Freedom has its cost (E11)

+ Transcript

Conversation for a better tomorrow - Episode 11

Freedom has its cost

Daniel Dubois 0:00 Empowering people are using it as a self development engine for them to be able to to pursue their passions and set them up for success for not only their skill set aligns with the company, but they're also extremely passionate about the mission and the, you know the purpose of what we're bringing to the world.

Luke Fenwick 0:20 Hello everyone. Thanks for joining us for Episode 11. Co founder and President of Key Market Manager of Airbnb guides and share shed founder Canadian G20 Young Entrepreneur delegate. Top 30 under 30 for business in BC, serial entrepreneur, angel investor, center of powerful intention and shaper of tomorrow. This week's guest is Daniel Dubois. And he is here to truly paint an incredible picture. We're excited to talk to him about his remarkable story thus far. And with that, let's get to the show.

Welcome back. Welcome back. Sean, wonderful to see you. Daniel, wonderful to see you also brilliant to have you on the show. Sean how's things what's new in your world?

Sean Oldham 1:15 Just just lots of things. Countdown coming really close with with baby number two and trying to get a lot of things finalized before that happens. Because you know, probably go silent for a couple of weeks after that. But couple things need to be shored up before we get there. So it's just you know, never it's never really boring when you have a little one. And you know, we're gonna add to that. So yeah, no, it's been fun. But how about yourself?

Luke Fenwick 1:38 Yeah, much, much the same, much the same. Evren's my little boy who's three recently he's doing the full potty training changed room at creche. Little Billy, who's three months old. She's doing well. She's sleeping through the night. We're back in lockdown here in Victoria. So actually, most of Australia at the moment is in lockdown. So the major cities, Sydney, Melbourne, and now Adelaide overnight. So we've had a bit of a COVID outbreak. So there's lots happening in this neck of the woods but you know, we won't worry about getting into that too much at this point in time. Yeah, let's roll. Let's get into it excited.

Sean Oldham 2:14 Let's get into it. And before we, you know, scare Daniel out of wanting to be a father, let's just dive into the content that we actually want to talk about. So I know.

Daniel Dubois 2:24 You got a two year old baby. But you know, a two year old business is very similar, right? Almost, I wouldn't want to say the same time constraints and demands but but I'm feeling it, you know, you. The thing is that the kid you know will grow up and it will turn out all right, we're a business. You know, you have to you have to nurture that little baby or also, it's not going anywhere. It's not growing on...

Sean Oldham 2:49 I cannot wait to dig into this. I really can't. And you know, before we go any further, I just want our listeners to know who exactly we are talking to. So Daniel Dubois, you know, currently co founder and president of Key, which is a very, very interesting housing concept in Toronto right now that I'm excited to talk about as well. But he's also been a Market Manager that Airbnb, Eastern Canada in northeastern United States, you know, guides and share shed founder, Canadian G20. Young Entrepreneurs delegate, top 30 under 30 for business and BC, and I believe you were actually still well under 30. At that point as well. Can't forget captain of his university basketball team in once upon a time I could maybe be this guy basketball, but that ended a long time ago, offered a contract in Europe to actually play basketball. But he was focused on becoming an entrepreneur. He's now as well an Angel investor, he has been a TED speaker, a setter of very powerful intention and a shaper of tomorrow. As again, this week's guest is Daniel Dubois. And we are really, really excited to talk to him today about you know, just entrepreneurship and the mindset required for you know, constantly innovating and constantly bringing new thoughts, new ideas and new ways to, you know, not just stay afloat, but thrive out there in the world of entrepreneurship. So, yeah, Daniel, thank you. Thank you for being here.

Daniel Dubois 4:14 Yeah. Hey, thanks for the nice intro here. I'm really excited for our conversation.

Sean Oldham 4:20 Yeah, honestly, I was I was as I was doing a little bit of research to find some some things. It's, uh, you know, it's remarkable, you know, a little background, I've known Daniel for a long time. You know, his older brother and I are very, very good friends. And you know, you've seen Daniel just kind of grow speaking at a we day doing these things. And it just became normal, because we expected that kind of behavior from you, because you were always thinking this way. It seemed like and that's what you know, Luke, and I kind of want to start with today is like, go back to you know, the younger years and the forming vision. You know, how that entrepreneurial mindset came to be? Because you were you started your clothing lines as early as 12 years old, right. So you're you're very early to get going. So what? Who are your earliest influences? And when did the thinking start to go in this direction that you were going to work for yourself? And really only do that?

Daniel Dubois 5:09 Yeah, you know, it's like it goes back to the conversation of born or bred, right. And having two, two parents that are both entrepreneurs, and my brother and I grew up in such a loving household, we're so blessed to have the upbringing that we did have and had a mom who any spark that she identified in us that have a passion or direction that we want to go, she would just encourage us in that direction.

Really, I think a strong testament of what parenting could be right of just like focusing on what people are passionate about. And, you know, having having struggled a bit in elementary school, it was something I remember, my teachers worried about. But my mom would always see me as like this entrepreneur because I was going out picking loss off the train tracks in Granville Island and Falls Creek and going door to door selling it for $5 a bag at five years old, right, like I don't even know what money was. But I just had this innate desire to build spending childhood, my summers on quadrille island with my cousins, and we kind of sit still, we're just building forts. And as soon as we've complete one fort, we're on to the next one, right? We just had that bad blood and desire to create. So really, like my passion for entrepreneurship really now has developed into a tool and mechanism to make a difference in the world and contribute and grow and chase my potential. But really, when you peel back the onion, what really keeps me up at night. And my innate desire is around building, it's around creation. And, and that's something that I've learned to now being a leader and having built out teams of teams within organizations, when it comes to delegating and empowering someone it's really hard to delegate something that someone isn't innately driven towards doing right, you don't want to delegate something that someone's not super passionate about, and something that they especially want to take on, outside of just being told that something that they need to do, right, so building is that for me, no matter where I am in the world, if it wasn't entrepreneurship, it would come out in another way, shape, or form. And, and yeah, just once again, blessed to have the brother and parents that I had that were so supportive. The fact that so Sean mentioned that my brother, and so on our close friends, my brother also being another Sean...

...and, you know, I've never had an argument with him, which is unheard of. It's like a dad centric podcast. It's, it's probably maybe if we were closer in age, right, it's a 10 year gap. But being able to have a brother that's 10 years older than me, that's just super even keeled and so supportive and proud of anything that I'm doing, has almost given me the foundation that I want to keep living up to the, to the encouragement and affirmation that I've received, essentially my entire life, you know, so yeah, I feel super fortunate. And everyone has their own founding story, and what drives them. And some of the most powerful ones are the ones that have the exact opposite, and came from extreme levels of adversity and for able to overcome that. For me... You know, it's, it's just been a very blessed upbringing and a ton of support. And yeah, just super grateful for the opportunity to build really, like every day, the fact that it's extremely stressful, you know, at times, and then you just count your blessings, the fact that I'm in a position that I have a number of venture capitalists and investors and employees and, you know, the opportunity to work on a really hard business, which attracts more talent, and more people buying in is, yeah, it's just, it's a great time to be alive.

