What if the biggest threat to your clients' life work isn't a bad market but a business that simply won't survive due diligence?
George Sandmann, founder and CEO of GrowthDrive, has spent decades building companies, crashing a few into the side of the mountain, and coming out the other side with a clear-eyed mission: help financial advisors equip the private businesses they serve to grow, scale, and actually succeed at transition. George is an attorney, a data geek, a passionate entrepreneur, and a self-described addict when it comes to helping people win. In this conversation, we unpack the staggering statistics behind business exits, introduce the concept of "strategic capacity," and explore why community, culture, and human connection are the real engines behind GrowthDrive's growth.
0:00 – Intro & Meet George Sandmann
1:14 – Meet George Sandmann (pre-interview debrief with Holland)
4:38 – Human Opening Question
4:38 – From Law to Startups
5:30 – Mission & Market Data
9:31 – Advisor Model Explained
9:51 – Entrepreneurial Addiction
11:41 – Community Builder Role
12:48 – Clarity Tech Platform
14:47 – Exit Planning Hard Truths
17:55 – Who Should Call GrowthDrive
21:27 – Client Relationship Story
25:10 – Scaling High Touch Service
31:26 – Tiny Giant Team Model
34:21 – Brand Growth Basics
35:48 – GrowthDrive's Brand Story Evolution
36:30 – Strategic Capacity Category
37:45 – Culture Drives Brand
39:48 – StoryBrand & the Rallying Cry
41:47 – Attracting A-Players
42:48 – Scaling Culture Principles
44:48 – Marketing Shift & Referrals
47:23 – Human Moments in B2B
49:08 – Marketing Budgets & AI
51:33 – Behind the Brand Quiz
54:05 – Last Thing That Made You Laugh
58:44 – Legacy & Closing
There's a tension every leader of a B2B service has to navigate: How do you scale without compromising the quality of your services - or the values that drive them? The CEO's Heart for Service is where accomplished B2B leaders share hard-won insights on walking that tightrope.
The CEO’s Heart for Service is a production of Brand3. If you’re a B2B service provider who delivers exceptional service but struggles to get your marketing to connect with the right people, find us at brand3.net. And sign up for our Brand3 Newsletter that only sends marketing insights worthy of your inbox - genuinely helpful stuff for the road ahead.
The CEO’s Heart for Service is also supported by Forge Podcast Company, a turnkey production solution for using podcasts to reach a wider audience, win new clients, and grow. Find them at forgepodcast.co
Matt Wolfe: Hi, everybody. Welcome back to The CEO's Heart for Service. I am your host, Matt Wolfe, partner at Brand Three, and we've got a new co-host today. This is Holland Kiser's first time on the podcast. Welcome, Holland.
Holland Kiser: Thank you so much, Matt. It's lovely to be here.
Matt Wolfe: It's lovely to have you here. Holland is one of our project managers, but she is oh, so much more. She's just returned to the team, and as she did, as they say in Monty Python, there was great rejoicing. Um, everyone was so happy to have her back, and Holland and I are just starting to uncover that we both have a really strong theater background. We are both theater geeks, theater nerds. Turns out our guest loves theater, too, so that's gonna come up today. What else is gonna come up today, Holland?
Matt Wolfe: What did you take... This was a great conversation with George Sandmann, who's the founder/CEO of GrowthDrive. They are helping financial advisors do a far better job of helping their business clients grow and prepare eventually for a successful exit. What'd you take away from this, Holland?
Holland Kiser: What I really loved about what George said is just how, how relational he tries to make everything, you know, from his peers to his advisors and to the people that those advisors help, which I think ties in so wonderfully to what Brand 3 really is all about, which is just making, you know, discovering that brand, making that really allowing you to kinda let it speak for itself. It- 'cause it is so powerful. So the way that George has really bought into that, that brand is everything, and it affects your culture and your marketing, and, uh, it was just really exciting to hear how passionate he is about that.
Matt Wolfe: Yeah, he definitely understands the power of having a very clear brand story in place, the story of who you are and who you serve, and what that relationship looks like to drive growth in every possible way, for the business, for the ways people are served, and for the culture they're building. That was really clear. The other thing I'm excited to hear him talk about, you know, we'd always try and figure out: how do you scale successfully, hold on to who you are? Um, the, at, at its heart, George is a community builder. He's building a community of advisors and equipping them to do their job and, and have a great- better, have a greater impact for the people they serve.
But for him, community is not a label; it's a reality. We said during this that he's just not taking any shortcuts in making sure that there's really just no one left behind, and everyone truly cared for, even as they scale, and that seems to be, although it sounds so simple, the often lost secret sauce of what he's doing. You're really gonna enjoy this today. Let's go over and talk to George Sandmannnn. George, thanks for being here today
George Sandmann: Thanks a lot, Matt. I'm psyched to be here.
Matt Wolfe: I am too. You know we had a great conversation earlier this week, and I've been looking forward to this all week to have the chance to reconnect and go further into this. You know, we... It's called CEO's Heart for Service, and we are truly looking for people to talk to who have a heart for service, who care deeply about their clients and their success. And I know from having talked to you earlier that that is clearly you. So I'm just really looking forward to this.
Matt Wolfe: We like to... We're gonna talk about the business and what you do in just a second, but we like to, you know, the thing is, any, any B2B service that we encounter tends to be a highly relational, high-stakes offer. You know, and your example is, is perfect, right? Like, "Hey, why don't you let me help you plan a successful business exit from this thing that you spent decades working on," right?
That is no small, it's no small ask. It's no small amount of trust that people have to provide. So we are always looking for ways to make B2B marketing more relational, more human. So to that end, symbolically, we like to just ask a nice human question at the, at the jump of this podcast. So the question is: What did you wanna be when you were growing up? 'Cause you probably didn't think about M&A and business exits when you were a kid. Like,
George Sandmann: Yeah.
Matt Wolfe: Where did you start and how far from the mark are we?
George Sandmann: Yeah, it's so funny. I, I, uh, that is a great question, Matt. Thank you very much. And Holland, great to see you.
George Sandmann: You know, when I was, I was maybe in second grade, and I was over at my friend Danny Clifton's house, and, uh, hi- his father had a, a colleague in, uh, visiting, and the colleague was an attorney. I had no idea what an attorney was, but from ... But Danny looked up and said, "I wanna be an attorney." And I stood there,e and I said, "I wanna be an attorney," and I ended up in law school. That's what I wanted to be when I grew up, and I grew up to be an attorney. I am an attorney, um, admitted to the Maryland Bar. But that is not where I ended up. I, I, I started my first company and became an addict. And here we are 30-some-odd years later.
Matt Wolfe: You discovered your passion, found your thing
George Sandmann: That's exactly right
Matt Wolfe: Well,l let's talk about the business for a minute. Holland, I'll let you take it away here.
Holland Kiser: Of course. Yeah. Well, let's just start with the basics. Tell us about you, what you do, who you serve,
George Sandmann: Yeah, absolutely.
