Brad Johnson: Welcome back to another episode of Do Business. Do Life. I’ve got Terence Brown here with me today. Welcome to the show, Terence.
Terence Brown: Hey, thanks, Brad. Really grateful to be on and have a good time with you.
Brad Johnson: Well, we were chatting and I’m like, “This is just like what we normally do every time we get together at Triad Experience,” except now we’re just recording it and putting it out to the world because one of the things I appreciate about you, we always have real conversations, not surface level that can be on the business side, that can be on the life side. And that’s one of the things I appreciate about you, man, is you’re always willing to go deep and talk about stuff that really matters. So, I’m sure we’ll do plenty of that today.
Terence Brown: Yeah, let’s get vulnerable. Let’s go after it.
Brad Johnson: Hey, that’s where the breakthroughs happen. So, well, the first thing, I just have to kick this off because when I met you the first time, we had a natural instant connection because we both played college football, you at a higher level than I did. So, you were a South Carolina boy, found your way to BYU, played Division 1 football, spent a year with the Dolphins, and then from there, was it Canadian Football League for a year?
Terence Brown: The United Football League at the time. Yeah. Omaha Nighthawks. It was a great experience.
Brad Johnson: This is Omaha, like Nebraska?
Terence Brown: Nebraska. Yep.
Brad Johnson: Had I only known, I could have taken the short road trip up and come and watch, man.
Terence Brown: I made a whole $28,000 there that year. It was phenomenal.
Brad Johnson: I bet you put some good blocks on some people, though. Was that arena league or was that outdoor?
Terence Brown: It was outdoor, 11-men football. Yeah. That league lasted like seven or eight years. It was a good time, but it was a reminder, or not a reminder, but an awakening that it was time to move on with life and figure something else out, but it was good.
Brad Johnson: Well, one of the things that I find common about finance is there are a lot of former athletes that find their way into kind of the role of financial advisor. And I think one of the things is, I’d love to get your take on this, but if I look at football, it’s a team sport, ultra-competitive. Obviously, if you’re not giving your all on the field, you better have your head on a swivel because you don’t know what’s coming at you. I find like that inner competitive drive, as soon as you get done, it’s like, “Dang, it’s time to hang up the cleats,” it’s kind of like, “Where do I get that from now?” And I find like finance is sometimes a grown-up sports. It’s like, “Hey, I can get what I put in. I put in the work. I can grow a business just like if I put in the work in the weight room, I can get out on the field.” But what’s your take? What are some of the successes that led to your success in football D1 and on? What things translated to you having success as a financial advisor?
Terence Brown: Man, that’s a great question. My brother, who actually also happens to be in this industry now, we’re competitive and a lot of times we gauge our success sometimes on what other people are doing, and we try and compare where we’re at to where they’re at. But he always tells me, and I appreciate him saying this, he says, “Dude, you just keep showing up.” And that’s how workouts work, right? It’s like just show up, make it through. You might throw up at the end, your body’s going to be worn down, right? But if you can keep showing up the next day and be ready to take another beating and just keep at it, I think that’s the biggest takeaway I’ve gotten from my sports career is get there again the next day and keep rolling.
Because it’s tough, right? I mean, life is tough. Business is tough. Playing sports is tough. And those that can just kind of weather the beating and remain in it, those are the people that I think find significance and find success.
Brad Johnson: Yeah. I think that’s a simple idea, but profound because I think a lot of times we talk a lot about vision in business and, “Hey, look three years in advance. Where do you want to be?” But I think sometimes people forget sometimes business is one day at a time, and I remember I think I was a fourth or fifth grader, summer baseball, and we were in the state championship. I was pitching. I threw one of the best games of my life, like five innings. I think I threw a two-hitter, like struck out 11, and we lost. And I remember just being crushed and crying my eyes out. I remember like you know how you have those memories growing up? This was one of those memories of my dad. He said he is sitting on the bed next to me. I’m just destroyed, worst day of my life up to that point.
And he goes, “You know, Brad, the sun will come up tomorrow.” And sometimes in business and in life, to your point, you just have to wake up, show up the next day and some days it’s a little bit of a battle, but then you’re like, “Okay, I put in the reps, the tide has turned and some of those nos start becoming yeses.” And I think there’s so much truth in that idea. So, did you have some adversity in sports that you had to battle through injuries or anything like that, or maybe even in business, where you’re like, “Okay, strap it up tomorrow,” and just go back in?
Terence Brown: Yeah. It’s funny, when I look back on life, I just tend to remember the good. Like, I don’t remember the hard times as well. I know the hard times when I’m going through them, but then when I look back, it’s like, “Oh, that was great. We made it through. Everything’s fine.” Yeah, I had a few injuries that I had to work through shoulders. As an offensive lineman, your shoulders take a beating that they’re not made to take. So, I had some of those things. But I think the hard work is just, yeah, being there every day. I’ve always enjoyed working and so I don’t know if that’s a good answer but, yeah, looking back, I think you put in the work and you work through it, but my memories are always usually pretty good, and I always when I’m talking with my wife and we’re going through business struggles, she’s like, “You’ve had hard times before,” and it’s like, “Well, I don’t remember them.” She’s like, “Well, I remember them.”
