Here is the transcript from The Uncommonwealth of Kentucky Podcast with Shawn Perry.
Chad Webb:
Hey everyone? This is Chad Webb with CrowdSouth. Sorry for the delay on the new episodes. I got a little busy and I kind of dropped the ball. So, I’m going to try to do better on that and get some more episodes recorded and ready to go over the next few weeks.
Chad Webb:
Thanks for listening to the Uncommon Wealth. Today’s episode is with Shawn Perry and it’s a good one. We hope you enjoy.
Jason Heflin:
Hey everybody, welcome to the podcast today. We got Shawn Perry of the JPR Group, which is a division of Baird Wealth Management. Shawn is a friend of ours. He is a colleague, a mentor. He is somebody that we see doing some interesting things in our community.
Jason Heflin:
He runs a successful business. He manages a busy family, as well as finding time to give back. So, we’re going to dive into that a little bit today and find out a little bit about how Shawn juggles everything that he does. So, welcome to the podcast Shawn.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, thanks. Thanks Jason, thanks Chad. I’ve been looking forward to this discussion for some time, so thanks.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. It’ll be fun. Thanks for being here. I guess we’ll probably just jump right into some questions and kind of get the 21 questions out of the way and learn a little bit about just the basics of who you are and where you’re from.
Shawn Perry:
Okay. I love that.
Chad Webb:
Shawn, would you mind just kind of introducing yourself, letting everyone know what you do and kind of what the company you work with or work for or leading up what they got going on.
Shawn Perry:
Okay. Yeah. My name is Shawn Perry as Jason said. I work for Baird who in the last couple of years bought Hilliard Lyons. So, Hilliard Lyons was a company that had been around since 1854.
Shawn Perry:
We were purchased by Baird that’s based in Milwaukee and it’s been a great partnership and we’ve enjoyed very much being a part of that company, which is also private. So it lends itself to some extra benefits of being part of a privately owned company.
Shawn Perry:
I’m fortunate to be a part of a team, there’s 10 of us that make up the JPR Group. We’re passionate about customer service and we happen to do financial planning as a part of that.
Chad Webb:
Awesome. Cool. Well did you grow up in Bowling Green? Are you from Bowling Green.
Shawn Perry:
I did. Like Mr. Heflin I’m an original at Logan County.
Chad Webb:
I know that.
Shawn Perry:
And I grew up in a small town called Danville, Kentucky that probably has about 800 people in it. Then I moved to Bowling Green when I was 12 or 13 and then went to high school here and then stayed here and went to the Western Kentucky.
Chad Webb:
Where did you go to high school here in town?
Shawn Perry:
I went to Warren Central. So, I’m a dragon.
Chad Webb:
Nice. Me too. When did you graduate? I probably knew that, I don’t know why.
Shawn Perry:
1994. So, I’m a different vintage than you.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, you were rolling out when I was on my way in. You said you went to Western. How long were you at Western?
Shawn Perry:
Now you’re trying to pin me down to how long it took me to get out of school. I was there between-
Chad Webb:
No man. No.
Shawn Perry:
I was there around five years.
Chad Webb:
Okay. You got to put a little extra time in there to do such a good job of what you’re doing now.
Shawn Perry:
That’s right. I did. In my defense, I worked my way through school. So, I worked 30 plus hours, 30, 35 hours a week the whole time I was in school. So maybe that.
Shawn Perry:
Then there was probably some other things that contributed to taking longer, but I think that had something to do with it too or at least I like to think so.
Jason Heflin:
I think you worked at Nat’s Outdoor Sports.
Shawn Perry:
I did. Yeah, I worked at Nat’s from literally when school started my freshman year until two months after I graduated. It was just a joy. I contribute to where I am now very much to that job and a lot of what I’ve learned of just being forced to interact with people. I think at first it was sort of intimidating.
Shawn Perry:
I grew up in a pretty low middle class environment, so being kind of thrust into that environment and seeing people that clearly had wealth, I had a choice of either retreating from that or kind of leaning into it and figuring out what made people tick.
Shawn Perry:
It was a time where I also read How to Win Friends and Influence People in college. So, it was like that concept of the sweetest sound a person can hear is their own name and I really embraced that and I built these great relationships with people that still to this day that they’re friends and people that were just customers that came in there.
Shawn Perry:
So, I think Nat’s was a very formative experience for me. Plus it was a really fun place to work. I probably met you Heflin in some way through there.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I was in there a lot.
Shawn Perry:
At least through some branch off of Nat’s.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I was doing a lot of rock climbing and expeditions out west to try to climb mountains and stuff like that. So, I was always in there mainly ogling things and not really purchasing so much. But trying things on and then backing out because I didn’t have the money.
Jason Heflin:
But yeah. So, you saw people in there and just for a little understanding, we’ll draw the picture, but there’s a store, it’s got a long legacy here in Bowling Green called Nat’s Outdoor Sports. It’s sort of an REI type store. It is tuned for people who love the outdoors.
Jason Heflin:
But also, it’s sort of a higher-end clientele because they have a lot of apparel. Your $100 or $200 shirts and $500 jackets and stuff like that.
Jason Heflin:
So, you were seeing people come in who could obviously afford that type of thing and when you were at a point in your life where you probably were just selling it for the most part. So, that inspired you in some way to say, “How do I become like that person?” Is that kind of what you’re saying or you just saw those people and said …
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, maybe a little bit. I don’t know if it was as much. It was just more of the intrigue. Like what does this person do because they come in here and randomly drop 400, 500 bucks on some stuff. Because I was at a point where it’s like what am I going to do with my life.
Shawn Perry:
For me, I knew I wanted to do sales and it was just like, “Well, I wonder what this guy does or I wonder what this lady does?” It was just a neat experience and I think Nat there was a lot about customer service that I learned how I’ve wanted to do things may be different or the same after that experience.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. You got to interview some people who were several steps ahead of you.
Shawn Perry:
That’s right.
Jason Heflin:
And learn from those folks. That’s awesome. Yeah. I felt the same way at that stage in life because I came from a similar socioeconomic class I think that you did. So yeah, when I would see somebody even just $100 bill I’d be like, “Wow, I don’t know that I’ve ever seen one of those.”
