In this episode of The Tactical Empire, Jeff Smith and Shawn Rider break down how business owners can make smarter business decisions without spreading themselves too thin. They discuss the dangers of chasing projects just because you can, the importance of ROI, knowing your ideal client, and how to filter opportunities through time and perspective. Learn why having the skill to do something doesn’t always mean it’s the right move, how to stay focused as a visionary entrepreneur, and strategies for balancing new ideas with the core business that got you here. Perfect for business owners, founders, and ambitious entrepreneurs who want to grow smartly while avoiding wasted effort.
In this episode of The Tactical Empire, Jeff Smith and Shawn Rider break down how business owners can make smarter business decisions without spreading themselves too thin. They discuss the dangers of chasing projects just because you can, the importance of ROI, knowing your ideal client, and how to filter opportunities through time and perspective.
Learn why having the skill to do something doesn’t always mean it’s the right move, how to stay focused as a visionary entrepreneur, and strategies for balancing new ideas with the core business that got you here. Perfect for business owners, founders, and ambitious entrepreneurs who want to grow smartly while avoiding wasted effort.
[00:00] Intro – Jeff Smith welcomes Shawn Rider
[00:17] Talking about personal skills we wish we had
[02:25] Shifting to business: Not every ability should be pursued
[04:02] Examples of wasted business spending and chasing ROI
[07:57] Visionary entrepreneurs and the “squirrel brain” problem
[11:21] How to filter opportunities before jumping in
[12:26] Can you see yourself doing this role in 3 years?
[14:37] The importance of unbiased third-party perspective
[15:33] How to reach Jeff and Shawn – IG, Facebook, YouTube
@realjeffsmith (00:00)
Welcome to another episode of the Tactical Empire. I am joined by Sean Rider. How are you, sir? Let's get to it.
@shawn_rider_ (00:07)
Hello, it's me. My best Adele voice. I think you'd like that.
@realjeffsmith (00:13)
Wow,
wow, it's a good start. It's a good start, man.
@shawn_rider_ (00:17)
You know, you know, if there was one skill that I do not have that I wish I had, it would probably be singing. think singing would be an awesome skill to have that I absolutely do not have an ounce of ability to do in my DNA. is something put me in any sport. Like I haven't hit a golf ball, dude, in like probably shit. Realistically.
seven, 10 years. And our neighbor brought over golf balls because my kids are in a country club camp and they do a little golfing. So we've been hitting golf balls in the yard and like it took me a day and now I'm like pretty decent at a pitching wedge. Just put us some sort of sport in front of me and I'll, I'll learn it fairly quickly. Singing fuck like dude, 30 I'm I turned 37 in like three weeks. Not, not even any, any ability.
to keep a ⁓ tune, a beat, nothing. Nothing. So what is that skill? If you could have a skill that you currently don't possess outside of what we normally talk about on this, this isn't what the podcast episode is, but that's where my brain went. What skill would you want?
@realjeffsmith (01:31)
woodworking.
@shawn_rider_ (01:33)
I knew it was gonna be something with your hands. Yeah, I wish I was definitely more handy, the listeners know that I've been working on my manliness with.
@realjeffsmith (01:42)
I
think it's woodworking, but I lack anything to do with artistic ability or artistic connection. My wife went to school for ballet originally and was in theater her whole life. I don't have that side of my brain. ⁓ It just does not work for me. that's why I think woodworking is a skill I want, because I think it would be cathartic.
but I don't have the artistic side to actually, I think, be a talented woodworker either. So there you go. I don't know. Weird start to the thing. Hope you guys are still with us. Should we wrap it now?
@shawn_rider_ (02:25)
No, we're good. That was only like, that
was only two and a half minutes. If they're listening at one and a half speed, that was only a minute and a half of their time. But okay, we wrapped up, we wrapped up a 90 day accelerator ⁓ call today and we've been on this, you know, helping business owner kick. So hopefully this helps someone that has a skillset or owns a business. ⁓ A comment came up, we won't give the exact context around from the client's perspective, but.