George Sandmann: And, and you know, it's interesting, Ma- uh, Matt, you an- you mentioned exit, uh, a couple of minutes ago, and we certainly do work with a lot of exit planners, and I'm very, very passionate. So when we ... if we open up, if we open up the, uh, the aperture a little bit, what I'm most passionate about is I'm an entrepreneur, and I've watched my f- I've watched some friends succeed.
I've watched some friends flame out. I've had some very successful companies. I've flown a couple, one in particular, into the side of the mountain. And I've seen all the ripples that, you know, the impact that can have. I'm a profound capitalist, right? I believe in liberty. I believe in capitalism. But I'm also very caring. You know, what, uh, George Bush 1 might have called 1,000 points of light. I'd like to be one of those points of light. What are we trying to solve for? So it's not exit planning. What I'm really most passionate about is delivering client wins, right? And can I, can I get into this and can I geek out a little on some data?
Matt Wolfe: Yeah.
George Sandmann: Would that, would that be okay? Okay. Thank you.
Matt Wolfe: Yeah, we're pretty geeky here.
George Sandmann: Well, I'm a data geek. When we look at the market, when we look at our national economy, we need to understand where jobs are created and where jobs need to be maintained. And jobs are created and need to be maintained in what I call the pre-middle market and the middle market. Businesses with gross annual revenues between $2.5 and $100 million. Depending on how you measure it, they're somewhere between 35 and 50, a little over 50% of our national GDP. They're 8 trillion in aggregate income. They have combined ... These businesses just in the United States generate more GDP, right?
They generate more revenue than the entire economies of Japan, the entire economies of Japan and Germany combined. This is an incredibly important part of our national and global economy, right? Imagine something bad happening to the German economy and the ripple effects that would have. Well, if something bad, little rabbit ears, happens to these businesses, who's seen, uh, who's seen Ghostbusters? Which would be bad, right? What I wrote my book about.
So, so that's 64% of new jobs, and what I care about the most is helping those businesses increase strategic capacity. And I'll get off my soapbox. But we need to make those businesses higher quality, more resilient, and better able to serve their owners, the people who are taking all the risk, right? Us, the, the, you know, the, the entrepreneurs, and their stakeholders, the communities in which they exist. And I'll, I'll drop the mic there. Sorry, I'm super passionate about this one. I apologize, guys
Matt Wolfe: It's powerful, and I've never heard it framed that way. So I'm actually, I'm really to understand that better. What are the actual services that you provide, George, within... 'Cause there, there's quite a breadth __actually of things that you're doing
George Sandmann: There is.
George Sandmann: You know, there, there's a, .. Let's just pick up that, that focus on that aspect of the economy, that part of the economy, and we're committed to impacting 10% of that part of the economy. Great. Well, how are we gonna do that? Most of those business owners think they're fine, right?
They're, they're operating under a They're, they're kind of getting positive feedback, great lifestyle. They work hard, right? They take a lot of risk. It's not easy, but, you know, generally speaking, they're happy people. You know, the problem is, is their businesses need help. So what do we do? Where do we come to the table? I tried going straight to business owners, and with some massive brands behind us, right? Household name brands. And that went over badly. It didn't ... There was no, there was no traction. What, what did get traction was the advisors to those businesses calling us and saying, "Hey, man, my client showed me this thing and wanted to know if you should get involved. Can I use that with my clients?" So we've started working with advisors. What do we do? We provide knowledge development, education; we provide technology; and we provide very sophisticated support and a peer-to-peer support network. So everything that the market needs, right, that advisors need to deliver client wins. I'd be happy to go through, uh, in that in detail, but I don't want to turn this into an infomercial.
George Sandmann: Okay, you mentioned that you became an addict, right?
Matt Wolfe: What was, the, what was the moment of addiction? What was the thing that caught you and gave you this sense of purpose that just sent you down this road?
George Sandmann: I am fiercely independent and I, I work well with others. I work a little less well for others. So being a ... And that's just, that's just part of my personality for better or for worse. I'm a high D, high I, if you know the DiSC. So, uh, we started this first business, and it was a wild ride, and I, and I was incredibly fortunate. We don't need to go down that, you know, that, that storyline. Happy to. But w- I got profound personal satisfaction. I loved the risk, I loved the Wild West, and I loved the, the reward. That business didn't end well, but for me personally in terms of career development, it was, it was absolutely magic. And that, that created the addiction,n and I got invited by the CEO of the next company to work with him, and then the CEO of the next company.
So I've, I've been very, very fortunate to just get pulled from, from startup to startup, or growth company to startup or growth company. It's an addiction, and we can talk about the negative sides of that as well. You know, it's not, it's not easy. And we all, all of us, you guys are entrepreneurs, right? We all have scars. Uh, and, and we all make, uh, sacrifices and, and our families make sacrifices, so I don't wanna make it sound glorious. It has its moments. But it's an incredible- it's been an incredible career.
Matt Wolfe: Yeah. So it was a- what I hear in that is you were addicted to helping people win. Is that right?
George Sandmann: That's exactly right. Yep. And to changing markets and to creating new categories. And addiction, by the way, has a negative connotation. I wanna make sure that I don't, you know, that's something we need to, uh, we need to talk about openly.
Matt Wolfe: It's true, and for people like us, you know, business people with that heart for service, it can be really hard to figure out that line of, when have I given too much? I forget what my DISC thing is, but my Enneagram is 2; I'm the giver. So I'll just keep giving until someone smacks me upside the head and says, "Go hang out with your family".
George Sandmann: We're gonna get along just fine, Matt, yeah.
Matt Wolfe: So yeah, exactly.
Matt Wolfe: George, do you have... Like, if someone pinned you down to say what your job title is, how do you describe, like, what you do?
George Sandmann: You know, I love making connections, right? So whether it's connections in data, that's, that's fun, but I love making connections between people. And it's very fulfilling, uh, for me personally. It scratches an itch. And so I think if I have a, if I have a, a superpower, it might be seeing, seeing trends, and seeing, uh, like for like, or, or, or white, white for black and needing to put the two together and making those connections. And that's ultimately what we have here is a community organized around helping private business owners.
Matt Wolfe: That tracks with me, yeah, you've built this powerful community, still growing, of equipping advisors.
Holland Kiser: Mm-hmm.
Matt Wolfe: I know just from having met you, understanding GrowthDrive a little better, you know, you've got training going on. There's a conference that brings people together. There's just all kinds of things going on where you're, where you're building community. Let me touch... you're right, we don't want to do an infomercial, but I do want to touch high level just what a few of those things are that you mentioned.
Matt Wolfe: What's the technology piece?
George Sandmann: Yeah, the technology is called Clarity, right? And it helps clients gain total clarity about what they're gonna need to do to get the success they want. And that is, uh, that is a traditional software suite. It's a very sophisticated software suite, and it helps a business owner, the CEO, go through s- it's almost a self-discovery. It's discovery about their business. Yet so much of our business is, is ourselves. So it's, uh, this, this self-discovery about where their business is strong, um, where it's weak. And fundamentally, what's different about my perspective is that we should be comparing these businesses not to themselves, but to the best-in-class businesses.
