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In this insightful episode of the Authors on Mission podcast, host Danielle Hutchinson sits down with Dre Baldwin to discuss the evolving role of AI in publishing and content creation.
The Great Black Race Hoax could be the scam of the decade. On a special episode of "Fearless," Jason is joined by American author and political analyst Boyce Watkins, entrepreneur and influencer Dre Baldwin, public speaker and author Vince Everett Ellison, and "Fearless" contributor Virgil Walker to discuss the nationwide Ponzi scheme that has fooled Americans for the last 5-10 years. In the second hour, a second panel joins the show as former police officer and conservative political commentator Brandon Tatum, political scientist Wilfred Reilly, and "Fearless" contributor Delano Squires give their takes on the Great Black Race Hoax. This calls into question every racially fueled feud that has occurred over the last decade. The demand for racism far outweighs the supply. We must stand for truth in this era of deception. If you can't get enough of "Fearless," hop over to "Jason Whitlock Harmony," where Steve Kim and Whitlock expand on Angel Reese's dramatic antics. Anthony Walker also joins the conversation to address Joe Rogan's possible conversion to Christianity. An amazing show you don't want to miss! That's all folks. Today's Sponsors: PreBorn PreBorn empowers women facing unplanned pregnancies to choose life by offering free ultrasounds and compassionate support. This care aims to foster a profound connection between mothers and their unborn babies, instilling hope. To support PreBorn's mission, dial #250 and say "BABY" or visit https://preborn.com/FEARLESS. The Last Rodeo Don't miss The Last Rodeo, a compelling story of grit, redemption, and family values, in theaters right now!. Secure your seats now at https://Angel.com/JASON. Relief Factor With Relief Factor, you'll feel better every day, and you'll live better every day. Get their 3-Week QuickStart for only $19.95 – that's less than a dollar a day. Call 1-800-4-Relief Or Visit https://ReliefFactor.com SHOW OUTLINE 04:16 Is Systemic Racism A Scam? w/ Dr. Boyce Watkins, Virgil Walker, Vince Ellison, Dre Baldwin 44:56 Angel Reese 0-8 From Field in Loss to the New York Liberty 1:02:30 Is Systemic Racism A Scam? w/ Delano Squires, Brandon Tatum, Wilfred Reilly, Shemeka Michelle We want to hear from the Fearless Army!! Join the conversation in the show chat, leave a comment or email Jason at FearlessBlazeShow@gmail.com Want more Fearless content? Subscribe to Jason Whitlock Harmony for a biblical perspective on everyday issues at https://www.youtube.com/@JasonWhitlockHarmony Get 10% off Blaze swag by using code Fearless10 at https://shop.blazemedia.com/fearless Make yourself an official member of the “Fearless Army!” Support Conservative Voices! Subscribe to BlazeTV at https://get.blazetv.com/FEARLESS and get $20 off your yearly subscription. Visit https://TheBlaze.com. Explore the all-new ad-free experience and see for yourself how we're standing up against suppression and prioritizing independent journalism. CLICK HERE to Subscribe to Jason Whitlock's YouTube: https://bit.ly/3jFL36G CLICK HERE to Listen to Jason Whitlock's podcast: https://apple.co/3zHaeLTCLICK HERE to Follow Jason Whitlock on Twitter: https://bit.ly/3hvSjiJ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Our guest this time, Dario Valenza, is all that and more. Dario hales from Australia where he grew up and went to high school. He then attended two years of college but then left academia to work on working on designing yachts for, among events, the America's Cup races. Eventually he did return to college to finish his degree. He does tell us that he has a passion for design thinking and designing. As you will discover he has designed yachts, aircraft including innovative drones and even automobiles. We talk about how his over-arching passion for design thinking also helps him design functioning and successful teams. Dario is a team leader by any standard. He founded and owns a successful design and implementation company, Carbonix. Much of the work in which he is involved today is around having designed and now manufacturing long-range drones that can stay aloft and travel up to 800 Kilometers before needing refuelling. His products can and are being used for major surveying jobs and other projects that take advantage of the economic enhancements his products bring to the table. Dario and I discuss leadership and how his design-oriented mindset has helped him be a strong and effective leader. I will leave it to him to describe how he works and how he helps bring out the best in people with whom he works. About the Guest: I have a passion for design and design thinking. This is the common thread that has led me to build yachts, planes, and cars - as well as create the teams and company structures to turn visions into reality. I believe that beautiful design, as well as enabling and inspiring, is inherently valuable. Testing a new design it in the real world, particularly in competition, is a way to interrogate nature and understand the world. I spent the first decade of my career working on racing yachts as a boatbuilder, designer, construction manager, and campaign manager. My treasured achievements include being part of several America's Cup teams and pioneering full hydrofoiling for World Championship winning boats. I applied the lessons learned to other fields. This trajectory diversified into aerospace applications including drones. I work to create products that bring joy by being desirable, aesthetically pleasing, and ergonomically correct, while always adding value through effective and efficient performance. I'm always keen to share my experiences and tackle new challenges with like-minded teams. Ways to connect Dario: Main point of contact is LI: https://au.linkedin.com/in/dario-valenza-a7380a23 Carbonix URL: www.carbonix.com.au Personal website: www.dariovalenza.com About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset . Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes: Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us. Michael Hingson ** 01:20 Hi everyone. This is your host, Michael hingson, and you are listening to another episode of unstoppable mindset. And today our guest is Dario, if I'm pronouncing that right, Valenza, how do i pronounce it? Oh, good. Oh, good. I can sometimes speak the King's English really well. Dario is a person who has a great passion for design, and he's going to tell us about that. He has been involved in designing many things, from yachts to aircraft to other kinds of things, as well as teams in companies, which I think is very fascinating, that make products and bring things about. So we're going to get to all of that. Daro is in Australia, so it's early in the morning. There for you right now. But welcome to unstoppable mindset. We're glad you're here. Yeah, my pleasure. Glad to be here. So what time is it over there right now? About 11am Yeah, and it's little after three here. So, yep, you're 20 hours ahead Dario Valenza ** 02:27 of us. No, here, it's Saturday, I assume. There it's Friday. It is to the confusion. Michael Hingson ** 02:33 So, so, as it's always fun to do, can you tell us about the future over the next 20 hours? 02:40 So, so far so good. Yeah, there you are. Well, Michael Hingson ** 02:43 thank you for being here and for being a part of unstoppable mindset. Let's start, if you would, by maybe you telling us a little bit about kind of the early Dario, growing up and some of those kinds of things, so that people listening and watching can get to know you a little bit better. Dario Valenza ** 03:01 Yeah, absolutely. I think the interest in how things worked was there as long as anyone can remember being exposed early on to different mechanical things and from household appliances to looking at trains and busses and cars outside. I think that all piqued my curiosity. But I remember the first time I came across the concept of a sailboat. Something clicked, or something about the way an aerofoil works, the way it can generate motion out of wind, the balance of forces, the structures, the things that all need to work for a sailboat to work. That sort of got me hooked, and then I spent every waking moment I could reading about it, doing research, making models that I'd sail across the pool, getting involved at the local sailing club, and just being hands on. And I think that's really where the passion started. So certainly, there's a general wanting to see how things work, and there's a specific aerodynamics, hydrodynamics, structures, just, I find it endlessly fascinating. And you're always learning, and Michael Hingson ** 04:10 should always be learning. I think that's one, of course, the real keys is always learning, which some people think they don't do, but and some people try very much not to do, but that's not the way to really progress in the world. So I'm glad that you do that. You've always lived in Australia. Dario Valenza ** 04:27 No, actually, born in Italy, moved here probably 10 years old, went to high school and uni here. Michael Hingson ** 04:37 Yeah, you do seem to have a little bit more of an Australian accent than an Italian one? Dario Valenza ** 04:41 Yeah, I think I was young enough when I moved that I learned the language pretty quickly. I did spend few years in New Zealand and a few years in Europe, so I think my accent is probably a little bit of a hybrid, but mostly Australian. I'd say, do you speak Italian? Yes. Funny, you get rusty at it, though, like when I go back, it probably takes me a few days to get used to speaking it, yeah, but it is in there Michael Hingson ** 05:08 which, which makes some sense. Well, so you went to high school, and did you go on to college? Dario Valenza ** 05:15 Did the first couple of years of an engineering degree, dropped out to go and do the America's Cup. Eventually went back and finished it. But really haven't spent more time working than started. Putting it that way, the things I was interested in, particularly the the advent of carbon fiber in in racing yachts, hadn't found its way into any curriculum yet. It was it was happening on the frontier in that environment. And so my judgment was you could learn more by doing it and by going to uni. Well, Michael Hingson ** 05:49 yeah, on the one hand, with school, to a large degree, it's theory, and putting it into practice is something that always brings you closer to it, which which makes sense. Well, so you, when you went to your first America's Cup, what did you were you just an observer? Were you involved in designing a yacht, or what? Dario Valenza ** 06:10 I was a boat builder. I was hands on, on the manufacturing, and that was the way in that was the the opportunity I had to actually be part of a team and prove myself over the course of the campaign, I obviously showed an interest in design, and I became more de facto part of the design team. But I really always like to sit at that interface between the designing and the building, so that there's a practical element to yes, there's a theory, yes, there's a design, there's a bunch of analysis you can do having that practical mindset of, is it easy to build? Is it practical? Is it possible to then tune it and modify it and improve it? And that actually led me to a lot of the logistical challenges of, how do you plan a build? How do you allocate time towards the things that make the biggest difference towards performance. So the journey was really from hands on boat builder to sort of logistics, to design Michael Hingson ** 07:08 well, and design is clearly been your passion overall. So that makes some sense. When did you do your first America's cut? Dario Valenza ** 07:17 So I was involved in the 2000 event in Auckland, which was the first time the Kiwis defended after winning in 95 right? Then I did 2003 also in Auckland, 2007 in Valencia. And then there was a bit of a hiatus after Valencia, because of the deed of gift match. And I was involved in a couple of teams as that transition happened. And eventually 2012 I peeled off to start my own business. Michael Hingson ** 07:44 So let's see the New Zealand won in 2000 right? Dario Valenza ** 07:48 They defended successfully in 2000 so they they won in 95 in San Diego against Dennis Connor, and it took them five years to basically set up a defense. So from 95 to 2000 and then they won, and they rolled straight into 2003 they lost in 2003 Michael Hingson ** 08:05 that was to Italy. Was it to the Swiss or to the Swiss? Right? Okay, Dario Valenza ** 08:11 even though the core of the sailing team was the former New Zealand team, the basically flag of allegiance, but yeah, the lingua team. Now, Were you successful challenger, which is amazing. Were you Michael Hingson ** 08:25 living in New Zealand in 2003 Dario Valenza ** 08:29 Yes, yeah. So when you become involved in a team, basically the whole operation camps out at a at a base in the lead up to the event. At the time, the yacht still had to be constructed in country. So in 2003 for example, I was with a Swedish team. I actually spent a little bit of time in Sweden during the construction of the yacht, and then traveled with a yacht to New Zealand, and stayed there for the duration. I asked, Michael Hingson ** 08:58 because I went to New Zealand in May of 2003 the Royal New Zealand Foundation for the Blind, or of the blind, asked me to come and do some speaking. It was, of course, after September 11, and I was pretty visible, so I went down and actually helped them raise something like close to $300,000 by giving a bunch of speeches around New Zealand, but I remember listening to the radio and hearing all the irate people because New Zealand lost. The government didn't put enough money into it, and we shouldn't have lost it was pretty fascinating to to to hear all of that. Dario Valenza ** 09:38 There was a campaign called the loyal campaign, just basically trying to reprimand the Kiwi sailors that affected at the end of the day. It's a professional sport. There were nationality rules, but it was really residency, so as long as they signed on with the Swiss team within a certain time. Period, it was like two years or something, and basically set up a residence in Switzerland, and they were eligible to compete. And I think there's been a history of that since the New Zealand government having Lisa supported in New Zealand, because it's certainly an investment in the national industry and tourism, everything that comes with it. And I think they did walk that back, particularly for the last event. And the latest result of that is the Kiwis defended in Spain last time around, which is again, unusual. Michael Hingson ** 10:35 Well, it was, it was fascinating to watch the races, and we watched them was before I went to New Zealand. But that's why my wife and I watched, because we knew I was going there, and it was, it was all being defended in New Zealand. And of course, they were using sails, and the yachts were just going at normal sailboat type speeds. But I know then later, so much redesign took place, and the boats started traveling significantly faster, right? Dario Valenza ** 11:08 Yeah, absolutely, there's been a change in that respect, just on the atmosphere in Auckland again, with my perspective, having, as I said, obsessed over sailing, worked my way up, got involved in campaigns, helped to put sponsors together with skippers, to get funding to build boats, and arriving in Auckland with the prospect of trialing with a team, you walk out of the airport and there's the actual boat that won the copy, 95 was sitting in The car park. There are posters. You can really see, like they called it the city of sales. And as I arrived the round the world race was stopping by in Auckland, so there was a sort of festive atmosphere around that. And you could really see people were getting behind it and getting involved. And it felt, you know, they had parades at the beginning of the event. So it was really special to be there at a time when there was maybe 12 teams. It was a big event. And to your point, they were symmetrical ballasted monohulls. So they were fairly conservative, you know, long, narrow, heavy boats. And the competition was really to eke out a one or 2% gain to have better maneuverability for match racing. And it was really down to that kind of refinement. And what happened after 2007 I mentioned a sort of hiatus, basically, two teams took each other to court, and they went back to what they call a deed of gift matches, which is the default terms that they have to abide by if they can't agree to a mutually agreeable protocol. And that deed of gift match ended up being in multi holes. So there was a catamaran and trimaran, and they were big and fast. And I think then, when the Americans won out of that, they they sort of got seduced by, let's make this about the fastest sailors and the faster boat in the fastest boats. So they went to multi holes. The next evolution was hydrofoiling Multi holes. And then once the boats are out of the water, the drag drops dramatically, and now they can go really fast. They ended up narrowly the Kiwis ended up narrowly losing in San Francisco. The Americans then defended Bermuda. The Kiwis eventually won in Bermuda. And then they in in sort of consultation with the challenge of record. That was Italians. They wanted to go back to monohulls, but they wanted them to be fast monohulls, and so they came up with this concept of a hydrofoiling monohull. So the boats now are certainly the fastest they've ever been, and the nature of the racing has changed, where it's more of a drag race than a sort of tactical match race. But it's still fascinating, because it's all about that last bit of technology, and it's all about resource management. You have so much time, you have so much budget, how do you get to the highest performance within that time that you can access, that the Sailors can get the best out of? So it's all a balance of many variables, and it's certainly tactical and strategic and very fascinating, but Michael Hingson ** 14:18 hasn't a lot of the the tactics, in a sense, gone out of it, because it's now so much, as you put it, a drag race or a speed race, that a lot of the strategies of outmaneuvering your opponents isn't the same as it used to be. Dario Valenza ** 14:37 Yeah. So if you imagine, the way you think about it is, it's a multi dimensional space. You've got all sorts of values that you can dial in, and the weighting of the values changes depending on the boat and the racing format and the weather so on a traditional monohull maneuvers are relatively cheap because the boat carries momentum. So when you tack you go. Through the eye of the wind, you lose drive for, you know, a second, three seconds, but your speed doesn't drop that much because a boat's heavy and it just powers along. And so if you have a three degree shift in the direction of the wind, it's worth tacking on that, because you'll then get the advantage of having a better angle. Similarly, if you're interacting with another boat, tacking to get out of their dirty air, or tacking to sit on top of them, is worthwhile, and so you get that the incentive is, I can spend some energy on a maneuver, because I'm going to get a gain when you have boats that are extremely fast, and we're talking three, four times faster than the wind, if the wind direction changes by three degrees, it's almost immaterial. And so it's not worth tacking on it. If you go through the dirty air of another boat, you get through it really quickly. And on the other hand, when you maneuver, you're effectively, you go from flying on the hydro force to gliding. You only have, like, a few boat lengths that you can do that for before the hull touches the water, and then you virtually stop. And so basically, the aim is you minimize maneuvers. You roll with the wind shifts. You roll with your opponent. And hence they've had to put boundaries around the course to force the boats back together, because otherwise I'd go out to a corner, do one tack and then go to the top mark. And so it's a different racing. It's still there are tactics involved, but the trade offs are different, that the cost versus reward of different tactical choices is very different. Michael Hingson ** 16:31 But the race obviously goes with the newer designs, goes a lot faster, and it isn't hours and many hours of racing as it used to be, is that right? Dario Valenza ** 16:42 It's also shorter course, so the format is kind of optimized for television, really, for, yeah, broadcast. So you have many short races, and it's it does mean that if you have a big disparity, like if one boat makes a mistake and falls a long way behind, it's over pretty quickly, because it did happen in the past where you get a boat that was outmatched or did something wrong and just spend three hours following the leader with no chance of catching up. So there's certainly a merit to having short, sharp races, but I think it's probably more physical and less cerebral, like, if you look at, yeah, the way the old boats worked, you had 17 people on there providing all the mechanical power, maneuvering, putting spinnakers up and down, dip ball driving, moving their weight around the boat. He had a tactician. They would have conversations about what's happening and react, you know, in a matter of seconds, not in a matter of milliseconds. Now you have eight people on the boat, four of them are just pedaling bikes, basically to put pressure into an accumulator to run the hydraulics. You have a helmsman on each side, and you have a trimmer on each side, and they don't cross the boat, because the boats are so fast that it's actually dangerous to get out of the cockpit. So it's very much more, I guess, closer to sort of Formula One in terms of it, you've got you've got speeds, you've got the reaction times are shorter. Everything happens more quickly, and there's certainly less interaction between the boats. Do you have Michael Hingson ** 18:19 a preference of whether you like more the old way or the newer way of doing the races and the way the boats are designed. Dario Valenza ** 18:28 If pressed, I would say I'd prefer the old way. But that's probably the bias, because I was involved more back then. Yeah. I think it's equally fascinating. And that sort of brings me to Yeah. So even you know, we'll get into how it applies to business and things like that, and it's the same problem, just with different variables. So my view with the cup was, whatever the rules are, you've got to try and win within them. And so they will change, the boat will change, the venue will change, the weather will change, budget limitations, all these things play into this multi variant problem, and your job is to balance all those variables to get the best Michael Hingson ** 19:10 outcome right in the rules. Exactly. Dario Valenza ** 19:12 Yeah. I mean, the teams do have a say. So I was, for example, in the committee that designed the rule for the catamarans that went to San Francisco, having said that what we thought we were encouraging by the rules, and what actually happened was nothing to do with each other, because once you set the rules, then the fascinating thing is how people interpret them, and they'll interpret them in ways that you can't possibly imagine, hence unintended consequences. But yeah, you have a say, but ultimately they are what they are, and the point of competing is to do well within those rules. Having said that, if they get to the point where you're just not interested anymore, then don't compete. But it is what it is. Yeah. Michael Hingson ** 19:54 So how long did you do yacht design and so on, dealing. With the cup, Dario Valenza ** 20:02 probably 15 years altogether, was 12 or so in the actual America's Cup, and a few years before that, working up to it, doing various different projects, and that's sort of in a professional capacity, getting paid before that as a passion. It's pretty much my whole settling my teens, maybe a few years before that as well. Michael Hingson ** 20:21 So what did you do after that? 20:25 I started my own business. Michael Hingson ** 20:26 There you go. Well, tell us about the business and what you what you started with. Dario Valenza ** 20:36 Yeah. So it the the aim was what we call long range aerial data capture. So fancy way of saying drones with a long range that can carry out surveys effectively. So whether it's taking photographs, video, LIDAR scans or combinations thereof, the sort of underlying motivation was the importance of data. So having come out of the America's Cup and seeing the way you develop is you interrogate what's happening with the boat and the boat and the crew and the conditions, and the more channels of information you have, the more informed decisions you can make about improving now, applying that to real world problems, to things like linear infrastructure, to mining to land management. It seemed like to me there's a gap where if you could have better aerial data, you could make better decisions. And I happened to have a tool in the design and manufacturing processes that came out of the America's Cup that would allow