Jason Heflin:
It’s like you’re like how do I get one of those? How do I make that happen? Or what do you do for a living buddy? That’s an interesting point in life where you’re just kind of opening up and seeing there aren’t just these four or five jobs that you understood life to be, but there are thousands of different paths that you can take in life and in your career path.
Shawn Perry:
There was very much a lot of well this guy is wealthy but I don’t want to be like that. You know there are different things you learn, right? You learn what to do and what not to do, I think if you’re open-minded and just pay attention.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah.
Shawn Perry:
Malcolm Gladwell, one of my favorite quotes is Malcolm Gladwell said, “It’s better to be interested than interesting.” I think about that a lot in the sense of so many people try to be different and unique when really you just need to be curious and you learn a lot more.
Jason Heflin:
You think the experience of also kind of, because I’m assuming the working the 35 hours a week as you had mentioned, 30, 35, the experience of the kind of putting yourself through college was … Are you happy that that’s something you had to do, that you had to do that?
Shawn Perry:
I am, yeah. I think looking … I just didn’t know any different at the time. My wife, she still laughs at me because she was like, “Well what was it like when your parents dropped you off at school?” And I was like, “I just went to school.”
Shawn Perry:
It wasn’t like you had to go to school. It was like I thought well I don’t want to do … I remember growing up working in a tobacco patch thinking, “Well I don’t want to do this for the rest of my life. That’s pretty obvious. So, it seems like people that have done well went to school, so I guess I’ll go to school.”
Shawn Perry:
For me, it was just kind of don’t want to do that so obviously I need to do this. So, yeah, school was just something I felt like I needed to do. When I joined, most of the friends I joined with all dropped out in the first couple of months. So, it was kind of like wow, this is different. All my buddies now are not in school but we all joined at the same time.
Jason Heflin:
What was it that kept you kind of committed when those things happened?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I just knew I couldn’t turn back, right? I don’t regret anything about my upbringing but I just knew what I didn’t want my life to look like and I felt like dropping out was more that than not that.
Shawn Perry:
I know there’s a lot of people that have been successful by not going to school, and I’m not arguing that school is essential. But for me, I just felt like I wasn’t going to get where I wanted to be if I didn’t push myself and make my way through even though they were kind of dropping out.
Shawn Perry:
I saw where that was going and I didn’t want to be … That wasn’t the direction or trajectory I wanted to be on.
Jason Heflin:
That kind of parlays well into our next question, which is about what did you do after that? What was your next role? What kind of job did you jump into after those experiences?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I worked in Nat’s through school and I graduated in December of ’99 and I started my career as a financial advisor in January, January 15th of 2000.
Shawn Perry:
So, I’m one of those fortunate people, this was my first career and I know it doesn’t work out like that.
Chad Webb:
What was the degree that you graduated with to then jump into that role?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I had a finance degree. So, I went down the finance path in college. I started out thinking I wanted to be a CPA and I had a really bad experience with an accounting professor and just thought this isn’t.
Shawn Perry:
It just wasn’t a great experience. It was a bad class and not a nice person and I ended up kind of shifting at that point to finance because it seemed more broad and ended up getting a finance degree at WKU.
Chad Webb:
Do you have, ending with a finance degree because there might be people listening, younger people who are going through school and things, is the finance degree to get that first job, was that all you needed?
Chad Webb:
Did you have to go take tests or anything like that to get approved to go to that level or whatever it is?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I think getting the job it wasn’t necessarily required. As we hire people now, sometimes I’m intrigued more about people that come from different backgrounds than just finance. But to get the job, I guess no it wasn’t.
Shawn Perry:
It was nice to have that experience because then you go right into some licensing exams that for me it was Series 7, Series 66 to get licensed to be able to sell investment products and to do the job that we do now.
Chad Webb:
That job that you started there or how long were with that company or at that position?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. That was Dean Winter and then it became Morgan Stanley and I was with them until November 2006. Then in 2001, I formed a partnership with my new partner Mike Jennings while we were at Morgan Stanley together.
Shawn Perry:
Mike was just a great godly man and I was at a point where I was kind of struggling to make it on my own and we ended up partnering with the concept that two was better than one and it’s been neat to see that evolution because we went from two of us and an assistant to now 10.
Shawn Perry:
So, we went from three to 10 and we got a couple of different partners to leave. We had a partner pass away and it’s been an interesting evolution over those, what now is this is year 20 for our partnership. So, it’s been really cool.
Chad Webb:
Once you started that partnership, you said 2001 you started that partnership, is that correct?
Shawn Perry:
That’s right. Yeah, we started working together in 2001.
Chad Webb:
2001 when you two were together, you were at, would you say, Morgan Stanley?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, that’s right. Mike had an existing practice and I was, when I joined Morgan Stanley, I was out knocking on doors and trying to generate business. Yeah, I think at the time it was very much more sales-oriented than I’ll tend to be.
Shawn Perry:
I tend to be very relationship-focused. I think Mike saw that and realized that, yeah, the truth is that I may not have made it at the firm based on what they were looking for.
Shawn Perry:
Mike just said, “Hey, you’re doing the right stuff it just takes longer. So, let’s do it together.” It was interesting. His son and I are about a month apart, so he has one child. And it’s been interesting really. He’s been like a dad to me. My dad passed away a few years ago and we’ve just had a great relationship.
Shawn Perry:
There’s been very little conflict. We disagree a lot but not true conflict and it’s been great. He’s actually now on the back end of his career, a few years left till he retires and it’s been a great run for us.
Chad Webb:
Yeah. That sounds like a really unique situation and it seems like a blessing too to have an older experienced person that you trust kind of take you under their wing but also be willing to partner with you in such a way.
Chad Webb:
I kind of have that with Jason since he’s so much older than me. But a lot of the … He doesn’t have a lot of those nuggets of knowledge that I’m sure your partner does.
Jason Heflin:
I like to put you through the school of hard knocks, Chad. Just let you learn by experiencing things.
Chad Webb:
Okay.
Shawn Perry:
Maybe not as compassionate either.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, right.
Chad Webb:
No.
Jason Heflin:
I say that a lot to Chad by the way. I say, “You know when you’re my age buddy, you’ll see. It’s different. It’s different. Five years is a big difference.”
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. There’s a big difference.