Now, my book is called, you know, Proven Strategies for Leading Businesses from Stuck to Best in Class. What does a best-in-class business look like? The software says, "Right, here's where you are. Here's what best in class looks like." And, and by the way, and this is the important part, we calculate a value for the business, and that value we then discount based on operational quality so that the CEO, for the first time and uniquely, gets a view of what their business should be worth in an M&A transaction, and we should talk about that, in an M&A transaction, due diligence, right?
And here's the price you're gonna get. Not the value. Here's the price. Someone is gonna put a number on a check, and we predict that it's going to be somewhere in this neighborhood, right? It says, "This is for planning purposes only." You know, I am an attorney, all the disclaimers. But that is, that piece of technology is profound. And on top of that, we have now poured, if you imagine pouring AI into that, into that topography, into that terrain, so that AI can do what,-I hate the term artificial intelligence, but what well-designed additional technology can bring to the conversation.
Matt Wolfe: That's excellent, so cool that you're providing that
George, when we talked the other day, I do wanna capture this.
Matt Wolfe: You shared a really sort of harrowing stat in terms of M&As and exits about what people experience in that world, and I'd love to hear you share that again, 'cause that was really eye-opening
George Sandmann: Well, so, so the, you know, there, there's, there's this dark secret that none of us talk about. So what we, we run around, and the, the exit planning world runs around, rightly saying, "Hey, you ought to be looking at your business as an asset. You ought to be l- thinking about how to harvest," to do two things, right? Th, what I- is profoundly important is that we create immortal businesses, businesses that are gonna survive the founding, the founder, the founding generation, or, or, you know, any transition, and that is a very difficult thing to do. We know that 19 out of 20 companies do not qualify to undergo a, a, to successfully complete a, an M&A transaction as they're currently run, right?
They're not blacklisted. They're just as they're currently run. They just won't survive due diligence, meaning the se- the transaction will start, it will run, get out of the gate, and then, and, and then be canceled by one side or the other. Then it gets, it gets, kind of gets worse. Only 20% of M&A transactions are successful, and we can talk about what successful means. I use a pretty broad lens. When I define success, I mean successful for the seller, right, that they get the value and personal satisfaction they want out of it. 75% end up... And this is according to EPI, the Exit Planning Institute. 75% of business owners who sell regret doing it. That's a failure. And on the other side, we have a failure of the private capital markets to, to hit their investment thesis, um, and to deliver the ROI that their investors... Private capital comes from somewhere, um, and to, to deliver the, the, on the, the ROI that the investors anticipated.
So there's failure at a lot of different levels. And here's something that n- not enough people are talking about. When we say prepare your business and then sell it, that is actually a bit of an untruth. I'm being... Look how political I'm being. It's telling a little bit of an untruth because everybody's aware of the statistics I just shared, and there are $10 trillion worth of businesses that need to transition. That's the number most commonly cited. Some say 14. It's a big number. And there's $2 trillion of capital. There's, in fact, $1 trillion of equity and $1 trillion of debt.
I'm talking in rough numbers. A little heavier on the equity, a little lighter on the debt, but you get the picture. So we basically have a $10 trillion opportunity with a $2 trillion solution. So if we run around saying, "Hey, hey, get your business ready to sell and then sell it to someone," we know that that cannot happen.
It is, it is literally market impossible for that to happen. So then, then, then that begs a question, and I, and I, I'll, I'll stop there. I'm happy to dive in. But that begs a big question, and this is where my, you can see my eyebrows going up and my, my blood pressure going up because we need to f- to address this. And, and I believe that we have invented, created, described the path to doing this.
Matt Wolfe: That's fantastic.
Matt Wolfe: Got some other things to talk about here, but just briefly I wanna... So you're helping people who help people, which is amazing. You know, equipping the advisors and helping them do it better. If I was an advisor in that space, how would I know it's time to talk to George and find GrowthDrive and join this community?
George Sandmann: If you are working with businesses, two and a half million to 100 million, and th- there are a lot... If you look at the demographics, there are a lot of businesses in that two and a half to 10, two and a half to 20. That's where most of these businesses are statistically, and it's in the f- it's the first thing I start my book with, is these, these statistics. You're gonna wanna call me if you have b- if you're a wealth advisor, a CPA, a business advisor, a management consultant. Uh, we're getting an increasing number of customers who are private equity operators. If you're wanna make sure that a business or a portfolio of businesses is high quality, has maximized options for their owners, for their shareholders, um, then you should call us because that is what we are in the business of delivering. We are del- in the business of, and we have a proven process for taking businesses,-the average business- and we have thousands and thousands of businesses that have been analyzed by advisors, right? I'm not in the room. They're doing it bona fide with their clients. average business has a strategic capacity score of 54.1.
That's the mean, not the average, but the mean is 54.1. For a business to, to contemplate confidently contemplate an M&A transaction, it really needs to be as far above 70 as possible. And an asset class business, what we describe as the 85-plus strategic capacity asset class or asset class businesses, those have a strategic capacity score of 85. And when... If... So if you are... want to d- tell your client, "Hey, man, stay at your desk, die at your desk, but harvest a bunch of wealth," high strategic capacity. "Sell your business to a third party," high strategic capacity. Strategic capacity describes and scores a business's ability; this is important. I'm gonna slow it down to predictably and sustainably grow profits and cash, or free cash flow. The private capital markets, the money, are looking for businesses that can predictably and sustainably grow free cash flow.
And when we talk about exit, most exits are internal transfers where the owner becomes the bank. And if the owner's gonna be the bank, don't you think they care about the fact that the business, looking forward after they stop coming to their desk every day, can predictably and sustainably grow free cash flow? That's what's gonna pay the note. So, this is a, it's a profound for business owners. And for the advisors who work with them, this is the conversation you should be having. It's not a conversation about value; it's a conversation about options. It's a conversation about delivering the prosperity, the wealth, to your family, prosperity for your community, and the legacy that every business owner hopes that they'll deliver.
Matt Wolfe: That's great. I love that you look at it in such a holistic way. You think about family, community, all of the impact around that. And I'll just throw this word out there, 'cause we talked about this the other day. The thing you're really solving, along with the financial, the strategic capacity, the financial things, all of that, is heartbreak. The unbearable heartbreak of working your whole life and realizing that you have an unsellable asset is just, uh, unfathomable.
Holland Kiser: Yeah
George Sandmann: I absolutely
Holland Kiser: George, you've, you've explained wonderfully how you deliver and how important it is for you to deliver exceptional service to your clients. Can you give us an example of one of those great relationships? You don't have to name names or, you know, provide anything too, too detailed, but give us an example of one of those great relationships. What made it work?
George Sandmann: So that's a, that's a great question, Holland, and I wanna make sure I answer the right question. Are you referring to a relationship with a business owner or a relationship with an advisor?
