From Fighter Jets To Business Jets: Resilience, Operations, Mentorship | James Spearman

Imagine leaving your business behind while fighting overseas. How do you ensure it thrives without you? 

 Our guest, James Spearman, founder & CEO of James Spearman Aircraft,  shares his inspiring journey, shedding light on the challenges he faced and the turning points that defined his path. From a childhood marked by adversity to discovering the transformative power of structured processes, he reveals how perseverance and the right guidance can lead to success. Listen in as we explore his story and the entrepreneurial vigor that drives him forward. 

Transitioning from a traditional job to becoming an Air Force pilot and eventually an entrepreneur wasn't easy, but it was fueled by the stories of successful individuals and the wisdom found in books like "Rich Dad, Poor Dad." I recount my transformation, highlighting the importance of learning from others’ experiences and embracing uncertainty. A poignant encounter with a mentor who turned his life around motivated me to pursue my ambitions, underscoring the essence of resilience and the willingness to face the unknown. 

Experience the tension of a high-stakes military operation involving a KC-135 refueler amid a direct threat to Israel. Our remarkable guest, James, played a crucial role in this mission, showcasing the power of teamwork and calmness under pressure, earning the Distinguished Flying Cross. This experience significantly influenced his entrepreneurial decisions, particularly in niching down within the aviation industry. By focusing on high-end aircraft like Cirrus and Diamond, he highlights the strategic value of specialization and targeting the right audience to achieve business success, offering a compelling narrative of triumph and determination. 

James Spearman shares his compelling story of overcoming challenges in both his personal life and aviation business. Listeners are encouraged to learn from mistakes, focus on personal development, and understand the importance of effective teamwork and clear operational processes. 

James Spearman: co-founder & CEO of James Spearman Aircraft

Website: https://www.spearmanaircraft.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/james-spearman-b897bb107/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jamesspearmanaircraft/

Blog: https://www.spearmanaircraft.com/blog

 #Entrepreneurship #SmallBusiness #BusinessGrowth #Leadership #SuccessMindset #VeteranEntrepreneur #MilitaryLeadership #AirForce #AviationBusiness #AircraftMaintenance #MentorshipMatters #BusinessStrategy #ScalingABusiness #Resilience #PodcastEpisode #BusinessPodcast #EntrepreneurPodcast #AviationPodcast #SmallBusinessPivots #GrowYourBusiness #SmallBusinessCoach #EntrepreneurMindset #BusinessSuccess #BusinessPodcast #MichaelDMorrison #BOSS #BusinessOwnership #OklahomaCity 

Chapters

• 0:00 Entrepreneur's Journey Through Adversity
• 11:42 Lessons From Successful Entrepreneurs
• 23:20 Overcoming Business Challenges Through Self-Investment
• 34:12 Aerial Adversity and Business Pivots
• 40:28 Navigating Business Niches and Overcoming Challenges

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

All right, welcome to another Small Business Pivots. And again we have another special guest from around the world and literally he's been around the world. But I know that business owners can only say their name and their business like the business owner can. So I'm going to let you introduce yourself where you're from, a little bit about your business, so we can kind of catch up where you're at today of catch up where you're at today.

Speaker 2: 0:25

Yeah, michael, hey, thank uh, thank you so much for having me on a big fan of the show. I really appreciate the opportunity and especially what uh? The work that you're doing. Uh, in the industry, I'm a small business owner. Uh, we just passed year five. Uh, we own aircraft maintenance. Uh, you know, um, it's all the ups and downs, the mistakes. You know it's all the ups and downs, the mistakes, the hard times, and so, man, I'll tell you it wasn't until about year three that I started working with a coach and it was like way too, it wasn't too late. It's never too late.

Speaker 2: 0:54

But I should have started like immediately, so I have a huge appreciation, yeah, huge appreciation for what you do.

Speaker 2: 1:04

I think it's good and, yeah, thanks again. We do aircraft maintenance on light GA aircraft, mostly Cirrus aircraft and Diamond aircraft. We're talking four to six seat airplanes, normally flown privately. Once you realize how nice it is and how much time you can save by owning your own aircraft, where there's zero TSA and you can take whatever you want in the plane and you take off and land when you want to, that's when a business owner, when they have the resources, they start an airplane is a time machine. It really starts saving you a massive amount of time. For example, I'm in East Tennessee and you fly down to Orlando in two and a half three hours.

Speaker 1: 1:50

Wow.

Speaker 2: 1:51

Where it's just really buys you back a lot amount of time, and so we do upgrades on those, Also maintenance upgrades. You see the Garmin sign behind me. We're a Garmin dealer. All of the nice avionics and instruments that airplanes use. We take those and upgrade them to glass screens and we do some flight training as well and aircraft management. Other than that, I also fly for the Air Force National Guard in Knoxville, Tennessee. I fly the KC-135. So I'm a pilot and been deployed and that is a lot of fun, essentially going from a six-seat plane behind me to an airliner.

Speaker 1: 2:34

Wow, yeah Well, thank you for your service.

Speaker 2: 2:38

No, thank you, I appreciate it.

Speaker 1: 2:40

You bet, you bet. Well, how do you think we're going to help our small business owner listeners today?

Speaker 2: 3:05

I think your eyes start getting really big, especially mine. Let's say, let's just talk about me and the mistakes that I made, but you start. You're like man, let's just crank this thing to 10, right?

