Jeremy Shapiro With Bay Area Mastermind

Intro: [00:00:06] Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in the Bay area. It’s time for Bay Area Business Radio. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:18] Lee Kantor. Here, another episode of Bay Area Business Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show we have Jeremy Shapiro with Bay Area Mastermind. Welcome.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:00:29] Thanks so much for having me. This is great.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:31] I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about Bay Area Mastermind. How you serving folks?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:00:36] Yeah, what we’re doing is we’re helping out our local Bay area entrepreneurs, business owners and founders really connect and get together for a full day of working on their business, as opposed to the day to day work in their business. And that lets our members connect, scale and really grow together.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:51] So what’s the genesis of the idea? How did this come about?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:00:55] Well, I’ve been part of mastermind groups myself for decades. Some groups are remote. You hop on a plane and fly somewhere exotic for a few days, you know, a few times a year, other times more casual, sort of weekly, like accountability calls or get togethers. And those haven’t really served the needs that I was looking for in my businesses and the structure we put together for the Bay Area Mastermind of meeting once a month for a full day right here in downtown San Jose, lets us get into what’s really going on in our own businesses and uncover the blind spots for each other, and provide that expertise and peer advisory that comes from hanging around with like minded, growth focused, lifelong learners.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:31] Now, for folks who aren’t familiar with the concept of mastermind, do you mind sharing a little bit of a primer on what it is and how it kind of came about?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:01:41] Yeah, the topic or the idea of a mastermind really came from author Napoleon Hill when he published this Think and Grow Rich book back in 1938. One of the titles he had there, chapter ten, is called The Power of the Mastermind, The Driving Force, and this really is where he exposes this idea of titans of industry getting together and helping each other out. And this structure lets individuals uncover the blind spots for each other and provide that real peer advisory. As an entrepreneur can get lonely at the top, you don’t really have that kind of honest, candid feedback you need from customers, from vendors, from family, friends and so on. So when you’re with other folks who are also in that same boat on that same journey, you can get that unbiased, real feedback. People who don’t mind asking the tough questions and don’t mind lending their superpowers and deep areas of expertise to help you get unblocked and move forward in life and in business.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:37] Now, it sounds like you’ve been kind of experiencing several different iterations or variations of a mastermind. Tell me about how you were able to kind of pick your favorite parts, or maybe the most effective that you found, and then build this into kind of your unique spin on a mastermind, like for the person who doesn’t understand or really maybe of experienced the variety, you know, like you mentioned, there are some that are kind of leads clubs. Some are just about, you know, support and accountability. Some are really, you know, noncompetitive people trying to grow their business. There’s there’s a lot of flavors to this. And talk about how you were able to kind of cherry pick your favorite parts or best parts that you find most effective into your the one that you’re doing.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:03:23] Business owners have long had groups available to them, just like the ones you’re describing. From leads, groups and networking groups to referral groups to just networking groups and social events and everything in between. A mastermind is really special and different from that, and when we look at what the best parts are from the sort of various formats and styles of mastermind groups out there, what I’ve found really matters is one that you’ve got the right people in the room with you, right? You don’t want to be the biggest fish in the pond, as it were, and so far ahead of everyone else that you can’t get much value from the group and the experience they have to share. And on the flip side, you don’t want to be the smallest guy in the room where you don’t have much to contribute or share with the group. So you’re looking for that like minded group of folks at a similar stage of business as to where you’re at, and we are really intentional about how we curate that and how we attract the right kinds of members to our group. Second, it’s important to us that within those members we have, like I shared, lifelong learners and people who are focused on self improvement, business improvement, and want to grow and scale and be the best version of themselves with the best version of their business that they can have. So within that, when we look at sort of the weekly cadence that typically is too frequent and those meetings are usually too short to really get a chance to deep dive into the heart of what’s going on in an individual’s business. On the flip side, the larger destination groups where you’re getting away for, you know, a week, once or twice a year, maybe three times the entire business can change.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:04:47] So by the time you show up, people have sold their business, launched a new business. Things are drastically different over the course of, say, six months. So one of the best practices we found was that meeting cadence of once a month for a full day that gives us time to implement and execute on our accountability items, where we hold each other accountable. And it lets you actually make real change in the business, much more that you can make in a one week period and less than you do in a six month period. So that cadence, I found, is one of the best practices for how often to meet. And lastly, when you look at like the free groups or coffee accountability groups that maybe meet for 30 up to at the most 90 minutes once a week. Those typically have a higher turnover because they’re usually free to very low cost. And as a busy business owner, if you’ve got something recurring on the calendar showing up to talk to a few friends that you do every single week, sometimes the fires of the day become more important and so members don’t really show up. There’s not much skin in the game. It’s a very low barrier to entry. So by having an actual financial investment as well as the time investment, you’re able to find folks who find value in the group and each other and are willing to invest the time, as well as the money in being part of the right kind of group of folks just like them, who also want to grow and scale.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:02] So how many groups are you running?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:06:06] Um, so it depends how we look at that. We have, um, we have our core groups that are for our scaling business owners. Um, this past year, we actually just kicked off a founders group as well for a much earlier stage businesses. And we also have folks we work with virtually, as well as folks that we, you know, we coach and consult in terms of an actual group size. What we found is you can’t let a group get too big. That’s the point where we actually want to split off and have a new group that’s not just an oversubscribed group like you’d find in sort of one of those destination groups, like we were talking about before, those you can have more members in.

