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Multi-Billionaire Cuts the B.S. and Explains How To Succeed | Tilman Fertitta on Impact Theory

May 30, 2021
I think you can see that I'm not smarter than anyone else in this room. I just use certain little basic tools to be successful every day. Eliminate the word no from your vocabulary. Worry about your client. There are no extra clients. Use the 95 5 rule separately. out of everyone else be the bull in whatever you do and I don't care if you're in the mail room or if you're the person behind that camera, I'm going to be better than anyone else with that camera and I'm going to be the best macho bearer and the person who shows up and is the most organized and does it in the most professional manner.
multi billionaire cuts the b s and explains how to succeed tilman fertitta on impact theory
You can be the bull in whatever position you're doing and you just tell yourself I'm going to do this better than anyone else Hello everyone, welcome to

impact

theory

. Today's guest is an entrepreneur extraordinaire who went from owning a single restaurant in Kansas, Texas to becoming the richest restaurant tour in the world, with 600 restaurants in 36 states spread across more than 15 countries. His business empire encompasses not only such iconic restaurants as Mastro Steakhouse Jungle Cafe Morton's Dos Caminos and Bubba Gump Shron Company, but also a wide variety of other industries, including numerous hotels, casinos, aquariums and even the Houston Rockets MBA franchise.
multi billionaire cuts the b s and explains how to succeed tilman fertitta on impact theory

More Interesting Facts About,

multi billionaire cuts the b s and explains how to succeed tilman fertitta on impact theory...

He is one of the largest employers. in the nation with a staggering 60,000 employees and his companies collectively serving more than 150 million customers annually, his enormous success ranks him 153rd on the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans and he has received countless awards for His efforts, including winning the Ernst Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award and being inducted into the Texas Business Hall of Fame as the second-youngest inductee in history, he is also an incredibly active philanthropist who currently serves as president of the board of directors of the houston police foundation, the houston children's charity, and the texas heart institute, and he is the longest serving president of the board of regents of the university of houston, so please, help me welcome the bullish and charismatic star of cnbc's

billionaire

buyer, the author of shut up and listen, illman

fertitta

, good welcome, glad to be here, tom man it.
multi billionaire cuts the b s and explains how to succeed tilman fertitta on impact theory
Good to have you mate, your story is pure madness, what you have achieved and built essentially from scratch is almost unparalleled, it is truly crazy and I love some of the notions that you have that I think have really helped you build, that give me something. Background to keep hitting, you know, it's funny and I guess when I really started in the '80s, you hit that horrible recession and people talk about how the banks got so big because the government took over some of the big banks and said You're going to take the good assets and we're going to take all the bad assets and that's why you have banks that are too big to fail today because they are accumulations of bank after bank and in the late '80s they were difficult. and I was getting going and and and you realized that when other people went bankrupt, you just had to keep punching and punching and punching and people don't realize how much you can last and if you keep punching and find a way to get out of trouble and you know what's funny, this is a great story and I talk about it in the book.
multi billionaire cuts the b s and explains how to succeed tilman fertitta on impact theory
I was doing business with nine or ten banks in the late '80s in Texas and it was getting really difficult and making payments or whatever, starting to default on some for a few days, all the banks I did business with failed before me. , it's not a crazy story and I know it's hard to believe, but the FDIC would come to Houston every Tuesday in the late '80s and I closed four, five or six banks, so for about a six month period everyone the banks I did business with went bankrupt and you called and said, what do I do with these payments? and there was such a bureaucracy, I really got a break for three four years and then in 1990, I remember someone called my office and said, Mr.
Fertitta, we have these notes from you, we would like you to come and talk to us, but at that time time I was able to go and continue building my company and I was able to pay him one hundred percent without interest, although yeah, that's a nice touch now, so in this notion of making sure you keep hitting and knowing how much shot you can take and how. Do you stay focused when you get hit? How do you weather that storm and have the clarity to move forward? You just have to keep knocking and go about your business and you realize until they come and shut you down or lock the doors or you can't get product or whatever until you can't make payroll, you'd be surprised what you can take and you keep knocking. and hitting and believe it or not, sometimes you know they get well and come back. to which I preach once again, when times are really bad, we forget that they will ever be good again and when times are really good, we forget that they will be bad again and we must always remember that so that the rowing doesn't I don't understand you, yeah, tell people your concept of the paddle, well there's a paddle for everyone's butt, we all know that and every day you just wake up and I'm not afraid of anything, but I worry about everything and the day you stop worry In good times, paddling will slow you down, and no matter how good things are in life, know that you are just a few steps or a few incidents away from something bad happening.
You can never forget it. Were you afraid when you were a child? You've gotten into enough business fights to figure things out, or you've always been brave. I'm pretty brave, but I worry about everything, but you know again you know the book and that's why Harper asked me to write the. book because of all my

