Are you ready for an open discussion with the best of the best and the best of what's next? Welcome to the Tony DUrso Show. Join in on a great conversation today with some of the world's great influencers as they showcase great advice and techniques that made them the game changers they are today. Now here's Tony DUrso.

Tony:

Welcome. I'm your host Tony DUrso. I interview some of the most successful people in the world and I thank you for joining us. This show is dedicated to helping you turn your vision into reality, and here's a successful entrepreneur who provides insights and guidance you can use to move along your vision path. Listen to my shows at tonyD-U-R-S-O.com, or go to your favorite podcast platform such as Apple podcasts and search for Tony D-U-R-S-O. So now before we get going, please stay tuned for an important message from our sponsor. Check out Masterclass. Now is the time to become the expert in the field of your interest. Listen for my story just ahead on what class I'm taking, and with an annual pass, you get a free one to share at masterclass.com/D-U-R-S-O. More details just ahead so please stay tuned. Today's show is about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk. Let's see what we can learn today and at the end of this interview, I'm going to do a summary recap of what we went over, so stay tuned for that. Here's some info on Scott. Scott Omelianuk recently joined Inc. as Editor-in-chief where his responsibilities include developing new lines of business to serve the entrepreneurial community, and overseeing the events and content that make up the Inc. ecosystem. Here we go. Hi Scott. Welcome to the Tony DUrso Show. So great to have you on with us today.

Scott:

Oh, my pleasure to be here, Tony. Thank you for having me.

Tony:

Oh, the honor is mine, Scott. You are such a consummate professional in entrepreneur world. It's amazing. I look forward to talking about the virus, its impacts and how it can help small businesses. I've got a large audience in the entrepreneur world, small business owners, entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, and I just can't wait to jump into this, but before we do this, Scott, I love to follow your journey to success and actually want to introduce you to our audience. Please tell us - how did it all start for you? What's your backstory?

Scott:

You know, I have a background professionally in media, which includes magazines and digital and television, and actually that was sort of my default career. I had wanted to be an artist, actually. I was a studio art major in college and I had a very kind art history professor who one day came to me and said, you know, Scott, you're a much better writer than you are a painter. Maybe you should think about that, and I took it to heart. I gave up painting and went off, worked as a carpenter for a while, but ultimately went to journalism school and found myself in New York. But I come from a family of entrepreneurs and so I always had an entrepreneurial bent, I guess to the way I approached my work, and ultimately did a bunch of interesting things in journalism that included working for such brands is GQ and Esquire. I ran This Old House, which you might be familiar with, which is a television show on PBS for 40 years now. And so I had great success in that and one day decided I needed to do something different and that included going off to be an entrepreneur myself, and I was not as good at it as I wanted to be.

Tony:

That's surprising. Scott. You've done so well with This Old House and you've really shown that you are a great entrepreneur, if I can say it that way. And I'm surprised that you didn't think you were an entrepreneur and I'm also surprised that you didn't continue on in journalism. It's very interesting how different events change our path. And you know, some people you wouldn't think that they're the great chef that they are today. It's just funny how we kind of seem to follow our calling. Did it start with a vision to help small businesses? How did you become so well known in the entrepreneurial world? How did this all come about?

Scott:

So what happened was that I did a lot of things in journalism that were firsts. When video didn't exist on the internet, we are one of the first brands when I was at This Old House to put video on the internet. We had the first issue of a print magazine. This Old House had a magazine as well that was created entirely out of user-generated content - another first. I used this entrepreneurial skill and ultimately we sold This Old House to private equity, something that entrepreneurs often face - an exit. And when I did that, I decided that I had spent 20 years in journalism. It was time for something new and I realized at the time that I was a good salesman for other people, not as good a salesman for myself, and as an entrepreneur, I think you have to be a terrific sales person for yourself. I was what I would consider an 'intrepreneur'. I knew all the lessons, but I needed the support. Intrepreneurs have that in big companies, entrepreneurs are on their own don't, and entrepreneurship can be quite lonely and I think I didn't have that piece of it.

Tony:

Very interesting. I think behind the vision that really takes off, there's a strong purpose, Scott. What was your purpose for what you do?