Chad Webb:
You guys, and again forgive me Shawn because I don’t understand that world. But it’s like so do you guys … When you form your partnership, do you then kind of … How do you go out on your own? Is that a thing in the financial world? I don’t really understand that.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. There’s a couple of different ways you can go in our industry. We are aligned with a regional brokerage firm. That’s what Baird would be considered. You can go that route. You can be involved with a Morgan Stanley, which is more of a wirehouse, large firm, 12,000 to 15,000 advisors.
Shawn Perry:
Baird currently has about 1200 or 1300. So, you know the executives, you know the people that lead the firm, you can call them on the phone if you need them or you can do kind of the independent channel where you go out and open your own company. We just chose to not go that route.
Shawn Perry:
I don’t want to work any harder on administrative things. I love the client related aspect and so there’s a benefit for us of having that infrastructure that’s built in and maybe our compensation isn’t dollar for dollar what it would be if we did it in our own.
Shawn Perry:
But I think there’s also some freedom and some lifestyle choices that may not lend themselves the same if we went our own route, the independent route.
Chad Webb:
I think that’s something that a lot of small businesses, medium businesses when you start going down a path, I think it’s sexy to completely run something yourself and do this.
Chad Webb:
I think some people forget about the day-to-day, the administrative pieces that you’re talking about. Whereas, if you’re able to in some cases like a restaurant, there maybe some you’ve got to give some money back if you’re doing a franchise but there’s also some things built in there that if you were just running a restaurant or something on your own and having to do that, that people forget.
Chad Webb:
I think that’s probably a mistake a lot of entrepreneurs and the small business owners make are thinking too much about the glamor of running a small business versus the day-to-day headaches of it and things like that.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I think we’ve always looked at it this way, you can look at it as with this existing amount of business we have, if we move to this channel, we would make more. But the other way to look at it, which we’ve always looked at, is well we can make more if we just grow this business that we have, right?
Shawn Perry:
Ultimately growing the top line fixes all the other problems and that’s what we tend to be laser focused on, is people that tend to nitpick the margins, I think can sometimes get lost in the fact that if you don’t grow the top line, the rest of it doesn’t matter.
Shawn Perry:
That’s what we’ve been really fortunate to do and if we continue to grow it fixes itself. We talk about in a partnership, if you start worrying about how to …
Shawn Perry:
Mike Jennings, Mike’s always got some kind of little wisdom nugget like you said to draw, but he was like, “In partnerships people worry about splitting the power.” He’s like, “We just need to be focused on making more powers. If we make more powers, then how we split it becomes a little less relevant.” So, we’ve grown kind of.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, that’s a really good point.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. Since Mike and I started together, it’s been 20 years. We’ve more than added a zero to the revenue and that’s exciting to think about.
Shawn Perry:
He had an existing business that was doing just fine but by doing that we’ve grown it by whatever that, not 100%.
Chad Webb:
Yeah.
Shawn Perry:
And a zero, whatever it is.
Chad Webb:
Exponential, yeah.
Jason Heflin:
Chad and I have talked about this concept too of the way that your industry works. In our industry, that really doesn’t exist, it’s not an option. But it’s something that we’ve talked about a lot that it should be.
Jason Heflin:
That there should be larger agencies that are willing to share their knowledge, help smaller startups grow and like hey, we’ve got all these processes and procedures and channels in place for you, just this is the playbook, you have the talent and you know the market. It’s not apples to apples with your industry, but it’s just something that we’ve thought about.
Jason Heflin:
A lot of industries could use that because, Chad mentioned the restaurant industry, you can either buy a franchise or you can just start a fresh new concept.
Jason Heflin:
New concepts have a huge margin. A larger percentage of those fail than the franchises because they’re not associated with somebody who’s like, “Hey, here’s the way. He’s a way to do it that has worked thousands of times over.” So it’s interesting.
Jason Heflin:
And you partnered up with somebody who sounds like they saw your strengths and really fostered those and saw the potential in you. So it sounds like you made some good choices.
Shawn Perry:
It’s been great. I really feel like I’ve been blessed to be put in those situations. Mike and I talk a lot about there’s times where I’ll just say, “Man, I really appreciate you taking a chance.”
Shawn Perry:
Because he was very humble in the sense of a lot of people in his position would have been just looking for a young person to carry their weight and add to his own compensation.
Shawn Perry:
Mike very much opened up the business and made me a partner and over time we grew it. His come back to it was he would say, “If I didn’t do those things you would have just left. Your skills … You can’t take advantage of somebody with a skillset like that too.”
Shawn Perry:
So, there’s definitely this balance of figuring out is somebody a leader or are they just a worker and you need both in an organization. But the quicker you can figure out which one they are, the better everybody would be.
Jason Heflin:
Have you applied that as well to those team members that you’ve recruited? Like looking for people who are creating an environment that fosters what they’re best at?
Shawn Perry:
That’s right. Yeah. We’ve tried to do that. Now we’ve grown to 10 and we’ve got five males and five females and we cover a mid to upper 60 year old down to a 25 year old.
Shawn Perry:
So, we’ve tried to be multi-generational and also be very, how do I say that, just it’s an industry of old white guys and I don’t want my business to look that way over a long period of time.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah.
Chad Webb:
I also think that allows you to … You get set in your ways and having diversity in general it allows to see sides of things that you’re just blind to. So, working towards those things, gender, culture, and age is always a positive thing.
Shawn Perry:
We all grew up in an agricultural kind of community. None of us are from Bowling Green. None of the advisors and we think that’s a really unique thing. We’re running a really successful practice in Bowling Green and none of us grew up here.
Shawn Perry:
I grew up in … I went to high school here but as far as we all had these origins of kind of more of a rural background, working on a firm, and just work ethic. That’s an important quality that I think can be lacking more and more these days.
Jason Heflin:
And knowing what the options are for your work-life outside of a professional environment because you’ve done that, you’ve been out there and you’ve cut to back or you’ve gotten those blisters, you’ve been sunburned, you’ve spent days picking up hay or whatever you’ve done.
Jason Heflin:
And you say as you said earlier, that was a good way to say it. Hey, well I know what I don’t want to do, I don’t want to be doing this. That’s for some people and it’s an honorable line of work. It’s just when you realize what you don’t want to do, it helps you find what you do want to do.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. For me, I just needed to butt my head into a couple of walls to be able to find my way through the darkroom and that’s where I’m at now.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, that helps too.
