EP296 - Beyond the Money, What Wealth Really Means for MSP Business Owners with Ian Luckett

IAN: In this episode of The IT Experts Podcast, we go beyond the money and we ask the question what wealth really means for MSP owners.

INTRO: Welcome to The IT Experts Podcast, the only podcast to help MSPs scale to 1 million, and if already there, get to five and go faster. At the end of the day, isn't it all about building a business that works for you rather than you for it? I hope you enjoy the show.

IAN: So good morning, good afternoon, good evening. Welcome back to The IT Experts Podcast. Great to have you here. Thanks very much for listening in. And today I want to have a little checkup from the neck up. We are midway point, we are just past the halfway point of 2026, and normally at the end of the year, everyone gets reflective and does their annual plans and kind of all of that chats but I want to have a little bit of a check-in to see where you are at in terms of what's fueling your fire.

Now what I mean by this is when we talk about the MSP journey, you know, everybody starts off and they're surviving and then they get into drive where it starts to get a bit hard work, but they're working really hard. Then they get into thrive where things are really starting to move. And then you get to the top of the pyramid where you'll see this anywhere, go and check it out on the website. You'll get to the top of the pyramid, which is around arrive. And arrive is enabling you to build a business that works for you rather than new for it. Where owner is not needed, where you are not needed in the technicalities of it every day. You know where when you go on holiday, the business doesn't just survive, it grows.

And a lot of the time we hear MSP owners, they kind of forget what their why was they lose their why and they get caught up in the grind. And sometimes when you get caught up in the grind and you can be working for 20, 30 years in the business without having any holidays and kind of all of that horrible stuff because you've forgotten the reason that you kind of went into business before.

So we are going to unpack what wealth truly means beyond the money and explore how profit can become an enabler for freedom, fulfilment, and the life that you actually enjoy. So get yourself coffee or cup of tea, drink of your choice. Let's slow things down for a couple of minutes and let's talk about what this actually looks like.

So many MSP owners as I just briefly mentioned lose sight of their why because they started the bees business for a reason. And it might have been a passion project, it might have been to build some wealth. It might have been to build, you know, wealth in retirement to help you with your kids, go through private school, whatever it might be in the house that you want to be in, great environment around you. But many people forget that when they get caught up in the day to day and the MSP businesses, probably not like many other businesses where you can just get caught up running the business. The business that drains the fulfilment and it no longer kind of feels meaningful. So you can literally come in every day, one after another and it'd be like Groundhog Day and you get to the next month, you get to the next quarter, you get to the next year, and nothing really changes. No real deliberate action's been put into in place to make things change. But nothing kind of really changes and it just feels like it's just a drag, it's a big weight around your shoulders. You know, you're employing people, okay luckily for you, the MSP model means that you can run a multimillion pound business on very few people, really. But you know, you might be feeling the responsibility of other people's livelihoods, you know, their mortgages, their families and everything, that if you don't build the business properly or if you don't grow the business, then effectively their jobs are at risk. But sometimes that can weigh a little bit on your mind.