Brad Johnson: She’ll remind you.
Terence Brown: Yeah.
Brad Johnson: Sometimes spouses are good at that. Yeah.
Terence Brown: Yeah. But it’s like when you build a muscle and when you continue to work it, and you know it’s there, right? And you can just keep working the muscle. But if you go a month without working the muscle and then you come back, you are like, “Oh, I didn’t work this muscle for this time,” and then you feel it, right? I don’t know if that makes any sense, but it’s stacking those wins and those bricks on top of each other.
Brad Johnson: Well, I’ll translate that to how I’ve seen you show up as a Triad member. When you joined Triad, you came from a very different model that you kind of grew up in business, and it was very much sales-based, here’s the product, know the product features, sell the product. And as you’ve really evolved into more of a holistic planning firm where it’s less product-driven and more plan-driven, “How can we help people?” and then, “What are the tools we put into the plan?” that was a big shift for you. And I know you had a core group you came over with. It was a big shift for everyone. And what I kind of saw was the same kind of teammate mentality where you guys jumped back in the trenches. You’re like, “This is new. There’s new language.”
And it was tough because you’d kind of mastered the old way, but the new way it was kind of like changing your golf swing. It’s like, “Uh-oh, I’m shanking it to the right now, consistently.” And how I saw you show up, though, back to that show up every day, you showed up as a humble student, no ego. You’re like, “Guys, I’m kind of sucking right now. I need your help. What do I need to tweak and change?” And then I just continued to see the growth and evolution, and not like there weren’t a couple of setbacks every once in a while. But where did that come from? Because that is not always normal, Terence. Have you always shown up that way? Like, in football, was it like, “Hey, my technique screwed up. Coach, help me out here,” because I’ve seen that translate really well into the business world?
Terence Brown: Yeah. I mean, I do think sports lens speak to that, right, especially at a high level. Everything is filmed, right? It’s a full-on production when you play sports at a high level. Every period at practice is filmed, it’s reviewed, it’s looked at. And so, I think feedback is a huge part of life, and those that can embrace it and just look at it for what it is, and then how do I take this feedback and move forward? It’s one of the things here at our firm, Left Tackle Advisors, it’s one of our core values, which is we’re always growing, we’re always improving. I know that today we’re better than we were six months ago, and I know that in six months we’re going to be better than we are right now because it’s an evolution.
And, yes, we went from a very product-driven approach to helping people, and we did a ton of good, and we’ve helped a lot of people, right, to where now it is more, “Let’s build a plan for you. Let’s understand you as a person. Let’s understand what’s most important to you. How do you envision your retirement? How do you envision life going? What’s the impact you want to leave?” And then building a plan around that, giving them the confidence to go out and spend the time to live more and to leave their mark.
Brad Johnson: Yeah. Which by the way, I love your brand, and I’m still jealous of the hats you created. So, hey, please bring one to…
Terence Brown: I got you. I got you.
Brad Johnson: I will purchase it. They’re so cool.
Terence Brown: No.
Brad Johnson: But let’s go back to watching game film. As a football player, I relate deeply with that. I think most people that haven’t played at a higher level don’t understand. You spend more time in the film room than you do on the field. So, there’s more time analyzing the chess game on the field than there is actually participating in it. You cannot hide on film. Like, if there is an error, it comes out, and not only does it come out, it gets rewound, and your coach is on you. And I think a lot of times in finance, we never watch game film. It’s like, “Oh, I did the seminar. Oh, I only booked 10% of the room.” And then we make the excuse, “It’s plate lickers. They’re Hollywood extras,” whatever our term is for them.
But in reality, we don’t take the accountability of like, “Wait, maybe I failed to communicate in a way that inspired those people that I could help them. Or it was clear enough. So, how have you incorporated kind of that concept of watching game film into the business side of what you do?
Terence Brown: Well, and especially in the last couple of years with the evolution of AI and the abilities that are there, I record every seminar that we do, every workshop, and I don’t go back and listen to every single one of them. Time is a little sparse nowadays, but I have kind of used AI to create a coach. You can do so many amazing things with it, but obviously, you prompt it. You kind of tell it what you want it to do, how you want it to coach you, the things you want it to look at. And I get pretty instant feedback, and it’ll let me know, “Hey, you connected really well with your intro story tonight.” Your content was sporadic, or you didn’t get to the point quick enough. And at the end, when you’re inviting them to take action and you’re inspiring them to come in and meet with your team to get that help and cast that vision and understand what a retirement can look like for them. So, yeah, just always getting the feedback and trying to grow and learn from it.
Brad Johnson: Yeah. The concept, which by the way that you just hit on that is easy to say, hard to do is put the feelings aside for the feedback. Because I mean, it’s wild. AI, you can have one of the world’s best seminar coaches in your pocket, in your cell phone. You just drop the audio in, drop the video in. It will give you very direct, honest feedback based on whatever you say, “Like, hey, pretend as if you’re Tony Robbins, who’s one of the best speakers I’ve ever seen live, and now tell me how his presentation and engagement compares to mine. Guess what? AI can do that now. The problem is most of us, that ego or those feelings get in the way, and we’re like, “Oh, that hurts. I don’t like to hear the fact that I talk too long and ramble.”