Speaker 2: 3:11

And you don't realize what it's going to take, what it looks like. I've never been to 10, you know. And then the people that I was hiring I had no process set up. I was definitely one of those people where, you know, you see those coaches and they say, oh, my salesman made a huge mistake, you know he's like, ok, well, what's the process that you have for your salesman to use? And he's like I don't have one.

Speaker 1: 3:37

Well, there's your problem. Right, that's your problem.

Speaker 2: 3:40

Yeah, and that was me. I had no first off. I knew nothing about sales, I was only a pilot and mechanic. I knew nothing about marketing. So we grew past a million only by word of mouth, and I got pretty good at hiring mechanics too. And four would have been a lot nicer to me had I have gone to a coach first to talk about my goals and then develop a process to get there other than just just go for it.

Speaker 1: 4:14

Yeah Well, you know that's the freedom we have as entrepreneurs. So I always say we don't know what we don't know, so let's introduce the show real quick and we'll be right back. Welcome to Small Business Pivots, a podcast produced for small business owners. I'm your host, michael Morrison, founder and CEO of BOSS, where we make business ownership simplified for success. Our business is helping yours grow. Boss offers business loans with business coaching support. Apply in minutes and get approved and funded in as little as 24 to 48 hours at businessownershipsimplifiedcom. All right, welcome back to Small Business Pivots. You have quite the story so, but let's first start with kind of your growing up, your childhood because I know lots of business owners have trials, tribulations. We lack self-doubt not all of us, but many of us do so kind of catch us up to your adulthood.

Speaker 2: 5:21

Yeah, so. So growing up, you know there's actually a really good stat that most of the successful people in the in in the world have had an extremely traumatic childhood. I don't know if you've heard that, but most and very most of my customers that I encounter that made their, their wealth within one lifetime. They also had some sort of instability. You know, uh, unstable childhood and uh, so if you're, if you're not alone in a lot of the things, that uh, that that creates is ability, where not saying it's right or wrong, but you're little, and if the home life isn't that stable, you've got to figure things out on your own as a child, and so those I it actually makes you a much stronger entrepreneur later on in life.

Speaker 1: 6:07

Survivor yeah.

Speaker 2: 6:08

Yeah, that's right. So, um, yeah, my parents they got, uh they got divorced when I was little and and, uh, my dad had a, had a uh really nice art business. Uh, my dad was an amazing artist and uh, he, he, uh he made some uh poor decisions and ended up losing it. And I watched him, he and I, and then going back and forth between my parents, kind of struggle for the rest of my pretty much seven years old on In essentially extreme poverty until I was about in high school. We had like a normal-ish situation and so those things.

Speaker 2: 6:49

Now, my dad, though he was, he was an entrepreneur the whole time. He still was trying to make his art business, build it back and grow. So he, I never saw my dad have a job until things got bad enough where he just he had to get a job, um and uh, just to bring in the bills. And this is somebody that I had to swallow his pride and just take it on. And I've heard, I've heard, uh, you know, other other business coaches talk about that in the beginning. You know, having you may have to. You probably heard this. Where there are, there are people that are working, uh, a normal job, 40 hours at a normal job and then they're building their business after hours. Yes, you know they'll work till 5 pm and then after work they'll work till midnight or something on their business and grow that over years.

Speaker 2: 7:38

And so I saw that and luckily I started playing football in high school. That kind of kept me away from a lot of the you know other poor decisions I could have made growing up. And football, just it gave me something to really work after and I've always had a really strong competitive side of me, especially internally, like I wanted, I want to be the best for me. And and um, football gave me that Avenue and it was a lot of fun Uh, but then it ended and I didn't have anything to go past that and uh for me anyways.

Speaker 2: 8:13

And my grandfather was a world war two aviator. Um, he flew B-25s in world war two. My dad would always tell me stories about my grandfather fighting the war in the Pacific and I've got pictures of him with bullet holes down the side of the plane. And uh, my dad did take me when I was little. He would go to uh air shows and we'd stop in and see airplanes and those wheels were always turning and obviously my dad was pushing me to join the air force and uh, so I joined uh straight out of high school before I turned 18. You know I had already had all the paperwork ready to go. So graduated high school, went straight to basic training, enlisted initially to be a mechanic, and then went through. I was a mechanic for seven years. Meanwhile I was working on my degree, so that was kind of getting me to, you know, the early years anyways.

Speaker 1: 9:09

What degree were you working on?

Speaker 2: 9:11

So I went to Middle Tennessee State University. They have a really good aerospace program there. Think about you probably heard the term Embry-Riddle, Purdue, Auburn those schools all have good aviation programs. So they train pilots, they train mechanics, air traffic controllers, stuff like that, and you come out with a bachelor's degree as well. So I was doing aerospace maintenance management the whole time while I was a crew chief or a mechanic for the Air Force, while I was a crew chief or a mechanic for the Air Force, and that really it helped me get my the rest of my civilian ratings license to be a mechanic, because the military rating doesn't exactly flow over. So I think it prepped me well. It was a good time.

Speaker 1: 10:01

Yeah Well, you're already ahead of most at that age, because most of us didn't figure anything out until we were at least 30. So you were aviation college, aviation job, aviation military, et cetera, et cetera. I know military. When us civilians think about it, we think of very, very organized right. So what are some of the things that you learned in the military that you think is applicable for business owners? Because I know there's a lot.