Scott:

So this is what I realized in this sort of interim period I spent, I started teaching and I taught actually entrepreneurship and marketing at a place called the Stevens Institute of technology, a very good business and technology school. And while I was doing that, I stumbled into a business, a start-up that I worked on and have a patent around, but I realized that there was this connection from when I worked with This Old House to when I was a professor, and I realized that the next step in my career had to include this. And that was the ability to facilitate for people, that I understood that sort of my purpose was to help people achieve things. And one day I got a phone call out of the blue asking if I would like to run Inc. Magazine, which is a famous magazine for entrepreneurs. The famous website, the inc5000 recognizes the fastest growing 5,000 businesses in the country, and suddenly this media background that I used to have, this experience as an entrepreneur and the understanding that my purpose was to help people achieve things whether they thought it was possible or not, all sort of coalesced around this current opportunity and it's been a remarkable privilege to do it even in a very difficult time like we're facing now.

Tony:

We're talking about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott O, and you can find him at inc.com. That's I-N-C.com. Yeah, it's that Inc. Scott, let's get into your vision path and how we can help small businesses and how you can help them through your magazine and so forth. We have some very interesting times right now. Businesses are heavily impacted. People that have even been successful at doing whatever they do in the small business, all of a sudden the supply chain is gone, the customers aren't there. It's kind of a mess and it's really bad. So let's take this a little bit one by one and start. How can we help these guys succeed to make it through these times?

Scott:

I think it is a remarkable time. People like to say this is an unprecedented time. Of course in history, we've faced these things before and we've gotten through them, and I think a certain set of principles always helps us through these things. And for me, as someone who wants to support entrepreneurs, I recognize that my role is to do everything I can in the job I have, but in my personal interest in supporting them. And so that's how I approach it. And the question I asked myself, which I think is an important one for anyone to ask is, what kind of world do you want to live in? And that might not be the world we have right now. I don't think anyone wants to live in the world we have right now. It's scary, frankly, to a lot of people. But on the other side of it when things settle down, what kind of world do we want to live in? Do you want to live in a world where small business still exists, where Main Street still exists, where you can get a job down the street, next town over, have a second career? All of those things that we've come to know. I think a lot of people do like that. Or do you want to live in a world where there are only two or three retailers left, and their goods come to you in a box delivered by a drone on your front step? Interesting, but I don't know that that's what I want. I want to be able to walk down my Main Street, have dinner someplace, have a drink someplace, buy a book in a bookstore, flowers at a flower store. And so I'd urge people to think about that. What kind of world they want to live in and do whatever they can now, even in the heart of this crisis, to see that world come to fruition. And so for me, what that means, for example really simply is it's quite easy for me to go online and order something through my account at that big retailer in Seattle, but maybe I should call the store down the street first. It's closed, but the guy who owns it is still there and I can ask him if he has the product first. Maybe he can drop it off on his way home and it'll cost me the same thing and I'll have helped him pay his rent that month. I think that's an important thing. What kind of world do you want to live in?

Tony:

You know, we're all being pushed and corralled a little bit to this automaticity. This 'just pick up your keyboard, pick up your laptop order, have it delivered to you'. It almost seems as if the convenience is being pushed, but we're being distanced whether we want to realize it or not. We're being so separated from others yet it's that camaraderie, that hanging out with people, that meeting people that infuses us with passion, ideas and so much. There's so much - we could spend a whole show just talking about that in itself - and the small businesses, they would very much appreciate that. And yes, even though their storefront may be closed, with the electronic age that we're in now, they will answer the phone. The phone will reach them and they would love to provide something. In some of the earlier shows we talked about ordering takeout from different restaurants to keep them alive because what's going to happen, and it's already starting to, is the bigger companies, the bigger conglomerates are going to start gobbling up that business because the small ones, they don't have the resources to last this whole long period and they're going to bail, so we do have to help them. And I really like that picture that you're painting. Yes. I'd love to be able to walk down the street and buy flowers. We used to buy fresh flowers literally every week for years. And now that I think about it, I am growing orchids. I love orchids, but there's been no fresh flowers with that fresh flower scent for some time. I miss that and there's probably other things that we miss as well. Let's kind of take this apart a little bit more in how can we kind of... it's sort of like the inertia's going one way. We kind of have to reverse it and push it back the other way. Let's go into some of these tips if you want to say, how can we help them and how can push this back?