So, how have you gotten past that where you’re just like, “Just give it to me, coach.” Like, whether it’s AI, whether it’s somebody you’re getting coaching from, how have you gotten past the ego and the feelings?
Terence Brown: I think just with time. I mean, I’ve been coached since I was five years old, and some people coached me really well and gave the feedback in a good way where you can be receptive and, I mean, I’ve been called things that you would never want to repeat on the air, right? And I think over time, I think all feedback is valid. The way that it’s given, especially from like a sports, is not always maybe the way it should be given but if you can strip away how it was given and actually just look at the feedback for what the feedback is and then you can evaluate and determine, “Yes, that’s accurate and I can improve from this,” or, “No, that’s not going to help me moving forward.”
I think the other thing, though, you got to be careful with AI is because you can coach it to be as nice to you as you want it to be, and you can coach it to be as critical as you want it to be. And so, it’s just like a human being. It learns who you are, and so it can tell you what you want to hear, right? That confirmation bias that we all seek sometimes, like you can find any research or information to back up the way you feel, and so you want to try and create it to be as agnostic as possible, if that makes any sense.
Brad Johnson: You hit on something that I actually learned in therapy when it comes to feedback. Separate the message from the messenger, which is really hard to do. If somebody’s yelling at you, which by the way, on the football field, that does happen a lot. But if you separate the messaging of it to the message of like, “Hey, Terence, you’ve missed that block. You need to drop this foot fast or whatever.” You’re like, “Oh, okay, yeah, he’s right. Let me do that next time so I perform better.” Really hard to do sometimes in business. But I think what I see some of the people I respect the most in business, the best leaders, have gotten very good at it when their team members even say, “Hey, this is kind of how you’re showing up in the meeting. I’m not sure you’re trying to, but you are.” The natural resistance is defensiveness.
And then you’re like, “Wait. What if they’re right? They cared enough to tell me.” That’s a pretty cool thing. That’s what you want from your team. So, before we get off that topic, anything else that comes to mind just with your team dynamics as you’ve grown, as you’ve grown more into a leader where you’re got a team that you’re overseeing. Anything else where that’s played out?
Terence Brown: Yeah. I don’t remember the exact quote, but it’s like if you think you’ve arrived, you’re way off. And if you take the mentality that you’ve never arrived and there’s always something to learn, that means you’re on the right path. You’re headed in the right direction. And so, one of my things is if there’s a moment where I ever stop learning or stop trying to grow and improve, then we need to reevaluate. And that’s the mentality I want our team to approach life with, to approach how we work with teammates. Sorry. Teammates. We refer to our clients as teammates. That’s just kind of the culture we build with our firm. But, yeah, just always looking to improve and grow.
Now, sometimes that’s a double-edged sword because you got to learn to appreciate where you are and where you’ve come from and the improvements that have been made. And not always just focus on I’m not there yet. It’s not that we’re not there yet, but we’re always going to figure out ways to improve and get better and grow.
Brad Johnson: All right. Let’s go to, we’ll call it more the financial planning side here.
Terence Brown: Yeah.
Brad Johnson: Your firm name, it’s one of the coolest names I’ve heard because it actually directly relates to your coming up in football. And if you think of left tackle, those that know football know that’s on the offensive line, typically you have a right-handed quarterback, so that’s protecting the blind side where the quarterbacks are facing this way. And so, the left tackle needs to be the guy that has his back. And it’s cool how you incorporated that into your firm name, because what I’m going to assume is it’s kind of like, “Hey, we’ve got your blindside, we’ve got you covered from a financial standpoint, the stuff you don’t see coming.” One of the things, I think this is on your website or somewhere in your story, you said, “Hey, you saw some teammates.”
Unfortunately, this was pre-NIL days. Now, it’s even happening at a younger age. But basically, the poor financial decisions that happen when young kids that haven’t come from money all of a sudden are millionaires. And so, how did some of those stories play out? And if you’ve got any that you can share that don’t give away anything personal that kind of impacted how you see the financial world and how you help people?
Terence Brown: Yeah. I mean, it’s funny when my wife and I decided to open up our own firm and try and build something that’s bigger than ourselves, I was actually at a networking event and I’m sitting at the end of a hotel bed and I’m like, “Well, if we’re going to do this, we got to have a name, right?” And it just popped into my head where we’re going to be Left Tackle Advisors because I did get into the industry mainly helping people protect money, protect income, right? But even from a planning standpoint, same thing. Our job is to look at all of the variables and make sure that they can have the confidence.
I mean, you think about a quarterback. A quarterback is going to do their job best when they can focus on the field and where to facilitate the football, what reads they need to make. If they’re worried about looking over their shoulder, they can’t do their job. And so, our teammates’ job in retirement is to focus on what matters most to them. What does it mean to them to live more? How can we help them do that? And what does it mean to them to leave their mark? We’re only on this earth for a given amount of time. Maybe I’m extremely prideful, but I do believe we should all find a way to leave a positive impact. And the ripple effect of those impacts, I think it’s important to be intentional and think about.