Luke Fenwick 8:49 Awesome, awesome. You were talking a little bit earlier about, you know, the building the forts. And moving on to the next fort, but I was reading some stuff online, there was a story about a lemonade stand, you know, many moons ago. I hope that article was correct. But can you talk to us a little bit about the lemonade stand and how that might have shaped some of these big moments that were to follow?

Daniel Dubois 9:10 Yeah, for sure. So it was kool aid to be specific, so I used to, I used to go in and buy Kool Aid. First of course, my mom would buy the Kool Aid but then I made enough money that I was independent and would be able to go out and buy my own Kool Aid and would buy it in the you know, the bulk and in Australia, you say Cordial right, and thank you. Yes, it's here as the just like the powder form from Costco and would spend my entire summer months on the Vancouver sea wall and regardless of whatever price I would price the Kool Aid people will complain right 50 cents even 25 cents people will compete with complain about price, and probably just giving me a hard time but I took it pretty serious. So saying, you know 25 cents for Kool Aid I quickly switched to kool aid for sale, pick your own price, and Instantly, I was getting loonies and toonies. New to Canadian ever term dollar $5 bills, you know, and tips with people like the strategy and when you empower people to make their own decisions, they're not going to cheap out for the most part. So it was only rare exceptions that I ever had anything like 25 cents or less. And yeah, I would there's days that has an elementary school student that I would make $80 and it got to the point that I ended up hiring other kids. So we've controlled all the Vancouver Sea wall, especially on Canada Day when it was Canada Day and everyone came to Granville Island we had we had that entire island on lock so yeah, it's a lot of fun. Then as Sean mentioned, I was 12 years old and I was messing around on Microsoft Paint and I was designing my initials. I don't know if you remember Microsoft Paint but I brought it into a store in Granville Island called Justin stitches and that I guess being in grade six, I thought it'd be cool at the time if I had my initials customer ordered into my clothing. And like I you know, it's hard to imagine why I want to do this in hindsight, but they you know, they laughed at me they they thought it was cute and they told me that they only do wholesale but I could buy for the sale and start a clothing line. And they're kind of joking around with this you know grade six elementary school students and I took my kool aid money and went back in there and I paid $500 to get the logo vectorize which you know, you can get that done with $5 on Fiverr right now or you know free software on the web so $500 back end to get this logo vectorized and bought wholesale and then instead of going door to door selling loss I was going door to door with cardboard boxes filled with shirts and jackets and sweatpants and you know Jean hats with my initials and instead of selling kool aid for sale on the Vancouver sea wall I would do pop up shops so yeah...

Luke Fenwick 11:52 Awesome awesome. So you very early days you created a marketing campaign that was a bit of a cannot resist for the consumers you doubled down and reinvested into the rest of the business and expanded on your employee footprint.

Daniel Dubois 12:06 And what I would say is back then there wasn't there wasn't like a ton of strategy I guess pick your own price, you can probably lean into that and try to come up with with some type of you know, narrative around identifying some market need I don't know about that. I think I was just you know, trying to figure it out. And I got into high school in grade eight I just felt like it would be embarrassing if I had my initials custom embroidered on clothing, right. So I so I stopped when I went to high school and with an entrepreneurial bug or once you have an inner DNA and you're just passionate about building and creating it was so hard for me not expressing that and then I created a second clothing line called Martian Crew in high school. And that that was actually much more of a lifestyle brand. it you know, it still is very much like a high school student running a company but but we had people that really pump the brand and different schools, especially my my best friend Remy on the on the North Shore. It's like Remy would bring me to a party and I was like borderline a celebrity there only because of how much he would hype Martian Crew, right. So it's almost the lesson here is I think around the the form of leadership that comes from the first follower, because it was very much like a Martian Crew, it's hard for me to take any almost responsibility for it. But the support network I had around Martian crew and the people that just encouraged me, and anytime we would launch a new item, it would sell out pretty much that day. So yeah, it was, it was a lot of fun. And it taught me a lot on you know, a lot of lessons around brand building and having having a logo that stands for something, being a part of something bigger than yourself, you know.

Sean Oldham 13:50 I really love that. And I want to pull something from what you said that speaks to your leadership style, I imagine, right? Like you'd like to create a work environment where you empower people to make their own decisions. And, you know, you talked about your upbringing, you know, at positivity and that push, like, as opposed to showing what could go wrong. Your parents had that mindset of what could go right, you know what I mean? And just kind of harbored that in you. And, like, what did that What did that do for where you are now in the relationships that you have to make, right like the the different types of people that you have to speak with, you know, to be to be not intimidated to just be yourself to, you know, just challenge yourself to continuously grow? What effect did that have on your ability to do what you're doing now?

Daniel Dubois 14:38 Yeah, I mean, it's everything right? The fact that my parents always focused on the positive right and like, not to say that they wouldn't drop the draw any boundaries, right, if they if they needed to. But but for the most part, they they almost didn't need to draw boundaries because I just wanted to make them proud. You know, I remember hearing as a young kid, that once you become a teenager I overheard this someone talking to my mom or saying that once you become once, like, enjoy it well last because he's gonna become a teenager, and then he's not gonna want to hang out with you or he's not gonna love his parents anymore. Some comment like that. I remember making like a promise to myself be like, That will never happen, I will not let that happen to my relationship with my parents. And it didn't happen, you know, they gave me a ton of autonomy and freedom. And maybe, maybe that doesn't work for everyone, right? If there there could have been the wrong people that I got together with and, you know, who knows? How they would have reacted? In that case? Good thing they didn't have to, but But yeah, the fact that like entrepreneurship you need, you need a bit of a, you know, go hard idiot gene, to be able to, like have this relentless pursuit of what you're passionate about. And then you also need to have a little bit of blind optimism. And I say, blind optimism because it's like, it's it's constant rejection, right? You have to be somewhat foolish to, like, I've, I've probably been rejected over 1000 times. It's like, sometimes people say it's 100 no's to get to a yes. With key it's probably been 1000, right? Like, the investors that we have are like, true visionary, they're betting feeling like there's a good chance they're gonna lose all their money. But if it does take, it's going to eat the world. Right. And, and that's, I'd be curious to dive into to their childhood. But for, for me, being able to give myself the freedom to build and pursue this dream that I have really comes from the fact that I'm confident that if this fails, that it's on to the next thing. My cousin, have you met Aaron, my cousin Aaron, I'm sure.

