When JC Hite joins us, he brings along the roller coaster narrative of an entrepreneur who's seen both the giddy heights of early success and the gut-wrenching drops of financial turmoil. His journey isn't just a series of business anecdotes; it's a heartfelt exploration of how aligning one's deepest values with their professional drive can become the cornerstone of not just a successful company, but a fulfilling life. As JC opens up about the crucial pivot from his pre-entrepreneurial days in real estate to creating the values-driven Hite International, the conversation evolves into a compelling analysis of life’s unexpected turns and the resilience they demand.
The road of entrepreneurship is fraught with the need for discipline as much as innovation, a balancing act that JC dissects with precision. Hear the insights on how monotonous processes are the backbone of a thriving business and how essential the right team is to bolster a founder's vision. This episode goes beyond the boardroom and touches on the cultural fabric of our lives, discussing the influence of multigenerational households and the intentional effort required to weave together a vibrant family life alongside business pursuits. JC's personal anecdotes offer a living case study of the complexities involved in maintaining that delicate equilibrium.
Finally, our conversation pivots to the enduring topic of legacy – what it means to leave a mark that outlasts material achievements. JC's reflections on mentorship, lifelong learning, and the wisdom of 'E-Myth' by Michael G. Gerber and 'EntreLeadership' by Dave Ramsey for aspiring entrepreneurs provide a roadmap for those eager to craft a meaningful footprint.
For those interested in connecting with JC Hite, he actively engages with his audience and shares valuable content on his Instagram
Ready to Finish 2024 Strong? Don’t wait until December to address your challenges. There's a few months left in 2024, now is the time to plan for a strong finish! Book a free strategy call with Dr. William Attaway to create a plan for impactful results.
Join Dr. William Attaway on the Catalytic Leadership podcast as he shares transformative insights to help high-performance entrepreneurs and agency owners achieve Clear-Minded Focus, Calm Control, and Confidence.
Free 30-Minute Discovery Call: Ready to elevate your business? Book a free 30-minute discovery call with Dr. William Attaway and start your journey to success.
When JC Hite joins us, he brings along the roller coaster narrative of an entrepreneur who's seen both the giddy heights of early success and the gut-wrenching drops of financial turmoil. His journey isn't just a series of business anecdotes; it's a heartfelt exploration of how aligning one's deepest values with their professional drive can become the cornerstone of not just a successful company, but a fulfilling life. As JC opens up about the crucial pivot from his pre-entrepreneurial days in real estate to creating the values-driven Hite International, the conversation evolves into a compelling analysis of life’s unexpected turns and the resilience they demand.
The road of entrepreneurship is fraught with the need for discipline as much as innovation, a balancing act that JC dissects with precision. Hear the insights on how monotonous processes are the backbone of a thriving business and how essential the right team is to bolster a founder's vision. This episode goes beyond the boardroom and touches on the cultural fabric of our lives, discussing the influence of multigenerational households and the intentional effort required to weave together a vibrant family life alongside business pursuits. JC's personal anecdotes offer a living case study of the complexities involved in maintaining that delicate equilibrium.
Finally, our conversation pivots to the enduring topic of legacy – what it means to leave a mark that outlasts material achievements. JC's reflections on mentorship, lifelong learning, and the wisdom of 'E-Myth' by Michael G. Gerber and 'EntreLeadership' by Dave Ramsey for aspiring entrepreneurs provide a roadmap for those eager to craft a meaningful footprint.
For those interested in connecting with JC Hite, he actively engages with his audience and shares valuable content on his Instagram
Ready to Finish 2024 Strong? Don’t wait until December to address your challenges. There's a few months left in 2024, now is the time to plan for a strong finish! Book a free strategy call with Dr. William Attaway to create a plan for impactful results.
Join Dr. William Attaway on the Catalytic Leadership podcast as he shares transformative insights to help high-performance entrepreneurs and agency owners achieve Clear-Minded Focus, Calm Control, and Confidence.
Free 30-Minute Discovery Call: Ready to elevate your business? Book a free 30-minute discovery call with Dr. William Attaway and start your journey to success.
