79: From Founder to Leader: Building Purpose-Driven Teams w/ Sam Davidson

Are you an entrepreneur or leader struggling to scale your business and empower your team?

In this episode of No Limit Leadership, host Sean Patton sits down with Sam Davidson, CEO of the Nashville Entrepreneur Center, seasoned founder, and leadership expert. Together, they explore how to transition from founder to leader, build trust with teams you didn’t hire, and develop the mindset and systems required to grow a purpose-driven business.

Whether you're leading a startup, stepping into a legacy organization, or simply trying to improve your leadership impact, this conversation is packed with tactical advice and powerful insights.

In this episode, you will learn:

• Why sales, public speaking, and leadership are the three essential skills for long-term influence
• How to lead with vision and trust, especially when inheriting legacy systems and teams
• The difference between managing systems and leading people
• Why purpose, not ego, creates lasting culture and sustainable growth
• How self-awareness shapes leadership capacity at every stage of growth

Sam also shares behind-the-scenes lessons from building multiple companies and now mentoring over 400 entrepreneurs each year.

Sam on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samdavidson/
Nashville Entrepreneur Center: https://ec.co/

Host, Sean Patton: https://seanpattonspeaks.com/
Host, Sean Patton on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanpattonpresents/
Host, Sean Patton on IG: https://www.instagram.com/seanpattonspeaks

No Limit Leadership is the go-to podcast for growth-minded executives, middle managers, and team leaders who want more than surface-level leadership advice. Hosted by executive coach and former Special Forces commander Sean Patton, this show dives deep into modern leadership, self-leadership, and the real-world strategies that build high-performing teams. Whether you're focused on leadership development, building a coaching culture, improving leadership communication, or strengthening team accountability, each episode equips you with actionable insights to unlock leadership potential across your organization. From designing onboarding systems that retain talent to asking better questions that drive clarity and impact, No Limit Leadership helps you lead yourself first so you can lead others better. If you're ready to create a culture of ownership, resilience, and results, this leadership podcast is for you.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Struggling to lead a team you didn't build from the ground up? Sam Davidson's been there, stepping into a 13-year-old organization with legacy systems, people and expectations. As CEO of the Nashville Entrepreneur Center and a serial founder, he's mastered the shift from builder to leader. In this conversation, we unpack how to build trust fast, align team around vision and lead with purpose, even when the playbook isn't yours. As a leader, you will face this scenario at some point, and the outcome will hinge on your ability to adapt and elevate others. This episode will equip you for that exact moment. Welcome to the No Limits Leadership Podcast. We discuss ancient wisdom, real-world experiences, and the latest concepts on mastering leadership of self and others. If you're committed to maximizing your life and your impact on the world, you're home. Welcome to the No Limits Leadership Podcast. I am your host, Sean Patton. We are here where we explore what it takes to break through self-imposed barriers and become the best leaders we can be. Today, I'm excited to welcome Sam Davidson, the CEO of the Nashville Entrepreneur Center. Sam is a serial entrepreneur, author, and speaker who has built businesses with purpose, including Cool People Care and Batch. Now, he's leading one of the most influential entrepreneur hubs in the country, helping startups and businesses thrive. And I'm really excited for this conversation. So thanks for coming on today, Sam. Hey, you bet, Sean. Thanks for having me. You know, you've gone through multiple ventures now. I've been an entrepreneur for a long time and seen different sides of this. You know, from starting your own companies and now leading the Nashville Entrepreneur Center, the NEC. Was there like a defining moment where you first saw yourself as a leader? Yes.

SPEAKER_01: 1:37

And I'll talk about it sort of outside the context of entrepreneurship and then within it. Um, yeah, man, I, I was so lucky growing up. Um, great family, great parents, but also had a lot of people around me from probably those high school years who, who believed in me, teachers, um, folks at my church, uh, people I as I worked part-time jobs who just gave me opportunities and I remember some of my earliest like again thinking way back to high school when when life was gosh so much simpler but you didn't think it was I'm getting a chance you know to lead whether it's student groups or student government being on the baseball team and then a church for for youth group stuff and getting a chance to stand up and talk in front of people just those opportunities and even though I I didn't do it from a sense of like, hey, look at me or hey, look at my resume, but rather from the place of, hey, I think I have a story to tell or I think I can help this group or this team come together. Having adults who said, yeah, go for it. was one of the best things that happened to me. Because at that early age, I got the chance to lead, to make some mistakes, to not do it perfectly early. And just like we would tell an entrepreneur, making those mistakes is a rite of passage. It's kind of needed. It's kind of critical. I think leadership's the same way. No one bats a thousand when it comes to leadership. The best you can hope to do is to win more than you lose, to make less mistakes than you have successes. But knowing that you're not going to be perfect. And that's kind of the whole process of leadership, I think.