Sean Oldham 16:42 You guys started the laneway business together. Yeah.

Daniel Dubois 16:46

So one thing that Aaron told me once, he's great at making up these analogies, but he said, you know, if a bird lands on as a character. Sean Oldham 16:57 This this person is quite a character.

Daniel Dubois 16:59 Absolutely. He said, If a bird lands on the branch, like how much do you think the birds worry about the strength of that branch if it breaks or not, because if it breaks the birds flying on to the next one, and I don't know, it's probably something he doesn't even remember. But it really resonated with me in the sense that like, I looked around at Hootsuite, once, Hootsuite was kind enough to, to give me office space for my my first technology company. And I remember looking around going, like I'm taking all this risk in my early 20s, putting in so much work to build this when I can have a nice job at Hootsuite, and be, you know, comfortable and making a lot more money and you know, and then I and then I had this almost epiphany where I felt like, they're actually taking a lot more risk than I'm taking. Because if they're laid off tomorrow, they're dependent on finding a finding somewhere else to work, you know, if like sheriff said, didn't work out for whatever reason, I have, you know, I had 17 investors, including the CEO and founder of Hootsuite, and you know, many others that would be happy to not only homes of Hootsuite actually reinvested in key or not only helped me, you know, start something new, but also, it would just create so much more opportunity. So that's, that's like a, maybe a long tangent way of going back to parenting and just being able to encourage people to pursue their passions and not to worry about failure and just know that you are enough, and you aren't the outcome of the projects that you start and whatever happens and and just to you know, go with the flow and I think that's like a good rule book and playbook for life is just, we used to go on mystery trips. I know in particular, my my brother was being driven to a hockey game by my mom and they got lost and instead of stressing about like the hockey game that they need to, they need to get to my mom laughed it off and said Mystery trip, the next exit was from the border and then drove to the States. And then made this like amazing trip happened and just totally skipped the hockey game, right? So we went that became like a thing of mystery trips, we get in the car, and we wouldn't even know where we're going and we just say like left turn right turn straight. And next thing you know, we're, you know, spending the weekend in Victoria. Right? Awesome.

Sean Oldham 19:23 I absolutely love that man. The the philosophy is absolutely brilliant. And I also like what you said about you know, so anybody that has like a an edge to become an entrepreneur, with what you were saying about you know, earlier in the tangent about, you know, the amount of no's that you have to face. And you are bang on in that edge, like Luke and I are earlier in this, you know, both worked in kind of corporate fields for large companies in the past, but then you have to kind of flex some entrepreneurial muscle like working in business as well, but it's very, very different when it's your own thing, but that bog you speak of 100% I relate. There's just something where it's kind of like this There's nothing once you've tasted this, there's nothing else you just want to keep pushing. So very happy to learn from you today. But Luke, did you have a follow up question about the vision forming?

Luke Fenwick 20:09 Yeah, I'd like to, I've been fortunate enough to, to know a gentleman over here, who's a big entrepreneur, you know, property developer, owns the National Basketball League here. And I have a very clear vision on what kind of individual he is. But I'd love to understand when you're in these situations where you're talking about opportunity to invest into some of the ventures that you're doing, or you're, you know, pitching your vision, so to speak, I'd love to understand where your mind is going, you know, what is what is going through your head in regards to this is what I need to, you know, convey or represent, because I picture a lot of people that might be sitting at home, thinking, you know, I'd be petrified if I stand up in front of three people in an office meeting and talk about, you know, my Monday sales WIP, or whatever it might be, you're sitting here talking about, you know, massive amounts of investment, very, very powerful and influential people. So I just love to know a little bit more about your mindset and vision of this is what must happen right now? Or maybe not.

Daniel Dubois 21:15 Yeah, it's interesting, because you brought up the vision building process as a founder, as well as as an investor. And as an angel investor and active angel investor now, I think it's made me a better operator and understanding the type of metrics that I need to work towards areas of the business I need to focus on. And ultimately, one thing that I lean very hard into for angel investing is the founder, right? And the team that the founder's been able to attract recruitment is something that I very much value. And as a leader, that's a big part of leadership. For me, I think it's hiring the right people, giving them the right tools and getting out of their way. Ultimately, right empowering people using it as a self development engine for them to be able to to pursue their passion and set them up for success for not only their skill set aligns with the company, but they're also extremely passionate about the mission and the, you know, the purpose of what we're bringing to the world. So So, so yeah, as far as as far as angel investing is concerned, typically, the things that you look at are team, traction, technology, market size. For me, anything that I've started, I've just felt like such a strong pull towards and it's always happened organically, like, share shed without going too into detail. I graduated high school, I backpacked Australia for six months, I had a trip of a lifetime. I stayed with people pretty much the entire trip. I had access to canoes, kayaks, surfboards, I went on bike trips with our neighbors, it was just like this magical trip and everyone that I stayed with connected me with someone in Cairns or Surfers Paradise, or mooloolaba, right? Or, you know, Melbourne, you name it. And it was just six months of just feeling like I was traveling like a local right. I came back home and I watched a TED talk. At the time, it was called rise of collaborative consumption. So now it's called the sharing economy, right? It didn't even have a term back then. But 30,000 views I had goosebumps sitting in the back of my entrepreneurship class, my first term at lindera. And just feeling like this is something that I experienced in Australia, but the world hasn't seen yet. The fact that we can use the power of technology not only to help people, you know, have access to what I felt while traveling, but to experience it in their own backyard, right? So that was something I was so drawn towards a wind up all to all my professors, I asked them, How do I learn more about collaborative consumption that no one knew anything about it. So So I directed a film series as a as a college project, I went to San Francisco I met with Airbnb when they're just starting out, I interviewed executives from Facebook and Google, the first ever co-housing set up the first ever co-working space where the hashtag from Twitter was was recently invented at the time. So it's just like, for me it is a way of hacking education. So that I can learn but also educate the world on something that I was just like, so passionate about, you know, 19 years old, or whatever it was. And that and that, like, that wasn't something where, you know, I saw another idea. And I felt like, Oh, I should do something similar here in Canada, what you see often, right are you see the world going somewhere and a bunch of companies starting in a similar space, and you're like, Oh, I should jump on this trend. I couldn't I couldn't not be involved in the sharing economy, consumption at the time. The same is true for Key, where I just, I saw the opportunity firsthand. And once I understood the first principles of this industry, which is, you know, it takes time to understand but when the light bulb went off, and it clicked, it was something that there's no way I could not bring into the world. And I left my dream job at Airbnb to make it happen. And and I'll say that as an Angel investor, I think about envision building and think about companies I invest into, if you're pitching me an idea where you're saying, Hey, we're going to, I'm starting a company to help people do workout classes at home, just making something up. That'd be really hard for me to get excited about, because everyone and their dogs are starting starting a company to help you work out at home, please like, and the opportunity is over a year late because the world opening up again, compared to if you told me a story, well, you know, having your first child and whatever, you know, managing technology in a certain way, and like seeing some opportunity that you that it feels like there's a trend towards but the world hasn't realized it yet. Really, what if there's an inflection point. And there's almost like a moment in time where you have interesting insight that other people don't have. That's exciting. And that's usually when there's a calling to go and pursue something.