Scott:

Sure. I think one thing, everyone's situation is different obviously, and we know many people in America live pay check to pay check and that's no different for small business owners. We're talking about people who are solopreneurs, not necessarily entrepreneurs. They're not the next Silicon Valley billion-dollar unicorn. We're talking about people with 5 and 10 employees, family businesses that have been around for a couple of generations.

Tony:

This is the Tony DUrso Show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Just ahead the chat continues about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk, but first it's time for us to take a short break. See you back here in just a moment. Find out what's happening on the Voice America Talk Radio Network. Find out about new shows, featured guests and what's up this week. Find us on Facebook by searching keyword Voice America.

Tony:

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Tony:

All right, we're back on the Tony DUrso Show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Let's see what we can learn today. Today's show is about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk. At the end of this interview, I'll give you a summary of what I got out of this and I'll share some pointers with you. Stay tuned for that. Trained as a journalist, motivated by business and excited by technology, Scott's passion is a disruptive, do-it-first approach that generates revenue by connecting consumers with content and services. He's built opportunity for marquee brands across verticals and platforms, including desktop and mobile web, television, print and digital books and magazines, social media and other brand extensions. All right, and now back to the chat with Scott.

Scott:

I'm fortunate that I have a good job, that I'm still employed. I do okay. I have, from my past I mentioned, I worked at GQ. I picked up a bit of a clothing habit there. So I have a tailor who I'm quite fond of and he has two people in his shop and I know there's no one going into the shop now. We're not supposed to leave our homes where he lives, so his shop certainly isn't open and no one is wearing suits - they're wearing sweatpants - but I called him, knowing that I would have some clothes, some that are actually in his shop and some that I was about to bring to the shop. And I said, look Nelson, let me pay you for this work now. I know you'll do it. We'll get through this. I'll need to wear pants out of the house. Let me pay you for this now, and that way I won't have to worry about paying you later and you'll have money for the rent. So all of us can do some small version of that, I think. That's one thing. Pay for work you know that is going to happen now. It can make a huge difference to a small business that each week struggles to make its payroll.

Tony:

I liked that. That's very good. Let's have some more, please.

Scott:

Other things, actually at work at Inc. Magazine, we have a virtual cocktail hour and so we all order from various liquor stores and believe it or not, we have a small expense account to do that - don't tell my boss!

Tony:

Okay, I won't say anything.

Scott:

And we have a virtual cocktail party, because we can't have one in real life. When you might go out for a drink with someone, but we order from the local liquor store which delivers. So it's not a problem again, and it keeps that economy going and actually it's a really useful psychological tool for yourself to create some sort of regular thing that's enjoyable. A lot of us have regular things right now that aren't so enjoyable. There's a lot of monotony being quarantined. A lot of staring at four walls for some people, but to get past that to the fun regular thing is kind of nice.

Tony:

Yes. And just a little side comment to that for those that find themselves with a lot of time on their hands. You probably could go one way and say great time to work on the house and do projects, but this is a great time to pick up something that may be a passion of yours that has probably been set aside and stomped on and pushed away because you had to go make money and survive, but this may be a time to pull out some of those things that you really love to do. For example, for me, I love radios and I've actually been taking a radio class on doing ham radio and I find it amazing and I have so much work to do and so much to study, there's just not enough time in the day to get through it all. So that's just one way. There's reading, there's so many great books to read or write a book. There's so many projects.

Scott:

Yeah absolutely, and there are a lot of online courses now that have been made free or at a reduced cost. So you could get a certificate program for your work. You could learn a language. I think Rosetta Stone for example right now is offering its software free. There's so many things you can do if you just take the time. We can't just sit in front of the TV all day, or move from our computer where we're working all day if we're lucky enough to still be working at home to the TV. There are other things that are important to do and it is a great time to develop those other skills, and you don't have to just do it again with the big companies. There are lots of learning outlets that individual people - having been a professor, I know this - individual people make courses available and you can buy those courses and you're helping again some person who's a solopreneur out and not just a big company, not just paying another Netflix subscription.