I'm so excited to have JC Hite on the podcast today. JC is a visionary figure in the digital marketing and branding sphere, celebrated for his captivating speaking abilities and profound insights. As the founder of Hite International, JC channels his passion for business and people into building a significant presence in the industry. Having earned the prestigious Inc 5000 ranking twice, JC is dedicated to scaling businesses and fostering a supportive community. Through influential events like the Commitment Summit and Committed Mastermind, he and his wife, karen, create platforms where entrepreneurs come together to elevate their skills and their aspirations. A devoted family man, JC finds profound joy in cherishing moments with his loved ones, whether he's captivating audiences on stage or embracing the warmth of family life. JC is a true force molding the future of business with his eloquence, his transformative ideas and his authentic love for those closest to him. JC man, I'm so glad you're here. Thanks for being on the show.
JC Hite:
What's going on, man? I appreciate it. I'm excited to be here. Hopefully we can add some really solid value to the audience.
Intro / Outro:
I have no doubt Welcome to Catalytic Leadership, the podcast designed to help leaders intentionally grow and thrive.
Dr. William Attaway:
Here is your host author and leadership and executive coach, dr William Attaway, I'd love to start by hearing a little bit of your story for you to share with our listeners how you got started your journey, your development as a leader, how you got started your journey, your development as a leader, yeah, yeah.
JC Hite:
So you grew up in a very humble home, lived in a trailer house a lot of my life growing up, and right in college I started playing around with real estate and, to be frank, I got lucky. I fell into real estate and by the time I graduated I got to 24. I had 52 homes 52 houses in my portfolio, which was just like nuts I mean, what in the world? And I had a Cessna airplane, william. I had a Harley guy in the world. Everyone else was idiots and I was just a genius and God just had a divine plan for me because it was.
JC Hite:
And I ended up meeting my future wife and we got engaged. And about three months before we got engaged, a huge factory went under and about 40 of my homes was within two miles of that factory and about 40 of my homes was within two miles of that factory and probably half my homes were people in there. I couldn't get them out, I couldn't collect rent. We were destroying the home. It was just a. Anyway spent the first, the next six months literally losing everything I had. In fact, two months after I got married, as a man, you're trying to to get married and you're wanting to provide for your family, and it's this first moment of we ended up moving into the maid's quarters of her dad's house in Nicaragua. Oh my goodness.
JC Hite:
And I don't ever remember us being. I grew up poor, right, so I don't ever remember us being ashamed or sad. I mean, you got to realize this is a maid's quarters in a third world country, so literally there was a twin size bed we spent the first year of our marriage on and you could see the toilet right, like like that's how close we were and um had this tech ed company that I started. I never could really get it off the ground. We made it up to make a little bit of money.
JC Hite:
And then I got the call. There was a big marketing company that was growing and they really wanted me to come over and lead all their service and I actually ended up eventually asking me to be the CEO, which I declined. I went to work with them and was a minor owner in the organization. We got on the ink list five times, five or six times in a row, 350 team members. I mean we were getting so many endorsements, and I mean Google. We were at every Super Bowl, the World Cup, the Olympics, like you know, all this crazy good stuff. But it was interesting.
JC Hite:
The company, karen and I are very devout in our faith and our family and that organization was an incredible business organization. But it was so lost spiritually and the three owners were, I think, good men but again, no faith. So therefore didn't have that same direction. And I mean Wolf of Wall Street had nothing on us. I mean we're talking heroin, cocaine. I remember for months the top sales team would get strippers.
JC Hite:
That was the, and so my wife and I, even though obviously we're very anti-this, we saw it as we were light to the world. We were in there. Everyone knew who we were, what we were about, we were included or participated in any of that type of stuff. It was a month before my daughter was going to be born that all of a sudden my entire mindset changed. Two months before and I went to Karen and we were both on the same page. We're recruiting 20 people a month into this. We're literally bringing people in saying this is how you grow a business and it kind of hit us of like man, I would be so embarrassed if my daughter came to work here. I would be so ashamed.
JC Hite:
And the owners were always fighting. It was just terrible. I mean, it was just a terrible environment from a sociology type of viewpoint. And I ended up walking in, got with one of the owners. I exchanged 100% of my equity we were trying to go for like I mean, we thought we could sell the company in the next year for like $50 million to give you an idea of where we were at and traded all my equity in exchange for my non-compete two months before my daughter was born with no health insurance, not really much in savings, and we started hype.