Lee Kantor: [00:06:40] So now when you’re building the group or curating the group, what are some of the at least red flags for you? Like, you know, I’m sure you don’t want people that are transactional, that are, you know, kind of jerks, like you’re trying to create a group of similarly valued people that appreciate this experience and not, you know, one to dominate it.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:07:06] Yeah, that’s spot on. Qualifying for the right people is really important. Everyone has their industry or trade groups they can go to to find more people who are just like themselves doing the same thing the same way. By consciously curating a diverse group, we get what I call the cross pollination of ideas, and this is where you get members sharing best practices in their industry with other individuals in a different industry, where they can really pivot and do something different than everybody else. So I’ll share an example I love in this space, you have an e-commerce company who’s selling purely online. They then hear about an offline retail business who’s doing direct mail. Right now you have one business who’s doing one style of marketing and a different business doing an almost opposite style of marketing. The two of them are then able to see what the other one is doing, ask questions about that, get access to resources, best practices, do’s, don’ts, and so on. So we’re looking for that range of businesses and range of superpowers and areas of expertise. In terms of characteristics, we want to make sure that our members are well read. They enjoy reading. They’re actively reading. We’re all lifelong learners. We’re all voracious readers, right? We are individuals who invest in ourselves, who go to conferences, who take courses, who are always learning and trying to be that better version.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:08:20] So we screen for that. We’re also looking for folks who won’t just get value from the group, but who are able to contribute value as well. So part of our screening process we have for our test drives is we’re looking for what are those areas of genius, or what are those areas where a business owner is seeing success that they be able to lend some expertise in the group? It’s not just about there being, you know, a linear one person is ahead of somebody else overall and able to help others up. It’s a matter that everyone has different areas of expertise and superpowers. So when it comes to marketing, you’ll have some members who have deep expertise. Others have deep expertise in sales, others in hiring and retention, and others in finance and so on. So depending on what a member needs, we’re looking for that range of skill sets and that range of superpowers that can really help to have that that lively peer advisory. And we want folks who are open to being lovingly and respectfully challenged around their blind spots and are open to seeing the opportunities others see within themselves and within their businesses.