SPEAKER_00: 3:14

I think that's so, so critical. You know, when I talk with anyone, but especially, I guess, younger groups, I'm glad you brought that up because, and you can disagree with me on this, but I think if there's three sort of critical skills in life that really maybe separate, for lack of a better word, I'll say like people achieve really, you know, a greatness or impact, whatever you define that as, right? And those who, you know, have some successes, but maybe hit a ceiling. And maybe in this, it'll have to go in this order, but I say it's excels public speaking and leadership. Because it's like, can I persuade one person about this thing? Can I then persuade more people about this idea to get them to come along with me? And then once I've got them convinced to come along with me, can I actually get them to continue to do something and drive them to an end state as like leadership? To me, it's like, if you can't get those things down, you know, you're almost destined to individual contributorship. if you will.

SPEAKER_01: 4:11

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. And I think that's a good order. I think leadership ultimately a lot of times is convincing someone or selling someone on the idea that they can go farther than they think they can go themselves. And understanding that probably the way they go farther is with others. So you're leading a group. Maybe you just lead one person from time to time, but you lead a group. And so somebody that is selling the vision. We're talking about high school stuff. kind of always had a job, part-time job, something like that. And one of those, I worked at Service Merchandise, which is an old retailer, no longer in business. And I was just a cashier. But part of what we did is we sold those dang extended warranties. You know, everybody sells them now too. But it's like, you know, people buying a hairdryer, people buying a mini fridge. And it would pop up on the register. And like, that was my job. Hey, do you want these extended warranties? And then one week, the manager was like, contest. Who can sell the most of these? And that's where I was like, let's go, dude. Extended warranties are the best thing out there. And it We were getting like, if you sold them that week or you won or something, you would get like an 80% commission. Like something just... extraordinary because again those things are never used or redeemed or whatever and I sold one for like a camcorder like where you actually put the whole tape in there the camcorder was probably like two grand instead of warranty was like$400 and like as a 16 year old who needed gas money like that's real coin and I remember doing that talking about those things as meaningless as I would say that actual product was it was the act of trying and selling and getting to a place where you were a little bit fearless and In terms of somebody saying no, not fearless where you're trying tactics that are, you know, unscrupulous or you're doing things that are below board. But just to the point where you're like, okay, say no, fine, I'll just ring them up, whatever, give me the credit card, swipe it, next. And so I think that's where you have to be with selling your leadership vision is not everybody's going to buy it. Not everybody's going to want to go there, want to get on the bus, pick your metaphor, but still your job is to sell it. I think any sales job, I encourage young people coming out of college or even in high school, like, I want to get this job. I want to be in this industry. Man, customer service and sales. If you cut your teeth there, I think you get to fearlessness a little quicker. You build that confidence. My first real job, paying job, full-time job out of college was with a hotel company. And I sold event technology, projectors and microphones for events, but I serviced it. dealing with hundreds of customers a week. And of course, I hated the job at the moment. But looking back, man, I don't know where else I could have got better training, fresh out of college, still not sure what I was going to do for a living, than running customer service at a major hotel brand. So any of those things, man, you're selling something every day. And just the more you do it, it's rep. So much of leadership is just rep.

SPEAKER_00: 6:57

Yeah, you know, I'm reminded, how I would describe that, what you're talking about is really this term that I talk about from a military perspective. standpoint a lot that we talk about in military is stress inoculation, right? It's like, it's, it's that exposure therapy, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's like, instead of, instead of, uh, you know, an arachnophobia, you know, making them get closer to the plastic spider until eventually the tarantulas walking on them, you're just like, you're eventually, you're just asking or presenting and getting told to know enough where the nose just don't have the same impact. And, um, and so much of that is just, uh, you know, What is that stoic philosophy, right? The obstacle is the way, right? It's like where the pain is, the progress is. And leaning into that, and I think so many people flee that or avoid that because they avoid the discomfort, they avoid the conflict. And then to your point, when it's not an extended warranty, now they're 10 years into their career, they need to have a very difficult conversation with extreme either personal or professional or financial consequences and they haven't put in the reps and it's like, man, you know, get in there and get it done early and expose yourself to those situations, those critical situations as early and often as possible, right? And it's never too late, I guess, but early and often. No, it's

SPEAKER_01: 8:15

never too late but I think that's why some of these extreme things have been catching on, ice baths and like ultra marathons and like we see these guys and gals who are doing those things and it makes for great, you know, social media kind of motivation porn, whatever you want to call it and because I think there is this desire that most of us have to push ourselves. So a great book called Flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, a Czech philosopher, look up his TED Talk. You don't have to read the whole book if you do that. But he looked at this idea of flow state because we associate it with athletes, high-performing athletes, Michael Jordan, Serena Williams, et cetera. And he was just like, man, can regular humans hit this flow state? And the answer is yes. And we can do it in any job. It doesn't matter the profession. But he defined flow state. And it's this sweet spot between this is too hard and this is too easy. And when we pick something, to your point, that's so easy, a career that's comfortable, a role that's easy, we actually get bored. It's not good for us. We develop stasis, comfort, complacency, whatever. Too hard, an anxiety sets in. This is impossible. I can't possibly do this. I'm stressed out. And he's like, man, if we find that spot, And again, that's what athletes are doing, even high-performance athletes. Michael Jordan didn't make every shot win every game, but he did it enough where he could hit that flow state most nights. So I think we were built to do that. For some of us, yeah, it's going to talk to a stranger, making a sale, drawing. There's so many things. Again, the ice bath stuff, fine. But finding that spot where you're like, God, it's a little bit uncomfortable,