JC Hite:
And this year will be our third year. You got to be in business three years to even apply for the Inc 5000 list. This is our year six in business. It'll be our third year on the list and it's been up, it's been down, it's been chaos, it's been down, it's been chaos, it's been crazy. Anybody who's built a company it doesn't get easier. As you grow, you just pray that your ability to manage complexity grows at the same rate as the complexity of your organization grows. And so we've been growing and scaling and here we are today with 160-something maybe 150 team members full-time. Yeah, it's been a fun, enjoyable ride.
Dr. William Attaway:
JC. That is so inspiring and I think the thing I love the most about it is the transparency that you shared that story you just laid out not just the highlight reel, which is really easy to do Inc. 5000, right, 150 team members that's so easy to spotlight those things, yeah, but you don't neglect the other part, the challenges, the struggles, the difficulties, and so often the highlight reels we see online do. There is no highlight reel.
JC Hite:
Without the struggles, it doesn't exist right, and so, um, we gotta wear those. You know like they are. I mean, this is what there's. There's never a good day without a bad day. If you only have good days, then they're. Then it's no longer good, it's no longer great, exceptional. You have to have the bad days. And with entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship sucks in so many ways. It's so hard, and there's a lot of bad days, but there's a lot of great ones as well.
Dr. William Attaway:
You've built multiple seven-figure businesses and I know a lot of the people listening are still working on their first one. Looking back over your journey so far, what would you attribute the success that you have seen in building multiples to Like? If you were going to say, hey, you know, this is one or two things that I would say. This is what has really helped me get there.
JC Hite:
Yeah yeah, the person who starts a business is normally not a person who can grow a business. So starting a business is this creative person. There's a sense of ego, you want change, you want new, you want there's something you're running either from or towards in a very fast pace. As entrepreneurs, we're a little bit chaotic, we're crazy, we have a billion ideas and we actually are not really good at growing companies. Actually, to scale a company should be boring in a lot of ways. Scaling a company takes very monotonous, repeatable processes, it takes discipline, it takes consistent, all these things that, again, normally entrepreneurs.
JC Hite:
And so one of the things that I think we've been very blessed at and I won't say that it was through intention, some of it was by accident but we really go after these technicians, these operators. Right, we can't have a bunch of JCs in the room. We will fail so miserably. It's not even funny. Nothing will ever get done. It will just be idea over idea over idea. And so I've really become fanatic when it comes to hiring A-plus technicians and A-plus operators, and in every one of my companies we have an A-plus operator at the top, someone that's like let's stop thinking, let's stop dreaming and let's just execute over and over.
JC Hite:
And if you look at these, so many people I think are are interested in innovation and I like the idea of innovation, but if you look the biggest companies in the world, they innovate less than what you think. If you look at an iphone, like, fundamentally, this has not changed in 10 years. Yes, it's a better camera. Yes, it's a little bit faster. Yes, it's, it's got a little bit more capacity to hold pictures. Yes, it's better in every way, but fundamentally it hasn't changed.
Intro / Outro:
Yeah.
JC Hite:
They don't even have 20, 30 products. Look at an F-150, a Ford truck. Yes, it's better. It's a little quicker, a little bit better gas mileage. Maybe there's an electric every once in a while, but fundamentally it and this has been huge for us in growing our organization is that we really try to create great process, great operations, and let people like me get out of the way because we just screw it up.
Dr. William Attaway:
That's so valuable because I see so many visionaries who are starting companies and as they begin to grow, they think they can continue to do it all because they had to do it all at the beginning. They think they can continue to do it all because they had to do it all at the beginning, so they think they can continue to do it all. I just earlier this week spoke to a group of operators from John Ali's group, spyglass Ops, and talking with them about the importance of what they do and the value that they bring and how they could not possibly be more critical in an organization when it comes to growth and scaling and I love what you're saying there. It's just so important and the visionaries need to hear and understand and adopt this.
JC Hite:
Yeah, a lot of times we try to like fight that personality trait and sometimes you have to fight it. Sometimes you can't afford to hire an operator. Go find someone right, you have to fight it. But the moment you don't have to fight it you can just really be that visionary.