Lee Kantor: [00:09:19] So walk me through. Um. Say, I raised my hand and I’m like, Jeremy, I’m curious. Um, how do I get involved with this mastermind group? How do I, you know, throw my hat into the ring? What do I have to do?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:09:32] What we found experientially. And this goes back to one of your questions earlier about best practices, is it doesn’t make sense for someone to join a group blind they’ve never been part of before, or had a chance to experience. On that same note, it’s unfair to a group to just tell them, hey, here’s somebody new who’s just in the group. So what we put together is our test drive process. So when someone heads over to Bay Area mastermind.com, you can start an application. And that application, even the questions that we asked during that, those questions themselves can be eye opening and can help you see some opportunities in your business for where you are and where you’re going. Once that application is in, we hop on the phone, we go over that application and better understand what you’re looking for in a mastermind group and see if there’s an opportunity to serve or to point you in a direction where someone can help you out. And if it looks like there’s there’s a good fit, we invite you to our test drive. So for a reduced fee, it lets you join us one time for a full day and really experience what it’s like to have a hot seat to to feel that joy and thrill that comes from providing insight and advisory to others and really experience that full day with us. And at the conclusion of that, if we feel that you’d be a good fit for the group, and if the group feels the same and you feel the group would be a good fit for you, then we extend the offer to join us and become a member with us longer.

Lee Kantor: [00:10:47] Tum now what is that day agenda typically, uh, how does it flow?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:10:54] The biggest thing we do throughout the day, and where most of our time is focused, is on our member hot seats. Within each hot seat, there are four main things that everyone’s going to be covering for you. If it’s your first time test driving with us, it’ll be a little bit about who you are, what you do, and all that. For the rest of our members who are returning, they’ll be going over accountability items and what’s been accomplished over the past month. And then what everyone’s really sharing, and it’s in varying formats, but there’s three major points beyond that. One is what’s working, two is what’s not, and three is where you need help. So this is where, you know, we’ve had members share, for example, challenges that they’ve had with a marketing campaign that didn’t go the way they wanted it to, and they would love some feedback on why. Or they’ll share the lessons learned from that. You might find someone else who is sharing about a new hiring process they put into place that’s working really well, and walk the group through what that looks like. And what I think is really interesting is everyone who comes into the room usually has some big question, some big ask, some big block, and they’re looking for insight on that. And they go in with the idea of success is getting an answer to that question. But where I see the biggest aha moments, I see the pens scribbling the most. I see people’s eyes go wide and the smile creep across their face. That always happens during everybody else’s hot seat. It’s when other members are sharing what’s going on in their business, what’s working, where they need help and so on that you see those sparks really ignite, and entrepreneurs take note and ask those questions of digging a little deeper. See, these hot seats aren’t just a one way presentation. They’re facilitated conversations. And so it’s a chance for members to ask questions and get that guidance they need in their own business based on the experience of others who’ve been there and done that.

Lee Kantor: [00:12:31] Now, when you started this concept, how did you get kind of that initial group together? Was it just your peers or people you’ve just met over the years? How did you kind of build this from scratch?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:12:43] Yeah, we were sort of in like the shadows for quite a while. It was people we know, people we connected with who shared this is really what they were looking for. And they’ve been they’ve been looking for a mastermind group to help them out. Generally, people who found us or knew about this had already read Napoleon Hill’s books, knew this idea of looking for a mastermind, or they heard about that concept somewhere else, and they then wanted to find a local to the Bay area mastermind group that they could join. And the Bay Area Mastermind is exactly that. So we filled a pretty unique gap that’s in the marketplace. There’s plenty of networking groups and founders groups and things like that to meet other people. But again, the focus there is usually networking. It’s not so much on the true mastermind concept of sharing what’s really going on in your business, both the wins and the failures. As an entrepreneur, it’s lonely at the top. There’s not a lot of folks you can celebrate your big successes and wins with. And the flip side, there’s not a lot of people you can share your real challenges and blocks with, and the mastermind group provides that safe environment to be vulnerable and share what’s really going on and have people celebrate your successes and help you out with your challenges.

