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Vince Guzzo, Dragon from Dragons’ Den, Discusses Being an Entrepreneur, Advice for Success, and Dealing with the COVID-19 Pandemic — Transcript

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TRANSCRIPTION WITH SPEAKERS
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[00:00] SPEAKER_01: It's Quabex Podcast on the Canada's Podcast Network.
[00:04] SPEAKER_01: Hello, this is Mario Toniguzu coming to you today with Montreal's Podcast, a member of Canada's
[00:10] SPEAKER_01: Podcast Network, where we talk to the entrepreneurs who are making it happen in Montreal for that.
[00:16] SPEAKER_01: So you can listen, discover, and engage.
[00:19] SPEAKER_01: Today's guest is Vince Gutso, who is owner and president of Cinema's Gutsos in Quebec,
[00:25] SPEAKER_01: and also a dragon on dragons, then on CBC.
[00:29] SPEAKER_01: Thanks a lot for joining us today, Vince.
[00:31] SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Mario.
[00:32] SPEAKER_01: First of all, let's start a little bit about being an entrepreneur and your business.
[00:38] SPEAKER_01: Now, you have a few businesses.
[00:40] SPEAKER_01: Let's start with the cinema's first, how you got started and how Cinema's Gutsos got started.
[00:47] SPEAKER_00: Well, my father in 1974 bought a theater, a one-screen complex,
[00:52] SPEAKER_00: then he was one of the first to have a multiplex where he subdivided that into three screens.
[00:58] SPEAKER_00: And then I joined the business in 91, but I'm not only child, so while I joined the business in 91,
[01:05] SPEAKER_00: I actually spent my weekends in theaters since 1974.
[01:11] SPEAKER_00: So very young age, my dad had taught me a little red usher's blazer so that I can go around with
[01:18] SPEAKER_00: my flashlight and tell people to put their feet down and help them seat them and whatever.
[01:22] SPEAKER_00: It kept me out of trouble, as he said.
[01:24] SPEAKER_00: And so, I got involved in 91 right out of Western, and then part time I went to law school.
[01:31] SPEAKER_00: And then I'm the one who reviewed all of the leases and everything.
[01:35] SPEAKER_00: So if we're in a position today not to pay any rent, legally is because of my drafting
[01:44] SPEAKER_00: that special clause that I like to call 10.1.1, which says, I'm not paying rent in case I'm forced to major.
[01:51] SPEAKER_01: Okay, a couple of factual things, Vince. How many Cinema's do you have now?
[01:56] SPEAKER_00: Ten locations, 144 screens, 9i Maxes, and we have, I would say,
[02:03] SPEAKER_00: right now about one theater, which is anywhere between 14 and 16 screens,
[02:10] SPEAKER_00: per year planned out for the next five years.
[02:14] SPEAKER_01: Okay, super, then.
[02:15] SPEAKER_01: And you're looking to expand outside Quebec?
[02:18] SPEAKER_00: No, for now we're still going to re-concentrate back in Quebec.
[02:22] SPEAKER_00: I think a few things happened and with cineplex possibly being sold to the cinema world and whatever,
[02:29] SPEAKER_00: created some opportunities in the Quack Market, which we're going to take right away.
[02:33] SPEAKER_00: And then we're going to go back to our initial plan, which was to look at the province of Alberta,
[02:38] SPEAKER_00: which I think a lot of people don't realize, but there's a lot of affinities between Alberta and Quebec.
[02:46] SPEAKER_01: Okay, super. Tell me, you have a couple of other businesses. Tell me about them.
[02:52] SPEAKER_00: So I have also a Pizzeria, two Pizzerias, and we have three more underway on the construction,
[03:00] SPEAKER_00: which is called Juliette Pizzeria, which is right now, every one of them is located next to a movie theater.
[03:07] SPEAKER_00: Basically, it's complimentary to our theater visit.
[03:10] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, then I own a construction company.
[03:12] SPEAKER_00: So the theaters are built by my construction company.
[03:16] SPEAKER_00: And then we also have on a, I would say, we in the medical research field,
[03:23] SPEAKER_00: so we have goods on medical.
