Jeremy S. Mosier is an investor, entrepreneur and international businessman. He has a proven track record of managing direct sales programs for Fortune 100 Companies that are held in the largest retailers in the world today. He also leads program management for new services as they launch through all facets of either face to face marketing or digital marketing. The newest of which, includes in-store campaigns for the clean energy sector and energy audits that will not only reduce the carbon footprint, but will also reduce the consumers bill.
 
Mosier brings a broad range of leadership skills in motivational speaking, sales, management, business development and operations in various roles throughout his career. Over the past decade, he has mentored thousands of new business owners and entrepreneurs across North America and throughout Europe.
 
He oversees all operations with Full Circle International, and won many awards for his accomplishments including Business Manager of the Year, multiple years in a row. He is also a partner in several other ventures including real estate holdings and charitable foundations. Notably, as a Program Director for Play and Save, a company created to raise awareness and funds for charities around the world, he was responsible for sales, recruitment and growth strategy. Under his leadership, they could raise and contribute millions of dollars to charities throughout North America, Europe and Australia.
 
In 2005, Jeremy Mosier was listed in the Wall Street Journal as a "Businessman of the Year". The list recognizes the top U.S. business leaders who have successfully integrated business and financial success along with providing invaluable input to the Business Advisory Board.
 
Jeremy resides in Roswell, Georgia with his wife Corey and their two children. He enjoys golfing, traveling, fishing, hunting, and his Buckeyes.

While hosting a meeting in Newport Beach, CA for new entrepreneurs, I was asked a question about the number of hours I work now compared to when I started my first company. Tough question to answer without sounding like a jerk. How do you define work? Is talking with your friends about the next thing you are going to launch, take over or the new markets that you are expanding into considered work? Is traveling around the world speaking at meetings work? Is getting the opportunity to make an impact on someone’s life work? Of course, I didn’t say any of that. It all just ran through my mind, in a matter of a split second.

I did say that I worked hard getting things started "paying my dues", and that it felt like more hours than what I put in now. Followed with, the number of hours might not be any different, in reality, I might work more hours now, but the hours are very different. Hours spent on research, personal development, networking, mentoring, being on the road and also the more mundane - emails, calls and texts. It takes hard work to become successful at anything.

I had to ask them all, “What are you working for? What are those life goals that you want to accomplish? Do you want to retire early, retire your parents, help the homeless, donate millions to charity, buy a dream house or boat?” 

How to get to the top... 

1.    Intentional. Consistent Effort. Deliberate.

I told the new entrepreneurs everything worthwhile is uphill. When you get to the top of the mountain, you don’t look back and say, “I have no idea how I got here. One day I just woke up and here I was.” This takes great effort. Any uphill climb must be intentional, consistent and deliberate. Your success, our success in business isn’t going to be on accident. Our collective discipline is essential for our success. You have to fight to get to the next plateau. 

2.    Run to Win! Not just to run.

As Paul wrote to the people of Corinth, "All runners in a race run but only one gets the prize. Run in such a way as to win." In most cases the difference between winning and losing is small and in the preparation. My kids are learning the importance of practice. My 8 year old son corrected me and said, “Its perfect practice, Dad.” How can you practice more, have perfect practice or become an expert at what you do? And then you have to run to win. Don’t settle for mediocrity.

 3.    Unfair advantage unless you use it.

Putting in two more hours a day than the person next to you, gives you an extra “work week” every month. (10 hours a week x 4 weeks per month = an additional 40 hrs/ mth). This gives you an extra 3 months or 13 more weeks a year practicing or doing. You should accomplish more than someone that just works a 40-hour week, right? And that’s only 50 hours in a week! What about the success stories of Bill Gates, Bezos, or Zuck and the hours they've spent building their empires? Chances are you're not creating the next big "dot com" like they did, but what you are creating takes effort. If what you are doing this for matters enough to you, then you won’t worry about the extra effort that it requires, you will find the time.

4.    The harder I work the luckier I get. 

 I knew that I put in more hours than my friends and family did at their jobs. They said I was crazy to work as hard as I was working then and do today. Now some of those same people tell me how lucky I've been. It wasn't luck. The harder I work, the luckier I get. Maybe I was in the right place at the right time. Maybe. My dad taught me to work hard, do the right thing, build the right relationships with people around me, be prepared for when the big man upstairs says it's my time to shine; I will be ready, willing and able. If I wasn't prepared and my time came, what would've happened? Would my business success have happened? Not sure, but in my opinion, that would've been lucky.

5.    Be willing to pay now so you can play later.

 Understand that progress comes at a price. You will have to stop and pay periodically. Sometimes you will pay by saying no to someone you've always said yes to before because your time matters and its better spent somewhere or with someone else. Sometimes you pay with the people you are developing, and other times in your personal life, missing the birthday party or not going out with your friends. It’s hard, but it'll be worth it. If you put in the work, you will be able to do the things that everyone else wishes they could do but aren't willing to do the work to get there. They might be playing now, but they will have to keep paying later.