He was talking about a potential project, a potential thing to get involved in and do. And you had a response that was, ⁓ pretty interesting. I liked it a lot, made a ton of sense. And you, and you said, just because you have the ability to do something, doesn't mean you should do it. And more specifically, you use the example, like we could basically solve having drinking water for everyone in the entire world. There's plenty of, ⁓ people that could solve that problem.
but what is the ROI from a financial standpoint on that, right? And we're not gonna get into morals and ethics and everyone should have clean, like we get it, everyone should have clean drinking water. But, and I know, know, ⁓ Gil Bates, Bill Gates ⁓ is attempting to do something like that, but we won't talk about his bitch ass on this podcast. ⁓ You said like, just cause you have the skill and ability and knowledge to do something doesn't mean it's the best.
use of your time. You could spend a trillion dollars on something and still earn zero dollars from it. So let's talk about that in the realm of business ownership skills, potential projects, abilities, ideas, things like that. You've worked with a ton of business owners. So where have you seen this go? Well, where have you seen this go? Iraq.
@realjeffsmith (04:02)
Yeah. So let's take this from a gigantic thousand mile macro viewed into a distilled down ⁓ example that everybody could kind of relate to. A lot of times business owners spend their money, especially early on, on really stupid shit. Like they want a fancy office or they want really nice equipment or they, they spend on reinvesting in their business in areas that
do not provide the necessary ROI to justify them. In the fitness space, you see this oftentimes with like building out a lounge area or something like that. And is there a true ROI on the lounge area? Maybe, maybe from a community standpoint, but if it costs you 120 grand to put flat screen TVs and all this fancy furniture in there, and then it looks like shit after two years.
It didn't bring you an ROI on that. ⁓ so just because you can do things doesn't mean you should. That is also pursuing different avatars. It's pursuing like non-ideal clients. Like from a business owner standpoint, the more narrow you can get at knowing who your audience is and who your ideal client profile is ⁓ and targeting nothing but them.
appealing everything else away. That creates efficiency in business. like trying to be everything. I mean, a simple example is trying to be everything to everyone, right? So you see these guys have the stack of product offerings or a restaurant, for example. If I go into a restaurant and I see a 15 page menu that's got everything from fucking sushi to burgers to
Mexican, like it weirds me out because I'm like the inefficiencies of this business are significant. There's a there's so much waste associated with that having fresh materials and things like that. So like in that case, that business owner would do themselves a service to cut that menu from 15 pages to three pages. And while their overall gross revenue may dip
in the interim, their profitability would skyrocket. And a lot of times we have all this head trash about what we're doing. Or in this particular guy's situation, he had a great idea conceptually, right? And he thought he needed to build a business out of it. So instead of building a business, we went down a little thought exercise of how can you simply take this thing to market?
and not build a huge business, but license it or potentially scale it in a different way to where you can get acquired. ⁓ And from an intellectual property standpoint or an IP standpoint, right? And so it's just there's a lot of different ways to do it. I think we get overzealous, ⁓ especially as business owners who get bored. You see this all the time with business owners that are creating a little bit of success.
and then they want to overhaul everything and start doing shit that is not really in their in their wheelhouse or it's not what really got them there and there's a saying that what got you here will not get you there right of course but like that doesn't always mean that you have to shift focus so you have to be crystal clear on on the innovations quote unquote innovations that you're making to your business and and how much they're in alignment with
where you're going and your overall vision of what you're doing.
@shawn_rider_ (07:57)
Sorry to switch gears here, but where my brain went, does, and maybe this is completely irrelevant, but it popped in my head, because something we talked about, like, how is that different than or similar to the entrepreneur? And just to put you and I in the spotlight, you and I are kind of this way where we get 80 % of the way there. And then we look for the next thing. How, like, take that.
statement and take it where like is it Is that a problem? Is that a good thing? Is it again? It's context dependent but like is that a different completely different situation or is that what we're talking about here or I don't know
@realjeffsmith (08:41)
Well, it can be what you're talking about to an extent. Like I think, I think you just have to gain a better understanding of yourself and your personality. Most visionaries are that way. There's, there's an entire segment of the business owner space that that's, that's what they do. And the, the more, and by what they do, I mean, start things and, then get bored with them and want to shift roles or like shift verticals or shift industries altogether.