[03:24] SPEAKER_00: So while I preside to those companies, I really don't handle the day-to-day of them,
[03:32] SPEAKER_00: but I still, you know, I'm very involved in that.
[03:35] SPEAKER_00: And then I did a few deals off dragons, then.
[03:39] SPEAKER_00: One of the ones that I enjoy the most working with is one called Rudy Lad, which is a T-shirt company.
[03:46] SPEAKER_00: Yeah, in fact, we have a series of COVID-19 T-shirts.
[03:50] SPEAKER_00: Some of them are inappropriate and then we have a cleaner version.
[03:54] SPEAKER_00: So what?
[03:55] SPEAKER_00: Caps are coming out also for the COVID-19 thing.
[03:58] SPEAKER_00: So it's, I think it'll be a determining factor for this, for that venture.
[04:02] SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'm going to ask you in a few minutes some COVID-related questions.
[04:08] SPEAKER_01: So, but the question I'm just going to ask you now, pre-COVID,
[04:13] SPEAKER_01: like what was some of the greatest challenges you faced as being an entrepreneur,
[04:18] SPEAKER_01: of being a business owner?
[04:20] SPEAKER_00: I think the hardest thing I had to do was to actually do as many varied projects as I was doing,
[04:29] SPEAKER_00: and actually not be micro-managing them.
[04:33] SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
[04:33] SPEAKER_00: And having to trust other people, you know, with my vision and my instructions,
[04:38] SPEAKER_00: you know, in many senses, what I like to say is,
[04:41] SPEAKER_00: dragons then came into my life at a point where I needed to be told,
[04:46] SPEAKER_00: you got to let go if you want to, if you want to explode the business part,
[04:52] SPEAKER_00: and you got to let go a bit and you got to do what you're best at and go get people that are,
[04:56] SPEAKER_00: you know, so in the case of the T-shirt company, for example, Rudy Ladd,
[04:59] SPEAKER_00: I really let Paul run that.
[05:02] SPEAKER_00: We need once, you know, once a week, once every two weeks, but he's really running it.
[05:07] SPEAKER_00: So, that was the hardest thing for an entrepreneur.
[05:09] SPEAKER_00: I remember most entrepreneurs are very hands-on, right?
[05:12] SPEAKER_00: It's on a paper we created.
[05:14] SPEAKER_00: If I still keep an enormous amount of control over the cinema division,
[05:20] SPEAKER_00: you know, it is, by the way, the one that's got my name in lights in his biggest format.
[05:25] SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I try and, I try and handle that one, but that was my hardest, my hardest thing.
[05:33] SPEAKER_00: In other words, I turned 50 last year and so it was, without saying I was getting ready for retirement,
[05:39] SPEAKER_00: what I was saying is I was getting ready to let in other people in the day-to-day,
[05:45] SPEAKER_00: you know, the kids were going to start coming in and so forth.
[05:47] SPEAKER_00: So, that possibly one day I could call it a retirement if there's such a thing.
[05:53] SPEAKER_01: Okay, over the years, you've talked to obviously a lot of people, a lot of people giving you advice,
[06:00] SPEAKER_01: etc. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received about being an entrepreneur?
[06:05] SPEAKER_00: I would tell you that the best piece of advice I've ever received was,
[06:10] SPEAKER_00: I mean, very, very successful entrepreneur. He's no longer with us.
[06:15] SPEAKER_00: And it was not to listen to anybody else who doesn't know 100% of your business.
[06:22] SPEAKER_00: And that's where I think, you know, we all make this mistake, right?
[06:25] SPEAKER_00: We go see attorneys and we ask them for advice, but we always seem to forget to mention some key elements
[06:33] SPEAKER_00: and so the advice is given to us wrong. It's the same thing. I think we all have a problem,
[06:37] SPEAKER_00: you know, with nudity in the sense of getting, you know, getting naked in front of others with all
[06:41] SPEAKER_00: of our intimate secrets. And so the only people who could really evaluate what's right or wrong
[06:48] SPEAKER_00: and what you should be doing is really you. I think that when we go get advice, I think what it
[06:54] SPEAKER_00: really is is we're just trying to get comfort. We're just trying to be reminded that we're not alone.
