

 EthosCollective.vip

All rights reserved. This book contains material protected under international and federal copyright laws and treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission from the author.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023914666

Paperback: 978-1-63680-196-4

Hardcover: 978-1-63680-197-1

Ebook: 978-1-63680-198-8

Available in paperback, hardback, e-book, and audiobook 

Any Internet addresses (websites, blogs, etc.) and telephone numbers printed in this book are offered as a resource. They are not intended in any way to be or imply an endorsement by Ethos Collective, nor does Ethos Collective vouch for the content of these sites and numbers for the life of this book.

Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to those who make it possible for me to be me - my lovely wife Jennifer, and my two beautiful daughters, Adelaide and Carson. Without your love, patience and support none of this could be possible.

Contents

Introduction

Part One: Confusion

1.Learning to See Through the Film

Part Two: Curiosity

2.Pursue the Why

3.Maintain Perspective

4.Take Ownership

5.Win Together

6.Curiosity + Capability + Connections = Collaboration

Part Three: Clarity

7.Zeros Outside the Box

8.What’s Next

About The Author

Introduction

Consider the windshield in your car on a crisp fall morning. The dew is thick—not quite frost. You could get in and put the car in drive; however, it might be a bit dangerous. Windshield wipers, defrosters, and a little elbow grease make things a bit safer.

That protector the electronics industry puts on every device works the same way. Except that sometimes you don’t even know it’s there for a while. The television doesn’t have as much definition as it did in the store. Your alarm clock seems to collect dirt and eventually you can’t get it clean. Why does the gaming console have a bubble in the cover? Then, a corner of the thin plastic pops up and a whole new world lies in front of you as you pull back the film.

Unfortunately, too many people have left the film on their business and their life. They don’t ask why things are blurry or even try to pull that tab to see the potential quantum leap opportunities that lie beneath to create value. When trouble hits, instead of getting rid of the fog that confuses their vision, they maintain the status quo or back track. Zeros can’t grow in the garden of complacency.

One of my favorite accomplishments has been peeling back the film on existing business models to reveal true, innovative solutions and collaborations for myself and entrepreneurs; I simply can’t help it. Removing the film has helped me start and grow over thirty-five businesses. Some say it’s one of the secrets to my success. Though many of the attributes that have led me down this path have been part of my nature since birth or instilled in me by my upbringing, most can be learned and replicated. I feel blessed to be able to help other entrepreneurs become Friction Identifiers who Leverage the Market—a much more productive and exciting kind of FILM that begs to be removed in most businesses and even some industries, though most do not see it.

The thought process necessary to Just Add a Zero has inspired the core values of all my companies. While other businesses have unilateral core values, ours build upon one another. They create a flywheel effect like Jim Collins describes in his book Good to Great. Every associate in our circle has their mind fixed to constantly pursue the why, maintain perspective, take ownership, and share the win—all for the benefit of creating true value for others—the type of value you feel when you open a new product from Apple®. And the result is JAAZ—Just Add a Zero.

Before we can truly take the steps necessary to add zeros, we must train ourselves to see the opportunities. Until we learn to identify the often-invisible connections and what could really be made of them, we won’t move in the direction of natural curiosity. But when we do, clarity will come, and you’ll see that success is as easy as Just Adding a Zero to what is already there but invisible to most.

Part One: Confusion

Chapter 1

Learning to See Through the Film

If you can sniff out suffering, you can sniff out problems, and if you can solve those problems, there is no limit to what you can accomplish.

—Joe Polish

Five blind men enter a room, and someone leads them to stand in five different places around an elephant. Never having been told about a beast so mighty before, each one is asked to tell the group what is in the room based on what they feel. One describes a long rough rope thicker than any he’d ever felt before. The second tells the group that the first man is mistaken, the rope is quite thin and frayed at the end. A third man tells the others that the object is more like a pillar than a rope, quite sturdy, it will hold a massive amount of weight, while the fourth describes a holding tank. It might be excellent for water storage, the blind man remarks. The fifth had a difficult time keeping hold of the part he stood closest too. It flutters around, he says, I couldn’t really grasp it, but the little I touched felt like a thick piece of leather ready to be made into a coat. It must be a piece of leather cloth on a clothesline.

All five described their area accurately; however, none were correct, and all remained quite confused because they didn’t have the full picture.

Many individuals and businesses today exist in a similar state of cloudiness and confusion about what real opportunity exists for them. They see only their little piece of the world and they evaluate it based on things they know. The fact something new might be standing right in front of them never crosses their mind, and they miss the magnitude of what might be possible if they took what they can see and melded it with another’s vision. Though limitless potential lies right outside the door, most never venture beyond the walls of the familiar.

Caught Up in Convention

One thief of added zeros is the Seven Deadly Words—We have always done it that way. This phrase has killed countless movements, churches, and civic groups. Unfortunately, life gives no exemptions for businesses. When entrepreneurs get stuck in conventional value creation, growth can’t happen. Even individuals extremely capable of something great can get caught in the mindset of my family’s always done it that way.

By the time we hit our teens, nearly every person has decided, I will not become my mother—or father—when I grow up. Two decades later, we realize the unthinkable happened, there in the mirror we see the gestures, hear the words, and wonder how in the world this transpired.

I was fortunate to have grown up on a farm with a wonderful family, and while I love the outdoors and having a lot of space for living, it didn’t take long for me to figure out I was not cut out for manually digging post holes and stringing barbed wire sixty hours a week. Though I wouldn’t trade the work ethic and integrity instilled in me from my parents for anything in the world, I quickly began creating a set of methods that empowered me to create my own path.

In his autobiography, Teddy Roosevelt quoted Squire Bill Widener who said, Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. I took this to heart. My early realization that farm living was not the life for me helped me escape the we have always done it that way career mentality.

Unfortunately, too many folks find themselves caught up in a conventional existence. They see what worked for their family, and they follow that path because it seems to set them up for success. Plus, let’s face it, the familiar is comfortable. Family legacies, tremendous parents we don’t want to let down, and fulfilling a dream someone else fashioned all lead to people living less than their best.

Others get stuck in their hometown or college allegiances. They choose their university based on alumni scholarships, then feel obligated to live up to a degree that took a big chunk of time and money to complete. Conventional thinking pushes them into respectable careers and keeps them from looking beyond traditional arenas.

Entrepreneurs in small- to medium-sized businesses get caught on the hamster wheel of conventional thinking. Owners think they can’t afford to hire new employees, or the person who could do the