Search Interviews:

Jeremy Weisz

Yeah, I’m gonna go back to going into college in a second. But what do you find Chris? What are in people’s financial junk drawers when you start to peel back the layers.

Chris Gandy

So I talked about the bread crumbs, and the bread crumbs are typically things that we’ve accumulated over time. Right? So I’ll give an example. When we first come out of college, we’ll say, hey, yes, we want to pay down debt. And we want to actually build our credit and we want to do these things. We’re going to start our first retirement account at this company. Why? Because my mom told me it’s a good thing to do and a match my money and things like that, oh, maybe I’ll start a Roth IRA things like me, just things like that, that over time, what happens is that as we progress, and we get better with our careers, our plans unfortunately, don’t do the same. We think they do, but they don’t. And, and and different phases of life require us to take a step back and refocus differently on what we need to what we need to be doing. So in their junk drawer. We’ll see 345678 910 times last year, I had 14 different retirement accounts that we had to actually organize and put together because compound interest is our friend. So we like the idea of money growing and compounding on a consistent basis. So we had to do that. And then, but you will see things like that. We’ll see things like we had a plan or we started a plan, risk management insurance. We started a plan, you know, 10 years ago, and we’ve never to revisit it. It’s like you start to say, huh, has your life changed? Has the outcome change? Do you still actually need what you had before? Because isn’t it nothing more than a gap between your assets and what you really want? If something happens to you, right? And then ultimately, we get to the end of the of the race, and we say, how long do you want to be paying for this? Does this this? Does this plan still match your objective of wherever you’re going? I mean, think about that. Think about that. Doc, right, you and I are going to get in a car. And you are, you and I are going to go down, we’re going to head towards Florida. Right, and we’re halfway to Florida. And you say, yeah, you know, we really should be going towards California. Right? Just gonna drive to Florida anyways, because it’s just fun to do. Are you going to say no, let’s turn around now. And we still have a chance to get into California, within a reasonable amount of time? Well, the odds are, I would hope that you would turn around if not, then I’m, I’m stopping the car and putting you out. But we would, we would turn around and

Jeremy Weisz

go and you got to get out of here.

Chris Gandy

Yeah, we would head towards Florida. And that’s what we hear people and we see people have to readjust because their life, the circumstances of their life have changed. Think about it when we when we educate our children, our children are no longer a large liability is when our children are underneath our, our household. And once those children are no longer underneath our household, our debt, our long term debt obligation drops. Right. So the question becomes then, about quality of life and legacy. It doesn’t even come about how do I make sure the family is taken care of I don’t make sure education is paid for how do I make sure that that if I’m not here, my replacement on my income? How do I make sure that if I can’t work, my income is continue? How do I make sure that my business continues during at least the timeframe, which my kids are in school, and they’re at home, and they’re underneath my roof, and it’s my responsibility. So those risks change. And unfortunately, people don’t adjust along the way. Interest rates change, investments change, everything changes over time. And unfortunately, people just don’t adjust along the way.

Jeremy Weisz

Yeah, I can totally see, Chris, that if someone doesn’t have a cohesive plan, they just start picking up things through the different decades of their life. And then at the end, there’s this just conglomerate of stuff that just doesn’t go together. And so we’ll talk about the CEOs, executives, and even, you know, the type, you know, you’ve athletes and other people who you work with, to help with the whole wealth management and cohesive plan, but back to high school, going to college. So people are saying, I don’t know if you could play. You’re like, I’m competitive. I’m going to make this happen. When you were a senior in high school, how tall are you? And were you going? Were you thinking of going play basketball that time like college was?

Chris Gandy

Yeah. So if we just go back about three, let’s go back six years from there, right. So, um, I started playing basketball. My first time out was my sixth grade year and grade school. That was my first opportunity to play basketball. And I played basketball. And actually, there was a team that you didn’t get cut from the sixth grade team, no matter how good you were. So I went out to play basketball, they put me on the beat team, they used to call them the beat team bombers. Okay. And my problem was that I could not gauge how far the basket was, or how hard to shoot the basketball. to actually make it go in, you know, touch I didn’t have, right I’ve never played this thing, right? I’m used to throwing baseballs as hard as you can run as fast as you can jump as high as you can, that used to try into Vanessa bass a ball into a rim. So I would often shoot the ball either too hard, and it would be what they call aka a brick. Right? Meaning go look it up right? It gets. I think it’s slang or terminology on the on the basketball courts where where you hit nothing, but the rim, nothing but glass or nothing at the back or you don’t touch any room, that’s considered a brick, right? And you may take somebody’s head off into the basket or something like that, because you shot the ball too hard. So I was that kid. And so they would bring me off the bench, probably with a minute to go in the first half and 30 seconds to go in the second half and say, hey, go in there. If anybody comes in there, put your hands up and just jumped and maybe block a shot or something. If you get a rebound, get rid of it right away. But if you get the ball round the basket too, right? So I remember that. And so that was my btn bombers is what we used to be called. And so that’s what my skill set allows me to do. Well, I continued to work at it because I’m one of those people that I don’t want people to be better than me. So somebody else can do it. I can do it. So I would mimic behaviors of when I saw other people doing and I was just memorize that physically and mentally I would teach my body how to memorize certain moves. Even if I cannot do the move. I would memorize what step I was Slow down, I take things and I would, I would slow it down, tape it, and then I would go out and I would learn those footworks those steps. So things like that. My seventh grade year, I actually made the a team. I made the a team. And actually I wasn’t a starter, but I actually played enough at that time to get better. And then that summer, I just worked my tail off, I went to a place called pioneer park in Kankakee, which is probably the we’ll call it the ghetto of Kankakee. And it’s where basically you learn how to play, right. And so I was tall, but I wasn’t the tallest on my team. And pretty much they told me they said, if you want to play here, you know, you got to get down and dirty. So every every day, I would just go out, play and play and play and play and play and play and play and play and play and mimic those moves and play and play. But now I’m playing with guys in their 40s 30s and 40s. They’ve been playing a long time. Right? So the moves that they were doing on the playground were way more advanced than people were in height in grade school, even High School. So now I go back my eighth grade year. And now they’re like, okay, who’s this kid? Right? This kid can actually actually play a matter of fact, I was I was athletic enough that I could jump up and actually somehow, maybe grab the rim and throw the ball off the glass and maybe go in and they call it a dunk right, maybe. But my coach told me unless you can make sure you do it. Don’t ever do it. So I never got a chance to do it in high school and grade school. But you know, average eight ounce 10 to 11 points. And in grade school, but I still was young. And then that just kept progressing. By the time I was a freshman. I continue to baptize myself and just punishment out on playground and came back my freshman year and made the varsity team. But I was a freshman kind of foenum at that time, and played varsity on Friday nights. And then I always got 20 minutes. So whenever I played varsity varsity game, and again, I was off the bench. I was like one of the last guys that come in towards the what they call junk time. So that was me. And then by my sophomore year again, I went to a camp and came back big man camp with a big man camp came back and then I was the man on campus. So I’ll tell you at the time, soft exam