[07:02] SPEAKER_00: Because that is, you know, somebody, somebody wants to ask me the question and actually
[07:07] SPEAKER_00: the question that comes up all the time, right? What's the secret to success? Yeah.
[07:11] SPEAKER_00: And so over the years, you know, you would say, well, you know, long hours, working hard,
[07:17] SPEAKER_00: determination, you know, whatever buzzword was of the time that we do use.
[07:22] SPEAKER_00: I tell you one of the things that as I turned 50 last year,
[07:27] SPEAKER_00: started to hit me is the real secret to success, to set belongingness.
[07:34] SPEAKER_00: And the fact that it's the only singular journey from where you started to success. Because at the
[07:40] SPEAKER_00: end of the day, like I said, there's very few people who can tell you what you should do and shouldn't
[07:46] SPEAKER_00: do. Sometimes we go out there and say, what's this new trend? What's going on?
[07:51] SPEAKER_00: True to the matter is a real entrepreneur is connected.
[07:55] SPEAKER_00: His long-term being an entrepreneur. I mean, you know, when COVID-19 hit,
[08:00] SPEAKER_00: I was the first one to argue with the Quebec authorities not to shut down theaters.
[08:06] SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know, the media pulled me what I would call a Donald Trump on me where they
[08:10] SPEAKER_00: they took the beginning of the quote and they cut it at the right time to make me sound that I was
[08:15] SPEAKER_00: in census, right? Basically, what I had said was, you know, we left the liquor stores open so we
[08:20] SPEAKER_00: can all get drunk. We left the plot stores open so we can all get stoned. But we can't go watch
[08:26] SPEAKER_00: movie theaters. So what are teenagers supposed to do? Well, they stopped that, but we can't go watch
[08:31] SPEAKER_00: a movie. Click. And so it made it look like, hey, you know, Gutsal wants to keep theaters open
[08:36] SPEAKER_00: because he wants to make money. The true to the matter was it took three days after closing
[08:41] SPEAKER_00: movie theaters that the, you know, our premier was pleading with parents and teenagers to keep
[08:48] SPEAKER_00: their kids at home. We got on the phone and he said, okay, now I understand what you're saying. Yeah,
[08:53] SPEAKER_00: I'm here. You're not keep 15, 16, 17 year olds confined for very long because we all have this,
[09:00] SPEAKER_00: this, you know, misconception that everybody lives like us. You know, so I'm lucky. I live in a big
[09:06] SPEAKER_00: house. I got, and even then it's the big house, but it's still small considering we're seven
[09:12] SPEAKER_00: people living in it because I got five kids. Right in their five kids that go from 10 years old to
[09:17] SPEAKER_00: 22. So when, when, you know, there's two kinds of entrepreneurs, my father's interpretation
[09:23] SPEAKER_00: was he's in Mexico and he says, okay, you know, we got enough money to cover the burn. So let it be.
[09:32] SPEAKER_00: And I instead said, no, wait up for me, we're going to double down on it. Let's start recapitalizing.
[09:38] SPEAKER_00: Let's start investing. Let's start changing renovating some theaters. Let's start, you know,
[09:43] SPEAKER_00: and all of a sudden, it's always two different philosophies, right? So in my mind,
[09:47] SPEAKER_00: it was time to upgrade. It was time to do things that we would have done over the next five years.
[09:52] SPEAKER_00: Let's do it now. We're closed. How long are we going to be closed for, right? Yeah. And so
[09:57] SPEAKER_00: it's just two philosophies in the time of crisis. Many entrepreneurs, I think, who succeed and then
[10:04] SPEAKER_00: fail along the way, it's because they've lost their way. And many entrepreneurs do lose their ways.
[10:11] SPEAKER_00: And I say, but I think what happens is as you, you know, when you start your entrepreneurial journey,
[10:20] SPEAKER_00: you realize it's a lonely journey, but it's okay. You're willing to do the sacrifice.
