Episode 54: Balance Your 3-Legged Stool – Work, Family, And Health With Enrico Palmerino
In this age of steep competition, it can be so easy to fall too deep into our work that we forget how to live the other equally important aspects of our lives. Maintaining the balance of the three-legged stool that is work, family, and health, Amy Vetter interviews Enrico Palmerino, CEO of BotKeeper. Here, Enrico shares his entrepreneurial journey that began with his grandparents that instilled in him the hard work and perseverance to create a successful business, as well as his insight along the way of not letting his aspirations take time away from what is most important in life. He then lets us know what they are doing at BotKeeper and how they are helping accountants with hassle-free and low-cost bookkeeping.
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Balance Your 3-Legged Stool – Work, Family, And Health With Enrico Palmerino
Welcome to this episode where I interview Enrico Palmerino, a serial entrepreneur, Founder and CEO of Botkeeper. His leadership and focus on execution, vision, values and culture have attracted the top talent necessary to transform industries. Botkeeper has raised over $50 million from our key investors and serves thousands of companies and accounting firms. Enrico is on the board of Fidelity Bank and has been recognized as one of the top 100 most influential people in accounting and the top 30 most inspiring business leaders. During my interview with Enrico, he shares his entrepreneurial journey that began with his grandparents that instilled in him the hard work and perseverance to create a successful business, as well as his insight along the way of not letting his aspirations take time away from what is most important in life. If you liked this show, make sure to subscribe and share this interview and story with leaders and other coworkers, friends or family that you think this would be helpful for.
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Enrico, give us a little background on yourself?
I'm the CEO of Botkeeper. Before Botkeeper, I was a Math major or Quant major from Babson College. I started a company while I was there that automated how you do lighting analysis, design and manufacturing. It grew quickly during my college stay in my dorm room. We got about $8.5 million in revenue by the time I was graduating. It’s a whirlwind and that is what set me on my journey in the bookkeeping and accounting sector. We had a nice exit with that business, but accounting was a thorn in my side through the whole process. I decided I was going to try to tackle that. I went into cloud accounting and then I realize all the headaches and challenges that come with running and scaling a cloud accounting firm. That's what led me to found the Botkeeper.
It's interesting how many non-accountants started accounting businesses because I’m frustrated with accounting.
I joke that I'm not a CPA. I just play one on TV.
You can start by giving us your story. Where were you born? What was your family life like as you grew up?
I was born in a tiny little town called West Brookfield. It's in Western Massachusetts. There's farmland and everyone has a multi-acre plot. You know you have neighbors, but you can’t get them through the trees. From a family perspective, my family was always close and big. I come to find that I'm not as Italian as my name made you to believe. We’re 16% but we act like an Italian family. There are lots of big get together. My grandfathers on both sides of the family were entrepreneurial, starting their own businesses. I love the impact that they had on the local community. They were like celebrities within a town.
What kind of businesses do they have?
My grandfather on my mom's side had a farm agriculture products distribution business like fertilizers and different feeds. My grandfather on my dad's side started a supermarket, plaza, gas station, carwash, and some other shops. I can't drive through the town without someone recognizing the name and being like, “You are Mark's son or related to Big Bunny.” The supermarket was called Big Bunny Market.
Was there a story behind the bunny?
It was a giant rabbit on top of it, fighting prices or something like that. That's been the name. It's been an inspiration for my career path.
Did you work in their businesses at all? Were you part of it?
I was a little stubborn. I never wanted a job. Rather than bagging groceries at the supermarket. I had a hot dog stand that I was able to have outside or inside the supermarket. I bought a vending machine like gumball machines and put that in the market, and then a bunch of other businesses related to it. I wanted to do my own thing and beat my own drum.
Why do you think that is?
I’m not good at taking orders.
From a young age, you weren't good at taking some of the bigger box.
Don't tell me what to do. You're better off influencing me to do the thing you want by having me think I came up with the idea. That was always my style. If we were going for a walk in the woods, I would always want to blaze the new trail versus follow the one that was already there. That got us lost sometimes and poison ivy and stuff. I wanted to explore, do new things, love the responsibility of it, and the ability to control. I am a control freak more than I am these days at an early age.
