The Sam Ovens Podcast

In this episode, I share my workstation setup. I get paid nothing from these companies, it's what I use. If you want to watch it: https://www.consulting.com/channel/my-workstation-setup-for-productivity

I'm back. Here's what I've been up to for the past 2-years.

Sacrificing things, and doing less, is not sexy. Sacrifice is tricky thing to get right, most entrepreneurs get it wrong. Rather watch it? https://www.consulting.com/channel/sacrifice-yield-and-asymmetric-returns

Here's a quick sneak-peek into the Consulting.com Quantum Mastermind event! Listen to Sam as he answers some burning questions. Note: We were using a throw mic and that has resulted in some inaudible questions (whoopsie). But Sam's audio is perfectly audible throughout the session. Happy listening. Rather watch it? Sure: https://www.consulting.com/channel/how-to-use-metrics

Scaling a business is an awesome topic, cleaning up the mess and paying back the debt from scaling is not. This is a tricky thing to balance. Most entrepreneurs get it wrong. If you don't grow fast, a competitor might overtake you —but— grow too fast and you'll make a mess and accumulate too much debt for the company to get out of. Finding the perfect balance between these two extremes is an art-form that lies at the core of an entrepreneur's ability. This podcast teaches you how to think about three things: scale, mess, debt, and how they're all parts of the same "growth cycle". I share practical tips to handle these issues in your business today + share personal stories of the rollercoaster ride I've been on to date. Full blog post here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/scale-mess-and-debt

3 Good books in 8 minutes. Need I say more. The books are: 1. Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don't by Jim Collins — https://amzn.to/2LqVKZh 2. Founders at Work: Stories of Startups' Early Days by Jessica Livingston — https://amzn.to/2LtuQzS 3. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown — https://amzn.to/2NakjMa Full blog post here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/3-good-books-in-8-mins

This is part two of the "Sleep To Win" mini-series, today we cover the software required to take your sleep to the next level. Rather want to watch it? Click here: https://youtu.be/zoUm_OP9R6A Didn't see part 1 about hardware?. No problem! Click here to watch it: https://youtu.be/FyYMtatUpTE Full blog post here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/sleep-to-win-part-two-software

Want to be smarter? Happier? Less stressed, more intelligent, more creative, less anxious, more focused, rational, and calm? If you want these things — get some SLEEP! (seriously...). This video shows you how to hack your sleep for high performance. Full blog post here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/sleep-to-win-part-one-hardware

Do you get distracted by shiny objects? Always looking for something new to replace the thing that was new yesterday? (yes, you're crazy). At its core, shiny object syndrome (SOS) is a disease of distraction, and it affects entrepreneurs specifically because of the qualities that make them unique: High motivation, crave new technology, new developments, and no fear of starting new things. It's called shiny object syndrome because it's the entrepreneurial equivalent of a small child chasing after shiny objects. Once they get there and see what the object is, they immediately lose interest and start chasing the next thing. For entrepreneurs, rather than literal shiny objects. Shiny objects may be business objectives, marketing strategies, clients or even other business ventures. In today's podcast, I show you how to BEAT the shiny object syndrome by implementing 9 practical steps you can take immediately. Full blog post here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/shiny-object-syndrome-the-cure

Are you indecisive? Struggle to make fast decisions? History of poor choices? Put things off? Resort to "other peoples thinking" or following the crowd? We are the sum of our choices. Where you are in life right now, your current situation, it's nobodies doing but your own. It's the sum total of every decision you've ever made. We are our choices. This podcast shows you how to free up time and energy to make better decisions, how to think critically about your decisions, as well as practical mental models you can use immediately to improve your life. Full blog post here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/how-to-make-decisions

Do you get confused? Trouble thinking clearly? Overwhelmed by complexity? Paralyzed by decisions? Emotions contradicting logic? The brain is humankind's greatest gift and a curse — it depends whether you control it, or it controls you. In the world of entrepreneurship and business, it's more about mastering your brain, not mastering the tactics of business. This podcast shows you how to get your thinking clean, and by doing so, win at life and business. Enjoy!