Whether that’s spending time with your family and passing down values, whether they are charitable causes or volunteering organizations you want to be involved in, whether that’s just traveling the world, right, I believe our teammates deserve that. That’s what they’ve worked their whole lives for. And if they have to worry about their blindside and some of the financial things or other risks that could happen, yeah, that’s our job. We protect the blindside so they can focus on spending their time and leaving the values and making the impact that they want to make.
Brad Johnson: I want to go to the word ‘teammates’ because I didn’t know that until we had started recording here. I know one of the things we look at, at Triad, is the intentionality behind words. And I think that’s lost oftentimes in our industry, where it’s just sales language that’s been recycled and you picked up from the guy down the road. But I do truly believe language creates, so you can kind of speak things into existence. And just hearing you say teammates, that has to have a different impact on your team, your individual employees, where you’re talking about your clients. Because if I view them as a teammate versus a client or a prospect or whatever the other terms used in the industry, a teammate, I want to have their back. It’s like it’s my job to cover them. So, when did you incorporate that language, and how has that impacted how your team treats your clients?
Terence Brown: Yeah, that probably was like five or six years ago. And, look, we’re trying… This is going to go a different direction, I apologize, but the world is a lonely place nowadays, right? I think people struggle to find their community and the culture that supports and uplifts them and helps them really be intentional about where they want to spend their time and the things they want to be involved in. And so, one of the things that we are trying to create and build is a culture and a community of people that this matters. And they want to be intentional about where they spend their time. So, sorry, roundabout way, but they are teammates, right? They’re partners of ours.
And when we bring somebody on board, we’re very intentional about the conversation of this is a partnership, and if we’re going to work together on this, we have to view this as a partnership. We’re on the same team. The recommendations and the things that we show you, yes, I mean, look, our business has to be profitable or we can’t help anybody. I mean, that’s a given, but this is a true partnership, your teammates of ours. And so, any recommendations that we make, we want them to be in your best interest so that you can accomplish all of the things that matter most to you. So, yeah, it’s just something, I mean, yeah, I’ve always been on a team. I’ve never played a non-team sport, and so I think that’s a big part of how I was brought up and raised. And so, I don’t know, it just resonated with me. I don’t know how much it resonates with other people, but.
Brad Johnson: I mean, just hearing you say that, I would like to think if I’m on the other side of the table sitting across from you, how can that not? How can I not want that? I think a lot of retirees, to your point, you’ve got the Facebook feeds, you’ve got the news feeds that are just trying to scare the life out of them every day when they click on the TV. And if your community and what you’re building to serve them in retirement is a safe place where someone is on their team and has their back and wants to help them accomplish the things they want in retirement before it’s all said and done, how can that not resonate? I mean, from my side, that’s what I’d want in life.
How is that applied internally? Like, when you message that to your team and you’re like, “Hey, Joe and Sally, the 65-year-old couple that just came in are teammates out there,” have you seen that make a difference for how your team serves them?
Terence Brown: Yeah. I’m really proud of the way our team shows up and the way that they view the people that trust us with their life savings. It is about how can we make an impact and what are we going to do to support them? And so, it is really cool when you start hearing your internal team, our team here at Left Tackle Advisors, start calling our teammates ‘teammates’ versus, “Hey, this client called in.” “Hey, this teammate called in. Here’s what they need. Here’s what we’re helping them with,” or, “This teammate’s coming back to a workshop. This person called in, and they had a grandkid.” And so, we have a way in the office of sending out little things of, “Hey, we heard you had a grandkid. Congrats. Here’s a little something.” You know, just little things like that.
Brad Johnson: Cool. All right. So, let’s get to you’ve got a really cool growth story. So, before we hit record here, we kind of rewound the clock. So, I’m just going to give a quick breakdown. And then while I’m doing that, Terence, I would love for you to think through. What I found in business when you look back, there are certain inflection points or breakthroughs. They’re like, “Hey, we kind of hit this glass ceiling and, boom, this was a huge breakthrough for us. They kind of got us to that next level and did it the right way.” And sometimes there are setbacks where it’s like, “Hey, oh, yeah, we learned this the hard way and here’s the lesson we learned and we didn’t repeat it.”
So, got into the business in 2013 after you hung up the football cleats. 2015, you met a mutual friend that’s also another Triad member who has also done an episode in Nico Pesci. And so, you guys kind of connect out in Utah. And then 2017-ish, you and Nico kind of joined the same firm. You’re like, “Hey, let’s go back to the East Coast, and I’m going to set up shop,” so from Utah, Raleigh, North Carolina. And then you kind of grow on this growth track, 2018 about 5 million. 2019, 10 million. 2020, obviously, the year of COVID, kind of flatlined at 10 million. 2021 15 million. 2022 17 million. 2023 really started focusing on gathering assets as well and managing those, so about 23.5, 24 million. Last year, 2024, 33 million-ish. And this year, off to a good start, you’re pacing for about the same 14, 15 million. We’re halfway through the year right now as we record this.
I would say a shift to a more balanced, as we said, less product-driven, more financial planning-driven process the last two, three years. So, as we go back and rewind, does anything stick out in your head, Terence, of like, “Oh, this was a breakthrough, this was a learning,” that you can share with the audience out there?