Speaker 2: 10:36

Yeah, there is a lot I would say, and as I grew and became an Air Force pilot too, Air Force pilot training has some of the highest washout rates in the world. Right, You're being trained by the world's best Air Force. People are being sent home all around you. And then any normal training by the Air Force is also difficult, and I think I learned in the beginning you know, if you can just not quit, you're probably not going to fail.

Speaker 1: 11:07

That's a powerful lesson.

Speaker 2: 11:09

Very early on and it is like okay, so all I have to do and I would go from meal to meal and a lot of people talk about this that have that, have served and gone through basic training you wake up, you're like just make it to lunchtime you know or make it to breakfast you know, and then you eat breakfast. Okay, let's see if I can make it to lunch.

Speaker 1: 11:29

Wow.

Speaker 2: 11:29

And then lunch, make it to dinner, and then you just repeat that and don't quit, and you're probably going to make it, you're probably going to be fine, and I think that's. There's a huge lesson to that, in this as well. In business I've heard that said a lot. I'm sure there's extenuating circumstances that shut people down, but for the most part the people that I see fail. They just quit, they're done. You know, they gave up, it's, it's gone past, whatever they're willing to give. Um, what are your thoughts there?

Speaker 1: 12:01

I agree, uh, just keep going. No-transcript all that. You can find hundreds and thousands of tips and insights and everything on marathon training, but I loved her answer and that's kind of what you're saying Just don't quit, don't give up.

Speaker 2: 12:43

Yeah, there's, there's. Uh, you know, I think in everyone's year one, everything's a fire, right? Yeah, oh, you wake up in the morning, oh, get one email. Oh, we're done, that's it, we're over.

Speaker 1: 12:54

Everybody's dead.

Speaker 2: 12:57

Yeah, well, one customer pulls out one person. One customer complains about a bill.

Speaker 1: 13:01

Well, that's it. We suck. You know Well. You have a pretty fascinating story in how you got into entrepreneurship and then the challenges of. I don't want to give the story away, but tell us a little bit about serving across seas and how you were running a business as well. Or do you want to start with your business in general, of how you started and some of those trials and tribulations you went through at the first?

Speaker 2: 13:30

Yeah, sure, I'll start there. Uh, so I had graduated, got my degree and I had started reading. Um, I was, I got selected to go to air force pilot training as well. So it does help, um, that I had a little bit of security there. Um so, but in the meantime I was reading rich dad, poor dad, and I never really was satisfied in a job. I just was not. Um, I mean, for whatever reason, whatever normal people have that makes them happy in a job, I just don't have it. I can't.

Speaker 1: 14:05

I know, whatever that thing is right, I don't get it.

Speaker 2: 14:08

You know, and I would always you probably we were talking about this a little bit in the beginning of the show. It's like, hey guys, why don't we do this? We could probably like three X this if we do this and they're just like, no, we're not gonna do that oh my gosh yeah, you're stuck yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 14:25

So I was reading rich dad, poor dad and pretty much everything else I could get my hands on. And when I say read it, my wife makes fun of me. She's like you don't read any books. I was like you're right, I listened to it on audible.

Speaker 1: 14:33

Okay, just to be clear well, yeah mean you're still learning to earn.

Speaker 2: 14:37

so that's right. So, uh, the wheels were definitely spinning and I knew my dad had done it. You know, I'd watched him for years. And um, at the time I was like let's, um, I, I don't know what this is going to look like, but I think I can get make this happen. And um, I started, uh, I was working for Sears Aircraft at the time. They're the largest manufacturer of GA airplanes right now general aviation, small six-seat planes. Actually, technically they're a five-seat plane, just if any airplane people are on here are going to correct me.

Speaker 1: 15:09

Oh, I promise you, there's someone out there that will correct anything we say.

Speaker 2: 15:14

It's the nicest GA plane out right now, but I was working for them and everyone that purchases these aircraft are millionaires. For the most part, the plane's $600 to $1.5 million, and then they've got a jet that's $3 million. And so I would get to sit in a seat with these people and interact with them, and I always I'm like James, you're an idiot if you don't ask these people what they do and just kind of rub shoulders with them. And I would always try to just be, you know, nonchalant. Hey, what do you do? That's cool, you know, tell me your story. And I started flying with customers periodically and when you fly with them, you're completely trapped in a plane with them for three hours, no cell phones, no, nothing. And so you've got the opportunity to just pick their brain if they're willing. And I just hey, do you mind telling me your story?

Speaker 2: 16:03

And one gentleman in particular he's a mentor to me. Now he's the reason I quit my job. I asked him and he's like James, I was just a normal guy, I was working a dead-end job and I effing hated it. And me and my wife, we just started saving a little bit of cash. And he's like all my friends told me. I was crazy this is never going to work, you're going to fail, we'll see you back in a year. And he's like well, we'll see. And he quits his job and buys a suntanning place. And he said he was making at the time like 50 or 60,000. He said within three years, I mean, his income went to like 600,000, which is probably an extreme. That's an extraordinary case. However, it still was he's like. And he said each day, he's like yeah, I'm sending back my bros the pictures of the bank statements, you know.

Speaker 1: 16:54

F. You guys, you're wrong.

Speaker 2: 16:58

And uh, I was like I can do this. I think you know if this guy can do it, I can do it. And uh, so I uh I actually left for air force pilot training and, um, I was like, if I I told the guys when I left, I was like, if you ever see me back here just now, my plan went horribly wrong.