Do you procrastinate? Problems with consistency and discipline? And... Do you have a hard time actually wanting to do the work? This podcast explains WHY gravity is pulling against your will and how to fix it (with practical instructions). Give it a listen. Rather watch it and check out the resources mentioned in the podcast? --> https://www.consulting.com/channel/why-you-cant-do-the-work

You might have noticed I've been quiet recently... No weekly blog videos, no daily emails, no social posts, no live-stream Q&A's, no nothing... Just silence... For 90+ days... The question is: What have I been doing? Give this a listen.

More With Less — A short piece of content on how to grow your business. Enjoy! Rather want to watch it? Click here --> https://youtu.be/ZsJ-2EOuyhA

Until you make the unknown known, it will dictate your life and you will call it "fate". We live in a world of complexity and chaos — you either drown in it, or you understand it. How do you understand the complexity and chaos? Through the use of mental models. Mental models are how we understand the world. Not only do they shape what we think and how we understand but they shape the connections and opportunities that we see. Mental models are how we simplify complexity, why we consider some things more relevant than others, and how we reason. A mental model is simply a representation of how something works. We cannot keep all of the details of the world in our brains, so we use models to simplify the complex into understandable and organizable chunks. Today's podcast is the first of a new "mental model mini-series". I plan to release new content weekly that covers different mental models I use to understand the world and make decisions. Today's mental model is "Chaos Theory", understanding the 4 universal laws from which infinite complexity emerges. This is a biggy! One podcast you seriously don't want to miss!

What are the "ingredients" of success, Intelligence, and skill? What are the constituent parts? The source materials? Most people believe success, intelligence and skill are natural things you're either born with or without and there's nothing you can do to change it. They're wrong. Success, intelligence and skill, like everything else in the universe, has "ingredients". The same way a chemical compound is made up of elements, success is made up of a different breed of elements. There's always building blocks, you've just got to know where to look! In this podcast, I share with you how to find them, in everything! If you've ever wondered why some people are considered successful, intelligent and skilled, while others aren't — this podcast will show you how to reverse engineer it back to its constituent parts. (this is a valuable skill you can use for life!).

Normal people believe in one true "right" and "wrong". Geniuses, billionaires, and scientific revolutionaries believe in "contradiction". Normal people see what everybody else is thinking/doing, and then they adopt that as their own belief of what to think/do. They never think for themselves, they never agitate the crowd, they blindly obey. This isn't a problem if you're ok with losing. But, if you want to win, you need to think differently. You need to learn how to transcend binary logic and play with both sides of the spectrum. You need to become idiosyncratic. Isaac Newton, Einstein, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Steve Jobs, Michael Jordan, Mike Tyson, Schumacher — they're all idiosyncratic. They all defied the "sacred conventions", upset the orthodox, and changed the rules of the game. If you've ever wondered why some people change the world and others just live in it, this video will show you how it starts by fundamentally changing the way you think. In this podcast, I show you how to play with fire!

What you see depends not only on WHAT you look at but also on WHERE you look from. This video shares how I use distance to think clearly + 7 important things I've been thinking about on my recent Salt Lake City vacation. These 7 things are recurring worries, thoughts, observations, and strategies that are currently on my mind. If you're an entrepreneur starting or growing a business, you'll probably find them interesting, and useful. From market inversion to the constituent parts of value, product development, recruiting intelligent unorthodox athletes, David VS Goliath asymmetric warfare, playing Moneyball to win an unfair game, Egypt pyramids, and the next stage of my evolution.

What problem are you solving? For who? With what solution? What makes your solution different? And most importantly: What would the perfect solution look like? These are the things you should be spending most of your time thinking about as an entrepreneur. NOT taking photos of your food, Gucci duffle bag, and shitty snakeskin loafers to get social media followers to think you're rich, and maybe buy your stuff. Right now the entrepreneur market is in a state of mass confusion. Why? I believe most people's targets and goals are vague undefined entities. And when you build a mind, business, and strategy based upon vagueness, you build nothing of value and cause confusion. This is why you need to think: What does perfection look like? Defining the perfect solution your customers would dream of in a world unconstrained with today's reality will open your eyes to what they really want. Your goal should be to make progress towards it. Innovation begins here!