Terence Brown: Yeah, I think got into the industry with a firm. Great people loved them. So grateful for the mentorship and bringing me into this business, but it was the old, what’s your warm market? Who’s the hundred people that you know? Go out and talk to them. And a few years in, I realized I don’t have a way to continue to grow and help people, right? I don’t have a real marketing strategy.
That’s where a good friend Nico shared with me some of the things that he was doing – workshops, seminars. That’s what brought me out to North Carolina. So, we figured out, okay, we can market, we can share our message, we can do things that way. But all of this, when we decided to start our own firm, the beginning of it was, let’s build a team. Let’s build something that’s bigger than ourselves. And it’s taken time for that to evolve and grow, right? Very product focused for a few years, and then realizing that if we’re really going to build that legacy, build that team, build something that’s greater than ourselves, we’ve got to have a comprehensive planning approach. And then we’ve got to get people on board that, I mean, you think of a football team, your offensive linemen are different than your running back. It’s different than your wide receiver, different than your tight end. And so, now, we’re trying to bring in the right people with the right skill set so that we can all support each other.
And going back to having teammates, we want our teammates not to just rely on Terence, but we want our teammates to be able to call into their team at Left Tackle Advisors and know that they’ve got a group of people, a team of people that support their long-term goals and what they want to accomplish. And so, that’s kind of, I think, been the evolution. And there have been small roadblocks along the way. There always are. I think as we’ve transitioned to being full planners, right, establishing what our planning process is going to look like, how we want to help people, what are some of our core tenets in how we approach that, and it’s a continued thing that we’re still working on.
Brad Johnson: Was your wife, Sara, was she in the firm from the very beginning or did she come in later when you needed help? How did that play out?
Terence Brown: When we moved to North Carolina, she came on board with me.
Brad Johnson: So, 2017-ish.
Terence Brown: Yep.
Brad Johnson: Okay. And was it just the two of you for a while as far as the…
Terence Brown: Yeah, just her and I for a couple of years and then we’ve added team members as we’ve grown and had roles to fill in. So, today, we’ve got a planning and service advisor, really, really bright young kid. We’re super pleased to have him on board, and he’s helping round out the team and bringing his perspective, which I think a good leader is going to listen to those perspectives and understand that bringing those skill sets together and matching them, how they complement each other. So, that’s been fun to try and figure out. It’s not easy, but it’s been fun.
Brad Johnson: Yeah. We just had a perspective. Actually, he just joined. So, I think that’s Triad member number 73 or 74 now. And he was in very much the season of grind where it was “I”. It was not “we”. All of the client stuff was coming to him and we kind of walked through the concept. As you’re familiar with the Triad advisor model, the three different types of advisors, and I walked through this analogy of like, dude, you’re basically running a Chick-fil-A by yourself. And he’s like, “What?” Well, I was like, well, you’re at the cash register. That’s the selling part, right? Sitting across the table, that’s how the revenue’s produced.
The problem is when you make the sale, now you’ve got to say, just a second. You got to run back, make the sandwich. That’s the financial plan, right? And then I said, and you know that that person at Chick-fil-A that’s walking around, like saying, do you want free refill? Do you– oh, let me clean your table up. I go, that’s the equivalent of a service advisor that’s basically fulfilling the promises once the sale is made. You’re that guy too. And he looked, he’s like, no wonder I’m exhausted. But the truth is, a lot of financial advisors, that is the dance they’re playing all day every day. So, how far back were you doing that before you said, wait, I got to get some help here. I’ve got to start to build out this team.
Terence Brown: I mean, if I’m being fully transparent, I think we’re still in some of that, right? As we’re learning to grow and involve our business, but yeah, definitely, two years ago, that’s exactly where I was. And just having the realization that if it’s not going to just be me, we have to start building and growing in a different way, which I think we all go through the seasons of that in life where we realize, it’s something you guys have always shared, what got me here may not get me to where I am going, right? And having the wherewithal and the ability to process and see, okay, yeah, this has gotten me to this point, but will that continue to get me to where I want to go? And if we use that in our world of planning, it’s the same thing we talk about with our teammates, which is, yeah, you’ve been living and growing and saving for 30 or 40 years, but now you want to retire. We have to look at things a little bit differently and we do have to make some adjustments and we have to approach this chapter of life a little bit differently than we approached the previous chapter of life.
Brad Johnson: Yeah, I think so many times in business and life, this applies to the business you’re building and oftentimes, to the clients you’re helping, teammates you’re helping, it’s kind of like you just keep doing what you do because that’s what you’ve always done and you’re like, wait, have you ever analyzed why you’re doing what you do? Does it even make sense? It’s like, I’m really tired and burned out. Yeah, because you’re wearing three hats. Maybe we should hire some people. And it’s like when you zoom out, some of this stuff gets really obvious, but so many times in business I see it, it’s just like, well, yeah, that’s just the way I’ve always done it or that’s the way I was taught to do it, which sometimes isn’t the right teachings, building with the wrong blueprint.
How hard was that for you to let some things go? So, it sounds, you bring in the young go-getter, he’s kind of filling the service role, the planning role, and that’s a lot of times what we see as the first hire is kind of a hybrid between those two seats. How hard was it for Terence to just say, hey, you got this and start to trust and let them stumble a couple of times. As any new team member will do is they figure it out.