6.    The greater the sacrifice the greater the reward.

Make sacrifices today that others aren’t willing to make so that tomorrow you can afford to do things that others can’t afford to do. When you get into your 50’s and 60’s, you can’t go back and change the effort that you put in for the last 20-30 years. You can use the resources that you’ve created to help the people that you want to help or buy the boat that you wanted. People are counting on you.

7.    Message from your future self.

What I know is that you will ask yourself a question 15-20 years from today that will go something like, “How did I end up here?” Either you are lucky (because of your hard work) and have heart of gratitude or bitter and blaming others. You have a choice to stay focused and passionate about those life goals you have or give up on them and give them an excuse later on in life because the extra effort wasn’t worth it.

I pushed through the challenges thinking about the family I was going to have and the people that I wanted to help. It’s what still drives me today. The reality of that question made me work harder. To put in more effort. To do whatever it takes. You can too. Don’t count the hours, days, months or even years. Count on the fulfillment of being able to take care of loved ones. To do for others what most people cannot do or aren’t willing to do.

I am willing to work harder for that. I owe to it to my future self. 

Most people quit their job because they don’t get to do what they want to do, and I’m not referring to being forced to use words instead of emoji’s in formal messages. Underperforming teams, turnover and lack luster results are because the team doesn’t own it.

So, how do you get people to do what you want them to do?

Look in the mirror or at your boss, is this person assigning projects and priorities asking for input regarding solutions or feedback? If not, this doesn’t allow talent to be developed. Even though intentions might be good, there is failure getting people to buy into the vision because of the delivery. Ultimately this leads to turnover of talented people and crappy results.

Commitment comes from ownership

A favorite experiment of mine was done by Harvard psychology professor Ellen Langer, while she was a graduate student at Yale. The story is told that her doctoral thesis came from a poker game. She dealt the cards and skipped a player, which happens all the time in UNO at my house. This drove everyone nuts, which drove her to the lab. The study was to examine the factors that make people believe they will succeed in a game of chance. She set up participants and gave them lottery tickets with a twist. Half of the group received randomly assigned lottery tickets and the other half was asked to write down any number they would like as their lottery number. Just before drawing the winning number, the researchers offered to buy back the tickets. The question the researchers wanted to answer is "How much more do you have to pay someone who 'wrote their own number' versus someone who was handed a number randomly?"

Rational thinking would suggest that there would be no difference because lottery is pure chance and everyone had the same chance regardless of the number. The researchers found that they had to pay five times more, to the group that wrote their own numbers. Rational managers think it’s a waste of time to let people discover for themselves what they already know-just tell them and be done with it. For those of us that have done this, unfortunately we realize it doesn’t foster the same results that comes with ownership of the answer.

Summary of the experiment is that when we choose for ourselves, we are far more committed to the outcome.

5 times more committed!

This is exactly why we mentor people to give as much ownership in their business as possible. Let people be entrepreneurs, as I stated in a previous post "Millennials Don't Need To Change, You Do". We want new people coming in to rewrite the culture for the business. We want them to develop new ways to double the business and get rewarded for it. The more we can align the leadership with this thought process of allowing people to write their own lottery ticket, the larger a difference it makes. 

If you are a leader of a business, you can implement this without a formal meeting by doing 6 simple things.

1. Share your vision. In the hallway, at an event or anytime you encounter someone in your organization talk about the direction you are heading and how they are a part of the team. It gets the blood pumping.
2. Explain the why behind it. The more they understand why you want to hit a certain target the more likely they will come up with the plan on how to get there. The larger the purpose, the more invested they will become.
3. Give them power to come up with solutions. This is where they can own a piece of the business. It’s important to not second guess their decisions if you want this concept to take off in your business. They want to and you want them to become a player in your business. This means they will make a mistake every now and then.   
4. Ask them what they are working on and if there is something that you can do to help. Focus on continuous improvement. Helping align them towards the path they should be going down is good for all.
5. Encourage them along the way. Provide instant feedback good, bad or ugly, let them know how they are doing with candor. Remember it’s progress not perfection. You need to use your position to foster change in your business and a positive voice will help.
6. Ask for feedback. My favorite thing to do! What can I do to better? Any suggestions? How can I help you?

I know that I personally have struggled with wanting to interject during a meeting. I would be sitting there or on a call listening to everyone talking about the problems for 10 or 15 minutes keeping quiet. This forced me to learn how to not give them all the answers. When I let them work through the problems themselves they would normally make good decisions, sometimes better ones. They were more invested in their solutions and ended up doing better because of it.

There needs to be a balance between allowing the team to come up with the solutions and you providing direction, but as one of my mentors taught me years ago, the art of leadership is getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it. Research shows we are five times more likely to get there if they can figure it out on their own. Sometimes we just need to nudge them along the way.

Where have you struggled in your leadership? Do you find yourself being able to let people run their own projects or solve problems your business is experiencing? 