Chances are your mind looks like this... It's full of "weeds", there probably is a plant somewhere in there, but you've mistaken the weeds for the plant itself. I talk to entrepreneurs every day, and a recurring pattern I see with all of them is that they've mistaken the distractions for the main thing. The weeds have taken over the garden of their minds. Today's podcast shows you how to identify the weeds and eliminate them -- so you can focus on the main thing.

I decided to become an entrepreneur when I was 20 years old, now I'm 30. I've made a lot of mistakes and learned important lessons. This video shares 9 things I wish I knew when I was getting started. If I knew these things back then, my journey would have been less painful and more productive. I would be much further ahead. My hope is that by sharing this content, others can learn from my mistakes and avoid the potholes that lie on the road ahead.

Communication KILLS businesses. It's a BAD thing! So are open-plan offices, meetings, managers, and big teams. Last year my company grew significantly, we hired 40 people, total headcount climbed to 48. We had more humans, we were paying more money in salaries, but productivity and throughput declined. How? How does hiring more people, paying more money in salaries, result in less stuff getting done? It baffled me. I've spent the past 6-months thinking about it, digging into the data and figuring it out. In this podcast, I share exactly that.

The greatest skill I have is the skill of learning. Most people haven't learned how to learn. They learned a specific skill, language or subject, but they never learned how to learn. Learning how to learn is the most powerful thing you can know because you can learn anything and do anything once you have it. In today's podcast, I break down my process for learning new things and show you how you can take it and use it for yourself immediately.

Warren Buffett said: "I want to know where I'm going to die so that I never go there". The best way to improve your life and business is to avoid catastrophic errors. The major lesson is “ignorance removal” and the notion that decision-making is not about making a brilliant decision, but avoiding terrible ones. Most people try to improve through addition, when you've really mastered something, you'll learn that improvement comes from subtraction. MORE with LESS. As you plan your goals and new year resolutions for 2019, make sure you set goals to remove things. Not just add new things. Today's podcast shows you how it's done!

If you don't have a plan, you'll become a part of somebody else's plan. By failing to plan, you're planning to fail. Planning your life is extremely important. I mean, it's your life. It's limited. And you only get one of them. So you better make it count! With 2019 just around the corner, right now is the perfect time to plan. In this podcast, I share with you how to create the ultimate plan for your future. Both personally and in business. It also includes 4 tools you can use immediately and for free. Rather want to watch it instead of listening.? Click here to watch and get the tools for free: https://www.consulting.com/channel/tools-to-plan-for-the-new-year

Ever wondered why I behave abnormally compared to others? Ever wondered why I use things I tell you not to use? To most people, my behavior looks contradictory. Example: I'll use a YouTube video to tell you to stop watching YouTube videos. When people see this, it makes no sense to them. They think I'm dishonest, hypocritical or just plain weird. Is there a single intent or pattern behind my seemingly contradictory behavior? YES, there is. And once you understand what it is, everything will make sense to you. Give this a listen.

Meditation has changed my life and made me a better businessman. It's also made me more money. How does that happen? Well, let's break it down... To be successful in business, you need self-discipline, clean thinking, and focus. The more self-discipline, clean thinking, and focus you have -- the more successful you'll be, and the money you'll make in business. The byproduct of meditation is increased self-discipline, clean thinking, and focus. Therefore, meditation makes you money! In this video, I share why I meditate and how I do it. After listening to this podcast, you'll be able to meditate and gain the benefits from it too.

The thing about money is time. The thing about time is that nobody knows how it works. The result? Frustrated people who don't have money or time. Time is the most powerful variable in any equation, yet it's the variable nobody understands and forgets to consider in their mental models, and daily decisions. In today's podcast, I take you on a journey to better understand time, how it works, how you can use it to make money, win at anything and live a better life. We discuss short-term thinking VS long-term thinking, instant gratification VS delayed gratification, 2nd order consequences, causal chains, effect horizons, exponential functions... all sorts of shit that will blow your mind, grow your bank account and turn you into your competitors worst nightmare.

