eCentral Business Show^©

How to flick the switch and become an entrepreneur with Mike O'Hagan

Thu 3:00pm 23 Nov 2017
Podcast Audio


We are joined on the eCentral business show by Mike O'Hagan. Most noted for his business Mini Movers, Mike is the essence of the entrepreneur and has 9 businesses across three countries. He is a huge advocate for offshoring and gives us some pointers on how to flip a switch and become an entrepreneur.

Interview transcript:
how do you flick the switch to become an entrepreneurs what we're talking about today on the east central business Sean John Nayler and is my pleasure to introduce Mike Hagen entrepreneur and mini-movies is one of your businesses yeah yeah how's our name 32 years ago I started mini movers still got it today it's one of my I think eight or nine businesses that are now got yeah okay to ambulance now today we're answering their question of a how do you flick the switch that from being an entrepreneur and I think you know off-camera talk a little bit about your personal story what what happened for you everybody has their own journey that you know my journey was pretty normal I suppose that the age of 14 I've got chucked out of the education system the teacher was wrong I told him how wrong and apparently they went you know that was called disruptive and I no longer went to school I did my time as a next day the very next day started as a pretty electrician mm-hmm doing electrical work and do an apprenticeship qualified for time I was 17 went on and did all sorts of jobs did every sort of job known to mankind for the next ten years and at the age of 28 in Brisbane in Australia I was working at Woolworths in there as his pork love driver and okay one of the many things I applied to become for their managing they had a management training program and I applied for that yes and I got rejected I was to put us into a classroom gave us all a test and I was the first one they called out of the room and told me I wasn't suitable for management I'll tell you I wore that mentor for many years I was angry about their for many years but now we're course my role today assignee employ managers I would not hire me as a manager because I'm disruptive I want to change I'm never happy I just want I won't follow processes you see which is what your managers to do okay age of 28 I started in Brisbane and Annalee as a secondhand deal with buying and selling things yes went into business because I wanted to be my own boss yeah it was very successful at that I was very good at buying I brought very very cheaply and I learned to sell it for the right price and n was you know it boomed over the next six years I grew three shops one at Annalee one in green slopes and another one in be lumber I was involved in the second-hand dealer school in Brisbane I helped change the legislation you know I started paying a house off I had at least a nice little car and they were there going for you well they are so good at all everybody was why hasn't he a great business guy but the problem was this the reality was this I was working my shops are open six seven days a week okay yep working seven days a week I was doing it I was doing at almost a 90 hour week okay giving a couple of days off a year and Zach Day and Christmas Day and that was it yeah right that doesn't sound like entrepreneurship I know well it was an entrepreneurship of a slavery I the problem was that I was earning just a little bit more not much more than my employees are only working 40 hours a week right yeah and I think that's so true of so many people in business Oh a person close to me in Sydney and he's he's he does an incredible job and so does these people but he says most of my people getting paid a lot more than me okay that doesn't sound right well like John and you know who you are III did that for six years and I got very angry with myself and worked out that that's pretty close the definition to stupidity it maybe is so at the age of 34 I will say to you that I became an entrepreneur do you flick the switch I flick the switch I and must look honestly it was as easy as this I was angry about what was going on I was thinking I'm working all this I'm getting there and everybody thought I was highly successful not quite it was but I wasn't kind of getting what I wanted and one night I'm watching TV and I suddenly realized that what I want is what you see inside that TV screen I want a big house big boat fast cars and a jet so a lifestyle and I realized that I personally me Michael Hagen personally that's what I wanted okay and I sat down and thought that through and thought if I want that how am I going to get it I realize I'd never get it working on wages for somebody mm-hm and it wasn't going to get it with my current business because it was locked I couldn't scale it up yeah and I started thinking that through and I started working out that I needed to find something else I needed to find something lots of people want that could be scaled that I could be uniquely different and it had unlimited ability to do group to grow hmm and short story was I went off get my second hand shops for several years after that but I messed around with a whole lot of different ideas business plans that all convinced myself most things weren't going to work and yes surely by accident one day I discovered a Lear 8 local moving and nobody at thought of it and I discovered it was a great way to do it how many members is born and got no idea how to move furniture never heard just stick a furniture and I started the business purely to feed my lifestyle yeah okay and I think that's when you become an entrepreneur is when you work on your business and not in it mmm I've never worked in many moves okay all right cool recall a bit that's a bad 30 seconds ago you said something really poignant about you you realize at some point that my remember was it just you realized that you know you need to get into a business you need to grow it and go out you need to work on the business not in it yeah I'm not talking about that flick of the switch like what was it the thing was that mower your sinner now this is a dog watching TV one night and then just just occurred to me your honor that lifestyle you wanted that your honor that level of success and so you then went on a mission to explore and explore explore various business models until you found one that financially worked out yeah and I wrote a list of what the business would have to be it had to be from where I could start it from where I didn't want to borrow any money no okay III write a list out and I had a list of about 15 criteria happy to send them if anybody wants them they can hunt me down and I'll send it to them what's not I can actually think now I see a nice little list against two criteria what I wanted that's a little nice little take away my gonna hunt that one down for his LinkedIn yeah and I I just went for a mother still I finally found something that I could that I could ramp up okay yeah alright so well that's fabulous in their mini movies has moved on to being I think you said something around 400 vehicles or something look many movies and it's one of those things you do look many movies just grew and we sort of we sort of experimented with everything we made a lot of mistakes when we figured out how not to make the mistakes we then systemized it and we duplicated it and so it's all about systemizing and duplicating it yes and you know many movies today operates in Brisbane Gold Coast Sydney Melbourne Adelaide and Perth we only do short distance direct daughter doll furniture moving very very niche very very focused on one thing we do one thing and do we do it very well I see a lot of business people trying to do anything and everything I think that's wrong hmm I think it really a not only a nation and in rule that owned the trucks and employ everybody's employees since I know franchising they're contractors that way I can control the workmanship quality okay we've got two minutes left what I want to say and maybe it's been a bit cheeky but entrepreneurship but not been an entrepreneur seems to be something of the Millennials of grabs and taken hold of and they go to garyvee conferences and they punch the air gun we all want to be entrepreneurs I mean can you be too old to become an entrepreneur I don't think it can be too old to become an entrepreneur Harold was saying as when he started Kentucky Fried okay answer the question for us in that it is in his abs are there you go no it's the such thing as being too old entrepreneurship is about building businesses and working growth businesses hmm and unfortunately in Australia so many Australians are trapped in their business and all they owned as a job they really do is if you'd get out of bed in the morning and you have to it's only a job it's time you thought start thinking through what you're doing and trying to work out something else and you don't get rid of your day job keep it there start a business on the side grow it up but start it with the intention if there's one thing that I learned from my Safari secondhand shop days I was in business for the wrong reason I was in business to be my own boss that's where I aimed that's where I got when I start I movers my complete different focus I was there purely to build a business for a lifestyle for me mm-hmm drop and ramp it up and that was very very clear and I had a different purpose for going into the business as a result it grew it grew because it was designed to grow fantastic my great story okay where you stick around talking to us and a few more other subjects for one day okay Mike thank you very much that's all for today on the east central business show I'm John Nayler