Lee Kantor: [00:13:48] Now, having been involved with these type of entrepreneurs over the years, have you kind of learned some maybe do’s and don’ts for an entrepreneur to maybe prevent them from making some mistakes when they’re beginning to scale their business? Have you gotten any advice for those entrepreneurs?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:14:08] A lot of entrepreneurs get started because they were a technician doing something at a different business, and they decide they want to go do it on their own. Right. This could be you’re a chef at a restaurant and decide you want to open your own restaurant. You could be a plumber and decide you want to open your own plumbing company. You could be an SEO expert working at an agency and decide to open your own company and so on. Right? That’s a common path that entrepreneurs take of hanging their own shingle. What they don’t realize, though, is that at some point you think you have a business, but you’re actually self-employed, and if you step away from the business, it would fall apart and the business is too dependent on you. So one of the first areas of growth that we focus on with folks, with their earlier stage, is this idea of moving beyond just a few team members they have and actually scaling up the systems and the people so that as the founder, as the entrepreneur, as the business owner, you can really step back from the business and have it continue to grow.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:14:58] This lets you work on the bigger picture, bigger picture, vision, leadership, and the areas of life that you want to spend your time that the business should support. So to your question about some of the common, uh, things that come up, it’s often entrepreneurs being their own block, thinking nobody can do it better than they can, and not wanting to hire people to do the jobs they’re doing in the business. Um, and the second is not having the right systems in place to scale. And then the third big piece, I would say, is not having that peer advisory and that feedback to provide shortcuts and uncover those blind spots when you’re in a great peer group of other business owners, founders and entrepreneurs who’ve been there and done that, they can show you those pathways to get to where you want to get to sooner, because they found ten ways that don’t work and can share with you the one way that does. And you don’t have to go through all that yourself. You can really learn and leverage the knowledge of others.

Lee Kantor: [00:15:52] Um, do you find that people who don’t have mastermind groups or boards of advisors or anything like that, what’s the kind of the fear that’s holding them back in that area? Or are they just do they have some imposter syndrome? Do they think that they don’t have anything to share? Like, what is kind of the psychological rationale for not participating in something like the Bay Area Mastermind?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:16:16] It’s fascinating to me how many entrepreneurs truly suffer from imposter syndrome. You know, the classic example is everyone sees the duck floating effortlessly across the surface of the water, not realizing all the turbulent craziness going on underneath the water, with the feet paddling in the water swirling and everything going on, they just see the duck effortlessly floating across the water. It’s the same thing often with Entrepreneurships. The outside view from the world is that a business owner is successful and doing well, and they’re living on Easy Street, and they have no idea what’s really going on behind the scenes and just how challenging it can be to be a founder and entrepreneur. And for many founders and entrepreneurs, they know just how difficult it is, and they lose sleep over the decisions they have made or need to make and the challenges that come from running your own business. But the outside world doesn’t see that. So there is an element for sure, of imposter syndrome and thinking there’s nothing to contribute yet when we actually look at a business and look at all that a business owner has done right, there’s usually a lot of deep expertise that an entrepreneur has that they have blinders on to. As entrepreneurs, we see the mountain in front of us, of all the things we need to do and all the things we need to get done, and it’s easy to lose sight of all that’s actually been accomplished. And so in a mastermind setting, we celebrate those accomplishments, and we start each meeting off by going over one really big win from this past month.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:17:40] And when we take a look in the rear view, we can see just how much has been done. So in terms of what stops folk, stops folks from seeking out or joining a group, yes, for sure there’s a bit of imposter syndrome. And to that I’d say complete an application. Let’s talk about your business. I know there’s some wins there and some really important lessons learned, even in big challenges. And trust me, as an entrepreneur, you have a wealth of knowledge to share if you’ve made it. As far as calling yourself an entrepreneur, that’s really big. On the flip side of that, there can also sometimes be a bit of, um, believing you know it all and can do it all yourself. And this is usually the founder who thinks they can’t find the right people, who can do the job as well as they can, let alone better. And trust me, you always want to be hiring people who are smarter than you and better at you in each area of your business, and so if you think you know it all, then that generally means you’re not as open to hearing feedback from others. It also means you’re not generally open to asking the vulnerable questions about what can really help you out and getting unblocked, and that can prove challenging. So those kinds of folks don’t typically seek out that kind of peer advisory input. And they generally, if they do, um, can dominate in providing feedback and not being open to receiving any of it. And so again, that’s kind of what we screened for in that application process.