Holland Kiser: Ooh
George Sandmann: Most of our relationships are with the, with the advisors. I do hear from them. We have thousands of cases, right?. So I do hear from them, and I, and I, I periodically hear from business owners themselves. And so I'd love to talk about that. And we need to remember that advisors are running advisory businesses. So everything that we teach, I, in fact, I just got... came back from a symposium, uh, that was led by my friend Mike Garrison, and in that symposium, you had 12 advisors working on their advisory businesses.
I was lucky enough to be a fly on the wall. So what do these great relationships look like? Well, they look like I'm gonna take my friend Larry. Larry Prince, I'll use his name. He won't mind. Uh, he's just a great advisor. He's a great coach. He's one of the most wonderful humans you'll meet. But when Larry and I met, Larry was delivering a lot of value for his clients, and he was working with businesses more in the million-to-two-million space. Now, those businesses are great. I've built them myself. The challenge is that those business owners view the world through this perspective, right? They view the world through their wallet because they still haven't, they haven't liberated themselves from that. They have to have that mentality, right?
"I can either hire Holland, or I can go on vacation." That's still the math they're doing. Larry has taken, has used our methodology and our process, and in fact, he now teaches in our, in our certification program. But Larry has taken our methodology and our process, and he has grown his client set so that now he's working with several hundred million, hundred million-plus, gross annual revenue businesses. What does that mean? Well, that means that he has multiplied his impact. Growth Drive's vision my personal vision, this is on my personal webpage- is to help $1 trillion of private businesses increase strategic capacity in what we call the three dimensions of business growth, right? So when Larry moves up the, up the, uh, the revenue demographic and starts working with larger and larger businesses, he is contributing more and more to executing our vision. And we're gonna hit our vision. I've set 2030 as the date.
There's a lot of work ahead of us, but, uh, we're gonna do it. And those are the types of relationships that we help advisors. They come to us. They're typically successful. They're typically not looking for new clients, but they end up evolving into more sophisticated opportunities because of what we bring to the table and what I've, I, you know... It's ha- it's hard to say invent because, you know, maybe you can say invent because the guy who invented the paperclip did not invent wire, right? He just invented a way to bend it that is more useful. And maybe I've invented this methodology and process, described it. I don't know. It makes me uncomfortable. But this methodology and process is de- demonstrated, proven to help business owners work with more and more gross annual revenue, and therefore help execute a vision that we have for the market. And I, I'll just leave it there. And there are a lot of stories like that.
Some of them are household names, big... We have several big banks, uh, doing this work with their, in their private wealth spaces. This is good stuff.
Matt Wolfe: Yeah.
Matt Wolfe: Well, you've grown a lot, and obviously that's the, the, the, at the... We try to understand the businesses first, in here, and then we wanna dig into the growth story 'cause the, the main thesis, of course, of this podcast is when we've got people like you who care so much about, in your case, both the advisors and then the downline effect of all of that, and the people that they're impacting. You grow; it gets harder and harder to maintain the quality of how you serve this community of advisors. It gets harder to stay true to your core values and just everything that makes you unique and powerful in what you do. So where have you seen some bumps in the road? What, what's been hard about scaling up along the way?
George Sandmann: You know, Careful Scaling Up is another brand, and we are not attached to that in any way, shape, or form. So, but I will say that, um, we do have some of their advisors now in our community. Anyway, leave that alone. The bumps along the way. You know, it is hard. I, I am... if you work with me, your phone is going to ring periodically, and it's just gonna be me picking up the phone to call and see how you're doing because I care. As we grow, it is hard. We've actually just expanded that, and I've had to delegate some of those calls to others. W- I, what matters is that the, the calls are made, that we ensure that people are getting, you know, the resources, the help, the feedback, the connections that they need. So that is, that is just something about which to always be mindful. And it's frustrating when people forget. They get so busy in their work that they forget that there's this fantastic resource. And so we tr- we track engagement, and it's like, hey, uh, I, I know you're working your tail off. Are you using ... Are you doing the best for yourself and therefore for your clients?"
And that's not an arrogant... Please don't, please don't mis- misunderstand that. But you know, s- we, we all, I am guilty as heck; I have to remind myself that answering email is not my job, right? We all have this whirlwind going on around us. So how do we maintain contact? How do we make sure that people are getting the value that they expect from this community? Those are the, those are the challenge points. And then of course, you know, you ... We can, we can shift that to, to AI and the impact it's having on all of us in, in from so many, in so many different ways. But, that, that I think, think that's, that's kind of the overarching: how do we maintain our high touch and continue to take care of people?
Matt Wolfe: Yeah, I wanna punch in on something come up yet in our conversations: this idea that you're checking in with people to make sure they are using the tools. That gets missed so much. This world is littered with underutilized certifications and trainings that people had, with CRMs and software systems of all kinds, right, that got installed and were never fully utilized. And, you know, 'cause they all involve a culture shift of some kind. They involve habit change, all these things that are really hard to engage and change what you're doing. So to me, that's an incredibly important piece of what you're doing.
George Sandmann: Yeah, thank you very much. And it's hard, right? We all, we all do. I mean, w- we all have... one of the first things I had my Claude cohort do is go and find the, uh, the things to which I'm subscribed that I, that I've probably forgotten I even subscribe to, right? And you're right. Making sure that people are getting the value. It's, at the end of the day, people are, well, you know, we can get commercial. They are buying something, and let's make sure that they're getting the value from what they're buying. And now what's interesting about what we do is there are many people in the community who... And I'll be the first to say a tool is a tool, right?
Our tool happens to be fantastic. It, you know, it's, it's a game changer. However, it's just a tool. What matters more is, is what I describe as this integrated, human-to-human and human-machine bond that there is, right? Of advisors working together to get, move their client in a, in a defined direction, that they are harnessing technology when appropriate to move the client in a, in a specific direction. We describe that direction as strategic capacity. And by the way, strategic capa- This isn't growing to, to drive value or growing to grow profits. A lot of business owners, 21% of business owners, just want their business to be easier to run. Does that resonate, right? Hey, man, m- wouldn't it be great if, you know... Hey, Mark, thanks for calling. Listen, here's the one thing. I, it... If you can help me m- just work 40 hours a week, that I would consider that a win.
That's 21% of CEOs. So, you know, saying that, that they, that they should be looking at an exit, for example, is nonsense. That's not what they want. So how do we integrate people, high touch, human contact, bring technology to bear, ours, others, make sure it's being used, that it's being engaged in this process? AI, not AI for AI's sake. I'm a f- get me started. A, a, you know, specific AI, and data. A lot of what's being done out there is being done by gut, and that's great. However, it is far from perfect, right? We have a saying, uh, at my house, uh, "Often wrong, but never in doubt," and I think that's true for all of us at, at points in time. And for business owners, if they're r- confidently wrong, now that can have, that can have profound effects.
Matt Wolfe: You know, when I think about, you're in a particular space here, particular business model in terms of building community, providing technology platforms along the way. But what I would say, I, what I'm hearing and sort of picking up on when we talk about scaling and growth, that what's been so key has just been the human thing, maintaining connections in the midst of that, and I think that gets lost a lot, right?