tilman

isms you have to know what you know and what you don't know and I knew I understood business now don't ask me, you know, go win an Emmy, I took guitar lessons for four years and I still struggle play the guitar.
I can't draw a stick person very well, but I knew I understood business, so I know what I know and I know how to do due diligence on a deal. I don't worry about getting a bad deal because I feel like that's what I know, so don't be afraid when it comes to that and how much of that is instinctive and how much of that you've had to learn on your own. I think I definitely got the DNA gene and I understood business, but at the same time I've been a sponge and I look and I observe everything and I pay attention and every day I wake up I look for mistakes and uh what I can learn that day don't ever think you know all because you don't know.
So every day is still a learning process and you can never be stuck with who you are because you're worth a few billion dollars and you have an extremely large company and because, like I said the day you don't, don't look in the back of my head. that rowing is going to affect my butt. My father-in-law is a very successful self-made man and came from a small town in Cyprus that I had never even heard of until I met his daughter and I think he gave me the best business advice I have ever received and still I use it to this day: knowing more about any situation than anyone else in the room and that has served me well.
I guess given your reputation and how people say you can spot a dead light bulb at 40,000 feet and all the things people say about you, you tend to know more about any deal going on at your company than anyone else who wants to. . to know how you master it at that level well, I mean, I can't go into some details that people know that I don't know, but if you walk into my office for a meeting, I don't care what department you're in, I'll select everything you have and you better know your numbers when you go in there with a spreadsheet or you better have your ads right if you're the marketing person coming in, but you also know you know. if people know what they're doing and uh, but it's my job to make sure and take everyone to another level and I think that's probably one of the biggest compliments I've ever received is that I'll take someone good and make it better is that it's a conscious process for you, like what are you doing, it's just kicking people in the butt, inspiring them by example, all of the above, I think so, you always know where you stand with me, uh, I have all my best vps.
They've probably been with me an average of 25 years, my two assistants have been with me 27 and 26 years and everyone will tell you he's the hardest son of a bitch in the world to work for, but I would never work for anyone else. Would you have to look at them to think it's worth the risk? I think one of the best things I've ever done was look at someone's resume and I can tell you know you've never been at the right company and that's why you haven't stood out and you are, that's why you're here today and so much.
People choose the wrong company to work for and I look at people all the time and I look at your resume and say why did you do it. You are going to work for this company. I knew they were screwed when you went to work for them. Well, some people are just not good at choosing the right company and also the person interviewing them makes promises that never happen and I think that's one. One of the biggest mistakes people make is choosing the wrong company to work for out of curiosity. What makes something the wrong company to work for?
Is it different from person to person or are there just certain things in a company that people should pay attention to? Do they really have good liquidity? Are they going to be in business? Are they an acquisition target? Suddenly they are and they will buy you out and probably fire you. You know, everything is. Have? a product that will be available for a long time, so everything from liquidity to product acquisition is aimed at growth, where is it going to go? Everyone should always ask themselves if they want to grow and just don't want to say where.
Can I be there in five years? If I can't be in this position in five years, then this is not a good career path for me. I think everything is a career path. I'd love to talk about that, so your career path is crazy and impressive, so how much of that was mapped out, like when you had that one restaurant in Texas. How big were you dreaming? Were you already thinking about aquariums? How much of this did you discover while you were going? Let's do it another way. Let's go back to 10 years. I walked with my business.
My briefcase full of business. There was no business in it, but I wanted to be a businessman, but you. I didn't really know what it was in high school. I was buying candy and reselling it at school. In high school. I was already trading in the stock market, so let's take these one at a time, so candy sales that gave you that idea, yeah? just understand, oh, if I can buy it for less and sell it, then I can make money. That's, hey, doing whatever it takes to make money. I always wanted to make money. I always had money, even when I was a child, because I always worked at any job.