Ask people who the best performing CEO in history was and they'll tell you "Jack Welch". What's interesting, is that Jack Welch was far from the best performing CEO. He's not even on the map! People tend to judge a CEO's performance based on their level of "fame" and "popularity". Not their numbers. Jack Welch was a charismatic, extraverted CEO who made a lot of public appearances and grew his fame. This is why people say his name because they remember him and he's the popular, socially acceptable answer to the question if you want to fit in and seems smart to somebody who isn't smart. But in reality, Jack Welches numbers suck. Probably because he was out taking photos and shaking hands instead of focusing on his business. The best performing CEO's of all time are quiet people you've never heard of. They're quiet, humble, analytical engineers who shy away from the spotlight, have zero interest in fame and focus incessantly on adding value, allocating capital and improving efficiency. They're outsiders. In today's podcast, I explain why outsiders always win, and how you can become one. I also share some book recommendations as well as 3 companies letters to shareholders you must read if you want to succeed in business.

In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act. Right now the online business market is in a state of delusion, fantasy and clinical-grade insanity. Everybody has gone mad! I've been quietly observing this and using it to my advantage for years, but today, I decided to share my observations with you. Today's podcast shares 9 inconvenient truths the market is too afraid to face. While this may be uncomfortable to hear, facing it will make you a better entrepreneur and it may just save your business!

It's funny, people try to make the business so complicated. They get all worried about the latest software, the new podcaster microphone and making sure they get those hashtags just right on the gram -- but -- they completely forget about managing the most precious resource they have -- their time! Quantum Mastermind is my highest level of training. Most people in the group are making 7-figures, 4 people are making 8-figures. It's a talented group of people who are doing well. You'd think we get into super-advanced things at this event? What's funny is, we start day 1 the same every single time by doing an audit of where people's time and attention is going. We basically work on "time management" and "productivity" for the first day. Why? Because this is where the big leverage is. Not by adding another chatbot to your site or a hashtag strategy to your shitty Instagram, by calming the hell down and focusing on doing some meaningful work that adds value. Click here to view the product --> https://www.consulting.com/quantum-mastermind

How do billionaires think? Are their brains different than other peoples? Success isn't magic, it's cause and effect. There are actions people have taken in their life that have had profound impacts that made them successful. Success doesn't happen by chance, it happens by taking specific actions. What causes somebody to take action? Their thinking! It's their analysis, rationalizing, decision making, tradeoffs, problem-solving, etc. What part of a human is responsible for these functions? The mind! Success derives from the mind: Mind - Thinking - Action - Success. Your mind is the boot loader for everything, it's the most important thing to understand and improve if you want to perform better in life. Because of this, I've had a fascination with successful people's minds. I wanted to study them, how they think, and how their brains function, so that I could assemble one for myself. In today's podcast, I share with you what billionaires' minds look like, how they work and how to assemble one of them for yourself starting today!

Why does your business exist other than for the purpose of making money? This is the MOST important question you can ask! And what's scary is that most entrepreneurs don't have an answer to this question. The only reason their business exists is to make money for themselves. What's wrong with this? Legally there's nothing wrong with this at all and people can do whatever they want! The problem is that these people will fail at making money and wonder "WHY?". Money is a byproduct of value when you create value you make money. And money isn't value. So you can't create money by trying to make money, it just doesn't work that way! Companies who aim to solve problems and improve people's lives create value, the byproduct of this is money. Lots of money. If you want to be motivated, have fun, help people and make a lot of money while doing so -- this video is for you!

Tired of moving slowly and getting pulled in 100 directions? Tired of projects lying in limbo and not completing anything? Chances are, you've suffered "death by 1,000 cuts". It's the little things that waste our time and suck our energy dry. Its the "got a minute", "quick check" or "just this once" that sneak up on you and suffocate you. The worst part is that you never see it coming because it disguises itself as a tiny task and we're standing guard for big tasks. If you want to get anything meaningful done, you've got to become a ruthless defender of your time. You've got to stand guard 24/7. In this podcast, I explain to you how to heal the 1,000 lacerations and get back to optimal efficiency as quickly as possible.

Confused? Frustrated? Not sure why you're doing what you're doing? Confusion occurs when you don't know what to do. To figure out what to do, you must first define what you want. Once you know what you want, you can select what to do based on its a likelihood of achieving what you want. Once you know what to do, you do it until you get what you want. Sound too simple? Common sense isn't common practice. This podcast explains how to cure confusion, get focused and win.