Jeremy Weisz

676

Chris Gandy

Yeah, six, seven, I was super athletic, 42 inch vertical, jump out the gym, go, I can go get it right and learn how to shoot a jump shot for big guy. So that was rare. still couldn’t dribble. But I had enough footwork around the basket and I could jump over the basket. And literally had a jump shot. Those are the three things I needed to go to college. So worked on it worked on it worked. On my junior year, I was actually playing with the junior college down in Kankakee. That’s where I practice and I come play with my team on Thursday and Friday. And then from there, I was a I was a heist, I was one of the top recruits in high school coming out. I was in the top 100 I think I was number 62 or something like that. And I made it to the top 20. And the rest was history. Right. And so it just goes to show that hard work pays off, you know, your intent, why I started and where I ended it were two different two different journeys. But none of it was because we didn’t work hard. Right? Yeah. And so it’s not what I intended to do. But it was what I needed to do to move past that chapter in my life and give me the support and instill in me some of the tools necessary to have some success in my life.

Jeremy Weisz

Yeah. And Chris, what’s interesting is I want to hear a couple of your favorite MBA stories, but you saw it firsthand. As far as you know, you help people with wealth management, cohesive plans, and you probably saw sometimes the other end of the spectrum in sports. When you were in, you know, GQ Magazine, you and Doug Glanville talked about this about, you know, athletes not managing their money properly. Correct. so exhausting that firsthand, I imagine.

Chris Gandy

Correct? Correct. So, so, um, you know, we do do a lot in the athlete and entertainment space, it’s fun. It reminds me It keeps me useful. It keeps me full of views, and reminds me that you know, money, money that people have, doesn’t come in when it comes by accident or comes because of a gift that you possibly have. It may not mean the same as somebody who’s who’s who’s worked their tail off for it for 20 or 30 years and has the same thing. So I did see you know, when it’s constantly hear it all the time, you hear athletes going broke athletes, losing money, athletes getting taken advantage of things like that. My goal was when I got done was I wanted to give back that was my way of giving back. I want to go into coaching. I wanted to actually be one of those people that actually helped players. just navigate the The the world of, of, of sports, but the business of sports, not necessarily being their agent and not necessarily being an, you know, coach, not that but the business of sports, there’s more money made outside of the sport than made inside of which people don’t understand, right sports is a billion dollar business. Right. And so the owners of the basketball teams can afford to pay LeBron James, you know, $40 million a year, which means that they’re making more than $40 million. They’re making way more than 40 million a year, and people don’t understand that all they see is man, LeBron James makes $40 million a year well, as an owner making 400 $400 million a year, I mean, okay, it’s 10% of what he makes, that’s not a bad investment, he’s gonna make him 400 million. So we saw a lot of we see a lot of that actually, we saw a lot of that we continue to see a lot of it, where agents will be in a position or agents may may introduce players to to people that they think are favorable. But the problem with that is this simple, is that unless you’ve walked in the shoes, and you understand what it’s like, a player’s retirement is not like you and I’s retirement is not like the retirement of someone who’s worked for 30 years at, at, at a large company, it’s not the same retirement, their retirement is you’re going to make a lot of money over a short period of time. And then based on whatever skill sets you have, or you’ve established at that point, that then will balance itself out, and that will become your new income. So people go through that culture shock. And it’s the same way with, we work with some settlement winners. And there’s a book out there called Sudden Wealth, if you’ve never heard of it, you should, you should, you should get it. So people that sell companies, I give them this book, I say sudden wealth, and it says it talks about what happens in the brain, when you’ve met, you’ve been oppressed from something for so long. And then you get it. There’s a dopamine that goes through the brain that makes you feel like you’re invincible. And money. Unfortunately, rep represents this power that it doesn’t really have. So we get this power in society that it doesn’t really have. Because, you know, I’ve never seen $1 bill walk across the table. I’ve never seen it open a door and behind other people, I’ve never seen it cry for other people. But I’ve seen people do those things for that. So we try to put it into some sort of context and give it some sort of identification. So it does not, it does not qualify their lives. And so then they can disconnect from it. Because until then, it’s their power so long that I can disconnect it, the only way you can disconnect the power from the money, then you have an opportunity to really help those guys understand that. This is something this is a stored labor. And this is only for a period of time. So your retirements gonna look a little differently than everybody else’s.

