Search Interviews:

Brian Brault

Brian Brault is a Coach and Transformational Leadership Trainer at Legacy of Significance, an executive-level educational coaching service that offers retreats, workshops, and executive education for individuals and couples. He is also the CEO and Founder of Pure Wellness, an air purification service that transforms interior spaces into world-class wellness environments that protect against viral and bacterial contaminants and promote overall wellbeing. He is a Co-chair for the Entrepreneurial Masters Program and Chairperson of the Board for the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO). Brian graduated from the University at Buffalo School of Management with a degree in human resources.

Spotify
Apple
Google Podcast
Amazon Music
Tune In
Stitcher
iHeart Radio
Deezer

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

  • Brian Brault talks about how a business opportunity kick-started his entrepreneurial journey
  • How Brian shifted his business from servicing hotels to office spaces at the forefront of the pandemic
  • The various ways that the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) is a database for education
  • What does a successful entrepreneurial business model look like?
  • Brian shares how the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) helped him evolve as a leader
  • Brian details a unique yearly excursion he has planned with his wife

In this episode…

Developing your business is not without its fair share of challenges and stress. It takes a great leader to build an enduring enterprise, and Brian Brault knew he needed to grow a great team to reach each milestone in the journey. What steps can you take to achieve your professional and leadership goals?

Brian grew a small vinyl siding cleaning company into an empire by systematically expanding his service offerings. Building an impeccable reputation and incorporating innovative business models propelled his success. As his business grew, he felt that most people in his life didn’t understand entrepreneurship, so he sought out to find like-minded people and eventually found his tribe at EO. He incorporated the entrepreneurial, managerial, and innovative skills he learned at the Entrepreneurial Master’s Program. What he discovered was sustainable growth and significant business opportunities time after time.

On this episode of the Rising Entrepreneurs Podcast, John Corcoran sits down with Brian Brault, Coach and Transformational Leadership Trainer at Legacy of Significance and Founder and CEO of Pure Wellness, to discuss how the Entrepreneurs’ Organization shaped his leadership skills. Brian talks about the entrepreneurial journey that began with vinyl siding, what influenced him to develop his leadership skills, and the business model that built an enduring enterprise.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Sponsor for this episode

At Rise25, we’re committed to helping you connect with your Dream 100 referral partners, clients, and strategic partners through our done-for-you podcast solution.

We’re a professional podcast production agency that makes creating a podcast effortless. Since 2009, our proven system has helped thousands of B2B businesses build strong relationships with referral partners, clients, and audiences without doing the hard work.

What do you need to start a podcast?

When you use our proven system, all you need is an idea and a voice. We handle the strategy, production, and distribution – you just need to show up and talk.

The Rise25 podcasting solution is designed to help you build a profitable podcast. This requires a specific strategy, and we’ve got that down pat. We focus on making sure you have a direct path to ROI, which is the most important component. Plus, our podcast production company takes any heavy lifting of production and distribution off your plate.

We make distribution easy.

We’ll distribute each episode across more than 11 unique channels, including iTunes, Spotify, and Google Podcasts. We’ll also create copy for each episode and promote your show across social media.

Co-founders Dr. Jeremy Weisz and John Corcoran credit podcasting as being the best thing they have ever done for their businesses. Podcasting connected them with the founders/CEOs of P90xAtariEinstein BagelsMattelRx BarsYPO, EO, Lending Tree, Freshdesk, and many more.

The relationships you form through podcasting run deep. Jeremy and John became business partners through podcasting. They have even gone on family vacations and attended weddings of guests who have been on the podcast.

Podcast production has a lot of moving parts and is a big commitment on our end; we only want to work with people who are committed to their business and to cultivating amazing relationships.

Are you considering launching a podcast to acquire partnerships, clients, and referrals? Would you like to work with a podcast agency that wants you to win?

Contact us now at support@rise25media.com or book a call at rise25.com/bookcall.

Rise25 Co-founders, Dr. Jeremy Weisz and John Corcoran, have been podcasting and advising about podcasting since 2008.

Episode Transcript

Intro  0:02 Welcome to the Rising Entrepreneurs Podcast where we feature top founders and entrepreneurs and their journey. Now let’s get started with the show.  