Do Billionaires think differently? How does their thinking differ compared to normal people? This question has fascinated me and finding the answer became an obsession. For more than 5 years I searched for clarity on this... One day I found out what the difference was -- something called "systems thinking". This is THE THING that makes all the difference. Check out the full video + downloadable resources here: https://www.consulting.com/channel/systems-thinking-how-billionaires-think

What should you focus on as the CEO/Founder of a brand new company? Most people have no idea and they waste their time focusing on the trivial many instead of the vital few things that move the needle. The truth is the role of a CEO/Founder changes with time and there are different priorities depending on the stage of the business: Stage One: Product-market fit. Stage Two: Distribution. Stage Three: Talent and culture. If you want to start and grow a profitable business for the long-term, you need to master the three stages and keep your eye on all three balls at all times.

The difference between "exceptional people" and "good people" isn't incremental, it's exponential. Exceptional people are 10x better than good people. They produce 10x the output. Our social and education systems mislead us on this fact. We think an "A" is only 1-step above "B" and exceptional is only 1-step above good. This is dead wrong. Why are exceptional people 10x better than good? It's because they're good at a broad range of things, they're generalists with wide and deep worldly wisdom and extreme talent on something specific. Google calls this "t-shaped people", we call them "full-stack people". Once you discover this kind of person, you will never hire a normal person ever again. In today's podcast, I share with you how to become one of these people, identify them, hire them and train them so you can build an army and win.

Why do most businesses fail? What do they do wrong? And most importantly, how can you avoid making these fatal mistakes? Most entrepreneurs and business owners are obsessed when it comes to studying success, but few of them turn to the dark side and study failure. Warren Buffet once said: "I want to know where I'm going to die so that I never go there". Buffet knows that avoiding fatal mistakes is a better business strategy than studying and implementing successful actions. I did a postmortem analysis investigating the causes of death for 100+ companies across different industries, time periods and countries and here's what I found to be the main 3 causes.

How do you grow your business from a scrappy 1-man band to a well oiled 8-figure machine? This transformation is hard and most entrepreneurs don't make it...You need to change who you are at a fundamental level. You need to evolve from a "promoter" to an "operator". History shows us that promoters never last, they thrive in new markets but quickly get taken out by disciplined operators. If you want to win in business over the long term -- you must become an operator -- this video shows you how.

How do you come up with those 10x ideas that get you exponential growth? How do you break the linear growth trajectory and go exponential? I can tell you this: It doesn't happen by doing more of what you're doing now. Exponential growth happens when you rethink everything and take a radically new perspective. Jeff Bezos said: "Point of view is worth 80 IQ points". How you see things and take a perspective is worth more than raw intelligence. The best way to see things in a different way is to rise above the day-to-day chaos and look down on it from a higher level. In this podcast, I share exactly that.

More with less -- That's the objective of evolution, to remove waste and optimize for value and efficiency. Darwin was right: Life is a game of "survival of the fittest"... Only the strong survive. If you want your business to survive the evolutionary arms race, you must continuously improve efficiency. The best way to do that is to "machine everything". Eliminate the need to think. Squeeze every ounce of utility out of every resource possible, and then figure out how to squeeze some more. If you don't, you'll cease to exist.

How do you find the TRUTH in today's world? How do you navigate the minefield of misinformation, fake news, propaganda, biased views, and blatant lies? Most people are walking around blindly with their umbilical cords hanging out looking for something to plug them into. Being successful requires good decision making and good decision making requires accurate information and beliefs. Plain and simple: If you listen to the opinion of most people, you will believe a lie, make poor decisions and fail to be successful. Accurate information lies at the heart of success and finding it should be your highest priority at all times.

Most people fail to see long-term cause and effect relationships...They're shortsighted and they only think in timeframes of today, this week and this month. If they don't see rewards from the actions they take immediately, they give up or find a new shiny object and the same pattern repeats itself again. It's a vicious cycle like a snake eating its tail. If you take action today, the true reward of that action will occur 1-2 years from now, not today. Most people are blind to this. If you want to succeed in life and business you need to understand cause and effect timeframes so that you can think clearly and execute on the power-law activities that truly move the needle. This video shows you how to do that!