Speaker 1: 17:19

I will never work another job for anybody ever again other than the air force as a pilot yeah, what would you say is probably the best advice with all those entrepreneurs at that level that they gave you um, I think the at sorry, just to be clear, you're at from their level or the level of yeah, from them just getting there like them to you because a lot of entrepreneurs that listen to this show they're stuck and they haven't gotten to that level. So you know kind of coming from their insights the.

Speaker 2: 17:53

The biggest thing that they've taught me is there's levels to this, especially in. I think of it almost like professional athletes. You can go tell when you watch middle school, high school or the pros, right, I mean there's a big visual difference on the field, the product on the field and the people that are at like, for example, the person I told you he's got a $200 million net worth person I told you he's got a $200 million net net worth. Um, he taught me grace and slowing down. You know, in the beginning I was just so everything made me freak out everything. You know I was hot. You know somebody would get say something wrong or or, or, you know whatever, something didn't go the way that I wanted and you're just hot, like somebody sends you the wrong bill or whatever. You just freak out over everything. And he, he taught me how to handle things with grace and and slowing down and having a touch. You know, having having more touch on things and that has helped me a ton.

Speaker 1: 18:54

Um, and it's hard to really explain that, but, um, and it's hard to really explain that, but I think that's probably the best thing that I've learned from their level slowing down on your decisions, having grace when you respond to people, and it goes a business coach and I'll ask them if a young entrepreneur or someone wanting to start a business asked your advice. It's never what you read in the books. It's things as simple as what you just shared For me one of my mentors that I really liked and followed. He simply said learn what not to do, not what to do. He said. If you learn that which most entrepreneurs can give you a long list of what not to do he said you'll make it Because there's plenty of stuff to do. It's learning those things what not to do. So it's amazing when I hear stories like that. So you learned from entrepreneurs. You're like, okay, let's go. So you took off and you opened up this massive aviation machine shop. Is it a machine shop? Do you upgrade? What does it actually do?

Speaker 2: 20:12

Yeah, Maintenance, repairs, management and then flight training.

Speaker 1: 20:16

Maintenance, repairs, management and then flight training. Okay, and so you prepare these for people that own them, or do you buy and sell them? How does that work?

Speaker 2: 20:24

So each airplane kind of like the one you see behind me every single year, the entire plane, it's federally mandated by the FAA. The whole plane has to come apart, wow, it goes through a massive inspection checklist, um, and then, uh, we have to, you know, put it back together and make sure everything works good, right, so it's a big job it's about?

Speaker 2: 20:46

it's about two weeks, you know, worth of labor, um. You know one, one to two weeks worth of labor, um, and so we uh primarily do the annual inspections on these planes where quite a bit of dollars that go through a surprising amount to keep the plane operating each year. You know, it's not really common with your car, where you just take it to the dealer and they're just going to take it all the way apart and look for stuff you know?

Speaker 1: 21:09

Yeah, you're right.

Speaker 2: 21:10

Put it back together. It's kind of a foreign concept, but that's how airplanes work. And then, while we've got it, you know, it's an excellent opportunity to say you know, hey, have you heard about Garmin? We can make all this touchscreen, you know, and beautiful.

Speaker 1: 21:27

And operational. More accurate, I guess, would be the word.

Speaker 2: 21:32

Yeah, it's more safe, true, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 21:37

So you know. That's how they sell it to the wife. You always got to make the wife Okay, yeah, yeah, so you know.

Speaker 2: 21:39

That's how they sell it to the wife. You can say, oh, he's got to make the wife. Okay, there you go.

Speaker 1: 21:42

Now we're talking.

Speaker 1: 21:43

Now there are some helpful tips. How do we sell to the other side of the family? So, on the aviation side, I know there's some things that are more important than others on a plane. So how do you make sure that those things happen? I know, of course, you're listening to Small Business Pivots.

Speaker 1: 22:03

This podcast is produced by my company, boss. Our business is helping yours grow. Boss offers business loans with business coaching support. Apply in minutes and get approved and funded in as little as 24 to 48 hours at businessownershipsimplifiedcom. If you're enjoying this podcast, don't forget to hit the subscribe button and share it as well.

Speaker 1: 22:26

Now let's get back to our special guest. So, on the aviation side, I know there's some things that are more important than others on a plane. So how do you make sure that those things happen? I know, of course, we want to keep it safe and that it depends on your life, but the reason I ask that is because so many business owners they have these same challenges that they can't seem to correct, but they're like, the vitals of their business, and so in the aviation it's like I know there are certain things that either have to be checked before every takeoff, like some. You can count on the screen, some you can count on this, but there's some things you have to manually do. Tell us what that's like so you, so business owners, can hear how to get that done.

Speaker 2: 23:11

So, and what I, what I hear you asking is operations right, like the thing that you do. How do you make that consistently good? Yeah, and it is a little bit unique in my industry just because there's already like pilots and mechanics and everyone that works for me is, you know, they're rated, they've got a license that they had to spend years to achieve, so they're licensed professionals, but there's already all these checklists. You know, if you do something on a plane, there's a checklist to do it. If you change a tire, change a wheel, change an engine, take the wing off, put it back on the inspection, there's an inspection checklist. You know hundreds of items where you got to just go down the list and check each one. You know hundreds of items where you got to just go down the list and check each one, and so that is kind of unique to my business, where I was already familiar with the checklist. And if you're, you know somebody that's still working on the product. You know that's where you take the biggest step when you start hiring people is okay, how can I put this in a checklist form so that it'll be, you know, at least 80% as good as when I do it Right, and so that is a little bit unique.

