A Leadership Lesson From My First Six Figure Mentor

The man you see in the center of his photo is Dr. Fran Clark and he is the guy, who mentored me to my first six figures in network marketing.

Yesterday, he made his transition from this life to the next.

The morning I found out he had been diagnosed with cancer and only had a short time to live, I drove to my local internet cafe where I do my books each Saturday morning, sat in my car and cried over a list of gratitude I’d made – each item on the list being a reason I was thankful Dr. Fran had come into my life.

Today I want to share with you one unforgettable story from my time learning from Doc.

We were building a nutritional network marketing company that was hot.

Our team was growing like crazy, people were loving the product and the comp plan was so revolutionary – a true innovation, and we were flat out excited.

Then one day I get my bottle of product in the mail and go to mix up my drink.  I take a swig and nearly spit it out all over the kitchen.  It tasted horrible!

Doc says, I’m sure they’ll fix it.

Next month, same thing.

I start to get nervous – thinking about what this will do to our business.  Customers all over the country getting product in the mail that they spit out all over their kitchen.

What will this do to our income?

I call Doc on the phone from the hallway of the single wide trailer-house I was living in at the time.

“Doc, this is terrible.  What are we going to do?”

Doc replies with the utmost confidence in his voice… “I don’t know about you, but I’m going to throw this product in the trash and keep promoting.”

I laugh out loud every time I think of this memory – but you know what I did?

I threw the product in the trash and I kept promoting.

And you know what the company did?

They fixed the problem and we went on to build a huge team – amazing incomes and my very first six figure breakthrough story.

According to John Maxwell, “Leadership is influence. Nothing more, nothing less.”

In this little example – Doc influenced me to remain calm and have faith so I could move forward building my future and not stay stuck.

That’s influence.

In business there are always reasons not to do the things we need to do to move our projects forward.

“Throw them in the trash and keep promoting.”

I have a feeling that’s what Doc would tell me today.

Keep promoting great products Paul.

Keep promoting great ideas Paul.

Keep promoting freedom Paul.

Throw your excuses in the trash, and keep moving forward.

Thanks Doc, for this and the many other lessons you taught me during our time together.

Godspeed my friend.