Chad Webb:
Some of the things we’re talking about are some, I think, struggles that all business owners have, I know it’s something that we’ve struggled with over the last seven years. That’s around … I know you said you don’t have the day-to-day, but there’s probably still some management lessons that you’ve learned, be it around people, around conversations or confrontations that you have between internal or clients.
Chad Webb:
Are there any things that kind of ring true to you that once you thought about those or once you learned about how to do those things it’s made your life in this business much easier?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I was just reading a new book this morning and the first chapter was talking about servant leadership. I think that’s been one thing for me is I never wanted to ask other people to do stuff that I hadn’t done at some point in my career.
Shawn Perry:
I also still feel like I want people to see that I haven’t reached some point where I don’t have to work hard anymore, or I don’t want to grow anymore. So, just showing.
Shawn Perry:
I think trying to lead from a people seeing it versus me telling them, is something that I tend to really be focused in on and it’s so interesting you say that.
Shawn Perry:
Two hours ago I was having a conversation with a client and we were talking about another advisor in a different industry and I just said, “Hey, what’s your experience been like with them?” He was like, “Yeah, it’s been kind of poor lately.”
Shawn Perry:
He said, “People in your organization reflect you. If you make a great team and you lead well people in your organization will reflect that.” I thought that was really interesting because basically he was saying when I call, he even mentioned a few of my team members by name.
Shawn Perry:
“If I call them I’m going to get the same experience I get when I work with you, and I know that. But when I call this other person I don’t get that same experience and the reason is the person at the top isn’t taking the time to spend time with the people underneath them and to talk through you did this and you shouldn’t have done that, here’s a better way to do it.”
Shawn Perry:
Just constructively trying to always be coaching people and always trying to be teaching them. I think that’s kind of lost customer service in itself is a little bit of a dying thing, it seems like unfortunately.
Chad Webb:
Well that’s not it. But that right there is not even, I guess, customer service. That’s more about like you’re saying, it’s an internal reflection of the time spent growing and mentoring the people in the organization, and you’re saying that reflects customer service which is really smart because your reflection is the way that you would run your business and the way that you would work with customers.
Jason Heflin:
And developing the culture too, which is nice.
Shawn Perry:
Right. I talk to young business owners. I think we see that with them. Heflin you and I have a friend who started a business and there was a young guy who owns a business here in Bowling Green and I was telling him, I was like, “As you scale you have to replicate yourself.”
Shawn Perry:
Scaling a business means that you don’t have to be there 70 hours a week and the experience is still the same. If the experience is different when you’re not there, then that’s an issue. You’ve got to figure out how if I’m home with my family or if I’m on a vacation, my client gets the same experience when they come into my restaurant or my accounting firm or my advisory firm or my wall just like they would if I was there.
Shawn Perry:
I don’t have to be there for the experience to be the same. That’s when you’ve really reached that point of being able to grow exponentially in my opinion.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. Chad and I have been able to just in the last year to two years, been able to get out and leave the business for more than a couple of weeks at a time, take a two week vacation if we want.
Jason Heflin:
Whereas I would say and correct me if I’m wrong Chad, but four years ago I don’t think we would have felt comfortable doing that. So, it’s a freeing thing.
Chad Webb:
I think we’re on the path to that. I think we’ve still got lots of things to change. I’m still, if I go away for two weeks I’ll check an email daily. I’m still doing those things.
Chad Webb:
Again, I think it’s a reflection of the work we’re doing. We still need to do the work to make sure the good to great stuff, the right people on the right seats on the bus. That’s still something that we’re working on.
Chad Webb:
But again, that’s part of the growing business. We recognize those things. We make those changes and it gives us good direction. That is where we’re going. We have clear vision that that’s where we need to go.
Chad Webb:
I think sometimes where that vision is clouded, I think like Shawn was talking about earlier, it’s sometimes the minutiae, the day-to-day that still has to get taken care of because of the way that we don’t have a framework for this, we’re still learning, we’re still trying to figure out the best way to do this.
Chad Webb:
Payroll still has to get done and I’m working on that and Jason is following up with clients and things like that. There’s not a handbook for the way that we’re running this. So, we’re still learning and we’re by no means perfect. But I can see that in the future, the feeling like we can step away fully for a month if we had to and things would get done and no worries at all, the place would not burn.
Chad Webb:
That’s a reflection of we’re starting to make decisions that are good for everyone in this company and hiring the right people, I think is incredible. The people are what matters. The customer’s matter and the top line numbers matter, but that top-line number isn’t growing if you don’t have the right people taking care of you and your customers.
Shawn Perry:
I remember getting to a point where I realized I can’t make it about me. If I make everything about me, then me always has to be there. That’s probably some rural background coming out, me has to be there.
Shawn Perry:
But you know what I mean. If it’s all about me, then I got to be a part of it and getting to a point where I just … I actively tell clients now, I don’t know how to do anything. I can help you solve problems but when it comes to sending a check out or any of that stuff, if you call me you’re just delaying the process. I don’t know how to do that stuff and getting to a point where you just make it about the team.
Shawn Perry:
Like our business card has the whole team on it. We don’t have any business card with just our name on it and it’s because it’s about the team. We just started an email through COVID to our clients every other week and we’ve made it from our service team. We have a picture of just the administrative team, the professional women of JPR that’s what they call themselves.
Shawn Perry:
But we decided the email is just from them, it’s not even from the advisors because they’re just communicating on here’s what’s coming up, here’s previous podcast, here’s events that are coming up. Why make it about us because really they’re the point person, the client and we just made it to where the email is completely from them, it’s not really from us at all.
Shawn Perry:
So, just getting to a point where you try to take yourself out of the process.
Jason Heflin:
Is there a singular thing you can identify that you felt like was a decision you made that jumped you forward your business? That changed, looking back it may have been something that you didn’t consciously do at the time but it happened or you did it and didn’t understand that it was going to have that affect?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I remember this book that somebody shared with me back early in my career that was called Hug Your Customers. It was about a clothing company in Connecticut and it was just this idea of here’s the customer service concept that they’ve built a business around and all these little unique special things they did for clients.
Shawn Perry:
And just this awareness of that’s really different and it doesn’t have to just be in a clothing business. We can do that kind of stuff in our industry. So, we’ve started, we call them WOWs where if a client is going on a cruise, we have a bottle of wine where you can pour them when they check in or a door mat when a client moves.