John Corcoran  0:13  

Alright welcome everyone. John Corcoran. Here. I am the host of this show. You know, check out some of my past interviews got all kinds of great interviews across multiple different podcasts. You know, I talked to smart entrepreneurs, founders, CEOs, all kinds of companies ranging from Netflix to Kinkos, YPO, EO activation, Blizzard lending tree, and many more. I’m also the Co-founder Rise25, where we help connect b2b business owners to their ideal prospects. And first quick shout out to David Bartholomeusz, who recommended today’s guest David, thank you so much for that one of my past guests as well. And our guest here today is Brian Brault, He is an author. He’s a leadership coach. He’s a speaker. He’s co chair of the Entrepreneurial Masters Program, which we will talk about as well, which was created by Verne Harnish and other past guests on my podcast. He’s also the founder of Legacy of Significance, which does Executive Education retreats and trainings and leadership coaching. also the founder and CEO of Pure Wellness, a company that transforms interior spaces into world class wellness environments, and does couples retreats, as well with Warren Rustand and other past guests on this show. So we have lots of things to talk about here today. Of course, this is brought to you by Rise25 Media, where we help b2b businesses to get clients referrals and strategic partnerships with done for you podcasts to go check us out at Rise25media.com to learn all about it. And final notice this is about part of our GLC series, the global leadership conference series, where we are featuring Entrepreneurs’ Organization members who have attended GLC which this year in 2022, is going to be held in April 23 to 26th. In Washington, DC, and also in Barcelona, Spain, and also virtually so if you are a member of Entrepreneurs’ Organization, go to EOnetwork.org and you can learn more about it. Alright, Brian, with that, so excited to have you here today. And I want to start at the beginning of your entrepreneurial journey. You turned a college project into your first business, Advanced Facility Services. What was that? How did that come about?  

Brian Brault  2:14  

Oh, Hi, John. Great to be here. And great question. So it started with my senior year in the undergraduate program at the University of Buffalo, we had to develop a business on paper now, that was quite a few years ago, back when vinyl siding on homes was relatively an relatively new thing. And it was designed to be maintenance free. And I used to walk by this one, one building every day on the way into school, and it had vinyl siding on it and it looked dirty. So I went up one day and kind of ran my finger across and realize it’s just all surface stuff. So I had this idea of power washing vinyl siding on homes. And so when I was asked to develop a business on paper for a class project, that’s the business I chose. So moving forward a little bit all the job offers I got out of my senior year and undergraduate were going to pay me less than what I earned putting myself through school. So I decided if I got a master’s in business, that that might help my job prospects a little bit more and, and so I decided I would go to go to graduate school and get my MBA. So I happened to develop, I got an assistantship to study for my MBA. So for the first time in my life, I didn’t have to worry about paying for college. So I decided, hey, you know what, let me let me take some $500 that I got from graduation and start this business powerwashing vinyl siding on homes.  

John Corcoran  3:45  

Buy a power washer, and you’re off to the races.  

Brian Brault  3:47  

I bought a power washer and I was off to the races. And then right before right before school started in the fall, I approached a grocery store chain about powerwashing the front of their store. And well I bid on it, what equated to being about $1 an hour in the end for how long it took me to do that job actually paid off really, really well because they started asking me to do all sorts of other projects. And pretty quickly it grew into a real business. And so I ended up saying, Listen, I can always go back to get my finish my MBA, but I got a job opportunity or a business opportunity. Let me see where this goes. So that’s what I did. I started building a business and gosh, 28 years later, I sold that business. We were probably at about 300 employees at our peak and and did quite a bit.  

John Corcoran  4:43  

And I want to ask about how you grew it. But first I imagine as a coach you you come across this from time to time where you have people come to you and they say I’m thinking about undercutting my prices because of the opportunity that might come along and you just said that with this grocery store chain. Did it $1 An hour and it ended up having this big opportunity. But there’s such tension for so many businesses, you know, do you lower your prices in order to get the work? What do you how do you reflect on that all these years later,  