Jeremy Weisz

I will definitely check out Sudden Wealth. Chris, thanks for the suggestion. I heard of it. Um, you know, in that article, they talk in the article that you’re in, they talked about somewhere between 60 and 80% of athletes in the NBA NFL go bankrupt within five years of retirement, which was was, every time I hear it still shocks me. Right. And they talk about despite making the average of over $5 million. Um, and what was interesting about the article and what you and Doug talked about was, speed is a really big factor in this some wonder if you talk about, you probably talk to athletes and other people, what are the mistakes that you see them making that you’re saying, Listen, be on the lookout for this? And speed stuck out? I didn’t even realize that was such a big factor. You want to talk about what what is the factor of speed with the mistakes that the athletes make?

Chris Gandy

Well, I mean, it’s if you’re, if you just got a let’s, let’s simplify the concept is that the the timeline in which they make this money is just like that. Right and in comparison to the rest of their life. I mean, really, let’s do the math, right? Let’s say you play professional basketball even, let’s say you play college basketball, college basketball is a professional sport, you just don’t get paid to do it. You get a scholarship or whatnot, right? So, so let’s just say over and over, even if you register, let’s call it five years, right and say five years in college, and then the average NBA player will use an NBA player because typically their life their life, their professional life is longer, then then the actual then boxing or football should football’s a little shorter than that. But let’s say you pet play another three years. Five years is a gift but the average is two and a half years for basketball, right? So let’s say you play five years and you play five years in college because you’re redshirted, that’s 10 years, right? They’ll average life expectancy is 76 and a half for a male. So what percentage of that line of your life are you actually, quote unquote, making revenue from basketball? Okay, my wife’s much, it’s a very, very, very, very small percentage. And then if we just count professional sports, it’s even a smaller percentage, right, and it’s in typically is less than 10% of their overall lifetime. And so when you take 10% of someone’s overall lifetime, and try to make it expand over an entire lifetime, those numbers are small, you divide it out, the numbers are super small. And so that is the challenge with with with with with sports, it does that give them the opportunity for success long term, because it doesn’t force them to have to create wealth later on, it doesn’t force them to have to do anything. And most people that make five millions live like they make six, most of the athletes. Because when because when the plane stops, the lifestyle doesn’t, that’s a whole nother conversation. But we won’t get into that. But you know, the lifestyle doesn’t stop, because most athletes are pretty, pretty proud. Most of them are pretty, you know, a personality, most of them are pretty good at what they do. Right. So the last thing they want people to do is feel like they failed. And again, that’s a psychological thing. Because again, it’s tied to what they perceive people want them to be versus who they really are. So, so the athletes are always fun. And I’ve actually said often that the world in which I live, is that I look for the professional athlete in the corporate world. So people that are our superstar superstars in their own in their own space. Like physicians, we do a lot with the physician, Marcus, because again, they work hard play hard, you tax a lot have wonderful lifestyles. And at the end of the day, someone’s always trying to sue them for money, right. So there’s, there’s the there’s the physicians, and then you have the executives, which is the same type of people. And then you have the CEOs or the entrepreneurs, you have the same type of people you have the CEOs are the same type of people, being unique, being different, allows for you, if you’re the if you’re the king of the jungle, right in your own space, or in your own world, a big fish in a small pond, then you have to do things a little bit differently. And so our experience has been that we can relate to those individuals who feel like you know what, my things a little bit different because of all the means and all the opportunities that I’m getting? How do I make sure that all this is moving in the right direction? to really help me optimize my opportunity? And who doesn’t want to be operating at the optimal performance level? I’m not sure.

Jeremy Weisz

So there’s you found there’s where three, four or five, six or more major issues that executives have. So I’d love for you to talk about that. And then how you help the executives? Sure.

Chris Gandy

Let’s talk about the top five ranking, there’s a bunch of them to kind of swirl and they kind of intermingle between between them all. But the number one issue I think executives have is simply reverse discrimination. You may say, Chris, reverse discrimination. Well, how does that work? Well, well, the actual 401 K’s retirement plans, qualified plans, whatever you want to call them, a typical pre tax retirement plan is is only only gives you a certain percentage of your income that you can put away. So I’m making half a million dollars and I can put $19,000 into my 401k. What kind of planning is that really for me? But people will tell me, Chris, my 401k is my retirement plan. But what most people don’t even understand is a 401k was a supplement to a retirement plan, because it was a supplement to the pension in which it was built. If you go back and read the actual act, a 401k was actually designed to be a supplemental plan, not to give you 100% of your income, it was designed to only give you 20 to 30% of your income in retirement. But again, people don’t understand the science and the math and they don’t understand the data. So what we try to do is we use data to continuously show people here the facts. You can disagree with Chris Gandy, all you want. But the facts are the facts. Your 401 k was designed to be a supplemental retirement plan. It was not designed to be your retirement plan. Your 401k is a retirement product. Right your retirement plan is where do I take my money from? How do I continue to make it grow? How do I make sure that it’s actually a tax tax favorable? How do I make sure that it’s complimentary to my other things that I have going so so we see that we also see that the set it and forget it, that’s number two, Number Number two, set it and forget that doesn’t work anymore. Right before used to work a long time, and you know what they give you a gold watch, give you a pension say God bless Goodbye, we’ll take care of you the rest of your life, and we’ll take care of your wife the rest of her life if