Sean Oldham 25:54 Intuition.

Daniel Dubois 25:56 Yeah, yeah. A level of intuition and a level of almost like market pull, in a way, right?

Sean Oldham 26:03 Because what you've said it several in several different ways, but like, not specifically saying, like, your gut, but you seem to really kind of go to where you're pulled as opposed to forcing it.

Daniel Dubois 26:16 Yeah, I mean, for me with, with leaving Airbnb to start Key with my co founder, I went to the most trusted people in my life. You know, my dad, my brother, my past investors. And I'll say that, that there was almost mentor whiplash, you know, we I had people that I respect a ton and still respect to this day, who were adamant that I that I don't leave Airbnb, right. And then I have my dad and brother, on the other hand, who were like, go for it, you know, like, if this is something you want to do make it happen. And it's like, not not fully logical, especially with like Airbnb, as opposed to IPO in the coming years, which obviously, was was a great event. And, and yeah, I think it's ultimately something that is important that I want to make actually, with that is, ultimately no one knows better than then you know yourself. And people can only help pull that out to you and Sean, you know, this better than anyone is a coach, right? Like, you don't tell people, this is what you should do. And I'm active within the tech community and with the, you know, entrepreneurship ecosystem, and I'm on the board of EO which is the largest entrepreneur group in the world. And in EO the word should is banned, right? You actually, if you say should someone will say like, Hey, you just should all over me, you know, it's like, it really should.

Sean Oldham 27:43 It's how could, right? Yeah, I just literally bring that to people make it a question. Always.

Daniel Dubois 27:51 Yeah, I love that. Right. It's like helping bring it out of them. And, and, and see what someone really wants and helping them, you know, pursue the things that light them up and get the most excited.

Luke Fenwick 28:02 Yeah, I've got some one more before I'll throw it back to Sean. So you've mentioned a number of really powerful words, you know, freedom, autonomy, strength, you know, these are things that I presume you live by and maybe instilled from, you know, family, but when of those, you know, values been really challenged, you know, where you're like, Okay, you know, autonomy and freedom, you know, might be nice to have. But I'm being really challenged. And maybe you know, the weight is buckling me a little bit as any of that occurred?

Daniel Dubois 28:38 Yeah, it's a great question. I did an exercise a number of years back called the painted picture, and it's defining your life as crystal clear as you can possibly make it came from Brian Scudamore one 800 got junk. And he felt like, why isn't the world going to plan? Why isn't this business where he fired everyone and rehired them? And just like, why isn't it working out? He's on his parents dock at their cottage and, and what he realized is that things aren't going to plan because he doesn't have a plan. So he wrote out the date, let's say, you know, August 1st 2024. And he just wrote like the conversations happening at the watercooler. He said that he he's in 30 cities, he just went and gave Oprah Winfrey a hug, like you have no idea how the things were gonna happen. But he just described a day in the life and he went back so excited. He showed his team and he let go of half his team afterwards, right? There was a people who lit up and said, this is possible and we're gonna make it happen and the people who are just like O'Brien's crazy, this will pass and not into it. And they went from one city to within three months of that year, that three year date that they said they hit their 30th city so it went from 29 to 30 cities. He got on to the Oprah show he gave Oprah a hug someone as they did it as a team building exercise. They all came up with these ideas. And when someone was like, let's, let's get on a Starbucks cup, like, let's just be everywhere. And sure enough, they got a quote from Brian Scudamore on the little sleeve, Starbucks cup. So it's, it's really cool the power of intention and part of doing that exercise. So Brian Scudamore is a close mentor of mine based on Vancouver, I won a student entrepreneurship competition and receive coaching from his team and himself. And part of that was defining your values and using your values as a filter on all decisions that you make. So it's really cool to hear the fact that you just leaned into the idea of freedom, because freedom is one of my core values, growth, contribution, freedom are like my top three. And then I'd say loving relationships. And that's just being honest with myself with, you know, loving relationships with the environment, and the net positive impact that I have in the world as a whole. And then honesty, it's something that just means so much to me, if I was ever accused of like lying as a kid, it would just eat me alive. Like, it's just like, so important for me to be honest with myself and others, but growth, contribution and freedom, those are like my pillars, right? And you ask a question of when there is a conflict with freedom. Ultimately, freedom has its responsibilities, you know, to create a life of freedom, you have to sacrifice freedom many times, right? I actually, I had a software engineer in our company, and something went wrong. And it was impacting people as as it does. And, you know, I had, he was leaving the office at three o'clock to go play as men's league basketball, which I totally encourage him to do. And, yeah, we found out about this, and he just left and that was fine. And he found out about it. And I found out that he didn't go to his basketball game went home and, and solve this, like, critical issue that was happening. And he messaged me saying, Hey, I skipped my basketball game. And I and I, you know, figured this out, "freedom has its cost", which he told me, you know, which is like, awesome that he got it. And that's like, what being an owner is, you know, like taking true ownership is understanding that freedom doesn't mean you know, what, lie on the couch and watch Netflix all day, because you choose to it's, for me, it's it's a balance of freedom, contribution and growth. And, you know, growth is chasing my potential and, and contribution is working on things that move society forward in a meaningful way. And you can't have that with just like, you know, chillin and all inclusive, and hanging out, right, it comes from, it comes from getting after it and pushing.

Sean Oldham 32:41 So effort, effort. It's also amazing though, you you get really granular on vision, and knowing core values, and all of the things that you're chasing, and you break it down. So granularly It's amazing, though, how many fly blind? Like how many people have like the loose kind of this would be nice to happen, or, you know, that would be okay to have happen? Do you look for that when you bring people in? Like when when you're bringing people onto your team? What are some of the questions that you ask these people to take on an important role with something like Key which is, you know, brand new, right? So you got to believe in this vision. And, you know, like, be a good cultural fit, or this could have big repercussions, so...