Speaker 2: 24:26

But at the same time, there's still the coaching, there's still the training, and then there's still the I'm the business owner and I totally swung and miss on the wrong person. You know, I hired the wrong person and that didn't um, you know, because you take, you got to take responsibility when um so another, what am I? I brought on a wrong partner at one point and boy, it almost ended me, um, but I was like you know, he's this, he's that, he's done all this and and he's my friend was like well, he's done all this. And my friend was like well, who hired him? James?

Speaker 1: 24:59

Who brought him in Yep. That's the part that really stinks about the business owner. I always tell business owners that the business you have today, all those challenges, weaknesses, all those things you need to fix you either created those or you allowed them to happen. Because you're the business owner, you know so. You should take responsibility. So let's keep moving through. You started your business and let's we talked about how you had some stumbling blocks up until you know year three, year four. Let's let's talk about some of those, cause that's, that's the stuff that business owners can really learn from.

Speaker 2: 25:37

Yeah, yeah. So, like I said, word of mouth, I pretty much got past a million and I was like, well, we just need to do more of what we're doing, which is true. I had no clue. I had zero sales training, zero marketing training. We had a website and a Facebook page and that was it, and we would post on it. I don't know, maybe like once a month or something, there's no, we were not even trying. We had no clue. I had no clue what more look like, how do we bring in more customers.

Speaker 2: 26:07

And then, you know, I was like, well, maybe we just need to do more products, more business, so I'll open all these other businesses. I'll open five businesses that are, you know, complimentary to this one business. You know, at at the point where I'm at, like year three, which is, uh, your, your eyes are probably opening like whoa Jay let's focus on one thing, right?

Speaker 1: 26:25

Yeah, yeah, it's a terrible idea.

Speaker 2: 26:27

So so I was like, well, let's do that. And and uh, so I was like I don't know how to sell things, or I thought I didn't know how to sell things. I thought somebody could do it better than me, and that's actually a good lesson for somebody that's in that range. The best salesman on the team is the owner.

Speaker 1: 26:45

Amen.

Speaker 2: 26:46

You can ride that for a while, amen, before you start tossing big, big dollars at somebody. But needless to say, I tossed a shit ton of money at somebody that.

Speaker 2: 26:56

I thought was going to take this thing to 10 million and, uh, you know, with no real expectations, no, no SOPs, no structure whatsoever, I just thought this was gonna, this was gonna work and uh, unfortunately it was a friend too, um, so that that ended, you know, poorly, um, and had to take out a ton of debt, and it put me behind the eight ball, uh, big time, because I took out a lot of very expensive debt in the time, which, uh, I don't know if anyone. Here's another great lesson Don't do MCA loans. Talk to, uh Michael, you know, you know, so I just the most expensive debt I could possibly find, and I had to do what I had to do, though I got through it right, so it is what it is.

Speaker 2: 27:41

So, year three and four was, you know, baking up for that huge mistake, but it taught me so much about myself. It taught me how much more I could actually do in sales and marketing. It taught me, or forced me, to learn how to actually sell and get better and better and better at it. Um, it forced me to kind of lean out everything else and you'd be surprised how much there's just kind of floating around, uh, money going out the door. Um, so, you know, we thought this one big vendor was the way to only buy this. We're like, oh, we can also get that on Amazon for, like you know, 10% or something.

Speaker 2: 28:16

Uh, so it forced us to lean out. And then, um, and then I'll tell you the biggest thing in it and, um, what this is what you do, right, you're, you are encouraging people to invest in themselves. Right, that's the heart of heart of coaching, right, I started at that time investing in myself and I started working with a coach. I started, um, I started working with a therapist. I started working with somebody to help me, um, with my advertising, with, uh, teach me how to run ads, and then eventually took it over. But I started investing in myself and I, looking back from now, compared to two years ago, it's just there's zero comparison, and so that's huge, the hard times you got to. You really got to be thankful for them as well.

Speaker 1: 29:07

You make a great point because it's not just one person you delegated or relied on. And I know sometimes business owners they think if I find one mentor or one coach and you know I've got four coaches there for different reasons, different parts of my life but you know, try to keep me rounded because it can be, it can be rough as a business owner, you know, like you're on an island by yourself. I was trying to sugarcoat it.

Speaker 2: 29:34

You know it's rough and you either got it or you don't. Yeah, well, so on the flip side, you've got control over that you can this you take responsibility to, to create a life and I read this on your page, right, you know turn your business into something that you don't hate you know, that's where I feel like so many people are. They're just like man.

Speaker 1: 29:54

I effing hate this and I was there too. I was like there's no way. We've all been there, I learned over two decades ago. When I'm in those situations and I'm like the world around me is falling apart, take a look inside. And I always say until I change, nothing around me will change, so invest in those outside resources.

Speaker 2: 30:15

Boy. I'll tell you there's so much wisdom there because in the moment I mean well, it felt like there for a solid full year every day I was. You know, bankruptcy was knocking at the door, right Like it was just right there waiting for me. They were like all right, you ready. Today I felt like in here, I felt like everybody, everybody knows I'm done except for me. Yet, you know, I was like when am I going to accept it? But that's, that's a limiting belief that I was giving myself. It wasn't true and and I always I was like, and people kept telling me that they're like James.