SPEAKER_00: 9:47

it will only make you better. Yeah, totally. If there's anything that's... I guess, synonymous to me with both, I should say all three entrepreneurship, leadership and life is in my own personal value system is, is growth, right? To say getting better, um, on your own schedule and, and, And sometimes just and not not burnout, not over pushing, not pushing yourself to your point too hard. Right. On that far end of that stress curve. But that slow, steady growth that makes just life more interesting and fulfilling. It does. We again, I

SPEAKER_01: 10:22

really think we were wired that way just as a species is is not to stagnate growth. Of course, the cool thing. About us is growth can be measured in depth, not just breadth. So if you're a tree and you're going to grow, you just got to get taller. That's kind of your only option. But for us, we can learn a language. We can, again, teach ourselves some sort of new hobby or discipline. Whatever those growth moments are, we want them deep down. We do not. We do not deep down. We don't want to just go home and watch Netflix every night. We don't. That's the easy choice. We do want to learn something. It gets harder as we get older because going to school, you're there every day to learn. But deep down, we want to keep that going. I think that's why things like TED or Masterclass or some of these things appeal to us so much is because, gosh, we're actually learning while we're doing this. And so whatever that opportunity is to grow, I don't know anybody who's been upset that they took the opportunity to learn something, to read a book, to take in art of some kind. And so, yeah, we just got to seek them out because they're not handed to us. Everything else in the world is pointing at convenience. You can fly from here to Australia. You can never leave your house again. You can, again, fly from here to Australia and never talk to another human if you don't want to. Check in online. Everything is seamless. You stay in your house. Again, never talk to anybody else if you don't want to. Everything coming at you from your phone. But that's not how we're meant to live or to lead by any means.

SPEAKER_00: 11:47

You know, and I... I want to, as we talk about leadership, I think that's another key aspect for me because a key component of true leadership to me is investing in other people. And I think you've mentioned that earlier. I think you said that, like investing in people and helping them grow, right? Helping them see, I don't want to say your exact wording, but you mentioned helping them see maybe what they're capable of. Beyond what they maybe see for themselves and then helping them get there and helping them grow and investing in people and how that in itself leading someone that creates value for them. And, you know, one of my favorite questions for clients I got from a mentor of mine, Ken Proctor, because I help, you know, one of my things in my business is I help companies retain, attract and retain top talent. through strong leadership cultures. And it's like, everybody wants that, right? Everybody wants top talent. Everyone wants great employees. And then you ask them, okay, so outside of compensation and benefits, why does top talent want to work for you? Right? What's the secret? Yeah. Well, to your point, I think because if you help them grow, right? If you're pouring into people and they know that they're growing personally, professionally, you know, if they look forward to their one-to-ones because they're going to learn new things and they're learning, you know, self-discipline and they're creating strong purpose and they're aligning their work with, like, their long-term goals and all of that, like, that person's not leaving you for an extra$5 an hour, right? That person's going to stay with that company for long-term. But, You know, there is a difference there between sort of management and leadership. So in your experience, how do you define those and how do they interact with each other to be successful in running the company? Man, yeah, that's a great question. And I

SPEAKER_01: 13:33

think both are needed. We don't need a world that's only leaders and we don't need a world that's only managers. And some of it, like, some people are great managers. And so I don't want to dissuade anybody who's listening to this and is like, you know what, maybe my track is, you know, 80% management and 20% leadership. That's okay. Not everybody can be... C-suite, CEO level, totally fine. Sometimes, not that this is where this conversation is going, but sometimes you need that great number two, you need that great first follower, whatever you want to call it. But I think the problem or the difficulty or the lost opportunity is where someone who really could lead only manages. And when I think about management, and this is how it was when I was starting businesses and was in the trenches as an entrepreneur, one thing I learned about myself is probably the second company, is I am way better at starting and leading than managing. When I hear managing, I hear, again, a dedication to systems and processes, a good manager. I see, again, pointing to our goal. But I probably see manageable growth. Hey, we want to grow 2% a year. We want to grow profit a point and a half a year. So sort of that slow, steady, realistic, achievable, plug-and-play approach. show up and run the playbook and you're good to go. We would talk about that like a football, like a game manager is like a negative for a quarterback. They're not a leader, they're a game. And again, they win a lot of games usually, so got it. Whereas a leader, and where I've been able to naturally, talent-wise, challenge-wise, growth-wise, want to jump in is be like, man, there is no playbook. And so we've got to kind of develop that and go from zero to one or zero to 100 as quickly as possible or as smart as possible. And that's where I think the leadership piece takes root. Again, the world needs both of these things, but there is a difference between management and leadership. Because I don't think anybody manages their way to a big goal. I think you only lead your way to a big goal. So I think when something gets to a management place, and look, whether it's you're running a city, you're running a company, you're running a startup, you're running a volunteer group at your kid's school. Again, understanding on the front end, hey, am I here to manage this or am I here to do this? And again, based on the timeline, the era, any of those things around, there's time for management, there's time for leadership. And so understanding that's important, but I don't think anything gets managed to a big goal. I