Unknown Speaker

you’re married, that’s that they don’t do that anymore. Right 99% of pensions all but

Chris Gandy

dried up or frozen. Right, there’s a handful, you’ll have a few occupations still have them. But that means that the onus falls back on the employee. And if I’m limited on how much I can put in to my quote, unquote, retirement plan, right, that means that I have to create other strategies to get there. And unfortunately, that information is not readily available to the general public. So that’s, that’s, that’s a problem. So that’s number two, we set it and forget it is out the door, just throw that one out the door, right. Number three, is, every time I have a chapter in my life, I have to prepare for the next chapter C, part of the preparation imagine as I go to practice, and we don’t talk about the game plan until the day we show up at the game. That doesn’t make any sense. So I tell everybody, we’re in the chapter right now is preparation for the next chapter. And where we are in the next chapter of our life, we’re either going to be there and be prepared, or is going to be a surprise, which would you rather have? Totally, right. So we’re, we’re in preparation for our next chapter of our life, right? If we’re not last 10 years working for retirement, we’re not really working to to get to retire, we’re actually preparing for our retirement distribution. That’s what we’re actually preparing for. We can’t wait till we get to the top of the mountain the call on a helicopter saying Oh, yeah, by the way, I forgot this, I need this for the rest of my life. But that’s not how it works, you got to prepare as you go. And you got to take those materials off the mountain along the way. So that’s that’s also last four and five are pretty simple, is our plans don’t complement each other. Right? So their actions and intent don’t align with each other. So I call it the alignment, right? And so, think of it like this, you’re a chiropractor, you know, this, you are in the medicine medical world, you’ve seen people that come in and out of alignment, right? And what happens when they’re inefficient in their alignment.

Jeremy Weisz

It’s not up near their bodies and function, they get pain, they have all sorts of issues.

Chris Gandy

Exactly. So think of it from a financial perspective, when we’re out of alignment. Right? We have a tendency to a not get to where we want to go be have pain along the way that we didn’t realize we even had, and see we have to take corrective measures to try and adjust and fix them. Right. So in those situations, their actions aren’t aligned with their intent. I hear people say, Chris, I want to retire in five years, okay, here’s the percentage of this, you need to save your income. Well, I don’t know if I can do that. That’s too much. And like what you told me, you said to me, I didn’t say to you, you said my intent is I would like to retire in five years with this much income here is the number to help you get there based on what you told me is important too. So either a is not that important or be the the the actually the things you need to sacrifice to actually do that is is is is pressing on you more and more important to you, then the inconvenience of giving up that, that, that that money. So. So again, that’s we see that alignment, actions in attempt don’t align with each other. And last, but not least, is people. Our executives, unfortunately, is they forget to have that connection with their vitamin, really, we coach people, and you got to have that relationships, you got to build that relationship with people, because they have to trust us and we have to trust them. And what I mean by trust them is is everybody can’t be on the right team. You got it, you got it. Everybody deserves the opportunity to retire and live a great quality of life. The problem is they rely on their companies to provide all their benefits for them. And then when they retire, they’re like, Oh, I gotta figure this out. And you started to say, well, wouldn’t it be nice if you would have been prepared before we got to this point. And so we’ll start to bring up things that they definitely don’t see as potholes along the way. That definitely we’ll need to actually address as we go along. And that’s what we have a tendency to do. So those are the five I mean, I have 10. But those are the five that I think everybody on listening to your podcast today. If they went down Check, check, check, check, check, check, check. If you’re 90% on that. You’re like okay, I’m good. But if you’re at about 50 you may maybe time to actually just reanalyze kind of see Am I in alignment. And as I tell everyone, I don’t know if I can help you or not. I don’t only way I know if I can help you is most of the time we end up complementing other advisors or enhancing what people already have in place, and who doesn’t want to actually get to where they want to go that much faster. Example If I told you, hey, based on your current plan, you’ve retired at 65. But if we just made this tweak or this tweak, you can be done at 61 why would you not consider that? Sounds good to me other than the inconvenience? Yeah.

Jeremy Weisz

Talk about that for a second. Chris. Um, you know, the same goes for sports, right? To get to be at the level you’re playing at. You have to make sacrifices, you have to do things that other people are not willing to do. You have to show up and you have to play more if the practice you look at the league game tape, you have to do all those things. What are some of the things that you’ve seen, you know, some of the clients that you’ve made recommendations to So listen, if you want to get here, if you want to retire by here and live the same lifestyle? Here’s some of the sacrifice you have to make now, for that. And not everyone’s going to do it. Everyone’s gonna listen in general. But what are some examples of sacrifices you’ve seen people make? And then so they can come out the way they want? On the other side?