George Sandmann: It does
Matt Wolfe: A lot of people invent great tech platforms, and they're like, "This is a great thing for you. Good luck. Be on your way, and may God shine upon you." You know, like, that's all they get.
George Sandmann: Right
Matt Wolfe: And even communities, right? Like, "Welcome to the community. This is a great community." And six months later people are like, "Am I in a community?" So
George Sandmann: Yeah.
Matt Wolfe: You know? So just the fact that you're attentive to that.
George Sandmann: And it's hard. Yeah.
Matt Wolfe: I do wanna touch on one other that kind of blew my mind the other day. w- when we were talking, because I asked you, 'cause you, look, you got technology platform, you've got training programs, certifications, conference, group, groups and things you're facilitating, and I said, "George, how many people does it take to do all that?" As you have scaled and grown, and you said
George Sandmann: We are a tiny giant. So, I'm a big believer this is a gig economy. The short answer is two of us. The longer answer is this is a gig economy, and when I talk about, for example, our, our dev team is offshore. I love them. I, that we have worked together for years. I really do. I have, we have great close personal friendships. They don't happen to be my employees, but I am 100% of their take-home, right? There, there is a, an engi- a dedicated engineering team that is five at the core and then can expand as we have big pushes as we do now. We're gonna be unveiling a new, a new UI/UX, and, uh, which is crazy cool and is actually gonna be trans- y- you transformative yet again.
Anyway, but, you know, if you remember earlier, I said we provide sophisticated support. In a traditional model, that sophisticated r- support sounds like a call center, sounds like, you know, sounds like all sorts of stuff, people. And it is people, but what we've managed to do is attract people who are makers, what I describe as makers.
In fact, Elon Musk described them as makers. And I love that. I call them givers, uh, but it's really making. Um, they make more value than they extract. And when you have a community of makers, it is natural for them ... I have never had to say, "Hey, Mark, Holland needs help. Would you please reach out to her?" Because Holland comes into the community and says, "Hi. I have X challenge, X opportunity. I need X resource." And you say, "Oh my gosh, I went through that just last week." So behind the scenes, we have this very, very s- the community becomes its own; it's not self-help. It is this beautiful, this beautiful s- very sophisticated member support system i- which is far better than anything I could stand up.
But could I put together a call center? You bet I could. We've got the scripts. We got m- m- I could ... I've done that before. This is much better, a much better model for you, the user. You don't wanna ask me. You don't want me in the middle of the spider's web. You wanna ask the smartest valuation expert in the country about something your client said, something your client s- or if they'll do the valuation for you, you know, et cetera.
So, so we are a tiny giant, and we are impacting an outs- very, very efficient. How's that?
Matt Wolfe: Yeah, that's outstanding. You know, there's community in label, and there's community in reality, and you are doing the latter, which is a big part of the success.
George Sandmann: Yeah. Thank you
Matt Wolfe: Oh, of course.
Matt Wolfe: I wanna shift. We're gonna talk, just dig in for a moment on some of the base components of what it takes to grow your brand: marketing, sales, client experience. That comes from our own philosophy, you know, here at Brand 3. So we're working with B2B service providers. We find that so many of them gave up on marketing 'cause it just never worked for them. They wasted inordinate amounts of time, heart- again, heartbreaking amounts of time and money on marketing. There are a couple of reasons for that.
But chief among them is usually nobody took the time to sit down with them to figure out their brand strategy, which is simply, are you telling the right story to the right people? B2B is all about relationships, right? And so there is a story about who you are as a business, who your ideal client is, the people you are best suited to serve, and what that relationship looks like. There's a story that invites them into their own narrative and makes them feel heard and understood and curious to know more.
It's the beginnings of a trusted relationship. And what's so cool is once you nail down that story, it has so many applications because it does
George Sandmann: Yes
Matt Wolfe: Fix, for lack of a better term right now, 'cause it's Friday. It fixes marketing, but it also enhances how you do sales and the client experience and the entire client journey, the entire relationship. So that's how we approach things. So we like to talk about this from that angle.
Matt Wolfe: So the first thing I'm interested to understand is you're, you know, you're several years down the road with Growth Drive. How has your understanding of just your brand story and how you talk about who you are evolved?
George Sandmann: And it is evolving- it, it is, it's funny. It's evolving in polish. It's not evolving in message. I got this vision; I've been pursuing this vision for years. So we are in a different category and, and it has become abundantly clear that it is a different category, it is a, we are unique in this category, and it is a very impactful category. It takes a while, at least for me, to be like, "You know what? This, we really have something here," and we are, we are not like...
George Sandmann: So I get, we get compared, let's talk about marketing, right? We get compared to value calculation, and those value calculation technologies are, they're, they're good. You know, they do a good job. They, they calculate a value for the business, but they don't make value actionable And if you're not making value actionable, it's like me telling you that you have a, you know, you have a, you have a hazy spot on your CT scan on your lung, and good luck. You know? You, you're like, "Well, well, wait a second. Now you've just told me that I, I might be sick." We need to, you know, we, we, we told a CEO who thinks they're worth $20 million that they're worth 12, have a nice day.
That, that's not how they do it, but at the end of the day, they don't make it actionable. We're in a category of strategic capacity, and strategic capacity makes... Strategic capacity drives growth. It drives value. Those are outputs of a business engine. So that, it's that growing awareness that we are in a category and that the category is real, and as we get... I'm a data guy, right? As we get proof, that is being baked into- I love you just touched on a few points. So from the way we describe the world, there are, there are 24 gears inside a business engine. Those gears include sales. They include marketing. They include brand. They include culture. And, and I'm coming to the answer to your question.
George Sandmann: From my perspective, brand itself...Now marketing is promoting brand, right? Brand is the outward manifestation of culture. Well, how do we create culture? And culture is not a ping pong table and pizza Fridays, right? Those are, those are nice to have. A culture may not even be collegial, right? But it certainly is competitive and effective and gets things done.
A good culture, and you know it. I walked into Bloomberg back, way back in the day. This is in company number one, right? The, the addiction maker. My first, my first hit on the crack pipe, and, uh... I'm keeping it light. But it was about n- it was about in that era. But we walked into Bloomberg, and they were on two floors, midtown Manhattan, and you walked into that place, and it was a hive. It was buzzing. You instantly wanted to be part of it. Like, I don't know what's going on here, but I want some. And look what Bloomberg went on to get because, 'cause Mike Bloomberg nailed culture. It had a can-do, will-do, on fire, this is what we're doing, and we are the best in the world. And if you do that, you know, n- notice in everything I just said, it doesn't matter if everybody likes each other.
It does matter that they're getting it done for their customers, for their clients. And so when we talk about brand, what needs to be the outward manifestation of culture, brand is really how the customer values your business. Marketing goes out and makes sure that everybody knows about the value, that the value has been worked on. Brand, brand contributes to culture. Culture drives brand. And marketing needs to go out and be the megaphone, but a very, very thoughtful one. What I love about you guys, and you know why, we have a friend in common who uses you, who I think very highly of. One of my very close friends, Anna.