SPEAKER_00: 15:47

think it's only led there. You know, a lot of entrepreneurs start with passion, right? They start with passion for the thing they do, the product, whatever that is, right? The mission. Then they start to grow. And as they do that, they start building a team. And then maybe they struggle with that management and or leadership piece. You know, As you've worked with multiple entrepreneurs, I mean, hundreds now at the Entrepreneur Center, and you've seen it, what struggles do you see, what are the potholes that you see entrepreneurs hit as they start to try to transition from purely driven by passion to bringing in management practices to then transitioning to be, how do they also lead in the same capacity?

SPEAKER_01: 16:29

Yeah, so I think one of the, not wrong steps, but maybe premature steps that an entrepreneur takes is like, I'm passionate about entrepreneurship. Um, and again, I had a friend in college and he sort of dabbled in entrepreneurship through his career. He's, he doesn't do it full time, but he was passionate just about like being his own boss and any college. And he was like, I will, I will run a subway sandwich franchise. I'll cut grass. Like I just want to be my own. Um, and that can be okay, but it rarely is self-sustaining. So I think the best entrepreneurs, meaning the ones who can take an idea, turn into reality and then grow it to some kind of, uh, inflection point, selling it, going public, merging, making a ton of money, whatever that is for you. Are those who are first passionate about some kind of problem. And so they're like, you know, the world needs a better, lower calorie barbecue sauce, or the world needs this software that can connect you to whatever. And they're really passionate about like, God, I wish this thing existed. This is a problem that doesn't exist. They're passionate about that problem. And when they develop a product to solve it, then they become passionate about the product. And so, hey, I was passionate about the problem and I worked so hard to solve it. And my solution is the best solution out there. Because then it goes back to who's selling that. Because if you start a company, nobody's heard of it. People may not even know it's a problem. And you're the only one out there who sees it as a problem. Now you've got to tell them that there is a problem and that you have the solution to it. So those two things can start an entrepreneur off on a better or a more right foot than just being passionate about being your own boss. And so those two things seem to create success more quickly than just I'm passionate about teddy bears or cars or technology or whatever industry is. Now, the challenge is just come up, see the problem and just can develop a solution. Now there's so much more to that, especially if you're going to scale and scale like multimillion dollar company, because usually you're passionate about the problem because you worked in an accounting firm, you're an accountant, And you saw this as a problem. You build a solution, but again, you're still an accountant. You've maybe managed a person, led a team, small team, but you have not hired salespeople before. You have not hired software engineers. You have not managed a board. You have not raised capital. So there's this entire kind of cliff that a lot of entrepreneurs jump off of where it's a a talent deficit like their own capacity deficit and we like to think that the entrepreneur because we glorify them in our society some way more than we should as like that guy that gal knows all and can do all and sometimes they can but it's usually because they they got the reps in they messed it up before their first six companies or ideas crashed and burned and only when they emerge do we get the the um You know, Mark Cubans or Sarah Blakely's or Oprah's or again, fill in the blank, where they take a company to great heights. So understanding that about yourself, a lot of what we do here at the Entrepreneur Center, and the reason it's called the National Entrepreneur Center, not the National Entrepreneurship Center, is because entrepreneurs at the center of what we do is that person. And so you as a person, you've got the problem, you've got the solution. Great. But what do you need? And we now do monthly mental health curriculum because entrepreneurs are notorious for having poor mental health as they stress themselves out, leverage themselves in a lot of ways. But then we also train for some of these, quote, more hard skills, like selling, like raising capital, like managing a board, like understanding how to hire, how to fire. So a lot of those things we can train for. I can't teach you what the problem is and what the solution is. You've got to build those on your own. But then you can come here and we can teach you the hard skills and some of those other pieces like the mental health. We had a panel once on parenting and being an entrepreneur, just to understand all these life factors. So Long way of saying, yes, be passionate, but be passionate about the problem and the product. And then as you grow it, understand your own deficits. And I think that's a key mark of a leader is A, knowing you can't do it all. And then B, knowing the things you can't do, who can and who can supplement that or where can you get better yourself?