Terence Brown: Yeah. That’s a great question. I don’t know that, like, letting that work go is very hard for me. But I think the challenge for me is making sure that we communicate and collaborate and that we’re doing the things that are best for our teammates, and that can keep us in business long term as well, right? Make sure that we’re building plans that are appropriate and figuring out what our planning process looks like. Well, my wife would say, you have a harder time letting things go. I do think as a business owner, sometimes when you evolve from knowing everything to not knowing everything, like making sure you’ve got the checks and balances in place so you don’t panic that you don’t know everything anymore. you’ve probably gone through that at Triad.
Brad Johnson: For sure. Literally, as you were saying that, Terence, I was like, there is so much stuff I have no clue about anymore.
Terence Brown: And that’s scary. But if you build the right team and you have the right people on board with the right long-term vision and you have the checks and balances to make sure along the way, nothing’s getting missed, but creating that and building that takes time and it takes showing up every day. Kind of goes back to our conversation at the beginning, right? I think the people that have the long-term success, they just continue to be there every day and have a growth mindset, willing to learn, thinking that they have all the right answers, and let people grow into the roles that they want, that are appropriate for their skill set.
Brad Johnson: So, here’s something I don’t want to pass over because you’ve said it without saying it. You said here is what Left Tackle is about. Here, we’re going to help our teammates, our clients leave a mark in life. And so, in that language, there’s pieces of the vision about why your company exists. And the cool thing is once you get that out of your head onto a piece of paper where you can communicate that, not only does it work externally, it works internally for that filter of who are the right team members to join Left Tackle that are aligned with that mission and that want to play for that name on the front of the jersey, right? And how do you trust when you create a culture where it’s like, I’m in on that, Terence, I got your back. I’m going to show up for that client when they need me.
And the more that culture starts to evolve and that team comes together, it’s like, damn, this is kind of fun. Like, I can pass the ball. I know they got it. And it’s not overnight and rent is due every day and you got to keep putting in the reps. But to me, like I was just thinking about it as you were explaining, I’m like, when you are surrounded by A players that care, it gets so much easier to start to let things go. Obviously, you still need quality control and checks and balances to make sure people aren’t just free styling and not serving clients. But I think that’s one of the biggest gaps in most businesses is they just start hiring people. They have no vision, they have no messaging of here’s why we exist. So, are you in on that or not? How has that played for you? Because I know you’ve put a lot of work in your firm.
Terence Brown: Yeah, it’s helped a ton and it does give you that filter through which you’re going to make your decisions moving forward, right? As we work with our teammates, I always express, look, the filter that we make decisions here at Left Tackle with you is not, how does this impact us today or tomorrow? The filter through which we make decisions is what is the impact this has 5, 10, and 15 years down the road? That’s how we want to make our decisions. And it’s the same with our internal team members. We want people on board who do see where we’re going and what we’re trying to accomplish and the impact and legacy we’re trying to create. And so, that’s the filter that we try and hire through. It’s not perfect today, but we are growing and evolving and getting better at that. And we’ve got good people on the team right now, which I’m super happy to have them as team members, as we continue to grow and evolve what we’re accomplishing.
Brad Johnson: So, on that note, and I don’t have the numbers in front of me, and you might not either, but I do know one thing that I’ve seen evolve. And this is not just you, this is a lot of the guys you kind of came up in the business with that came from a model of like selling, transactional. It’s like, hey, you have 100k? Cool. Here’s a product for you. But as you, just even in that language you just said, where we’re looking longer term now, 5, 10, 15 years, and starting to build a plan that delivers on helping get them there, I know the size of the people you’re helping as far as investible assets has grown and grown pretty substantially. Can you give me like kind of a before and after of here’s what kind of what we were seeing before and with this evolution, here’s what we’re seeing now from an investible asset size and how that’s growing the business faster?
Terence Brown: Yeah, I mean the big time difference, you’re exactly right. It was, hey, we’ll take whatever you want to put into product X, Y, Z, and we’ll help you with that, right? Now, it is, we’re building you a plan. And so, yeah, I think last year, average was like 700 or 800. This year is probably a little bit higher than that. We’re not onboarding as many people as we used to, right? I mean, in a transactional business, we were doing hundreds of transactions a year now, but we’re just as busy because now, we do have more things to execute on, right? The service offering that we have today is very different than what it was five years ago. And so, we have to be able to follow through and make sure that, hey, we talked about doing this strategy. Now we need to actually follow through and do the strategy right. But yeah, so it’s fun from that standpoint. I listen, read a lot of books. One guy that’s out there now, Hormozi, he talks about if you want to make more money, learn to solve bigger and more expensive problems. And I think that’s the track that we’re on in terms of, you want to bring on higher net worth clients, figure out the problems that they have and figure out how to help them solve them.
Brad Johnson: Well, and circling back to making a bigger impact and allowing your clients to leave a mark on what they want their legacy to be, hey, I grew up on the insurance side of the world. I mean, there’s great value in protecting somebody’s retirement savings, creating an income stream, but that’s like one fifth of the pie if you look at the CFP standard, right? Income, investments, taxes, healthcare, legacy estate. And so, now, as you have more holistic planning, you’re solving bigger problems. You’re allowing your team to make a bigger impact on your clients. And now, in turn, they’re leaving a bigger impact on whatever’s important to them.