I could figure out whether it was mowing someone's yard or washing cars or selling lemonade to construction workers, it was always about making money, which made you good at selling, that's a very particular skill, you know, I'm even today. , it's about someone said why are you so successful because I sell? and even when you go out and raise billions of dollars in debt and meet with debt holders, you're still selling yourself, that's what it's all about, you're not just selling the business when I went public for 18 years, okay , and you are selling shares. I made five follow-up offers, the most any restaurant company made when it was public and uh, and and you're selling yourself and and you know you know your numbers, you know your business and you make yourself known more than everyone else, even if you don't you do it, to go deeper beyond the kind of mythology of the boy carrying the briefcase and, oh, this is a natural thing, at some point it becomes a systematic thing, so if you're going to be a sponge, you have to put yourself in a position to Being a sponge, you have to know who to listen to, who to ignore, how you started formulating that and what that process is like now.
I knew how to make money and so at 21 I sold vitamins I started building houses building shopping centers when I was 26 I built my first hotel when I was 25 I told myself I would have my first airplane at 35 and I did it I was an investor in a restaurant and then when the world collapsed in the late '80s, nothing could be developed in Texas for the next 10 years, that's when all the SNLs went bankrupt, like I said, all the banks went bankrupt and I started opening restaurants and I did that between 86 and 92 and then 93. I said, well, you know, I'll just build restaurants because I understand this business since it can't be developed any further and I'll make it public because that's when the whole thing about The restaurant chains that went public in the stock market they did that for the next 17 years and then they were opportunistic, what I always talk about is that my stock plummeted with all the others at 0.809 when I took it public, it was 100 in 93, you wake up, you're worth 100 million. dollars, I took it private in 09 and it's worth 500 million dollars, it was very successful, I bought it well and then you know I was able to really grow because I didn't have the handcuffs of being a public company and when you think about the fundamentals of a business when you go to evaluate an agreementor whatever, what key things are you looking for, well, it's all the occupancy cost, the lease term, do they own any property?
What are their margins? I'm not. very smart but I know how to do it rightI can analyze the numbers of any business and tell you what your margin should be or whatever because my cost of production is this. I have so many subscribers you should do this or that and I don't care what the business is so that's what I know how to do it so if I try to make the right deal and do the due diligence and then I hope you can continue to increase your net worth and if someone wanted to be good at what you are good at, what would you recommend? they know, I think you know if you know business or not, and people ask me if I should go get my mba and you know what I usually tell them, you know if you need to get your mba if you don't have it in you. of you and you understand economics, finance and business operations, then you have to go find it.
I knew I didn't need it, it was just a gift from God, but also remember I didn't get many of those. other gifts, don't ask me to play that guitar, don't ask me to sing you a song and don't ask me to draw you anything, but you must know the gifts that God has given you and everyone has them. this room has it right here, so do what you know was the gift that God gave you and find a way to use it as your path, so when you think about someone who enters a career and builds something, obviously there is an element well that you should understand. find out what you are good at what you are not good at Do you think people can improve the things they are not good at?
Should they just not think about it and partner with people who have a different skill set? I've said don't partner with someone who has the same sales skills who read the book, who absolutely read the book, but at the same time I've forced myself to understand information technology and if you talk to any CEO of any company . They'll tell you that's the one department you don't want to be in, because no matter who you bring in, everyone has their own way of doing it and I've still forced myself to understand technology even though I'm not a millennial.
I try to know at least a little about each department, even if I don't know much, so guide me if you want to learn about it. What are you doing? You Google it or sit down with the director. of that and say, teach me everything, no, I just want to, I want to know everything, I want to understand this, you know, you know, malware, how people are getting into all of our systems and hacking and, uh, just process to learn, although just sit there and say you have to make me smarter about this you have to help me with these steps because I don't understand don't go into too much minutiae because you will lose me because I'm not that smart, but you have to give me the steps of why this is happening or no and that's something everyone should do.
You don't have to understand. You know I'm going to go and be able to program something or write something. but we should all, if we run a company, understand a part of it. When I'm photographing a billion dollar buyer, I know what all these different people do and exactly what they're doing and how important it is to know who each person is and and uh, it's just trying to understand what you do and what it does to you. Appreciate that person and how smart they are at that job too and how important they are to your company.