Daniel Dubois 33:24 Absolutely! And there's so many people that are and, and not to point the finger or pass judgment at all right to each their own, which is a quote that I love, and I live by, right. So if people want to hang on the couch and watch Netflix all day, actually like, I don't judge that behavior. Sometimes I just want a wish that I like help people like flip the switch, though, to understand how powerful intention can be, like, again, into the back of an Uber, or Lyft. And I'm driving somewhere and they're just like, top 40 on the radio, like and by the way, songs get stuck in my head like so easily that I just like, you're trying to sleep at night, and then something like terrible song will be playing my head. But I just wish that I could like introduce them to podcasts that we're having conversations like this, you know, around like personal development, introducing them to the painted picture and understanding what their values are so that they're, and yeah, especially, I mean, I talked to a lot of people in the world of finance, right, we talked to large institutional investors, you know, huge pools of, you know, where they don't write smaller checks than $100 million. And they don't invest in portfolios less than 2 billion, right. And their entire life is just being a grind. They they leave their jacket on the on the seat when they're leaving their office as an investment banker because they don't want anyone to feel like they're going home because they're coming right back. They're just going to get some takeout or they don't leave the office with a gym bag over their shoulder because it looks like they have enough time to be working out and taking care of themselves. You know And then and then it usually gets to a point where something happens. And like a, like a health event or a health event and someone a loved one in their family and they go like, what am I working towards? You know? And and unfortunately, usually that happens all too late. I have a friend who runs 120 mango tree organic farming in Florida. And he was very high up at Credit Suisse. And then he he hit a moment in time where he realized that he was miserable. And it actually came from coaching and counseling, the Credit Suisse paid for two Credit Suisse's credit, right? And he coached through like, why do I, my entire life I've been wanting this dream of like just farming and being in touch with the environment. And I have all the means to make it happen, but I just can't do it. That's a powerful question that actually led him to now pursuing his dream by running a, you know, a mango farm in Florida, that most people just don't even get to the point, that level of awareness of understanding, you know, why their sleep quality is so crappy? And why they're short with their kids. Right? Like, where's this coming from? What's the underlying emotion where you're not satisfied with, with where you're at?

Sean Oldham 36:16 Yeah, no, most people self talk is, is not very strong. Sadly.

Daniel Dubois 36:21 Yeah, you know, the power of affirmations and visualization and just understanding, you know, where where you want to go and how you're going to get there and not being we're all our own toughest critic, right? So giving ourselves the space to be able to try and fail instead of fail to try where most people go wrong. What was the first part of your question, though, we talked a little bit about intentionality. And then there's a second part to that, that I think I missed.

Sean Oldham 36:45 Just about the you know, like, when you're bringing somebody on for a concept, like he like his Key, I mean. Give it a little bit of a company description, I'd love you to describe it and do it more justice than what you know, I'm going to just kind of describe, but like, basically, to put it into layman's terms, you guys are helping people become investors in real estate, you know, in their own homes, that would likely not believe that they would have had a chance to be homeowners, right? Like you, you read a lot of stories like that about people becoming homeowners at Key. And as well, it's very easy for them to move on from it, having built some equity that they get to take with them. So it's it's a very, very interesting model. You know, I would like my financial mind, and like investor side of me would love to just like dig into the financials and see how this all works. But we're obviously not going to go there. But first part of the question was, you know, how does somebody have to think like to what, to what level do you dig into their thinking and decision making and pick you if you will, which is a new version? And kind of another way to look at things? How do you decide on who is a fit culturally, like, it's not a decision you must take lightly.

For sure. So we won't hijack the conversation with key because it can, we can peel back the onion as deep as you want to go. But for listeners sake, Key's a moonshot. As we discussed throughout this entire conversation, we're a FinTech company. And we've actually built technology to replace a conventional mortgage. And we've created a new model for homeownership, where someone can own a home with just $15,000, without qualifying for a mortgage or ever having to have a mortgage. So the way that it works is co equity model. So you have passive investors who co own the suite with the owner resident. So as an owner resident, you can buy a home with just 2.5%, you still pay rent, but your rent is determined by how much you own. So let's say if you didn't own any of your suite, you'd be paying market rent, you have to at least own 2.5% of your suite. So essentially, you're receiving a 2.5% to what would be almost like a market rent, we call it financing costs. And if you own 100% of your suite, you'd be rent free. You just have to pay the baseline taxes and condo fees analogous to if you paid off your mortgage. But unlike a mortgage, you're not paying years more interest in principal, you're not tied in for a long period of time. You don't pay six to 8% buy sell costs from the all the middlemen that are involved in the home buying experience, right real estate brokers, mortgage brokers legal. So it's frictionless. It's we just recently had a young single mom pulled over on the side of the road on her iPhone, and she bought a house in 15 minutes with $15,000 and she's a instacart shopper making $45,000 a year. So like homeownership in downtown Toronto for her has meant drive till you qualify and wait you're saving up when when it takes 24 years now on average to save up for a down payment. And most people like an instacart shopper or Uber driver or Lyft nurses, teachers, firefighters like the first service foundation of these cities are getting squeezed out and their income isn't actually going up at the same rates as housing prices. So they're actually getting further and further out of reach, usually on a yearly basis. from ever being able to own, and the American dream of homeownership is real in our culture, like we want it, it's actually the foundation of the middle class, which is why we have a shrinking middle class right now. Cities like Vancouver, we have billions of dollars of a wealth divide that's taken place over the last decade, the last 10 years. It used to take four years to save up for a down payment in Vancouver and now takes 29 right. So anyways, I think the problem is well understood around the world, we've been pulled to Mongolia to Italy to you know, South Africa. We have conversation today with a group based on South Africa. And and the entire world for the most part is, is values homeownership, but they're just squeezed out. So that's what we've built. It's been a lot of fun and super challenging. There's, you know, working with all three levels of government working with groups outside of Canada, ultimately, where we're going is creating a global network where you could graduate college and you don't even have to buy a couch, you can subscribe to furniture as a service, you can move from a bachelor to a one two or three bedroom because you started a family, or you could shrink back down and age gracefully in place without being house bore, because you have access to capital as you need. And every month, apologies for not making this more clear, every single month you choose if you want to buy more of your suite, or sell some of your suite directly in our app. So every month, you can choose, Hey, I just got a $5,000 bonus or inheritance, I'm going to own more of my suite which is compounding in value with the real estate markets doing. And at the same time, I'm receiving more of a reduction in rent because I own more, or I want to sell 20 grand and go travel the world or fund my wedding. So that's the way Key works from a high level. From a hiring perspective. We need we need A players we need people who are tenacious and share our values which we've clearly defined. And and resonate with our mission that want to be part of something bigger than themselves and want to want to swing for the fence. We say we say get it want it and capacity to do it. So anyone that we have on our team, we want to make sure it's the right, the right people in the right seats, right generally sort of good Good to Great philosophy.

I was gonna say that.