[10:24] SPEAKER_00: Then as success comes to you, you get used to the company. Yeah. And then you don't want to
[10:29] SPEAKER_00: miss the company, but the company's actually distracting you. It's actually taking you off the ball
[10:33] SPEAKER_00: of the game, right? So in a time like quarantining, the most dedicated entrepreneurs are probably
[10:42] SPEAKER_00: refocusing more than ever because they're being left alone to do so. Right? So in that's, I think,
[10:48] SPEAKER_01: very important during this time. So what do you think businesses and entrepreneurs should be doing
[10:54] SPEAKER_01: right now to a survive and then be prepared for the future? Well, you know, look, I tell you
[11:01] SPEAKER_00: an advice I gave someone not too long ago in early January, somebody sold part of their business
[11:11] SPEAKER_00: and found themselves with a huge amount of liquidity and said to me, what should I do?
[11:16] SPEAKER_00: That's why you know what you should do is put 20% of your annual revenue and leave it liquid and
[11:22] SPEAKER_00: then the other 80% capitalized do whatever. I gave him a few and he says 20%. That's a lot of money.
[11:29] SPEAKER_00: Just like you never know. Yeah, I know, but 20% just sitting there, I'd like, you know, a quarter of a
[11:34] SPEAKER_00: point, a half a point, trust me, you want to be liquid, put it somewhere where you can get, you know,
[11:40] SPEAKER_00: something, but leave it liquid. You never know what it's like an insurance policy.
[11:43] SPEAKER_00: Call it that 2% that you're not making, that 3% you're not making, that 5%
[11:49] SPEAKER_00: call it a premium on this insurance policy. You know, when COVID-19 hit, the first thing a lot of
[11:56] SPEAKER_00: movie theaters did is they said, oh, we're gonna go, we're gonna go under if we don't get help.
[12:02] SPEAKER_00: My advice to the government was, before you give any money to any corporation, you better make sure
[12:09] SPEAKER_00: that this company wasn't bankrupt 18 months ago and just surviving on, you know, respirator
[12:15] SPEAKER_00: because you're gonna be really throwing good money with bad administrators. And that's what's
[12:22] SPEAKER_00: coming out in a lot of movie theaters, right? So AMC, you know, who's a monster in the movie industry
[12:28] SPEAKER_00: is basically now been recapitalized. It's forced, it's owners to actually pay more attention to AMC
[12:36] SPEAKER_00: and they've managed to get out of trouble. But for the last 12 months, they were at the brink of
[12:42] SPEAKER_00: always going bankruptcy, right? And so I think that at this time, what's very important is
[12:49] SPEAKER_00: to reestablish priorities in your company, in your corporation, in your life, if you know,
[12:54] SPEAKER_00: if you know, intense appropriations for an entrepreneurial life, make sure you're validating
[13:00] SPEAKER_00: where your money should be spent. Make sure that, you know, if you're gonna invest. So I told the
[13:08] SPEAKER_00: government, for example, when it came to the movie industry, I told them, don't give money to movie
[13:13] SPEAKER_00: theaters for recapitalization. Give them money for the relaunch of the industry. In other words,
[13:19] SPEAKER_00: you know, we want to open nationwide on the 19th of June. So help us promote that theaters are
[13:26] SPEAKER_00: back in business because when we do open on the 19th, we will not have brand new movies. We're
[13:31] SPEAKER_00: only gonna have old movies. That's probably gonna last for anywhere between seven and 21 days.
[13:38] SPEAKER_00: And then American movies are gonna start gradually coming out. And so in the meantime,
[13:44] SPEAKER_00: what did we have in our business that was inefficient, that was, you know, just let it be,
[13:50] SPEAKER_00: it's just part of the business. That's the way it is, right? So many times we say, we can't change
[13:55] SPEAKER_00: stuff because that's the way it is. It's always been done that way and leave it that way, right?
[13:59] SPEAKER_00: And so those are the priorities, those are the analysis that we need to be doing now that we have
[14:04] SPEAKER_01: the time. And just curious, what do you enjoy about being an entrepreneur? Why do you do this?