What did your parents do? Were they part of those businesses?
My dad went into hotel management originally and then came back to run the supermarket when my grandfather had gotten sick. He went into it bagging groceries. He did every one of the roles in the market before he eventually took over.
Did he enjoy it?
Not really. It was more of a job for him or more work. He felt like he had to do it. He's like I am. Anything we're going to do, we're going to do it to the best that we can. He didn't like it, but he loved Wall Street, stocks, trading and wealth management. He decided to leave, get into that, and then start his own wealth management firm. I've seen his firm has grown and he's been ranked top ten in Massachusetts, and then Botkeeper has been ranked. It's been fun to see and experience different walks.
Do you think watching your dad not want to do that job put you more into that path of, “I want to do my own thing?”
It was tough. Running a supermarket takes a lot of hours. You're up early.
Seven days a week.
He was home as much as he could. He's like a slave to the business. I saw my grandfather on my mom's side. He structured his business differently where he was able to have super flexibility in terms of his schedule and time. He retired early and sells the business to one of his partners. My mom was entrepreneurial in the sense that she got into starting days spas and she was doing consulting. I got to see the benefits of all walks of life and stability to control over your time.
People getting into businesses didn't have expertise necessarily. They just had an interest.
Work Balance: A CEO’s job is to solve problems all day. You're constantly faced with headaches and problems. You've got to figure that out.
I had originally gotten into lighting and I didn't have a background in lighting. That was the first start that I did in college.
Why did you choose that?
I saw a problem. It started as a class project. It was like, “Go find something that you can build like an access-based solution around, and automate a process or a task.” I saw these people doing a lighting assessment on campus. They were flipping through pads of paper, taking notes, looking at catalogs and documenting it. I was like, “The catalog could be a database.” Whatever calculations they're doing on the graphing paper, that could be preprogrammed. You could take all that in. Instead of having to do a whole bunch of calculations and manual work, we automate it with some software. That's what led me down that path, and being naive to something is a great value. My dad innovated a lot of aspects of the supermarket because he came into it not calling it a passion, and not having any preconceived notions as to what was possible.
No one was saying, “That won’t work.”
Being told how things should work. Instead, you come in and you start to ask, “Why couldn't we do it this way?” That's worked well with Botkeeper and in that lighting company I had too.
When you were a kid, was there any dream you had of what you wanted to be?
My mom still has this picture I drew. I was in my 3rd or 4th grade when they're like, “Draw a picture of what you want to be when you're older.” I drew a guy with a briefcase and put the CEO on top. I'm living my dream. In high school, I love math because I love the problem-solving side of it. I didn't want to be a math professor. I remember talking to my professor and being like, “I want to solve problems all day.” That's what I want to do. What job is that? Inevitably, that's being a CEO. You're constantly faced with headaches and problems that you've got to figure that out.
Some days you're like, “Can I take a break from solving problems?” Someone else solve them.
That's me on the family side. When it comes to planning of where we're going, I was like, "You got this one. This is your game plan. I'm here to be the passenger and ride along.”
You started this lighting business, what did you learn? You were young and not even finished with college. Knowing what you watched with your grandfathers, your father and your mom, what did you take into that business that you didn't fully understand until you were running a business?
You go into it and you think that it's going to be a little bit easier. You're like, “I got this idea I'm going to start in, clients and customers will come, or you build it and they will come.” You realize there's a lot more work there to get something off the ground. Buying the vending machines does not mean that they're going to be placed in a location. Even if you get it place in a location, it didn't mean that they were going to be profitable or get enough foot traffic. It's research, analysis and a lot of cold calling of store owners and staff to get together there.
It's the sweat equity that people don't understand like getting your hands dirty.
The things I learned from my family and parents was that. There was no shortage of seeing that at home or across my grandparents’. That’s their biggest skillset. They're not the smartest person in the room, but they'll outwork anyone. I instilled that drive and desire that even though I went into it a little naive thinking it would be easier, I was going to will it to be no matter what.