Shawn Perry:
Or one of the most recent things we did for a client, which was super cool, was they lived in a house for 30 years and they moved and they were really excited to have this new house but they kind of mourned their old house and we had a painting made of their old house and framed it and gave it to them so they could hang it up at their new house.
Shawn Perry:
Just this idea that so many people in my industry make it about the numbers and it’s clients can buy up stock or a mutual fund anywhere. And being able to really focus on the relationship and experience that the client gets, obviously we have the knowledge and the accreditations and all that to back it up, but we don’t lead with we’re the best stock-pickers or any of this kind of other stuff that so much of our competitors lead with.
Shawn Perry:
I think when we really made it about the relationship, and not just saying we made it about the relationship, but truly making it about the relationship it changed then for us.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, and when you do those things, which you’re really good. I always look to you as somebody that I want to emulate with that type of attention to detail because when you send that painting or you have that bottle of wine waiting, it’s one of those things that it tells the client that you’re not just listening to the words that they’re saying, you’re hearing them and you care. You are genuinely interested that they were mourning this house or that they were getting to go on this cruise and you make a …
Jason Heflin:
I will often personally make a mental note and I probably have a 20% success rate with remembering to go back and do that thing. So, is there something you do in the moment or something you do even if it’s just write a note, just I don’t know is there something you do to say, you know what, I need to do something for this person because that’s a special moment for them and I want to let them know I noticed.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, I think two ways. One, is if I’m in a client meeting or something, I’m constantly downloading a list. I’ve got just a separate box on the page where I’m writing notes and trying to capture things that they said about an upcoming trip or whatever.
Shawn Perry:
I also use an app called Email Echo that I can just voice text into and it sends me an email and then I can just forward that email onto Michelle on the team. She handles those. That’s what we call our WOW opportunity. She’ll take care of it. She runs from there.
Shawn Perry:
It’s actually become such an important part of our business that every Monday I have it reported to the team of WOWs that we were able to capitalize on the week before because I think things that you talk about become important. So, we talk about another measuring stick in the team is how many thank you notes do we have on the board?
Shawn Perry:
We need to be doing stuff that’s so compelling that clients feel a need to write us a thank you note. If our board is full of thank you notes, then that’s number one measuring stick of success for us.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, that’s good stuff. That’s something that I don’t always do well. So, I think I could learn some things from you there.
Chad Webb:
Do you think those things translate because that seems like that’s current client pieces? From a sales perspective because I think it’s kind of where you said your background felt like it was early on and kind of what you learn there, and that’s from a sales perspective, what kind of tips have you learned over your time kind of trying to get new clients and things like that?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I think just being aware. I use the term sales. In my mind doing something like that for a client is have them use the term care. We do it because we genuinely care about them, we want an experience for them.
Shawn Perry:
But also, they’re going to have 100 people come to their house that’s going to ask them about that painting too. So, for me that’s they’re kind of intertwined, right? Sales in the sense of me calling up somebody that I don’t know to ask them for their business, those days don’t really, it’s kind of those days are gone.
Shawn Perry:
Fortunately for me I didn’t really love that part of it. But meeting somebody through a client or a client hopefully just creating. There was a book probably 10 years ago called The Raving Fans. But this idea that you’re doing such a good job for your clients they want to just tell everybody about you.
Shawn Perry:
So, for us sales is that aspect, right? It’s like these behind the scenes things we’re doing to hopefully just get people talking us about more.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, because it’s I think in our experience as well word of mouth has always been, for the last seven years, has always been the leading referral channel, I believe.
Shawn Perry:
And more sticky. Sometimes when you sale somebody something the relationship doesn’t last as long, right? You don’t have that kind of built in good will with them that you may have if someone else said you need to talk to Chad because I’ve dealt with him for 10 years and he’s great.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, yeah. Because I think the traditional advertising, traditional marketing has its place. But if you’re doing the right things and you’re giving people, again, good experiences that is going to come back to pay off in the long run. So, I think that’s a good point as well.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, and like you guys very much. I think we’re similar in this. Hopefully our competition doesn’t catch on to what we’re doing because the longer they keep doing what they’re doing, the more we continue to look good and we grow just by being in a pool of people that aren’t doing the stuff they need to be doing.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I do business development for us and it’s a lot of times they land on our door because of another client and it speaks to what you’re saying. It’s like I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve gotten a phone call and said, “Hey, so and so said I need to call you, so here I am. You tell me what I need to do. They said I can trust you.”
Jason Heflin:
It’s such an honor and it’s a little bit nerve-racking when that happens and it happens all the time. But it’s a little nerve-racking at first because I’m like, “Wow, I really need to make sure I take care of this person because someone has vouched for me.” Basically this person is going to lay a bunch of money on me to take care of things.
Jason Heflin:
But it kind of continually ratchets it up like well we’re going to continue to do a good job because you don’t have to do all that kind of cold calling and the uncomfortable part of selling if you’re doing the right things then it sort of will come back to you, sort of a karma type thing, business karma.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, and Chad you had mentioned the younger people on here. I talk to people a lot. I actually had this conversation today about people ask well who is your competitor? I believe that I’m my biggest competitor, right? I’m not doing all the stuff I know I need to do to be successful.
Shawn Perry:
So, when we start looking at it about well what can I do different versus all of these other people are my competitors, it’s like no, what are the things we need to do as an organization to be better. That gets you to a point where you’re getting these phone calls, like you were talking about Jason.
Shawn Perry:
Probably one out of 20 people that we meet with are meeting with someone else. It’s not like they’re coming to us because they want our help. They’re not coming to us to try to quote us versus someone else.
Shawn Perry:
Typically, if it is like well this other person said they would do it for less, then it’s like that’s okay, you should probably go there. It’s just not how we want to start a relationship.
Jason Heflin:
No.
Chad Webb:
I think that’s a really good point. We are aware of our competition. But as you said, the things that we do are going to have a lot more impact on that top line number and our growth than it is if we’re trying to take business from other people.
Chad Webb:
It’s like I can’t affect someone’s thought process. Like you said, if we come in for a quote and they’re like well they’re about 20% cheaper, it’s like that’s cool. I’ve got 12 people here that this is the cost to do this with us and I know we’re going to do a good job, you may not know that because you don’t know us. But if you’re really worried about price, then try that, and if that didn’t work you’re welcome to come back, no big deal.