[14:10] SPEAKER_00: I would tell you being an entrepreneur is probably the modern version of medieval warfare.
[14:21] SPEAKER_00: In other words, it's, you know, it's the competitive edge. When I got into the movie business,
[14:27] SPEAKER_00: I was really headed to New York City and become a litigation lawyer.
[14:33] SPEAKER_00: Oh wow. And my father said, look, you know, you're an only child. Your mom and I built this business.
[14:40] SPEAKER_00: You want to come in with us or eventually we're just gonna sell it off and, you know,
[14:45] SPEAKER_00: gonna be a normal family, I guess, you know, with normal weekends and so forth and so forth.
[14:49] SPEAKER_00: So I said to him, I said, you know what? Let me think about it. I went into work a few,
[14:54] SPEAKER_00: a few times in the office and one of the things I handled was a few discussions with the US
[14:59] SPEAKER_00: studios. And when I realized how litigious some of those negotiations could be, I said to myself,
[15:06] SPEAKER_00: you know, I don't have to go to New York and resolve somebody else's fights by being a litigator.
[15:12] SPEAKER_00: I mean, I can litigate my own arguments here with my father and so forth. And that's how it
[15:18] SPEAKER_00: started. I mean, it is, you know, there's a love hate relationship with the US studios in the
[15:24] SPEAKER_00: sense that they're my suppliers. I depend on them, but they can be abusive and on the flip side,
[15:31] SPEAKER_00: they depend on me as well. Every theater I open back in 91, 92, whatever was a confrontation
[15:39] SPEAKER_00: against, you know, the old famous plays or synoplex. I was a fight. You know, so I was always,
[15:46] SPEAKER_00: because I was an only child, I had to impose myself, you know, I come from an Italian background.
[15:53] SPEAKER_00: So most of the people who lived on the street that we lived on had three brothers, four kids,
[15:58] SPEAKER_00: you know, they were like big family. So I got into a fight with one of the brothers. I got
[16:03] SPEAKER_00: three other brothers who showed up, right? So I always had to be overly, I take more space than I
[16:09] SPEAKER_00: had to. I always, I always used to say to people, I don't take a lot of space. I'm just taking a lot
[16:14] SPEAKER_00: of buffer space so that you can't get too close. So I have enough protection area, right?
[16:20] SPEAKER_00: And so for me being an entrepreneur at the end of the day is about fighting a fight every day
[16:28] SPEAKER_00: about something, right? So even if the medical reinvesting the medical research,
[16:33] SPEAKER_00: my fight right now, you know, in good sonano corporation is basically advancing
[16:42] SPEAKER_00: nano research when it comes to finding a cure or a treatment for cancer. So for me, the enemy is
[16:48] SPEAKER_00: cancer and in some sense or sometimes the enemy is the medical infrastructure that stops us
[16:55] SPEAKER_00: from being more efficient, right? So one of the first hurdles I had to get through when I
[17:01] SPEAKER_00: started investing in the medical field was explaining to doctors that money is worth just as much
[17:10] SPEAKER_00: to a rich person as it is to what not rich person. So don't think that because I have the money
[17:16] SPEAKER_00: to put in that it doesn't mean anything to me. So you have to respect the money just as much as if
[17:22] SPEAKER_00: you were getting it from somebody who has less money. And so it's the continuous quest is that in some
[17:31] SPEAKER_00: senses it's that continuous gratification and winning the next fight. As a as a dragon, a question I
[17:39] SPEAKER_01: have for you is what do you look for in these entrepreneurs? What is some of the key things that you
[17:44] SPEAKER_00: you really really look at going forward? So you know, I think one of the most important things for me is
[17:54] SPEAKER_00: the coachability or the teachability of the person. If I have somebody that I feel I'm going to be
[18:02] SPEAKER_00: arguing with on a continuous basis because the person is not willing to understand or not
[18:07] SPEAKER_00: willing to be taught how to do things a little different then I'm going to have a problem because
[18:13] SPEAKER_00: you know partnerships are like a marriage right. So I don't want to go into a marriage. I mean,
[18:19] SPEAKER_00: I've been divorced once already. I'm happily remarried. But you know, I don't you I just don't
[18:23] SPEAKER_00: need it. I mean, you know, I was like to say I got 25 good years left. I want to have fun. I want
[18:29] SPEAKER_00: to enjoy myself while you know, progressing my business and making my families a way more money.