me to create a lightweight airframe that would have that efficiency and be able to give that range. And this was at a time when, you know, people were already starting to think of drones as a solution, though there was a lot of hype around them, but it was really all around the electronics, around multi rotors, around things that you could effectively buy and put up in the air and do a short mission wave and then land. The idea of a long range drone, other than in the military, was pretty much unexplored, and I think largely because to make it work commercially financially, you needed the range you need to be able to cover in the order of hundreds of kilometers in one flight, so that you're not having a ground crew, effectively driving the line relocating from point to point as the surveys carried out. So initially it was fairly conservative in the sense that the main focus was to set up that manufacturing capability. So basically, copy or transfer those process out of the America's Cup into a commercial setting. So making molds, curing carbon, the way you document or the way you go about it, that design process, and I was open to doing custom work to subsidize it, basically. So doing stuff again, for for sailboats, for racing, cars, for architecture, just with that composite manufacturing capability as a way to prove it and refine it. And whatever money was coming out of that was going into developing a drone airframe. And then I was fortunate enough to have a collaboration with a former colleague of mine in the cup who set up a business in Spain doing computational fluid dynamics, and he alerted me to a contract over there for a military surveillance research drone. We, by then, had an airframe that more or less we could demonstrate, and we could show that it was lighter and was more efficient, and then fly further and it had a more stable flying path and all of that. So we won that contract, we supplied that, and then out of that came the commercial offering, and it basically grew from there. Michael Hingson ** 23:50 But when did you start dealing with the drone design, the airframe and so on, 23:57 probably to 2015 Michael Hingson ** 24:00 Okay, yeah, I think I had started hearing about drones by then, and in fact, I know I had by that time, but yeah, they they were still fairly new. So how far would your drone travel? Dario Valenza ** 24:16 So we have two versions, the old electric one will do a couple of 100 kilometers, the petro hybrid one will do up to 800 and so we're really squarely in the territory of crude helicopter, smaller, small fixed wing planes like Cessnas, and we're really going into that same way of operating. So we're not so much selling the drone to a utility to do their scans. We are providing the data that comes out of the scan, and we're using the drone as our tool to get that data. And by effectively mirroring the model of the traditional sort of legacy aviation, we can offer, obviously, a lower cost, but also better data. Because we fly lower and slower, so we can get a higher resolution and more accuracy, and there's a obviously carbon footprint reduction, because we're burning about 2% of the fuel, and it's quieter and it's safer and all of that stuff. So it's really doing that close in aerial survey work over large distances the way it's currently being done, but with a better tool, Michael Hingson ** 25:21 the electric drone, you said, only goes a couple 100 kilometers, is that basically because of battery issues, Dario Valenza ** 25:27 absolutely, especially power density. So not so much energy density, but power density really how much energy you can store in the battery in terms of mass, and obviously the fact that you're not burning it off, so you're carrying the empty battery around with you. Right? Michael Hingson ** 25:45 Any interest in, or has there been any exploration of making solar powered drones? Dario Valenza ** 25:52 We've certainly looked into it, and we've developed relationships with suppliers that are developing specialized, conformal, curvy solar panels that form part of the structure of the wing. There are a couple of considerations. Most prominent is the trade off that you're making. Like if you take add solar panels to a wing, even if they're integrated in the structure, and you minimize the structural weight, they will have a mass. So call it an extra kilo. Yeah. Right now, if I were to take that extra kilo and put it in battery or in fuel, I would be better off, so I'd have more energy by doing that than by having the solar panel Michael Hingson ** 26:36 dealing on efficiency yet, yeah, Dario Valenza ** 26:37 yeah. So obviously, on a hot day, when you're flying with the sun directly above, you probably would be better. But over the course of the day, different locations, banking, etc, it's just not there yet. Net, net, particularly considering that there'll be a degradation and there'll be a maintenance that's required as the panels deteriorate and the various connections breakdown, etc. So it's not something you'd rule out. Then the secondary consideration is, when you look at our aircraft, it's fairly skinny, long, skinny wings. When you look at the area from above, there's not a lot of projected area, particularly the wings being thin and very high aspect ratio, you wouldn't really be able to fit that much area right when it comes to and then you've got to remember also that if you're generating while you're flying, your electronics have to be very different, because you have to have some way to manage that power, balance it off against the battery itself. The battery is multi cells, 12 S system, so you then have to balance that charging. So there's some complexity involved. There's a weight penalty, potentially a drag penalty. There is a Net Advantage in a very narrow range of conditions. And overall, we're just not there yet in terms of the advantage. And even if it could extend the range by a few minutes, because we have an aircraft that can fly for eight hours, doesn't really matter, yeah. Michael Hingson ** 28:04 So dealing with an electric drone again, have you ever looked into things like fuel cells as opposed to batteries? Or does it not make we have, Dario Valenza ** 28:14 and there's a company in France that we've been collaborating with, it's developing a hydrogen fuel cell, yeah? Michael Hingson ** 28:21 So I was wondering, yeah. And Dario Valenza ** 28:23 again, this is about, sort of, maybe sounds a bit conservative, but you know, during these lessons from the Americas capitals, talking about being seduced by the latest shiny thing can come at the detriment of achieving what you need to achieve today. So we're very conscious in the business in carbonics, of having this roadmap where there's a lot of nice to haves, there's a lot of capability that we want going forward, and that's everything from the remote one to many operations, detect and avoid fail safes, additional comms, all stuff that will enable us to do what we're doing today, plus x, y, z, but we need to be able to do what we can do what we have to do today. And most of the missions that we're doing, they're over a power line in the middle of nowhere. They're in relatively non congested airspace. The coordination is relatively simple. We have the ability to go beyond visual line of sight. We have the range, so it's really let's use what we have today and put all the other stuff in time and space. As the business grows, the mission grows, the customers get more comfortable, and that's a way to then maintain the advantage. But it's very easy to get sucked into doing cool R and D at the expense of delivering today. Michael Hingson ** 29:42 Yeah, it's R and D is great, but you still gotta pay the bills. Yeah, so you have worked across several industries. What's kind of the common thread for you, working across and designing in several industries? Yeah. So Dario Valenza ** 30:00 I think it's a high level problem solving is having an outcome that's very clearly defined and a rule set and a set of constraints. And the challenge is, how do you balance all those elements to deliver the best value? So whether it's, how do you design a boat within a rule to go as fast as possible? How do you develop a drone to fly as long as possible, given a certain time and budget availability? You're always looking at variables that will each have their own pros and cons, and how do you combine them so things like, you know, team size versus burn rate versus how aggressively you go to market, how do you select your missions? How do you decide whether to say yes or no to a customer based on the overall strategy? I see that as you have all these variables that you can tweak, you're trying to get an outcome. How do you balance and weigh them all to get that outcome? Michael Hingson ** 30:58 Yeah, well, you've I'm sorry, go ahead. Dario Valenza ** 31:01 I was gonna say, I mean, I have also, like, an interesting motorsport and when you look at a formula, one strategy, same thing, right? Did you carry a fuel load? Do you change tires? Do you optimize your arrow for this? It's a similar type of problem you're saying, I this is my aim. I've got all these variables. How do I set them all in a way that it gives me the best outcome? Yeah, Michael Hingson ** 31:23 and in your design and and as you construct and look at what you're doing, you decide exactly what the parameters are, and you know when you're going to change the tires, or, you know when it's time to put in more fuel or whatever. And then, see, you've got to really know the product very well, Dario Valenza ** 31:42 absolutely. And again, in the case of salvo racing, it's almost exemplary, because the rules are spelled out, and you have, it's a very artificial set of constraints, and you have a race day, you'll have your budget, and obviously you can work to increase that, but the time is what it is. And then in the rules, you actually get to trade off length versus width, versus mass versus sail area. Do I make my boat more powerful so it goes faster in strong winds, or do I make it skinnier so it goes better in light winds? You look at the history of the weather in the venue, and the teams that win are the ones that get all those mostly, right? So it's not necessarily the latest, fastest, more, most extreme solution, it's the one that best balances all these variables. Yeah, you transfer that into business, and it's a similar thing. You've got, you've got funding, you've got burn rate, you've got people, you've got customers, probably more variables, and it's a little bit more fuzzy in some cases. So you need to work harder to nail these things down. And it's a longer term. It's an open ended prospect. It's not I've just got to race on Sunday, then I can have a break for six months. It's you do it today and tomorrow and tomorrow. So it's going to be sustainable. But I the way you think about it in the abstract, it's the same, Michael Hingson ** 33:00 and you also have to keep evolving as technology grows, as as the industry grows, as demands change, or maybe better than saying as demands change, as you foresee demands changing, you have to be able to keep up with it. And there's a lot to all that. There's a lot of challenge that that someone like you has to really keep up with. It's Dario Valenza ** 33:23 a balance between leading and listening. So there's a classic Henry Ford line that if I'd asked the customer what he wanted, he would have told me a faster horse. We've fallen into the trap sometimes of talking to a customer, and they're very set about, you know, we want to use this camera to take these this resolution, at this distance, because that's what we use on a helicopter, because that's what used on a multi rotor. And you have to unpack that and say, Hang on, what data do you actually like? Because we have a different payload. We fly in a different way. So let us tell you how we can give you that solution if you tell us what we want, and I think that applies across various sort of aspects of the business. But to your point about the continuous evolution, one of the most fascinating things out of this experience of almost 10 years of sort of pioneering the drone industry is just how much the ecosystem has evolved. So when we started out, the naive assumption was we're good at making airframes. We can make really good, lightweight, efficient aircraft. We don't necessarily want to be an electronics manufacturer. It's a whole other challenge. Let's buy what we can off the shelf, put it in the aircraft for the command and control and go fly. And we very quickly realized that for the standard that we wanted in terms of being able to satisfy a regulator, that the reliability is at a certain point, having fail safes, having programmability. There was nothing out there when we had to go and design. Avionics, because you could either buy hobby stuff that was inconsistent and of dubious quality, or you had to spend millions of dollars on something out of the military, and then it didn't work commercially. And so we went and looked at cars, and we said, okay, can seems like control area network seems like a good protocol. Let's adopt that. Although some of the peripherals that we buy, like the servos, they don't speak, can so then we have to make a peripheral node that can translate from can to Rs, 232, or whatever. And we went through that process. But over the years, these suppliers that came out of hobby, came out of consumer electronics, came out of the military, very quickly saw the opportunity, and we were one of the companies driving it that hang on. I can make an autopilot module that is ISO certified and has a certain quality assurance that comes with it, and I can make it in a form factor under the price where a commercial drone company can use it. And so it really accelerated the last maybe three, four years. There's a lot of stuff available that's been developed for commercial drones that now gives us a lot more options in terms of what we buy rather than what we make. Michael Hingson ** 36:13 Well, now I have to ask, since you brought it up, does anybody use Rs 232, anymore? I had to ask. I mean, you know, Dario Valenza ** 36:21 less and less, yeah, at one point, like we use it for GPS parks, because we didn't have anything that ran on can right slowly we're replacing. So the latest version of the aircraft now is all cap, but it took a while to get there. That's Michael Hingson ** 36:37 gonna say that's a very long Rs 232, cable you have if you're going to communicate with the aircraft, that'd be I still have here some Rs 232 cables that I remember using them back in the 1980s and into the 1990s but yeah, Rs 232 Dario Valenza ** 36:57 horrendous ones was, there was a, I think it was a light LIDAR altimeter. Someone will correct me, it ran on I squared C, oh, which is the most inappropriate possible thing. And it is what it is. So all we, all we could do is shorten the wire length as much as possible and live with it until we found something better, and Michael Hingson ** 37:18 then we also had parallel cables. Yes, of course, one connected printers, Dario Valenza ** 37:26 and we have ethernet on the aircraft for the comms. Well, yeah, there's a lot of translating that we need to do. And again, I'm not an electronic engineer, but I understand enough of it to know what's good and what's not. Yeah, Michael Hingson ** 37:38 yeah. The days have gone by with all of the RS, 232, and parallel ports and all that. Now it's all USB and Ethernet and cams and other things like that which making kind of fun. Well, what other industries have you been involved in besides the drone and the boat or yacht world? Dario Valenza ** 37:56 So I've done a little bit in cinemable Things which was kind of pituitous. The last of the Star Wars prequels was filmed in Sydney, and I happened to be here for a few months between America's Cup campaigns. And there's a few boat builders that were asked to go and do fiberglass work on the set, and they recommended me to do some of the structural design work for some of the sets. I don't think I was credited, but it was fun. Again, not something I planned to do long term. It just happened to come up, and I did it for about three months. As I said, a little bit in motor sport, more as a hobby, but as an interest. But we've made in the early days of carbonics, we made spoilers and wings and bits and pieces for cars when we were getting going, but mainly the sailing of the drones, really, because I've been in the drones now for 10 years. So right? Michael Hingson ** 38:51 What? Why did you switch? Or maybe, why is it the wrong answer? But what made you switch from doing yachts to drones, and how did the drone story come about? Dario Valenza ** 39:05 Yeah, so I mentioned the angle of the importance of data, looking for a real world problem where data was going to make a difference, and having the right so that not a solution in search of a problem, but the right solution for this problem, saying, if we can design an airframe that can do this, there's an obvious advantage and an obvious saving that that would make a difference to the world that has a big market. Now that's the theory, then to take the plunge. It was a bit of a combination of things. It was being beholden to the unpredictable movements of the cup, where your career depends on who wins and where it goes, and as a young single man, that's fantastic once you're trying to get married and have a family, becomes a little bit more of a problem. So again, starting your own business doesn't exactly give you stability. Cheap but more stable, I guess. And really that combination of an opportunity, being able to say I can actually see if I can make this work, and see what happens, wanting to be located in one place, I guess, looking for variety as well, and knowing that, you know, I still could have contact with the Americas Cup World, because I said I was doing custom work, and we had people from the cup working in carbonics. But it's really that point where you say, Do I want to keep following the circus around the world, or do you want to try and do my own thing and see how that goes? And I can always go back. And the aim is, you know, once you're committed, then you sort of tend to try and make it work no matter what, and it becomes the new aim, and that's what you put your energy into. Michael Hingson ** 40:52 I had a guest on unstoppable mindset named Dre Baldwin, and Dre was a professional basketball player for nine years. He went to high school, was on the bench the whole time, went to college, played in college pretty well, but wasn't really noticed until he went to a camp where people could try out and be scouted by professionals who wouldn't come and see you because you weren't famous enough to be seen just by them coming to look for you. But he got a video, and he got some good suggestions, and anyway, he eventually made that into a nine year career. And I asked him, when we talked, why did you end the career? Why did you leave and start a business? And the business he started was up your game LLC, and it's all about helping people up their game in business and so on. And of course, he does it all in the sports environment. But I asked him why he left, and one of the things that he said was it, what people don't know is it's not just the games themselves and the basketball that you play. It's all the other stuff. It's all the fact that if you're going to really do it and be reasonably well, you need to go to the gym a lot, not just when they tell you to practice, but you got to take the initiative and do it on your own. You have to do other things. And he said, I just got to the point where I didn't want to do that, all that invisible part of it anymore. And so he left and started his own business, and has been very successful, but it was an interesting answer. And in a sense, I hear, you know what you're saying. It's really where you're going to go, and what is, what's really going to interest you, which is what has to be part of whatever you do? Dario Valenza ** 42:34 Yeah, that all makes sense. I think, in my experience, I've never not had an obsession, so to speak. So yeah, with the sailing absolutely like, if you want to be in the America's Cup, it can't be a day job. You have to be committed. You have to be able to concentrate, innovate again, if you're I wasn't an athlete on the boat, so it wasn't necessarily about going to the gym, but certainly doing research, doing testing, working on the boat overnight before I went out the next day. It is a competition, so that the longer, the harder you work, assuming you still keep your performance up, the better you're going to do. So it was an obsession. I accepted that I never it never occurred to me that I don't want to keep doing it right. It was really the logistics. It was thinking, because of the cup had gone to court, we'd had the deed of gift match. Everything had been on hold for a while. It got going again, and the rules changed and there were fewer teams. I'd actually spent a bit of time fundraising for the team that had come out of Valencia to keep it going until the eventual San Francisco cup. So that was interesting as well, saying that, you know, is it getting the reception that I hoped it would, in terms of people investing in it and seeing the value, and kind of looking at it and saying, Okay, now I've got to move to San Francisco the next one, who knows where it's going to be, the format and all those things, you just sort of trade it off and say, Well, if I can make a go of something where I can do it in my hometown, it can be just as interesting, because the technical challenges is just as fascinating. And it's really about, can I create this little environment that I control, where I can do the same fun stuff that I was doing in the cup in terms of tech development, but also make it a business and make a difference to the world and make it commercially viable. And that was really the challenge. And saying that, that was the motivation, to say, if I can take the thing that interests me from the cup and apply it to a commercial technological challenge, then I'll have the best of the best of both worlds. Michael Hingson ** 44:44 What? What made you really go into doing drones after the yacht stuff? Dario Valenza ** 44:52 So yeah, certainly that aerial data capture piece, but also the it's very announced. I guess. So most of the work that I was doing in the cup was around aeroelastic optimization, lightweight structures, which really dynamics, yeah. And so, you know, a yacht is a plane with one wing in the water and one wing in the air. It's all fluids. The maths is the same, the physics is the same, the materials are the same. If you do it well in the cup, you win. If you do it well in drones, you win also. But you win by going further and being more efficient and economical at doing these missions. And so it's sort of like having this superpower where you can say, I can make this tool really good that's going to give me an advantage. Let's go and see if that actually makes a difference in the market. Michael Hingson ** 45:44 Well, I mean, as we know, the only difference really, between water and air is that the molecules are further apart in air than they are in water. So why? It really isn't that much different? He said, being a physicist and picking on chemists, but you know, I do understand what you're saying. So when did you actually start carbonics? Was that when you went into the Drone Dario Valenza ** 46:05 World? So the business itself early 2012 and as I said, those are a few years there where we're doing custom work. And as it happened, I ended up supplying to New Zealand because we built an A class catamaran, which is effectively a little America's Cup boat for the punters, kind of thing that did well in some regattas. It caught the attention of the team New Zealand guys. They decided to use them as a training platform. We did a world championship where they were skipping the boats the carbonics built did really well in that sort of top five spots got a bunch of commercial orders off the back of that, which then brought some money into subsidize the drones, etc, etc. So by the time we were properly so the first time we flew our airframe would have been, you know, 2015 Michael Hingson ** 46:55 but nobody has created an America's Cup for drones yet. So there's a project for you. Dario Valenza ** 47:01 They're all sort of drone racing, so I'm not surprised. Yeah, and I think again, it's really interesting. So when you look at motorsport and yacht racing in the 70s, the 80s, the 90s, the 2000s it really was a test bet, because you had to build something, go compete with it, learn from it, repeat. And you'd get, you know, the case of motorsport, traction control, ABS, all that stuff. In the case of sailing, that the use of, you know, modern fiber materials for ropes and structures, that was really sort of the cauldron where the development happened. And I think that was sort of the result of an analog world, so to speak, where you had to build things to know. I think now, with better compute and a more sophisticated role that simulations can play, it's still there is value in competition, but I think it's done in a different way. You're doing it. The