Speaker 2: 30:49

You know, just focus on yourself. Try to be the best you can, that you can be, and stop focusing on the result all the time. You can't affect the result. Sometimes you get lucky. You know you can have bad inputs and get a really good result. You got lucky. Sometimes you put bad, you know you know really good inputs and get a bad result, vice versa. So, you know, just focus on the things that you know that will make you successful. What's, what can you do that will make you successful? Running more ads, calling more customers? What about handwriting letters to people? You know, do you think that would get you more customers. Yeah, how much does that cost? Nothing, except for the stamps you know and the paper to print it out on and pens.

Speaker 2: 31:31

You know so, but in my heart I was just like well, how's this going to? You know, work on myself. I need cash now, yeah, but yeah, it was short-sighted. And then looking at it, when you start dragging that out and the timeline out, you realize, okay, yeah, things started changing a lot when I started focusing and investing in myself and trying to make myself better.

Speaker 1: 31:58

Great advice there's a go ahead.

Speaker 2: 32:01

May just not happen as fast as you want it.

Speaker 1: 32:03

Oh no, never, never. There's a great book out there. It's a little lengthy, but I encourage business owners to invest in Mindset. It's by Carol Dweck. I mentioned earlier. I'm running my first marathon and from my coaches, they all say, yes, strength training is important, running, all that stuff is important. Your legs will feel like they're going to fall off. You'll feel like you hit a wall, but the number one they're all training me on is mindset to get through it, and that's what you're saying about business ownership. It's yourself, it's your mind, your limited beliefs, and so powerful, powerful, powerful. So let's talk about you got deployed and I'll let you tell the whole story because it's a it's an incredible story.

Speaker 2: 32:53

Yeah. So when I was enlisted, I was deployed a few times, but most recently first deployment as a pilot, deployed to the Middle East and we were flying out of Qatar and that was really scary, because imagine being away from what you're building for 60 full days, where you're literally thousands of miles and most people if you're listening to this and you're in the early stage, or at least you can resonate with it if you're way past it but who's who's fixes every problem.

Speaker 1: 33:25

You do Most, can't even leave for the afternoon.

Speaker 2: 33:30

Yeah, and then you get addicted to that because you're like oh this, you know you're Superman, right, you just fix every problem. You know it goes to your. If you haven't worked on your childhood trauma, you know that's addictive addictive feeling, Right.

Speaker 2: 33:43

So, um, it forced me to. Finally, I had no control over you know, I could not touch anything physically and so I had to work through people for 60 days, only Forced. There was no way. Wow, it was tough. I mean, I primarily do sales. Right At the time I was only bringing in sales, so we would do an eight, nine-hour sortie, uh, in the middle East combat sortie and land and I'd hop on the phone. Uh, by the time I landed it was daytime back home, hop on the phone, start calling customers. All the all my bros are at the bar drinking beer, you know they're like James.

Speaker 2: 34:21

Come on, give up with that, just go to the airlines. Uh, all my friends are at the airline, my peers are, are flying for American and Delta and, uh, you know, for them they only work like 15 days a month, 60 hour weeks, um, but so it forced me, uh, forced me to to work through people, um, and it I I'm super grateful for it. Also that you know one of the sorties, um, we flew. It was uh during, um, if you remember, back to this past summer, around April, spring, april, iran launched at Israel directly for the first time and we had known that was going to happen, that there was an escalation in the area and we didn't know exactly when it was going to pop off. But we had a good idea until saying that you know, very likely Iran is going to launch directly at Israel and we're going to try to do everything we can to thwart the attack, and so normally we're doing routine combat stories. That night we had a decent idea it was going to happen and the crews that launched that night we knew we were going to be going. I can't say where we were flying, but it was, uh, right between Israel and Iran, is the area there and um, so there's a one way path between Iran and Israel. We're going to be directly in the middle of it, or they didn't know exactly. They said they may use missiles, they may use drones, but likely just drones, is what they were telling us. And we're like, okay, well, those are probably several thousand feet beneath us.

Speaker 2: 36:00

And so we took off that night and everyone we knew something was going to pop off and we were just dead silent. But we knew in our hearts that's our job. Right, here we go, let's go do our job, no questions asked. Every crew that launched that night um, normally you at least have a couple planes that maintenance break. They just push through them. They got it, um, got the planes in the air, got past adversity we did as well, um, and we took off and we flew up to our operating area and and the all through that area, uh, united Arab Emirates and all the other countries, they had all ceased all their flying. None, no airlines were flying whatsoever. Some of the biggest, um, uh, the the most, uh, busy airspace in the world is through that area and there was not a single airline or flying.

Speaker 2: 36:49

And we're like, oh my gosh gosh, this is serious this is serious.

Speaker 2: 36:55

So we went and we hit some, uh, we refueled some f-15s that, um, that night. Normally there's some when they hook up to us which I fly a refueler kc-135. We refuel the other planes in air and, um, you know, normally it's like, hey bro, how you doing? Uh, this night it was all business. They're like we need as much gas as we can get right now, as fast as you can, we're going to belt feed the jets to you. And so they took every ounce of gas that we could give them and a little bit more. To where we were, you know, feeling a little testy and making it back, not like we're afraid we're going to run out of gas, but we need a certain amount just in case, if anything goes wrong, to add it to it. But we gave them everything that we could, and you could hear it with the radio. They're shooting down things left and right On the way back.