Brian Brault  5:11  

oh, I didn’t intentionally work for $1. I bet a job at $300 that I thought I would do really well on. And I realized what I had done, before I bid on the job, I did a little test patch, for the test patch was really easy. So I thought this will I’ll fly through this, well, I must have, I must have picked the easiest spot on the entire storefront, because it ended up taking me about 300 hours. And so that’s why I made $1 an hour. You know, however, I think it’s really a matter of saying, you know, it’s a combination of having respect for your value, and recognizing what it takes to show what your value is. And so it’s it’s, it’s sometimes it’s just reading what’s going on, there are times when you know what your value is, with respect to your customer. And then there’s other times when they don’t really know who you are. I’m in a business that I started later, it was, we actually had a revenue share model that worked exceptionally well for us, because we knew what our value was, but getting customers to take that leap of faith and scratch out a check for 50 grand is a tougher sell. So we actually turned it around and said, I’ll tell you what, we’ll put these rooms in for free, you pay us a certain amount of money when you receive it. And then once you reach a certain hurdle, we’ll then split it with you. And we actually made substantially more money with that revenue share model, because we knew what our value was, and we took all the risk out of it for the company.  

John Corcoran  6:59  

And this is the Pure Wellness business.  

Brian Brault  7:03  

That’s the Pure Wellness room. So we would go to hotels and and and talk to them about creating special wellness rooms in hotels that created a very healthy environment. So the surfaces that you touched the quality of the air that you breathe, was really a far superior quality than any other hotel room that exists. And, and hotels love the concept. But to scratch out a check for $50,000 for 20 rooms, on a floor in their hotel was a tough sell at times, certainly at the beginning. So we created a revenue share model that we put the rooms in at no charge than the first $1,800 in premiums that they were able to collect for those rooms they gave to us. And then from that point on, they retained 60% of the premium they charge and we got 40% Interesting. Yeah, for them. It was money that they found a revenue stream they didn’t have to come up with capital for and we actually made more money.  

John Corcoran  8:03  

It’s interesting that company’s about 20 years old. And yet talk about a company that seems to have been created for these times. Pure wellness, I’m reading directly from your website here protects against 99.9% of viral and bacterial contaminants, including COVID-19. So what I’m curious about is, what was 2020? Like for you? Was it an influx of business was an immediate drop in business. Well, how was that business affected by COVID?  

Brian Brault  8:30  

Yeah, great question because it would seem like we should have taken off instantly. There are the challenges 99% of our market was the hotel space. And hotels went from an average of like 87 to 88% occupancy, which means 87 to 88% of their rooms are fully occupied throughout the course of the year at edit being paid at a rate down to low single digits, which means 2 3 4 percent occupancy. And our program success is based on occupancy in hotels. So 99% of our market went down to next to nothing well, and hotels charge a premium for our rooms. And when your occupancy is down that low, you’re just happy to get anybody to come into your hotel and stay there. You money to stay there. So it was a very difficult time for us at first. But what the CEO and the marketing team in the in the operations team came together and said, you know, let’s shift our focus from hotels into office space, because all of a sudden, you know, there’s their buildings needed to create a reason why people would want to come back. And so we started pivoting to office buildings and so we’ve been building relationships with building owners and property developers on creating very healthy environments inside off,  

John Corcoran  10:04  

is really critical. Now, as we record this in March of 2022, when a lot of companies are trying to lure their people back into the office space, I want to ask you about when did you first join EO? And you joined? EO, it was it was with Advanced Facilities Services. And you had a tremendous result, the first four years they were in a EO in terms of growing that business.  