Okay, let's say I'm one of your children. I want to take control. the business someday how are you going to help me absorb the fundamentals of the business? Does he just follow you? Are you going to give me a list of Tillmanisms like what that process entails? which you just asked because some people have told me why don't you let your kids work for me for a while instead of just working for you and then other people told me you should put them in an apartment and let them learn that. department and you know what I said and I really think I'm doing well and we'll see, only time will tell, there are so many departments, you're talking about a company with four billion dollars in revenue and 60,000 employees. and 700 million in ebitda that does everything from you know, I have 25 biologists that work for me in aquariums, so everything from aquariums to amusement parks to five casinos to restaurants to an NBA basketball team is fine , anything you can think of, I'm teaching them. making decisions because that's what it's really about is learning how to make decisions seeing how I make decisions every day about everything whether it's a small decision or a big decision and they've been doing it with me and they're pretty smart We don't know if we could run this without you , so it's interesting because they're the ones who sit in meetings and see how I make decisions, it's the best thing I can do for them instead of learning a little department, so yeah Let's teach ourselves some key business principles.
What are some basic business principles that you would really like if you knew that if I died without my children understanding these three to five things? What would those three to five things look like? Numbers, no matter what business you are looking for, always know your numbers. Number two, understand that we will not be successful if that consumer does not come to us, whether he is eating at your restaurants or playing at your casino. and if you don't have a good product on that basketball court, the fans are not going to come to buy those tickets, the sponsors are not going to come and therefore you are not going to have the money to pay for those good ones.
The players next year will not They will be able to pay Russell Westbrook and James Harden $40 million a year each. They must always remember that we are only as good as we are at taking care of that consumer, one of the things he taught. everyone and especially my children don't assume anything. People think that someone comes in and gives you an answer that it's the right answer and even when I tell someone to do something, I don't assume that he went and did it all. A week later I asked them if you did that thing I asked you to do because that was very important to me.
Oh my gosh, I didn't do that and I think the biggest mistake people make is not assuming that everything is working fine. Don't assume you see parallels between the game you play in business and sports that's why there is a passion for you on both sides 100 percent I operate by the 95 5 95 rule of everything we do in business yes I'm doing any thing is fine, so look for five percent. Soon you will find five percent. This is so powerful and reading it in the book I thought, "Okay, here we go, so how do you identify the five percent?
How do you know what the five percent matters?" How do you prioritize how you attack that five percent? Well, let me tell you this. I entered this studio. I have done many interviews. As soon as I walk in, your people greet you and introduce you. You know this, you come here, here's, uh, here's some snacks, there's even a camera light, uh, so if they're doing your makeup up there, it's perfect lighting. I realized this guy has his act together, this guy, I'm having a hard time. time to find their five percent because they're doing everything right and I'm not just saying that, but you know everything I say is true, that you have someone who meets us outside, we're not working on lost and so, I had I didn't find the five percent here, I'm sure before the show is over I will, but it's there, sure, I think you're all right, but I judged you and your operation the moment I came in and it's not different if I do it.
I'm pulling into a retail store, hotel, restaurant or whatever and before I get to the front door I pull into that parking lot. Is the parking lot in fairly good condition? Are there weeds? Are there cigarette butts? the parking lot uh or your lights are burning out uh the front door has a lot of stains on it I haven't even gotten in yet and I can tell you this is not a clear cut operation. I can tell you everything how the operation is going. be inside before you walk in the front door because if you don't take care of the outside, the inside won't be good and that's the same parallel I used for the basketball team.
We had a great year again. We won the most games we've won in a two-year period in my first two years as owner, but I sat down with the general manager, the head coach and my best basketball people and said, "Okay, we did 95 of everything right, but I didn't beat Golden State again, so what should we do? How can we improve that five percent? We thought about it and that's when we decided that maybe there's an opportunity to be a little bit more athletics and make a great transition player that can speed up the game and make us a better team like Russell Westbrook and that was the five percent we were looking for changing some coaching positions changing some other players you will never be great if you don't look for the five percent Yeah, as you were talking I thought, "Okay, I'm starting to get a pretty good idea of ​​what makes you work, so remember that I don't believe, and it's not that I don't believe, that some people come with some kind of gifts." programmed, it's just that I don't find it very useful, so if the sum total of your story is like this, you're either born with it or not, why read the book properly?