SPEAKER_00: 20:26

I think that's so critical. And it sounds like through your own growth and development over time, you had these mission-driven companies. Now you're at the National Entrepreneur Center with with all that background experience and you get to see all these different entrepreneurs and leadership styles come together. So through that whole journey, I guess, how has your personal leadership philosophy changed?

SPEAKER_01: 20:49

Oh, man. It's a continual work in progress. I think leadership, you know, a lot of times it's situational. So leadership My first company, one of our first employees told this story to a group of entrepreneurs a couple months ago. I don't even know why she worked for me more than one day. I was in my mid-20s, and I just hadn't managed somebody before, especially somebody around my own age. I think when I worked in a hotel, I had a part-time college kid or something. But this is somebody who had a lot of responsibility that I was supposed to manage, and I was just not good. And I think back to that of how much... grace or patience or forgiveness she probably showed me in those moments where she probably knew like this guy's in charge of this company um so you're always learning those things about yourself it probably took me several more years before i came way more self-aware and so for me i don't think you can lead well unless you have a real solid self-awareness i think entrepreneurs uh leaders who don't have that self-awareness of knowing where they're deficient or where they need to improve or grow then those are the ones that have just a ton of hubris that that run on ego that um people that see people as numbers, objects, means to an end. And that's not effective, I think. It's not authentic leadership by any means. So for me, that's what it starts with. The other piece is that I'm still living into is you lead people. It's easy to say you're leading an initiative, you're leading a company, you're leading a product line. But no, man, you're leading people. And so understanding that human element is That's what makes it, of course, so messy. I get it why everybody wants to use AI and robots because they're easier to manage how I'm feeling. But man, dealing with people and the stuff that they're dealing with, all the complexities of life, that adds to it. But all the effective leaders, I think, that we admire in our own lives or that we can see and that we idolize for what they've accomplished, I think they understand, at least people that I love, understand and imagine people

SPEAKER_00: 22:49

at the end of it. As you continue to grow now, You mentioned that, like, where's your growth edge now? Like, where are you at personally that you're trying to work on to improve as a leader?

SPEAKER_01: 23:00

So this is the first time running the Entrepreneur Center. I've been here almost two years. This is the first time in 17 years that when I came in in 2023, the first time I stepped into a job I didn't create for myself. And so there was a lot to understand coming in then, a 13-year-old organization that was very healthy, has a great reputation, is doing so much good. Something that I watched as I was an entrepreneur, I watched this place take shape and launch and grow with so many great leaders before me. Inheriting that was a new paradigm for me, just to be able to say, gosh, I didn't create this. This job predated me and it will be around. I will not be the last CEO of this place. So that was new. And so I'm learning a lot, reading a lot, trying to understand a lot about leadership from that non-entrepreneurial lens, even though it's something that we here teach and coach every day. It's also understanding that a staff of 13 folks, a board of directors, And so many supporters, we've got a little over 400 active entrepreneurs at the time of this recording that we're working with through our membership or through our accelerator programs. So I didn't create any of that. And so understanding the special honor that that is, is new. and managing a team that I didn't fully hire. Again, as my most recent company eventually got to a size where I didn't make a direct hire every time, but at least was there when people were hired and saw them on our first day. So to walk in and to have people who had been here two, four, six years was also different. So this is more of a CEO role, even though I held the title at other places. It was because I've created a job, gave myself a title once we got to a certain size. And yeah, I earned it. But here to walk into that is just different and it's special and it's something new to me.

SPEAKER_00: 24:45

As you continue to grow and navigate, especially in this new role, are there certain habits or routines that have helped you grow as a leader? Yeah, I think one is

SPEAKER_01: 24:55

relying on that core leadership team. And one thing I learned as I grew my prior company was when we got to a point to hire somebody who was in a sales role of like, oh my gosh, that person is better than me. Because I think sometimes as an entrepreneur, I tell every entrepreneur this, even if you built the product just because you can code, you know, software, like you're still the first salesperson of this thing. You just are. And until you get to a point where you can hire a salesperson who's better at sales than you are, then that's just where you're going to be. And I had done that at my gift company. And then the first time we hire a salesperson who is better than me, it was a relief, but it was also like good. Because I think as you're growing something, when you say, great, that person is best in class and way better than me at this job, that could be managing a warehouse, it could be a CTO, whatever role. And so So you see to have that on our leadership team is very special. But then it's growing trust in them. I think trusting others. Because as a leader, you can feel so often that this is on me. I'm the leader. I've got to do all of these 26 things every day. To get to a place where you're like, no, there's A, I can't do all 26 things. And I don't need to because I have three other people and we can all divide it up. Equally, not equally, whatever. So for me, I'm still leaning into that and still learning where to rely on them. But you can't get there. Back to the vision discussion. If they don't know what they're trying to manage and lead to, then they're not going to be any help anyway. So still casting that vision. We've got a great three-year plan that we just kicked off at the beginning of this year, 2025. That'll take us through the end of 2027. And having everybody aligned on that and head in the same direction is such a key benefit. And that is something that I... had to set the tone and help create through lots of input

SPEAKER_00: 26:46

of where we wanted to go. How do you approach, especially now that you've got a team that, as you mentioned, you didn't hire, right? You didn't handpick each person that you showed up and this is the team you got. What is your system or plan in terms of aligning with them and leading them personally? Like creating that, we mentioned helping them grow. What does that look like for you in terms of developmental coaching, counseling, weekly one-to-ones. What does that look like when you work with each member of your team to help them grow and become better?