Other things around, you know, the family life and things like that, missing out. Football matches, swimming classes, ballet classes, you know, ceremonies. The good old panto at Christmas, you miss out on that. You'll feel like the worst parent in the world. Because the business is consuming everything. You feel guilty when you take time out to go for a swim, go for a walk, pop to the shops, you know, go and walk the dog, wash the car, whatever it is that kind of floats your bow. But then you sometimes realise that too late, that success doesn't feel like success. You've got where you are and we always say, you know what got you here is not going to be the thing that's going to get you there. But what is there, what is that arrive? What does success look like? And you know, I guess, you know, when Stuart and I set this business up, we set up for many of that there's a big thread of special needs through our families. So the Growth Hub pretty much is an enabler to enable us to help more people with shareholder accommodation, school for autistic people, you know, supported living, helping people who are less fortunate. And that's the driving force that's behind the growth hub. You know, that's why we get up every day and do what we do. It's not a grind. It's a joy. We love doing it. And the best bit about what we do is that we actually get to change people's lives and transform people's lives by helping them see and learn and do things in a different way. You know, the whole personal development thing, building confidence, building trust, building, you know, all of those other great things that enable you to have like a fulfilled life. And that's not a pipe dream. It's not, you know, Instagram and Facebook, all, you know, it's real life. It's living with passion. It's living with purpose, as they call it. So you know, what does that look like for you? And you might not even be thinking that's something that you need to think about. But when you do get these things and you do get that far in your belly, and you do get that purpose, then all of a sudden life becomes more purposeful than the things that you do. The people that you spend your time with. The time that you do, you realise that, you know, we've only got one shot at this. And we want to make sure that that life matters. So, you know, it can look successful running an MSP, on paper it might look pretty good. Your accounts might look pretty good. You've got so many people, you're bumping chest with people at events. But it feels pretty hollow. You kind of like lost the love for it. Sometimes you can be firefighting. You've got no space to think or lead properly. You know, you might be, if you are struggling to motivate yourself. Guess how that shows up. We talk about it all the time. Shadow of the leader, how's that show up with your team? They're going to be moping around. And, you know, just not having that much energy as well, because there's no shared why. You know, when we talk about the vision, the mission, and the values of the business, that's when you've decided what you want to achieve. Then you come. So this sits above the vision, mission, and values. It's your, why are you doing this? You know, what's the kind of purpose? So you know what also ends up happening is you can end up making decisions driven by fear, rather than, the visions and values. You, it can be driven by, you know, survival. If I don't do this, then I'm going to get this. And I don't do that. And I've had a conversation with one of our clients many times, you know who you are. And I've said to him, stop focusing on what you can't have and start focusing on what you can have, you know, and stop looking at your cash flows as if you've got a problem in six months time. Start looking at it as a 12 month opportunity to really start to generate. And, you know, if you think you can, you think you can't, you're probably right. You know that, that's the thing. If you look at things negatively, you'll attract negativity and you'll only just focus on those one things. And if you've got a big vision, then you only, you know, as they say, you shoot for the start, shoot for the moon. If you miss you landed, the stars are still a pretty great place to be. Right?

But the one thing we really want to avoid is burnout, because burnout, stress, anxiety, all of those kind of mental health issues, are sometimes, you know, a symptom of what's happened in your life, you know, but it's can also be what happens when you lose that purpose as well. So let's bring this into some actionable tips. You know, you can do this right now, middle of the year. You can do it at the end of the year. You can do it whenever you want. A great time to do this. In actual fact, it's probably quite a good timing podcast when you're on holiday, when you're not being badged by tickets, you're not being pestered by your team or your clients. And you can sit there and just have a bit of a wild thing. You're sitting on a sunbed, you're out in a really nice place. You might be sitting there having a drink overlooking the beach in Portugal or somewhere like that.

And the first thing I want you to do is I want you to have a think about revisiting your original why. There is an amazing book, guy called Simon Sinek - Start with Why and it just kind of brings together the whole concept of personal purpose. Um, write down, you know, how that why evolved, you know, make it part of your team conversations. Another great book, that I read recently was, Arnold Schwarzenegger's Be Useful.

And it really pushed me with my vision, particularly for the supported living homes that I want to be building for my son and others. It really pushed me into thinking, you know, out of the comfort zone and thinking bigger. I was only talking to a client this week and he said, I've just got to think bigger. I'm not thinking big enough for this. I'm just like living in my comfort zone and comfort zone's great. And if you want to bob along, that's absolutely fine, but if you want to live a purposeful life then you've got to have a north star, I guess, to make that happen.

STUART INTERRUPT: Hold that thought for a moment, Ian. It's Stuart here. I just got a quick pit stop here for everyone that could really move the needle. If growing your MSP is on your radar, but it feels somehow a bit foggy, a bit difficult to get your arms around the concept, then download our Ultimate MSP Growth Guide because it lays out all of the best support options that are out there in the channel, so you can fast-track what really works for you and make a clear decision. Alternatively, you may be the kind of person that likes to see things up real for yourself in action physically. So why not come to one of our events where you can do exactly that? And we'd love to meet you, so there's just a head up for you down in the show notes that you'll find the links to be able to take the next step. But otherwise, let's get back to the good stuff and back to the show.