Tony:

Exactly. And you brought up a great point before we hopped on the show about continuing to work out and continuing to exercise, even though we're staying at home quite a bit.

Scott:

Yeah, absolutely and this is true going back to when I was an entrepreneur, I knew that I had energy that I had to burn off frustration, anxiety, all of those things, things that we're all feeling now in different ways. And I think some measure of exercise is incredibly important for that. It helps me to meditate and I do that now, and I think I get through the day in a way and get a better night's sleep, and most importantly, I'm kinder to my family who I've, I've seen every minute of every day for the last month and a half now so that's kind of important. And it doesn't matter again, in my experience, just doing the least little bit of exercise, walking up and down the stairs, doing sit ups with your feet under the sofa. It doesn't matter. Maybe it's not your traditional workout. Maybe it's not your nightly after dinner walk you used to take, but there's something there that you can do that can just get a little bit of that energy out.

Tony:

Absolutely. And we all of course are all bonding more with our friends and family like never before. I think that social opportunity has gone through the roof and I believe we're going into a whole new evolution of society where those original roots of camaraderie, of family that have been lost or disappearing or waning over the years with the advent of the internet and everything else electronic. I think that's all coming back now and I'm really interested to see what the future holds because it's something we haven't seen for who knows a hundred years. It's like going backwards. We're becoming more and more social with a tighter family.

Scott:

I think that there's an interesting thing in that we can use technology to isolate ourselves from people, or we can use technology to get closer to people. That's a choice. I have an eight year old son and my father-in law-is a cyclist and he has a exercise bike at home. My son has a little bike too. I propped it up so the axle of the back wheel was on a milk crate and we set up the computer and went to FaceTime, and my father-in-law took out his phone and put it on his exercise bike, and he and my son, he and his grandson had a conversation for a half hour while they both rode their bicycles in front of each other. And it was a delightful moment because my son had this great bonding with his grandfather, and grandfather was happy to see his grandson and they both got their exercise and technology made that possible. So there are ways we can use technology to our benefit as people, not just as a benefit to the technology companies, if you will, and I think that's an example.

Tony:

Absolutely. And you mentioned stairs earlier and I'd like to comment. There's a place not far from us which has a lot of stairs, and just last night when my wife came home, we went out and we walked the stairs. Just walked all the way up and it's very simple. You don't need anything else but just get out there and just find something that you can do that will keep your body going, because you need that because we are sitting a little bit too much these days.

Scott:

Yes, there's no question about that and I think a lot of the simple things like that are becoming important. I was talking to an entrepreneur the other night who owns a cookware business and believe it or not, his business is one of the lucky few that has grown exponentially since the advent of CoVid because people are staying home and cooking. But again, this is a choice people are exploring. His business in particular is about ethnic cookware of all different kinds. So people have the opportunity, much like we talked about learning a language or taking a course before, we can cook the same slop that we eat every night of the week, or we have the opportunity to make it an event and to try something different. And in doing so by ordering through this entrepreneur, through someone else, getting your food from a local place rather than a big grocery chain or a delivery service. Again, all helpful to the entrepreneur.

Tony:

I like that. And in different parts of the world, different parts of the country, we're really locked down. Literally not allowed to go anywhere without a slip. In France, you need a slip to go to the store. In England, you need a slip to go out. In India, you can't even walk out of your house right now to go to the front of your property outside. There's different rules or protocols throughout the world. And I have some friends that have family members just a couple of miles away but could not even get together and congregate for a birthday party. So there are things that are a little bit... we don't like them. So one thing you've mentioned before is have a Zoom party and I thought that was very interesting. Families could get together and even if you can't physically go see each other, throw everybody up on a Zoom or FaceTime or something like that.

Scott:

Absolutely, and I think it's important and it does speak to, I think, our social need. Everyone feels better after a situation like that and it'll be very interesting to see how we behave when this is over, and I do think to some extent we're going to recognize the importance of social interaction, that getting out of our house and away from the television set for a while is actually a nice thing, and having a conversation with a stranger is a remarkable thing because we haven't been able do that. And I think what has, I hope we'll have a greater appreciation, right? Like everyone says that we wish things would return to normal.