Daniel Dubois 42:19 Exactly. And we follow something called the who methodology. So there's a book called this called Who, that it's the the approach to hiring a players, right, it's, it's a way that it's an evolution from a book called top grading. And the idea is like, first of all, top of funnel. Like it's really hard to hire the right people when you only have like two or three candidates in front of you. So make sure that you have 100 plus candidates for every role that you're looking to hire. And then it's running a process. So I will I'm very involved. And I'll be as involved as I can for a long time. We're a 20 person team right now. And and there's not a person that we've hired that I haven't been, you know, part of that process. Personally, the way that I like to interview and everyone on my team is a little bit different. But the one thing that I cover is going almost like the conversation we've had today is going back to like earliest childhood memory and trying to find repetitive themes throughout their life, and understanding what they truly value and what their core competencies are and creating not just a job description, but a scorecard on how they're going to be measured. So you can actually score them based on your best assumptions on how you think they're going to perform and the role that you're hiring them for. And that's where everyone goes wrong. They don't actually know what most people are going to be measured on. So they're hiring a little bit blind back to our conversation around intention. And another thing that I I tried to get really clear on is is just like a day in the life what it will look like you know, we're a venture backed FinTech company. Are we like suit wearing briefcase holding finance guys? Are we like a real estate guys that are you know, whatever, whatever sort of stereotype you want to apply to that? Are we tech guys that are wearing hoodies and like coding all day? And playing ping pong and happy hours and vegan muffins? Or is it or is it something that's unique to our culture, which is which it always is, right? Every company is different. And we want to create a space where where people can learn and grow and contribute and move on to another company one day and there's not shame involved in that you know, and, and hopefully leaving a much better person holistically. And, and contribute while they're here. So, so what just to go one layer deeper, and I'll make this part quick, but this is where I spend the root of my time. I'll do a quick 15 minute, sometimes 30 minutes, but I try to do a quick 15 minute call just to weed people out when we have a large top of funnel. And the idea is just pull up their resume or their LinkedIn and I ask them on a scale of one to 10. What would what would their manager rate them based on their performance? And it doesn't matter the number, what matters is the context behind the number. So then you just keep, it's almost like positive interrogation. They're like, Oh, yeah, tell me more, then what happened? And why is that? And like, then what did you do, right? And then the next and then what you do after, you know, asking them on a scale of one to 10, what the manager would rate them. And you ask for their manager's name, you asked how to spell it, like you make it. So it's real, and you could contact their manager, then you ask them to score their manager. So on a scale of one to 10, what would you rate Sean as a leader? And then, how do you set them up for success?

Sean Oldham 46:45 No, I think you've absolutely nailed it. I was gonna ask Luke, do you want to? Do you want to introduce a quote? Because we do.

Luke Fenwick 46:55 Yeah, absolutely. So you know, we usually asks for some quotes from the greats. And those quotes are usually, you know, things that resonate or have shaped our lives or whatever it might be. But I know that Sean's got one that you, you provided him, Sean, if you want to fire away, and we'd love to get the thoughts.

Sean Oldham 47:14 Yeah, so I mean, always, I always like to chew, like, you know, chew on a good quote, right? And like, like, pull some, some amazing meaning from it. So this is the one you provided us. "Entrepreneurship is a personal development engine disguised as a business endeavor", by author James Clear who atomic habits, I assume you've read, and I assume you've implemented the elements. So what does that quote kind of mean to you? How does that speak to you about you?

Daniel Dubois 47:41 Yeah, James Clear. I love the book, atomic habits, it's a super quick read. And just as theme of 1% better is something that my wife Lucy, and I focus on a daily basis every day, it's like, how can we get 1% better? Everything from like our work environment, our nutrition to our workouts to like, you know, there's just there's just endless room for continuous improvement. And we do a weekly accountability meeting where we actually go through like, okay, what's our week look like? What can we hold each other accountable for Usually, we have a foundation that's relatively consistent, like, what's the five things that we're hitting every day, whether that'd be like meditation, finding stillness, 10,000 steps working out, you know, there's usually the same sort of buckets journaling and, and then the other goals, right, like, eating the frog first thing in the morning. But the idea of So James clear, has an amazing mailing list, like I unsubscribe for everything, but I can't not read his emails that come through. And they're just very concise, and everything is just cold. And one of them was this idea that business is a personal development engine disguised as a business endeavor, right? Or entrepreneurship is, it's disguised as a business endeavor, but it's really around personal development and growth. And it resonated with me, because most business challenges are actually personal challenges. So instead of asking, you know, why is my CFO so unreliable? It's, why do I have such a hard time holding people accountable who are older than me? Right? Or it's asking me like, what is what is the if you're taking absolute ownership over the situation? What's the introspective question that you need to ask yourself? Because it's usually not about someone else and them not doing their job? It's more it's on as a leader, it's on you. Right? And, and why do I have such a hard time letting someone go when I know they're not a right fit? And they're, they're struggling in their role, whatever it might be? Why do I have such a hard time having difficult conversations with people I like, or why do I value being liked compared to holding people accountable? You know, I'm just making things up on the spot. But that's that's the idea of like, I think leaders who get it are the ones that are asking themselves the introspective questions. And that takes a lot more personal development than it does like an MBA and understanding business.

Sean Oldham 50:14 Actually, like what you say, just makes me think of a Tony Robbins quote, but I share with clients always. And as "you can tell the quality of one's life by the quality of questions they ask themselves". And you've been start to finish talking about that introspection, checking in with self, you know, creating a state of clarity that if you read any of Brendon Bouchard's work, right, like speaks to, you know, a linear pattern between high achievers is that habit of clarity.

Daniel Dubois 50:44 But it's the idea of top getting out of the office is talking to customers is understanding what works and what doesn't work. So that's, that's a personal development engine applied to business where you're actually seeking to understand before you're seeking to be understood, and applying that Lean Startup methodology not to business but to your own life. It can only go up, right? And that just comes with introspection and asking the right questions and being honest with yourself.

Sean Oldham 51:09 And I'm gonna pass it right over to Luke in a second here. But that's just that's the switch you were talking about earlier. Right? Like when I work with clients, that's like, you're digging, right? You're digging, trying to really kind of get them to open up to figure out, where is it? It's in there somewhere. But like you have to decide, right? You have to decide because it's daily. It's a daily thing. But, Luke, sorry, there's another question you wanted to ask.

Luke Fenwick 51:32 Yeah, that's a that's a nice segway. So boardroom presentation stage or the great outdoors. Where would you rather be? The Great Outdoors Come on now. Oh, I thought that but I'm not gonna let you off the hook that easy. Talk to us about what the great outdoors represents to you. Why is it so special?