Most people suffer from the "natural giftedness" delusion. They think that successful people are born naturals who master things immediately -- and -- If they try something new and they're not good at it and confident on the first few tries, it's just not meant to be. This sort of thinking is fucked up. Everybody is born into this world the same way. Everything must be learned through practice. Sheer repetition, consistency and time. You will NEVER be successful in life or business until you turn the hard things you avoid doing into base instincts. Things you execute on all day, every day, without even thinking. To do this you have to go through a few stages: The first one is to brute force your way through, then turn it into a habit, then turn it into a base instinct. The magic happens when hard things become base instincts.

How can you do things that others can't? That's the question you must ask yourself if you want to gain a competitive advantage, slaughter the competition and win in business. Most entrepreneurs try to gain "easy advantages". They ask the question: "What's fast, cheap and easy to build that will give us an advantage?". The problem with easy advantages is that they are replicated easily and when that happens, they are no longer advantages. Billionaires ask the advantage question another way...They ask: "What's slow, extremely expensive and excruciatingly hard to build that will give us an advantage?". The best competitive advantages are the ones with "moats" and high barriers to entry. In this podcast, I share exactly how you can build a moat around your business so that you can slaughter the competition and win.

Why do people like Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, and Dr. Dre wear the same clothes every day? It's because of something called "decision fatigue". It doesn't matter what the decision is, all decisions zap the same amount of brainpower and you only have so much of it each day. Should I wear my white shoes, red shoes or blue shoes? Should I hire a new sales rep or continue slaving away at it myself? These two decisions use the same amount of energy but they have very different outcomes and rewards. One leads to nothing while the other leads to a radical life change that affects your wealth and happiness for the rest of your life. Understanding decision fatigue is an awakening experience. It will make you live your life in a radically different way.

Do you struggle to stick to things and get distracted by new shiny objects? If you look back over the past month or the past year -- How many different niches, opportunities or methods have you tried? Shiny object syndrome is something that plagues most entrepreneurs and renders them helpless in their fight for success. Here's what it looks like: Somebody chooses e-commerce as their area of interest and starts learning the game, absorbing information and putting in the work...Two weeks go by, and by then, things start to look harder than they'd imagined, they start to see the real "depth" of their chosen field. At this stage, the entrepreneur loses their passion for the field and starts looking on social media to see what other people are doing. They see a guru in another field like Crypto wearing fancy watches, flying in private jets and driving nice cars -- And at this moment -- In this moment of sound-minded reason, they think to themselves: "Ahhh the reason I'm not rich yet is that I'm in the wrong field! It's not my fault, it's not the fact that I've only been doing this for two weeks -- It's because I'm trying to do e-commerce and obviously Crypto is where the money's at!". This isn't rational, it's flat out lunacy. It's the kind of shit people get put in straight jackets for. But as insane as it is -- This is the practice of 99% of entrepreneurs who are just starting out, today! If you suffer from this relentless disease, do yourself a favor and listen to this.

Most people think they're hustling and grinding, but really they're just going hard on maintenance. And no matter how hard you go on maintenance -- You're NEVER going to make the boat go faster! You're never going to win the race. To win in life and business, maintenance is never enough, you have to get better. You have to get leaner, faster, lighter, stronger, more agile, etc. This video shows you how to differentiate between maintenance tasks and performance tasks and how to channel all of your energy into performance so that you can become the apex predator and win.

Do you know that Amazon has 560,000 employees and 300,000,000 customers? Right now, today, there are people out there that are struggling to reply to their emails or get 1 customer -- So how does Amazon get 300 million of them? The secret Jeff Bezos uses is something called "chunking". Chunking is the process of clearly defining the end goal and then reverse engineering all the way back to the current day -- By doing this, he takes a monumental task and turns it into small bite-sized chunks that can be executed on this hour and today. The concept of chunking has completely changed my life and allowed me to achieve long term things... Today I thought I'd share it with you because I'm sure it can do the same for you!

Are you tired of burning yourself out trying to do 1,000 different things and feeling like you're going nowhere? Time is the most finite and precious thing we have in life -- What you spend your time doing, the decisions you make, this will determine how good or bad your life is. Rather watch it? Click here -> https://www.consulting.com/channel/tired-of-wasting-your-time-watch-this (P.S. For the free tool, click the link above)