Chris Gandy

Yeah. What are some of the major sacrifices that they went when when when people in there when children are no longer at home, people are willing to give up whatever it takes to get what they want? For some reason, when our kids are home, and you know, we’re taking care of them, we have a tendency to say, well, we’ll just wait. Right? So so we see a lot of that, we also see a lot that people aren’t taken advantage of a lot of the new tax laws and tax rules that allow for us to be able to leverage that to be able to enhance and buffer our retirement opportunities, right. So they typically forget about that, because they haven’t been doing the research and reading the data. We’ve been reading the white papers in the data. And I was actually part of what you said is the National Association of insurance and financial advisors. I was actually on Capitol Hill when they voted on part of the the change that you saw come out in normal society, where now you can actually wait on taking rmds from your retirement plan. So if you didn’t weren’t taking my 70 and a half, you could actually wait till 72. Well, that didn’t just come out of nowhere, that actually came from actual our committee, which is in the association. So a lot of the retirement changes that you’ve seen the increases that came from a lot of that came from our committee. So there’s a lot of stuff that we get up privy to where we kind of know it’s coming, before it actually hits the streets, what we call Main Street America. So we educate our clients in advance, here are some of the things that we need to definitely talk about, because it’s going to be changing example, now qualify plans, if you got four companies, they can get together, they only have to work in the same institution before they used to have the same tax ID number. Now four companies can literally they’re all strangers and come together and say we want to have one retirement plan for the cost of for the purpose of saving money. Right. that’s never been done before. So that was one of the things that they started to do when they started to consolidate some of the plans. Even the states now are offering retirement plans. How many? How many? How many registered representatives? Or how many licensed professionals? Did the state hire that? I don’t know about? Nine, right, but they have a plan, right? So there’s a lot of options. The problem is there’s a lot of options out there. There’s a lot of information on the internet. And people believe if you just Google Google is Google is the new Bible, right? If you Google it, then that’s the actual fact. But we all know that 70% of stuff on 50% of the stuff on Google or 40, or some is some crazy number is just people’s opinion. Which is really kind of interesting, because people believe that it’s the Bible, right? You got to do your research, you got to do your fact checking. You got to do your due diligence to make sure that that those facts are actual real facts versus just someone’s opinion. Now, I got to buy Amazon today. No, you don’t have to, especially if it doesn’t fit your objective. I mean, I stand just because it’s a cool thing to do. And everybody’s saying do it. Because Suzy Orman screaming at the screen or Kramer screen sell by bla bla bla bla bla or Dave Ramsey says no debt, you know, these are what I call celebrity advisors. And people will use that and say, Well, this is the absolute way and the only way to build wealth. Well, we all know that there’s a one size fits all doc. Think about it like this. Right? I came to see you before you ever examined me. You just prescribed me Hey, give him 200 milligrams of a track to Laura’s fan and send him out the door. I’m like, wait a minute, I need to tell you what was right. I really just had a headache. You know, when I came to see you but none No, Christmas is our one fix for everybody. It’s guaranteed to fix everything in the world regardless of what’s going on in your life. Regardless of how much debt you have, regardless of what’s going on, regardless of the pain. guarantee. How often when people come see,

Jeremy Weisz

it reminds me of My Big Fat Greek Wedding where they’re like, yeah, just spraying Windex on it. Oh, cure everything. Um, you know, Chris, you’ve, you’ve talked to organizations in groups, and one of the things you’ve talked about are the 10. things you need to know if you’re working with someone who’s African American. You don’t have to go through all 10 of them. But But, but talk about a few of those.

Chris Gandy

Yeah. So I think I think what’s happened because of COVID. And I’ll just speak to this, I’ll speak to this because it’s really a passion of mine. Because of COVID, I believe that people have started to realize that the world in which we the business world in which we’ve been in recently, and the business world in which we’ve kind of grown into it’s, the institution of it has been disproportionately oppressive to too many cultures, right. And so, and so, opportunities have not been given a fair opportunity at times have not been given to people that are as good, or even better than others who have gotten that opportunity because of that. So. So it’s allowed for me to kind of talk through that a little bit, and just have what I call a very understanding conversation. Because, you know, just because you and I may look different, it’s not your fault, right, but the system around us

has to change if we want it to be different. And so I think, unfortunately, the minorities in America have blamed, hey, we’re gonna blame white America, and Hispanics that says, hey, we’re gonna blame everybody else. And everybody’s blaming every everybody else. But you and I talked about this before, as I said, I think we are actually creating the reverse of what we really want to happen, you know, the stereotypes that are existing, because we’re putting people in categories now. And again, here’s an A great example of that. Everybody put up put the police in a category, when they saw that there was too much aggression happening in a video of someone dying on TV, right? And they kept playing it over and over and over. And I said to myself, and my son, I said, Can I tell you something? There’s nothing positive that would ever come of that. So why are they still playing it? Other than to put fuel on the fire? Right? I mean, other than to put fuel on the fire of what’s happening, or to get ratings one or the two, as it ratings make the most sense? Because follow the money. Right? It’s a money thing, right? We have the first one that break the news, we have the first one to show it over and over and over and over and over, hey, turn to CNN, you can see it right? You know, that type of thing. But the problem with that is it then in turn, made a culture, right, feel a certain way, and then take that aggression out on another culture. And then everybody became these, these these very divisional stereotypes, right? The police officers, right, you realize there’s black, white, Hispanic police officers, right? So how did the police officers become a color? They did, right. But all of a sudden they did they became a color like you’re you’re a police officer. So you saw actually black police officers fighting with black protesters saying you’re not one of us? Like what? I guess I may say, like, Do not leave me like I always stand like, what is what is I have to turn this off? Because he created the wrong narrative. And I think the narrative that we should have been having a narrative that should have been talked about is that, yes, there’s been overarching force of beliefs. And there’s been, there’s been things happening in certain cultures that’s never been talked about and realized, because of those things have been going on for 2030 years. And that’s nothing new. Right? Just because it’s now you can video and tape it. Is that new that is happening though. So you asked me the question, because I wanted to kind of start with that. So I’ve been on a lot of calls. And I think people are afraid to engage in that conversation, but I’m not right. So So I represent diversity, but I also represent some of my best friends are white Hispanic women, LGBT, right so so I can have the right conversation because of where it’s coming from. So here are five things that if you have African Americans as friends as clients, here’s what I’d recommend that you don’t do. Right? The first thing is count your friends. Right? Yeah, I get five I get five African American friends don’t ever do that again. Please that’s that’s just a no no. right because think about it you don’t count how many white friends you have you don’t count Hispanic friends you have you don’t count on being Chinese friends you have you don’t do that. So why all of a sudden would you tell other friends you have your friend your friend regardless of the color or the race or the scanner pigment in their skin, they can control that so so number one don’t do that. So yeah, good. Bye bye, friends. What No, you don’t do that. Right? This thing about how how simplistic that is? Right? You don’t count your friends. Back thing. I got eight friends out there, this segments right because all of a sudden, indirectly you’re segmenting people. You’re creating classifications for people that live breathe and eat the same thing lead right so so that’s number one. Number two, if we want to change society, what change what’s going on. Do something kind for somebody else, it doesn’t look like you. It’s, I wish the world was this simple. But I tell my clients the same thing, the legacy in our name comes from leave the world a little bit. And we found it right, I didn’t really come with too much. But if I could leave the world a little better if I knew at least $1 At least that’s compound interest on $1. Right? So so if we can do that, with somebody that does that look like us? Guess what that does? That that increases the the kindness that’s going on that that then lowers the tension that’s happening with certain cultures, just random, like just just just do some kind for somebody who doesn’t look like you. What about that? Seems pretty simplistic, right? But some of these things are so simple. But of course, you said it’s so simple, it works. So good, you stopped doing. Right. So I think we’ve we’ve lost that, that, that compassion for the human spirit and the human soul for each other. I do believe that, unfortunately.