Matt Wolfe: I think, you know, people get confused about brand, and one of the just really simple ways that I describe it to people is brand comes first. This is the thing you do first. But,
George Sandmann: Yep
Matt Wolfe: And it's not fonts. And it's not only- this is part of it- but it's not only fonts, colors, and design. It is a story. And the reason why it impacts culture
Holland Kiser: Yeah
Matt Wolfe: We actually do talk about that a lot, too.
Matt Wolfe: The reason why it impacts culture is, and I'm, so I'm a StoryBrand certified consultant. That's a big
George Sandmann: Awesome. Awesome. Dan's a great guy. Yeah
Matt Wolfe: And if you tell the story well, you're going to capture who the people we serve are. What are their goals? What are all of the problems that they're facing, uh, in trying to pursue those goals? Why does that matter? What, you know, there's a thing in there called a philosophical statement, which is really everyone planting a flag in the ground to say, "This is a problem worth solving."
George Sandmann: Yes
Matt Wolfe: And then you talk about who you are. In StoryBrand terms, we say the client is the hero, the business is the guide who's going to help them. And the, and when you talk about the guide, the first thing you're gonna talk about is what is unique about how we solve that.
George Sandmann: Yes
Matt Wolfe: What is it that we can bring to the table that no one else can do? And by the time you get to the end of the story, you're gonna give them a plan for how it works. You're gonna call them to action, but you're also gonna talk about, then, what does success look like, and how does this change their lives and create the kind of impact you're talking about? So if you put all those pieces together, these are the people we serve.
This is why it matters. This is what's special about how we do it, and this is how we change their lives. That's a rallying cry for the team.
George Sandmann: Uh-huh. 100%.
Matt Wolfe: And that's why it'so impactful for the rest of everything that's happening. And that's why it's in... Uh, and I've told people before, if you wanna change your culture, take that brand story and sit with every team and every department and say, "This is the story of who we are. How does this increase our sense of mission and purpose, and what clues are in here to help us do it better?" And even without all the sophisticated, all the things that we know we can do in terms of HR and culture development, that alone, that catalyst, a great story, a great conversation, and the commitment to act on it transforms culture.
Holland Kiser: Yeah
George Sandmann: 100%.
Matt Wolfe: So okay, that was my soapbox today.
George Sandmann: No, Matt, I am in, I am in profound agreement. I'm in violent agreement with you. That's exactly right.
George Sandmann: And, and what happens, what ends up happening, and we see this, and maybe you've experienced it, right? So winners love hanging out with winners. Everybody wants to be on the winning team. So you're gonna attract A players, and the people who, for whom that, that cultural vibe doesn't work, vote themselves off the island. You know? You, you don't have to run around firing the people who don't fit. They self-identify, and they're like, "You know what? I just don't want this. All you guys run around being so energetic, so rah rah rah.
I hate this. I'm finding another job." Great. Ha-We wish you the best. This is what we're doing.
Holland Kiser: Yeah
George Sandmann: This is how we're changing our clients' lives. And if you wanna be part of that ... And that's why this, my community, this, it's not my community. It's, it's, it's their community, right? This is why their community works so well for them, why we don't really have to recruit to fill our summit because we're like, "Hey, man, there are 50 seats. Who's coming?" And people come year after year after year. So, heck yes.
Matt Wolfe: Heck yeah
Holland Kiser: That's awes- that's excellent. That's excellent.
Holland Kiser: I guess something else that would be interesting, to, to kind of shift the focus to is how has that thinking about culture, how has that changed as you have grown? How has, you know, how has that thinking about culture and your own brand story, how has that been impacted by your growth?
George Sandmann: You know, what's interesting is, I don't think it has Cchangchangede this- you may have noticed I'm a fairly energetic and outspoken, outgoing guy. We are, all three of us are theater geeks, right? I, uh, uh, and, um, so I'm very happy. That hasn't been a challenge because we have some, some simple truths. And the truths of where we are: net givers, we are makers. We, you know, all of that, uh, those guiding principles, by the way, that, uh, I, I don't know if you work with your clients to enshrine guiding principles or core values as they're referred to. But those guiding principles end up being what drives the cultural behavior. And if you read, uh, Mad Dog Mattis' book, Call Sign Chaos, he talks about intent and communicating intent, and that is really creating a culture of accountability and delegation. Delegation with accountability, and great organizations delegate with accountability. A business with high strategic capacity is not dependent on the heroics of any one person or any one group. It is dependent on the coordinated whole. People executing processes that generate revenues. And then we can get into whether those revenues are profitable, whether they're efficient, et cetera. But they're really people executing processes to generate revenues, and that hasn't changed. And I don't see it changing.
I see it being a challenge, back to your earlier question, Matt. You know, how do, how do you, how do you keep it together? We keep our, keep our hand on the pulse, and we're about, like I s- as I teased earlier, we're about to take that, I use these photographic terms, but out on aperture. Bec- I use that because when you open an aperture, you know, it looks like one step, but you've actually more than doubled the size of the circle, so... Or the, uh, the surface area of the circle. And you mathematicians out there, you can tell me I'm wrong. But, uh, you know, I'm roughly correct.
Matt Wolfe: George, has the way you sell this program to advisors changed over time as you've scaled?
George Sandmann: Yes. So you mentioned the difficulty of marketing earlier, and marketing is hard, and marketing is changing right now. I mean, what do you guys see? Would you, would you, would you agree? From my perspective, marketing is changing faster than it has in recent memory, right? And it's changing; I feel like it's changing right now as fast as it did back when we, we got the internet.
And, you know, and yeah, I'm that old. But marketing is changing very, very rapidly. So, you know, when we talk about selling, we used to market, and we used to be... Uh, and I used to, at the snap of a finger, could get 100 people into a webinar. Now, that has changed, not because my authority has changed. My authority is far higher. I got a bestselling, I have a bestselling book. We have all these programs. That's great, but the audience's appetite has changed. You know, they don't want steak anymore. They want sushi. I don't know how else to describe it. So what we've, what we do is very relationship-driven sales.
Essentially, all of our new members of this community come from referrals. Do we crank out content? We put out three, at least three pieces of content every week, right? And they're, they're big. They're meaty. I work hard on them. But it's that, it's that, it's leveraging the community. And again, if you think of it, it's, you know, if you have three people referring, we have a community of three people, and they each refer one, you've gone to six. Great. When six people refer, we've doubled to 12, 12 to 24. So that referral engine, and people love what they get here. They are getting a lot of value. And so yes, it has changed. It has changed from a traditional sales and marketing engine where I'm, I'm strong. I'm not the best in the world, but I'm quite strong.