What it comes down to is there's an element of this that can be taught and listening to you talk the part that I find so interesting that I think can be taught is that you have very high standards and more importantly you have high standards that when you look at where it goes wrong it doesn't hurt your sense of self-worth so you're willing to look at it you're willing to do what I call staring at your inadequacies you don't walk into a restaurant to applaud yourself, you walk into a restaurant to find out something is wrong you don't say which is bad, you're just saying that if we want to and this is my favorite concept of yours, separating ourselves from others, the easiest thing to do, it's the easiest thing to do. to do and I tell everyone that no matter what their job is, they can go to work every day and separate themselves from everyone else and it's no different than the sound guy on this set, if they answer, they know what this sound guy is. really really good and he's worried about this and he's worried about that and all of a sudden you tell someone you need a good sound guy for this and then they break up with this person because of a recommendation, suddenly this guy is known as The best sound guy in Los Angeles because he's paying attention or she's paying attention to details that the other sound people don't know, no, you know what I hear an ambulance out there, let's cut it, you know, just some little things and I just think it's easy to separate yourself from others no matter what your position is if you go to work for a company and you don't move up the corporate ladder it's your fault it's no one else's or you're in the wrong company where there is no upward mobility or you just separate because I know one thing if you work for me I'm paying attention nothing goes unnoticed okay and I tell people that all the time if you want to separate it's easy to do because someone above you goes to notice it, your colleagues will notice it , it's easy to separate yourself from others.
Yes, that notion to me is one of the most important things anyone in a company can do and I love what you're saying about personal responsibility. It's up to you, man, if you're not, even if, like you said, it's just that you're, you're in the wrong company, you're in the wrong company, so if you want to get somewhere where you can move, you've got to do it. go somewhere else or align your skill set if someone comes to you and says I want to improve. I understand it's specific to that case, but are there general things someone can do?
Start with shut up and listen? Is it the illmanisms that make those things take root in your soul or is there something else that gives someone the mental framework with which to propel themselves forward. You know, I think you can learn from talking to me that I'm not. on a different level, okay, these are pretty simple basic tools, so no one listens to him and says "OMG", he's just using words and he's a lot smarter than me, so I'm not going to be worth five billion dollars. that book is fine, he is naturally smarter than me.
I think you can see that I'm not smarter than anyone else in this room. I just use certain little basic tools to be successful every day. Eliminate the word no from your vocabulary. Worry about your customer there are no spare parts customers use the rule 95 5 separate yourself from others be the bull in everything you do and go on and on and on you know what you are good at you know what you are not good at I want to go back to the bull thing, like this which I certainly understand when it comes to an acquisition, being optimistic basically when there's blood on the street, that's when there's a real opportunity, like I have all that, now give it to me like I'm a young child. trying to get through the mail room whatever how you embody the bull it's about confidence it's about boldness like what is that thing um whatever position you're in you want to be the bull and I don't care if you're in the mail room or if you're the person behind that camera, I'm going to be better than anyone else with that camera and I'm going to be the best male carrier and the person who comes up and is the most organized and does it in the most professional way.
You can be the bull in any position you are doing andYou just tell yourself that I'm I'm going to do this better than anyone else. I don't care what the job is. I don't care what you do. Be the bull in what you do. What motivates you is setting goals. Is it the conquest? Do you know someone who? "It's an all-weather winner. There's something that pushes them. It's a sport now. It's just the sport. This is what I do every day and people say, 'Why are you doing this?' And I just said, 'Why are you doing this?' What would I do if I could?" I don't come to the office and solve problems and fight with everyone and conquer some and you know how to conquer so what am I going to do with myself?
I'm going to stay home and die, I mean, that's what I enjoy doing, this is my basketball. This is my game that I play, this is my monopoly game, whatever you want to call it, okay, this is the one that I love going to the office and leading people and trying to conquer something, that's what I enjoy doing, it's a sport, so when It was very interesting because you once said that when I had my first restaurant and I was finally