Tony:

This is the Tony DUrso Show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Just ahead the chat continues about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk, but first it's time for us to take a short break. See you back here in just a moment. Now you don't have to stay linked to your desktop or laptop. Take Voice America on the go and listen anywhere. Get our mobile app for iPhone, Blackberry, or Android at the Apple iTunes App Store, Blackberry App World or Android Market.

Tony:

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Tony:

All right, we're back on the Tony DUrso Show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Let's see what we can learn today. Today's show is about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk. At the end of this interview, I'll give you a summary of what I got out of this and I'll share some pointers with you. Stay tuned for that. All right. And now back to the chat with Scott.

Scott:

We have a choice about what normal is. Broadly, we understand what normal is, but we have a choice to keep some things different, and some of those things might be having more concern for your employees if you're a manager. Every night of the week I send an email to a different employee asking them how they're doing, if they need anything, if they're holding up on their own. That doesn't have to stop. That kind of behavior, the generosity I would show toward someone. I live in one of those places where we're not supposed to leave the house. We're strongly encouraged to stay inside. The generosity I showed toward the delivery person doesn't need to change afterwards. We have some choices on how we live our lives. Like I said before, what kind of world do we want to live in? And so by taking advantage of this terrible time in a way, it's actually taking advantage of it and examining our lives and how we live our lives. We have the potential to live a much richer one afterwards.

Tony:

Scott, so many of us have a landlord, a mortgage. We have to pay our rent. What ideas or advice could you give for landlords, mortgage companies and so forth?

Scott:

Yeah, a lot of advice like this applies actually to businesses and to individuals too, and the biggest one I would say is, and it's easy too because we all have various degrees of anxiety around money, but it's really important now more than ever actually to pay attention to your money, and to have in advance the conversations you need to have about your ability to pay. You know, recognize that I've got one month rent left, I've got two months’ rent left, whatever it is, do that now before the money is out because it'll be much easier to have that conversation with the landlord about can I pay half the rent out catch up over the next 12 months or something like that than just saying one day, oh by the way, I got nothing.

Tony:

Good points, very good points. And I think also the pressure is there on banks and landlords to acquiesce, to be lenient, to help out cause we're all in this together. There's no him and her. We're all together trying to survive and do better and I think that there's more awareness on that.

Scott:

I think that's an important point. We can behave in a way that is zero sum and some people are going to get cut off at the knees and left on their own, or we can behave in a way that we all sort of sacrifice a little bit, but everyone gets to the other side. And I personally would like the situation in which we all sacrifice a little bit and everyone gets to the other side.

Tony:

Scott, there are stimulus checks that have been promised. Some people have gotten them, some people I know haven't gotten them. How would you recommend or advise an entrepreneur in that scenario to deal with that when it comes, if it comes?

Scott:

Yeah, I think this is a really difficult situation because there's been so much, or there's been actually a lack of information I should say on when to expect checks. You know, the law says 10 days. That has not necessarily happened. Banks have run out of money. The good news is that Congress just passed another stimulus bill, a smaller 300 and some odd million-dollar package that I think will help a lot of folks. One important thing, and I don't mean to be self-serving at all, but every Friday, Inc.com and the US Chamber of Commerce hold a national town hall webinar to talk about these very topics. And this Friday we'll be talking about the new stimulus check, what to do if you haven't received yours yet, and provide some solutions from people that are policymakers, that are legal experts, that are HR experts, our journalists and people from the Chamber of Commerce. I'd really encourage people to listen to that because I think it's a tremendous value and people who were far more expert on this topic will be able to help answer your questions.

Tony:

I like that. So every Friday we go, we can go to Inc.com and where can we navigate to find the town hall?

Scott:

You go to Inc.com. There's a story on the homepage. You'll see to register for the town hall. You can do that and it's Friday at noon Eastern and we will do at least five more of them, and we'll likely do them until it's not needed. Hopefully they're not needed soon, but we'll be there every week answering those questions.

Tony:

Sounds good. Noon Eastern every Friday and then you're all good because my show comes out 5:00 PM Eastern every Friday so you have plenty of time not to be self-serving.