Number Number three is, if you’re doing business with with minority individuals, you have to listen, I think people have to listen more to, to their plight, where they came from their understanding, because remember, that if you’re having a financial conversation, we only know what we were taught, or what we observed from our parents. So if that was the first generation of wealth, you know, minority professionals that I work with on a regular basis, I was challenged them, I say, What did your parents teach you about wealth. And the understanding is that you when you start to understand how minorities, African Americans specifically learned about wealth, you can’t have the conversation here, if they’re here, because their comprehension of the conversation is different. And so that’s, that’s one of the that’s one of the key things. As you as you know, for African American professionals, if you’re going to work with them, hire them work with them just understand their plight, where they came from. The other thing is, is I think you got to reach across party lines, because parties don’t exist, when you have racists, it just doesn’t, right. And you got to reach across that and say, Hey, you can be Republican, you can be independent, you can be whatever you may be for the greater good of mankind. Let’s figure out how we can do this, and make this world better. And the last one, which is phenomenal, is there’s a golden rule, treat others like you want to be treated. And I got one even better for you, Dr. Reddy. I want everybody on this podcast to write this now. They’ll just treat everybody how you want to be treated. Treat them how you want your children to be treated. Because if you treat them how you want your children to be treated, I’ll guarantee you there’s not a person listening to this podcast today that would say I want my kid treated like anything but excellent. Right? It takes a village to raise children. Right? So if you might kids at your house, I want you to treat him like your kid. Right? Right. Don’t abuse him down, not feed him things like that. But treat him like your kid as if you would love and care for him if he was yours. Right. So I think that is if we treat people like we would want our children to be treated. That is kind that is patient. That is all those wonderful words that allow for us to get back to like I said, the reset of kindness and humanity and uplifting and supporting each other and going beyond the the racial divide or racial differences that that make us that made society a little difficult at this current time. And maybe it’s exponentially more more, you know, onus on it because of COVID. But it’s been underlying I think for a while so it’s good that we were open to having conversations and doing business with others that even doing business. Well, those who don’t look like us. Why not? There’s no downside to it.

Jeremy Weisz

Why not risk? Um, we, we need a fancy name for that. Besides the Chris Ghandi rule, I don’t know what we call it. The diamond rule, the Chris Gani diamond, I don’t know what it’s called, but I love that, um, treat people how you’d want your children to be treated. I love that.

Chris Gandy

So you’re gonna try to me that touches you when you say it. You’re like, yeah, yeah, this makes

Jeremy Weisz

perfect sense. Yeah, totally. So we need that we need a fancy name for it, that you can coin. Um, Chris, I have a couple last questions. Before I ask them, I just want to thank you. I want to thank you for sharing your your knowledge and your time and your, your, your expertise. And I want to encourage people to check out what Chris is doing. You can go to midwestlegacygroupllc.com. And there’s numerous articles he’s been featured in and spoken to numerous groups, but you could start there and check out midwestlegacygroupllc.com. Anywhere else Chris, we should point people towards online or is that the bar I

Chris Gandy

think that the big thing is just just googling right? I think if you google me, you’ll see a bunch of A bunch of things that we’re doing. You know, with the help of of you, we’re going to be launching some fantastic content into the marketplace. So pay attention to that. You also can find us on social media outlets at Midwest legacy group on Facebook and on on LinkedIn and on Instagram, if you’re an instagramer. But, you know, I would, I would simply say, Hey, keep your eyes peeled, we’re coming out with some good stuff we are, we are on the forefront right now really speaking to the media, because in our industry, there’s just not a lot of minority owners and leaders within the industry. So we’re bending the ear of, of insurance companies, risk management companies, asset protection companies and investment companies to just change the narrative, I think the narrative has to be changed, for us to to all be able to excel, you know, survive is one thing, but to excel and exceed. I think we have to have the opportunity to do it, the opportunity to do that, and the opportunity to continue to learn from each other. I think there’s so much knowledge out here. The abundance mentality is where we have to live going forward, if we expect to kind of transcend where we are today.