And I think most advisors, I mean, what I love about our business, build whatever business you want that serves you and lights you up. But I think if you said, A or B, do you want lots of small transactions that are kind of, I do the convo, and then might not see really the person because they kind of just look at me, like, I’ll come back when I need something versus higher net worth transactions. We’re going deeper with people, more meaningful conversations, understanding them more, and having bigger impacts and less of those. I think most people would go option B, it’s just more meaningful work at the end of the day.
So, has that, like when you show up to the office and you’re like, wow, here’s the impact we made on this person’s life. They came in, anxiety, uncertain, and now, they’re leaving and they’re confident and they have a plan and they’ve got a smile on their face. Has that changed you? Like, Terence, the guy showing up at the office of like, this is kind of cool, like, I’d like to think it has, but I’d love to hear your take.
Terence Brown: Yeah. No, it definitely has. And look, I’ll be real transparent, like I’ve had a lot of changes in my life over the last five years. And what I mean by that is, and I don’t know how much we’ve talked about this, Brad, but three and a half years ago, I was almost 500 pounds. I was an offensive lineman. I was always a big person, right? Played ball bringing around 320, 330. And then as I got into the real world, sitting behind a desk, I kept eating the same way I had always eaten. And 12 years later, I’m sitting at 500 pounds. And I’m on a flight back here to Raleigh from Las Vegas and I got to go to the bathroom and I can’t fit in the bathroom, Brad. And it was one of those moments in life where it was like, sh*t– excuse me, sorry.
Brad Johnson: No, it’s all good. Let’s keep it real.
Terence Brown: I got to make some adjustments. This trajectory is not the one I want to continue to be on, and I start to see that people of that size, they don’t live past 55 or 60 if they’re lucky, right? And so, spoke with my wife, she’s always been 100% supportive. She said, “Hey, we can do this right.” Met with doctors, figured out, I was going to do bariatric surgery. So, went that route. And going through that transition and the support that I’ve had from friends and other people and changing my health and my life trajectory from that standpoint made me realize I want to have that type of impact on people’s lives that we work with and our team members’ lives, right? I want to put them on a trajectory that’s completely different to what they see is possible and what they can accomplish.
And so, yeah, today, when a teammate of ours sends us a postcard from The Bahamas because they’re confident in their plan and that they can go take some of the trips that maybe they’ve put off or not done, I love seeing that, right? We had a teammate– because as part of our process, we want to get to know them and what they want to be involved in, how they want to spend their time. So, I had one teammate who we go through this process and he’s like, “I don’t know how to spend my time now that I’m retired.” And I’m like, “Yeah, I could totally understand that. You’ve been working for 50 years.”
And so, this process is not just a financial process as well. Again, it’s what are we going to be doing? How are we going to spend our time? How are we going to stay active? How are we going to stay healthy? What hobbies are going to we be involved in? So, fast forward, this guy comes in for a strategic meeting, kind of doing an update. And he says– because I had kind of challenged him, I said, “Hey, go find a hobby. Go find a hobby to get involved in.” So, he comes in, he says, “Terence, I did what you asked.” I said, “What are you talking about?” He says, “I found a hobby.” He says, “Ever since I was little, I wanted to play the drums and my dad wouldn’t let me. And I could totally understand as an– who wants a drum set in their house, a kid banging on drums all day?” But this 68-year-old man, he says, “I went out and bought a drum set and I’m taking drum lessons.”
Brad Johnson: That’s so cool.
Terence Brown: And to know that we were involved in that, yeah, I’m not going to lie, I think we’re showing up in a different way than maybe we used to. Not that what we did previously was not good. I’m very proud of what we’ve done. But being able to have those types of conversations and build those types of relationships, build that community and that culture. And if I can take a second, sorry, Brad, I don’t mean to…
Brad Johnson: No, I love the track you’re on. Please?
Terence Brown: I don’t know what the next 10 years looks like from a technology standpoint, but I know that this world is changing. Ten years from now, if you don’t know how to build relationships and help your teammates be a part of a community and a culture, they may not need you, right? I think people will be able to solve any financial problem over the next 10 years through AI if they want to. And so, the people that we want to attract are the people that value a relationship, value having a team of people that can be there for them when they need them and can proactively help them plan and look at all of the variables that are out there because some people don’t want that, right? And that’s fine.
But you got to attract the people that do want that, that value. I’ve always enjoyed being on a team, playing team sports growing up. I like knowing that people have my back and that we’re working towards a common goal. If you want to be in business in 10 or 15 years, I think you have to build your business that way. Or otherwise, you are just a commodity. And if you’re just a commodity, AI will solve the commodity problem in 15 years. Now, I don’t know, I’m not a technology genius, I don’t know how all that stuff works, but that’s just kind of the way I see it.
Brad Johnson: I think that is a solid take. It’s already happening right now. There’s a movie, Her. Have you seen it? It’s Joaquin Phoenix, Scarlett Johansson. And literally, this dude falls in love with an AI bot. And what’s wild is it’s already happening now. Like people are having relationships because, guess what? AI will talk to you. Like you said, you can program it to be what you want it to be.
