Why Self-Leadership Is The Only Thing Holding You Back From 7 Figures

Dustin: [00:00:00] One of the key things I've learned this year is all leadership starts with leading yourself. So whether that's a business, whether that's as a family leader or community leader, ultimately the only way you can do any leadership of others or have any real impact in the world is you first and foremost have to lead yourself.
Intro: You are listening to the seven-Figure Leap podcast. We're here to leverage rich relationships and smart strategies to take your business to the next level. Here's your host, Dustin Rieman. What
Dustin: is required of you as a leader to scale your business? my name's Dustin Rieman and I'm really excited to unpack what has been one of the more transformational topics of this year for me personally and for a lot of our clients.
Dustin: So, I don't know about you, but I used to be sort of allergic to the word leadership. I had certain connotations, that I was really trying to [00:01:00] escape whenever I started my own business. Became a solopreneur and kind of got away from the corporate. World. but what I hope to do today is share with you a new framework, a new, paradigm shift around leadership, and not only why it's critical and how to do it well in growing your own creator business.
Dustin: But how it can actually be fun and, the opposite maybe of some of the negative connotations you've had of leadership in the past. So as we go to unpack this leadership triangle framework, I'd like to start with a little story. And I was reflecting back on when I became a allergic to leadership. so when I was 16 years old, I had a job at McDonald's, not just like any McDonald's.
Dustin: It was a McDonald's inside of a Walmart. So this was like. The nerdiest of nerdy, like fast food jobs. as soon as I got my driver's license, it was a huge upgrade from the farm work and putting up hay and the things that I had done prior to that. But, it was a, just a really unique [00:02:00] environment because I was the youngest one.
Dustin: Working and what happened was about three months into working at McDonald's and you know, I had all the, jobs frying fries and making Big Macs and doing cash register work and cleaning the dining room. You know, I guess I did a pretty good job because the. Manager, came to me one day and said, Hey, I wanna promote you to crew Chief.
Dustin: And so I got this gold name tag and I'm like, Hey, this is pretty cool. And I got like a 15 cent an hour raise. I was like, all right, you know, I'm crushing the McDonald's journey here. What I come to find out, is that crew chief came with a 15 cent raise, and it also came with this really awkward role where I was.
Dustin: Basically the manager, the shift manager, for the rest of the crew. And some of this crew were like 45, 50-year-old women and, and men like adults, right? Like, and I'm the 16-year-old kid and I'm now like their quote unquote boss, at least, you know, for parts of my shifts. And that was kind of when I was, anointed a [00:03:00] leader, I guess.
Dustin: And I really. I was not comfortable with it and I was not equipped by it. And of course, you know, I progressed from there into a lot of different roles in my career and I'm mostly in engineering. And so I worked at two different engineering firms and started as more of a technical traffic engineer and doing the work.
Dustin: And you know, the, funny thing happens in those environments is like, oh, you're really good at engineering, wanna promote you and make you a manager. And I'm like, okay. So I did that, got the pay raises. ultimately became a partner actually in both of those engineering firms. And was just never really comfortable with the title of leader because, and I, I think you might relate to this, as a listener, I equated leadership with management.
Dustin: And what I've come to really realize in, in recent times, leadership does not have to equal management. It can't include management, but actually it doesn't have to. And there's many aspects, several key aspects, three in particular, that I feel are critical for you to [00:04:00] embrace. a solopreneur, as a founder, as someone who's leading or creator business, and they may or may not involve employees, and they may or may not involve management of people, so.
Dustin: This is where this new framework that I'm really excited to share with you comes in and I call it the leadership triangle. It's very simple. This came to me through a discussion and sort of an epiphany moment at one of our seven figure lead Mastermind retreats. This year we're in Franklin, Tennessee.
Dustin: We're having a discussion about team and leadership and. I was sitting next to someone I've really grown to admire named Dusty Holcomb. And Dusty is a member of our mastermind. He went through our podcast Profits accelerator
earlier this year, and he is a true leader. He, you know, was a CEO and a COO at some really large companies.
Dustin: He runs a training on leadership and. I looked at Dusty as sort of like, yeah, that's the thing. I don't want to be, I don't want this corporate identity and management having hundreds of employees and sort of being, held up as a leader with all that. That comes with in an [00:05:00] org chart. But in this discussion, what I came to believe, understand, and ultimately implement is this idea of a leadership triangle.
Dustin: So leadership Triangle is pretty simple. It's three things, hence the triangle, self leadership. Team leadership and thought leadership. And so the base of this triangle is self-leadership because one of the key things I've learned this year is all leadership starts with leading yourself. So whether that's a business, whether that's as a family leader or community leader, ultimately the only way you can do any leadership of others or have any real impact in the world is you first and foremost have to lead yourself.
