Jeff Butler

Have someone coach you whose two or three years ahead of you. If you get the right coach it’s a huge acceleration to your career path.

 

Jeff Butler is a speaker, author and passionate millennial who helps organizations improve their relationships with millennial employees. You may have see on him on Forbes, USA Weekly, or on the TED stage. A native Californian and raised in Silicon Valley, he graduated from UC Berkeley with a degree in Computer Science. During his time in college, he was training for the Olympics under 3 time Olympian Tore Gustafsson, but left that pursuit because software engineering paid more. Unlike other experts on millennials, Jeff has been in the trenches of what it means to be a millennial and what it takes to retain and keep them engaged. With Jeff‘s versatile background, he has addressed companies like Amazon and Google as well as thousands of professionals across the North America.

Where did the idea for becoming an author come from?

The thing is I was actually involved in consulting companies on technology trends and after one of the talks someone asked to speak about millennials. And it turned out that since I have first hand experience being a millennial it made perfect sense for me to go to corporations and help them with millennial activities because I can speak from first hand experience and on top of that I love research and work with people.

What does your typical day look like and how do you make it productive?

I’m either doing research, traveling and speaking or consulting or even working with my team and all those fluctuate depending on my travel schedule that will really depend on that part.

How do you bring ideas to life?

The way that I bring ideas to life so is similar to bringing a new book to life, part of that is simply sitting down and breaking out the strategy and being able to delegate and break it over a certain timeline period. It’s not this miraculous thing where I sit down and I have epiphanies. It’s a very phragmatic process where we diligently push for certain deadlines by different points.

What’s one trend that excites you?

Trends don’t excite me. It’s more of the old fashion hardwork and perseverance that excites me. Very often people tend to get really caught up on trend on what’s cool in especially in the Silicon Valley world and honestly it’s old news and people really need to stick to fundamentals if they’re gonna make it. Thinking that you simply call yourself an entrepreneur and have an instagram that says that, will not make you an entrepreneur. I am a third generation Silicon Valley entrepreneur so I heard a lot of hype. Stay away from the trends and do what works.

What is one habit of yours that makes you more productive as an entrepreneur?

Doing the most important thing first thing every single day.

What advice would you give your younger self?

If you want to take this path, it will be a lot harder than you would think it would be but the rewards are much more than you can ever imagine. For instance, I am able to be happy with myself to a point where can I look up myself in the mirror and be proud on what I’m doing in the world.

Tell us something that’s true that almost nobody agrees with you on.

Building a consulting business when we are in the age of technology and being successful at doing it.

As an entrepreneur, what is the one thing you do over and over and recommend everyone else do?

Have someone coach you whose two or three years ahead of you. If you get the right coach it’s a huge acceleration to your career path.

What is one strategy that has helped you grow your business?

The same answer to number 8. I was very stagnant in my business for a while but until I hired someone as a coach who understood sales and business processes, my business started to explode.

What is one failure you had as an entrepreneur, and how did you overcome it?

I actually went completely broke when I started my first company where it was profitable but I left my day job way too early. I thought I can muscle it out. No matter how much determination that you have if you’re not that experienced and the market does not like your product, you will not win.

What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers?

A client service that automatically sets up Tinder, Bumble and OKCupid dating apps. There you go, there’s your million dollar idea.

What is the best $100 you recently spent? What and why?

Spending a hundred dollars on books. You can buy a ton of books for a $100 and you can learn so much. The problem is very few people will sit down, absorb the information, then actually do something about it.

What is one piece of software or a web service that helps you be productive? How do you use it?

Streak. It is the email CRM that I use. I can send emails later, batch emails and snooze emails. I can do all sorts of things and this really helps me more productive with emailing.

What is the one book that you recommend our community should read and why?

“The Effective Executive” by Peter Drucker.

What is your favorite quote?

Know Thyself.

Key learnings:

• Trends don’t excite me. It’s more of the old fashion hardwork and perseverance that excites me. Very often people tend to get really caught up on trend on what’s cool in especially in the Silicon Valley world and honestly it’s old news and people really need to stick to fundamentals if they’re gonna make it.
• Thinking that you can simply call yourself an entrepreneur and have an instagram that says that, will not make you an entrepreneur. I am a third generation Silicon Valley entrepreneur so I heard a lot of hype. Stay away from the trends and do what works.
• If you want to take this path (entrepreneurship), it will be a lot harder than you would ever think it would be but the rewards are much more than you can ever imagine.
• The better you know yourself, the easier entrepreneurship is.

Connect:

Jeffery Butler: linkedin.com/in/jefferyjbutler/