But back to your take, one of the things that’s wild that I think most financial advisors don’t realize when they first get into this business, young Terence just getting out of football and getting in, you’re looking like, oh, we’re going to help people and we’re doing spreadsheet work and all this stuff. You don’t realize the psychology that you’re going to be dealing with when somebody loses a spouse of 50 years and they’re in your office crying, or loss of a loved one was completely unexpected and sometimes, you’re the shoulder to cry on. And I do know, that is a very human thing, and the more you create a culture and a community of people knowing you care, obviously, you have to know how to build a plan to, but it’s that human element of being there for people when they need it most in those lowest moments. It’s going to be really hard for a robot to replace that.
Terence Brown: Yeah.
Brad Johnson: And so, I think you’re spot on with how do we create a community shared values, people that know that we care and we’re there for them in their toughest times. And I think that will be a big sticky factor 10, 15 years from now. So, I think that’s a really solid take.
Terence Brown: Yeah, that’s just another random thought. Obviously, as you’re in this business, you have teammates that pass away, and bless my wife for this, but one day she comes into my office and she’s like, “If we’re around long enough, at some point, all of these teammates that we have, we’re going to see pass away.” And so, think about that, right? And yeah, are you going to be there? And can you support when that happens? And can you show up and can you be a human being? Or do you just view things as dollar signs and cents? And I’m not knocking people if that’s the way they view things, but it is important to me, right? It is important to me the impact that we’re making and how we show up for people. We’re not perfect at it today, but we’ll continue to grow and evolve and get better.
Brad Johnson: Well, I think it all starts with the intention and the heart, which you obviously have. And I know that your clients feel it, guaranteed, because you wear it on your sleeve, which is one of the reasons I, instantly the first time I met you, just was like, I like this dude because you just wear it on your sleeve. You are who you are. And those are the sort of people I want to surround myself with.
Well, I know we’re getting close to the end here. So, we’re going to go, to kind of a little bit of the Do Business, Do Life side. So, being that it is Friday in Silver Lake, Kansas and I accidentally opened a card store and it’s trade night tonight, I have to ask you, how is your cardboard addiction going? How are you keeping that active?
Terence Brown: It’s not as heavy as yours, but I do enjoy picking up a few cards and memorabilia here and there. My most recent, I’ve got a little collection of signed baseballs from some of the 90s Braves, John Smoltz, Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux. I got to find a few more. But yeah, some of the nostalgic, look, we’re all eight-year-olds at heart.
Brad Johnson: True.
Terence Brown: I mean, we’re trying to adult in this world, but we’re eight-year-olds at heart and we love doing little things that bring joy and happiness, and I have a little nostalgic bone in me that I always like to feed, I guess, whatever.
Brad Johnson: Well, hey, back to your 65, 68-year-old that’s learning how to play the drums, someday, when you hang it up and you got to have something to do, and I will tell you, there is definitely a rebirth going on in sports cards and memorabilia right now because it’s the nostalgia cycle of all the guys our age who now have eight-year-olds. And it’s really fun. Tonight, I have a feeling is going to be wild at trade night. We’ll have dads. We will have kids. And it lights me up, man. It’s like, it’s fun.
So, I will keep the cardboard addiction going. We’ll potentially find a little shop out in Utah while we’re out there. And yeah, life is good. So, with that, one final question for you, my man. By the way, they’ll probably edit this out, but that’s fun. That’s a first. We had a guest appearance from Ben, our next podcast guest.
Terence Brown: I love it. I love it.
Brad Johnson: So, one final question for you, Terence. When it comes to, obviously, we’ve talked a lot about it at Triad, one of our missions is to do business, do life, do business with people we want to do life with, also help you build a business that allows you to bless your life. It doesn’t just become your life like, unfortunately happens in finance a lot. So, I would love to hear your take. What does do business, do life mean to Terence?
Terence Brown: Yeah, it means having the freedom to be intentional on how you spend your time. And so, for me, as we build our business, I want to be able to create time to do life with my wife, Sara, and to do the things that we enjoy. And so, one of the things that we do every year is we’re trying to hit every baseball stadium. So, last year, we went to Philadelphia, caught a few games there. I’ll tell you this, if you’re a Braves fan, wearing Braves stuff to a Phillies game, they don’t like that.
Brad Johnson: They weren’t kind to you, they didn’t greet you normally?
Terence Brown: There were a few, but we had some fun, things said to us, but…
Brad Johnson: I can second, if you’re a Chiefs fan going to a Super Bowl surrounded by Eagles fans, it feels the same way. Just so you know.
Terence Brown: Yep. This year, we went to Fenway, we went to Boston. We’ll figure out where we’re going to go next year. That’s one of the things.
Brad Johnson: You hit Atlanta, too, didn’t you? You hit Atlanta.
Terence Brown: Yeah, I’ve been to a few games in Atlanta there at Truist. But doing life is, yeah, finding time to spend with the people that you care about. And so, yeah, that’s what’s important to me.
Brad Johnson: Awesome, brother. Well, always enjoy our conversations. Thanks for carving out the time, and fortunately, get to see you in a few days out in Utah. So, until I see you in person.
Terence Brown: Sounds good. Thanks, Brad.