What was the lowest point in the business, and then where did it turn around?
It was a roller coaster. There are lows and highs along the way. There were times we started taking off. We landed some big clients and money started coming in. We were excited about that. We started growing and expanding. You realize that growth is a vacuum for cashflow. As far as the lowest point, it’s not a low and then everything high. There was a point where I learned to not make assumptions. We were making a new product that we were patenting, and we were doing some contract manufacturing. They told us like, “If we produce this as fast as you want it, if you need this out next week, it’s not going to last as long. We had to build this mold that was stamping these products out. The mold is not going to last as long if we accelerate the production like this.”
I assume that if this is a ten-year mold, not as long as 5 or 8 years. Who cares? It didn't last the production run. I should have asked more questions in between that, and some accounting. It was an accounting mistake. Our books were behind and some cashflow hadn't been caught up or reconciled. We found ourselves at a point where it was like, “We've already got a bunch of debt personally on this.” At that point, we might have had $1 million in debt each that we were personally liable for it.
Our business can hold that. We had to personally sign off on it. I remember thinking like, “My life is screwed.” A million dollars in debt that's not collateralized is going to be hard to pay off on top of student loans. My partner and I looked at each other like, “If we're screwed for the next 40 years, what's the difference between that and the next 60 years?” We took on another $2 million in debt, another million each, and we got ourselves out of it. We corrected the ship. That was what we needed to get cashflows back to the right point. We always put the client first.
When the business needed them to be flexible with us on delivery of the product or payment terms, some of them were willing to help out and do what they could. We were vulnerable in letting them know, “This is my first real venture. We made a couple of mistakes but we're going to get through it.” There were a few people and a few clients of ours, mentors and advisors that grabbed the torch and helped run with it. Having people around you and doing good by others, they pay it forward. Karma always comes back. Being able to pull from that bank a little bit when we needed it most was awesome. It led to a big success, which was great.
How did you go and sell it? Were you approached?
We were approached. When we were growing that fast, we were 46th in Inc. 500 lists for a few years running. We were one of the fastest-growing in Massachusetts. I was flying around the globe and so is my partner. Imagine these two young kids in China where we tower over most people. We’re standing at the docks, loading up crates of lights, and we've got boats. You draw attention and people are like, “What's going on? Who are these kids? What's this business?” We ended up going international and that drew attention. Ultimately, we got approached by a manufacturer that wanted to incorporate us into their business. That didn't exactly go as planned. The outcome was great, but the post outcome is I left the business and my partner stayed. There were some hasty ideas around how that integration was going to work. My partner and his brother bought back the company themselves. It raised some capital and repurchase it for pennies on the dollar. It's a big business again in Massachusetts and doing well. If you got the right people who are determined to see something succeed, they'll make it succeed.
They should have a passion for it.
They do and I did, but international business sounds glorious when you run it, and all the time zones. I was never sleeping. I was getting calls at 3:00 AM. There are always fire drills so I was ready to be out.
Did you finish college during this or you went and did this?
I did finish it somehow. I fight trying to take a leave of absence numerous times. My counselor kept being like, “Let me work with your professors.” It's one of those things where you realize that you're like a piece of a greater organism. My business success also brought attention to Babson from an entrepreneurial perspective. There was an invested interest in making sure that we could succeed while being students. That meant that some of our class projects were projects for the business. It was like, you're opening an office in Turkey. The success of that is going to drive the success of your grade and here are some students to help you. My legal professor helped us with contracts. I owe a lot to Babson. They're a phenomenal school. I'd recommend them to anyone that has a passion for entrepreneurship. I managed to finish college with great grades, but I got a lot of help.
You became their own case study since you started from one of their class projects.
Work Balance: If you get the right people who are determined to see something succeed, they'll make it succeed.
A couple of case studies. I do a lot of speaking there.
How old are you when you sell?
I don't think I was twenty yet. I remember having the money to buy a house and being like, “I'd love to get a beer at a bar,” but I'll wait a few months to do that.