SPEAKER_01: 27:17

Yeah, so there's weekly leadership meetings where the four of us get together. There's one-on-ones. And there's constant check-ins because what I've told them all along is, man, I can be gas pedal, all gas pedal all day, but I rely on them to either break or tell me when to break, allow me to steer a little bit, Cause I said, guys, the worst thing that can happen is I'm just running this thing off the cliff. And then the whole time you guys are like, great way. Yeah, let's do that. And so, and I, and so some of that is reassuring them because again, I don't know their entire careers, right? Projectoring while they, um, work with and work for. So maybe they were somewhere where like, no, you never questioned the boss. You never questioned leadership. Whereas I welcome that. I'm like, man, poke holes in any of this, please. I tell my board of directors that cause I'm not married to any single idea. The only thing that I'm resolute on is again, taking this organization toward, um, our strategic goals that our board of directors has blessed over these next three years. So I'm not going to deviate from that, but how we get there, how fast we get there, man, I'm all ears. And so right now, I'll say at this point in time, we're looking really deeply at infrastructure. So my dad was healthcare his entire career, ended up over time being part of some founding teams, was never the front guy out there, but helped found two companies. When I started my first company in 2006, I asked him for some advice and we'll talk about different stuff. And the, and the first piece he said, he was like, never outgrow your infrastructure. And I've never forgotten that. Um, and I'm mindful of it because infrastructure costs money and it takes time to set up and train. Um, Meaning that you can be the greatest storyteller salesperson in the world and you can have POs for a mile. But if you don't have the actual operational setup to deliver on that, I'm sure I'm going to go away. And so there's this tension between people who are building companies or teams or leaders who are like, how fast can I go with who and how we're working? And so that's something we're mindful of right now is as fast as I want to go. as where we've set those goalposts and making sure that we've got enough engine, enough gas, the game plan to actually get there.

SPEAKER_00: 29:23

What is that? As much as you can share, I guess, what's that three-year vision look like?

SPEAKER_01: 29:26

Yeah, so the overarching strategic intent statement is that by the end of 2027, we want to meaningfully help 1,000 entrepreneurs a year start or grow a business. So we get to that number in a couple different ways, but some of that is membership. So we operate a membership basis, month to month, different tiers. We have an awesome building that includes co-working space for entrepreneurs. So no matter your idea, no matter your stage, You can join not only in co-working, but that also gets you access to over 150 advisors. So you're stuck on something or you have an opportunity, kind of dial up an advisor. These are all volunteers that will give you their time to help you figure that out. There's also an online community resource library, et cetera. So that membership is intended to be longitudinal. So we have 300 active members right now. The other way is through accelerators. We have five accelerators based on either your business stage, that kind of idea stage, or just getting started onto ones that are more mature and want to hit, say, the million-dollar mark. We have accelerators based on industry, like fintech and healthcare. Those are 12-week programs. We run those at the same time. And so right now, we've got a little over 100 founders enrolled across those five programs. So we do that twice a year. So hopefully in the fall, we'll have another 100. And so that's how the math starts adding up. We're about halfway there for where we want to be. A couple of the key metrics that get us there, because as we recruit more entrepreneurs, we need to recruit more advisors and mentors. And so both of those things, we can't just do one without the other. So There's eight different key metrics there, but they're all pointed towards, can we help 1,000 entrepreneurs a year, again, start or grow a business? We do lunch and learns. Anybody can come to those. Just because you come to a lunch and learn, we've got one coming up this month about capital and just understanding, do I raise money? How do I raise money? What kind of money? Where do I start with this? Should I look at a loan? Should I look at venture capital? What's going on? You can come to that. Does anybody help definitively you grow your business? Tough to say, but if you're a member and you're Then yes, we're helping you grow your business. If you're going through our 12-week curriculum, yes, we're helping you grow your business. So there's all of those opportunities that we do on a very regular basis to get to that number by the end of 2027.