Daniel Dubois 51:53 Yeah, I mean, having grown up in British Columbia, I think there's a level of just innate comfort that comes from being in nature. I love pushing myself in nature and the adventure side I love adventure travel. You know, I was made fun of for quite a bit on Airbnb and you know, poking fun way but I was always like, just making the most of my trips. You know, like anywhere I go I'd always push it a little bit further you know, get into some pretty ridiculous adventures at times or you know, spend instead of flying back right away spend an evening you know, just see all the great things that that are offered and life you know, and whether it be the Smoky Mountains in North Carolina or you know, getting after it and on a trip to China and trying to you know, explore a bamboo forest right.

Sean Oldham 52:49 Or biking 100 kilometers across the Great Wall of China to the casually throw that in.

Daniel Dubois 52:55 Yeah, that's a great that's actually a great example. I was at the G20 and in China, everyone was going to the Forbidden City. I've been there done that, you know, not to discount it, but I was just ready to like really get after experiencing nature in China and and yeah, just an incredible incredible opportunity where I was meeting with the CEO of sanzo which is a Chinese equivalent of, of REI or monokuma. Co Op and next thing you know Yeah, and then 100k race along the Great Wall of China that I found myself on and took me 27 hours nonstop to finish this race. And I had to go at a certain speed to be able to make my flight home so didn't sleep and and yeah, like what an adventure At first this could be a much longer story so I'll just leave it at I thought it was going to be a 10k... for the 10k cuz I don't run and it wasn't a running shape so it's like it destroyed me but like a weekend that obviously I'll never forget and have just the most amazing memories and chapters of that weekend you know heat wave in the during the day freezing cold in the mountains at night. But yeah, so the outdoors for me just represents adventure and making the most of an absolute day.

Sean Oldham 54:15 Yeah, and you got to earn it right? Like you got to earn it. The best things are earned and you earned that memory that's for sure. No, no, we still got to do one day we've got to do that 42 kilometer pipe run from Victoria.

Daniel Dubois 54:31 Believe me I've been thinking about it quite a bit I have it has not left to my mind since you're like you want to run it and I was like that would kill me But yeah, let's do it. Let's move into that one day. We're doing okay. committing to that right now. We are doing that one day.

sounds good. No, I I definitely it's on the list and I'm I'm game just yet just for Luke your your, your benefit here. There's an Australian actually he runs a amazing Little community of just doing crazy things outdoors. And he just found the crazy that he doesn't know much about the history of his area and the railroad tracks that existed. And that's the foundation of why this town exists. And he decided to run this old railway line that happens to be a marathon and filmed himself doing it to then be able to educate his town and the world around the history of where he lives that everyone has forgotten. So anyways, from my brother Stagg, we were zip lining, and there was a, there was a water line that cut through the zip line area, and the top of it didn't have moss like is covered in moss, but the top was bare. And that's because it's pretty much the entire water line makes I think it was 42 kilometers, so almost a marathon. And because it's a water line, it's actually public land. So you're cutting through all these mountains and beautiful terrain that you're allowed to run or or mountain bike. So that's what Sean and I just committed doing. Well, if I can get on a plane, I'll count me in that. Not sure if that'll be anytime soon.

Sean Oldham 56:02 Yeah, absolutely wild way to spend an afternoon I'll tell you that. me a lot of fun, right?

Luke Fenwick 56:08 Sean.

Daniel Dubois 56:10 Yeah. So we're, we're getting near the end here, my friend is, what more gold can we can...

Luke Fenwick 56:17 Well, I have a, I have one, I have one more, Sean. So I was having a look through your some of your social stuff. Again, I hope this is correct. Because you just never know. You know, much of what we've spoken about has certainly been business related. And there's been, you know, some family stuff and some philosophy, and certainly, you know, what life has been built on for you. So I appreciate that. However, back in November 2020, I read this "Once again, we're sleeping outside on the streets of Toronto to support homeless youth and fight sex trafficking". This is certainly a very powerful gesture, you know, to raise awareness and support change in education and, you know, begin a movement, join a movement, you know, be the pointy part of a movement, whatever that might be. But how did this come about? Is this something that, that you're still doing within this space? Is that part of your ambition? I know, there's a lot to that question. So

Daniel Dubois 57:11 I know, it's the thing. Thank you for bringing that up. And I'm pretty quiet on social. So you mentioned that you found something on social I was like, I don't know how relevant This is gonna be or Yeah, I mean, it's probably like one of the last things I tweeted, even though it's, you know, almost a year ago. Yeah, it holds a very special place in my life. You know, just just, you know, opening up and Sean has a lot of contacts from being a close family friend, but my mom ran a group home throughout my childhood. And it was like the group home for the worst kids that didn't have a home that were kicked out of every other group home. And this was sort of like, last, their last chance to like, stay out of jail or out of values. And so after high after elementary school, I would often go to the group home. And, you know, the kids were always good with me, but there's often cops there and people punching holes in walls and all teenagers, right, another one's pregnant again, they're in a fight or got stabbed. And my mom just had this like incredible patience. And I'd walked down on the Downtown Eastside in Vancouver port postal code in the entire country, man in Hastings area, and you can walk a block without someone like running up and giving her a big hug. And just like talking about like, what impact she had on on their lives. So unfortunately, my mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given a month to live and, and lived lived it only a couple of months. And at the time, I signed up to do the Covenant House sleepout which is to raise money for homeless youth. So specifically youth under the age of 24, I actually wasn't allowed to do it the first year for it's an executive sleep boat, but I was the youngest person to ever get invited to do it. Because it's a media it's a bit of a prestigious event. And in Canada, at least, and I wasn't allowed to do it, because I was the age of the youth that could be in there that I could have gone to high school with and and have known. But the next year, the year, it was actually the night that my mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer, that, that I slept outside and for me, like, you know, raise money for it and still, like, honor that commitment and went out and spent a night like, you know, skip the entire event because it was like, you know, six o'clock that my mom was diagnosed and like, you know, 11pm I show up in an alley and I'm sleeping outside. And media is all there and they're interviewing a bunch of leaders like the owner of the Vancouver Whitecaps and large developers or whoever it might be and everyone's talking about how hard it is to sleep on like a hard surface and just having a piece of cardboard even though there's like, you know, the chief police officers there and it's like so well protected and you have hot tea and coffee. And it made me just go like, this is not hard. It's not about like the hard surface or the fact that the city's loud at night like that sucks and I've had a Very crappy night's sleep without a doubt, and I have every year since. But it's a it's about like not having family, it's about not having friends, it's about not knowing where your next meal is gonna come from and just being set up for such failure that I couldn't even come close to resonating or empathizing with because of the level of support that I mentioned at the beginning, right, like the type of childhood that I had. So for me, it just pulled on my heartstrings in the sense that I've been so fortunate, and you know how At what age are we going to give a damn about youth that are homeless, and you just see them and you walk right past them, you know. And it's like, if you saw a baby on on the street, you'd like, sure as hell do something. But you see, like, a 13 year old in an alley. And it's like, second nature, we're just like, onto our meeting. And after doing that event, I started seeing people like for the first time, it feels like that I just had no idea how bad this this situation is for homeless youth, and especially sex trafficking, which is almost like a taboo topic, where you think it happens in like Eastern Europe, or like the Middle East sex trafficking, you watch these movies, but no, it happens here in our own backyard. And the way these young women get looped into, to a situation they can't get out of is is terrible. And there's a solution, right. And there's like the Covenant House has the most incredible program and the most powerful success stories, and they just need capital to expand. They're just like, never enough support, or government government dollars. So when I think about philanthropy, it's like, this is an investment, this is an investment in people's lives, right? And how can you have the best return on capital for whatever your investment buy might be, whether it's investing in, you know, Africa to help people see again, which is usually a great return on dollars, or in your own backyard with a very small amount of money that can actually help someone get out of being sex trafficked. Right. So I'll always be involved in Covenant House, I've since joined the board in Toronto, and their corporate committee here. And, yeah, really grateful for all the work that they do.