Dr. William Attaway:
That's when things really start to flow in a whole new way. Yeah yeah, we talked in our previous conversation about family and how important family is to you, and I've watched so many leaders, so many entrepreneurs, sacrifice their family on the altar of building a business. I'm building this for them. They sacrifice the time, they sacrifice the investment into their spouse, into their kids, for the one-day payoff. They think, well, it's just for a season, it's just for a season. But as a wise guy I know once told me, if every season never ends, that's not a season.
JC Hite:
That's your life. How do you balance that? Well, it's hard and and, uh, balance is is ever going to be the right, like word right. It's always off one way or the other. Typically, there's times when my kids just need to be way more and then we kind of slow down the business. There's times on the opposite side as well Um, you know, my wife and I run the business together.
JC Hite:
Uh, she handles all of our education side, our events, and I handle the day-to-days of the businesses and uh, and so we've kind of taken the standpoint that, honestly, our number one responsibility to our kids is for us to be a a great example of a great example of what a future relationship would look like, and so that's kind of like our biggest priority. And so we are always together. We're always, you know, running around together. We don't have time. You know, like these types of things are really important to us. We try to limit the days away, and that's hard.
JC Hite:
I do some speaking now and travel and trying to always balance that Right. And nowadays in these schools they can't just get up anytime they want. So you know it's a tough. It's a tough balance we are. We try to block our time, and so our goal was that every day, by four or 30, we're done with work and I leave my computer at the office. We don't, we don't take it home. We try to engage as much as possible. We're not perfect at it, by any stretch. We also. My family is Latino, so abuelita grandma, my wife's mother, lives with us right, and the impact of generations on children is something that we used to have a lot, and it's something that Latin cultures and cultures around the world have, but here in the US we don't have it near as much.
Dr. William Attaway:
And there's such a value in having that generational influence on children. I think that's so good. I love how you talk about that. I love the intentionality with which you approach this. It's not just going to happen. You're not just going to wake up one day and, oh wow, that turned out exactly like I hoped it would. I didn't mean for it, I mean, I didn't intend that. But there it is the intentionality you approach that with is really powerful.
JC Hite:
In fact, it's the opposite. I think. If you're not intentional about it, you'll actually flow the other direction, especially if you have success, because success just enables your ability to fill holes. If I have success, I don't want to mow my lawn. Let me go hire a lawn guy. If you have success, all of these things that you don't want to do, and it's really easy to fill those holes, just like what we do in our business, right? So you gotta be very, very intentional and cautious as you grow and as you scale.
Dr. William Attaway:
That's good, as you juggle so many things and you do. You juggle quite a few things, from from speaking to running your businesses, to the events that you put on to your family, your faith. I mean you're juggling a lot. Yeah, what are some tips or suggestions that you would give to entrepreneurs who also feel like they're juggling a lot?
JC Hite:
Yeah, john Maxwell is one of my personal mentors, who we meet on a monthly basis, and I'll never forget. He added to that analogy a long time ago too. I mean we were talking about juggling and he said the most important thing is to realize that every one of those balls that you're juggling are made of different things. And he said that some of those balls are plastic and they'll just fall on the ground. Nothing's going to happen to them, but at some point you got to reach back down and pick them up. Some are rubber. They'll fall and they'll bounce up and you don't have to do anything. They'll just kind of keep going in rotation. But some of them are made of glass and if you drop those it's over. And so just really understanding in our world what's made of glass and what's not and I've had companies that are. I even have a company now that's really, really struggling I mean I don't know if it'll make it- to be frank, um, but it's not one of my glasses, it's just not.
JC Hite:
If it, if it falls apart, if it breaks, yes, I'll have to reposition a couple people and that would suck, but, like, at the end of the day, it's not class and that's okay and so, uh, I, you know, again, I'm an entrepreneur, right. So I have a tendency, or I've, historically, I'm a little bit lazy, right. Like it's okay for me to like put off a task and I'm not OCD at all, so for me, it's okay to like be disassociated with certain organizations that I have Now Hype, my baby, you know. Hype Digital, like, that's maybe not glass, maybe I would count my family more, but it's, it's something that I really like care about. I let a lot of other things fall apart before I let it fall apart, right, so, yeah, I love that analogy.
Dr. William Attaway:
I think that's so helpful, understanding that not everything you're juggling is made of the same thing. I really hope our listeners are grabbing on to that, because I think that's helpful. You mentioned working with your wife, karen. You know, working with a spouse can be really challenging for a lot of entrepreneurs. You said you know y'all are always together, yeah, and that works out really well if things are going really well. But if things are not going really well, that can be a little bit of a challenge.