SPEAKER_00: 31:30

With, you know, National Entrepreneur Center has been around, like you said, like 17 years, right? Is that what you said? 15, yeah, 15. 15 years. I know I got out of the military in 2015 and kind of started my entrepreneur stuff around 2014, 2015 in Nashville and have kind of seen that grow as well. What role do you think an entrepreneur center support plays in interacting with the growth and development of a city? Yeah,

SPEAKER_01: 32:00

I think they go hand in hand. And so that's part of our DNA as a center is that we were started 15 years ago because the city, city leadership at the time, 75 people came together, was part of this initial steering committee convened by the Chamber of Commerce to really look at what can we do as a city to help create more entrepreneurs. And other cities in Nashville's kind of peer set had resources like that. So before that, it was kind of hard. It was like, hey, I have an idea, but I don't even know what to do now. Who do I even call to ask? And there wasn't a centralized force. Some of our role still is to be that first stop for entrepreneurs. Whether you move here with a company from a different place, or you're here working a day job and you've got an idea and you're like, okay, what's the first thing? Call us first. And we may say, hey, who you need, what you need is actually... over here and we'll send you there happy to do it or we'll say hey yeah yeah we've got this program or this opportunity so here's here's we can walk you through these things as we've been around 15 years and um you know have worked with uh well over 14 000 entrepreneurs in some capacity in that time there those companies have raised 100 million in capital or created 400 million in revenue 300 million in capital raise sorry an exit 100 million exit value 300 million capital rates um thousands of jobs created they're absolutely the I think cities that are growing are, are growing because of, um, entrepreneurs, not exclusively, but it's a big ingredient and cities that are shrinking. I think it's because it's hard to, or people don't want to be entrepreneurs there. They're not seeing the opportunity again, not a one-to-one correlation, but something that's pretty, pretty caught, you know, um, uh, Pretty similar. The story rhymes, so to speak. So I think by a city like Nashville, and there's several others that have invested in supported centers like ours, then they're seeing those ideas come to life, especially in diverse or multiple industries. Nashville is clearly healthcare capital of the world. There are lots of healthcare startups. We run a healthcare accelerator. But the city needs to be more than a healthcare city. And it is. Music. Tourism is obviously huge here. Advanced manufacturing in the region is huge. Supply chain distribution. Construction, obviously, as it's growing. You need entrepreneurs in all those sectors to be innovative, to continue to help people grow the economy. All of those things matter. To your point, the thing that I think is overlooked, and we did a workshop last fall, our first workshop with veterans for business owners, entrepreneurs, to understand the veteran-owned certification process and what doors that opens. I mean, we're in the shadow of Fort Campbell. thousands of military folks who are leaving the military every year, military families and spouses. Entrepreneurship is such a viable career option post-service for so many veterans, and we're seeing that. We've got a couple in our current accelerators that that's part of their story. And so I think there's a huge opportunity in– military towns or cities that are adjacent to significant bases where folks are, again, ending their career or spouses and family members to really leverage and teach some of those skills. Bunker Labs is a great example that for a long time they eventually merged with the University of Syracuse that was training so many veterans to start viable, sustainable businesses. There are venture capital funds that are just focused on veteran businesses. There are franchise opportunities that are focused on providing franchises to veterans. So,

SPEAKER_00: 35:20

so viable and so needed. That's funny. I don't know if you knew that. So yeah, I was a Bunker Labs ambassador for two and a half years under Blake there. You get it. Yeah. Did that multiple cohorts, graduated and then ran four cohorts out of there. It's so important. And then one of my clients is actually the National Veteran Owned Business Association. Yeah. Certifies veteran businesses. Yeah. So yeah, very familiar in that sector. And I love the fact you're focusing there because whether it's what you're working on working with Fort Campbell and veterans. I do think entrepreneurship or startup world, there's a lot of traits that veterans can bring that give them a higher probability and chance of success when it comes to things like entrepreneurship. I also know there's a lot of people in the Nashville area and I know in other cities adjacent to military bases that are trying to make connections just for management and leadership. Like once those companies get growing and start scaling, it's like you need leaders at all those levels and you have such a resource. These people have been, you know, have been the government and have they put years and hundreds of thousands of dollars into just leadership development for these, you know, these service members getting out and they bring such a unique take that, you know, there's not, I don't know as much as I would love for the clients I work with and companies I work with to be able to do what the military does, where you bring someone in and then pull them out of their job for six months and just train them on leadership for the next role and then put them back into their job. That's just not the way that the private sector works. And so what a unique way to grab someone who is not just has nine, 10 years experience, but let's call it two, three years of that was nothing but just intensive leadership and management training that you can't replicate that in almost any sector outside of it.

SPEAKER_01: 37:15

No. And I saw a presentation literally this morning, and it was the first time I heard a veteran who was then hired private sector after her time in service here. And she talked about purpose. So when I was in the military, work had purpose every single day. I knew why I enlisted or signed up or however she got into it. And then you get out and you're like, well, now what's my purpose? And she felt where she ended up getting hired and her career progression in that sector provided her with purpose again. And again, her family gave her purpose, all that kind of stuff, but from a work standpoint. And to me, that goes back to this idea of leadership is that company was able to provide leadership to her to say, here's how we can connect the dots, even though I think it was in financial services where she ended up, was still critical to giving her that purpose that she experienced every day while in the military.