Good for you for reading this. When I'm asked to help steer another business back on track, I spend most my time fixing these two things: getting their leadership to be solution oriented and having people invest their time in areas that matter. Once they have the discipline, they take off again.

Think for a second about going to the gym. You don't get in shape because you show up once. You don't get in shape because you watch everyone else work out every day for a few months. You get in shape because you're disciplined enough to do the workout even when your body is telling you no. Your diet is right and you make sacrifices that other people aren't willing to make. That’s why most people are out of shape and broke.

It all starts with 'Self Discipline'

Unfortunately (or fortunately) we live in an instant gratification society and we keep getting faster and faster. Movies on demand, quick cash from an ATM, fast food…Success, however, doesn't come instantly.

When it comes to being successful, people choose one of two things: the pain of sacrifice and growth or the pain of regret. Hard is easy or easy is hard. You choose. Make the decision to do it now and pay the price and life will be easier later or play now and have it easy and life will be harder for you later. There is no other way around it. 

I've listed two areas of self-discipline where you are in total control. They will change how you live your life, advance your career and/ or run your business if you have the discipline.

1. Be able to handle your emotions. You need to have the right attitude. And you need to realize that your emotional reactions are your own responsibility. An easy way to stay positive is to understand some things are in your control and some are not. There are facts in life that you cannot change, and there are things that you can pour yourself into that will change the outcome. It’s not worth a second of your time to spend any effort, mental or physical, trying to change facts. Be intentional with your attitude. Believe that you will be able to accomplish the task at hand by focusing on solutions, not dwelling on the problem. We all deal with problems. How you react to those problems is more important to the outcome than the problem itself.
2. Manage your time. Everyone is given the same allotment of minutes each day. Each person's level of self-discipline dictates how effectively those minutes are used. Don't just be busy throughout your day. Be productive, always growing, always striving for improvement. Maximize the use of your time. Life is chaotic enough. Focus on where you are right now and what you are working towards. Have the discipline to put blinders on to everything else around you and spend your time making the most of the moment that you have in front of you. You need to have a very clear vision about where you are going. This inspires you and will help you stay focused. Then you need to put in the work.

You are where you are because of the habits and choices that you've made in your life. Fast forward and add up the things you'll do daily over the next 3 months, 6 months or a year; What will it equal? Every day is a new day. Every day is another opportunity. Every day there is a chance for us to make the choice to move forward or not. To be a better leader, mentor, student or not.

Being intentional about your attitude and your time are entirely in your control.

Where do you struggle the most when dealing with your emotions? What aspects of your life do you need to be more intentional?

I recently read an article about a company CEO complaining how the employees their company was hiring have “changed”. He was referring to Millennials or Generation Y, which is the largest generation in the workforce and growing. As I read, I couldn't help but disagree with the author's comments. We have been hiring millennials and developing them into outstanding leaders in our field for years; Some of them are practically running the entire enterprise.

By 2020 this generation will make up nearly 50 percent of the global workforce. With that in mind, one would think it should be easy to attract and develop great Millennials. It’s not. I’ve put together a list of five ways to develop the next generation of business leaders that I hope will help reshape your company.

1. Let them be entrepreneurs. They don't want to work for someone else and neither did I. They want to be a player in the game because they know if they get the job done right there is a payoff in the end. According to a survey from Bentley University, 67 percent of their respondents said they wanted to start their own business, while only 13 percent said they wanted to climb the corporate ladder to become a President or CEO. If your company or business doesn't provide this type of opportunity, get creative.
2. Give them a lab to experiment in. Set the frame work for what's expected, deadlines or boundaries and then let them loose. They want to discover and control their own destiny. Also, they want to collaborate and if it can be done in a team environment, even better. 
3. They will need a coach. Be available to help with the decision-making process. They will work harder if they feel they are headed in the right direction. If possible, provide same-day feedback. This isn't looking over shoulders or pestering about every detail. It’s about listening and connecting. It could be as simple as a text or an informal two-minute conversation.
4. Create a culture that is flexible and relaxed. Be as flexible with the schedule as you can. They want an environment that is comfortable and inspires them to contribute without fear of being criticized. Simple things like throwing a pizza lunch or giving time off for a job well done can go a long way. A fun atmosphere is attractive to everyone.
5. They want to be social and connected. Provide opportunities for social sharing and engagement by using technology and doing team events. Most millennials grew up with phones and sleep with them on their bedside tables. Remember, this is a share-everything generation. Co-workers often are more than colleagues  they are friends as well. Model healthy boundaries for a new supervisor and encourage them to do the same with their teams. 

It is true that millennials are vocal about their experiences and expectations and pay isn't the only thing attracting them. They want a culture that will allow them to fit in and grow. They expect things to happen faster while having the ability to utilize technology in ways that maybe you haven't thought of yet. My advice is to embrace the change because it’s you that need to change, not them.

Are there other things that you've changed in your business to help develop new recruits?