JC Hite:
Yeah.
Dr. William Attaway:
How do you do that? Is there a suggestion or an idea that has helped you navigate that?
JC Hite:
I think Karen and I both love what we do first off. Second off, neither one of us are really big into making a ton of money.
JC Hite:
So if profits are down. Honestly, it doesn't even like we don't want to lose money, but like we don't get stressed out because we're not making enough money. It's just not our like, we're just not built that way, which is terrible if you're investing in one of my companies. And so we like what we do. So this changes the dynamic. I see some people saying things like some people that work together like, oh man, but like when we go home, all we talk about his business and like, yeah, I kind of we're almost okay with that, because this is kind of what, like God put us, we believe like God has for us right now. It's our hobby, it's our fun, it's what we do for work, it's how we get paid, it's what's going to pay for my kid's college. It's like, so we're okay with that. Um, and so if it was a job, if, like my wife was forced to do it because she had to, because we had to make enough money, that changes that conversation, it changes that dynamic. Now it's like this isn't my passion. I'd rather be with the kids all day or I'd rather be in some other business. So now that desire to that willingness and ability to talk things because we are, I mean it's just again, it's what we do, and ability to talk things because we are. I mean, it's just again, it's what we do. So, like, it's not uncommon for my wife to lean over while we, before we go to sleep and go hey, by the way, have you talked to Brad about that? And I'm like, and I'm just sometimes like, babe, I am watching Netflix, let's talk about this tomorrow, and sometimes I'm not, but it can't bother you, right?
JC Hite:
The second thing I would say is that is separating yourselves, and so I don't report to Karen. Karen doesn't report to me. She runs our education division, so she teaches our inner circle, our accelerator, and she runs our events. I'm not in charge of that. I'm not a team member on that team. I don't do anything with that team. I don't manage the P&L and then I run, you know Hite, and we're a local swag company, a franchise company and those type of things, right, and so that makes it where it's.
JC Hite:
Never we try to prevent me being a boss. No, I'm always the husband, right, I'm always the partner, whether it's a business partner or a life partner, and I'm not the boss. Now, some people have figured out a way to do that. I just haven't. We've done it in the past. It doesn't work very well, because whenever I tell my team, do this, come on guys, and she's like, yeah, I'm not doing that and it's like you know, and so it's fine if we're alone, but if we're with a team and she says that out loud in front of everyone, you know, so you got to find those boundaries.
Dr. William Attaway:
Right, that's really helpful. That's, that's fantastic. I'm curious. You know you obviously are a continual learner. You know you are always growing and I'm curious how do you intentionally stay on top of your game? How do you level?
JC Hite:
up with the leadership skills you are going to need a year, three years, five years from now and that your team's going to need you to have. Well, our events are one way to do this. Like, if you go to one of our events, it's interesting. I've been to a lot of events and I haven't seen anyone do what we do. Karen and I are in the audience, like every speaker I'm bringing it's because I want to learn from them, right, yes, and I see a lot of speakers that are behind the stage or whatever the kid like I'm literally sitting there taking notes beside everyone else. Right, this is a big part of our learning. And then we're, we're really, I actually probably read.
JC Hite:
You're a big book guy, uh, and I, I read my bible more than most probably. By far. Outside of that, I'm much more to mentors, and so I like books. Um, but the but, but I prefer mentors and long-term mentors. So, again, like I mentioned a few minutes ago, john Maxwell is a mentor, so he understands me, he understands my context, uh, he, he.
JC Hite:
You give different advice based on different contexts. You give different advice based on goals, and you give different advice based on goals and desires. And a lot of times when we get generic. I have found, when I get generic advice that maybe it's good for me or maybe it's terrible for me, based on a lot of other things, and so I've spent most of my time actually with actual mentors. Kevin Harrington from Shark Tank is one of my mentors and we've done things together. Kevin Harrington from Shark Tank is one of my mentors and we've done things together, and I've been blessed to have some really incredible leaders in my life that are at our disposal, so to speak, as we need them.