Dustin: So. I'm gonna break down each of these three aspects of leadership, give you some ideas for how you can think about this and apply this and uplevel this in your own life because as you increase your ability to lead. In all three of these areas, you will undoubtedly and inevitably have a [00:06:00] bigger impact and your business will grow as a result.
Dustin: So this is really important for growing your business. So I'm gonna go through each of these, give you some kind of general examples that might apply to you. And now I'm gonna talk about some very specific things I've done this year in each of these three areas that I can now look back at and see like very tangible revenue growth and.
Dustin: Impact growth with what we do at Seven Figure Leap. So self leadership, maybe a little bit obvious, it's about leading you. It's about improving yourself, right? So self-leadership ultimately comes down to investing in your health. Your wealth and your business in your case, and your relationships, right?
Dustin: And so, the better that you are as a person and the more, healthy and vibrant and energetic and clear and engaged you are, naturally that's gonna spill over and have a huge positive impact in all parts of your life. And including, and maybe first and foremost, your business. because as an entrepreneur.
Dustin: Especially as a founder [00:07:00] led business, you are, you are the lever, right? You are the most important part of the equation, at least in the earlier stages of your business. And so self-leadership is, taking a true, honest assessment and saying like, where am I not taking care of myself? Or where am I not investing in improving myself?
Dustin: First and foremost outside of any other people in my sphere. So for me this year, a few key things. One, I remained alcohol free. so in the middle of 2024, I had my last drink of alcohol on my 45th birthday. And I'm proud to say I've continued that and that's paid amazing dividends and in many ways, physical, mental health, clarity.
Dustin: that's a really keystone habit that has changed in my life in the area of self-leadership. In addition to that, this year, for the first time ever, I've invested in a health coach, a fitness coach. I work with a company called Nerd Fitness. They are a client of ours in the Podcast Profits Accelerator, and as I got to [00:08:00] understand them and their model, it's one-on-one coaching, it's app based, but still human to human.
Dustin: I realized like this is what I need to really uplevel myself and get away from event-based fitness and have a more sustainable and, accountable, version of , my health maintenance and my health optimization. So that's been important for me. number two, something I did this year was I invested.
Dustin: Leadership training. So I actually went and worked with Dusty. so I helped him launch his group coaching program, on, on leadership. And then I enrolled in it and it was amazing. It was powerful. highly recommended. And I was in a group with some entrepreneurs, some employees and some high level executives.
Dustin: And that really gave me a lot better appreciation of the impact of leadership. And so investing in that was definitely an area where I invested my own. Wisdom and my own wealth. I've stayed very involved in front row dads, so sharpening my saw when it comes to being a better husband, being a better dad.
Dustin: I went on an adventure with a small group of [00:09:00] front row dads this year and was able to have some more recreation in my life, which is something important. To give me more fuel for the grind of entrepreneurship. And then, you know, one of the last things I'll mention here, I recently went on a silent retreat.
Dustin: So my Christian faith is important to me, as I'm sure you can relate. It's a busy, busy world. And so to unplug for three and a half days. Just have spiritual time, have spiritual direction, and not talk when, whenever your, your career is basically talking on podcasts and group coaching and things like that, it was really nice to unplug and have that sort of deep spiritual renewal by going on a silent retreat.
Dustin: So obviously there's lots of different ways this could apply to you, but hopefully it gives you a flavor of what I mean when I say self-leadership. And again, this is the base of the triangle. If you don't do this well. You really can't do anything else well, so it's first and foremost, you have to take care of
yourself and invest in upleveling your own leadership of yourself.
Dustin: Number two, team leadership. [00:10:00] Okay, this is of course where I thought all leadership was in business. I thought, well, to be a leader means you have a big team and you're their manager and therefore you're a leader. Not true. Definitely not true. And so you may be a solopreneur with no one on your team right now, in the sense of that word, that version of team.
Dustin: you may have some employees, you may have some contractors. That's definitely part of this. And it's a very important part of this is actual team members in your business. but it's not only your employees. I've really grown to appreciate and understand this year that my family. Is part of my business team right now.
Dustin: They may or may not work in the business, but they are influenced by, or they're impacted by the business. They influence me, which influences the business. so you know, you have a family team in a sense that supports you. you may have, I hope you have. Community that you're involved in, a mastermind that you might be involved in.
Dustin: And I've really grown to understand that these are areas, these are [00:11:00] resources, these are people and places that are extensions of me and my team, right? So they all affect me and my business. And so by upleveling your network, by upleveling your communication and your commitment and your clarity with your family, and of course by.