Chad Webb:
But at the end of the day, I’m more concerned about what Jason and I do and how our people are doing the job that they do for that top line number. I’m not really that concerned about other people coming in and eating our lunch because we’re constantly looking at other ways to grow the business.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I’ve had conversations with people too where they are saying, “Hey, I’m thinking about leaving the agency that I’m with coming to you guys. Why should I do that?” Multiple times I’ve said, “Why are you leaving the agency you’re leaving? Have you?” “Well they’re not doing a good job.” “Well have you told them what they’re not doing a good job? What are the specific things that you have tried to get them to? Let’s give them a chance to make it right.”
Jason Heflin:
It’s sort of a way to feel them out too and see are you committed to being a partner in this because we like to say in the very first meeting with any client we work with is, “Hey, we want to be partners. We’re going to work on this together. I need your expertise to go a good job for you, and you need my expertise from the technical aspect of getting it done.”
Jason Heflin:
So, if somebody is not willing to partner and be a willing participant in the process, it gets tough. You don’t want to have to milk someone for information. I don’t know if it works like that in your industry, but it’s a good way to say, “Hey look, I’m not out there to just pull all the business I can from my competitors, I want to make sure we’re a good fit for you and that we’re going to work well together and have you made sure that this person that you’re working with understands what they need to be doing?”
Jason Heflin:
So, I don’t know if you get many conversations like that where someone’s defecting and wants you to put on a parade for them or there are various ways people can be like that, which I find very interesting.
Shawn Perry:
Sure, yeah. I’m always really intrigued about who they’re leaving and what they’re saying about them, right? Because if it’s somebody I respect then it kind of puts a red flag up of maybe I might not be able to make this person happy.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah.
Shawn Perry:
It may not be them. But there are some people when they’re coming to us it’s like, “Well you’re coming here because you thought I hadn’t from your advisor in two years.” That one I can fix.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, sure.
Shawn Perry:
I can fix that one pretty easy. Fortunately for me there’s a lot more of the second than the first. Just people that just take a leisure approach to service and people.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. One of the questions, Chad, out on the list today for you which I want to make sure we get to, is do you do any other sort of work, side hustle, real estate, own a line of men’s lingerie, lead up an underground rap mogul, rap group? What you got going on? Is there, not that you don’t need to talk about anything, but do you do other things?
Jason Heflin:
I know you’re very giving of your time and of your resources to try to help other people and I know you do some mentoring. So, maybe you could talk about that a little bit even if it’s non-work related.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I sometimes get as excited about the non-work stuff. I have a family. I’ve got three kids. We kind of bought our dream house so we’ve been doing the social distancing out here on a farm for the last year.
Shawn Perry:
I’m becoming a little bit recursive to some degree but I’m not completely off the grid yet on that same point. Natalie and I do spend a lot of time with college students. So, we both have a rural mission just to kind of hang out and spend time with students.
Shawn Perry:
This idea that they’re just a few, they’ve got a couple more years maybe with them before they’re going to enter the world. And if you could somehow tweak their path a little bit and get them more prepared for, one, what employers are looking for? What does it mean to be an adult.
Shawn Perry:
I think a lot of that’s lacking. So, we spend a lot of time. We laugh, we tend to spend time with people that are in their 20s or people that are in their 50s and 60s. We really don’t spend a ton of time with people our own age.
Shawn Perry:
I think a lot of that is we love mentoring and part of that I think love is because I’ve seen it. I’ve had some great mentors in my life. So, it’s that idea that you lead based on how you’ve been lead. When my life has been impacted by older people, I tend to want to try to pass that along as much as I can.
Shawn Perry:
That’s our big side hustle. We’re involved in our church. I’m the board president, I guess you would say at Center for Courageous Kids. So, I’m really involved at CCK and love that organization.
Shawn Perry:
Then I do own some real estate with a friend that constantly I say to him, “Why are we partners? There’s nothing I offer to this relationship?” He always laughs at me and says, “It’s okay.”
Shawn Perry:
Then I would say being a part of a private company like Baird, there’s opportunities for investment and things in that company on an individual level that’s been helpful. So, that’s probably my side work right now.
Jason Heflin:
Anything in the plans, anything in the works for the future or something you’d like to do?
Shawn Perry:
I don’t know what the future looks like. I think Natalie and even my therapist said that I get bored really easy, so I need a challenge. Even I like to blow stuff up just so I can have something to work on.
Shawn Perry:
So, I’m trying to, I think if anything the last few months for me has caused me to chill out a little bit, which has been a good thing and it’s caused me to be okay with silence and okay with not having a lot going on.
Shawn Perry:
One of the things I’ve been really focused on lately is thinking about have I been doing it all wrong all along. Could I have done what I did without all the extra busyness? It’s interesting to think about just from a pure lifestyle work balance standpoint. Has this proven that I’ve done it all wrong all along?
Chad Webb:
I think something that’s interesting for me is I feel like the first two months of the quarantine, maybe when on the 15th when the schools shut down and we all went to, here at CrowdSouth, we all went to working from home. We’re still working from home, that’s probably going to be that way for a little while.
Chad Webb:
I really enjoyed that time. I enjoy being around the girls every day, I enjoyed assisting Jenny while she taught online with helping the girls. I was still able to get my work done. My work probably pushed into the 10 o’clock at nighttime because I didn’t have as much time in the mornings, but it really wasn’t that big a deal.
Chad Webb:
It felt like the outside world’s expectations kind of took a break. I think that’s very telling in terms of how important the outside world felt this is my experience on my life. That when all that stopped it was so much easier.
Chad Webb:
I found these last few weeks as things have ramped up and as the outside world pressures have started to come back in and as there’s more confusion now, it seems, than ever about what’s going on, I felt my anxiety levels rise again.
Chad Webb:
It’s like I want to get back to that spot where I was in the first two months of this because it was probably the best I felt in 15 years. I have no idea. I loved it. It was incredible. I loved the time with my family.
Chad Webb:
I think the thing that I’ve kind of thought about through that and working through is that can happen if you ignore certain things and you don’t put weight on those things. As they start coming in, it’s like well there was no weight on that two months ago. So, why am I putting weight on it now?