[18:35] SPEAKER_00: But that's very important. The coachability. The other thing is honesty and the other thing is
[18:44] SPEAKER_00: some humility. In other words, you know, a lot of people seem to forget, right? They come to us. So
[18:49] SPEAKER_00: I can understand you come into the then we know absolutely nothing about you when you come. Like,
[18:54] SPEAKER_00: I don't even know you're coming. So I saw that I have a briefing on your company or anything.
[18:58] SPEAKER_00: So you walk in the minute you walk in is the first time I've heard of you. And so the problem is
[19:03] SPEAKER_00: that a lot of times. So I can understand those people are nervous, right? They come in, you know,
[19:07] SPEAKER_00: it's a big studio. It's the largest studio at CDC. So I mean, you know, it's
[19:12] SPEAKER_00: and some of them you can see that they're nervous. So you say it's okay. You know, I mean, a lot of
[19:17] SPEAKER_00: people don't realize that a pitch lasts between 30 minutes to an hour. Yeah. So we get it then, you
[19:24] SPEAKER_00: know, they then edit it down to 10 to 15 minutes, right? So there's things we see like sometimes
[19:29] SPEAKER_00: while the show's going on, I have friends with text and he says, how come nobody's asking him this?
[19:34] SPEAKER_00: He asked, it just that didn't make the cut. Okay, but we asked them that. They'll worry about it.
[19:39] SPEAKER_00: So we understand people can be nervous. But what happens sometimes is some people offset the nervousness
[19:46] SPEAKER_00: by arrogance, right? And that arrogance sometimes comes out across as, okay, wait up. I mean,
[19:53] SPEAKER_00: this person doesn't realize who he's talking to, right? So he doesn't realize that we know that if
[19:58] SPEAKER_00: you're standing there, chances are you've asked money to your mom and dad and they've said, no,
[20:03] SPEAKER_00: your cousins and relatives of all said, no, your friends and families have said, no, some banks
[20:08] SPEAKER_00: said, no. And now you're at the point that giving up equity to make your dream happen, right? So
[20:14] SPEAKER_00: we know that I'm sitting there. I see it. I know why you're here. And the fact that you don't
[20:21] SPEAKER_00: recognize that, the fact that sometimes you as a, as, as, as, you know, somebody coming there would
[20:28] SPEAKER_00: give me this attitude, you know, and we've had it in season 14. We had somebody, Michelle Arlene,
[20:34] SPEAKER_00: everybody was trying to explain to him that what he, what he wanted to do was borderline illegal.
[20:41] SPEAKER_00: And he basically turned around and said, you guys just don't understand, right? And we'll see
[20:46] SPEAKER_00: there. But wait a minute. You're asking me for a million bucks of my money. And you're not going
[20:52] SPEAKER_00: to force yourself to make me understand, or you're not going to try and present it to me in a different
[20:56] SPEAKER_00: way, right? Instead, you're going to tell me that you have 20 million dollars being thrown at you
[21:02] SPEAKER_00: from Silicon Valley. Well, go get the 20 million dollars and get out of my face like I got
[21:06] SPEAKER_00: other people I want to see, right? And so that's what you don't want to end up doing.
[21:12] SPEAKER_00: Right? You don't want to have to deal with those people. The other thing you want is you do want
[21:17] SPEAKER_00: somebody who's, I don't know if you remember in one of the shows there was a guy who, you know,
[21:22] SPEAKER_00: and some purposes he was a, I will call it a carpentry, he developed a butcher block,
[21:31] SPEAKER_00: kind of counter finishing that was super durable, super beautiful, whatever, whatever, whatever.
[21:36] SPEAKER_00: Yeah. The guy in a very humble way was avoiding to answer a question.
[21:43] SPEAKER_00: And everybody got mad at him. And then finally, I got him to answer the question.