How did you feel about starting another business at that point? Were you tired or were you energized to start something? I know you're saying you start Botkeeper because of the accounting issues of that business, but where did that start coming to fruition?
I had to do some soul searching. You achieve a level of success early and you start to question, “What's the meaning of life? What's the rest of it for?” I could live comfortably for the rest of my life. It's like, “I’d set the bar here. I needed to set the bar higher.” I started to prioritize family. I'd put that on the back burner for too long during all of that. It was like, “Let me find the next passion. Let me take a little bit of time before doing it.”
I tried a few little projects on the side while I was taking some time off. I was like, “This accounting thing that was a headache or a thorn, I'm going to go try to fix that.” I joined the husband and wife who had started a bookkeeping practice. I invested in it and came in as the managing director, and help lead what I call the next chapter of growth for the business. I ran into all the headaches and the glass ceiling that is the accounting industry. That led me to Botkeeper a few years later. I was there for 3.5 years.
Were you running the business?
I was a partner and an owner. I ran the sales and marketing side. My partner ran the accounting and operations side.
Where did the idea of Botkeeper begin?
While I’m there, in the early years you could find and hire accountants, good ones. Progressively every year, it got harder and harder to find good accountants. I started looking into why. What are we doing that's not working? I’m going to conferences and realizing everyone else is having the same problem. Lo and behold, the number of people going into accounting is on the decline. There is an exponential increase for financial services. It's easier to start businesses. More businesses are starting and have a need than ever before. A lot of people were retiring. The average age in the industry was 55. A lot of people who were in the industry, when they leave an accounting job, they didn't take another accounting job. They left the industry altogether.
You started to see these big macro effects of you need to figure out a way to automate as much of this as you can so you could have the limited resources focus on the critical thinking, the advisory, the consulting, and the human aspect of accounting. The big headaches that most firms struggle with, and we saw it too, was you hire skilled people, but you can't do skilled work until the basics are done like tax, audit, CFO, advisory and consulting. It all depends on clean and accurate books. If you can't find or hire the resources to do the bookkeeping, those skilled people will get dragged into doing more basic routine work. They're not free to do the advisory and consulting.
I wonder if I could take some of the things I did with my lighting company from an automation standpoint, automate aspects of bookkeeping, and the basic high volume time-consuming processes. The other part was the average firm had six to a dozen apps in their app stack. That meant you had to have someone managing integrations and none of these systems talk to each other. It's a terrible experience. To do the books for a client, I log in and out of six different systems and build these crazy Excels, manage it and visualize everything that's going on, and clients are using what apps. For the client, that's a terrible experience. You got to tell them, “Send me receipts. Use this app. I need you to sign in for this app, so I can get your bank statements. Here's where you're going to store files. I need you to sign up for Asana to do tasks.”
The thought for Botkeeper was two things. If we could consolidate that app stack and unify it into one integrated solution designed purposely for our accountants, that would act as data exchange, because it would get the data from the client into the system. You could run that data through machine learning and AI, which had made some pretty big leaps in the past couple of years. The output would go into the books accurate and clean. You could pull that output back in and render it in dashboards, and visualize ways to provide the analytics and visualization on it, which would then automate the need also for creating Excel dashboards. That was the idea of Botkeeper. One unified system with machine learning embedded that could do a lot of the work, and allow the skilled individual to do more skilled work and be more human.
From a leadership standpoint, you're willing to take risks and solve problems yourself since you were little and saw your parents doing that. How did you transfer to leading people? There's a big difference of like, “I've got faith in myself to get this stuff done. We'll make it because I'm going to wheel it to happen. I won't stop working. I have to trust other people to get this stuff done in the way that I want it to get done,” when you're a person that takes care of this stuff yourself.
It progressed over time. I was more of a control freak early on. What I saw was that if you want to control everything, the impact you can have on anything is going to be limited by you. There's only so many hours in the day, and no matter how hard you work, you need others. Even with the gumball business, I convinced my brother and sister to both invest in it. They’ve put some money in that, and then start helping me service the machines. I hired some friends and family to start a landscaping business. You're getting leverage on yourself. When I got to the lighting business, there's a photo in the The New York Times or Bloomberg of my team. It was me and my partner. We were seventeen years old and young-looking, and everyone else was at least twice our age.