Brian Brault  10:28  

Yeah, so I started my business in 1986. And in 2001, I qualified for EO, but I didn’t, what what attracted me to it is, I had somewhat plateaued in my growth. And I wanted to grow the company, but I knew I was going to need help. And also, quite frankly, I was kind of lonely. Most of the people that I had in my life didn’t necessarily understand what it’s like to be an entrepreneur, amazing people amazing resources, but they just didn’t think, necessarily the way I did. So whenever I would go to weddings or parties, I would always migrate towards those other entrepreneurs. So I felt like I had kind of found my tribe. But more importantly, I was really attracted to the learning programs that EO offered both at the chapter, you know, regionally and globally. So I joined EO, in May of 2001. And and then, you know, gosh, four months later, 911 happened. Yeah, and, and so really, I walked into forum, and one of my four mates started talking about SBA disaster funding. And, you know, we were able to secure a loan that really helped us survive as a business. And what I what I did is I just started jumping in with both feet to every learning opportunity I had attended every local event, started going to some regional conferences, EO had, I signed up for the executive education program, which is now EMP, or the Entrepreneurial Master’s Program. At the time, it was called birthing of giants. I didn’t get in my first try. It took me a second try. And I got in. And that changed my life on on many levels. One is it started, I didn’t, I attended the year one of birthing of giants in in Dedham, Massachusetts, at a MIT retreat campus. And while I was there, there was a guy who had studied Russian history. And he said, Hey, listen, there’s a there’s a regional conference EO is putting on this September. If you if anyone has a chance to go, you really need to go to this. So I thought, What the heck. So I never really left the country. I mean, I, I live 10 minutes from Canada. So I, you know, I traveled to Canada a lot. But other than Canada, I had never really left the country. And so I decided, What the heck, I’ll go. So I went to this regional conference in Moscow, Russia. And it just, it was just such an incredible experience. I called my wife, the second day said whatever we need to do, to, to travel the world, we need to because we just don’t really understand what’s going on in the rest of the world. And also, because of that, it started me down a path of you know, starting to make connections with other EO leaders. I wasn’t a leader at the time. But you know, EO leaders that would be at these events and a lot of the professional staff, which eventually later would start to get me involved in leadership positions outside the chapter. But let me step back to the entrepreneurial master’s program or birthing of giants at the time. That started to get me to think differently about my business. It started to help me think bigger than I had ever thought of before. And it helped me realize that I don’t have to be the one with all the answers in my company. That if I can really develop a great culture in my company, if I can share my numbers with people that can influence how we earn, how we profit, how we grow our business, and really create environments for us as an organization to really scale our business. It just shifted the way I thought. And so I took all the concepts that are taught in EO and specifically with the entrepreneurial master’s program and started to put them into my business. We were really particular about how we recruited hired and retain top talent or A players. We started using open book management, sharing numbers with the people who influence power company performs, and we really started being very creative with the way we grew our team and grew our business. I think started, you know, I started creating small little entrepreneurial environments within our company.  

John Corcoran  15:06  

And I assume by this point, you’re not just doing vinyl siding, you know, yeah,  

Brian Brault  15:10  

we, we actually never did vinyl siding anymore. But what we did is we, we always approached every customer as if they were our only customer. And that was just natural to me. There was a guy that I did work for that he owned three grocery stores. And he my biggest customer had 200 grocery stores. He always felt and I never knew it until much later that I always treated him as if he was my biggest customer. He said, You always made me feel like I was your most important customer. He said, I knew I wasn’t because I knew who your big customer was. So he ended up selling those stores. I thought, well, you know what, it was a good run, he sold a store as well, about a year and a half later, he ended up as the director of property management for the largest privately owned owner of shopping centers, retail strip centers, in in the country. And he started asking me to do other types of services than what we had previously provided him. He said, Because I just liked the way you approach taking care of customers. I like your work ethic. I like your culture, I like your people. So that actually started to expand us way beyond what the the product lines were originally offering the services we were offering. He also had a big division down in Florida that he was looking to have us help manage their properties for a period of time, and then provide bundled services, which really started to evolve us into a total facility service company, a back before it was really popular. And so we just, you know, again, we had the opportunity in front of us. Yeah, it was really a lot of the learning that we had had in EO and the, you know, the birthing of giants or entrepreneurial masters program is what made us ready for  

John Corcoran  17:07  

Yeah, now there’s, there’s kind of two tensions that come up from what you’ve just articulated. One is, do you stay true to what you stay in your lane trade to stay true to what you’ve known what you’ve been doing? Or do you expand your services. And then the other one is when a big client, a whale client comes to you, and then that portion of your revenue becomes so big that you come kind of, you know, indebted in a way to that that client, you’ve got one client too many eggs in one basket, did either of those two things, enter into your mind as you engage in this service?  