Chad Webb:
But anyway, I only mention that because I feel like kind of like you were saying. It’s like I felt like I’ve enjoyed this time more than I actually thought I would and now the worries are coming back in.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. One of the things that I’ve been almost arguing with people about to some degree, especially other advisors is people want to say that this time has killed people’s culture.
Shawn Perry:
I can tell you with our team, it’s revealed a desire for us to be together, right? It’s revealed a desire for community. But we have Zoom calls twice a day and maybe there’s nothing to talk about, but it’s just great to have that interaction and still keep that close knit community.
Shawn Perry:
I think we’re as close now as we’ve ever been. I think it’s just you get out of something what you put into it and the easy thing is just to throw your hands up and say this is not a culture, this is hard for culture or you can lean into it and do something about it.
Shawn Perry:
So, it’s really, really good for our team and I’m just kind of curious of how it changes things for the better going forward.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I think there’s a lot of opportunities that will rise to the top probably very soon if not already. Opportunities to work in a different way because you’ve been, like you said, you’ve been able to maintain your culture and your friendships remotely.
Jason Heflin:
But there’s probably some sort of hybrid work experience that’s going to be a new reality for a lot of companies.
Shawn Perry:
Sure.
Jason Heflin:
We’re talking through that ourselves now. How that’s going to work for us and it will allow people to build a better work life balance. People work differently, some people we’ve had people that have worked for us that work in the middle of the night or they’re better time …
Jason Heflin:
Some people are better in the mornings, some people are better in the afternoons. It’s just you learn a lot about yourself when you get the opportunity to work how you naturally work. So, it’s interesting.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah and it’s not lost on me or our team that there is a lot of people that are hurting and out of jobs and we’re fortunate to be able to just keep going kind of on our trajectory that we were on. But it has been neat.
Shawn Perry:
It’s been a neat experience and it’s been, Chad as you said, I just feel like it’s been this little gift of time at home. We talk about our five year old is probably going to cry when I go back to the office because she’ll come in here a couple of times a day, just give me a hug and then walk out again.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, that’s nice.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah.
Chad Webb:
I think we’re getting to, we’re at about 50 minutes so let’s probably wrap this up in the next 10. There’s a couple more questions that I wanted to get to. One was the, maybe that will push these together, it was around kind of the hardest lesson you’ve learned or what’s something that you’ve failed at?
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I think for me it was that, we talked about it a little bit earlier, that first year in my career. There was, I tell this to some of the younger guys not in a sense of being the old man that walked ways bare foot to school, but going a month or two and not selling anything and not having a paycheck.
Shawn Perry:
Or laying in bed at night wondering are they going to call me tomorrow and fire me? When you’re out doing what you need to do but there’s also this sense of maybe it’s not enough. Those are really hard things to deal with, but man they build character. They just build so much character because it just shows you just got to keep doing what’s right.
Shawn Perry:
For me it’s just great to look back on that and I share that with the younger guys on my team in the sense of we’ve built a team that affords them the ability to not have those kind of experiences. Those experiences I think are formative and I don’t mean that in any way to downgrade it. We’ve chosen to structure an organization where they can be a part of it and they’re not dictated on bringing in a certain number of assets.
Shawn Perry:
But it is important to realize that the business was built on those kind of experiences where you go a month or two and not have a paycheck and you just think maybe this career is not right for me. Maybe I’m going to have to do something else.
Shawn Perry:
While those things are hard, I think that for me they were great. They made me appreciate. Definitely looking back on it, they made me appreciate where I’m at now so much more.
Jason Heflin:
I thought maybe the last question we would get to is around just because you’ve said it or you’ve mentioned this about three or four times now. Can you give us three book recommendations because I know you’re into books?
Shawn Perry:
That’s a tough one. It’s tough because I think I like them too much. I shared this book recently with somebody, it’s called Setting the Table by Danny Meyer. Danny started Shake Shack and a restaurant group that has a bunch of restaurants in New York city.
Shawn Perry:
It’s just for anybody that’s leading an organization, take the whole restaurant thing to the side, it’s such a great concept on how to manage people and customer service. So, Setting the Table is one of my all time favorites.
Shawn Perry:
Willpower Doesn’t Work by Benjamin Hardy. That’s a book that I read a couple of years ago and he actually just came out with a second book. It’s around creating a culture. You can’t do something just because you want it bad enough. You got to create culture and community and things around you that’s going to cause you to be successful.
Shawn Perry:
I think part of, I’ve been working out more consistently in the last 34 years and it’s been a big part of just feeling better and being more productive for sure.
Shawn Perry:
Then I just read a book recently called The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. I would put it in the Christian book category. It was written by a pastor who had experienced burnout and it’s just this idea of kind of enjoying rest, enjoying being okay with solitude.
Shawn Perry:
It’s a great book because it’s sort of theoretical but then at the end it’s like here’s 20 ways you can do this better, which I tend to like. But one of them I’ve noticed that I’ve embraced more is driving the speed limit.
Shawn Perry:
Just these things of just not building this anxiety, of just being okay if I’m on the interstate going 72 and everybody is passing me. That sounds so corny and cheesy but it is just this sense of not forcing kind of my own anxiety in my life.
Shawn Perry:
So, I think Ruthless Elimination of Hurry is probably one of the best books I’ve read in the last couple of years.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, that’s awesome.
Shawn Perry:
Those three.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, I appreciate that. That’s interesting.
Jason Heflin:
Shawn is nicknamed the librarian among Chad and I. If you want a book, he’s got it.
Shawn Perry:
The funny is, I was 18 before I read the first book. And we read so much to our kids. For me growing up, just books weren’t in the house and people didn’t read books. I think I’ve just been, I think now it’s like I’m trying to catch up on just missing out on, people will reference children books and stuff I’m like, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I never heard of that.” They’re like …
Shawn Perry:
So, I think once I’ve started reading, I just realize it’s like a built in mentor. I probably will never meet Danny Meyer but I can read his book over and over again and learn stuff from him.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, it’s amazing if you think about it in terms of just how many books there are out there and just how much knowledge there is to gather especially around simply entrepreneurship, running a business, things like that.
Chad Webb:
It’s like you’re never going to be able to consume all of it. Do you find yourself, do you do more of the audio books or just straight up reading?
Shawn Perry:
I’m a straight read guy. I’ve got to have the book. I’ll do one or two audio books a year if I’m going on a trip or something. But I just can’t. I can’t focus. I don’t feel like I retain as much. I’ll read a book with a new pen. I write on it. I’ve got a system of creating an outline in the back of it.