That was a big lesson. It was tough the first time I did it, but the best thing I could do was to take things that I'm doing right now and keep replacing myself with people who are more skilled, experienced and experts at any one of those things. I still do that Botkeeper. I constantly look at, what am I doing? What's made it onto my plate, and how do I compartmentalize some chunk of that? I then hire someone who's way better than me, more skilled, experienced and passionate about that one thing. I lead and inspire them into like, “Here's what we're trying to do. If I can bring enough people together to make this happen, that's how we're going to have this huge impact.” I inspire, influence and attract the talent, and then I get out of their way. I act as a sounding board but I give them control.
Once you attract the talent, it's my job to be a sounding board but I get out of their way. I let them do the things that they're good at, move as fast as they can, make the decisions, have the control, have the responsibility, and enable them as best as I can. I'm constantly trying to take a chunk of whatever I'm doing off my plate and bringing an expert in to own it, and be passionate about just that. If you can attract enough people, you can do something great. That's going to impact generations and not just a town or a neighborhood.
Where have you gotten in trouble with that? Where has that taken you down a bad path?
You have to get comfortable with the idea that you're bringing in people who know more than you do. It's a weird relinquishment of control and also, you feel small. You've started this thing and it was your baby, but now there are people all around you who know more about it. You start to think like, “What's my value anymore?” The things that got me into trouble was I hired people that weren't better than me that I thought I could teach or train. As soon as I got comfortable with the idea of, “I want to be taught or trained by the people I hire.” My value to the business is not being the smartest person or the best in that, but bringing the best people in. That is what made a big difference for the business. We've been able to do that at Botkeeper. The dividends that has paid has been insane.
That's such a good lesson. When you took that break and you were questioning the meaning of life and prioritizing family, how are you doing that with Botkeeper? Have you gotten off track of what you thought you needed during that intermediate period?
Part of the period was to realize that my passion is to build things. Selling this business, that's not me. I knew I am, it's one piece of my journey, getting to that point where I could be happy. Botkeeper isn't the last venture for me. It will be a long venture for me, but I'll likely start other businesses too. Botkeeper is something that's beyond me. That was an important part. The other part was balancing that three-legged stool. I have a purpose. I love what I do. When you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life.
The other legs of that stool is our family and health. I made sure that I stay healthy, eat healthy, and I exercise. I make sure that I put enough back into the family bank. Even if I can't do it in terms of quantity of time, the time I put into that bank is meaningful, purposeful, and it creates moments and memories. Every Friday I take 2 to 3 hours in the morning to do a dad and daughter adventure. I alternate Fridays with each one of my girls. On the third Friday, I take them both somewhere. We'll go on an adventure. We'll go to a pond, a lake, a new playground or the market. We have a cool memory that is not in front of the TV, being on my phone. I put the phone away. It's all-in on the family during those times. I’m unplugging on the weekends. I always got to work on it. I love work that it's like you're trading one love for the next, but I love that I love so many things, and I have many people who love me back and support mechanisms. I’m blessed.
You can only get there by going through the bads to know. As soon as you have that feeling again, that you're working too much or you're getting separated, you got to pause. Some of your other lessons is, what part of me do I need to replace at work so I can get my time back?
What makes you an entrepreneur is the control. You're not willing to let things play out the way they are. You're like, “I can do that better. If I did it, it could be better.” It's being comfortable, letting other people do it, and having them be better at it.
Work Balance: What makes you an entrepreneur is the control. You're not willing to let things play out the way they are.
They get to the same answer but in a different way. You can learn from the way they got there. You're like, “I wouldn't have done it that way but it’s interesting.”
It's always having an open mind. Somehow the best that you entered with, you got to keep.
I sold my accounting practice many years ago. I remember the day after, I was so depressed which I should have been happy that I got it sold. I had to keep pushing myself to go out running every day. I'm like, “I got to get out of this funk.” People don't realize when you're an entrepreneur, it's like your right arm or it's a part of your body. It defines yourself by what you're creating. When you let it go, it's grief. It's passing and you have to create something new.