Scott:

And by the way, we record it so you can watch over the weekend. So if you're very excited for Tony and you can't think about anything else, you can just wait, listen to Tony and then come to Inc. on the weekend.

Tony:

There you go. Well, that's very good public service that you offer to the world, to the entrepreneurs at large and so forth. That is very good.

Scott:

Yes.

Tony:

Scott, for small businesses, middle-sized businesses, entrepreneurs, any other types of grants or perks or anything else that you know from all your experience that entrepreneurs can do to get them through this? They could have been in the middle of a project that now has to be refunded or resources have to be put together. It's hard to think of everything but surely want to really try to give as much value as we can to them.

Scott:

Yeah, absolutely. There is obviously the big government-led stimulus, but there are also state level opportunities funding available, city-wide funding available. Some local business associations are making money available. There's a website that helps small women and minority-owned businesses called Hello Alice that has a number of $50,000 grants available. Even the big companies like Facebook and Google have pledged to make hundreds of millions of dollars available to small businesses. They understand in a way we've talked about before, even though they're big businesses, that small businesses are the lifeblood of this country, so there are more programs out there. They take some looking. We try again to track them at Inc.com and keep track of them, but they change every day and new ones come online. Others go offline because they've used up the money. The important thing again - I can't stress this enough - is to be proactive. Don't wait until it's too late, whether that means don't wait until it's too late to have a conversation with your creditors. Don't wait until it's too late to send out invoices for people who owe you money. Don't wait till it's too late even to think about how your business might have to change entirely because of the way the world has changed. All the planning that you can do now ultimately will benefit you down the road. And I have to say entrepreneurs are creative, gutsy people to begin with. So this is a situation which might be unfamiliar to you, but if you've built a successful business already, you sort of have the internal drive to do whatever it takes to get to the next place with a little luck. And frankly, luck is going to be a little bit of this. Not everyone will come out the other side with their business intact unfortunately.

Tony:

So true. Scott, we're seeing small businesses, of course, just kind of hold up and kind of stop depending on what they serve and if it's something that can be useful at this time. In midsize businesses, we're seeing that decision where they're putting their employees on furlough. They're just letting them go where perhaps they could keep them on a little bit and give them some smaller amount of salary, but it's just so hard. These are very, very tough choices to make. What's your take on keeping the employees on with some income as opposed to just you're off indefinitely until this thing blows over?

Scott:

I think this is a decision each business has to make on its own, based on a couple of things. Obviously cash on hand is important, but that employee is important to you too especially in small businesses where we have even more significant relationships with the people who work for us than in larger businesses. How long did it take you to find that person? How long will it take you to find a replacement if that person goes off and finds another job before you're back on your feet? Does it actually make sense, is it actually cost effective for you to pay that person half salary even if they're not working? Because the time to find a new employee, the time to train that new employee, all will end up costing you more than that payment to that person now. Those are some of the things to consider. There are legal issues too. Laying someone off is different from furloughing somebody where generally speaking you get to keep your health insurance and other benefit packages. So each company really has to make this decision on their own. And again, I can't stress it enough, doing it with the right legal and tax and accounting help and doing it in advance before it's too late while you still have time to maneuver.

Tony:

And Scott, what about the customers in all this? The customers of the small business owner or the mid-sized businesses that would receive offers, coupons, newsletters, whatever. What happens there?

Scott:

Yeah, I think as a customer, you know the places that are important to you like we talked before, and I think actually sometimes, and we've talked about entrepreneurship being a lonely business. You've got a lot riding on your shoulders. Sometimes all it takes to help someone get through this is just a little bit of acknowledgement. Just sending a postcard or a note or an email or leaving a phone message at the shops that you used to frequent saying we haven't forgotten you and we can't wait to come back can mean a lot. It gives the entrepreneur hope that struggling now will be worth it because people valued what they did and they're going to come back because they valued what you did.

Tony:

Scott, I so much appreciate you giving so much advice and commenting and talking about helping the entrepreneur, small business owner and so forth. Really appreciate it. I want to do a little shift here in to Inc. Magazine, what you can do there as the editor. What are you guys planning to do in the next couple of years and how do current events play out in this?