key is to iterate virtually as much as possible before you build something, rather than building as many things as possible and doing the development that way. Michael Hingson ** 48:13 Well, here's an interesting Oh, go ahead, yeah. Dario Valenza ** 48:16 So I think that affects, certainly, how sport is seen in terms of there's probably more emphasis on the actual athletic competition, on the technology, because there are just other areas now where that development is happening, and SpaceX drones, there are more commercial places where control systems, electronic structures are really being pushed well before it was mainly in sport. Michael Hingson ** 48:45 Well, here's a business question for you. How do you identify value that is something that you uniquely can do, that other people can't, and that here's the big part, people will pay for it, Dario Valenza ** 49:01 cost per kilometer of scan is really my answer in the case of carbonics, saying you want to get a digital twin of a power transmission line over 800 kilometers. You can do that with a helicopter, and it's going to cost 1000s of dollars, and you're going to burn tons of fuel, and you can only get so close, etc. So you can only do it in visual conditions, and that's sort of the current best practice. That's how it's done. You can do it with satellites, but you can't really get in close enough yet in terms of resolution and independent on orbits and weather. You can do it by having someone drive or walk along the line, and that's stupendously inefficient. You can do it with multi rotor drones, and then, yeah, you might be able to do five kilometers at a time, but then you got to land and relocate and launch again, and you end up with this big sort of disparity of data sets that go stitch together by the time you add that all up. It's actually more expensive than a helicopter. Or you could do it with a drone like. Fly for 800 kilometers, which is making it Yes, and making a drone that can fly for 800 kilometers is not trivial, and that's where the unique value sits. And it's not just the airframe that the airframe holds it all up, but you have to have the redundancies to command and control, the engineering certifications, the comms, the stability, the payload triggering and geo tagging. So all of that stuff has to work. And the value of carbonics is, yes, the carbon fiber in the airframe, but also the the team ethos, which, again, comes out of that competition world, to really grab the low hanging fruit, make it all work, get it out there and be flexible, like we've had missions with stuff hasn't gone to plan, and we've fixed it, and we've still delivered the data. So the value is really being able to do something that no one else can do. Michael Hingson ** 50:54 So I assume that you're still having fun as a founder and the owner of a company, 51:02 sometimes, Michael Hingson ** 51:05 more often than not, one would hope, Dario Valenza ** 51:07 Oh, absolutely, yeah. I mean, obviously there's a huge amount of pride in seeing now we're 22 people, some of certainly leaders in the field, some of the best in the world, the fact that they have chosen to back the vision, to spend years of their professional life making it happen, according to the thing that I started, I mean that that's flattering and humbling. There's always a challenge. It's always interesting. Again, having investors and all that you're not it's not all on my shoulders. People that are also invested, literally, who have the same interests and we support each other. But at the same time, it's not exactly certain. In terms of you're always working through prices and looking at what's going to happen in a day a year, six months, but you sort of get used to it and say, Well, I've done this willingly. I know there's a risk, but it's fun and it's worth it, and we'll get there. And so you do it Michael Hingson ** 52:10 well, you're the you're the visionary, and that that brings excitement to it all. And as long as you can have fun and you can reward yourself by what you're doing. It doesn't get any better than that. Dario Valenza ** 52:26 So they tell me, yeah, how do you absolutely, how do you Michael Hingson ** 52:31 create a good, cohesive team? Dario Valenza ** 52:36 Values, I think, are the base of them would be very clear about what we are and what we aren't. It's really interesting because I've never really spent any time in a corporate environment, nor do I want to. So keeping that informal fun element, where it's fairly egalitarian, it's fairly focused, we're not too worried about saying things how they are and offending people. We know we're all in it together. It's very much that focus and common goal, I think, creates the bond and then communication like being absolutely clear about what are we trying to do? What are the priorities? What are the constraints? And constantly updating each other when, when one department is having an issue and it's going to hold something up, we support each other and we adjust accordingly, and we move resources around. But yeah, I think the short answer is culture you have to have when someone walks in, there's a certain quality to the atmosphere that tells you what this team is about, right? And everyone is on their page, and it's not for everyone. Again, we don't demand that people put in their heart and soul into 24/7 but if you don't, you probably don't want Michael Hingson ** 53:56 to be there. Yeah, makes sense. So what kind of advice would you give to someone who's starting out in a career or considering what they want to do with their lives? Dario Valenza ** 54:08 Where do I start? Certainly take, take the risks while you're young and independent, you don't have a lot to lose. Give it a go and be humble. So getting my experience going into the cup like my approach was, I'll clean the floors, I'll be the Gopher, I'll work for free, until you guys see some value, like I'm it's not about what am I going to get out of this? It's how do I get involved, and how do I prove myself? And so being open and learning, being willing to put in the hours. And I think at one point there was a comment during the trial that he doesn't know what he's doing, but he's really keen, and his attitude is good. And I think that's that's how you want to be, because you can learn the thing you. That you need to have the attitude to be involved and have have a go. Michael Hingson ** 55:05 Have fun. Yeah, you have to decide to have fun. Dario Valenza ** 55:14 Yeah, absolutely. You have to be interested in what you're doing, because if you're doing it for the money, yes, it's nice when you get the paycheck, but you don't have that passion to really be motivated and put in the time. So right by this is that the Venn diagram right, find something you're interested in, that someone is willing to pay you for, and that you're good at, not easy, but having that openness and the humble and saying, Well, I'm don't try and get to the top straightaway, like get in, prove yourself. Learn, improve, gain skills, and probably, in my case, the value of cross pollination. So rather than sort of going into one discipline and just learning how it's done and only seeing that, look at the analogous stuff out there and see how you can apply it. Yeah. So again, from from boats to drones, from cars to boats, from really racing to business, abstract the problem into what are we trying to solve? What are the variables? How's it been done elsewhere, and really knowing when to think by analogy and when to think from first principles, Michael Hingson ** 56:23 that makes sense. And with that, I'm going to thank you. We've been doing this for an hour. My gosh, is life fun or what? But I really appreciate it. Well, there you go. I appreciate you being here, and this has been a lot of fun. I hope that all of you out there watching and listening have liked our podcast episode. Please let us know. I'd appreciate it if you'd email me. Michael h i at accessibe, A, C, C, E, S, S, I B, e.com, or go to our podcast page, which is w, w, w, dot Michael hingson, that's m, I, C, H, A, E, L, H, I N, G, s, O, n.com/podcast, and I would ask you how, how can people reach out to you? If they'd like to reach out to you and maybe learn more about what you do, maybe join the team? Dario Valenza ** 57:09 Yeah, probably the easiest way would be LinkedIn, just Dario Valencia. Otherwise, my email is just Dario D, A, R, I, o@carbonics.com.au.au, Michael Hingson ** 57:21 being Australian, and Valenc spelled V, A, Dario Valenza ** 57:25 l e n z, A, but the email is just dario@carbonics.com.au You don't need to know how to spell my last name, right? Yeah, sorry for the LinkedIn. It'll be Dario Valencia, V A, l e n z A, or look at the carbonics profile on LinkedIn, and I'll be one of the people who works. There you Michael Hingson ** 57:43 go. Well again, this has been fun, and we appreciate you, and hope that people will reach out and want to learn more. If you know of anybody who might make a good guest, or if any of you watching or listening out there might know of anyone who would be a good guest for unstoppable mindset, I sure would appreciate it if you'd let us know, we really value your help with that. We're always looking for more people to be on the podcast, so please don't hesitate. And also, wherever you're listening or watching, we sure would appreciate it if you give us a five star rating. We really appreciate your views, especially when they're positive, but we like all the comments, so however you're listening and so on, please give us a five star rating and let us know how we can even do better next time. But Dario, again, I want to thank you. Really appreciate you being here with us today. This has been a lot of fun, and I'm glad I learned a lot today. So thank you very much. 58:37 My pleasure. You **Michael Hingson ** 58:43 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com . AccessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for Listening. 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From time to time I am contacted by someone who says they have an interesting and thought provoking guest who would be perfect for Unstoppable Mindset. Such was the case when I was contacted about our guest this time, Dre Baldwin. Dre and I had an initial conversation and I invited him to appear as a guest. I must say that he more than exceeded my expectations. And now he is back for a second time with us with more stories and insights. You may recall from my first episode with him that Dre grew up in Philadelphia. He wanted to do something with sports and tried out various options until he discovered Basketball in high school. While he wasn't considered overly exceptional and only played one year in high school he realized that Basketball was the sport for him. Dre went to Penn State and played all four of his college years. Again, while he played consistently and reasonably well, he was not noticed and after college he was not signed to a professional team. He worked at a couple of jobs for a time and then decided to try to get noticed for basketball by going to a camp where he could be seen by scouts and where he could prove he had the talent to make basketball a profession. As he will tell us, eventually he did get a contract to play professionally. Other things happened along the way as you will hear. Dre discovered Youtube and the internet and began posting basketball tips which became popular. In this episode we continue to discuss with Dre the lessons he wishes to convey as well as his life philosophy. Dre discuss more about the value and need for personal initiative. He tells us the value of having a personal initiative mindset and how that can lead to high performance. I asked Dre about how playing basketball prepared him for his work in business. His answer will surprise you. It did me. As he points out, his business preparation came earlier and in different ways than playing basketball. I also asked Dre why he left playing professional basketball. Again, his answer is fascinating. I will leave that for Dre to tell you. I hope you enjoy my talk with Dre as much as I. Dre Baldwin provided many lessons we all can use. Who knows? Dre, you and I may talk again. Stay tuned. About the Guest: As CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc., Dre Baldwin has given 4 TEDxTalks on Discipline, Confidence, Mental Toughness & Personal Initiative and has authored 35 books. He has appeared in national campaigns with Nike, Finish Line, Wendy's, Gatorade, Buick, Wilson Sports, STASH Investments and DIME magazine. Dre has published over 8,000 videos to 142,000+ subscribers, his content being consumed over 103 million times. Dre's daily Work On Your Game MasterClass has amassed over 2,900 episodes and more than 7.3 million downloads. In just 5 years, Dre went from the end of his high school team's bench to a 9-year professional basketball career. He played in 8 countries including Lithuania, Germany, Montenegro, Slovakia and Germany. Dre invented his Work On Your Game framework as a "roadmap in reverse" to help professionals with High Performance, Consistency and Results. A Philadelphia native, Dre lives in Miami. Ways to connect Dre: http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwin http://YouTube.com/Dreupt https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay http://X.com/DreAllDay http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame Kindly use this link for our Free book, The Third Day
Join host Danielle Hutchinson on the Authors on Mission podcast as she sits down with Dr. Dre Baldwin to unpack the game-changing "Third Day" philosophy that separates professionals from amateurs. In this powerful episode, Dre reveals:
#3282: Why The "Red Pill" Movement Is GREAT For Society [Part 1 of 2] by Dre Baldwin
to a first contract and enjoyed a 9-year professional basketball career. For the past 14 years, Dre has pioneered personal and professional development, helping tens of thousands of people master their "Game" in business, sports, and life. “In life, you can never get to the highest level of anything if you are afraid of going too far.” 0.00: Dre's background in Pro Sports 3.00: Importance of financial literacy for young athletes 7.00: Growing up in the early days of the internet and finding basketball 12.00: Early naïve confidence as an athlete 15.30: The number one trait is discipline 20.00: Developing the creative muscle through repetition 27.00: How to grow your Disciple using anchors, motivation, and structure 33.00: Finding your non-negotiables and structuring them in your day 41.30: When to decide to retire from pro sports to pursue other opportunities 50.00: Life abroad as a professional player 54.00: How Parenthood is the best life hack for being your best self www.drebaldwin.com Until next time, love and good vibes. Podcast Website: https://enterthelionheart.com/ Check out the latest episode here: Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/enter-the-lionheart/id1554904704 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4tD7VvMUvnOgChoNYShbcI
Where do I get the energy? One of our Work On Your Game University members, Jen, asked me that recently — and I gave her an answer on the spot. But the more I thought about it, I realized this is something many of you might be wondering too. So in this episode, I break down where my energy comes from and how you can get more of it for yourself. Energy is one of the five key things you need to succeed — and today, I'll show you how to get more of it. Show Notes: [03:01]#1 I do things that I like and enjoy. [11:10]#2 Energy is a skill, it is not a talent. [17:58]#3 Momentum is a self serving mechanism. [22:22]Recap Episodes Mentioned: 2466: The Law Of Inertia Next Steps: ---
#3256: How To Protect Your Mental Health As You Age [Part 2 of 2] by Dre Baldwin
In this episode, I'm joined by Dre Baldwin, CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc., a former professional basketball player turned business strategist. With over 103 million content views, 7.3 million podcast listeners, and 35 books written, Dre is an expert in high performance, mindset, and building systems that allow entrepreneurs to scale with confidence. We dive into: - Why mindset is the foundation of every successful business - The four pillars of high performance: mindset, strategy, systems, and accountability - How systems—not talent—create sustainable growth - The biggest mistakes entrepreneurs make when scaling to seven figures - How to remove yourself from the day-to-day grind and step into true business ownership If your business depends on you doing everything, this episode will shift your perspective and help you build a scalable, self-sustaining business model! Free resources from Dre: - Free book: http://ThirdDayBook.com - Free training to increase business without working harder for your listeners: http://www.WorkOnYourGame.net - Dre's text number to get his FREE #MondayMotivation text 1.305.384.6894 Where to Find Dre: - Website: http://WorkOnYourGame.com/Dre] - Instagram: @DreBaldwin - YouTube: http://YouTube.com/Dreupt - Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity - LinkedIn: http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay - Twitter: http://Twitter.com/DreAllDay - TikTok: http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame *Loved this episode?* DM me (@meraki_media_management) your biggest takeaway, or share this episode with someone who needs to hear it. If you're serious about scaling without burnout, check out Dre's coaching programs and start building a business that runs without you! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Join me, Aswand Cruickshank, for a live session as I reflect on the “Three P's”—Professionally, Personally, and Physically—as I gear up for March 2025. In this livestream, I'll share my monthly goals inspired by the powerful insights of my mentor, Dre Baldwin, and reveal the steps I'm taking to stay in a state of constant improvement.What to Expect:New Beginnings: How I'm setting fresh goals for the new month.Creative Journey: My plan to write the intro chapters of “How to be a Win-Trapreneur.”Live Engagement: Strategies for hosting and securing events to expand my influence.Community Building: Insights into growing a high-ticket community on Patreon.If you're passionate about growth and ready to #MakeYaMove, join the conversation, share your goals, and let's take this journey together!
This episode dives into leadership and personal development, featuring insights from Dre Baldwin, a CEO and founder of Work On Your Game, Inc. Baldwin, known for his prolific content creation and public speaking, shares his unique approach to leadership and personal growth, emphasizing the importance of discipline, confidence, and mental toughness—competencies rooted in his background as a professional basketball player.Listeners are introduced to innovative concepts like the "third day," which represents the critical moment when initial enthusiasm wanes, and true commitment is tested. Throughout the discussion, Baldwin illustrates the intersections of sports and business, revealing how skills acquired in athletics can parallel business success. His candid discussion on maintaining momentum in both personal and professional landscapes offers valuable strategies.Baldwin's message is clear: continuous self-improvement and goal-setting are pivotal to success, regardless of background or field.
#3192: How Lawfare Works [Part 2 of 3] by Dre Baldwin
In this high-energy episode of Mindset Mastery Moments, Dr. Alisa Whyte sits down with the powerhouse of mental game mastery, Dre Baldwin, to uncover what it truly takes to dominate in business, sports, and life. From being a high school benchwarmer to a 9-year professional basketball career, Dre's journey is a masterclass in resilience, discipline, and personal initiative.Dre shares how he went from teaching himself basketball at 14 to playing professionally in Lithuania and eight other countries—and how he used setbacks as fuel for comebacks. He walks us through his game-changing philosophy built on the four pillars of discipline, confidence, mental toughness, and personal initiative, offering a no-BS breakdown of what it really takes to unlock potential and embrace challenges.Key Takeaways from this Episode:
What separates elite performers from everyone else? Former pro basketball player Dre Baldwin reveals how true champions create distance between themselves and the competition - and it happens long before game day. Drawing from his nine-year professional basketball career and experience impacting over 103 million people, Dre breaks down his revolutionary concept of "separation days" and explains why discipline, not talent, is the ultimate differentiator. He shares powerful insights on how to build momentum through consistent daily action. Learn: Why most people misunderstand when competitive advantage is really created The hidden psychology of maintaining discipline when no one's watching How to develop unshakeable confidence through systematic preparation The counterintuitive truth about handling setbacks and failures Why processing speed may be more valuable than raw intelligence Get my weekly newsletter - Adaptation Book Erik for your next event Start AIM7 for Free Check out Work on Your Game University Connect with Dre on Instagram, X, or YouTube Purchase - Work on Your Game Quotable moments: "The separation day already happened three months ago... it's doing the work that you do in the dark that comes out in the light." - Dre Baldwin "Discipline is the foundation of everything I do... people want to learn how to get more of that in their life." - Dre Baldwin "What we consider to be intelligence is really about processing speed - it's not about whether you can get the right answer, it's how quickly you get it." - Dre Baldwin ABOUT THE BLUEPRINT PODCAST: The BluePrint Podcast is for busy professionals and Household CEOs who care deeply about their families, career, and health. Host Dr. Erik Korem distills cutting edge-science, leadership, and life skills into simple tactics optimized for your busy lifestyle and goals. Dr. Korem interviews scientists, coaches, elite athletes, entrepreneurs, entertainers, and exceptional people to discuss science and practical skills you can implement to become the most healthy, resilient, and impactful version of yourself. On a mission to equip people to pursue audacious goals, thrive in uncertainty, and live a healthy and fulfilled life, Dr. Erik Korem is a High-Performance pioneer. He introduced sports science and athlete-tracking technologies to collegiate and professional (NFL) football over a decade ago. He has worked with the National Football League, Power-5 NCAA programs, gold-medal Olympians, Nike, and the United States Department of Defense. Erik is an expert in sleep and stress resilience. He is the Founder and CEO of AIM7, the #1 pickleball health and performance app that helps pickleball players win more, recovery faster, and prevent pain and injury. SUPPORT & CONNECT Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/erikkorem/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/ErikKorem LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/erik-korem-phd-19991734/ Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/erikkorem Website - https://www.erikkorem.com/ Newsletter - https://adaptation.beehiiv.com/subscribeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
#3159: How To Argue by Dre Baldwin
Matty Dalrymple talks with Dre Baldwin about THE DISCIPLINE-DRIVEN PATH TO SUCCESS, including the importance of having clear goals to maintain focus; the role of discipline, time management, execution, and planning in achieving goals; the value of seeking external perspectives and of sharing your goals only with those who can provide support to achieve them; and practical tips for overcoming writer's block. Interview video at https://bit.ly/TIAPYTPlaylist Show notes at https://www.theindyauthor.com/podcast.html If you find the information in this video useful, please consider supporting The Indy Author! https://www.patreon.com/theindyauthor https://www.buymeacoffee.com/mattydalrymple Dre Baldwin is CEO and Founder of Work on Your Game Inc. He has given 4 TEDxTalks and has authored 35 books. Dre's content has been consumed over 103 million times. His daily Work on Your Game MasterClass has amassed over 3,100 episodes and over 7.3 million listeners. Dre had a 9-year professional basketball career, playing in 8 countries. Dre's framework is the "roadmap in reverse" for professional High Performance, Consistency, and Results. Matty Dalrymple is the author of the Lizzy Ballard Thrillers, beginning with ROCK PAPER SCISSORS; the Ann Kinnear Suspense Novels, beginning with THE SENSE OF DEATH; and the Ann Kinnear Suspense Shorts. She is a member of International Thriller Writers and Sisters in Crime. Matty also writes, speaks, and consults on the writing craft and the publishing voyage, and shares what she's learned on THE INDY AUTHOR PODCAST. She has written books on the business of short fiction and podcasting for authors; her articles have appeared in "Writer's Digest" magazine. She serves as the Campaigns Manager for the Alliance of Independent Authors.