You lose your identity and that way, I related it to people. Everyone says, “You should be so happy. Look at this. It’s awesome.” Every time I interacted with family or friends for several years that I was building that lighting business, what do you think they were asking about? They’re like, “What's going on? What's up.” I was like, “We're doing this. We've got this thing.” You interact with friends and family, and they're like, “What are you up to these days?” You can’t tell stories.
That's where it goes wrong. When you start thinking of it as yours, instead of what you're saying about Botkeeper. Botkeeper is this thing. If you start personalizing it too much, then what happens is you make bad decisions for the business. You have to have that independent view of what's the right thing for Botkeeper and not the right thing for me. That's hard.
I tell my team what my personal touch on the business, the embodiment of me is the culture and the values. It's the company. It's all of you, not me. If I died or got hit by a bus, Botkeeper will live on and keep thriving. It doesn't need me anymore. I'm a piece of the equation. Being humble and vulnerable enough to accept that reality.
I like to end with some rapid-fire questions. You get to pick a category. Is it family and friends, money, spirituality or health?
Family and friends.
Things or actions I don't have that I want.
Enough time with them. I will never have enough time with them. Scaling a business, your most scarce commodity is time. It's a constant battle.
It’s being present and it's hard because you got all this stuff going on. Things or actions that I do have that I want.
Loved ones, family, and friends. I’m surrounded by a lot of great people, advisors, mentors and family. I want all of that and more.
Things or actions I don't have that I don't want.
It’s material possessions. I enjoy nice things, but I don't have a want for them. If I could buy time, I would trade material possessions any day.
There are people that are driven over money. I'm driven over the journey, seeing what works, what doesn't work, and getting excited by it. It's a different understanding than people that are driven by things.
That's what makes a lot of companies. It's so hard to be driven by the outcome. You're going through so many ups and downs. That's going to be a mental struggle, but if you love the whole process of what you're doing and where you're trying to go, the outcome doesn't matter if you're enjoying the ride.
You can get through the hard parts because you're like, “We got this coming up. We'll get through this.”
There’s now, not buying something at the end of the day.
Things or actions that I do have that I don't want?
I'm a little bit of a perfectionist. To that end, it would be nice to be more satisfied with things. It's not that I want more, but I always feel like if I could have done more, it would be better. It would be nice if I had a little bit of a lower bar and maybe more at the moment.
You've given us lots of great lessons. Is there anything that we haven't said that you want to make sure or key things that you want people to remember about your story? What lessons you'd like them to know?
Find your purpose and be passionate about it. If you do, you'll never work a day in your life. You’ll love what you do regardless of the outcome. Make sure you maintain that three-legged stool. The purpose is one part. If you're healthy, family and purpose will be better. If you have time with your family, you'll feel more motivated and wholesome. Don't lose track of that three-legged stool and keeping the balance.
Thank you for joining me. I appreciate it.
Thanks for having me.
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For our Mindful Moments segment of this interview with Enrico, there were many different tips and lessons that Enrico has learned along the way that is helpful for us to step back, and think about how to incorporate some of this into our own lives. First off, his observation of himself as a young boy, and understanding that he wasn't into having a boss or someone telling him what to do, and taking on initiatives for himself. It is interesting when you look at yourself and realize those things. The people around you also have to encourage or support you in who you are. Too many times, we try to make cutouts, whether they're family members or coworkers, that everyone should fit a certain formula. Had that happened with Enrico, his journey could have been completely different because he may have never had the confidence to do the things that he talked about doing like starting a business when he was seventeen years old, and having the wherewithal and confidence to do something like that.
Work Balance: The outcome doesn't matter if you're enjoying the ride.