Scott:

I actually came to Inc. just a few months ago with big plans to launch a lot of new businesses for Inc. that I thought would benefit the entrepreneurial community. I did not expect this right as most people, but I have to say it's been an utter privilege to run Inc. at this time, a time that to me is brand defining. It's sort of like what Watergate was to Woodward and Bernstein and the Washington Post, I feel like this crisis is to Inc. We've had the opportunity to step up, provide incredible information to the entrepreneurial community, listen to them, help them set up these webinars. Tomorrow actually, we'll have Mark Cuban on to do a webinar, the famous shark from Shark Tank, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks what his advice is. We're doing these almost every day of the week. Not to make money cause we're not making money off of these right now, but to help the community and I think that's the most important thing and ultimately that that is Inc.'s purpose. Inc. exists to support the entrepreneur, to give them the information, the inspiration, and most importantly the recognition that they are important to the American economy, that they are important to American innovation, that we are who we are because of American small business, and we'll continue to do that no matter what happens.

Tony:

This is the Tony DUrso Show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Just ahead the chat continues about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk, but first it's time for us to take a short break. See you back here in just a moment. Find out what's happening on the Voice America Talk Radio Network by keeping up with us on Twitter. You can find us at Voice America TRN.

Tony:

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Tony:

All right, we're back on the Tony DUrso Show where you can learn from the wisdom and success of others to help you move on your vision path. Let's see what we can learn today. Today's show is about Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk. At the end of this interview, I'll give you a summary of what I got out of this and I'll share some pointers with you. Stay tuned for that. After his tenure at This Old House, Scott moved into the entrepreneurial world, consulting with start-ups, joining the board of the MIT Enterprise Forum, and serving as entrepreneur in residence at the Stevens Institute of Technology, where he taught a class on innovation and entrepreneurship. He's also co-founder of HumanConsult.io where he created the Quid Si methodology, a combination of rapid ideation, the lean canvas and transformation management to help businesses in transition develop strategic plans, branding, marketing, investment thesis and digital transitions. And now back to the chat with Scott.

Tony:

You're very successful as an entrepreneur. We've covered quite a bit. What personal habits have helped you contribute to that success of here you are accomplishing your vision?

Scott:

It would be nice to say that there's one or two or three simple things, but I think for me it's been more complicated than that, and I think one of the fundamentals is curiosity and curiosity about the world around me, and more importantly, the people in the world around me. Understanding and having empathy for them, understanding what their challenges are, what is useful to them, what's not, what problems do they encounter, what could be better for them? I think there's so much material around us. It's about opening your eyes and sort of letting it in. And then for me, it's asking the question - what if? What if this were different? What if I talked to Tony today? What if I wake up tomorrow and decide we're going to do this kind of story for the entrepreneur? Asking that question - what if - can open up so many doors of opportunity.? What if we do things entirely differently? Not because we have to, but because maybe we'll discover something really interesting if we do, and that something interesting will lead us down an entirely new path. I'm a big believer in asking the question what if?

Tony:

I like that, and I encourage our audience to stay in touch with Inc.com and definitely attend those Friday chats, your daily podcast as well and keep connected, cause a lot of great resources and a lot of very intelligent and able and successful people are there and being interviewed. It's just a plethora of advice and help and tips and suggestions. So I encourage all of you out there to just connect up more with Inc.com and just put it on one of your things to do at least once a week and go through and absorb this. Before we go, I actually want to talk more about this too, because I want to ask you about any great resources to share with our audience success squad, and here we can actually dive into some of the great resources at Inc. Magazine as well.

Scott:

I think for me, like I said before, my greatest resource is curiosity, and the fact that all the information in the world is at my fingertips and just being willing to explore it and being open to new things. At Inc. you're right. I think we have incredible resources for entrepreneurs. We do have this webinar series every Friday, the national town hall on the economy. We have other webinars throughout the week with successful entrepreneurs. People who once were just like all the rest of us who hit it big like Mark Cuban, like Sean Paul DeJoria, the owner of Patron liquor, Sara Blakely coming up who is the founder of Spanx, a billionaire herself. Really interesting people contributing to the conversation, offering advice on what they would do in a similar situation, how to bootstrap, how to negotiate, how to get a pivot happening for your company. All of these things we provide. That's why we exist to serve the American entrepreneur, to serve small business, that founder down the street who puts in too many hours, who works too hard not to be recognized. That's what we're here for.