Brian Brault  17:41  

So yes, and yes. They what was fortunate is that one big customer that this this guy who on the grocery stores, always knew was my biggest customers kept getting bigger. So when he left and joined this other, you know, management company or or shopping center ownership company, they started become big as well. But we also started growing with an additional grocery store chain, and also universities and we started doing work with banks. So quite honestly, we started getting a lot of really big customers, because we started gaining momentum on on really our reputation and so forth. So you asked a couple great questions there. We were a service company. And so what we did is we never, we stayed focused on being a service company. But what we did is added added ancillary services to what we were doing. So we started out as a power washing and specialized cleaning company, which means going in with scaffolding and, and doing high level cleaning inside of grocery stores. And, you know, we didn’t we didn’t do what most companies could do, we did what really no one else could do. And from there, we expand expanded into floor care. And then from from there when we started, we started providing services in general and what we would do is we would go out and hire subcontractors who were the best in the field in that market, to work with us. And eventually we started to build up our own team of experts to be able to provide those services. So we didn’t, whenever we added a new ancillary service offering, we went out and tried to hire the best leaders in that space in that market to lead our lead our portion of our company that’s why what we would do is we would set up like an entrepreneurial company within our company, we add central human resources, central accounting and central administrative support that you know, and also central leadership so you know, once CEO One Chief Operating Officer, one chief financial officer. And then we but then we Other than that, each general manager of that entrepreneurial division was responsible as if they own the business so that the p&l ultimately higher, you know, ultimately making the decisions around who to hire who to fire as long as they fit criteria. Yeah. And sales and marketing, budget forecasting performance, and delivering on the service.  

John Corcoran  20:28  

Really interesting model there. And then how did Pure Wellness come about? Because I could see kind of the interrelated nature of it, because they’re both, you’re dealing with facilities in a sense, how did you decide to make that be its own separate company?  

Brian Brault  20:45  

Well, it in mid 2000s, we were recognized by Inc, as one of the 500 fastest growing companies. That was before it was the 5000 list, it was just the 500 list. And when you make that list, you just, you get a lot of press, certainly in the market that you’re in. And and so there were a lot of people reaching out to us with, with business ideas. Well, interestingly enough, my assistant, you know, buzzed me one day and said, hey, this person is on the phone for you. Well, this person’s name was a very unique name. It happened to be the head of human resources. For my biggest customer. I thought, wow, why is he calling me. And we had previously bought a division of their grocery store chain. It was their internal service department, we, we took over that department for them. So when  

John Corcoran  21:44  

another interesting model, by the way, when the when the client doesn’t want to run a particular division, they sell it to you. Yeah, I got a forum mate who’s employing that strategy now?  

Brian Brault  21:53  

Oh, and it was it just really took us to a whole new level, it was great. Well, so then when the head of human resources for my largest customers calling me, I thought, Wow, I wonder if there’s another opportunity? Well, the crazy thing is, it happened to be someone else with the exact same name. And he had a market research firm, representing a Swedish engineer. So I took the call, because of the name. And it was a different person. And, you know, he had me on the phone. So he kind of quickly gave me a pitch that he this market research firm representing this Swedish engineer who had developed this concept for allergy friendly hotel rooms. And so I thought, well, let me take a look at it, maybe we’ll set it up as another division within our company. What we so we did some research, we went to Cornell University to their hotel school, the dean of the school. And he actually did a Cornell quarterly study on it, and felt like there was a real good opportunity there. We talked to Hilton Hotels, and Marriott Hotels. And, and they both came to us and said, Hey, we think this has legs. So we decided it’s different enough from what we do, because it doesn’t serve us really our local markets. We had to build outside our current markets. So we, we dedicated some resources and people to it to say, why don’t we start a new business and just build this. And so we did. About a year into it, I realized that I don’t really understand the hotel space. So we brought on a an investor, who had spent his career as part of a team buying and selling and managing hotels. And so he came on, he brought some capital that we needed, and also he brought some expertise in the hotel space, and really helped us understand how to sell to that market.  

John Corcoran  23:45  

Hmm, I want to I know we’re going a little over on time here. But this is all fascinating. So I appreciate you sharing it all. I want to ask you about, you know, you got involved in the EO and eventually advanced to leadership. You become the chair of the global board of directors, what what drove that what drove? You know, not everyone does that there’s 16,000 members. Now that’s takes a big commitment. What What motivated you to do that?  

Brian Brault  24:12  

What motivated me to become the chair or  

John Corcoran  24:17  

get well, I guess more broadly, it wasn’t a well articulated question. You more broadly get involved in leadership.  

