First What, Then How (Dov Gordon)

Welcome to Making It! This weekly show explores the lives and stories of entrepreneurs as they share their unique perspectives on their success and the path to making it.  

     For Dov, founder and CEO of Profitable Relationships, the what is the essential element to entrepreneurial success. Too often, people get bogged down in the how and limit themselves and their opportunities before they ever start. Dov equates creating a business to creating a work of art. It’s a creative process in which you know roughly where you want to end up—what you want the finished product to look like—and you trust through the journey that each step in the process will reveal itself as you move toward your masterpiece. 

     In this episode of Making It, Dov takes us through his own journey of finding his secret to success after years of “pushing the boulder up the hill and watching roll right back down” only to realize that he was the one making it hard. Dov’s greatest teacher was experience in those early years, and the lesson was letting go. There is no right or wrong way, there is only the individual path, and no one else can chart it for you.

“To me, making it is about being free to live according to your own genuine values and priorities.”

“Worry less about yourself and focus more on contribution.”

– Dov Gordon

Dov Gordon is the founder and CEO of Profitable Relationships. Starting out in his 20s, Dov knew a “real job” wouldn’t cut it and that anything less than success was not an option. With no formal training or experience, he began coaching small business leaders. After nearly a decade of arduous ups and downs mixed with enough wins to keep him going, Dov knew he wanted to go bigger. 

He started a peer group for CEOs of companies doing $150 million or more in annual sales, pushing his then-current business to a new level. Since then, Dov has created even more success with his latest company, Profitable Relationships and the Under-the-Radar system, uniquely helping consultants find and retain a steady stream of ideal clients.

After experiencing firsthand the highs and lows of entrepreneurship, Dov discovered the secret that brought a lot of success to his own small company. He started teaching this secret to others, and one by one, they too experienced the success that was elusive for all those years.

Resources or websites mentioned in this episode:

Mirasee 

Dov’s website ProfitableRelationships

Dov’s Twitter

Credits:

Guest – Dov Gordon

Associate producer – Danny Bermant

Producer – Cynthia Lamb

Executive producer – Danny Iny

Assembled by – Geoff Govertsen

Audio Post Supervisor: Evan Miles, Christopher Martin

Audio Post Production by Post Office Sound

Music soundscape: Chad Michael Snavely

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Music and SFX credits: 

• Track Title: Sweet Loving Waltz

Artist Name(s): Sounds Like Sander

Writer Name: S.L.J. Kalmeijer

Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION

• Track Title: The Sunniest Kids

Artist Name(s): Rhythm Scott

Writer Name: Scott Roush

Publisher Name: A SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTION

• Track Title: Onwards

Artist Name(s): Matteo Galesi

Writer Name: Matteo Galesi

Publisher Name: BOSS SOUNDSTRIPE PRODUCTIONS

Episode transcript:

      I'm Dov Gordon and you're listening to Making It! I run a business called Profitable Relationships Dot Com and we help consultants become under-the-radar leaders in their industry as a way of gaining ideal clients consistently.

     I think of business as a work of art. You're creating a work of art and you need to know what is this painting or a piece of art that I'm looking to create? One of the lessons that so many of us really need to learn is really the trust is to have that faith that the path forward will show itself. As I take a step towards it. Every step. Another step, another step. Things will start to come together only after you make a real commitment to a certain outcome to a certain vision that you have to a certain artwork, let's say a painting that you want to create. But if you do the other way around where you start with how in order to figure out what, well you say what do I know how to do or what kind of clients that know how to get, then you're not even envisioning what you really want. You're starting with what you think you can have. you're settling for what you think you can have rather than going after what you really want. And that's a big mistake that a lot of us make. Now, first what then how. Once you have a clear ideas about what kind of clients you want to have then the next question, Well how do I get them And that could be a journey. 

     I got started as a coach for small business really just because I'd always enjoyed studying different aspects of business as a teenager and after discovering the self help and the business sections in the library. Then after getting married and realizing, well I need to do something, you know, I was early twenties and starting a family and what am I gonna do? I came across this idea that there's this thing called business coaching. I looked into it a bit more, signed up for one of these coach training programs, and went through it. It gave me the tools to get started. I heard that there was a Dale Carnegie course starting up in my area and I realized that this is a 14 week course of mostly business people of one kind or another, small business, and it was four hours once a week for 14 weeks. I realized that well if I join this course, I'll be able to get to know other small business people, I didn't really know where else to go and maybe I'll get some clients from it. And I did use that as a way of beginning relationships, getting to know people. And I recall that after the 14 weeks are calculated in about 14% of the class have become my first clients. So in that sense, it was a success. 
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