Sean Oldham 1:02:13 I really, really love hearing that, Daniel, thank you. I'm actually a group of few friends that were close with are actually starting to take on the project of funding a school in Zambia to eat for a year while they're at school, working through a charity that just kind of focuses on these developing nations where, you know, kids, especially girls just can't eat well, like, you know, like, they don't go to school and eat. So they're there, they're trying to learn, you know, with an empty stomach. And so, you know, I'm really starting to get you on the contribution, and it's really starting to become a major part of my life as well. And it really does change the game. Like it really does change the game when you start looking at, you know, how you can serve and how you can help other people. And, yeah, I think that's something that, you know, I'm glad I found it. But, you know, it seems like it's a core pillar to what you do.

Daniel Dubois 1:03:07 Just on that point, Sean, like, it's great that you that you're doing that, and, you know, thank you for doing that. What's crazy is like, most people don't realize that, like, none of this matters, you know, like, we're here for a finite period of time, and we're all going the same direction. Exactly. None of us are making that alive. Unless like, you know, there's some crazy advances in technology. Unless Elon actually does the brain chip and something else happens and who knows, right? Well, it's gonna be a wild ride. We totally reverse aging, and we can live forever. And, you know, we're a multiplanetary species. But for the most part, while we are here on this planet, that we've, we've been somewhat destroying in a pretty meaningful way. There's a whole hell of a lot that we can do actually support the people that and the, you know, the environment that we share this earth with, right?

And, and, you know, as soon as you shift your mindset where it's not about measuring dollars made, but lives changed, usually you'll probably make more money that way. But you'll probably make more friends and have a better legacy and, and impact on the world.

Luke Fenwick 1:04:20 Awesome well... That kind of feels like a really good place to start to, to land this thing. But um, you know, I think we'll start to bring it to a close, Daniel it has been an absolute pleasure having you on. It's been amazing. I think we could have spoken for four hours, let alone It's an hour and a bit, but really appreciate your time from across the other side of the planet. I know Sean's got one more question to kind of take us home that you're maybe touching on then. But Sean, take us home?

Sean Oldham 1:04:46 A little bit of advice annual for a listener whether they're, you know, thinking about being an entrepreneur one day or just you know, living a life of meaning and looking back on one that they can, you know, they can be proud of and the show is called conversations for a better tomorrow. So for listeners out there, how does someone start to create a better tomorrow for themselves starting from tomorrow?

Daniel Dubois 1:05:10 Yeah maybe it's just a recency bias of speaking with you and your experience in coaching. But I think it can be really hard to make a meaningful change without a bit of support or accountability buddy, and being able to reach out for support and in helping find someone that can hold you accountable to living a meaningful life and whatever that means for you, right, it doesn't have to be starting a company, it's, it's great to be an entrepreneur or to be an employee and contributing, and you know, in a, in a different fashion, right. And back to that idea of To each their own. But what's important is that you just, you know, that you're honest with yourself. And what I was speaking on a panel recently, and this is maybe the last thing that I'll end on here is just the panel ended with everyone's last piece of advice. And someone mentioned, you have to find the overlap between what you're good at what the world wants, and what makes money and like, that's your purpose. And then and the next person said the same thing, like I can't say anything better than the advice of just understanding your superpower, and what people will pay for and what you're really passionate about. And that sounds like kind of interesting, I forget what my my piece of advice was, but like three people in a row all said the same thing. And then the last person said, like, my concern is that we have a generation of people who are so focused on finding their one purpose, that it's creating anxiety, and it's, it's like an unfair, it's an unfair expectation that we're putting on ourselves. And I've experienced that firsthand with having people on my team that have struggled so hard with trying to find out like, what exactly why do they exist on this planet? And like, what is the purpose of life for them, and they have to find their purpose, that, that, that I don't think it's healthy, you know, I think it's important that we're honest with ourselves and 1% better, but just like, being a good person is enough, like just the just having the mindset that you are enough, and that you have enough, and you know, by like opening up the door for your neighbor, and smiling is like enough. And if you can just focus on like 1% better and not put so much pressure on understanding exactly what your values are, and your mission and purpose. And, you know, and having to have that figured out tomorrow is just unrealistic. So my leaving advice would be you know, if you can find someone that you can lean on to help you develop and chase your potential and great, and, yeah, just don't take it too seriously.

Sean Oldham 1:08:05 Amazing, I'm gonna, I'm gonna pass it to Luke for the send off, but I promise I did not applaud you on that. I'm gonna take that little snippet that you said about accountability. And, you know, have my clients listen to that, because I coach them on the importance of accountability, and how if you want to keep this momentum going, using the consistency principle that drives us humans and utilizing the power of accountability could just change your life. So thank you for sharing that last little bit. I'll be leveraging that Daniel, thank you.

Daniel Dubois 1:08:33 There's a reason why the Navy SEALs still have accountability buddies. You know, even the most driven hardcore people in the world are still relying on someone holding them accountable. There's a reason why the top CEOs in the world have coaches and there's a reason why Olympic athletes aren't trying to do it themselves as well. Right so I I'm a big fan of coaching for many different aspects of life.

Sean Oldham 1:08:56 That could not have been a better end. Luke!

Luke Fenwick 1:08:59 Beautiful, awesome. Well, I love that that thing that you said towards very, very new enough and if you're sitting at home listening to this, is that absolutely a story about being enough? So I think the listeners everybody if you've enjoyed this, like, share, subscribe. Tell your friends, tell your cousins, tell everybody about it. We'll see you in a few weeks. But as always be safe. Be present, be you and Sean and be fulfilled. Beautiful Daniel, Sean, thank you. Bye for now.

Daniel Dubois 1:09:29 Cheers.