Dustin: Doing the thing that you may, assume comes in this category, taking good care and being communicative and setting strategic, goals and things like that with your actual employees. all of these things are ways to level up your leadership. In the team realm. So for me this year, there's definitely been some traditional team, improvements.
Dustin: So we've hired numerous people. So we hired, Jessica Miller to be a coach within our community. So she's an alumni of PPA, she's also in our mastermind, and so she now co-host our office hours each week. I already had Tony de Lorenzo in a similar role. Co-hosting our main accelerator calls each week.
Dustin: we've hired people to [00:12:00] support me in email marketing and LinkedIn marketing, and content production. I hired recently in the fourth quarter, a sales steward, right? So, a salesperson for our team, and we did a lot of work on that and a lot of preparation for that. I, I'd say that was the biggest.
Dustin: Team upgrade this year was really getting our sales system to a point where it could, not only exist but thrive without me. And so that was a big investment in team this year as Seven Figure Leap. another huge shift is I've now started to view and we've started to structure the Seven Figure Elite Mastermind as not only for me, but for each other.
Dustin: We're all an extension. Of our business team. So we have this amazing group of people who are experts in all kinds of cool stuff. Like I've already mentioned, you know, numerous ones of them because they're also, either people I've paid to coach me and train me, or I, you know, employ as, as part of our seven figure leap team.
Dustin: But way beyond that, we have experts in. Finances [00:13:00] and leadership and email marketing and marriage and relationships and, storytelling and messaging and group coaching and like, I could go on and on and so I. That already existed. I already had this Mastermind, but I just didn't view it and I wasn't structuring it in a way that we were operating as an extension of each other's business team.
Dustin: So now we do. So they, this mastermind is not only an amazing group of people and, friends and, all that that entails, but we now. Assist each other as sort of fractional extensions of our business team. And that's really powerful and really important. So if you have access or, you're interested having access to ours, you know, hit me up on that.
Dustin: But I think your masterminds, your communities, these group coaching programs, things that maybe you're already plugged into, how can that be an extension of your team? And then the final thing I'll say on this topic is my wife Bethany, has always been aware of what we're doing in the business, but I've really made a concerted effort [00:14:00] recently to bring her in.
Dustin: To the planning of the business, the strategy of the business. one of our mastermind members is also our financial coach on the business side. And so he and my wife and I will meet via Zoom and talk about how the business is, you know, affecting and impacting and empowering our personal lives and the finances on that side of the world.
Dustin: And so just having my spouse, my wife, my partner, be. Involved in a deeper way in the high level operations and strategy of the business, is absolutely an extension of team leadership within seven figure leap. So again, hopefully those are some good like practical examples for team leadership. So we talked about self-leadership, we just talked about team leadership.
Dustin: And the final part of this, which is maybe the most exciting to me because I feel like it was the least obvious, in the triangle, is thought leadership. So thought leadership doesn't apply to [00:15:00] all people. It doesn't apply to all businesses. not all businesses have a sort of thought leadership model, but yours probably does.
Dustin: Many of our, people in this ecosystem, you know, would identify as a creator, a founder. They're people, who are experts in certain things. They write, speak, create video content. Post on LinkedIn. These are all forms of thought leadership, right? And so I think this is a really special part of the triangle for people like us, because I'm obviously in this category as well.
Dustin: Hence the podcast you're listening to. This is a form and expression of thought leadership. So this is really unique to creator businesses for the most part. And, as you think about your own business and your own forms of thought leadership, I'm sure you think of things like content. Books, podcasts. but thought leadership can also be internal to a company, right?
Dustin: A lot of this is external. It's, it's basically forms of marketing. So thought leadership is a great form of marketing, but thought [00:16:00] leadership is also, can be internal to the company. It could be how you. Train and inspire and, and lead a team. It could be even how again you lead yourself. so journaling, introspection, creative thinking, strategic, time to think.
Dustin: These are all forms of thought leadership, right? And so that all three of these pieces of the triangle, of course, tie together, and they are all integral to each other. And I think thought leadership definitely falls in that category. So for me this year. you know, thought leadership has been sort of the bread and butter of seven figure leaps.
Dustin: The whole origin of this, business is me doing podcast guesting for a meat stick company. and so that was, it's always been fueled by some form of thought leadership, but I feel like this year we've went deeper on that. we've had some very intentional focus on that. So one of the things I'm really proud of is.
Dustin: I practice what I preach, so I consistently guess on podcasts. Like that's something I believe in. It's something that's changed my life. It's something that we've helped 250 other [00:17:00] people weigh or with in an intensive way in our podcast Profits accelerator program, and I've continued to do that. this year I would say we really hit an inflection point in sort of the, the size and the.