I've built a bunch of businesses on that model. The first business that went b- that went bananas for us, w- I, was down in Texas. We had full-page ads in The Wall Street Journal. Nobody's doing that. Well, you know, United Airlines is, but we w- we were buying leftover space and buying the back page of The Wall Street Journal. It was great for us, and we had a call center. And we had, you know, we had all that traditional stuff. That's, that, that doesn't, th- that's not relevant for me anymore. For others it, it is, but
Matt Wolfe: Yeah, you asked what we're seeing and, at a high level, you know, obviously AI is scrambling all sorts of things about how stuff gets done.
George Sandmann: A- and including the time to close, right? Days to close. But let's, we don't have to go down that rabbit hole. I'm sorry, Matt, I didn't mean to interrupt. I apologize
Matt Wolfe: But the uptick of it, it is consistently almost exponentially, driving a desire for human contact.
George Sandmann: 100%.
Matt Wolfe: That's a great advantage for a B2B because you spend a lot of energy now trying to help people move from, and you named it well, a traditional marketing strategy to a relational one, right? It's again, it's the human touch that's gonna make all the difference. So people do need... need the content and all that.
But we need to ask, what is the point of all the stuff that goes out in digital marketing? And it should be to catalyze moments of human encounters so that people can see you, George, in whatever forum we can find, like this podcast, like events, like conferences, wherever. But are we getting people to the venues where they can see the human behind the brand? And usually, a lot of B2Bs are still founder-led. They need to know who is the human behind this big high-stakes thing that I'm going to give them, and entrust them with. And so we, we try and get people to those kinds of moments.
We actually... It's funny you say referrals. We have a new program rolling out called Scale Beyond Referrals for B2Bs; we see people reliant on referrals. And it's not that referrals don't work. Referrals do work. But on their own, they create an issue for scalability. So you want to- and predictability of growth. So if you can make the front-end thing work in terms of marketing from a relational perspective, and market all about relationship-based marketing and create more human moments, you're still building a wider funnel, and then in the middle, as we said, you take care of marketing, sales, and client experience.
You're creating a great journey for people in the middle that holds and deepens the sacred trust that they've given you, that ends up leading to more referrals on the back end.
George Sandmann: Totally agree.
George Sandmann: And, you know, let's be clear. If money were no object, right? And every business exists on a budget. You know, the biggest business I ever ran, we still fretted about, or I helped run. I didn't run it. I helped run. We still fretted about payroll, right? We still had cash issues.
That's why the first dimension of growth for us is predictable profits and cash flow. If money was no object, I would turn the money hose on marketing, and I would hire someone exactly like Brand3 to get out there. And there's-- marketing is absolutely relevant, right? We just do our marketing, in the, in the kitchen sink, if you will. We are not investing a lot- uh, invest 'cause we're investing in technology, and we're investing in growing the community. And so I'll leave it there. Marketing is absolutely relevant, and people would be crazy if they think that it's no longer... You know what AI has done is people are getting their answers without going to your website, folks. And if you don't think marketing is more important now than ever, You ought to sit down and take a, take a deep think because now more than ever, you need people like Brand3, to help you get your message out there in a way that finds your ideal client, that helps that ideal client understand that they, they don't need to go to Claude or to Chat vet you out, that they need to pick up the phone and call you and say, "Hey, man, here's what I need.
Can you help?" and it's getting to the place where you are the, you are the person that they are going to call when they need help. And we, we are blessed, blessed to be in that position.
Matt Wolfe: The sort of resource issue that you, that you mentioned is important. It's part of why we offer a lot of options for strategic consulting, you know, to become someone's coach. That can be as valuable as anything. A lot of B2Bs operate in unique ways, with limited resources; they can do some of their own marketing, but they need the outside perspective and the strategy to make sure that it's effective. And then we have a full agency that can do all the other things, like you said, when it's time to invest in those. But the most important thing is, you know, I, I think we're all learning, as you said. But whether it's the gig economy, whether it's running lean and bringing in experts to help us with things, any of us who are running a small business are learning to stay in our lane of where our zone of genius is and, and make friends for the other things, you know, and trusted partners. This is so definitely so glad you've been able to... I feel like we could go on for another hour easily.
George Sandmann: I know. I'm like, "What? What else? What do we got?" This is very fun. Thank you. Thank you
Matt Wolfe: But who has the time, so we're gonna wrap up with something that we call the Behind the Brand questionnaire, because in, in the theme of everything we've been talking about, right, we've gotta make sure if we're doing B2B marketing, people need to meet great people like you and understand the r- the literal beating heart behind the business. And so we've got a little questionnaire here, questionnaire here that's just kinda fun and lets us do that with you, and lets people get to know you as they're thinking about, especially advisors as they're thinking about reaching out to you, or business leaders right now who are thinking, "I gotta find a Growth Drive George Sandmannn trained and equipped advisor somewhere." so, Holland, you're gonna kick this off. I
Holland Kiser: All right.
Matt Wolfe: This is fun.
Holland Kiser: This is, this is a fun one. For, for a theater geek like you, this will be an easy question. What's your go-to karaoke song, or what song do you wish you could sing?
George Sandmann: Wish I could sing. I wish I could sing the national anthem without cracking. Don't we all? My go-to karaoke song is " You Never Close Your Eyes Anymore When I Kiss Your Lips. That is just, I can... It's right in my range. I can pull it off badly, but I can pull... It's where I'm comfortable. How's that?
Matt Wolfe: So "I've Had the Time of My Life" Dirty Dancing. That's the one?
George Sandmann: That's- there you go.
Matt Wolfe: Amazing.
Holland Kiser: Excellent. Excellent.
Matt Wolfe: That's actually a fun one to sing. That's a fun one to sing, like, on a cruise ship if they're doing karaoke.
George Sandmann: Yeah,
Matt Wolfe: 'Cause it's got kinda like a cruise shippy vibe. You never close your eyes.
George Sandmann: So, so Dan, uh, who runs Accounting Today, they started doing this years ago. They have a growth forum out in San Diego, and at the end of the growth forum, he has all these CPA firms, the top performing CPA firms in the country, and they know that it's gonna happen. So, so they have a karaoke night to close out the, the, uh, forum. And you've got the managing partner, the, you know, some of the most, you would think, harrumph people out there, the most serious. And these are serious professionals. I'm not... They, they are killer, uh, operators. But they're up there belting it out. They prepare, they compete, they... It is fantastic.
Matt Wolfe: That's funny.
Holland Kiser: Yeah.
George Sandmann: Yeah.
Holland Kiser: That's excellent
Matt Wolfe: Yeah, I've been to a conference that used to be in San Diego, now it's Anaheim. They do an epic live band karaoke. So shout out to social media world, I guess. Must acknowledge at this point I'm an absolute fool. I just cr- I just named the wrong song. You were doing Righteous Brothers.
George Sandmann: I was doing Righteous Brothers. That's okay. Yep. Yep. From Top, from Top Gun.
Matt Wolfe: You know what, I've Had the Time of My Life is kind of the 80s successor to that song.
George Sandmann: It is. That's another one, though it's in the same range. Just give me the mic.
Holland Kiser: Agreed. That's a, it's a...These are, these are all crowd-pleaser songs. Excellent choices.