Ever wonder why motivation fades precisely when you need it most? Former pro basketball player and 4-time TEDx speaker Dre Baldwin reveals the hidden pattern that derails most people's goals - and how to break through it. In this powerful episode, Dre shares his revolutionary "Third Day" framework, developed through nine years of professional basketball and reaching over 103 million people through his Work On Your Game platform. He breaks down the psychology of sustainable success and reveals how to maintain momentum when enthusiasm fades. Learn: The crucial moment that determines success or failure in any endeavor Why traditional motivation advice may be sabotaging your progress How elite performers maintain consistency when others quit The counterintuitive approach to celebrating wins without losing edge The hidden pattern that separates champions from everyone else Get my weekly newsletter - Adaptation Book Erik for your next event Start AIM7 for Free Check out Work on Your Game University Connect with Dre on Instagram, X, or YouTube Purchase - Work on Your Game Quotable moments: "Time is the most valuable resource that we have. Every time we add time to a situation by delay, we're placing a blind bet that we will have time in the future." - Dre Baldwin "The third day is not the moment that it happens, but the decision that you make." - Dre Baldwin "Getting through the tough days needs to become your normal mode of operation." - Dre Baldwin ABOUT THE BLUEPRINT PODCAST: The BluePrint Podcast is for busy professionals and Household CEOs who care deeply about their families, career, and health. Host Dr. Erik Korem distills cutting edge-science, leadership, and life skills into simple tactics optimized for your busy lifestyle and goals. Dr. Korem interviews scientists, coaches, elite athletes, entrepreneurs, entertainers, and exceptional people to discuss science and practical skills you can implement to become the most healthy, resilient, and impactful version of yourself. On a mission to equip people to pursue audacious goals, thrive in uncertainty, and live a healthy and fulfilled life, Dr. Erik Korem is a High-Performance pioneer. He introduced sports science and athlete-tracking technologies to collegiate and professional (NFL) football over a decade ago. He has worked with the National Football League, Power-5 NCAA programs, gold-medal Olympians, Nike, and the United States Department of Defense. Erik is an expert in sleep and stress resilience. He is the Founder and CEO of AIM7, the #1 pickleball health and performance app that helps pickleball players win more, recovery faster, and prevent pain and injury. SUPPORT & CONNECT Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/erikkorem/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/ErikKorem LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/erik-korem-phd-19991734/ Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/erikkorem Website - https://www.erikkorem.com/ Newsletter - https://adaptation.beehiiv.com/subscribeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
From time to time I am contacted by someone who says they have an interesting and thought provoking guest who would be perfect for Unstoppable Mindset. Since I am of the opinion that everyone has a story within themselves worth telling I always work to learn more about the guest. Such was the case when I was contacted about our guest this time, Dre Baldwin. Dre and I had an initial conversation and I invited him to appear as a guest. I must say that he more than exceeded my expectations. Dre grew up in Philadelphia. He wanted to do something with sports and tried out various options until he discovered Basketball in high school. While he wasn't considered overly exceptional and only played one year in high school he realized that Basketball was the sport for him. Dre went to Penn State and played all four of his college years. Again, while he played consistently and reasonably well, he was not noticed and after college he was not signed to a professional team. He worked at a couple of jobs for a time and then decided to try to get noticed for basketball by going to a camp where he could be seen by scouts and where he could prove he had the talent to make basketball a profession. As he will tell us, eventually he did get a contract to play professionally. Other things happened along the way as you will hear. Dre discovered Youtube and the internet and began posting basketball tips which became popular. While playing basketball professionally he also started blogging, posting videos and eventually he began selling video basketball lessons online. His internet business grew and by 2015 after playing basketball he decided to leave the sport and open his own business called, Work On Your Game Inc. His business has given him the time to author 35 books, deliver 4 TDX talks, create thousands of videos and coach others. Dre and I talk about such concepts as discipline, mindset and the value of consistency. Our conversation will provide many useful insights and ideas you and all of us can use. About the Guest: As CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc., Dre Baldwin has given 4 TEDxTalks on Discipline, Confidence, Mental Toughness & Personal Initiative and has authored 35 books. He has appeared in national campaigns with Nike, Finish Line, Wendy's, Gatorade, Buick, Wilson Sports, STASH Investments and DIME magazine. Dre has published over 8,000 videos to 142,000+ subscribers, his content being consumed over 103 million times. Dre's daily Work On Your Game MasterClass has amassed over 2,900 episodes and more than 7.3 million downloads. In just 5 years, Dre went from the end of his high school team's bench to a 9-year professional basketball career. He played in 8 countries including Lithuania, Germany, Montenegro, Slovakia and Germany. Dre invented his Work On Your Game framework as a "roadmap in reverse" to help professionals with High Performance, Consistency and Results. A Philadelphia native, Dre lives in Miami. Ways to connect with Dre: http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwin http://YouTube.com/Dreupt https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay http://X.com/DreAllDay http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog. Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards. https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/ accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/ Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below! Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can subscribe in your favorite podcast app. You can also support our podcast through our tip jar https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/unstoppable-mindset . Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts. Transcription Notes: Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us. Michael Hingson ** 01:21 Hi again. Welcome to another edition of unstoppable mindset. Our goal in unstoppable mindset is to show you that, in fact, you are most likely more unstoppable than you think you are, at least that's the goal. Is to try to get people to believe that it's been fun talking to a lot of people about that, talking to people about the fact that they show that they're more unstoppable than they thought they were. And a lot of people tend to to stay that right out. Our guest today is a first for me. I've not ever talked to a professional basketball player live on unstoppable mindset. And our guest Dre Baldwin was a professional basketball player for a number of years, and I'm sure we're going to get into that, along with so many other things to talk about what he does today, because he's not doing basketball as such today. He's got a company called work on your game, Inc, and I'm sure that that relates back to basketball in some way. So we'll get to it. But anyway, Dre, I want to welcome you to unstoppable mindset, and thank you for taking the time to be here. Dre Baldwin ** 02:28 Oh, thank you, Michael. And you can call me Dre, yes. Dre, yeah. So okay, I I appreciate, I appreciate you having me on. I'm looking forward to this conversation. Well, we're Michael Hingson ** 02:38 glad that you're here and all that. Why don't we start by you maybe telling us about the early Dre growing up and some of those kinds of things. Dre Baldwin ** 02:46 Sure, come from the city of Philadelphia, PA and now live in South Florida, but always played sports growing up, dabbled in a little bit of everything that was available. So went to my mom, put me in a little tennis camp once for a week or two, played a little football, touch football in the driveways. Played baseball for a couple years on an organized level, but didn't really find my find my groove in any sports. I got around to basketball, which is around age 14, which is pretty late to start playing a sport, if you're trying to go somewhere in it. That was my situation. No barely played in high school. Only played one year, and then it led to, I'm sure we'll get into what happened after that. But for the most part, as a youth, I was really into athletics and just figuring out what I could do athletically. So no, of course, you know, in the the street, you grow up on foot races, two hand, touch football, etc, things like that. But I figured that my meaning was going to be somewhere towards using my body in some way. I didn't know how, but that's what I figured I would do. Michael Hingson ** 03:47 I would presume that along all the time you were in Philadelphia, you never did encounter Rocky Balboa running up the steps of Liberty Hall, or any of those things. Dre Baldwin ** 03:57 Oh, that's, that's the art museum, the Philadelphia Art Museum. Oh, the art museum. Yeah, Rocky, running up the steps. I never did that. The only reason, no, go ahead, I was saying, the only reason I never did it is because where I grew up is kind of far from the art museum. Is big city, but had I moved near the art museum, then, yeah, I would have ran up steps as exercise. I just, I just, it just wasn't in proximity to me. So that's the only reason I didn't do Michael Hingson ** 04:21 it, well, that's okay. Well, so what did you do after high school? Well, Dre Baldwin ** 04:25 I wanted to go to college. I knew I was going to go to college period, even if it weren't for sports. I figured college was Well, first of all, I didn't know what I want to do with my life. Yet at age 18, and the small Inkling I had that I could be a professional athlete at this point, I got that idea around age 16. I wasn't not like I was good enough to be LeBron James or Kobe Bryant, who were no so good. They skipped college and went straight to playing at the program. I wasn't that good. So if I was going to play pro, I needed four more years of seasoning, which meant I needed to go to college. So just on that level alone, I knew I wanted to go. So, but because of my unimpressive high school career, if you want to call it a career, no one was recruiting me to come play in college. So whatever college I went to would not be on the basis of sports, it just be on the basis of I'm here, and let's see if I can get on the basketball team as an unknown, unverified person. So that's what I did. I walked on at a college that happened to be a division three college. Was the third tier of college sports. Most of your pro players are sourced from the Division One level. And I did go there, and I was able to get on the basketball team. Played four years of college basketball at the Division Three level, yet, and still Michael at that level, nobody at the pro level is really looking for pros from the Division Three level. Because, again, who cares about division three players? They can pull from the Division One ranks Division Three guys. So that was my situation. Graduated from college having played, but still, at that point, nobody was looking for me to come play at the Michael Hingson ** 05:57 pro level. What did you get your degree in? I have a degree from Dre Baldwin ** 06:01 Penn State University in business with a focus in management and marketing. Michael Hingson ** 06:05 That explains where you went later, but and kind of how you ended up, yeah, sort of, and Penn State so you were a Nittany Lion, huh? Dre Baldwin ** 06:17 Technically, yeah, we never talk about, we never say that. But yes, Michael Hingson ** 06:21 well, yeah, whatever, yeah, Penn State, yeah, well, that's, I didn't know that they were division three in basketball. They certainly aren't in football. But okay, and they have more Dre Baldwin ** 06:33 than one no, they have more than one campus. So, well, that's true, yeah. So I went to my degree, so just so people understand when Penn State has 23 campuses. So I started at Penn State Abington, which is a division three sports school, and I transferred to Penn State Altoona, which is also a division three sports school. At the time, Abington was not full fledged d3 it is now Altoona was so Altoona was the second highest level inside the entire Penn State system, which was a four years of sports school at the time. At the time, there were only two schools in the whole system where you could play four years. It was the main campus with the football team, and it was out tuning. Nowadays, there are several others who you can play four years of sports. But back then, for many other campuses, you can only play two years. And the other piece is, when you graduate from Penn State, any campus your degree is still Penn State, regardless of which campus you graduated from, I graduated from Altoona, so my degree still just says, it just says Penn State. It doesn't say which campus, Michael Hingson ** 07:32 right? And, and in a sense, does it really matter? Not Dre Baldwin ** 07:35 really maybe, to the people who go to the main campus, because they say, Oh, you all went to the other ones. So they try to, in a joking way, kind of discredit it. But I only went to Altoona for basketball. I was accepted into the main campus straight out of high school, Michael Hingson ** 07:48 right? Well, so whatever. But at least you got a degree from Penn State, and you can't argue with that. Yes, you're right about that. I went to University of California, Irvine, UC Irvine, and when I enrolled my first year, my freshman year was the first year they had a graduating class. It was a new campus for UC system. So 1968 they had their first well 69 they had their first graduating class. And that was the year I was a freshman. And it was a only had like about 2500 2700 students that first year. I was back there in June of this year, they have 31,000 undergraduates. Now it's changed a little bit. Dre Baldwin ** 08:34 Yeah, so you were part of the first class, where they had all four classes on campus at the same time. Then, Michael Hingson ** 08:40 right, and they also had graduate school. They had started doing work. It was a well known, even back then, a biology school. In fact, if you wanted to major in biology in the first year I enrolled, I went into physics, so I didn't get to be a victim of this. But they had 1600 students enroll in biology, and the way they weeded them out was they insisted that before you could really take major biology courses, you had to take at least a year of organic chemistry. And so by the time students got to the end of their sophomore year that 1600 students got whittled down to 200 so they use organic chemistry to get get people out of it. Dre Baldwin ** 09:29 Oh, well, that would have worked on me. Yeah. Well, yeah, Michael Hingson ** 09:33 yeah, I had no interest in doing that either. So, you know, I dodged a bullet, but, but it was fun. So you went to college, you got a degree in in business and so on. And then what did you Dre Baldwin ** 09:48 do? Well, then I wanted to play professional basketball. So this is 2004 give everybody a timeline. And initially I didn't have any. Nobody was calling me. Nobody was checking for me, nothing. I tried a few things when. To a couple of tryouts for local, what they call semi professional teams that were based in the United States on smaller towns. Nothing really came of that. So the first work thing I did after college was get a job at Foot Locker as an assistant manager. So I was selling sneakers with the referee shirt and all and everything. So that was my first job out of college. I did that for about six months, and then after that, I went and got a job at ballet Total Fitness was a fitness gym that's now out of business, but not because of me. I made a lot of sales for ballet total fitness, and that's a relief. It Michael Hingson ** 10:34 wasn't you, what'd you say? I say that's a relief. It wasn't you, yes, Dre Baldwin ** 10:38 it wasn't me. If it was for me, they'd still be in business that was making a lot of sales, or maybe not, because people didn't like their contracts, but so maybe I contributed to the problem one way or another. So I then, in the summer of 2005 so this is a year removed from graduation, I went to this event called an exposure camp. And then, Michael, you familiar with those? Heard of them? Michael Hingson ** 10:57 I've heard of it. I don't know anything about it. I can imagine. Okay, I suppose Dre Baldwin ** 11:00 you can't. Similar to a job fair or a casting call in sports world. So it's where a bunch of people who want a job or want a better job, they go to this place that announces, hey, the people who can give you a job are all going to be here. And they all converge in one place. And as opposed to a job fair, where you just show up and shake hands and hand out your resume at an exposure camp. You bring your sneakers and you actually play whatever the sport is, and you try to impress the decision makers in the audience, who are there to look for people like you. They're there to scout and find talent people like you. So I went to one of these events. It was in Orlando, Florida. At the time. I still live in Philadelphia, so me and a couple college teammates who had similar ambitions to me. We rented a car in Philadelphia and drove to Orlando. It's about a 1517, hour drive, depending on traffic, and we showed up there 9am Saturday morning, hopped out the car, and that's the exact time that the exposure camp began. So I tell people, I could get away with that at age 23 Michael couldn't do it now, but then I could do it. How about the car and just start playing a two day event, and I played pretty well at that event. From there, I got two key things that I needed. One was a scouting report of a scout, a professional level Scout, who just wrote up some positive things about me that basically affirmed, like, Hey, this guy does have the ability to play at the pro level. Another thing I got was footage from those games, because you need in the sports world, you need proof of yourself playing. You can't just say you can play. You got to prove it, and the game film is your proof. So that game film was important to me, because even though I had played in college at college, I was only playing against Division Three level talent. At this exposure camp, I was playing against professional level talent. So this footage mattered a whole lot more. So with that footage, I had to be back in Philadelphia. I was still working in ballet, Total Fitness at the time. I negotiated, I had negotiated with my boss to get the weekend off just to go to this camp. Had to be back at work on Monday morning. So the camp was Saturday and Sunday, and had to be back at work on Monday so we when that camp ended on Sunday afternoon, we hopped right back in the car and drove right back home. So and I didn't sleep that Sunday night or that previous Friday night. And from there, what I started doing was cold calling basketball agents. So the way that agents work in the sports world is pretty similar to the literary or entertainment world, where the agent is basically the go between, between the person who has some ability, or at least they think they do, and the people who like to hire people with ability. And usually agents call you if you show potential, because they believe they can help well, they believe you have the potential to make money. And we know all know what agents do. They're the middleman. So if they help you make money, then they make money. Right? Of course, they want to find people who are going to make money. But no agent had ever been calling me, Michael, because it didn't look like I was going to make any money. But after I went to this exposure camp. Now I had some proof that maybe, maybe I might make some money. So at the same time, no agent knew who I was, so I started calling them. I started calling basketball agents myself, and I was selling myself to them and saying, Hey, I have this scouting report. This is some proof. I have this game footage. Here's some more proof. I called about 60 basketball agents. This is straight up cold calling. And after calling those 60 agents, I was well, through calling those 60, I was able to get in touch with 20 of those 20. I sent the footage to all 20, and one of those 20 was interested in representing me, and he's the one who signed me to become my agent. Now, when you get signed to an agent, doesn't mean you get any money, it just means somebody's working to help you make some money. And then he went and found me my first contract, which was in the late summer of 2005 August, 2005 playing in countless Lithuania. So that's how I started my professional basketball career. Michael Hingson ** 14:33 So you weren't playing in the US, and it was a long commute to go to Lithuania. So, so how long did you play there? Then? What happened? Well, Dre Baldwin ** 14:42 each year, for almost 10 years, playing ball, every year I was in a different place. So I never played in the same place more than one season. So I was in that year, I was in Lithuania. I came back to the USA later, later in that in the middle of that season, and I played for a Troy. Traveling team in the USA. It wasn't the team that any of you would know from TV, but play for a traveling team in the USA. Then from there was Mexico from there. After that, you had Montenegro, you had and this is as years are going on. So I don't know when you go through every single one, but I'm just fast forwarding here. Yeah, Mexico is Montenegro. There was Germany, there was Croatia, there was Slovakia. There was a couple other places. I'm not thinking of right off the top of my head, but this was between 2005 and 2015 these are all the different places that I played. Sometimes there were gaps in my schedule. I'm sure we'll talk about that. And there were other things I was doing besides just playing basketball, because the life of a professional athlete, for those who don't know, is a long day of work for us, might be four hours of committed time at work, that's all told. So we have a whole lot of time on our hands. So athletes tend to do other things besides play sports, because we have the time and space to do so, Michael Hingson ** 15:55 right? And so how did you fill your time? Because you couldn't practice all the time, Dre Baldwin ** 16:00 right? Yes, physically, there's only so much practice you can do. So I am an internet geek, a closet internet geek. So what I was doing, even back to when I was a child, I was always into computers. So I'm sure you remember given the frame that you gave me here, but I remember the days of the one computer in the whole school, we had a room called the computer we had. It'd be one room with maybe a couple computers. When I was in high school, there was one room with enough computers for everybody. But when I was in second grade, there was one room with one computer, and there was this the green screen, and we would play Oregon Trail and games like that in the computer with a little floppy disk. So that's as far back as I go. So I was always into computers, even back then. And then by the time I graduated college in 2004 now, we were starting to get what I guess people call web 2.0 so this was the Internet where you could kind of create your own stuff, even if you didn't know anything about the back end of the internet, like coding and HTML, etc. So that was about my era when I got out of college, and when I saw that during college, I said to myself, this internet thing, I'm going to do something on the internet. I didn't know what, but I knew I was going to do something. This is before we had we didn't quite have social media yet. We had some software or platforms where you could kind of make profiles and talk to people, but it was nothing like what we have now. So anyway, to answer your question, finally, in 2005 I took the footage from that exposure camp that I went to and at this good footage that I had this. It was not a link that I got this footage on. This is not a download. This was this thing called a VHS tape. Mike, you remember those? Oh, yeah, yeah. So the VHS tape was the format for my footage. It Michael Hingson ** 17:42 was VHS and VHS, and not beta max, huh? And not Dre Baldwin ** 17:47 that old, not that old. Remember VHS? Only the VHS the farthest back that I go. So with the VHS tape, I knew that no you can lose this. You can leave it in the sun. You can get it dropping in mortar. You destroy your footage. I needed this footage to last forever, so I took it to an audio visual store, and they transferred it onto a data CD, and that CD I uploaded to, I took the footage off that CD and uploaded to this new website called youtube.com and this website claimed that you could publish as much footage as you want for free. Now, yeah, and I said clean, because 2005 nobody knows is this YouTube thing going to stick around? So I put my footage up there and didn't think anything of it, because, I mean, who cares about putting videos on YouTube in 2005 and maybe six months later, I went just to check on the website make sure it still existed, and there were people who were leaving comments on my video. I didn't know. These people. Didn't know who they were or why they were looking for me. Turns out, they were not looking for me. They were just looking for a basketball period, and I happened to be providing it through my footage. And they were asking questions like, Where do you play? What schools you go to, how often do you practice? They just want to know more about this random person who is showing them this guy looks like he can play basketball. So who is he, and they were hoping maybe that I might give them more of what they were seeing on that footage. And that's it wasn't immediate, Michael, but over the next maybe year or two, the light bulb went off in my head that, hey, these players are just looking for help with basketball, right? And I can provide it, because I do actually practice every day. I can actually play. I'm at the pro level now, and at this point, by about 2007 I had this cheap little digital camera, $100 digital camera, because it's before we had cameras on our phones. So now I could just bring this camera with me to the gym every day, because I go every day anyway. Only difference is now I'm going to film myself working out, and I can take little pieces from what I do, and I can put it on his YouTube site, and if it can help some kids out and maybe stroke my ego a little bit, because they're happy to show them how to play basketball, and why not? So that that was the seed of what led to me building my name on the internet well, Michael Hingson ** 19:53 and that makes sense for me when I started at UC Irvine back in 19. 