Jeremy Weisz

Chris, thanks, everyone. Check it out. midwestlegacygroupllc.com. This you know, the interview will not be complete Chris without some of your favorite NBA stories. You know, if you think about it, there’s children, kids all over the US all over the world, who are you know, out in the playground playing basketball and their dream is to go to the NBA their dream is play college basketball or go to the NBA. And I love for you to talk about just a few of your favorite NBA stories. And then I may follow up with a question or two.

Chris Gandy

Okay, I’ll give you a couple that. Let’s see some I can talk about. Let’s see. Okay, cool. So I think the one that kind of stands out to me was there’s a couple when I was here in Chicago, so in 1987, I was picked up as a free agent here with bulls. I signed a free agent contract and if you go back and look at the history, it was the same year that Keith Booth was picked from Maryland. The Bulls had a second round pick they had they had already traded away the first round pick and they ended up picking up Keith Booth. Actually Keith Booth was the end of the first round and they didn’t have a second round so they only actually had to pick it up one guy same you’re rusty Lulu. So I think rusty kinda was the last pick or something like that. But you know typically a team will have eight to 10 guys that they they bring in and probably half those guys showed up shows guys make in any other part become part of the practice squad and then maybe one or two I was one of the guys that they brought in with the hopes that I made the practice squad and you know I did that and you know every now and again I get a chance to dress and they on and off injured reserve. Most people don’t understand how it works. But the people on injured reserve aren’t necessarily injured. Right? You could only have so many people on the active roster. So you bring the other people’s Yes, for the purpose of if somebody gets hurt, you can actually bring somebody else in, put him in a locker. So but we still go to practice every day and every day, as you probably know in 1997. Jordan Pippen, Robert, all those guys, right and it was kind of a cool thing. But I remember the first day I walked into practice all the rookies, were there rook, rook, rook or graffiti or s, what’s your name? You don’t actually have a name. Name is rook. Right rook from Illinois rook. They come up with names for it, which is kind of cool. But I remember sitting there and the first day that we had workouts with the vets so you get invited back to that camp. Well, I got my invite to vet camp, I went in just like I did, because a rookie had rookie camp. You went into that camp, and I remember sitting there in bed camp, and I remember that walking in and I would they were like, Hey, you guys are down there. And so basically think of like little small High School lockers down to one and you got these big, huge, basically, million dollar lockers that are over here. And they’re like, Jordans, got one wing, and pippins got another one. And you know, everyone else. And then there’s us, right? And I remember, I remember calling my friend after practice that day. I called him up and I said, Hey, I said, guess where I’m at? He’s like, I have no idea. Am I you know, my friend is one of those guys that is never impressed by fame because he just doesn’t care. Right? He’s that guy. So I call him up. And I say, just for a minute. He said, Camp somewhere. I don’t know. Where are you going in Chicago? He goes, Oh, how’s the weather up there? I don’t know. I mean, I mean, I’m in the boot camp. He’s like, Oh, cool. He goes, he goes, how’s it going? I go, I just got done play against Michael Jordan click and I hung up. Right? Because, you know, it’s always a childhood. I mean, growing up, you know, you got a chance to watch him play and mature. I mean, you’re just kind of like, yeah, if I ever get a chance to play against that guy, how wonderful would that be? Right? So that was just kind of a humbling experience for me as a kid, to get a chance to kind of see those guys, but also get a chance to get to know those guys and kind of humanize with them. They live and eat and breathe the same air we do. They don’t walk on water. They’re nice people, they have kids and families and guess why you’d be treat him like a normal human being and not like a celebrity. They’ll respect you much more so than just treat them like normal guys, same way I treat my guys now I have. I have guys now where we help them organize their financial affairs and they and NBA Major League Baseball. Hockey, we got I think tennis. International basketball, football, NFL. So we got a bunch of players where we kind of helped them do that. Let me see. Is there another story? What sticks out? Does

Jeremy Weisz

anything stick out from those practices? Whether it’s from Phil Jackson or Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen? What sticks out? Did anyone give any specific advice, feedback? Or did you just observe anything? Uh,

Chris Gandy

I mean, just, I think everybody wants to know about Michael Jordan, because that’s just but the hardest working man on that team was actually Dennis Rodman. But I mean, the hardest working person. He just was intense all the time. When he was there. Right, he would work out he would work out two to three hours before practice, go practice and and work out two to three hours after practice. Every practice, I full blown practice full blown workouts, and you’re like, you just got done. But he really was an actual quintessential of a cornerstone of that team. And you saw it on the floor. But you don’t know the amount of work. That guy did. Everybody talks about I saw the last dance that I saw they kind of portrayed him as a guy that was unfocused. And yes, he was all that. But when he was there, there was nobody like, I mean, he just literally and he was he was nice. He was tied on everybody. I mean, he really went out of his way to help other people. He wasn’t persona. And I think that was part of what the narrative that TV gives us, is the persona of what what people are versus who they really are. As a person. I always tell people, I’m not a basketball player. But I’m Chris Gandy. Even when I was playing basketball, they were like, nice. I’ve always wanted to meet a basketball player. I’m like, nice to meet you. My name is Chris Gandy. Right, let me tell you something about me, because basketball is not who I am. Basketball is what I do. Does that make sense? So So I’ve always tried to tell people and help people understand that just because you see someone that way or that you they get acknowledgement because of what they do. That’s not who they are. So that’s, that’s, that’s, that’s what I’ll tell someone if they run into, like, if you see somebody you know, and there’s no superstar or something or seeing them on TV. At the end of the day, if they’re out having dinner with their spouse or their wife at the end of the day, just leave him alone. I mean, there’s normal people in society they just happen to be gifted at a single thing. And so they deserve their privacy just like everybody else. Yeah,