Brian Brault  24:25  

So great. So in I there was a period of a couple of years where my business had really started to grow a lot. I graduated in the ie the birthing of giants class of 2005. A year later, Verne Harnish decided that he was going to step away from running the birthing of giants, which is now the entrepreneurial master’s program. And so they looked for three people who could They felt could step step in and lead each person lead a year. So I, I thought that would be amazing. So going back to when I started traveling and going to universities and conferences for EO I started getting to know, started getting to know the leadership at the time, as well as the staff. And so Brian Hansell, who was, had been the was the, the chair at the time, at unite had run into each other at a couple conferences. So he suggested my name. At the same time, I also raised my hand, because I thought I would enjoy being a forum trainer, I had no idea what a forum trainer really was, I just thought forum was amazing and life changing. And I thought that I’d love to kind of volunteer my time three, four times a year and train in foreign forum. So at the same time, I was stepping into being one of the CO facilite co chairs of the entrepreneurial master’s program, and becoming a forum trainer, I had had a kind of an interesting position on the global forum committee just as like a test subject for something, what for what is now forum experts. And, and so very quickly, I was the I became they? Well, I became the one of the chairs of EMP. And they asked me if I would consider being the Global Forum chair. And I can remember at the time thinking, Did you ask like, a dozen other people? And they all said, no, why are you asking me I don’t really have a ton of experience in it. And they said it was more of my leadership style than anything else. And I didn’t really, I didn’t know what my leadership style was at the time. And quite frankly, didn’t necessarily think I was a great leader. So what happened, John, between that and becoming global chair is every role I ever played in EO leadership, I absolutely positively was certain it would be my last role in leadership, I would play 100%. In fact, every time that I, I was convinced to continue on in leadership, I consciously thought, Okay, this is when they’re going to realize I’m just not that good of a leader. And so what I did, and I think it’s really important for EO members to understand, and I get asked all the time, what do I need to do to get on the global board? Or what do I need to do to be global chair? And my answer is this. Focus on the role that you are in when you’re in it, and nothing else. Because if you’re executing in one role, and you’re thinking about something else, you’re not in your role, you’re in a role that may or may not come to you and your your family deserves if you’re going to raise your hand and take time away from your family and your business, to volunteer in EO your family in your business deserve you to be your, the best you can be and what you what you’ve raised your hand to do. Your members, your fellow members deserve 100% of your focus on the role that you’ve committed to. And certainly you do as an individual, you want to be good at what you do. So just focus on the role that you’re in. And so what happened is I never wanted to advance in leadership. I just never did. It’s just I, I just wanted to be good at the role that I was in. And what would happen is people just kept asking me to step into other roles. And that’s kind of what eventually had someone asked me if I would, you know, consider applying for the board of directors. And I said no. And we had a conversation, it was Jody Dhawan was just an amazing human being who’s on the board at the time. And he said, Brian, the reason I’m asking you is this, you have a you have an approach to leadership that is, you don’t get caught up in the drama. You you care about the people you lead. And you the board is going to be going through a transition. And it’s going to need your kind of leadership to be part of that board. And that spoke to me. And so I talked with my wife, we ended up going to Geneva University, really to see how the board interacts with members, and how the, you know, the board interacts with their family or their spouses when they’re together. And what I saw was some pretty amazing things. I saw a board that really interacted well with with the members, I saw a board that had their spouses with them as they were serving in leadership, and, and their spouses were a part of that my wife is a very important part of my life. And I you know, my kids were, you know, grown and out of the house at that point. So that wasn’t as much of a consideration. But my wife always has been and so I wanted to make sure she could be part of that journey.  

John Corcoran  29:47  

That’s great. I have so many things I want to ask you about but I know we’re running short on time. So a couple that I I have to ask about before we run out of time. One when you became global chair, you spoke at the UN you gave a great impassioned speech about the importance of education? Talk a little bit about what that experience was like for you personally?  