68 that was the first time I really encountered any kind of a computer. And what we had were, well, we had in a building, mainframes and terminals around the campus, but we certainly didn't have individual machines. A little bit later on, I started to encounter, for a variety of reasons, more mini and micro computers, like the digital equipment, PDP, 8e, and Data General, no, but to later on, but mostly it was all terminals connected to a big computer. Actually, there were two big computers and and that was, that was what we did. Now for me, of course, it was more of a challenge because all of it was very visual, right? And back then, we didn't have software to make computers talk or anything like that. So there were other adaptions that adaptations that I had to do, but I know exactly what you're talking about. And then I appreciate all the the the challenges and things that you ran into. But obviously it worked for you. And by putting that stuff up on YouTube, I knew you were going to what you were going to say, and how that actually started to open the door. You're right, yeah, which is cool. Well, you So you started helping people by putting up shots and so on. So what happened from that? I assume that more and more people wanted to know more and more about you and what you did and and started asking more questions Dre Baldwin ** 21:28 between 2005 when I first put the first footage up in 2009 I was putting video out sporadically. So every now and then Michael, I put a new video up on YouTube. I would record my workouts, but I didn't always put something up. So one thing about basketball, as in almost any profession, is that you're doing a lot of the same stuff over and over again. So it's not like I keep putting up the same video me doing the same drills. So I was just put stuff out randomly whenever I got around to it. On top of the fact this is compounded by the fact that there was nothing personal to gain from having people on YouTube watching your video again, you can get a little bit of an ego boost. But other than that, there was nothing tangible to get out of it, so I didn't really care. And mind you, at the same time, I'm playing basketball, my main thing is actually playing basketball, not YouTube. So in 2009 what happened is, Michael, I found myself unemployed, so I was in between jobs, waiting for the phone to ring, and the phone was not yet ringing. I wasn't sure if or when it was going to ring. Good news is going back in the story a little bit. And I got introduced to what I found out to be network marketing when I was in college, and I just wanted to a bulletin board posting about making some money, extra money in the summertime. Turns out some guy was doing network marketing, and I had gone to a few of the meetings. Didn't stay in the in the industry or build a business, but I go into a few of the meetings where a couple breakthrough things happened in my mind. Number one is that the speaker on the stage was talking about business in ways that my college experience had not taught, never even touched on. So that was one that was eye opening. Number two is that the speaker said, if you're going to build your business, you must also build yourself at the same time, because your business cannot business cannot grow any more than you grow. And that made perfect sense to me, and that introduced and then he went on to introduce the concept of personal development, or reinforce it to the people who had heard the message before. That was a phrase I'd never heard of before. I'd always been into reading and human psychology, but I didn't know there was a term called personal development. And number three, he mentioned a couple of the books that he was suggesting that everyone read, and he name dropped some some authors like Napoleon Hill and Zig Ziglar and Brian Tracy and Jim Rohn and Errol Nightingale. And I'd never heard of these people, but I kept them in mind, even though he sold us outside of this hotel room, there's people selling books with these same authors. Just bought a book. Well, I was a broke college student. I could not afford the book, so I didn't buy the book, so I didn't buy the books, Michael, but I went on eBay when I got back to college, and I bought some pi rated copies of some of these books. And there were two of them that made a big impact on me that led to what happened in the future. One was thinking, Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, rich, right? Which showed me that there's a way that you could intentionally and consciously alter your thought patterns that lead to an alteration in your actions. And the other was Rich Dad, Poor Dad, by Robert Kiyosaki. And when reading that book, I realized, okay, there's another way that you can earn revenue and make money in life, aside from what my school teachers, college professors and parents were demonstrating to me. And this is what really set me on the path toward entrepreneur. Entrepreneurship. These, these, this little story I'm telling you here. And this all happened in the middle of my college years, right? So 2009 I just finished reading. I've always been reading. So I just finished reading another book, which was almost like the the New Age version of Rich Dad, Poor Dad. And it was made for people who knew how to use computers, and it was called The Four Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss. And Tim was talking about similar it was a similar direction as Mr. Kiyosaki. Difference is Tim Ferriss was telling you how to do all of these things through the internet. He was the first person, for example, that ever heard say you can hire someone to work for you who doesn't even you know. Even physically met. They can live in India or the Philippines, where they cost the living is a lot lower than the United States, which means you can pay them less than you need to pay an American, and they can still do the same job as long as it's on the internet. I never heard anyone explain it, and then he explained exactly how to do it. And he talked about, know, how you need to structure, how you talk to them and deconstruct things. And my mind, my mind works in that way. So it was perfect for me. So all that is said to say 2009 Michael, that flashed forward in the story when my when I'm unemployed and trying to figure out what to do, I asked myself a really important question, which was, how do I combine these three things? One is my ability to play basketball. Number two is me being an internet geek, and number three is my desire to earn revenue in a way that I control. And what I just explained, the backstory tells you why all three of these matter, right? So that's how I started to build what we now call a personal brand. At the time, that was a new phrase. So when I what I started doing was, first of all putting videos on YouTube every single day. Because another thing that happened about that? Yeah, so another thing that happened at that time Michael was YouTube got purchased by Google and Google, and people don't remember this, maybe, but YouTube was not monetized up to that point. So YouTube was losing a lot of money. It was very popular, but they were losing money because they were spending all this money on the the space to hold all these these videos, but they weren't making any money. So by monetizing the site, ie that means putting advertisements on the videos. There was a time those of you listening that you could watch YouTube all day with no ads, but they started putting ads on the videos, and this allowed them to make money, and it also allowed them to share in the profits. So people like myself, the more videos we put out, and the more I got viewed, the more money we made. So I started making videos every day. Other thing was, I had always been blogging. I've always been a big reader, always a big writer. So I started writing more often, just about my experiences playing overseas. And also I started writing about my background in basketball, and also about how to play overseas, because there's a a niche market, but a hungry market of basketball players who believe they could play overseas the same way that I've once believed it. The thing is, is, unlike being a doctor or a lawyer, there's no, like, quote, unquote, official documentation on how to do it. So I started writing and explaining that, because I have the ability not only to have done certain things, but also I'm pretty good at explaining them. So I started doing that. That was the writing piece. And as I continue to do this, people started to know my name on the internet. So then I started to become kind of a, what we now call an influencer, specifically for basketball players, because of what I was doing online. So this all happened during that about 2009 to 2000 maybe 11 period, and the two other pieces I'll add to this cap, this long answer to a short question, which is also Tim Ferriss introduced this concept of you can sell your own products on the internet. And he gave a little experiment on how to test out the market viability. I did it. I started selling my own products. My first two products, Michael, were $4.99 each. That was the price. One was for dribbling the basketball. Ones for shooting the basketball, and they started selling immediately, as soon as I put them out. And the reason was because I had a hungry audience who was already following me, and I had already built a relationship with them, not because I was any type of marketing expert, but I kind of was. But by accident, I didn't, I didn't think of it as marketing. I just thought of it as I had something they want. And the last thing is, self publishing became a thing. So I told you I told you I was a big reader, big writer, so now I can write my own books, and I didn't have to go through a publisher to do it, because I always had the idea writing a book, but I didn't know anything about going through the traditional publishing process, which eventually I have done. But at the time, I wasn't thinking about doing that. But now I can write a book, and I can put it out tomorrow if I want to. So that's what I started doing. So all of this happened between 2009 and 2000 1101. More piece. I'm sorry. Lot of things happen in this period. One more piece was that the players who were following me online, basketball players, 99% of my audience, they started finding out about my background, because every now and then I would reply in the comments telling them, oh, well, I only played one year of high school, or I walked on to play in college, or I played overseas because I went to this exposure camp, or I would make a video just talking, just explaining these things, because I got asked the same question so often. And when players found out about this background of mine, they started asking questions about mindset. They started asking me things like, what kept you disciplined? What keeps you disciplined to keep working out because you put these videos out every day, or, where do you get the confidence to show up and perform at an exposure camp when you only have two days basically to make or break your career? Or why'd you keep trying when you were getting cut from your high school team over and over again, because they would say, hey, Dre I got cut from my team, but I feel like quitting. So why'd you keep trying? What is it that kept you going? Or they would ask something about, how do you get started now? How do you get started playing overseas? How do you get started getting known on the internet? Because now, internet? Because now this is when we start to have the seeds, Michael, of this generation of kids who, instead of growing up wanting to be a police officer or a firefighter, now they want to be YouTubers, because this is what they're seeing. And I was, I guess I was that to them. So they just want to know, how do you get started with all these things that you seem to be doing? Troy, so you. Now that's the end of my long answer to your short question. All of these things happen around a three year span, and that's kind of what sent me in the next direction I ended up going. Michael Hingson ** 30:08 So I'm curious. One thing you said earlier was that one of the things that you discovered by going to the meeting of the network marketing guy was that he was telling you things that were significantly different than what you learned in business courses in college. What kinds of things were different? Dre Baldwin ** 30:31 Well, so much so number one, the guy, well, the first, first thing is, I'm sure you've been to a network marketing meeting before. I everybody, I think my age or older has been someone so in these meetings, the first thing that they do, I would say, about 70% of the presentation is just helping you understand a different way of thinking about earning money and just money period. And the other 20 to 30% of the presentation is about the actual product or service that you would actually be selling if you were to take advantage of the join the business opportunity, as they call it. So the first thing is, they help people understand that to make more money, most people just go looking for ways to do more work, put in more time, put in more hours, when they explain instead, you should look for ways to have a network, or for ways to have assets that will do work for you, so you're making money, even if you're not doing the work. And then you language it in a way that makes it simple for the everyday person to understand, not the way that I just said it, but they make it really simple to understand. That's the first Michael Hingson ** 31:32 thing. But the reality is that while people may or may not realize it, anybody who tends to be very successful in business has probably essentially done the same thing, whether they acknowledge it or not. So I mean, I appreciate what you're saying anyway. Go ahead, yeah. Dre Baldwin ** 31:47 So that's the first thing. Is they help you understand that to make more money is not give more time to your job, whatever, because most people there have a job may introduce the business for the first time like myself, and many of them no older than me. So that's the first thing. The second thing is them helping you understand that, hey, it's possible to have other people working for you, which everyone logically understands, but most of us have this block in our minds that to get people working for me. Well, first of all, I had to have my own company. Secondly, I got to make a lot of money. And third, I got to go find the people. Fourth, I got to teach them what to do. And fifth, I got to watch them. And network marketing kind of handles all those problems at the same time. Because if you join the business and you get other people to join with you, the system teaches them all that stuff. You don't have to spend any money to get them on your team. You don't actually even be having you don't have to be making that much money yourself to get someone else on your team. And every time they make money, you make money, right? So it kind of solves all those problems of getting people on your team to where their efforts put money in your pocket without you having to do all the work. So that was the second breakthrough that happened in that meeting, and the third breakthrough to me, Michael, because I've always been a person who I consider myself a critical thinker, and I try to be as logical and as objective as I can be. As I already told you, I have a business degree from Penn State University, so I'm thinking to myself, why haven't any of my college professors ever mentioned anything is being told to us in this meeting? I just didn't understand it. Why are they not talking about this? Because it sounds like it makes perfect sense. So if it's wrong, maybe they can explain why it's wrong. But if it's right, why are they not talking about it? So these are the three biggest things that stuck in my head after I went to that meeting. Michael Hingson ** 33:26 How did you or what did you discover? Was the answer to that last one, why they don't talk about it? Dre Baldwin ** 33:33 We have a whole conversation on that so I understand the answer is that the system that we have in the United States, especially educational system is designed to produce employees. It's designed to produce people. We're going to go work for somebody else and work out your no salvation for someone else. Because if you are, this is just my my opinion here. If you are independently making your own money, then you are less controlled, and you are, it's harder to keep you under the thumb of anything or anyone else, and you can do or say, you have much more freedom. Let's just put it that way, when you have your own business and you're making your own money, as opposed to when you work somewhere and they set the rules upon you. So I believe the educational system not I believe, I know the educational system was initially created the way that it is to train people to be ready to be ready to go work in factories during the Industrial Revolution. Now we're not in that space anymore. Now it's more mental work than it is physical labor. But the system is the framework of the system still exists the exact same way teaching Michael Hingson ** 34:33 entrepreneurialism, if you will, is still something that is not nearly as common as it as it really probably should be correct. Yeah. So that happens. Well, so how long did you continue to play basketball? Dre Baldwin ** 34:48 I played basketball to 2015 so by this 2009 to 2011 period. Now I basically had two, if you want to call them jobs, neither one of them was well, basketball is technically a job. If you're a contractor, but I basically had two jobs playing basketball, and I have this internet thing going on that we now call personal brand, or you can call it a business, but I wasn't calling it either of those back then. I was just a guy who was known on YouTube, and I sell products, and I got books, and there was no word for it. So in this time period that last four or five years that I was playing basketball, of course, I'm traveling back and forth and playing, but as I told you, our long days of work are four hours, so I have plenty of time on my hands. So I'm blogging, I'm making videos, I'm updating my website. I'm making more programs, because when those first two four hour and 99 cent programs started selling, I said, Well, I know I got more about basketball than just two things. Let me just make programs for everything that I know. So I just made programs for every single aspect of the game that I understood, and I just kept putting them out. And I just was selling those programs to the point that I was making money online. And I got to the point probably about 2010 that I remember telling a friend that whatever this is that we're going to call this, that I'm doing on the internet is going to be bigger for me than basketball. I can see that very clearly, Michael, it's just for the simple fact that athletes have a very short shelf life. You can only play a professional sport for so long, no matter how good you are, because the body can't keep doing that at that level forever. But what I had created when I started selling products was what we call intellectual property. And you can create intellectual property forever, as long as your brain works and you can either write or you can talk or some way of communicating, you can sell intellectual property your entire life. You cannot sell physical property, at least not through your physical body, forever, not in the sports realm. So I knew my time was going to end in basketball, and my time using my brain to communicate something and sell it, hopefully that would never expire. To this point, I'm it's still true, so that's how I knew what I was going to be doing next. So Michael Hingson ** 36:46 you played basketball, but eventually, I gather that what you're really saying is you made the decision that you were going to go into to doing the marketing, to strengthening your brand and creating new intellectual property, and you were going to do that full time? Dre Baldwin ** 37:03 Yes, absolutely. So I was doing it from, again, my 2010 and 2015 I guess you could call it part time, right? And, but again, you had the off season, and I had a lot more time doing that than I had on the basketball court, right? And it was just building the business. Because remember the network marketing experience, reading Robert Kiyosaki, reading Tim Ferriss. I knew I wanted to go into the business world, because after sports, you start to do something. I mean, it's not like you just sit around do nothing for the rest of your life. You're 30 something years old. I was 33 when I stopped playing, so I knew there was something else that I was going to be doing, and I knew I didn't want to go the traditional route. So I knew that from watching my parents, I knew that from listening to my college professors, and I knew that from looking at my college classmates, I said, I'm not like these people. I need a different option. What else am I going to do? So I already knew that route was my route. Michael Hingson ** 37:51 When did you come up with the the title and the concept work on your game? Dre Baldwin ** 37:57 That same time period about 2009 so this was early in the days when I first started publishing on YouTube a little bit more consistently. And my audience is steadily growing, of athletes at this point. And athletes were starting to just ask me a lot of questions about, help can you help me with this? Help me with that? And one day, I was in a 24 hour fitness gym here in Miami, as a matter of fact, excuse me, and I just had my camera with me. My little $100 camera still had it, and I was finishing a workout on my own at about four o'clock in the morning, because I was couldn't sleep, so I just went to the gym, and I was stretching after my workout. And I remember recording this video. It's about two minutes long, and it's still on YouTube to this day. And what I said in the video was that a lot of you players, the reason that you all are having trouble getting better or making a team or you play, but nobody wants to give you the ball is because you all are spending way too much time watching me on youtube or playing Xbox than you are actually doing what I'm doing, which is being in the gym and literally working on your game. So I said in a little bit more colorful language than that, but when I put that out there, Michael, people really loved the phrase. They loved the phrase work on your game because they hadn't heard it used so forcefully in such a way. And it took about a year and a half of people repeating it back to me, seeing me in a mall, seeing me on internet, and saying it when I realized, you know what, I could just name. I can put a name on this and call it work on your game. Because the good thing about it is, because I already had this business mindset. Even though a lot of these players only knew me for basketball, I was thinking bigger than just basketball. And the phrase, the great thing about the phrase is that it doesn't limit you to sports. So that's where I first said it, Michael Hingson ** 39:32 right, which makes perfect sense, you know? And and one of the things that I'm reacting to is when you said earlier that people kept asking you, well, why did you continue? Why did you keep working and trying to get on basketball, even though you didn't get very far in high school and you did some in college, but you never got to be pro, and then you eventually went to the resilience camp and so on. But ultimately, a lot of it comes down to discipline. Uh, and you, you chose to be disciplined about what you did, which I think is really a very important thing. So the question I would ask is, why is discipline such a very important part of success? Dre Baldwin ** 40:16 I believe it's the biggest differentiator between, if you have people who have potential or resources. Biggest differentiator between who actually makes it and who doesn't is who has discipline. Because if everyone in the room has potential and everyone has access to resources, information, knowledge, talent, etc, the person who's the most disciplined is the one who's going to get the most out of the opportunities that are in front of them. And I believe so few people have discipline that it becomes the opportunity. Because I tell people, Michael, the opportunity is always in the opposites. So you just look around at what most people in any space are doing. If you could just be the opposite of that, that's where the opportunity is. You just have to ask yourself, all right, looking at how everybody else is and what everybody else is doing or thinking or saying, if I looked at the opposite of that, where's the opportunity? Because the opportunity somewhere over there. So if you just wrote, you'll find it so discipline, easy differentiator, because most people are not disciplined, Michael Hingson ** 41:10 no and and even the people who are, they're generally looking for that difference that they can take advantage of, which makes perfect sense. How about discipline and how it actually helps in building confidence? Dre Baldwin ** 41:28 Great question. Well, discipline produces confidence, and most people don't go looking for discipline, even though everyone understands that they need it. If you ask, if you stop the 100 people on the street and say, Do you need more discipline, everybody will laugh and say yes. And they can point to several areas in life in which they need it, but most people don't have it, even though everyone claims that they need it, because this is one of those things. But if you ask 100 people, would you like to be more confident, and in what area, most people would also say yes. The challenge is, most people don't know how to go about getting confidence. They don't know how to get this one either. But confidence, since you want it, confidence comes from discipline. So the more disciplined you are, the more confident you'll become, because discipline is basically about doing the work consistently, and confidence is your belief and your ability to do a thing. So the more you do your homework, so to speak, the more prepared you are for the test. If people can follow that metaphor, and that's what confidence is really about. And a lot of people tend to think confidence comes from faking it until you make it, or pretending that you're something that you're not. The problem with that is eventually you had to stop faking and then you have to go back to being who you were before. So you don't want to be on this roller coaster of up and down. Instead, you want to become it. And the way you become anything is by embodying it, by doing the things that that person that's you, the future version of you would already do. All you have to do is figure out what's the process, what are the disciplines of that type of person that already exists? You can model after that, follow the structure that's already been put in place by someone who's already done it, or already has become it. You follow it, and you can get the same result. So that's where confidence actually comes from, and it's based on following the disciplines, and you follow disciplines when you simply have a structure to plug yourself into. Michael Hingson ** 43:06 I am also a firm believer in the fact that if you try to fake it, people are going to see through it. People are generally smarter than people who fake it. Give them credit for being and the fact of the matter is, you can fake it all you want, but they're going to see through it. And the reality is, if you're authentic, no matter what you do, you're going to go a whole heck of a lot further Anyway, yes. So the other thing is that, when you're dealing with discipline and so on, another sort of phrase that comes to mind is the whole idea of mental toughness and and you've gotta be able to become tough