Lee Kantor: [00:18:58] Now, is there a story you can share of maybe somebody who came to the group as a skeptic or just said, oh, I’ll just try it. And but we’re not really 100%. It sold and then was able to get maybe some achievement or got to a new level, you know, as I don’t want to say a surprise, but maybe it it kind of did surprise them on the power of this kind of a group.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:19:22] Yet thematically, I find these surprises always people are coming in looking to get unblocked in one area, and the delightful surprise is that they found their their their business family. They found others like themselves they didn’t even realize were out there. And they got insight into areas they didn’t know were even challenges within the business. We all have an idea of the things that we know. We sometimes think we know. Some of the spots where we could improve in areas of things we don’t know. But the biggest opportunities I’ve found time and time again are in the areas that we didn’t know, we didn’t know anything about. And that’s really where that period advisory can help out. So yeah, to your question about like individual stories, I can think back to one of our members who joined us and, you know, was on that fence of like, hey, let’s see what this mastermind group is all about. You know, they looked at, for example, coaching, they talked to coaches, they talked to consultants. They’d, uh, talk to some online communities. And they were curious sort of where a mastermind group fit within that. And their question sort of came down to afterwards of like really seeing the difference between group coaching and a mastermind group. But the value they found was not just in the facilitation, but in the openness and willingness of other members to to challenge some of those basic mindsets. So sometimes we’ll come up. The biggest limiting factor is an individual’s mindset in terms of how much they charge or what they’re worth, or what the value is of their customers. See, so we had we had one member who joined us who had his his billable rates relatively low, but thought for himself. He was pretty high. And that sort of he priced himself mentally based on what he thought he was worth.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:21:06] And so the group lovingly challenged that and said, your prices should actually be quite a bit higher. And the response to that was along the lines of, well, when I get to X number of customers, then that will justify raising the price. And we said, well, that’ll justify it to you, but to your prospects, they don’t need you to have a certain number of customers. That’s just you getting comfortable with the idea. And so we were able to help as a group unblock that mental. Uh, limit and limitation of what his time was worth until he was able to go out there and raise the prices and like, right off the bat, that increases profitability in the business and not just top line revenue, just simply that little change we provided, you know, um, product feedback to businesses that are looking to launch a new product line. We had a member in our group who, uh, you know, when he came in, had one business model, which was successful. It was also kind of dated. And so as a group, we were lovingly prodding this, bringing the business model into a modern style, SAS, a software as a service platform, as opposed to the business model that was there before. Um, and that idea was met with some resistance. But when that member came around to the idea, a whole new business was launched. That business went on to double revenue every single year, and that became that next big business in the older business was suddenly the side business. And that’s just one of many, many stories we have of wins folks get from, you know, being part of the group and being open to the feedback and advisory from others.

Lee Kantor: [00:22:36] So if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team or get Ahold of that application, what’s the website? What’s the coordinates?

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:22:45] Yeah. Head over to Bay Area mastermind.com. You can find out more about our group, what the meetings are like, upcoming events. You can submit that test drive application. And even if you’re not sure if the group is a fit for you, the application process itself will be eye opening in terms of the questions we ask, and that’ll give you an idea of what we’re looking for. And then from there, we hop on a call and go over that. And if there’s an opportunity that, you know, looks like it’s a fit for you, we’d welcome you to join us for a test drive. And if not, that’s great. We’ve got a ton of great resources that we can share with you to help you on that journey of entrepreneurship. We’ve been there before. We’ve been running the groups for quite a long time. We’re not going anywhere anytime soon. And you’re not alone on the journey. We’re here with you.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:24] Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Jeremy Shapiro: [00:23:29] Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

Lee Kantor: [00:23:30] All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Bay Area Business Radio.