because they're not being challenged mentally enough. I am that person 100%. And so for me, I know that I need certain pieces in place before I go out and chase something because I need the backend to step in and support where I need to go do other creative things. And so like from a business standpoint,
Like you have to understand that about yourself so you don't continue to crash and burn and start stuff. then it, it, cause what happens is when the founder steps out or the owner steps out or the visionary steps out, a lot of times the business is flounder and then they go into like this no man land of like a slow death. Like you've seen it a million times in different service based businesses, but like when, when the focus shifts from the energetic founder,
Like you, oftentimes see this like backpedaling of the business. And so who's going to keep it going? Who's going to understand the growth is necessary. And then how can that strategic operator like stay involved to a point that keeps them engaged, but also services the business on a high level. Right. If you want to stay involved, otherwise you need to build it and sell it and build it and sell it. and, and unless like,
I'm not really into that either. like, well, while I do understand that like my focus is going to be stretched until I'm challenged again, I just kind of prepare for that in my business life cycle now. Like what can I get excited about? and it's sometimes it's just setting different targets for where you've been, right? Like 10 X is easier than two X try to do that.
and go through that thought exercise and then let's see if we can do that. ⁓ Sometimes it's just that that can really invigorate you or reinvigorate you into the business ⁓ and tie you back into it. And then how long do you want to be doing the role that you're doing?
@shawn_rider_ (11:21)
Are there any thoughts you have on like how we can put these ideas through a filter system? The first two that come to mind simply is give it time, let it marinate. It's kind of like a tattoo. If you have a tattoo idea, I was told when I was younger, ⁓ wait one year. And if in a year from now you want that same tattoo, then go ahead and get it. And that was a pretty good filter system for me in regards to getting tattoos at younger ages. Another one, so that's time.
is number one. Maybe a second simple filter is if you do have this squirrel brain or you're a visionary where you get projects started, then you start trailing off. Just rededicating yourself for the next 30 days to get back into what the current thing is and seeing where we can be more efficient and more productive and see if the fruits of that labor yield the type of return you're looking for from this other project.
so you don't have to jump ship before you're maximizing everything. Do you have any particular strategies?
@realjeffsmith (12:26)
Yeah, I think that for me, it's like, you, if you get stuck in this role, can you see yourself doing this role in three years? Because like for me, there's a lot of different, you get a lot of opportunities and a lot of opportunities start to present themselves the more and more success you have, right? And so for us, it's really distilling down.
@shawn_rider_ (12:36)
you
@realjeffsmith (12:53)
Do you see yourself doing this? Because I get a lot of opportunities where I'm like, I could do this for a period of time and then go make x amount of money. And that was a curse of my 30s, I feel like. Because I had these opportunities where I could go make money, but I didn't really like what I was doing or I would hate what I was doing. And so for me, it's really all encompassing. ⁓
What's this look like from a family perspective? Are you going to be fulfilled doing it? Is it challenging enough? And then what's the financial payoff, obviously? And so it's a balance of all those things. And I say quite frequently that you constantly reshape yourself anyway. Every three to five years, we're a different iteration of who we are.
⁓ And so what you want to be doing today is not necessarily what you're going to be doing in five years. ⁓ But sometimes people paralyze themselves with the decision-making process, thinking it's a forever thing. Now, all I'm saying is, can you picture yourself here in three years if you happen to get stuck? Because two or three years in business is like no time. ⁓ You make a bad decision that's a six-figure, seven-figure bad decision.
and you got to dig yourself out of that hole or you signed the wrong lease, like two or three years is going to go by in a flash. ⁓ So you have to consider that type of stuff as a business owner. And then also as a human being that's living in the background of this, because it's all integrated together.
@shawn_rider_ (14:37)
All right. Love it. If you are someone that is listening to this episode and it resonates with you, I'm going to venture to say that you don't have an outside, unbiased source to help you filter these things through. You don't have to take the onus all on yourself to make these decisions. And so if you're listening to this episode, you need to go to the very next episode.
and listen to what we have to say, because that's going to play into what we're going to talk about on the episode after this one. If anything we said in this episode resonates with you and you do not have a third party unbiased source to help you filter these, ⁓ listen to that episode and you're going to get a big takeaway on something that you should take a step forward in and decide to do. So Jeff, great information. Appreciate your insight. Send the people out.
@realjeffsmith (15:33)
Guys, if you have questions, as always, hit us up. Instagram is the best place to get a hold of us. You can join us on the Tactical Empire community on Facebook. It's a free community. Go ahead and like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you will, we appreciate all the followers out there. Let us know if you have any questions that we can address on the show, as always. Have a kick-ass week, and we will talk to you soon.