enough to be able to cope with whatever you know you're going to be able to do, and you've gotta have the conviction to make it happen. That means you gotta be pretty tough internally, Dre Baldwin ** 43:54 yes, and that's another differentiating factor. All of these are differentiators, but mental toughness is about understanding that no matter how prepared you are, no matter how disciplined, how confident at some point along the way, many points along the way, things are not going to go the way that you expecting them to go. Something's going to go left, that you expect them to go right, a person's going to let you down. Just something randomly pops up that throws a wrench in your plans. And what people should understand is that everyone has these kind of things happen to them. Everyone has stuff happen in their lives. There's no one who is immune to this. The difference between the people who get to tell their story and everyone else, because everyone has a story, but not everyone has the luxury of getting their story heard, is that the people who get to tell their story are those who persevered through the stuff and came out on the other side to where they can tell their story. They created some success despite the stuff that they went through, and now, because you created the success, now you have this credibility, and you're on this sort of pedestal that makes people want to hear what you have to say and hear about your story. But it's not that the people who are in the audience don't have a story. Is simply that until you create a certain level of success, people don't care to hear your story. They only want to hear the story when you become a success. But you can't just be a success with no story. Instead of person who hasn't gone through stuff but they became quote unquote successful, nobody wants to hear that either. So you have to go through the process of going through the stuff, going through the challenges, the times where it looks like you're going to lose and you figure out a way to make it work. Then, once you're a success, now you get to tell your story. So that's what mental toughness is about. Michael Hingson ** 45:27 I wrote a book, and started it around the time the pandemic started began, and the idea behind the book was to teach people to learn that they can control fear and that fear doesn't need to overwhelm them and blind them and make them incapable of making decisions. And if they truly learn about fear and how to use it, they can use it in a very positive way to further them. And of course, that's for me. The example is what I learned in order that, as it turns out, I survived being in the World Trade Center on September 11 and escaping with a guide dog. And it's and it's all about really learning those skills, learning to be tough, learning to persevere, and at the same time, being, I think, resilient, and being able to go sometimes with the flow. You talked about the fact that, in reality, many times things will happen that you don't expect, and it can can take you down. But the other part about it is, if you analyze the things that are happening to you, especially when there's something that you don't expect happening, and it occurs, what are you going to do about it? What do you learn from that? And that's, I think the thing that most people never really discover is that they can go back and from all the challenges they face. They're not failures, and they can learn from that, and they just don't do that. Dre Baldwin ** 46:50 I agree with that completely. Is that, well, one reasons people don't tend to not look back often enough at the things that they've gone through, and also people are just not very people tend to not want to be too much of a critical thinker about themselves. Now, people will be critics of themselves or criticize themselves, but being a critical thinker doesn't necessarily mean beating yourself down. It just means looking at the situation and asking yourself, uh, given the same circumstances, if i What did I overlook at the beginning? What did I not notice that I sort of noticed, and of course, looking at what we know now after going through the situation, maybe what what I have done differently. But a lot of people don't take the time to really think critically about their own lives and their own situations. Therefore, they miss the opportunities in kind of debriefing, so to speak, as you describe it. And Michael Hingson ** 47:35 the other part about that is they don't develop, if you will, the mind muscle to be able to analyze and be introspective and learn from the challenges that happened, or even when they do something well, could I do it better? We don't. We don't tend to do that. And I think that so many people become so critical of themselves, it's a very negative thing. And I used to say it, I'm my own worst critic, because I like to listen to speeches that I give and learn from them. But over the past year, year and a half, what I really discovered is wrong thing to say. It's not I'm my own worst critic. I'm my own best teacher, which is absolutely true. I am the only one that can really teach me. And my own best teacher puts everything in a much more positive light. That's right, and which is cool. And you know, you, you, you certainly demonstrated a lot of personal initiative. You You stuck to it. You were mentally tough, and so on. And you build a business, and now that business, I gather, is pretty successful. You've written, what, 35 books, you've created lots of videos, and you continue to do things. What do you think the most important thing is that people get from you today and that they've gotten from you? Dre Baldwin ** 48:51 Great question. Well, I'll tell you the answer that I've gotten from people who work with us because I asked that question, I asked them, or I framed it by saying, I know, and you know, Mister client, that I'm not the only person in the world who does what I do, not the only person offering what I offer or talking about what I talk about. So what is it about my material? If you see an I sent an email, you see I just put out a video, or you're getting in a conversation with me, what is it about my approach that makes it different from anyone else who might be offering something similar in the marketplace, and the common answer that I get every time is, it's your style of delivery. So it's Dre you're no nonsense. You're no fluff. You get straight to the point. You're honest, you're objective, you keep it real. You do a good job of explaining different angles of things, while at the same time letting people know your opinion. So I just people tell me they just appreciate my style of communication. But nobody ever says, Dre you're the best in the world when it comes to talking about discipline or confidence or writing books or entrepreneurship or nobody ever says that even though I may be the best in the world, nobody says I'm the best in the world. They all say, we like the way that you get your point across. That's what they appreciate the most. Michael Hingson ** 50:01 Well, and I, I would buy into that anyway, because I think that authenticity and telling the truth in a way that that people can accept it is so important and and so often we don't see that. So I can appreciate them saying that to you. Dre Baldwin ** 50:18 Well, thank you. Michael Hingson ** 50:20 Me why? Yeah, go ahead. No, Dre Baldwin ** 50:22 I agree. Michael Hingson ** 50:24 Well, there you go. We'll see, see. Okay, we both bought into that one. Why is discipline more important than motivation? I mean, everybody talks about motivation. There are a lot of motivational speakers out there. I know that a lot of times I'm providing motivational or inspirational talks, but and I suspect that the answer you're going to give will explain the but, but, why is it that motivation isn't nearly as as crucial as discipline? Well, Dre Baldwin ** 50:51 just like you, Michael, I will give out motivational messages as well, so to speak. And if someone is booking me to speak and they say, need a motivational speaker, I'll take it right? They want me on the stage, so I'm good with that. The thing is, motivation and discipline are not diametrically opposed, and sometimes when we talk about these things, people tend to get the idea that they are like enemies. They're not enemies. They work together. The thing is, motivation comes and goes. We don't know when motivation is going to show up. Sometimes we're motivated, sometimes we're not, discipline always shows up. So even in the times when we are not motivated, if you're disciplined, you're still going to go to the gym, you're still going to write the next 500 words in your book, you're still going to record your show, you're still going to do the paperwork you're supposed to do. You'll still check your email inbox, whatever it is that you're supposed to do for the discipline. So motivation, if and when I have it, great, but if I don't have it, no one would know the days that I'm not motivated, because I'm still going to do the same work. So motivation is a good thing because, again, it'll get people fired up. It'll get you moving. It can light a fire under someone and get them to do something that they otherwise would not have done. The problem is motivation is much more temporary than the long term effects of discipline. So when people are going around looking for motivation, especially at the professional level, you're setting yourself up for a problem. Because at the professional level, you're getting paid to do something as your main occupation, which means you have to deliver consistently. The problem is motivation is not always there. So what will you do when you're not motivated? This is where discipline picks up. So what I advise people, and I give them a whole structure for this, is you need to take their short term motivations and convert them into long term disciplines, because that's the one that you can Michael Hingson ** 52:31 count on. I would also submit that those long term disciplines will greatly enhance the amount of time you're motivated as well. Good point, because the the reality is that the discipline
In this engaging episode of The Paul Taylor Podcast, I sit down with Dre Baldwin, a former elite athlete and transformative performance coach, who shares his journey from professional basketball to becoming a high-performance thought leader. We delve into the intricate world of mental resilience, exploring how discipline, confidence, and personal initiative can radically reshape your life trajectory—whether you're an athlete, entrepreneur, or someone seeking meaningful personal growth. From navigating the pressures of professional sports to building a personal brand that transcends athletic achievement, this conversation offers a masterclass in adapting, thriving, and consistently elevating your performance across all domains of life. If you're looking to understand how top performers think, develop unshakeable mental toughness, and turn challenges into opportunities for growth, this episode is packed with actionable insights that will challenge and inspire you. Key Topics: From Professional Basketball to High-Performance Coaching: An Athlete's Journey The Mental Game: Navigating Pressure, Passion, and Performance The Power of Discipline: Keys to Success in Sport, Business, and Personal Development Mental Toughness and Confidence: Beyond "Fake It Till You Make It" Accountability and Personal Initiative: Strategies for Continuous Improvement Key Takeaways: Build genuine confidence through consistent disciplined action, not by faking it. Maintain daily discipline to keep yourself in forward motion and naturally boost motivation. Always prepare for career transitions by developing complementary skills and maintaining a long-term perspective. Create robust accountability systems, such as finding a partner or establishing formal check-ins to maintain progress. Intentionally seek out challenging tasks that promote personal growth and psychological resilience. Replace unhealthy stress management techniques with holistic performance habits that support your overall well-being. Take radical personal responsibility by proactively creating opportunities and viewing challenges as chances for development. Connect with Dre Baldwin: Learn more about Dre BaldwinDre Baldwin on InstagramDre Baldwin on YouTube Dre Baldwin on LinkedInDre Baldwin on XConnect with Paul Taylor:Learn more about Paul TaylorPaul Taylor on LinkedInPaul Taylor on InstagramPaul Taylor on YouTube Support the Podcast:If you found this episode valuable, please consider subscribing, rating, and leaving a review on your preferred podcast platform. Your support helps us reach more people with important conversations like this one. Share this episode with someone who might benefit from hearing it—emotional eating is more common than we think, and this conversation could make a difference in someone's life.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
How do you turn ideas into impact and expertise into action? On this episode of Leveraging Thought Leadership, Peter Winick speaks with Dre Baldwin, Founder and CEO of Work on Your Game. Dre is a four-time TEDx speaker and author of 35 books, including "The Third Day: The Decision that Separates The Pros from the Amateurs" and the creator of the Work on Your Game framework. Together, they unpack the critical role frameworks play in scaling ideas and ensuring consistency. Dre shares how frameworks act as guardrails, anchoring your principles and making your work repeatable and impactful across topics and audiences. Dre emphasizes the power of mindset as the foundation for success. A shift in thinking sparks changes in actions, which in turn drive outcomes. Skipping this sequence leads to frustration, wasted resources, and unmet goals. Whether you're an athlete or an entrepreneur, Dre insists the process starts in your head. From there, strategies and systems create a path for repeatable success. Systems aren't just efficient—they're liberating. Build it once, and you can focus on execution and innovation. Dre's own journey began with a realization: the clock on a professional basketball career runs out fast. Embracing his inner tech enthusiast, Dre leveraged the internet to bypass gatekeepers and build his brand. Blogging, YouTube, and podcasting became his tools to connect directly with an audience eager for his insights. His approach? Show up consistently and deliver value based on real-time audience needs. It's a formula he's honed into a repeatable system, and it's working. Writing 35 books might seem Herculean, but Dre demystifies it with a system that maximizes today's tech. From dictation to transcription, he's found ways to streamline the creative process while staying true to his ideas. The tools evolve, but the challenge remains the same: having something meaningful to say and a receptive audience. For Dre, systems make the execution scalable—but only if you start with a strong mindset and clear strategy. Three Key Takeaways: • Frameworks Anchor Success: A strong framework acts as a guide, keeping your work aligned with your principles and making it repeatable. It ensures consistency and clarity across topics and audiences, which is essential for scaling impact. • Mindset Drives Results: Change starts in your mind. Adjusting your thinking leads to better actions, which then create meaningful outcomes. Skipping the mindset step results in frustration and wasted effort. • Systems Simplify and Scale: Whether writing books or building a business, systems are the key to efficiency. Once a system is in place, you can focus on execution and innovation, letting the process do the heavy lifting. Dre does a great job of illustrating why changing mindset is so important to creating long lasting impact. For additional information on Changing Mindset and Building Skills take a look at this article by Thought Leadership Leverage CEO Peter Winick.
Are you feeling overwhelmed and struggling to prioritize your time as a school leader? In this episode, I share some exciting news about my upcoming digital course, Take Control of Your Leadership:. This course is designed to help you overcome overwhelm, focus on what truly matters, and lead with clarity, and it's LIVE - go to theprincipalacademy.com and check out Take Control of Your Leadership.And now...about our guest on this week's episode:Dre Baldwin is CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc. He has given 4 TEDxTalks and has authored 35 books. Dre's content has been consumed over 103 million times. His daily Work On Your Game MasterClass has amassed over 2,900 episodes and over 7.3 million listeners. Dre had a 9-year professional basketball career, playing in 8 countries. Dre's framework is the "roadmap in reverse" for professional High Performance, Consistency and Results. Website: workonyourgameuniversity.comSocial Media: http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwinhttp://YouTube.com/Dreupthttps://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversityhttp://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDayhttp://Twitter.com/DreAllDayhttp://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame
Dave Lukas, The Misfit Entrepreneur_Breakthrough Entrepreneurship
This week's Misfit Entrepreneur is Dre Baldwin. Dre is an interesting entrepreneur who owns the brand, Work on Your Game. He is a former pro-basketball player playing in 8 countries during this career. But, he wasn't a superstar from the start. He had to work harder than anyone and walk on at a division 3 school to get his shot. And he made the most of it succeeding and turning pro. He was an early adopter of YouTube and has a massive following and since leaving pro basketball, he has authored 35 books, created over 400 products, given 4 Ted Talks on Discipline, Confidence, Mental Toughness, and Personal Initiative. His daily Work on Your Game Masterclass has been downloaded over 7.5 million times! Hearing all of that, you can see why I asked him to be on the show and I love his no-nonsense straightforward approach to success because it's a lot like mine. www.WorkonYourGame.com To see the full show notes and Misfit 3 for this episode, go to www.MisfitEntrepreneur.com. Show Sponsors: Entrepreneurs, what if there was a way to know you were hiring the best salespeople to drive your business? How much would that help your success? Well, with SalesDrive's DriveTest, you can! Drive is composed of three non-teachable traits shared by all top producers: Need for Achievement, Competitiveness, and Optimism. You can get a FREE DriveTest assessment to help you in your hiring efforts at www.MisfitEntrepreneur.com/SalesDrive 5 Minute Journal: www.MisfitEntrepreneur.com/Journal
Today Lori welcomes Dre Baldwin, a former professional basketball player turned entrepreneur. Dre shares his journey from navigating the competitive sports world to building a successful business. Dre highlights the importance of mindset, resilience, and personal development, drawing parallels between his athletic and entrepreneurial experiences. He discusses leveraging platforms like YouTube to build his brand and to connect with his audience. Lori and Dre discuss the significance of discipline, responsibility, and continuous growth in achieving success. Dre is offering all listeners a free copy of his book - just cover shipping and handling. To receive his free book - The Third Day: The Decision That Separates The Pros From The Amateurs click HERE. Connect with Dre: Website Instagram YouTube Facebook LinkedIn Twitter TikTok Resources: Are you frustrated that your business isn't growing? "Messy to Magnetic: Unlocking the Secret to Effective Marketing" is a free course that goes over the top 10 mistakes small business owners make with attracting their ideal client and converting those clients to leads. Click here for your free gift! Join Lori's private Facebook group - Make Your Marketing Simple. Lori interviews her guests in the group (giving you advance listening!) and has a community of small business owners just like yourself to connect and grow their businesses. Join now! Schedule a Website Biz Accelerator call. Answer just a few questions and Lori will audit your website for the ONE biggest change you can make to your site to get more clients. Schedule here! Connect with Lori Check out this episode!
Dre Baldwin is CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game who's done 4 TEDxTalks and has authored 35 books after a 9-year professional basketball career. What problem do we solve? This episode focuses on helping business owners and entrepreneurs tackle common mental hurdles—like self-doubt, lack of discipline, and fear of failure—that hold them back from achieving their full potential. Dre Baldwin shares powerful insights on building mental toughness, developing discipline, and fostering a confident mindset. Listeners will learn practical strategies for staying motivated and making confident decisions, empowering them to grow their businesses and set themselves up for a successful 2025. Small Business Answer Man Show Notes: Discussion on overcoming mental blocks that limit business growth, such as self-doubt and fear of failure Dre Baldwin's journey to mastering discipline, resilience, and confidence, and how these skills have shaped his career Practical strategies for building a strong mindset and improving mental toughness in challenging times Key habits and routines for maintaining motivation and focus as an entrepreneur Tips for making decisions with confidence, even when faced with uncertainty Insights on turning negative thoughts into opportunities for growth and progress Advice on setting realistic goals for business success in the coming year How to handle rejection and failure in a way that builds resilience Actionable steps to cultivate discipline, consistency, and productivity daily A look into Dre's philosophy on "Work On Your Game" and how it applies to entrepreneurship Dre emphasizes the importance of defining goals before offering advice, noting that without understanding a person's specific goals, it's impossible to provide meaningful guidance. He illustrates the difference in goals using an example: two people in a gym may have different objectives—one aiming for the NBA and the other to become a YouTuber. Dre outlines a framework for success: develop your skills, perform consistently, produce results, and ultimately achieve rewards aligned with your goals. He also discusses the importance of discipline over motivation, explaining that motivation is fleeting, while discipline allows for consistent performance regardless of external circumstances. Professionalism means delivering consistently to get paid consistently—this reliability cannot be built on motivation alone. Dre shares three "future-proof" skills: strong communication, sales skills, and discernment, stating these will always be in demand. He introduces his book The Third Day, which covers discipline and the idea of consistently delivering top effort, even when challenging. He suggests mindset as the foundation of success, mediocrity, and failure, emphasizing the importance of mindset in achieving business results. Dre concludes with a call to action, encouraging listeners to focus on discipline and min Dre Baldwin Advice for Leaders: Focus on showing up every day, even if it's just small progress. Consistency builds trust, skill, and results over time. Instead of fearing failure, treat setbacks as valuable lessons that contribute to personal and business growth. Define specific, realistic goals to stay motivated and focused, breaking them into actionable steps to make progress manageable. Push yourself outside of your comfort zone regularly to strengthen mental toughness and adaptability. Surround yourself with mentors and like-minded individuals who encourage and challenge you to grow. Prioritize your physical and mental health to maintain energy, focus, and a positive outlook on your journey. Always clarify the other person's goals before giving advice—assuming can lead to misaligned guidance. Rely on discipline rather than motivation; discipline ensures consistency even when motivation fades. Develop "future-proof" skills, such as communication, sales, and discernment, which remain valuable in any field. Focus on mindset as it shapes all outcomes; a strong mindset leads to actions that drive results. Set clear goals and track progress regularly, especially in the last quarter of the year, to propel long-term growth. Get Dre's book at https://www.thirddaybook.com/ Connect with Dre Baldwin: Website Facebook Instagram Youtube Twitter Tiktok Linkedin Clarity Navigator Discovery Session – Sign Up HERE
Are you ready to turn your life's biggest challenges into your greatest opportunities for growth? In this episode of Life in Transition, Dre Baldwin shares his powerful insights on navigating life's twists and turns with the right mindset. Known for his discipline, resilience, and approach to achieving excellence, Dre dives into the strategies that helped him thrive through every transition in his life.From his career shift as a professional athlete to becoming a successful entrepreneur, Dre opens up about the mindset tools he used to stay focused and motivated, even in the face of setbacks. He discusses the importance of self-discipline, goal setting, and how to reframe challenges into opportunities for growth. Dre's approach isn't just about surviving transitions; it's about embracing them as a vital part of your journey to self-mastery and success.Dre offers practical advice on how to strengthen their resilience, maintain a growth-oriented mindset, and turn life's inevitable changes into stepping stones for achieving their dreams. Whether you're facing a career shift, personal loss, or simply looking for ways to level up your mindset, this episode provides the actionable tools and inspiration you need to make it happen.In this episode, we'll talk about:Reframing Challenges: Dre explains how shifting your perspective on challenges can transform them into opportunities for personal growth.Mindset Mastery: Techniques for developing a mindset that thrives in times of uncertainty and transition.The Power of Self-Discipline: How staying disciplined can help you navigate any life shift with clarity and purpose.Goal Setting for Success: Dre's strategies for setting clear, actionable goals that drive long-term growth.Turning Setbacks into Stepping Stones: How to use failures and obstacles as learning tools for future success.Resilience Building: Dre's tips on how to strengthen your resilience in the face of life's ups and downs.Embracing Change: The importance of embracing life's transitions as a path to discovering your true potential.Connect with Dre Baldwin :Website: DreAllDayInstagram: @drebaldwinLinkedIn: Dre (DreAllDay) BaldwinFacebook: Dre BaldwinYoutube: Dre BaldwinMentioned on the Show:My new book PURPOSEFUL LIVING is out now. Order it now: https://a.co/d/cJKOpo6Let's connect! Follow us on social media for a daily dose of inspiration, updates, and behind-the-scenes moments.FacebookInstagramXLinkedInYouTubeExplore our website for more in-depth information, resources, and to download the 8-step guide to mastering mid-life transitions.The views and opinions expressed on the Life In Transition podcast are solely those of the author and guests and should not be attributed to any other individual or entity. This podcast is an independent production of Life In Transition, and the podcast production is an original work of the author. All rights of ownership and reproduction are retained—copyright 2024.