IAN: Cheers!

And once you've got that in place and then you start having those conversations with your team and you can go into as much or as little detail as you want, they're going to connect with that. They're going to connect with your vision, your personal vision, the business vision, the values, the people you want to hang around with.

You will become the average of the five people that you hang around with. So if you mope around down the pub with people moaning and groaning about East Enders, other soap operas are available, by the way, perhaps, but not in my house. And, you want to, you know, you want to lift yourself up, you're not going to do it. Hanging around with people who are moaning about the government all the time and moaning them, what they haven't got and why they can't do things and all of that kind of great stuff. Move yourself into some circles where you've got some motivational people, you know, where you've got some inspiring people, you've got some people who've gone outside of their comfort zone. You know, our community with our clients is an amazing example of that. We've got some people who haven't had a holiday for, you know, for 20 years who are now starting to have holidays and having other people turning up in 250,000 pound Bentleys, different ends of the scale. And one are probably looking at the other going, my God, what are you doing with your life? And the others are looking at the other one going, what are you doing with your life? And it all starts with vision. Everything's possible if you've got a vision because you just work out, not can I make this possible? How can I make this possible? And a great sales coach I had back in the day, Matt Elwell, he was amazing at coming up with these the way that you phrase questions like when you're asking for a referral, it's not, do you know anyone? Because if you say, do you know anyone? You close the question down. Who do you know who needs what we do? It's a completely different question. It makes your brain work in a different way. So what do you need to become? Who do you need to become? Who do you need to hang around with? Where are those people that you can then go and get inspired and get energy from? Because who doesn't want to wake up in the morning clicking the heels full of energy, full of life, you know, feeling fit, feeling healthy and ready to conquer the world because life don't get any easier as you get older. And you know, but it's our choice, you know, we are where we are because of who we've become.

So define what wealth, you know, truly means to you. Does it mean you're going to work less on the business and spend time on a Friday having lunch with a wife or the husband? You know, what impact are you going to have on the community giving back? What freedom are you going to have? You know, what relationships are you going to have? Do you want to spend a lot of time with your friends, you know, on holiday, going away on trips, walking up mountains? You know who you are. I know you guys in the north of the country walking up mountains all the time. All I see you do is walking around mountains. I don't know, why, how don't haven even know how you MSPs are functioning and yes, you know who you are. I saw you at an event recently, but it's not just about money, it's about all of the other things that make your life fulfilled. Okay? I'm going to try not to get too deep, but, but you never know with me.

Let's align those profit targets with purpose. You know, we've got things like, you know, the pensions and everything. We want to make sure that we've got the accounts running properly. The reason that you've running the business is to make it more profitable so that you can then have more choice to do what you want to do in the business, and then what you want to do outside of the business. And I want you to treat profit as a fuel for your bigger vision, not the end goal. So profit is your fuel for your big vision. It's not the end goal. It'll be a stepping stone when you come to exit. And it'll be a stepping stone when someone says, here, I'm going to give you a 6, 7, 8, 9 multiplier, or whatever it might be. But that's just going to be a stepping stone to the next part of your life or what that part of your life looks like. Whether, as I say, it's kids through university, it's building that dream house, it's exploring the world, making memories, you know, and having fun with the people that you love, right?

So what the next thing I want you to do is want you to start to build some reflection into your leadership rhythm. We do this very deliberately, um, in the Growth Hub when we meet up for our intensive events and eight week alignments and nobody ever stops in business and looks back at what they've achieved. Gap in the gain is another great book. My God, I'm throwing all the books in today. Really great book about looking at, okay, you've got a vision on where you want to go, but most people measure how far they've got left to go rather than how far they've come. And that's a really important thing to do and to measure it against the plan that you've got to measure it against your KPIs, your quarterly check-ins, your living, your values, are you, are you focusing on your priorities and are you fulfilled in what you are doing? And having that time to stop. And if you say you haven't got time to stop, then you're lying because we've all got the same amount of time in the day. It just depends what we do with it. Prioritisation is the most important thing here, but building that reflection into your leadership rhythm is very very important because that, again, will fuel what you are going to do for the next period oh, wow, look what we achieved last time. Wow. Look what we're going to do next time. Oh my God, this is absolutely fantastic. Let's just keep driving. Let's just keep trucking this forwards.