Shawn Perry:
I tend to read it to be able to use it as a reference guide. I’ll read a couple of chapters or something and just throw it to the side and move on because if it doesn’t grab me then I’m going to move on to another book.
Chad Webb:
Jason completely understands that.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah, I’m the guy that reads about, I don’t know, a third of a book maybe, on a good day. Then I kind of … I do this with a lot of things in my life and he’ll also attest to this, but if I get the kind of understanding of how something works, it’s like I got to move on to the next thing. I can’t.
Jason Heflin:
It’s I don’t know, ADD or something. But when I was a kid, I did scouts for a year, and then I ran track for a year, and then I played basketball for a year, and then I played football for a year, and then I played … So, I never did anything for very long.
Jason Heflin:
Like what did you? What was your sport as a kid? I’m like I did them all. I don’t know. Every year I would switch and my mom would say, “We just got all the stuff. Why do you want to do this now?” “I don’t know. I figured that out, I see how it works. I want to do something different.”
Jason Heflin:
So, I usually read. Chad will say, “Did you read that book?” And I’ll be like, “Yeah, I read it.” He’ll be like, “How much?” I’m like, “Five of 12 chapters. I got it. I understand.”
Shawn Perry:
People say you could just the first sentence of every paragraph and you’d have most of the book.
Jason Heflin:
Right. Maybe I’ll change it.
Shawn Perry:
So that may be a good shortcut for you.
Jason Heflin:
I’ll switch to that method.
Shawn Perry:
There’s a book called, I’m in a coaching program and there’s a book called, that one of the people have and they promote a lot called Rocket Fuel. But in it it’s kind of like you guys and I think it’s similar to Drew and I too where it says where it says every organization needs … Successful organizations have a visionary and an implementer and how important organizations are.
Shawn Perry:
You can’t run one with just a visionary and an implementer, you can’t just run. When you have those two things together it’s such a powerful combination and I think Drew, my partner and I talk about that a lot and I see that in you guys too.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I read the first third of that book. It’s a good one.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, I do think Drew recommended that to us a few years back.
Jason Heflin:
He did, he did. Yeah, he did. Because he was like, “This is you guys. You guys do this too.” I don’t know how many more questions you have Chad, but I have one.
Chad Webb:
Yeah, go for it.
Jason Heflin:
Growing up in Danville, Kentucky in the ’80s, is there a specific music genre or a song or anything that kind of stuck out? Anything that it’s the theme song of your youth?
Shawn Perry:
Smokin’ in the Boys Room, Mötley Crüe.
Jason Heflin:
That’s a good one. That’s a good one. So you were a little bit-
Shawn Perry:
There was some-
Jason Heflin:
I don’t think of you as a rebel, though, Shawn.
Shawn Perry:
I had this weird-
Jason Heflin:
I don’t think of you as a rebel.
Shawn Perry:
Well, I had this, there was this period of time where Mötley Crüe twisted sister, man I was all over that stuff. Then when I moved to Bowling Green it became gangster rap music. Then in college which has fortunately stayed with me, is Bluegrass/Americana stuff. So, I don’t even listen to anything else.
Shawn Perry:
I occasionally will listen to some Christian rap and there’s some really good rap music coming up of the Christian rap circles. That’s probably a podcast for a whole nother day.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. Smokin’ in the Boys Room.
Chad Webb:
The Christian rap podcast with Shawn Perry.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah, that’s right.
Chad Webb:
You should just start it.
Jason Heflin:
I can’t even think of a word that rhymes with Jesus. It’s true. So yeah.
Chad Webb:
All right, cool. And some other point which I’m sure I’ve already told you this a thousand times Shawn, but I just think it’s funny is that when your wife was learning to cut hair she cut … I would go there and get a hair cut from her because it might have been $2. I don’t even know. It was super cheap. She would …
Shawn Perry:
They paid you. They paid you $2 to come in there.
Chad Webb:
They almost did, yeah. They’re like, “We might mess this up but please come in.” But I remember it was, I don’t remember if this was high school or college. But I would go there and get my hair dyed by your wife. I’d get frosted tips. It looked good. Anyway.
Shawn Perry:
That’s amazing.
Chad Webb:
I always think it’s funny because-
Shawn Perry:
A throwback story for us that we always laugh about is when we started going to church together, unbeknownst to us that we were referred to as the Dharma and Greg couple. You guys remember that old show Dharma & Greg?
Jason Heflin:
Yeah.
Shawn Perry:
So, Natalie would have pink hair and I’ve had a suit on and everyone was so intrigued.
Jason Heflin:
She was the fun one. She was the fun one and you were the stuffy one.
Shawn Perry:
She was the funnest. Stuffy guy, yeah. You know me, stuffy guy.
Jason Heflin:
No. You just got to chip away. You got to chip that suit off.
Shawn Perry:
That’s right. That’s okay.
Jason Heflin:
You don’t wear a suit anymore, do you?
Shawn Perry:
Now if I just put a vest on I feel like I’m dressing up.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. I was going to say you don’t wear it. I haven’t seen you in a suit in a while.
Shawn Perry:
That’s my new virtual world. It’s been a while.
Jason Heflin:
That’s good.
Shawn Perry:
My motto, we could end on this, but my motto is taking myself less serious. That’s my new motto.
Jason Heflin:
Okay. Vision board that. I want to see that on your wall.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. Yeah, thanks.
Jason Heflin:
Thank you for your time today Shawn Perry. This has been fun.
Chad Webb:
Thank you. Yeah, absolutely.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah.
Jason Heflin:
I think-
Chad Webb:
This has been a lot of fun. I really appreciate it.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. We’ll have to tell tobacco cutting stories sometime.
Shawn Perry:
Yeah. I’ve got a few of them.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah.
Chad Webb:
Cool. Well, thank you, Shawn.
Jason Heflin:
Yeah. Appreciate it, man.
Shawn Perry:
Thanks, guys. I appreciate it.
Jason Heflin:
Thank you.
Chad Webb:
See you.
By Chad Webb
Chad Webb (who is 40) is one of CrowdSouth’s Partners and brings years (not quite 40) of experience managing multi-million dollar website projects to your business. He loves hoodies, puffy vests, jeans and flip flops.