Jeremy Weisz

I know Chris, for you. You are about work ethic, you’re about you know, competitiveness doing your best who else sticks out like the Dennis Rodman who had, you know, behind the scenes you don’t see behind the scenes, you don’t see all the you know, the work ethic and the hours and hours and hours feel put in who else sticks out to you from that team, or maybe the Spurs or somewhere else that like, wow, these this person an unbelievable work ethic. They you just don’t see.

Chris Gandy

Yeah. Um, well, there’s a couple people, they kind of stick out to me that what I say that their their effort, their effort, made their their skill. look way better than it was right. I go back to college. Brian Johnson and Lucas Johnson. I think they’re from Chicago. desplaines. You know, those guys. Were they Okay, basketball players? Sure. Matt helmet. You know, Matt Hellman that played in Illinois, same thing. Were they good basketball players? Yeah, that’s where they talented basketball players. Yes. But were they great basketball players? No. They were good basketball players, but really great basketball players. No, not at all. But they got more out of what their skill set was. And there was not there’s always been people that have more in the skill set. They can’t get it out of there. And those guys were were just Super, super, super talent. I mean, I think Tim Duncan had both. Right, Tim Duncan, I didn’t see too many kids growing up saying I want to be Tim Duncan, when I grew up, I want to be manager noblis. When I grew up, I want to be Tony Parker. I didn’t see that. But if you look at how many championships those guys won, you should look at that they were the ones that were beating jack and coke. They were the ones that were beating consistently. They were the ones that were beating LeBron James and Miami Heat. They were the ones that were beating those teams consistently. They were putting them out every single year. And it was like who’s gonna beat the Spurs? Well, none of them were flashy. None of them were guys. You you would say, hey, that’s the top three guys ever play an NBA. You say they’re all a bunch of role players. Right. And so until they got kawhi, Leonard, but they had enough of that they were able to, to actually work hard enough to in a system to put their personality aside to put others needs before their own, and they were able to win. So what was more important, winning, being successful, or being a superstar? So you know, it’s interesting to kind of see who, you know, what’s more important? I think Tim Duncan had had booked, right, he was an all star, year after year after year after year, like how he was just, he was just that guy, the guys just just go go to work, right? He’s a guy you hate to play against and love to have on your team? Do you want people like that? You know, Chris,

Jeremy Weisz

what I love about what you talk about, you talk a lot about mindset. And you bring that competitive, hard working mindset with the clients that you work with executives who work with athletes you work with. So I’m wondering, when you go into a practice, you’re competing against Skype and Michael Jordan, whoever, what’s the mindset you go in to? What are you thinking, when you’re going into competing with some of the best in the world?

Unknown Speaker

Me?

Jeremy Weisz

Yeah, you Yeah, like you’re going in? You’re like, I’m gonna be guarding Michael Jordan namic, maybe guarding Scottie Pippen a what’s your mindset? going in to, to that?

Chris Gandy

But two different mindsets? Two things on my mind, right. Number one, I don’t care who you are, you put your shoes on the same way I do. So let’s get after it. Right. So. So I’m, I’m, I’m the guy regardless of who I’m talking to. So I related to my everyday world, right? Is you’re a stranger until I meet you for the first time. Everybody’s no stranger to they meet someone for the first time, then no longer a stranger. So how can you tell me I don’t want to do business with you, or I have no idea what you do if you don’t, if you and I have never had a conversation? Right? So so so so I, if I’m relating it to sports, it’s, it’s, if I’m playing against a guardian, a guy like Michael Jordan, right, is simply a couple things. One, he got to remember, he got remember, I was gardening, right? So if that means I got to follow him if that means I got I’m going hard on him, right? Because that’s just what I do. Right? If, if, if you’re gonna go I’m gonna go to, right, I may not be as talented as you, but we’re gonna get after it. Right. And so, so there’s that. And then number two was was simply if you can do it, I can do it. I have that mentality. Now if you can do it, I can do if there’s somebody can do it, I can do it. If there’s nobody doing it, that I’m going to do it because I’ll be the first to do it. Right. And that’s, that’s kind of my mindset. So, so fear for me is secondary to the uncertainty of, of of the why my why is that I there’s so many people out here who’s never heard our message. And they never heard our message. They’re a stranger to us. So I haven’t given them the opportunity to have the the legacy experience. Right. And if they’ve never had that opportunity, that means we’re stranger, so why not give them the opportunity and one day in the future if they’re considering some of the services or resources that we provide? They hopefully they think about us and consider us and say maybe that’ll be a different experience for me. I

Jeremy Weisz

love it. I want to be the first one to thank you Chris, check out midwestlegacygroupllc.com and check it out. Check out what Chris and his team are doing. And thank you so much, Chris.

Chris Gandy

Anytime, anytime. Love to have love to come back and talk. Talk about all types of cool stuff. anything relating to sports and next level performance, mental mindset and or just the reset right perspective? Right and where do you go from here. So, thanks for having me. I appreciate it. And God bless Have a good night. appreciate

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