 

Brian Brault  30:06  

Well, yeah, it was just, you know, kind of a cool thing to actually give a speech on the floor of the UN. In 2015, when I was leading, you know, an EMP class, Jeff Hoffman, founder of Priceline, had just returned from a trip around the world where it was advancing entrepreneurship. And he said something there, that kind of crystallized what had been echoing inside me, and that is the power of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship. And so I asked him if he would mentor me, along with Warren Rustand. And they both separately did. Cuz at that point, I knew I was going to be on the board. And what they, one of the things that Jeff Hoffman and I realized is that, you know, entrepreneurs have a special heart, you know, and tenacity and creativity and innovation. And if we could apply those talents, to the way the world tries to solve problems, we may be able to come up with solutions that the bureaucracies or the governments of the world were struggling to. And you know, we just don’t take no for an answer. So I started, I became very passionate about bringing entrepreneurs together to solve problems of the world. And so that’s what we did at the UN. We were there a few different times. And it really made made a significant impact. And I think it’s it’s an important partnership for EO.  

John Corcoran  31:34  

Yeah. And talk about Global Leadership Conference, GLC, and for any, you know, members who are listening to this, why they should go to it?  

Brian Brault  31:45  

Well, you know, for me, the Global Leadership Conference was actually the very first event outside my chapter I went to, and I can remember thinking, wow, if this is the kind of event, EO can curate, to help train its future leaders. I can only imagine how incredible their programming must be for building your business and becoming a better entrepreneur. And so that’s really what triggered me to apply for EMP. And, and started, you know, traveling around, you know, so just the experience in and of itself, changed my life, totally changed my life, in terms of global travel leadership in EO and also jumping in and learning about how to build my business. Because then I started just going to everything EO offered that was so that in and of itself, for me, personally was just a great experience it, it opened my eyes to the global aspect of EO beyond just my chapter. So that in and of itself was great. Plus, it made it made, stepping into leadership roles in EO easier, because I never felt like I was going to be going in blind, I knew that I was going to be trained by other people like me sharing their experiences, how they were successful in those roles. And so I knew that if I raise my hand to do something, I was going to be trained to do it. The and there’s just been some really amazing experiences at GLC. Over the years, I’ve made connections and relationships with people from from, you know, around the world. And it’s just been really one of the one of the things I look forward to every year. That’s what I’ve been in EO for 21 years.  

John Corcoran  33:35  

That’s great. And then last thing I want to ask you about, I know you’ve got a Couples Retreat, which you do every year with Warren Rustand. It’s at a dude ranch in Idaho, Rocky Mountains that’s coming up later this year. Tell us about where and when it is and and what you accomplished there. I know you mentioned your relationship with your wife is incredibly important.  

Brian Brault  33:53  

Yeah, great, great question. So my wife and I, we’ve been married, Gosh, 34 years. And we we are certainly not marriage experts. We have our challenges just like everyone else does. But we’ve also been trained and other things form trainers. My wife is a coach. And so we’ve partnered with Warren Rustand. And also, we have caddy and Jamie ragi. Join us as well and we go up into a dude ranch in the Idaho Rocky Mountains. You know, either late August or late September this coming year happens to be late September. And there are 22 couples that join us and we spent a week in a ranch and there’s content in the morning content late afternoon. And in between we do everything from Gosh, ropes courses to we’re assigned a horse for the week. We go horseback riding anytime we want, and you’re going up into the trails of the Rocky Mountain. It’s it’s a it’s pretty exciting stuff, bicycling, mountain biking, all sorts of amazing things. And what we do is we focus on presenting content that couples can then explore as a couple. So it’s a really safe environment, you can raise your hand and ask questions or share things if you want. Or you can just sit and observe and really only have conversations with your spouse if you want. Typically, people end up really warming up and creating some pretty amazing friendships and bonds with with other couples throughout the course of the week. But regardless of where your relationship is, this week, takes it to the next level. Really, really impactful.  

John Corcoran  35:30  

Brian, you’re involved in so many different things. It’s such a pleasure talking to you. Where can people go to connect with you and learn more about the different projects you’re involved in?  

Brian Brault  35:39  

Well, I mean, there’s our website is legacyofsignificance.com. Or my email address is Brian Brian@life-bydesign.com, life dash, by design dot com. Alright, Brian, thank you so much. Thanks, John.  

Outro  36:00  

Thanks for listening to the Rising Entrepreneurs Podcast. This episode is powered by Rise25 Please subscribe and check out future episodes.