SPEAKER_00: 38:02

Yeah, I think I see it all the time, especially with my camera switched on me here, especially with anyone that goes through transitions, right? I'm sure maybe you've seen this with other entrepreneurs that they grow a company, it's their life, it's their purpose, they're solving the problem, and then they sell it. And then it's that Yeah. Oh, now what? For the last 10 years, I've been the guy or gal who has been doing this amazing thing, solving this problem, making the same pitch 10,000 times. Now that identity is gone. And it's like, what is that next identity? And I think helping as leaders, when we can play that role in helping someone find that purpose and that mission, and when we can align, as you mentioned, the work they're doing every day with this higher purpose, higher mission, personally, professionally, we can create total alignment as leaders. That is the force multiplier, right? That's when we can help people grow and, you know, coming back full circle to your original point, being a leader who helps people accomplish more. You know, I think, what is it? John Adams, right? Has this quote. It's like, if you inspire others to dream more, do more and become more, you are a leader. Yeah, I don't disagree. And

SPEAKER_01: 39:18

that's, I mean, the question is always, when do you, how do you leave the stage? I mean, we see an athlete stay way too long because that's their identity versus like, hey, you know what? I'm going to give up this slot to the younger guy or gal. Who's ready? And I'm going to, in my career, you know, the next two years, instead of trying to grind it out and give myself cortisone shots or whatever, I'm actually going to train them and that's going to be my legacy. And you see that especially with entrepreneurs who are willing to hand over the reins of their company, whether because they sell it or they recognize it's someone else's turn. I mean, that's leadership, man. It's, again, realizing... not your deficiencies necessarily, but the potential in someone else to take this to the next level. Incredible amount of humility, incredible amount of leadership to do that. But it also requires that you find purpose outside of that job. And I think that's what's so, because for entrepreneurs, and this is some of what we hit on the mental health stuff here, it's because you can be so focused And one year turns into six, turns into 15 of being so focused and resolute. And even if you're not burnt out, it's all you think about. It's all you talk about. It's what your entire future wealth retirement is wrapped up in. So it has to succeed. And then you just get to a point where you look around and you didn't develop key relationships. You didn't invest in those community causes that were passionate to you. So that well-roundedness, for lack of a better term, is critical in any job so that your identity is not tied to one thing. And

SPEAKER_00: 40:49

this, Sam, this has been fantastic. And, you know, you've, you're doing such fantastic work. You've, you mentioned so much of kind of your growth trajectory and different lessons. And you mentioned, you know, how you started off with those opportunities in high school and stepping up and trying to lead. And if you go back and see, you know, that 17 year old Sam stepping up in the church group where I was like, what's one piece of advice you give, you give younger Sam?

SPEAKER_01: 41:15

Yeah. I think a couple of things, of course, in retrospect. One is, man, you're not going to end up where you think. Not in a bad way, but just as a way to say, lean into the things that come your way. The relationships, the opportunities, the conversations. Keep planning. I definitely like to plan. I like a strategy. But leaving room for those unexpected things. Again, those chance meetings, those random conversations, those doors that open. The other thing that I think Young Sam was good at, but I encourage everybody and could only encourage him more than, is to continue to build your community before you need it. I think more and more, I am only here because of the people that I've been privileged to be around. And that's everything from family to parents to other leaders and mentors and opportunities. And we were built for community. And the more that we can rely on, surround ourselves with that community, the more opportunities we're going to get. And so the more you can do that, the younger you can do that, the more successful you'll be.

SPEAKER_00: 42:20

If the audience wants to learn more about you or the Entrepreneur Center, Best place to go? Yeah, man. Yeah, check us out at

SPEAKER_01: 42:25

ec.co. So that's our website. You can find our social media links on there. I tend to be most active on LinkedIn, just sort of sharing what I'm up to. You can search for me, Sam Davidson on there. But the EC itself, we share wins from our entrepreneurs and the work that we're doing there all the time. But be sure to check us out, visit us there, learn more about what we're doing. If you're in the area or we even serve entrepreneurs who aren't based in Nashville, if they're in the healthcare fintech industry, man, look us up. We'd love to give you a tour. Love to have that conversation.

SPEAKER_00: 42:51

Awesome. Thanks so much for your time today, man. your wisdom. I know I learned a lot and I'm sure everybody else did too. You bet. Thanks for having me, Sean. Thanks for being a part of the No Limit Leadership family. This isn't just a podcast. We're building a movement of No Limit leaders driven to unlock our greatness and lead the world forward. If this made you think or gave you something useful, please, please, please, right now, go hit follow and then share it with one leader you believe in. Challenge limits, develop leaders, fuel greatness.