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363: From Going to Prison at 16 to 7-Figures a Month, How Kash Hasworth Figured Out the Path to Success in Life and Business
This week’s Misfit Entrepreneur is Kash Hasworth. Kash went from prison at 16 to scaling a single mall kiosk to a 28-location franchise that was eventually acquired in a takeover deal worth $640 million. Nowadays, Kash is the CEO of Solar Ignite, a best-selling author, and a leading broker in the solar space making seven figures a month.
One area that Kash has focused intently on over the years is sales and specifically how modern-day sales is done wrong. He wrote the best-selling book; Selling Keeps You Broke: A Holistic Approach to Disruptive Sales Performance to Earn Big.
I’m excited for him to share his experience and how you can transform your business through improving the way you sell.
Kash grew up in an intense environment. Everyone has struggle and Kash believes the struggle, adversity, and hardship taught him what was necessary to succeed in life.
“Pure grit and initiative alone is more valuable than any academic degree out there.” The hunger and drive to win with the right perspective is what it takes.
Kash’s dad was a notorious drug dealer, and he grew up in that world. It led him down a path of destruction. He ended up incarcerated and charged as an adult at 16 for 2 years for shooting someone. When he came home, most of his friends were incarcerated, his dad was incarcerated, and he was depressed and didn’t know how to escape the environment. Prison made him cherish and value freedom and the possibilities of it. He didn’t know where to start, but his pivoting point was when he had a deep conversation with God. He broke and begged God for help with the right people and the right information to help him. After that moment, things began to change.
What did you learn in going to prison that helped you become a successful entrepreneur?
Adversity and difficulty make you stronger.
Mentors make a difference, a big difference.
You learn to deal with fear and let go.
After going to prison, it is hard to get intimidated by building a business.
You built a kiosk business to almost 30 locations and sold it, how did you do it?
Kash started as a part-time sales rep in a mall selling wireless.
Within a year, he was VP of sales and they started scaling up the company.
At the forefront is initiative and then identifying people that are better in key areas.
FAAR: Find, analyze, adopt, and refine.
Find the best people, analyze best practices, adopt them as your own, and then continually refine the process.
At the 10:30 mark, Kash gives examples of things he did to increase success and scale.
Talk about leadership and how you built it into the business to scale.
Culture reflects the foundation of leadership.
Communication is paramount.
Authenticity. Be who you are.
You must bring value to and elevate others around you.
Obsessively recruit people that are better than you.
Train. You have a responsibility to train and make your employees the best they can be.
At the 14 min mark, Kash talks about selling the company and going into the solar business.
What are doing to make 7-figures a month in the solar business?
Adversity is the birthplace for resourcefulness.
There is an overabundance of excuses.
There are two types of people: Those that make excuses and those that make a way.
Kash started out as a W2 and tripled his income in his first year.
Today, Kash is set up as a solopreneur who has built his business to doing over $6M per year.
He approaches every day with “success amnesia” like he is back to zero and plays the mental game to keep him hungry.
He sells residential solar systems.
What do you attribute to your success?
Lead flow – Kash leads are digital. He doesn’t knock on doors all day.
It’s better to be effective than “cute or witty.”
Selling should be simple. The hard work should be in building the lead flow and getting the opportunities.
At the 27 min mark, Kash and I discuss sales and selling.
Talk to us about Selling Keeps You Broke and the approach you advocate…
In selling, your job is to give the customer all the information they need to make an informed decision.
Expectations. Set the proper ones.
EVOC Method for objections.
Extract the reservation.
What are your thoughts on how to build a great sales organization?
At the core of good leadership is clear, consistent communication.
Recruit aggressively.
Have a commitment to excellence.
Be accountable and hold people accountable.
Anything else you think is important to share?
Keep the main thing, the main thing.
Pure grit and initiative alone is more valuable than any academic degree out there. The hunger and drive to win with the right perspective is what it takes.
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