Tony:

Once again, we've been talking about the current situation that we're in with the Corona virus and how to help small businesses with Scott Omelianuk, also known as Scott O and you can find him at Inc.com. Scott, thank you so much. We've covered so much. I want to thank you and I want to thank all that you do at Inc.com to help us and help entrepreneurs because it's the entrepreneur that's going to help turn things around because that's where it all started from is that entrepreneur. All the great businesses that you see today all had entrepreneurs at the beginning and that's where I think we're going to be able to pull out of this.

Scott:

You're absolutely right, Tony, and thank you so much for having me.

Tony:

Hey, success squad. Thanks for hanging out with me while I featured an elite entrepreneur who took his vision to reality. I hope this was as inspiring for you as it was for me to do this interview. I learned so much. The insights are so valuable. So how did you like it? Corona virus and helping small businesses with Scott Omelianuk. I like how Scott had the wisdom to accept the advice of his art professor in college and go into journalism. The rest is history, as they say. You know, it takes guts to follow good advice and switch to a different career path. It's not always a path of what your passion is, but it's usually a path of what you're good at. I know of others who have made very successful changes. Are you really good at what you're doing in your business, and are you in tune to a better path if anyone tries to honestly help you? Food for thought. Scott brings up a great point that as an entrepreneur, you have to be a terrific salesperson - for yourself. Yeah, we can all be great working for other people and companies. They are often very structured and often there's a lot of support to help make that sale, but are you really good at selling your own wares? That's a higher sales level indeed. It's a must for the entrepreneur. I love his purpose of the ability to facilitate for people, to help people achieve things whether they thought it was possible or not. I love his thought process of how to deal with our current times. It all depends on your answer to this. What kind of world do you want to live in? Not that anyone likes what's going on, but when it all settles down, what kind of world do you want to live in? I really love the picture he paints, and recommend you listen to this again and this time write down what is your ideal world? What is your vision for this world? Really! What would you like to see in it? And you know, if a ton of people would write down what they really want to see in this world and reflect and look upon it, guess what? It could very well come true. And that's what I'm counting on. I think if thousands of you out there listening to this wrote down your ideal vision for this world and focused on it that we really and truly could help bring it together. You guys can change the whole thought process that's going on right now. This is that powerful. Scott rolls out great idea after idea on how to help other businesses during these tough times. Please make notes of them and help out if you can. I think by all of us working together, we can make a significant impact on the businesses around us, strengthen our bonds and get a better grip on our sanity and we all sure need that. I don't think I've heard this one before. Scott says working out regularly makes him feel kinder. While humorous, there's a bit of truth to that. Do you notice the difference in your mood when you work out regularly as opposed to when you don't? Is there a correlation here? Do you find that it helps when you're cooped up in your house more often and trying to survive at your business while family is at home too? I'd like to know what you think. There's so much more I got out of this interview. What did you get? I'd love to know how you use this information to help you in your business or career. Reach out to me. Now grab hold of your vision. Decide you're either going to start something great or take it to the next level. You have to decide first. It always starts with a decision and you can get my vision map to help you along the process. The free eBook is at Tony D-U-R-S-O.com I created my empire in just a few years. That's all it took. I had the vision map as my guide. I wrote it up. You can do it too. And once again, check out all my shows on Spotify, all designed to help you get to the next level in your business or career. Let's help you move on your journey to success. And if you have Apple podcasts, look up my name Tony D-U-R-S-O and subscribe to my show. A kind review there will get you tremendous appreciation back in return. Thanks and remember, just take action. Success awaits those who persevere and remain steadfast despite the odds. Sow good seeds, do good deeds and join me on the next episode of the Tony DUrso Show. We hope you've enjoyed this week's edition of the Tony DUrso Show with his key influencers. Be sure to tune in again next Friday at 5:00 PM Eastern time, 2:00 PM Pacific time on the Voice America Influencers channel.