Speaker 2: 37:44

We also had an in-flight emergency up at 30,000 feet. We lost our electrical system. We lost our electrical system and so for a moment and mind you, iran is launching and we're looking at it and you can see it. You can see the missiles. You know the contrails from the missiles overhead and there's Tourette's in the area and all this. And we had this in-flight emergency and me and my crew there's three people on it on a refueler Um, that that team was awesome and we worked together the whole, the whole deployment and, uh, we worked through what we did and made it back safely, um, and then when we got back, we were notified, we were awarded the distinguished flying cross uh, us and the other crews that flew that night, which is the uh, the nation's fourth highest award, three beneath the medal of honor, um, so it was just just really, really special.

Speaker 1: 38:37

Congratulations, and that shows the power of teamwork.

Speaker 2: 38:41

Yeah, yeah, that's right, especially when and I I felt like in that moment, you know, we were in the cockpit, you know, um, and we're working together as a team to make it through. There are so many lessons that I was like, well, this is just like a normal day back at the shop.

Speaker 1: 38:58

I was going to say you're probably like this is nothing, guys, yeah.

Speaker 2: 39:02

There's missiles flying at me every day, exactly, exactly.

Speaker 1: 39:08

Well, what are some of the go ahead?

Speaker 2: 39:11

I was just kidding. It was definitely terrifying. It was tough, but we worked together as a team.

Speaker 1: 39:17

Oh, just listening to that, you had me on needles. So what are some pivots that you learned along the way in your business that you feel like were well done, or maybe not well done at all and you would never do them again?

Speaker 2: 39:32

Yeah, so pivot as something that we were going to try and it didn't work out or yeah, yeah, that's right, you know, one of them was um.

Speaker 2: 39:43

Actually this was during this time where I was gonna okay, I need to open five new businesses yeah and so I actually opened this little um, um I one of my friends who's a one of my customers and mentor I told him I was like I think I want to start a sea plane flight training business, um, and kind of have it as a complimentary to what I'm doing and I think we can make money with it. And um, he was like, well, yeah, man, I'll make the capital, I'll do the capital, but you've the capital, but you're going to manage it. And so we went out and bought an Icon aircraft.

Speaker 2: 40:19

I wish it was right behind. It's actually out in front of me. I wish I had it, but it's a little two-seat, it's like a jet ski with wings. It is so much fun. And you know, over the past couple years, should I have sold that thing and made my life a lot easier? Yeah, probably. But now it's actually making a lot of traction and it's actually because it's actually forced me to start working with more people that actually know how to do Facebook and Google ads yourself, if you're truly a wizard.

Speaker 2: 40:54

But for the most part, you need somebody to help you, um and so now that's helped me, uh, grow what I'm doing, like this right, doing podcasts, getting my face in front of the camera and learning, uh, that, hey, this is 2025. You're doing it right. I sell your Instagram and Facebook. I mean. You're posting. You're probably doing multiple posts a day. You're doing a podcast. You're on everyone else's podcast. This is 2025. If you're not doing this, you're I mean, you're going to get left in the dust.

Speaker 1: 41:20

So it is what it is. Yep, yep, totally agree. Well, I know a lot of people probably want to learn more about you or from you, so what's the best place to follow you at?

Speaker 2: 41:32

Yeah from you. So what's the best place to follow you at? Yeah, so, um, on Instagram or YouTube, the same, uh, same uh handle at the James Spearman, and then, uh, obviously, a website is, uh, wwwspearmanaircraftcom, and, uh, I try to make as much. If you, uh, if you have any interest in in aviation whatsoever, I try to make content that kind of shows people, um, you know little airplanes or you might not be used to it. You'd be surprised how many of my customers are in their forties and fifties and they've got now. Now they're, the business has caught up. They've got some money to spend and I'm like I think I want to be a pilot. Maybe I'll start buying back my time. They'll fly with a friend that has like a King Air or something or another plane and they're like, wow, this is awesome, I could do this, and so that's really who I help.

Speaker 2: 42:18

A lot is those people, because buying an airplane is not like buying a car. The percentage of pilots in the United States is like 1%, and then the people that own an airplane on top of that is probably, you know, half of that or less, and so it's not like you can just ask your brother hey, man, when you bought an airplane. What was it like? So it's very rare and the processes are completely different, and so it's good to have some sort of professional to help coach you into or through the process of buying an airplane. Are you going to hire a pilot, or are you going to learn how to fly? Or you know, how do you get insurance on it, how do you pay the sales tax on it? All of these things are pretty much foreign and not there's uh, I haven't there's. There's good like AOPA is a good website that gives you this, but there's not like exactly books written on it. So that's where I, where I like to help out.

Speaker 1: 43:11

Well, that brings up a great point. If only 1% fly and less than that own their own aircraft, that's a very small percentage of the world's population and I know for most business owners they won't niche down, they won't find their little. As they say stay in your lane. So they might be a landscaper, so they do pools and they do golf courses and it's like no, no, no, you got to find your lane. How do you differentiate yourself in such a small space so they can go? Yeah, I really do need to niche down.

Speaker 2: 43:51

Yeah, I mean, probably the first thing to niche down is you need to work with people that have money to pay for your services.

Speaker 1: 44:01

That's a good start.