Finally, you know, I want you to lead with, you know, with transparency, you know, and sharing with people what you are doing. There's no better accountability than sharing with people what you want to try and achieve. And yeah, some people will say, you are never going to do that. You are not going to do this. Why do you want to do that for blah, blah, blah? And that's fine, because you stay in that little length ceiling. You see, I'm sure you've seen these clips on YouTube where they put a load of fleas in a jam jar and the fleas are bouncing up and down and they're banging their heads on the lid of the jam jar. And then after a period of time, I can't remember what it is, they take the lid off the jam jar and they don't bounce out because they've been conditioned, bounce, bounce, bounce. You know, oh, you a flea in a jam jar. That's a great little analogy to make up. You know, are you banging your head on that ceiling? When they take that lid off, they don't bounce. Why not? Because they're being conditioned to do that. And that's when you're going to bump across people where you're going to say, Hey, I'm going to build a swimming pool. I want build this house. I want to do this, I want to achieve this. I want to give back, blah, blah, blah, whatever it might be. And they'll go, you know, the people who go, well, you won't be able to do that. Oh, that's going to be too difficult. Oh, the government will shut that down, yada yada, yada. Those are the people you need to kind of like, either not talk to about what you want to do or move out your life and move into people who say, oh yeah, what you should do is, why don't you connect with this community? Why don't you do this? Why don't you do that? You know, Hey, you could raise some funds doing this and doing that. I was talking to another client the other day and he was saying that he wanted to raise some funds to buy another business slightly different, slightly, not in an MSP space, but, he needed 4 million pounds. He ended up meeting up with this other guy and he sort said, I'm having a trouble. I can't get hold of. You know, it is really difficult to raise 4 million pounds. And he said, dude, yeah, the reason for that is 4 million pounds is quite a small amount of money. He says if you widened your vision and you looked at the bigger thing and you went to go and get 20 million pound, you'll be able to get hold of 20 million pound and could do four. I'm sitting there going, oh my word. This is crazy money. What are you talking about? But this guy was inspired by all of a sudden, he's now building a team of people. Well, if I bought in an MD to do this and I bought an MD to do that, that's going to be a really, really great place to be.

So that's it from me on this episode. I hope you enjoyed it. I hope it resonated with you. So let's take a moment to jot down your why, what does wealth and success really mean to you right now, how can your business help you serve it and not take it away and remember, profit is your fuel. It's not the finish line. Profit's the fuel, it's not the finish line. I hope you enjoyed the show. I'm going to leave you to reflect on that. Enjoy the rest of your day, and I look forward to catching up with you on the next one. Take care now.

NEXT WEEK TEASER: And in next week's show, we've got a real treat for you. We're talking to Gemma Telford from the Archer agency about how you can work with your vendors to release marketing development funds. And if you don't know what that is, it's free money to help you with your marketing while collaborating with your vendors. You don't want to miss it. It's literally free cash, and it's there for you next week. Look forward to seeing you there.

OUTRO: Just before you go, and if you're curious about how this episode links with the ability to scale your MSP to a million or, or if you're already there, accelerate to five, then we want to invite you to come and take the MSP Mastery Quiz. And in just three minutes, you're going to get a 360 degree scan of your business where you can identify the one or two tactics that can help you find more time, engage and align your people, and help generate more leads in your MSP, it's really simple. Just click on the link in the show notes. And if you have enjoyed this episode, we'd love to get some feedback from you by means of a rating review on Spotify or iTunes or your podcast platform of choice. We really appreciate every single one of them. Now you can go and enjoy the rest of your day and we look forward to catching up and connecting with you soon. All the best now.