[21:47] SPEAKER_00: And then I got upset at all the dragon saying, okay, guys, the guy is trying to hold back the fact
[21:53] SPEAKER_00: that he had an 80,000 square foot plan had to downsize the 20,000 because he screwed it up. He made
[21:59] SPEAKER_00: a mistake, he miscalculated his stuff. And you guys are making it look like he's got this big secret
[22:05] SPEAKER_00: where God knows what, you know, what was behind him. You know, like it's the big conspiracy theory,
[22:09] SPEAKER_00: right? So get over it, right? So, but you have to remember, like I said, we have sometimes only
[22:14] SPEAKER_00: half an hour to determine, you know, I'll tell you, it's happened to me to lose deals and then
[22:21] SPEAKER_00: get calls months later, say, we were unable to do a deal with so and so, you want to reconsider
[22:27] SPEAKER_00: doing a deal with us. And I sit down and I, and sometimes I do do a deal and sometimes I just
[22:32] SPEAKER_00: give them the mentoring that they wanted and push them. And some other times I literally got to say
[22:36] SPEAKER_00: to somebody, you're not getting, you're really out understanding how this is going to work.
[22:41] SPEAKER_00: But the coach ability, I would tell you, and the teach ability is the key element because as
[22:48] SPEAKER_00: long as you know that you, you're helping somebody better understand, better work at their stuff,
[22:56] SPEAKER_00: you at least have the satisfaction, even if you've lost a few hundred thousand bucks to say,
[23:00] SPEAKER_00: you know what, we gave it a shot. And the guy, you know, we all gave it our best.
[23:05] SPEAKER_01: Yeah. Okay, Dan, is there anything you'd like to add Vince before you leave us today?
[23:11] SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, guys, I, you know, I think the most important thing to remember is, you know,
[23:16] SPEAKER_00: many times we associate entrepreneurship with just making money. I want everybody to realize that
[23:24] SPEAKER_00: money is just, it's just a measuring gauge, right? So you make a lot of money, you're an amazing
[23:29] SPEAKER_00: entrepreneur. You make less money, well, you know, that is amazing. Okay. But the truth of the
[23:34] SPEAKER_00: matter is, why don't you understand that the entrepreneurial spirit is what you find in,
[23:41] SPEAKER_00: in everything that has made humanity advance. I mean, you know, just look at the doctor who decided
[23:49] SPEAKER_00: to find the cure for some vaccine, right? Let's call it COVID-19 right now, right? Those guys are
[23:58] SPEAKER_00: just entrepreneurs in their field. They're just pushing and many of them don't only do it for the money,
[24:06] SPEAKER_00: right? The money is just that reward at the end. Sometimes it's just a satisfaction. You know,
[24:11] SPEAKER_00: I always like to say there's a bit of self-centeredness in entrepreneurship. Steve Jobs is somebody
[24:18] SPEAKER_00: that I met. I knew him. He was a tyrant. But the thing he did best out of anybody else is,
[24:27] SPEAKER_00: he gave 120% and people knew that as long as you saw his vision and followed his vision,
[24:36] SPEAKER_00: you could get somewhere, right? A lot of the things Steve Jobs has accomplished with his team at Apple
[24:41] SPEAKER_00: and so forth, have changed our lives. Forget the money that he's made or not made, right? If I'm
[24:46] SPEAKER_00: talking to you today on this on the Zoom, God knows that the first starting, you know, stepping
[24:54] SPEAKER_00: block to this was probably the first iPhone that was ever created. So you can imagine, and so that's
[25:01] SPEAKER_00: important that we don't associate entrepreneurship just to business, but there can be entrepreneurship
[25:07] SPEAKER_00: in social enterprise. There could be in government. There could be in all kinds of sectors,
[25:14] SPEAKER_00: the entrepreneurial spirit. And I think that's important. I think a lot of people forget that about
[25:19] SPEAKER_01: entrepreneurship. Okay, super. Thanks, Vince, for joining us today on Montreal. Thank you very
[25:25] SPEAKER_01: much for having me. Thank you. Thanks everyone for joining us today and listening to Canada's
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