Speaker 2: 44:02

It is way easier to deal with people that have the. You know they have the financial resources. When you send them a bill, it's not like, well, did it really take 10 minutes for this? Why did it do that? They're just like keep the card on file, james, I don't care, just run it, just make sure it's ready to go on Tuesday, got it? And so I would say that's the number one. But for me yeah, my customer base realistically, the amount of people that I can affect in service is probably like 100,000 total in the United States. Um, something, something very small to that. Now there are, um, actually, actually I think there's only I forget the numbers, but you know, let a hundred thousand or less total people that I could actually help. Um, and there's the. Uh, what I really try to focus on is the is the Cirrus and the higher endend aircraft Diamond. There's only, you know, 5,000, 6,000, 7,000 of those planes total in the United States.

Speaker 2: 45:00

Or actually, I think, worldwide, but you know, so there's probably, down to me, there's probably only like, realistically, 10,000 planes true customers that I want to work with, thousand planes true customers that I want to work with. And it took me getting kicked in the you know where, over and over and over again, taking on jobs that we couldn't be, couldn't be, you know, profitable on customers I didn't want to work with, until finally I was like you know, ok, I'm going to, I like working with these people.

Speaker 1: 45:33

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 45:34

My life would be so much easier if I just only worked with these people, and that's that's what really forced me to kind of niche down. So I'm I'm a niche within a niche, I guess.

Speaker 1: 45:47

Well, it's an important part because so many business owners they're afraid they're not going to make payroll if they don't take every single client, and so that was kind of my point here you have a very, very small population to that even can afford your industry, your service, aviation, and yet here's other contractors that have hundreds of thousands and they're so worried about missing a customer, you know. So.

Speaker 2: 46:14

Yeah, yeah, that's a, that's actually a limiting, that's a big limiting belief right there, because you're, you're actually what you're doing is sabotaging yourself. Uh if the the longer that you continue to just say yes to everyone, you are sabotaging yourself, um and. I mean, there's been jobs where I said yes and made payroll and it cost me way more in the long run.

Speaker 1: 46:34

Yeah, I think we've all been there. I got uh. One last question before we sign off here. It's, uh, if you got a second to think about it, that's all right, but it's. If you're in a room full of entrepreneurs, different sizes of business, lengths of business, what's something that's applicable to all of them Could?

Speaker 2: 46:56

be a tip, it could be a book, a quote, something that I would give them.

Speaker 1: 46:58

Sure. Yeah, or something that you would say you would share. That could be applicable to all entrepreneurs, no matter what business they own.

Speaker 2: 47:08

Well, you know now I'm really big into sales. I'd ask which ones of you own an airplane that I can help with.

Speaker 1: 47:17

I would say our listeners probably, maybe one.

Speaker 2: 47:21

That's one. Really, I only service 100 customers a year, so that's 10% of my volume.

Speaker 1: 47:30

Yeah, that's right. 1%.

Speaker 2: 47:33

Yeah. So, um, uh, yeah, I would. I would say something that every one of them would have in common is I don't think there's any way to escape that how difficult this is to do it. And if, um, each person that somebody told me you know money, actually it exaggerates who you are. And so if you have a lot of you know, if you've got addictions, or you got a lot of things going on that you're not good at right now, or limiting beliefs, or the way you sabotage yourself, if you have all those right now, toss in a million dollars, $2 million, it's going to make it that much worse. And so I think every person at that level that owns a business realizes how hard this is and how it's. You really got no choice. You're either going to put yourself in the hospital, or you're you know, or you're going to work on yourself and try to get better and work with people like you that can make your life. You can. You can do this and enjoy life at the same time. That is that is true.

Speaker 1: 48:43

That is words of wisdom, because I'm often asked have you ever seen a business owner as bad as me? And we're all bad, we're. We all have our challenges. We're not bad, we're just learning. And we're all bad, we all have our challenges. We're not bad, we're just learning. And we're doing something that most others won't kind of like. Your pilots, we are very a small percentage there was a really good I started working.

Speaker 2: 49:05

Uh, when things got really bad right, like when anytime things get bad right it's, it's easy. When the coach is winning, everyone's like, oh yeah, he's got that he's got everything figured out. You know, as soon as things go bad, right, you normally tend to internalize all of it. You try to close down. That's a normal process and you're like well, I'm just. You know, I said I just suck this bad. There's no way anyone else sucks as bad as I'm doing you know that's a normal, normal reaction.

Speaker 2: 49:29

Uh, I went to this company that was going to help me. You know like, look into finances and try to start making a plan, and I just was internalizing all this and I was like God, I just feel like I'm really, you know, this is really tough and I suck and he's like he slaps me on the back. He's like James, you know, if you've never had to put payroll on on a credit card before, you're not a real entrepreneur.

Speaker 1: 49:51

That's a good point, entrepreneur.

Speaker 2: 49:52

That's a good point and it just it made it like I almost released.

Speaker 1: 49:57

I was like okay, uh yeah, bad credit scores almost bankrupt payroll on credit cards. Yeah, yeah, it's. Yeah, you're not an entrepreneur if you haven't done just those few things. So, james, you've been a wealth of information and fun to talk with. Wish you continued success and we'll see you around over on the social channels.

Speaker 2: 50:23

Yeah, thank you so much, Michael, appreciate you.

Speaker 1: 50:25

Yeah, my pleasure. Thank you for listening to Small Business Pivots. This podcast is created and produced by my company, boss. Our business is growing. Yours. Boss, offers flexible business loans with business coaching support. Apply in minutes and get approved and funded in as little as 24 to 48 hours at businessownershipsimplifiedcom. If you're enjoying this podcast, don't forget to hit the subscribe button and share it as well. If you need help growing your business, email me at Michael at Michael D Morrison dot com. We'll see you next time on Small Business Pivots.