Matt Wolfe: George, what is the last thing that made you laugh out loud?
George Sandmann: I can't tell that story. It, it happened up in, uh, well, I, I guess I can, but I'll just, I'll just clean it up just a, a skosh. So my, uh, my, my friend Mike Garrison, I mentioned him earlier, he wrote a book called, uh, Can I Borrow Your Car? It's about referral building, very building a, a, a referral-driven sales process. Shout out to Mike. Well, he literally lent our friend Peter his car, and Peter was like, "Well, I have to take Mike back his car." And I, I actually had an idea, and you can imagine, it would've been a heck of a gag, um, to, to, to take the car back destroyed. Can I borrow your car? If you're gonna bring it back better than you took it, and this would not have been the case. And we laughed. We had a good l- a good laugh over that one.
Matt Wolfe: That's great. It
Holland Kiser: Excellent.
Matt Wolfe: Good gag
George Sandmann: It was, well, it would've ... Imagine what a teenager would leave in the backseat of your car; we were gonna do that to Mike's car. And but, you know, time and opportunity, so
Holland Kiser: Oh man, well, all right, on to the next one. What is your favorite way to get away from it all?
George Sandmann: So I went to law school to be a conservation attorney, a wildlife and habitat conservation attorney, and I was driven by hunting and, and, you know, there, there-- we can have an ethical debate about hunting. I happen to be a very passionate hunter. And what I love the most about it, I'm also a bird watcher. And what I love the most about it is getting out and immersing yourself in the landscape, immersing yourself in the scenery. Hunting and fishing, you're participating in that landscape. Happy to debate, you know, but that is what-- that's when I wanna recharge. Other than hanging out with my best friend in the world, my amazing wife, um, that is how I, I really recharge. And it's, and it is, it is profound because it is so such a passion. It's this atavistic passion, not shy about- I'm not shy either.
Holland Kiser: No, it's good. You're, you're, you're passionate about lots of things, and it's ver- it's really, like I said, it's very engaging to listen to you, George. Thank you.
George Sandmann: Thank you. I appreciate it
Matt Wolfe: All right, the next question is an interesting one. What smell reminds you of a specific place or time?
George Sandmann: Fresh baked bread, childhood. Fresh baked bread, definitely childhood. And it's not that my-- I b- I'm a baker, but it reminds me of those, those moments going with my mom into the bakery. I was fortunate enough to grow up in Europe, and it reminds me of going into the bakery and, and pick every... We bought fresh bread every day. Their shopping model, and this is the '70s, right? Their shopping model is profoundly different. But the smell of bread reminds me of home, of my mom, of childhood, of, you know, sort of all things good. That and, uh, and freshly, a freshly mown hay field has the same, same effect.
Holland Kiser: Great selections. Awesome. Well, what is one day in your life that you would like to relive?
George Sandmann: Wow
Holland Kiser: That's a big one.
George Sandmann: You know, that I would like to relive. I, uh, I sat on the banks of the Yellowstone River in Gardiner, Montana, with my three sons. We rented an RV and we, we had, we did a, a, uh, Teton Crest. So we, we climbed and, and crossed the Tetons and, and then we drove up through Yellowstone, and we parked our, our little, our little, uh, RV, four men in a tin can, on the sides of the, the Yellowstone. And we went for a swim, and we dragged the chairs out of the, uh, out of the, you know, the fold-out camp chairs, and we sat there s- sucking on a beer. That was a truly great day.
That was a really great day. And I'm fortunate enough to have several of those, but that's the one that just jumped to mind. I love my sons. I love hanging out with them. So that's one I'd, I'd take again.
Matt Wolfe: That's cool. I actually have some powerful memories of being with my dad at Yellowstone and the Tetons.
George Sandmann: Awesome. Awesome
Matt Wolfe: What three words would your loved ones use to describe you?
George Sandmann: Glad he's dead. No, no. Um, what three words? Passionate would probably... I'm a very good friend. I, well, these are how I'd like to- I'd hope, I hope they... They're like, "That guy." Passionate, friend, and I can be... You know, passion has a good side and a bad side, right? So I can also be, I'm mindful not to be a jerk. Let's just go with passionate and friend, and you guys can fill in the blank for the third one.
Nobody's perfect.
Holland Kiser: So what would it mean to have truly succeeded in your work? Not your company, but for you.
George Sandmann: Man, if we make it anywhere near... I mean, we're already having a profound impact, right? So, what I really- if we can bring efficiency to the private market, and if we can bring it in a, in a meaningful... We are already, but if we can do it for more people, and when we do it, it's not if, when we do this for more people, at some point, you know, they turn off the klieg lights and tell you to clean out your, your, your costume bin. And, uh, there, you know, that's gonna happen. And if, if, when that happens, if I've been able to help, I want to... I know that I will have helped as many people as I possibly can, and that's, that's profoundly important. Would I like to make a lot of money in the process? You bet I would. It's equitable.
You know, if we're, if, if we're impacting a trillion dollars' worth of the market, you know, taking a, taking a few basis points off the top seems, seems fair. But if we can have that profound good, if we can make all of those dreams come true, I know that sounds hokey, but we're really in the business of making dreams come true, of making people's lives work deliver for them, and for their families, and for their communities. And if we can do that, when we have, will have done that, w- will have had a, a left a, left a mark, you know, had a legacy that means something. You know, I'm just gonna digress a little bit. Right when I was in, at the end of law school, I got to work at the National Wildlife Federation, I had the...
You know, this is a small nonprofit organiz- well, it's a big nonprofit organization with a small legal staff. As the attorney, we got to, uh, I got the, I got handed a b- a, a manila envelope literally with the Endangered Species Act reauthorization, their take on it, and I got to work on that. And that's the type of work when you can pr- when you can deliver that le- By the way, sad, but it's true, it's still on the books. The one that we wrote, the one that I worked on, the one that I took up to Capitol Hill is still on the books today, 1992 to today. Anyway, You know, if we can ha- those, have those types of impacts, then I will have, you know, not only lived a, you know, just a great life, a blessed life, but, uh, but have left something behind that's better than I found it.
And that's, at the end of the day, that's what we really, it's a good thing.
Matt Wolfe: Wonderful. Ok, well first of all, I award you bonus points for the theater kid metaphors you used at the beginning of that, the klieg lights and the costume bin. Thank you so much for that. And then, um, you
George Sandmann: Somebody out there's gonna be on, on, they're gonna be on, on AI like, "What's a Klieg light? How do you spell Klieg?"
Matt Wolfe: But now, having spent time with you, what advisor wouldn't wanna work with you? You can learn more about what George is doing at growthdrive.com, but that's growth-drive.com. That's George Sandmann with two Ns if you're looking up George.
George Sandmann: No, that, that's great. This has been a super fun conversation. And, uh, George Sandmann with two Ns. You could just Google me. I'm easy enough to find if you're interested. We're here, and we're happy to help. So thank you, guys. Thank you, Holland. Thank you, Matt.
Holland Kiser: Thanks a lot for your time
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