JC Hite:
The other thing I'll mention one more thing about that For me, when I'm looking for mentors, there's these five boxes that I want to check, because so for me, a mentor has to be a family guy. You can't have seven divorces. I love you, respect you, but we're just not tied in together. You got to be a man of faith. You have to have a successful business. You got to really love people. I know a lot of guys that have the top three but just like the company is a P&L, and for me, I'm just not like that at all in any way. Shape, shape form or fashion, right, uh, and you have to be a positive individual. So these five things.
JC Hite:
So when I'm doing a paid mentorship, like I'm actually paying a mentor, they have to check all five boxes, and the reason be it is because if you're off on one of these that are really crucial to me, it changed. You know, every one of these affects every one of these, okay, so so if how, how I do business, is going to correlate with how my marriage operates and how my kids operate and how my happiness operates and all these things, you can't do one without affecting the other, and so I look for these five elements here so that I can. So the fifth element was kids. They have to have children, right, and so these all five of these elements here need to play together, and so I'm very particular with my mentors who they are, what they're about, what they're doing. So, like John checks these boxes, right, yeah.
Dr. William Attaway:
That's so good. I think that's the intentionality that you're displaying there and the filters, the lenses you're looking through. That is so important Because I've watched so many people in the entrepreneurial space who are admiring people from afar and so often trying to replicate or duplicate what they're doing, without understanding that's a different context and they have different values.
JC Hite:
They see the world differently and if I'm, if I'm listening to an entrepreneur and you're, you're giving me an advice and you've been through, you know, four divorces and your kids don't even like anymore right, and you're giving me business advice. Your business advice is, is could be where it's like all right, you got to do what you got to do. This is, you know, the season for business. Focus on the family. It's just going to be a different context potentially than the others, and for me, we get one life. I'm already halfway through this sucker. I kind of want to invest in trying to be a little bit intentional about how I make decisions and push forward and so on and so forth.
Dr. William Attaway:
So good, you know, as a continual learner, and I know you said you prefer mentors, but is there a book that has made a big difference in your journey, something that you would?
JC Hite:
recommend that the leaders who are listening put on their to-read list. E-myth is a really great read if you're an entrepreneur and you want to grow and scale. If you're a new entrepreneur, I actually like Dave Ramsey's Entree Leadership as a holistic good book. To read E-Myth if you're wanting to grow and scale. Gerber's a good friend. He was on my last podcast. Probably those two, if you're wanting to grow, are really good reads.
Dr. William Attaway:
Two fantastic reads for sure. I'm curious you mentioned that you're kind of at the halfway point, and typically when we hit that point we start to think about legacy. Have you given thought to what you want your legacy to be?
JC Hite:
Oh, that's funny. I am not At this moment in my life. I could be wrong, I could be the idiot. I'm just not a big, not really big, into legacy. I don't really. You know, I'm not. I don't necessarily. Even though Hite is called Hite, it's my last name. I don't really care about having my name on the building. I don't really care too much about leaving my kids a bunch of money. I don't really care too much. I'm much more into how do we spread the gospel, how do we influence people? How do we help our team members so that they can change their families' future?
JC Hite:
I hear a lot of stuff on legacy. A lot of people are into it and building generational wealth, and I think these are great, really cool things that can be very positive. I don't know, it's just not something. I'm a big, I hope my kids do really well. But that has nothing to do with money for me and it has nothing to do with their name on anything. I guess, so to speak. But we'll see, who knows, that might change, because I know I'm not the norm when I say that.
Dr. William Attaway:
It's so interesting that you describe that in that way, because I think you did describe your legacy. I think you did describe that when you said you want to invest in your team, you want to invest in other people so that they change their story, so that they change their family. That is legacy. You know, our legacy can be what we, how we invest in and impact other people, and that can go for generations. That can go for generations. This is the beauty of truly being a catalytic leader. I believe that you know what you do, the decisions you make and how you lead doesn't just affect you. It affects those around you, your team, their families, your family, your kids, their kids, your clients and the ripples go so far that you really never know exactly how far those ripples will touch. Yeah, so I hear your legacy in the people that you impact through how you lead.
JC Hite:
Well, there you go, that works, that works. Normally, when I'm talking to entrepreneurs, what we see is leaving the kids a bunch of money and our names on as many buildings as possible and the book that's a Wall Street Journal bestseller. That type of stuff doesn't interest me as much.