Send us a textEver wondered how a Division III college basketball player could become a digital content powerhouse? Meet Dre Baldwin, whose extraordinary journey from the court to the digital realm is nothing short of inspiring. Join us as we uncover Dre's path to success, built not on a single viral moment but on relentless consistency since 2005. His transformation from basketball tutorials to a mindset coach is a masterclass in personal branding, showcasing how authenticity and dedicated content creation can pave the way for an empire of over 100 million views online.Explore the nuances of personal branding and its power to monetize influence in today's digital landscape. Through Dre's experiences, learn how a focused, engaged audience can be more valuable than sheer numbers. We'll share insights into Dre's early ventures into YouTube ad revenue and selling basketball training programs, illustrating how these early steps evolved into significant income streams. Dre's story is a testament to the importance of targeted audience engagement and the immense potential of turning digital influence into tangible success.In this deep dive, the importance of leveraging personal strengths and embracing collaboration is a recurring theme. Discover Dre's proactive approach to outreach, where strategic emails and personalized outreach videos highlight the impact of merging digital marketing with traditional methods. Whether you're building a personal brand or elevating your business presence, this episode offers strategies for maintaining a positive online footprint and crafting a legacy that stands the test of time. Get ready to master the art of personal branding and digital marketing with insights that could transform your approach to success.Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Follow The Brand! We hope you enjoyed learning about the latest marketing trends and strategies in Personal Branding, Business and Career Development, Financial Empowerment, Technology Innovation, and Executive Presence. To keep up with the latest insights and updates from us, be sure to follow us at 5starbdm.com. See you next time on Follow The Brand!
8:35Quickfire Questions with Dre BaldwinMichael Wright outlined the format for the discussion with Dre Baldwin, starting with quickfire questions before delving into Dre's background and work. Dre shared his enthusiasm for the current political climate, noting that he remains neutral but sees opportunities for content engagement. They also touched on childhood sports memories, with Dre recalling his admiration for Deion Sanders and significant sports moments from his youth.14:02Insights on Sports Discipline and Personal JourneyDre Baldwin highlighted the importance of discipline in sports, referencing Derek Jeter's approach to professionalism while playing for the Yankees. He criticized the San Antonio Spurs' resting policy for star players, calling it unnecessary, and expressed his annoyance with coach Greg Popovich's political views. Michael Wright agreed, sharing his frustration about missing star players during games he stayed up late to watch.16:46Mindset Development and Its Impact on PerformanceDre Baldwin shared his journey from teaching basketball techniques to emphasizing the significance of mindset, which he found to be valuable beyond sports. He explained that mindset is the subconscious setting of the mind, influencing thoughts and actions. Baldwin's interest in personal development and human psychology, combined with his own experiences as an athlete, led him to recognize the need for mindset training in both sports and business contexts.22:14Discipline and Structure in Achieving SuccessMichael Wright and Dre Baldwin highlight the critical role of discipline in personal and professional success, noting that many people struggle to maintain consistent effort. Baldwin argues that discipline is not merely about motivation but is a natural outcome of following a structured system. He suggests that individuals should seek external accountability, such as hiring a coach, to help establish and respect this structure.34:25Transitioning from Athlete to EntrepreneurMichael Wright asked Dre Baldwin about his initial ambitions when he decided to leave basketball for entrepreneurship. Dre Baldwin explained that he had been consistently publishing content and had already established an audience prior to his transition, which allowed him to build on his existing foundation rather than starting from zero. He emphasized that his journey was not typical for athletes who often face a complete career shift.36:27TEDx Speaking Engagements and Content CreationDre Baldwin recounted how a podcast interview with Derek Sivers motivated him to pursue professional speaking. He reached out to Sivers for guidance, who suggested starting with TEDx talks. Baldwin then applied to numerous TEDx events, successfully securing several speaking engagements while highlighting the need to embrace rejection as part of the process.40:20TED Talk Insights and Personal BrandingDre Baldwin discussed the content of his TED talks, which revolve around concepts like showing up when motivation is low and building confidence despite self-doubt. He explained how his experiences as an athlete shaped these topics and how he uses copywriting techniques to create engaging presentations. Baldwin also mentioned the importance of establishing credibility and a strong personal narrative when presenting ideas.51:21Discussion on Athlete Potential and PerformanceMichael Wright discussed the challenges in identifying high-potential athletes who may not be performing well at the moment. He highlighted the need for a systematic approach to player evaluation that considers factors like discipline and consistency. Dre Baldwin shared his personal experience as an athlete who faced similar challenges, emphasizing the importance of nurturing potential. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Discipline Over Motivation: How to Master Confidence and Purpose with Dre BaldwinIn this impactful episode, Sam Wakefield is joined by Dre Baldwin, CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game, to explore the secrets behind true success. Together, they break down why discipline and systems are far more reliable than motivation when it comes to achieving lasting results. Dre shares his proven strategies for cultivating discipline, establishing systems that work, and consistently performing at a high level.The conversation also delves into how to generate genuine confidence and why it's critical to understand your deeper purpose—your “why”—to maintain focus and drive. Dre's unique insights from his professional basketball career and his journey as an entrepreneur provide powerful takeaways for sales professionals, entrepreneurs, and anyone aiming to elevate their performance.Key Topics Covered:The difference between discipline and motivation, and why one matters moreHow to implement systems that ensure consistent successTechniques to build and sustain unshakeable confidenceFinding and using your “why” to fuel your journeyIf you're ready to master the mental game and take your performance to the next level, don't miss this episode!Dre's Bio:Dre Baldwin is CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc. He has given 4 TEDxTalks and has authored 35 books. Dre's content has been consumed over 103 million times. His daily Work On Your Game MasterClass has amassed over 3,100 episodes and over 7.3 million listeners. Dre had a 9-year professional basketball career, playing in 8 countries. Dre's framework is the "roadmap in reverse" for professional High Performance, Consistency and Results. ---Web: http://WorkOnYourGame.com/DrePhotos: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1RIakBrvuHNp5IuwQiaur1mdK9qrHqj2a?usp=drive_linkSocial:http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwinhttp://YouTube.com/Dreupthttps://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversityhttp://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDayhttp://Twitter.com/DreAllDayhttp://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGameHost...
Mike “C-Roc” welcomes the unstoppable Dre Baldwin, a powerhouse in performance coaching and founder of Work on Your Game. Known for his resilience, Dre shares his incredible journey from Division III college basketball to a nine-year professional career spanning eight countries. He explains how he built his brand through consistent daily content and the tenacity required to make an impact online long before it was mainstream. Dre, who has published 35 books and delivered four TEDx talks, emphasizes the importance of persistence, discipline, and self-confidence. His philosophy—"just keep showing up"—is an inspiring roadmap for anyone facing obstacles on their path to greatness. Tune in to discover Dre's four pillars of success, how he fuels creativity, and why consistency is the ultimate differentiator in both sports and business. Website - http://workonyourgame.com/Dre Social Media Links/Handles: http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwin http://YouTube.com/Dreupt https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay http://Twitter.com/DreAllDay http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame
Researchers suggest that willpower and self-discipline can weaken after doing sequential tasks, much like an overused muscle strained to fatigue or a battery that has lost its charge. The results proved interesting in looking at the two groups—one that ate cookies (requiring no willpower) and one that ate radishes (exercising their willpower against the tantalizing cookie smell). Do you want more success? Increase your willpower? Have unlimited confidence? Join me for this week's podcast on Get Your Game On With Dre Baldwin. I will interview Dre Baldwin, who will give you more willpower and confidence and help you get game in the business world. Discover the keys of a professional athlete that will dramatically increase your success. What is your Persuasion IQ? FInd out here for free! For more info about Dre find his info here.
Many of us struggle to stay motivated and consistent long enough to achieve our life and fitness goals. This week's guest, Dre Baldwin, reveals how you can build a disciplined mindset, break down your journey into manageable steps, and stay on track for lasting success.Dre, also known as "DreAllDay,” is a former professional basketball player who transitioned into entrepreneurship, becoming the founder of "Work On Your Game." Dre has worked with major brands like Nike, Wilson, and Gatorade and has coached countless individuals on performing at their highest level.In this episode, Dre reveals his four-part framework and explains how its principles apply not only to athletes but also to business professionals and anyone seeking to achieve high performance. He emphasizes the importance of discipline, overcoming the "Third Day" slump, and taking consistent action, even without motivation. Join us for practical tips to build mental toughness and a disciplined mindset for long-term success in life and fitness.Timestamps:04:50 Dre Baldwin's journey to basketball and entrepreneurship15:24 Transitioning from basketball to weekly mindset training 20:05 Applying mindset to life and fitness: the “Third Day” concept25:41 Dre Baldwin's Four Pillars of Success27:14 Developing a winning strategy and effective systems 29:10 Accountability and implementation33:28 When transitioning to a new career36:34 How to become a better leader39:40 The power of writing things down44:07 Introducing the “Work On Your Game” framework46:30 How to expand your existing resourcesThe Third Day BookDre Baldwin's book, The Third Day: The Decision That Separates The Pros From The Amateurs, is available now.Get your FREE copy (just cover shipping!) at: https://www.thirddaybook.com/the-third-dayz7fdhqqn?affiliate_id=4278028 Join ‘Work On Your Game' University: http://www.WorkOnYourGameUniversity.com Subscribe and Listen on iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-over-40-alpha-podcast/id1446632685 Listen to This Episode on Your Favourite Podcast Channel: www.over40alphapodcast.comYour support of the Over 40 Alpha Podcast helps to spread the word and ultimately change the lives of men worldwide over 40, 50, and 60 who struggle with health and fitness.I want to give a MASSIVE thanks to everyone stepping up and leaving 5-star reviews.Please Review and Share the Podcast Here:Drop that 5-star review.https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-over-40-alpha-podcast/id1446632685Connect with Dre Baldwin:Website -
Welcome back to another insightful episode of *Mick Unplugged*! In today's show, we're diving deep into the fascinating journey of Dre Baldwin, renowned former professional basketball player turned entrepreneurial powerhouse. Alongside hosts Dre Baldwin and Mick Hunt, we explore how Dre kicked off his parallel career in the digital space while playing basketball internationally, transforming his passion into a thriving business. We'll uncover Dre's initial steps into content creation on YouTube, selling $5 basketball training programs, and eventually shifting gears towards motivational content that resonates beyond the court. From self-publishing books to his innovative "roadmap in reverse" framework, Dre's story is a blueprint for aspiring entrepreneurs. Our discussion touches on the hustle culture, highlighting the crucial blend of hard work, strategy, and execution necessary for sustained success. Mick and Dre dissect the balance between talent and effort, the power of focusing on outcomes, and practical advice for entrepreneurs looking to maximize their impact. Tune in for an enriching conversation filled with real-life anecdotes, strategic insights, and a motivational push to strive for greatness. Stick around to hear how Dre's journey can inspire your path to personal and professional growth. Let's get started! Takeaways: · Starting late in basketball didn't deter Dre; he found his path through hard work. · Consistency in content creation has led to Dre's massive audience engagement. · Hustle is important, but strategy is essential for sustainable success. · Understanding the 80-20 principle can help entrepreneurs focus on impactful actions. · Plans may change, but the process of planning is invaluable. · Focusing on outcomes rather than outputs leads to better results. Questions & Answers: 1. Question: Mick Hunt: "Dre, how have you maintained motivation and consistency since 2005, creating around 30,000 pieces of content?" Answer: Dre Baldwin: "Consistency is about showing up every day. Over Dre, it's the cumulative effort that counts, not any single viral piece. This approach built my audience and kept athletes returning for advice, eventually expanding my coaching business." 2. Question: Mick Hunt: "Can you explain your 'roadmap in reverse' framework?" Answer: Dre Baldwin: "Start with the end goal and work backwards to identify necessary steps. This method helped me secure a basketball career and later, plan my business ventures by breaking down large goals into manageable actions." 3. Question: Mick Hunt: "How do you balance hustle with strategy for long-term success?" Answer: Dre Baldwin: "Hustle gets you started, but strategy sustains you. I hustled early on, but scaling required studying the market and refining my approach. Combining hard work with smart planning allowed me to effectively grow my business." Sound Bites · "His content has been consumed over 103 million Drees." · "I started selling $5 training programs." · "Hard work is an element of success, not the key." Connect and DiscoverLinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/dreallday Instagram: Instagram.com/drebaldwin Facebook: facebook.com/DreBaldwin Website: https://www.drebaldwin.com/dre-dreallday-baldwin https://www.workonyourgameuniversity.com/ Podcast: Work On Your GameSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Dre Baldwin is a multi-hyphenate entrepreneur who is proof you don't need resources to become great, only yourself and your own convictions. He is a former pro baller turned Founder and CEO of Work on Your Game Inc. whose hustle broke all the rules. Now, the business influencer has created something that's more than a mental framework. It's a roadmap in reverse to separating winners from the other guys…and the key to dominating your game, whatever field, court or profession you play.Website: www.workonyourgameuniversity.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drebaldwin/?hl=en Twitter: https://x.com/dreallday?lang=en Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DreBaldwin/Check out our YouTube channel: https://youtu.be/XVsuuNxGceo
Dre Baldwin joins the Rise to the Challenge Podcast to share his inspiring journey from professional basketball to becoming a successful entrepreneur. Dre played at an international level, where he showcased his skills and built a reputation for excellence on and off the court. In this episode, he opens up about his transition into motivational speaking and writing as an author, as well as his vision behind the brand 'Work On Your Game.' We dive deep into the struggles he faced along the way and how he overcame them to build his own empire. Learn more about Dre Baldwin: - http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwin - http://YouTube.com/Dreupt - https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity - http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay - http://Twitter.com/DreAllDay - http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame Rise to the Challenge Podcast is dedicated to unveiling Real Life Stories and Genuine Motivations that resonate across All Generations. In every episode, we invite a diverse array of guests, spanning various backgrounds, experiences, and age groups, to share their personal narratives of triumph over adversity, achieving their goals, and embracing the call to rise to the challenge. Our guests bring authenticity to the forefront, delving into the intricacies of their journeys because, ultimately, we all navigate our unique stories. Join us on this compelling journey as our guests open up about their experiences. You might find connections to your own narrative, discover new insights, and gain inspiration when our guests generously share their stories. What challenges are you currently facing, and how are you rising to them? Subscribe to Youtube Channel: @risetothechallengepodcast
"I noticed opportunities and I would show up." -Dre Baldwin Dre never saw failures or disappointment-- he only saw opportunity. As a young athlete with a desire to get better, he sought out opportunities to get himself in position to get better. He was always working on his game and now he wants you to work on your game. When you're stuck, or you can't seem to get traction, you need to “put yourself on a better roster“ and that means surrounding yourself with better people. Dre has built a first class coaching platform. To improve, you need confidence and you need experience. Dre‘s going to help you get both. You will find greater success and a balanced life. Work to collaborate. Work on your mindset. Work on your game.