Part of that was watching his grandfathers. What it sounded like to me was looking at them through rockstar glasses, because everybody knew who they were in the town. He wanted that as well. Secondly, besides allowing someone to be who they are is having that vision of who you want to be. He had that vision for so long by watching their examples, and also being honest with himself about what he was good at and what he wasn't good at. Thirdly, his observation of watching his father work in his grandfather's business and didn't love what he did, it took an effect on him as well. What he has always done if you look at all the different businesses he started and so forth, whether they be vending machine businesses or Botkeeper is that he knew he had to love what he was going to do in life, and that it wouldn't feel like work.
It's important that we have a vision and then we also align it with what we're passionate about and what is our purpose. A lot of times we don't spend time to step back and think about the things that we are passionate about or the feeling that we want to have. Maybe we don't know the thing, but we do know the feeling that when we do things that we enjoy, we create energy or feeling inside of ourselves that we want to achieve. Even if we don't know the thing, but we know we're not aligning to that feeling, we know we're getting off. Having some vision of what you want to feel, or what is the thing that you want to do is important so that as you go through your career, you know when it's time to pivot and shift.
His story of starting this lighting business right from school is amazing besides the fact that he graduated and building a global company at the same time and being young. Part of what we learn along the way is what we saw other people do. He saw his family take risks. His dad eventually creates a wealth management firm that he was happy with and his mom starting day spas. It wasn't about whether he had expertise in something, it was about being passionate about the work. Some of his lessons were important that he talked about from building a business standpoint is number one, learning to not make assumptions and ask more questions. Often, we don't ask questions because we're afraid if we ask the question, people might think we don't know something, or we're supposed to be smarter than we are for the position that we're in.
It's important that we realize that you probably don't have that expectation of other people. It's a lot of self-talk that holds us back from being more transparent and vulnerable to go out there and ask the questions that you need. If you don't know something, it's important that we stretch ourselves that we take career or business opportunities that maybe we're not an expert in. We need to make sure we are asking the questions and being vulnerable and saying, “We may not know the answer,” and letting someone know that so that they're explaining what we need to know. One of his lessons too was it’s important to have the right advisors and mentors around you as well. Sometimes we don't want to spend the money on that or ask someone for help. If you don't know what to ask and somebody else does know what to ask, it can help skip a lot of pain that you might get into by not having that expertise around you.
He also took a transition out of that business. He was a partner with somebody else. That partner stayed on, but he realized he was ready to move on from that business. It was an important point in his life where he took that pause now that he learned what it was like to grow a business of that size and what he wanted for his life. All of us have those moments in our life and maybe multiple moments in our life that we need to be honest with ourselves about how we're feeling and how we want to shift things to make sure we get things into the right balance. That was the three-legged stool that Enrico talked about. It’s making sure that as you're building a business, you are equally putting work, family and health in the right buckets and assessing that.
If you get off track, which is easy to get off track because we're all motivated. We all want to achieve and be successful. What we don't want to do is get off from the feeling that we have or start feeling like our career or our business as a burden, and not have the joy and passion around it. Part of what he's talked about doing that is important to create that three-legged stool is always replacing himself. I thought that was a great way of putting it. We need to think about what areas are we working in that someone else could do better. That we're not always hiring people that aren't as smart as us. We're hiring people smarter than us in different areas of things that we do so it can be taken to the next level.
We did have quite a conversation about as an entrepreneur, it’s not thinking the business is a part of you but looking at it as a separate entity, and what is right to do the business versus for the individual. When we start looking at it from an individual, from a selfish standpoint, we'll never do the right thing for the business. That's whether you're an entrepreneur or you're in leadership in a corporation, that we always have to step back from an independent observer standpoint and make sure that you are giving the business space to do the things that it needs to do and not for selfish purposes. Things will always work out the way it should. Rather than having the fear that someone might be better, instead think about how you're going to be lifted up and become smarter. The businesses can become even better because you were able to be vulnerable, and not feel like you have to be the one with all the answers. You are creating a culture where people can step up, grow, learn, and you're able to balance your own life as well.
Important Links:
@EnricoPalmerino - Twitter
@EnricoPalmerino - Instagram
About Enrico Palmerino
Serial Entrepreneur, Investor, Top 25 Under 25, #46 on Inc 500 list, Quant Major, Babson College
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