Dr. William Attaway:
Yeah, I think it's people. I think, particularly for people of faith, they're going to resonate with what Jesus taught us, right? I mean, what is the one way he said, the one way people will know that you are my followers if you love one another. That's right. The one way people will know that you are my followers if you love one another. And the Apostle Paul fleshed that out in some three dozen ways of explaining. What does that look like? Well, it looks like you encourage one another. It looks like you bear one another's burdens, all these different one another's that you see, are simply fleshing out what Jesus told us. We're recording this, actually on Maundy Thursday, and that comes from the Latin word mandatus, which is command. It's the day that Jesus gave that command, and I hear that being lived out in what you're talking about. When you think about this alternative legacy, that, I think, is actually the great legacy.
JC Hite:
There you go. I wouldn't argue with that. I wouldn't argue with that.
Dr. William Attaway:
You know, JC, so often people walk away from a conversation like this with one big idea. If you could define what you want that one big idea, that one takeaway to be, what would you want that to be? Well, we haven't talked about this much. What?
JC Hite:
would you want that to be? Well, we haven't talked about this much, but my word that's been my word for a few years now is commitment, and specifically having a commitment worth fighting for. And life's hard, entrepreneurship's hard. When I was younger I was very interested in my daughter taking over the business one day. Now I'm like man, it'd be great to go be a teacher somewhere. It's just hard. But regardless what you do, it's hard.
JC Hite:
But when you have something, a North Star, when you have a purpose and a why I call it a commitment worth fighting for. That's the key. A lot of us are committed to something not really worth fighting for, but worth fighting for. That's the key. A lot of us are committed to something not really worth fighting for but worth fighting for. It overcomes any type of anxiety. It helps you overcome any type of shame or pride or arrogance.
JC Hite:
I would never go work at McDonald's, but if my kids were hungry, do it in a heartbeat. There would be no shame, there would be no pride that would get in the way. There would be no like. I'll go door knocking if I have to, because I care that much. And so if you can find something worth fighting for in your business. It can be your drive. It can be what you need to overcome the tough days, to get done, what you need to get done For entrepreneurs, to get tactical and be consistent that we're not good at it is that fuel, and so you know, as you're listening to this podcast, we're thinking through this, as your followers are following you in this journey. Right, it's just what are you fighting for and what makes it worth it on a day-to-day basis, even the tough days, and if you can find that, everything else gets a lot more simple.
Dr. William Attaway:
A lot more simple, so impactful. JC, I'm so grateful for your generosity today and sharing from your story so much of the wisdom and insight that you've gleaned along the way. I know people are going to want to stay connected with you and continue to learn from you. What's the best way for them to do that?
JC Hite:
Instagram is the one place that I personally am on, and so if you want to connect, I'd love to connect with you. JC Hite, h-i-t-e. You can. Also. My wife and I have a website at thehites. com but everything you can find on our Instagram, and so look forward to seeing all of you there. Shoot me a DM, I'll follow you back and love to connect.
Dr. William Attaway:
I've so enjoyed this conversation. Thank you again for being on the show.
JC Hite:
I appreciate you, man. This is great. This is great. Hopefully we added some value today.
Dr. William Attaway:
Thanks for joining me for this episode today. As we wrap up, I'd love for you to do two things. First, subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss an episode, and if you find value here, I'd love it if you would rate it and review it. That really does make a difference in helping other people to discover this podcast. Second, if you don't have a copy of my newest book, catalytic Leadership, I'd love to put a copy in your hands. If you go to catalyticleadershipbookcom, you can get a copy for free. Just pay the shipping so I can get it to you and we'll get one right out.
Dr. William Attaway:
My goal is to put this into the hands of as many leaders as possible. This book captures principles that I've learned in 20 plus years of coaching leaders in the entrepreneurial space, in business, government, nonprofits, education and the local church. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn to keep up with what I'm currently learning and thinking about. If you're ready to take a next step with a coach to help you intentionally grow and thrive as a leader, I'd be honored to help you. Just go to catalyticleadershipnet to book a call with me. Stay tuned for our next episode next week. Until then, as always, leaders choose to be catalytic.
Intro / Outro:
Thanks for listening to Catalytic Leadership with Dr William Attaway. Be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts so you don't miss the next episode. Want more? Go to catalyticleadershipnet.