succeed

ing and I think you were making like three or four million dollars a year and your father asked me why do you keep putting all this at risk? and you said this is basically how I think of myself now, maybe you think I've gotten big, but for me this is nothing compared to where I want to go, how big do you dream and how concrete are those dreams?
You may not be willing to say it out loud, but do you already know that this is my next acquisition and this is where I'm headed and this is how I get the NFL team and this is it? You're right. Steps to get to the next level now, if I don't achieve any of that, have I reached that point in life where I'm happy? Yeah, I don't feel like it after buying the Houston Rockets. Oh, and once again, you know. Who owns 100 members of his team in his hometown? There are probably nine of the top 100 sports teams.
There probably aren't five, so I feel very lucky. If nothing else is accomplished, do I feel pretty good? I feel good. I really do. I really do. and I thank God, you know, and all the people who helped me achieve it, but what you just said is happening. I'm taking the next steps right now to get to the next level because that's always my sport, let's play. I go play basketball, we go to the office and we play business and that's what I do every day. I go to the office and play business. I have weekends if I'm not on vacation or on the boat or whatever and I'm sitting at home. and it's labor day or memorial day and I have no plans, I'm going crazy, I'm going to go to the office, I want to attack, if people want to interact with you, they want to learn more about what you're doing, where?
Would they find you? You know, follow me on Instagram, Facebook or Twitter and read, shut up and listen, and all the people who work for me will tell you that they read Tillman's book talking, that is, him. capture it perfectly and like I said, I have never been the smartest guy in the room, I have never professed to be, but I will thank you, I will outwork you, I will motivate you and I will teach you how to truly lead. Talk to me quickly about the notion of people working harder. I can tell you that we have worn out a lot of people on deals when we just say, let's move on.
The best time to negotiate a deal is Friday and thinking that everyone will leave at five or six in the afternoon, so I always try to set up a negotiation for all of you, who I plan to make an acquisition of in the future, because we will spend the weekend and they want to go home and So we keep going at three in the morning, at four in the morning, we'll outwork your ass, yeah, one of the best strategies in life, in my opinion, I'm totally with you on that, what

impact

do you want to have on the world, you always want to do the right thing, you want to be remembered, you were very successful, but you did it fairly and squarely. leaving this world that everyone told god he was a difficult son of a bitch but he always did the right thing that's pretty cool guys, the illmanisms alone are worth the price of admission.
I highly recommend the book, it is very fun. If you were paying attention to the way he speaks, definitely, when you read the book, you will realize that that is definitely his voice and it captures his spirit and someone who can start with just one restaurant and build what he has built today, if you have any interest in doing so. something extraordinary in your life, regardless of whether you want to be an entrepreneur or not, I think a lot of the rules apply to just knowing more about something that works better than people, knowing what you want, big audacious goals, that's all bull . it will pay off in your life if you haven't already be sure to subscribe and until next time my friends will be legendary take care gentlemen thank you my friend you were a wonderful man and I learned this selling encyclopedias door to door early in the 20s. prepare in life for a lot of rejection because if you are prepared for a lot of rejection that is coming, don't get discouraged, don't be disappointed, well, I'm not going to do this anymore, no one thinks it's a good idea

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