Dustin: Just the quality of some of the opportunities that we've had. So, you know, this year I was on Smart Passive Income with Pat Flynn. I had a massive, opportunity and impact with an appearance I had on the Nathan Barry Show. And there, there were many more, but those are a few of the highlights of intentional places.
Dustin: I sought platforms for thought leadership. The other thing I think I've done this year more than ever and has had a much bigger impact on. The recipients and on me, in our business is guest training. So I always view guest training, partnership marketing as an extension of what we teach in, the PPA for podcast.
Dustin: Guessing like podcast guessing is foundational, but it's far from the only, form of marketing that uses that model, right? Like teaching other people. Other people's [00:18:00] audiences is like, in my opinion, the best form of marketing. And so podcast guesting is that, but something I've done a lot more of this year is a, a deeper version of that by guest training in other people's private communities.
Dustin: So I've had the opportunity to guest train in Justin Welsh's community, smart passive income digital marketer, uh, NA Chin, John Meese, John Meyer. Like if I went back and actually cataloged it, it's been. More than a dozen really
cool opportunities, to come in and speak in a virtual format. In all those cases, I've also had the opportunity to speak on stages, and that's another form of thought leadership, right?
Dustin: So speaking at agency builders this year, and I'm getting ready to go speak at Pod Fest for the second time, these are all forms of thought leadership as well. So again, your form of thought leadership might be writing, it might be speaking, uh. I hope it includes, podcasting. 'cause I feel like that's a universal,
powerful way to develop your thought leadership and have a big impact in the world.[00:19:00]
Dustin: But regardless of the form and format, if you're running a business and especially a business that would identify as. Part of the creator economy. thought leadership is something you really have to take seriously. So that's what I wanted to share today. I wanted to give you some inside baseball and some shifts I've made this year and how I view leadership.
Dustin: it's had a massive impact in not only our growth, but on the level of peace that I have, because I think for the first time in my adult life, I am not. Giving the stiff arm to leadership. I'm embracing it. I'm investing in it, and I'm seeing it much more holistically as a key driver of growth in my personal and professional life, right?
Dustin: So self-leadership is the foundation. So if you're, coming away from this episode and you're thinking, I believe this, this sounds good, but like, where do I start? I would absolutely start with self-leadership. So I would be looking at your own life and think about your health. Think about your relationships.
Dustin: think about your wealth, legacy fam or you know, [00:20:00] business. Those are all, you know, important aspects of your personal life. And as I go and say those verbally, my guess is there's something that's gonna come to your mind. Like, you know what? It's finally time that I take my health seriously, right? It's finally time I go see a therapist.
Dustin: It's finally time that I go. Take my spouse on a marriage retreat, whatever it is, where you feel like you could use some more self-leadership and development. I think that would be definitely the place to start. And then from there, think about team leadership in a more expansive way. And finally thought leadership.
Dustin: And what are some ways that you can leverage your unique ability. And show up in a bigger way, in the new year, whenever you're listening to this, the next chapter, the next quarter, and make some commitments to each of these three areas. Like I would try to make one commitment in each of the three areas, and I promise you, and I'm excited for you to see the dividends that that pays.
Dustin: So be a leader, embrace leadership, increase. Elevate your own leadership and it will have a massive impact on the growth of your [00:21:00] business. So I'm Dustin Reman. I'm really grateful for you listening to this. If
you are looking for help, especially in the thought leadership camp, you need help with your marketing, you know that your business growth is one of the big things that you want to focus on.
Dustin: that's exactly what we do at Seven Figure Leap. As I mentioned, we've got a, flagship program called the Podcast Profits Accelerator. We're enrolling right now for our 19th sold out cohort of, uh, of that program. And if you're interested in that, one of the coolest things you can do to get started is just go get educated about podcast guesting, how it works, what we do, and, uh, you know, certainly no pressure there.
Dustin: But I would love for you to explore that if this sounds like. This would be a strategy that would help you grow your business, your thought leadership. And by doing that, I promise you it will have a spillover effect and help you be a better team leader. And I honestly believe self or podcast guesting is one of
the highest and best forms of self-leadership and self-development as well.
Dustin: So you can do that by going to seven figure leap. Com [00:22:00] slash playbook and seven figure leap.com/playbook is gonna let you get access to a free resource. It's all about how we approach podcast. Guessing it's got some amazing examples and case studies and tools and things that you can grab there. And then if you're like, Hey, I want the fast path, I wanna work with us and personally to make sure that we absolutely nail this, that's what our accelerator program is for.
Dustin: But you can come in and get started for free. Just go to seven figure leap.com/playbook and I'll see you over there.