Let's pick up right where we left off. I'm laying it out straight—here's why I avoid the corporate grind. I'd rather be honest and deal with the fallout than play the fake game and get caught up in office politics. I chose the independent route because in my world, honesty and real results matter more than fitting into a corporate mold. Show Notes: [02:37]#7 I would rather be honest and piss you off than lie to please you. [09:03]#8 I cannot stomach seeing incompetent and fake people being rewarded for bullshit. I can't deal with it. [17:13]#9 The educational system is designed to train you to succeed in the corporate world. [22:17]Recap Episodes Mentioned: 2219: The 12 Work On Your Game Commandments [#1-3] 1663: Your Favorite Flavor Of "Shit Sandwich" Next Steps: Text Dre Baldwin: Text Dre at 1.305.384.6894 (or go to http://www.DreAllDay.com/Text) Work On Your Game University: http://www.WorkOnYourGameUniversity.com Sponsor: AG1 by Athletic Greens: http://drinkAG1.com/WORKONYOURGAME Get Dre's Emails FREE: Http://WorkOnMyGame.com Free Audiobooks: The Third Day: http://www.ThirdDayBook.com/audible The Mirror Of Motivation: http://www.MirrorOfMotivation.com/audible Get The Free Books: The Third Day: http://ThirdDayBook.com The Mirror Of Motivation: http://MirrorOfMotivation.com The Overseas Basketball Blueprint: http://BallOverseas.com Basketball: How To Play As Well As You Practice: http://HoopHandbook.com/Free Donate: CashApp: http://Cash.app/$DreBaldwin PayPal: http://PayPal.me/DreAllDay Be sure to Subscribe to have each new episode sent directly to you daily! If you're enjoying Work On Your Game, please Review the show and let us know! Dre on social media: Instagram [http://instagram.com/DreBaldwin] Facebook [http://Facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity] Twitter / X [http://X.com/DreAllDay] YouTube [http://youtube.com/dreupt] Facebook Business Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/6figuresandgrowing/ All Episodes + FULL Work On Your Game Podcast archive at: http://WorkOnYourGamePodcast.com
In this class, I'm diving into why I'm not built for the corporate world. If you've ever felt like you don't fit into the “go along to get along” culture, you'll get where I'm coming from. I break down how I'm wired differently, why I can't be fake, and why being my own boss is the only way that works for me. Show Notes: [02:56]#4 I lack the ability to go along to get along. [10:06]#5 I cannot deal with people being fake, nor can I pretend to be fake. [18:19]#6 I'm good at climbing ladders. I just don't want to. [22:24]Recap Episodes Mentioned: 2764: There Are No "Safe Spaces" In Real Life 2765: How To Create Your Real-Life "Safe Space" 2672: Entrepreneurs: Stop Climbing Ladders Next Steps: Text Dre Baldwin: Text Dre at 1.305.384.6894 (or go to http://www.DreAllDay.com/Text) Work On Your Game University: http://www.WorkOnYourGameUniversity.com Sponsor: AG1 by Athletic Greens: http://drinkAG1.com/WORKONYOURGAME Get Dre's Emails FREE: Http://WorkOnMyGame.com Free Audiobooks: The Third Day: http://www.ThirdDayBook.com/audible The Mirror Of Motivation: http://www.MirrorOfMotivation.com/audible Get The Free Books: The Third Day: http://ThirdDayBook.com The Mirror Of Motivation: http://MirrorOfMotivation.com The Overseas Basketball Blueprint: http://BallOverseas.com Basketball: How To Play As Well As You Practice: http://HoopHandbook.com/Free Donate: CashApp: http://Cash.app/$DreBaldwin PayPal: http://PayPal.me/DreAllDay Be sure to Subscribe to have each new episode sent directly to you daily! If you're enjoying Work On Your Game, please Review the show and let us know! Dre on social media: Instagram [http://instagram.com/DreBaldwin] Facebook [http://Facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity] Twitter / X [http://X.com/DreAllDay] YouTube [http://youtube.com/dreupt] Facebook Business Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/6figuresandgrowing/ All Episodes + FULL Work On Your Game Podcast archive at: http://WorkOnYourGamePodcast.com
In this class, I'm breaking down why I can't work in the corporate world full-time. Just like I talked about in episode 1667, where I explained why politics isn't for me, the reasons are pretty much the same. Today, I'll share why I wouldn't make it in the corporate space either. Show Notes: [03:23]#1 I am very good at following rules and processes. I simply just don't want to. [11:27]#2 I say too many things that are complete nonsense that I cannot hold my tongue about and not say something. [22:25]#3 I refuse to have bosses. I just don't want anybody telling me what to do. [26:56]Recap Episodes Mentioned: 1667: Dre For President? Governor? Mayor? Why I'd FAIL In Politics 997: Why You Need To Start A Podcast 2338: The TRASH That Is The American Medical System Next Steps: Text Dre Baldwin: Text Dre at 1.305.384.6894 (or go to http://www.DreAllDay.com/Text) Work On Your Game University: http://www.WorkOnYourGameUniversity.com Sponsor: AG1 by Athletic Greens: http://drinkAG1.com/WORKONYOURGAME Get Dre's Emails FREE: Http://WorkOnMyGame.com Free Audiobooks: The Third Day: http://www.ThirdDayBook.com/audible The Mirror Of Motivation: http://www.MirrorOfMotivation.com/audible Get The Free Books: The Third Day: http://ThirdDayBook.com The Mirror Of Motivation: http://MirrorOfMotivation.com The Overseas Basketball Blueprint: http://BallOverseas.com Basketball: How To Play As Well As You Practice: http://HoopHandbook.com/Free Donate: CashApp: http://Cash.app/$DreBaldwin PayPal: http://PayPal.me/DreAllDay Be sure to Subscribe to have each new episode sent directly to you daily! If you're enjoying Work On Your Game, please Review the show and let us know! Dre on social media: Instagram [http://instagram.com/DreBaldwin] Facebook [http://Facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity] Twitter / X [http://X.com/DreAllDay] YouTube [http://youtube.com/dreupt] Facebook Business Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/6figuresandgrowing/ All Episodes + FULL Work On Your Game Podcast archive at: http://WorkOnYourGamePodcast.com
SummaryIn this episode of BizNinja Radio Show, host Tyler Jorgenson interviews Dre Baldwin, a former professional basketball player and the founder of Work on Your Game University. Dre shares his inspiring journey from walking onto a Division III basketball team to becoming a pro athlete and eventually an entrepreneur. His story is one of resilience, determination, and mental toughness, as he navigated through setbacks and found success both on and off the court. Dre talks about how he built his brand by focusing on mindset, confidence, and discipline—traits that have been essential in his transition from sports to coaching and business.Dre also reflects on his early career, where he faced numerous challenges, including periods of unemployment between contracts, working odd jobs, and even sending out 10,000 cold emails to get noticed by basketball teams. Through his experiences, Dre developed a results-driven mentality that he now shares with his clients through Work on Your Game University. He helps entrepreneurs, athletes, and professionals perform at their highest levels by focusing on mental fortitude and consistent execution.Listeners will come away with actionable insights on how to develop a winning mindset, stay persistent through difficult times, and embrace discipline as the key to achieving long-term success. Dre's philosophy of asking the right questions and stepping into the version of yourself that you want to become is a game-changer for anyone looking to level up in business or life.TakeawaysResilience and Perseverance: Dre's journey highlights the importance of persistence, whether it's through sending thousands of cold emails or navigating through career transitions.Mindset over Actions: Dre emphasizes that success comes not just from hard work but from focusing on who you need to "be" to achieve your goals, a crucial element for entrepreneurs.Confidence Through Discipline: Consistent discipline is the foundation of confidence. Dre explains how sticking to your routine and showing up daily helps build unshakable belief in yourself and your work.Chapters00:00 Introduction and Dre Baldwin's Background08:35 Transitioning from Basketball to Entrepreneurship16:01 The Importance of Mindset and Overcoming Challenges21:42 Building Work On Your Game University and Delegating25:43 Starting Over and Pricing Strategies28:28 Where to Find Dre Baldwin
Mark interviews Dre Baldwin the CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc. about his books and his experience helping others in finding their own paths to success. Prior to the interview Mark shares comments from recent episodes, a personal update, and a word about this episode's sponsor This episode is sponsored by FROM PAGE TO PLATFORM by Matty Dalrymple and Michael La Ronn. You can learn more about the book at https://theindyauthor.com/platform. During the interview, Mark and Dre talk about: The importance of the simplification process as a great place to begin The 80/20 rule and the less-than-smooth ways we have of not being able to drop the 80% How, over time, Dre has accumulated little pieces of wisdom that have ended up being part of the training and coaching that he does The first question that Dre often asks which is: What is your goal? The challenge of being inundated with so many messages which results in trying to work on more than one priority How Dre has always been a big reader and a bit of a closet computer geek The appeal of self-generated media and being able to articulate his ideas Putting videos on YouTube about the basketball he was playing professionally and how other players began to take advantage of his advice and coaching How even people who weren't playing sports could benefit from those basketball videos, which led to Dre recognizing he could help people beyond athletes How a lot of Dre's mindset stuff started to come out around 2009/2010 Blogging his ideas and starting to put out his books How discipline is the most important hallmark of the professional The way people can fall off their structure and the importance of finding the structure that works best for you Coaches being one of the ways that people can find/apply the proper structure How a true professional holds themselves accountable to a structure Shortcuts as something that can come from the right coach The way that a coach can KEEP a professional athlete good Human beings doing better work when accountability is involved The importance of showing yourself the same respect you would show to a "boss" or some other supervisor or superior you report to at work How the two golden questions related to your goal (What do you want and why do you want it?) help you build that bridge to the structure that can get you there Knowing that he had always wanted to write a book and combining that with the fact he knew he already had an audience via his YouTube channel The reason Dre didn't really pursue traditional publishing and decided to publish it himself in 2010 Dre's book Buy Me A Game (which is available as a free download) Publishing about 19/20 books between 2010 and 2017 Doing an in person speaking gig in Atlanta all on his own dime and what opportunities that led to, including a New York publisher (McGraw Hill) who was interested in publishing a book for him. That book was Working on Your Game Why Dre wasn't interested in reliving that experience again without the right offer/contract in place Adapting part of the traditional publishing editing process into his own procedure for self-publishing his books Why Dre prefers to have direct sales of his books on his own website How in business the most valuable thing you have is your customer list Dre's book The Third Day: The Decision That Separates The Pros From The Amateurs How a professional shows up and delivers even when they don't "feel like it" - that's what makes them a professional The fact that most people don't hear something you say - repeating it or exploring it in different ways can help And more . . . After the interview Mark reflects on several of the points Dre brought up in the conversation, including re-leveraging your own IP by exploring a single topic into further detail and the fact that a professional always shows up. Links of Interest: Dre Baldwin's Website Work on Your Game/Dre Third Day (Book) http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwin http://YouTube.com/Dreupt https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay http://Twitter.com/DreAllDay http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame Mark's Kickstarter for ONE HAND SCREAMING: 20 Haunting Years Wide for the Win Wide for the Win New YouTube Channel EP 378 - Multimedia Storytelling with Dominician Gennari Mark's Stark Reflections on Writing & Publishing Newsletter (Signup) Buy Mark a Coffee Patreon for Stark Reflections How to Access Patreon RSS Feeds An Author's Guide to Working With Bookstores and Libraries The Relaxed Author Buy eBook Direct Buy Audiobook Direct Publishing Pitfalls for Authors An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores Wide for the Win Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books This Time Around (Short Story) A Canadian Werewolf in New York Stowe Away (Novella) Fear and Longing in Los Angeles Fright Nights, Big City Lover's Moon Hex and the City Only Monsters in the Building The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard Dre Baldwin is CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc. He has given 4 TEDxTalks and has authored 35 books. Dre's content has been consumed over 103 million times. His daily Work On Your Game MasterClass has amassed over 2,900 episodes and over 7.3 million listeners. Dre had a 9-year professional basketball career, playing in 8 countries. Dre's framework is the "roadmap in reverse" for professional Mindset, Strategy, Systems & Accountability. The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
In this episode of The Root of All Success hosted by The Real Jason Duncan, guest Dre Baldwin, CEO and Founder of Work On Your Game Inc., shares powerful insights on why hard work alone isn't the key to success. Baldwin, a former pro athlete and accomplished author of 33 books, delves into the importance of directing hard work with intention, comparing hard work to an ingredient in a sandwich—necessary, but not sufficient on its own. Drawing from his experiences as a TEDx speaker, author, and basketball player who turned a benchwarmer position in high school into a 9-year professional career, Baldwin emphasizes that success comes not just from effort, but from aligning effort with clear purpose and strategy. Throughout the episode, Baldwin challenges common narratives of hustle culture and explains why a game-changing mindset—focusing on "being" before "doing"—is essential for long-term success. He breaks down how many people focus solely on working harder without considering whether their energy is properly channeled, often leading to frustration despite their efforts. Baldwin's wisdom, drawn from his own life story and career achievements, offers listeners a fresh perspective on what it truly takes to succeed. Don't miss this thought-provoking conversation packed with actionable insights. Dre's Website Link: http://WorkOnYourGame.com Dre's Social Media: http://Instagram.com/DreBaldwin http://YouTube.com/Dreupt https://www.facebook.com/WorkOnYourGameUniversity http://LinkedIn.com/in/DreAllDay http://Twitter.com/DreAllDay http://TikTok.com/WorkOnYourGame Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review & share! https://therealjasonduncan.com/podcast This episode is sponsored by Dubb. Up your email game and make videos that convert! Get two free weeks and 50% off your first two months with this link: therealjasonduncan.com/dubb Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In the competitive world of sales, adopting the right mindset is crucial for success. On this episode of the Sales Gravy podcast, Jeb Blount Jr. sits down with Dre Baldwin, a former professional basketball player in the NBA turned business guru to discuss why sales professionals who adopt an opportunistic mindset have greater long-term success. Key Takeaways - Importance of Personal Initiative: Personal initiative is crucial for success. It involves taking proactive steps, like attending events or reaching out to potential opportunities, to create paths where none existed. - Mindset Tools: The mindset tools that lead to success—such as discipline, confidence, and mental toughness—are universally applicable, whether in sports, business, or any other area. - Role of Discipline: Discipline acts as the "steering wheel" that keeps you on course, while motivation serves as the "gas" that drives action. Discipline ensures consistent effort, even when motivation wanes. - Cold-Calling and Selling Yourself: Selling yourself is key, especially in scenarios like cold-calling. Being able to present yourself credibly and persuasively is crucial to securing opportunities. - Long-Term Thinking: Adopting a long-term mindset is valuable. It's important to think beyond immediate goals and consider where your actions will lead in the future. - Finding Opportunity in Opposites: There's often opportunity in doing what others are not. Thinking differently and looking for opportunities in unconventional places can lead to success. - Playing the Long Game: Success is a long-term effort. Cumulative actions and consistent effort over time are more important than short-term gains. - Value of Asking the Right Questions: Career transformation often begins with asking the right questions. Reflecting on how to combine your skills into a sustainable career can lead to significant growth and success. - Building a Personal Brand: Building a personal brand is important. Your experiences and successes can establish your credibility and open new opportunities, helping to build trust and expand your influence. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvi5ARbDLsQ The Power of Personal Initiative Success is a journey built on a series of steps that anyone can take if they're willing to put in the effort. It's about creating opportunities for yourself, rather than waiting for them to appear. Success often begins with a simple decision: the decision to take action, even when the outcome is uncertain. Personal initiative means doing what others might not—like attending events to network, cold-calling potential employers, or pursuing opportunities that seem out of reach. These proactive steps can open doors you didn't even know existed. The Role of Discipline and Confidence Discipline is the backbone of success. Think of it as the steering wheel that keeps you on track, while motivation is the gas pedal that gets you moving. Motivation might start your journey, but it's discipline that ensures you keep going, especially when the road gets tough. Confidence isn't something you're born with; it's something you build over time. Every time you take initiative or tackle a challenge, you're building a little more confidence. This confidence then fuels your ability to take even more initiative, creating a positive cycle that propels you forward. The more you step out of your comfort zone, the more confident you become. This newfound confidence helps you tackle bigger challenges, creating a solid foundation for future success. The Importance of Long-Term Thinking While it's easy to focus on immediate goals, true success often requires thinking ahead. Where do you want to be in five or ten years? The most successful people make decisions today that will benefit them in the long run, not just in the moment. Asking yourself questions like, “How can I combine my skills to create something sustainable?
Show notes: (0:50) Who is Dre Baldwin and what is his background? (3:52) The importance of discipline in achieving success (6:50) Creating structure and leveraging mentorship (13:05) Work On Your Game (14:14) Building confidence through discipline and mindset (17:59) The Third Day (24:12) The power of “thinking time” (25:58) Shifting your mindset to focus on achievements (27:18) The influence of social circles and why you might need new friends (29:54) Letting go of old habits to level up (34:09) Learn more about Dre (36:33) Outro Who is Dre Baldwin? Dre Baldwin is an International Social Media expert, author, entrepreneur, and business coach with a professional athlete background. After graduating with a Business Marketing & Management degree from Penn State Altoona in 2004, Dre played professional basketball internationally for 9 years, spanning 8 countries. Coming from a humble athletic background, Dre had no choice but to market and promote himself tirelessly to create his professional opportunities - not to mention working on his game to be ready to deliver when the opportunity was created. Dre had started blogging in 2005, and began filming and publishing his basketball workouts and motivational messages to YouTube in 2006. In 2009, Dre decided to start a practice of posting a new video daily to his YouTube channel, a discipline that continues to this day: He has published over 4,800 videos to YouTube, which go out to his 100,000+ subscribers and have been viewed over 35 million times. The presence Dre developed through his videos and blogging led to the development of his "DreAllDay" and "Work On Your Game" brands; Dre's WOYG Enterprises works with businesses and entrepreneurs on branding and marketing their businesses through dominating the internet the same way Dre did to build his brands. An internet pioneer who built his name on the same discipline and persistence that made him a professional athlete, Dre has never been one to do just one thing. As of December 2015, Dre has published 6 books and over 100 athletic training programs. A Philadelphia native, Dre lives in South Florida. Connect with Dre: Website: http://workonyourgameuniversity.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dreallday/ IG: https://www.instagram.com/drebaldwin/?hl=en YT: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwHgkC8tsH6r0hQjCw_raYw Links and Resources: Peak Performance Life Peak Performance on Facebook Peak Performance on Instagram
"No matter how much of a genius you are, no matter how smart you are, no matter how great your product or service is, nothing you do can make another person change their stripes if they don't want to change." - Dre Baldwin in today's Tip 1782 Do you sell to people who are destined to win? Join the conversation at DailySales.Tips/1782 and learn more about Dre! Have feedback? Want to share a sales tip? Call or text the Sales Success Hotline: 512-777-1442 or Email: scott@top1.fm
“Can you show yourself the same respect that you show your parents, your teachers and military leaders, your coaches, and your bosses? That's the biggest challenge that most people have.”If you're trying to up your game in work and in life, you definitely don't want to miss this episode.I talk to Dre Baldwin, a former professional athlete turned author, speaker, and CEO and founder of Work On Your Game Inc. He brings practical tips and insights for personal mastery in an inspirational style that will help you with discipline, confidence, mental toughness, and more.Our discussion highlights some of the keys to success in anything you are attempting to master in your life. In this episode:Dre's journey from professional sports to 'Work On Your Game'Tips for mental conditioning and personal masteryThe influence of your environment and othersHow to get yourself to do things you don't want to do to get to where you want to beUnderstand discipline and the importance of structureSetting non-negotiable rules for yourselfStep into the Super YouHandling setbacks and failures3 requirements of a leader that elevates others And more!Power Presence Academy | Leadership with Less Ego And More Soul is the go-to podcast for anyone who leads. Your host is Janet Ioli, she helps leaders ground themselves with confidence, connection, and purpose to lead with Less Ego and More Soul.Resource Links:For Dre's videos and 'Work On Your Game' podcast go to @DreB on YouTube.Check out the book where Dre talks about mental conditioning: Work On Your Game: Use the Pro Athlete Mindset to Dominate Your Game in Business, Sports, and Life.Learn more about confidence and building confidence in Dre's book: The Super You: Unlocking and Living With Your Highest Level Of Confidence.LinkedIn: Dre BaldwinConnect with Janet Ioli:Website: janetioli.comLinkedin: Janet IoliInstagram: @janetioliJanet is the founder of Power Presence Academy. She helps leaders ground themselves with confidence, connection, and purpose and lead with Less Ego, More Soul.If you want to become more grounded, confident, and aligned with your deeper values in just 21 days. Check out Janet Ioli's book Less Ego, More Soul: A Modern Reinvention Guide for Women.If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Select “Listen in Apple Podcasts,” then choose the “Ratings & Reviews” tab to share what you think. Produced by Ideablossoms
Dre Baldwin, CEO and founder of Work on Your Game, Inc., shares his journey as a former professional basketball player and how it has shaped his approach to personal and professional development. He emphasizes the importance of discipline, structure, and persistence in achieving success. Dre highlights the need to find the right opportunity that aligns with your skills and goals, and the importance of continuously working on your game to improve and produce results. He encourages individuals to assess their game, develop their skills, create opportunities, and repeat the cycle to achieve ongoing success.Connect with Dre on Linkedin at @drealldayTakeawaysThe foundation of success is discipline, structure, and persistence.Finding the right opportunity that aligns with your skills and goals is crucial for success.Continuous improvement and working on your game is essential to produce results.Assess your game, develop your skills, create opportunities, and repeat the cycle for ongoing success.Sign up for the monthly newsletter with Steve and Career Competitor by providing your details here - Request to become part of our communityAlso be sure to give him and the show a follow on Instagram @careercompetitorpodcast
Send us a Text Message.Unlock the secrets to maximizing your potential with our special guest, Dre Baldwin, a former Professional Basketball player turned entrepreneur, coach, and speaker. How do skills like communication, energy, and salesmanship multiply your success? Dre takes us through his unique journey from the basketball court to the boardroom, highlighting why mastering the art of selling matters more than just doing. Learn his top strategies for content creation, busting myths about video length, and standing out in a saturated market.Ever struggled with balancing new projects while maintaining quality? We tackle this head-on, discussing how to overcome perfectionism and streamline your content creation process. Whether you're podcasting or posting on social media, Dre and I share actionable tips to focus on quality content over technical perfection. Plus, we explore the differences in podcast production approaches and how to create engaging material that resonates with your audience despite minor imperfections.From effective communication to savvy marketing strategies, this episode is packed with insights on transforming your intellectual property into various valuable formats. Discover how to turn a single idea into keynote speeches, mastermind groups, and more, all while keeping your audience engaged. We also dive into the critical role of physical fitness in professional success and the rising trend of the coaching industry. ✂️ Discover the secret to beating perfectionism and making content creation easier
In this episode of the D/D Podcast, host Sam Tagger sits down with the multi-talented Dre Baldwin. Dre, a former professional basketball player with nine years of experience, has not only excelled on the court but also as an author of 35 books and a successful entrepreneur. Join us as Dre shares his inspiring journey from playing D3 college basketball to going pro, and how he transitioned into the business world with sharp skills, consistency, and an unwavering work ethic.Dre discusses:His professional basketball career and what it takes to go from D3 to proThe discipline and mindset required to write 35 booksKey insights into succeeding in business and entrepreneurshipThe importance of work ethic, sharp skills, and consistency in achieving successValuable advice for direct sales reps looking to enhance their careersTune in for actionable insights and inspiration from someone who has mastered both the athletic and business arenas.Thank you for listening! Follow us on Facebook and Instagram. You may also watch this podcast on YouTube!You may also follow Sam Taggart on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok for more nuggets on D2D and Sales Tips.
Let's stop with the qualifiers and keep it simple: Caitlin Clark is the best women's basketball player any of us have ever seen. Caitlin Clark is the most important basketball player since Michael Jordan. Clark and the Iowa Hawkeyes can lose to Connecticut on Saturday in the Final Four and that will still be true. Clark can disappear into the WNBA abyss next season and that will still be true. Clark isn't just the best scorer or shooter the women's game has ever seen. She's not simply the most exciting women's player we've ever seen. She doesn't need an NCAA title to validate her place in history. She's the greatest of all time, and it's not really close. Jason lays out his case for Clark's GOAT status in today's fire-starter. Following Iowa's dismantling of LSU, Angel Reese hosted a pity party during the post-game press conference. The “Bayou Barbie” broke down, claiming she's been the victim of online attacks, death threats, and sexualization. Jason and Shemeka Michelle discuss Reese's first-world problems. Plus, Dre Baldwin of “Work on Your Game” joins Whitlock to discuss how differently Clark and Angel Reese responded to victory and defeat. We want to hear from the Fearless Army!! Join the conversation in the show chat, leave a comment or email Jason at FearlessBlazeShow@gmail.com Visit https://TheBlaze.com. Explore the all-new ad-free experience and see for yourself how we're standing up against suppression and prioritizing independent journalism. Today's Sponsors: Fall in love with beef, chicken and seafood all over again by subscribing at https://goodranchers.com Use my code FEARLESS to get $150 worth of free chicken wings for a year plus $20 OFF with your subscription. Cozy Earth bed sheets are soft, made of the finest luxury material and temperature-regulating so you can sleep cool and comfy year-round! Save 35% when you go to CozyEarth.com/FEARLESS and enter my special promo code FEARLESS at checkout. Support healthy blood flow and deliver more vitamins, nutrients and minerals to your entire body. Get started now for a healthier, happier you by visiting https://CardioMiracle.com/FEARLESS. Receive 10% off your first order; 15% if you choose to subscribe and save. They also offer a 60-day no risk 100% money back guarantee. Get 10% off Blaze swag by using code Fearless10 at https://shop.blazemedia.com/fearless Make yourself an official member of the “Fearless Army!” Support Conservative Voices! Subscribe to BlazeTV at https://get.blazetv.com/FEARLESS and get $20 off your yearly subscription. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices