Being A Responsible Business Leader With Adrian Ghila

I’m excited to have Adrian Ghila here with us. Adrian is the CEO of Luxe RV, which is based in California in the LA area. Adrian is a serial entrepreneur. He has done lots of things. He is also an investor interested in helping other companies that are getting started and looking for help. I’ll have him say more about that.

This episode is one of those awesome ones where we get to pick somebody’s brain and mind for all the golden nuggets that they have, and their real experience growing a seven-figure business. All of you as seven-figure business owners, pay close attention. Let me welcome officially Adrian to the show. Thank you for joining us, Adrian.

Thank you for having me. I want to salute your audience as well. I’m sure if they tune in to your show, they’re serious about growing business and putting a dent or a mark in this world. Salute, everybody.

I love the way that you frame that, “Putting a dent or mark in this world.” I see entrepreneurs like you as creators. You’re out there doing something. You’re making something out of nothing. That’s not like a rags-to-riches comment. It wasn’t there before they put their mark on it and decided to create something. I honor you and all the others here for being that type of person.

I didn’t say this in your intro, but let me say it now. You’re on that Inc. 5000 list. You’re one of those business owners who have figured out how to grow and accelerate that growth. You’ve been in that space for the last couple of years. We’re in this very interesting and unusual time of the COVID-19 pandemic. Who knows how that will play out for the rest of this year?

You’re growing quickly. You figured out how to lead your business in a way that you can grow consistently. I both honor and salute you. I want to start to ask you questions about that. Before we do, I gave a brief intro. Do you want to share a little bit more about your background? You have an interesting background. I’d love for our audience to understand better the person that they’re going to learn from today.

My name is Adrian Ghila. I’m originally from Romania, which is in Eastern Europe. I moved here when I was 23. I did build back in Romania an eight-figure business as well before moving here, and then I wanted a bigger challenge. I wanted something better and bigger. Especially for entrepreneurs, this is the place to be. It is not to say that you can’t do business elsewhere and do business in the States, but this is the place to be.

I moved to the States. I started a couple of companies from retail to service to rentals that I’m managing. Most of my time, it’s Luxe RV. I’ve been in everything from real estate development to retail and services. I have a company that I started during the 2007 and 2008 recession, and I still own it today. It is called Earth Car Wash, a mobile carwash. It was pre-Uber and all the trends that came after. It’s the same mentality. It goes to your house for a full service. It is all organic water-based stuff. I’m pretty experienced in business, generally speaking, being through different areas or categories.

We are very fortunate to be able to learn from all of those businesses that you’ve started and grown. It takes a special person to be able to do all of those things. Luxe RV has your focus. We’ll primarily talk about that. We’re super excited to leverage all the experience that you’ve had as a founder and business owner. Let’s jump into that.

This show is focused on seven-figure business owners who are trying to grow. As you think back to that moment, whether it was for the first time that you crossed that million-dollar mark or the second or third, however many businesses you’ve done that with, think back to the challenges that you didn’t expect to have. You’ve got a business and it has grown. You’ve got some stability, and you’ve figured out how to market and sell. You know how to deliver your product or service consistently. You might feel like you arrived at $1 million-plus, and now there are new challenges that you might have found there. I’d love to have you take us back and remember some of the challenges that you faced after $1 million in revenue that maybe you didn’t expect.

The first thing that comes to my mind when you were asking the question was that up to $1 million, you can be what we call a one-man show solopreneur. You have a couple of people around you, but not a big operation. The biggest challenge I realized over $1 million was that you need a team. You need budgeting. You need to be serious about it. You need all the legal work done properly. It becomes a serious business.

Prior, especially nowadays, you could get around with less seriousness of the business and responsibility. Once you grow over that, depending on what type of business you have, you have employees depending on you and their families. You have all kinds of commitments to all kinds of services including local taxes. You have to understand better your position on the map.

I didn’t know that every city and location offers different advantages for a business, depending on what business you’re in. You start looking for and having the right CPA and the right lawyer beside you. You start looking at all these little details and start realizing that it’s not just a service or a product that you sell or something. It’s more than that. It’s an ecosystem that you want to build. You want to make sure it works and if anything works without you.

You said a lot there. I’d like to unpack some of that. I don’t know if you used these words, but this is what came to my mind. It’s almost like a human being that starts to grow up a little bit. It’s like, “I’ve got this far winging it, going with the flow, or making it happen myself. Now, all of a sudden, I have to be a little bit more mature about it. I got to be a little more intentional.” I don’t know if I’m putting words in your mouth, but that’s what I was hearing from you. Is that accurate?

That is very accurate.

In that process, you mentioned several things. You need a good CPA. You might need some legal help to set up your company properly. You might pay more attention to what municipality or location advantages or considerations there are. There were a lot more things that started to come into your mind about that time. We don’t need to get into the specifics of finding a good CPA or legal help, but I’d like to focus your energy on your own transformation as a leader. That is how you went from you with a few guys or people around you to now more intentionally building a team and trying to lead so that you didn’t have to be involved in the day-to-day. Can you talk to us about that transformation for you?

I learned from experience. I built some businesses prior. I was probably naïve about it. I was too young. I was not paying so much attention. I couldn’t think about the future too much. I just knew I’m going to be successful. As I got a little older, and I did it again, I started educating myself in these areas. I started talking to more people. You can call them mentors if you want to. I was listening to podcasts like yours. You’re doing a fabulous job bringing this information to a younger or starting entrepreneur.

A lot of things come to my mind about that transition. A bank will talk to you differently over a certain number. It’s not just the numbers. They figure out how serious this becomes and how important you become with your brand or company. It is the same thing with the cities. You start having a voice. You should be involved. You should know your area. You should support them, but you should be supported back.

I started talking to all kinds of people, from bankers to the city to accountants at that time. Don’t be afraid when you grow to go to the people that have been growing next to you. It’s not a matter of being loyal or not. It’s a matter of being capable or not of doing the job forward. I read on your website that not a lot of people get to the $1 million mark and go over, and then do not talk about $10 million, $20 million, and up.

Responsible Business Leader: Don’t be afraid when you grow to go to people who have been next to you growing. It’s not a matter of being loyal or not; it’s a matter of being capable or not of doing the job.

You are special and different. Don’t be afraid, at that point, to let go of some of your old teammates. Let’s focus there because it’s a good example. I had an accountant and move to a CPA. There’s nothing wrong with that. Ask them what kind of company sizes they manage. If they do manage larger companies, what is the difference between you and them? How will they approach you over this mark and forward? If they don’t have those types of companies, then it’s normal to be in a smaller branch. Look for a CPA and be upfront with them and say, “I’m growing,” and you need different pants. It’s normal.

I started talking to everybody around me and ask advice. I started talking to people that made it bigger. I’m a big advocate of reading books because I feel like whoever writes a book puts their best into it because you can’t go back and change it. I feel like they will give their best in that. Read books and educate yourself in every department. It depends very much on what type of business you’re in. That’s where I started.

That’s awesome. I have a good friend. You’ll be able to relate to this based on what you said with the books and educating yourself. His name is Clate Mask. He’s the CEO of a company called Keap. It used to be called Infusionsoft. My audience hears me reference him from time to time. He says, “I’m not the CEO today that the company needs me to be twelve months from now.” In other words, as the company continues to grow, the requirements of leading that company change. I’m not ready to be the CEO today that the company is going to need a year from now. He says, “By the time we get there, I will be.” That’s part of his constant commitment to developing himself to be the leader that the company’s going to need to be at that next stage.

I hear you talking about reading lots of books and talking to mentors. You’re doing the work to pour into yourself to be the leader that will enable your company to continue growing. Especially after all the experience you have, we both know your company cannot outgrow you as the leader. At some point, you become the bottleneck. You’re the ceiling. You got to keep pushing yourself. I am sorry for that little segue.

That’s a good one.

I love what you’re talking about when you said, “The accountant that got me to this point might not be the right leader or partner to help me going forward.” You talked about maybe you need to get a CPA instead of an accountant or a higher-level CPA if you already had a CPA. I love that. Did you find anything like that internally with your internal team as well?

100%. I changed my teams all the time. Some of them you outgrow, and it’s normal. You have to be upfront. It’s nothing bad with being who you are. If you have a goal or you have a destination and the other teammates might not see themselves to that same destination or are not capable to make it there, you have to let them go. You don’t have to fire them. You can give them different projects, move them around, put them on different tasks, or even write a letter of recommendation. Give them a three months severance package. Help them find something else. It’s normal.

When you start a business, there’s a lot of emotion involved, generally speaking, especially if you’re a beginner. With time, it becomes more of a strategy. You have to realize that at one point. Think about an analogy like, “This is a train.” It might be a joke in the beginning. If it starts, you can stop. You can do whatever. There is not much to lose. Once you start it and you go to that next level, you can’t stop it. You have a lot of responsibilities. People depend on you. Customers depend on you. You have to be aware of how many people depend on you. You can’t let them down. You have to keep growing.

If something doesn’t work, change it. It’s normal. There are no hard feelings in business, generally speaking. You have to be fair. That always has to be given. There are no hard feelings about letting teammates go. You can’t have the same employee. If we talk about a few years back, was it $8, $9, or $10 an hour? When you start, you’re going to pay them at a minimum. You can’t tell me that person or the son became a $30 or $40 an hour guy. By nature, it wouldn’t work.

I will disagree with whomever unless they are a couple of founders and are all super qualified to take to the next level. Other than that, I’m sure everybody can relate to hiring employees that are as cheap as possible and as qualified as possible for that position, but there’s no way they’ll manage a multi-million dollar company.

From a business standpoint, usually, we’re looking for the lowest cost way to meet the need. When we do that, the company and the need grow in that spot. If we’re not good at developing people fast enough, they’re not going to be ready to go where you’re trying to go next. You do have to make those changes. I love that you’re saying let’s be fair. Let’s treat people well. We don’t have to treat people poorly in this process. If you outgrow somebody, then you’re going to have to move them to another seat if there’s another one available. You’re going to help them find something that’s good for them outside your company.

It happens in the natural process of your company’s development and business growth. Sometimes, you’re going to outgrow people. Unfortunately, sometimes, it’s going to be a friend or even a family member that could hold you back if you’re not willing to make some of those important decisions to help your company forward. I love the lessons learned there. Thank you for sharing those.

When you made the shift from pretty much you were the leader to now you’ve got a larger company, maybe the team has grown to 10, 15, or 20 people. How did you take that step towards having other leaders be involved in your business? Was that challenging? What did you find as the best practice for bringing on leaders that you didn’t know before?

It was very challenging, for me at least, because it’s your baby. It’s hard to let it go and trust that somebody else will do what you’re doing. For me, I learned from my mistakes of trying to do everything myself. It was a mistake, and I will admit that forever. You have to delegate. When it comes to delegation and people, first of all, especially when you can’t afford to pay that, you have to hire people that are better than you in that department. You have to realize what you are good at. We’re good at everything. As an entrepreneur, you do everything. You wear all the hats. Your job is to fire yourself from all those positions and get to the one that is the most efficient.

Responsible Business Leader: As an entrepreneur, you wear many hats. Your job is to fire yourself from all those positions and get to the one where you’re the most efficient.

If you like yourself and you think you are the best at everything, you’re probably going to stay at some smaller level. It was hard for me to realize and trust that I have to get people better than me in some departments. I have to trust that what they say and do will be better for the company than what I will do, and I will use my time more efficiently where I’m good at.

It took time. You have to find somebody that convinces you and has a record of doing a better job than you. Let’s say marketing, management of people, HR, or anything like that. We have a lot of qualities. An entrepreneur is a special person. We have a lot of qualities. We can do a lot of things and outwork most people, but we can’t say we’re the best at everything. Figure out who you are, hire the people first around you that will complete those gaps where you’re not as good, and then delegate. For delegation, I don’t know if you want to stop me here and talk because delegation is one of my favorite subjects or whatnot. It’s a misunderstood fact in business.

I don’t know that I want to stop you while you’re on a roll, but I do want to point out that I love what you said about your job is to get yourself out of each of all of the hats that you wear if you want to keep growing. You see yourself as being a capable entrepreneur who can figure things out, which most of us do as entrepreneurs. I’ve spent my life figuring things out. I learn stuff. I do it. I figure it out.

Because of that, we see ourselves as so capable. It’s hard to think that somebody else might be able to take one of those things for us and run with it, much less do something better than we did. I love that you’re talking about working yourself out of the job in each of those hats. Let’s dive in. I love that you have this passion for the idea of delegating. Let’s talk about what to do and what not to do when delegating from your experience.

Let me add something. When you get to the point where you hire somebody else in the department that you want them to run it and be out of your hands, don’t try to be the boss. I’ve seen this a lot and do this too. Don’t try to control that from an interview standpoint all the way to hiring and training this person. If you want somebody to run that department, give them the opportunity to show you they can run it, then give them the respect to let them run it.

A lot of us will come from a very protective position. We’re going to be on their back all the time from the interview standpoint. We’re going to try to say that we’re better than them and convince us. How would I tell them to convince me when you’re the professor? Let them be who they are. Empower them if you think that they’re right for that position to prove to you that they can do it, and then to do it. Otherwise, you’ll set up a standard that might not be as high as their capability. That’s not going to be smart for you. Let them set up the standard because they’re supposed to be the experts.

I love that. Why artificially constrain what you could get from that person with your standard if their standard is even higher? That’s really good.

As far as delegation, I don’t know if it’s my favorite, but the reason I like this subject is that it’s misunderstood, especially nowadays when it’s trendy to be an entrepreneur. Everybody’s cool. Everybody is an entrepreneur. If you look at Instagram, everybody has an entrepreneur title doing whatever. A major part of this is a problem with the money that we have on the market now, the VCs, the Angel investors, and all this money they pour into these young entrepreneurs.

It’s cool to have a couple of assistants upfront with this person, like a personal assistant. The manager has an assistant himself because they have all this money that they raise, and they’re planning to raise more money in the future. They go on the delegation and say, “Anything under your pay rate, you should delegate.” All these little jobs that I mentioned, and there are a few of them that come to my mind, you should delegate, like the $10 or $20 an hour, because you make $50, $200, or $1,000 an hour. You delegate all these jobs.

We’re still talking about that million mark or a few million marks. As a young entrepreneur, you spend all this money on being cool, having this environment, and a nice office. Yet, you copy-paste a policy agreement that you should have on your website. You don’t hire a $600-an-hour lawyer because you didn’t budget that in. You only budget what’s cool. Who’s Steve Jobs? Who’s Mark Zuckerberg and all these people that have set up a standard for younger entrepreneurs?

I took a number on a very general idea. That one will be adjusted as needed based on the business. I said, “If you are not a $5 million a year business, never delegate anything under your pay rate. That’s including you, your managers, maybe co-founders, shareholders, and whatnot. Never delegate. Do that yourself. Go get your own coffee. Print something yourself. Take all those savings from all those $20-an-hour jobs, and put them not into a $200-an-hour lawyer or into software for that online.

Go get the best lawyer for $600 an hour or $1,000 an hour. Pay him because if something hits you later when you are at the $2 million, $3 million, $5 million, or $10 million mark and all eyes are on you, and you make mistakes, the fines that you’re going to get from that and the mistakes that you could have prevented by hiring the right people is going to cost you tremendously. It’s more than you ever think, maybe even your entire business, not to mention your position. I’m sure you and I know a number of people that have been fired from their own companies.

Be serious about it. Don’t try to be cool because you didn’t put a dent yet. Be cool over $300 million or $400 million a year. That’s when I’ll respect somebody for being cool. Do them yourself, take all these savings, and put them into the right CPA, the right business advisors, and the right lawyers around you. That’s going to make you so much more money back. It’s going to give you so much more peace of mind that all the other little things that you have to do around you are normal. They don’t make you dumb by putting your own coffee or answering the phone. It’s part of the process and the growth.

That’s great stuff there. If I recap that for people to underscore it for the audience, what you’re saying is it’s trendy to say, “Don’t spend any of your time on tasks that should be done by a lower-cost resource.” Anything less than your maximum billable rate, you shouldn’t spend time on that kind of stuff. You should spend time on the highest-value things.

You picked $5 million for purposes of your comment, but for some more sizable point, there’s certainly no shame in doing all of those tasks still yourself. The balance here is let’s not forget what you were done talking about getting yourself out of the hats. You still want to hire people that can take stuff off your plate, but you don’t want to be too good to do anything.

You still do stuff, but we want to make sure that we’re focused on putting the money toward the resources that are going to help our business move forward. That’s the CPA, the business advisor, or the legal help. It is things that they would normally say, “I can’t afford.” Spend some time doing the things that you can afford so that you can save up some money for some of those higher-value services. Did I get that?

That’s exactly what I’m saying. It comes hand-in-hand. If you have a marketing manager, pay him right and hire the right one. If you pay a front desk person more than an office manager, and these people pretty much do the same thing or whatnot, you wasted $40 an hour. When you hire a marketing manager and don’t have the money for it so you got to budget him down to $60,000 a year instead of paying him $120,000 a year and make sure that guy is amazing for your company, that’s exactly where the mistake comes in. That’s my point.

Most businesses don’t look at their legal status or how the business is legally structured. They don’t understand that either. You’ll be surprised at what numbers I talk to people and they have no idea what they signed or they get themselves into when it comes to a shareholder agreement, raising money, getting a loan from a bank, budgeting the company, or having the cash flow. They have no idea. They take it from the left and give it to the right. Hopefully, there’s something left for them. It’s unbelievable to me. Some of them might have great qualities that got them there, but they might not be the best at the financials.

Hiring a CFO is important too. You can hire a part-time one. You can hire a full-time one. You can outsource that. Nobody pays attention to that because they want to have this environment around them that they think is right and cool, and it gives them inspiration. Business is more than having fun. It’s very serious.

Although it’s cool and all that stuff, what people don’t realize is your responsibilities, how many people depend on you, and how many families are fed by this company. You have to keep those jobs and give them a better life. You have to make a better example for younger kids or younger entrepreneurs. You have to make your city better and your state better. You have to keep growing. A lot of people don’t look at it like that. They look at it as cool and fun. It’s a couple of people and then it looks cool.

Responsible Business Leader: Business is more than just having fun. It’s very serious. People don’t realize your responsibilities, how many people depend on you, and how many families are fed by the company.

I’ve been part of the companies personally with people. I’ve been to bigger companies like Google and Apple. They tried to recreate that environment, and we raised money very fast. It’s so easy to spend somebody else’s money. You don’t understand how you dilute your own shares and what value you have left in that company. This is the sad part. This is where entrepreneurs make mistakes in growing a business and getting into a business. They wake up ten years later and they have a small chunk of a company that may or may not succeed.

It’s super interesting because I’ve seen that too. Once you have somebody else’s money, your mentality shifts. You spend differently. I know that’s a side point. You were talking a lot about the delegating point. It’s super valuable what you’ve shared. Once you have somebody else’s money, it’s easy to think and spend differently. You then start messing up your shares.

You have a ton of wisdom. I want to get as much more as we can out of this conversation here in the last little bit that we have left. I’m going to have you think about your journey as you went through the process of delegating. You talk about this differently than other guests I’ve had, so I want to pick this apart a little bit more. You have this new level of responsibility as a business owner once you get to a certain size, scale, or scope.

I hear you reference it again and again. You’re responsible for the families of the employees. You’re responsible to customers and stakeholders. You’re responsible to the community or the city. There’s this ecosystem that you described that is relying on the decisions you’re making at the helm of this company. When did that transition happen for you? How do you step into those shoes? That’s an important thing that you’re highlighting that most people don’t talk about.

Luckily, I learned that at a very young age. My parents used to own a bunch of convenience stores in Romania. They are much like 7-Eleven nowadays. I was interested in the business. I was always going with my dad, helping him out, and learning about it. It felt good for me. The moral comes from him because he is one of those guys that is the last one to eat. He wants to take care of everybody else before he puts anything in his pocket. That’s what comes to my mind. That’s where it’s coming from.

As I grew and I started my own businesses and my own family, the responsibilities got bigger. I had failures too. That added to it because when you have failures, then you feel powerless of helping as many people as you wanted to help. That probably reinforces. It started at a young age. It’s important to realize that what could be for you a trial, for somebody else, it might be a living and a full-on career. You don’t want to mess with that. What I’m talking about is the system around you, including the city. Everybody depends on your good being or goodwill.

Think about it as you have your customers. Let’s say you have plenty of customers and one of them is not serious. You lost him. That was part of your projections and maybe part of your budget. You can see how if big companies get hurt, the whole world gets hurt, especially in America. We’re talking about Amazon, Apple, Google, and these big companies. You see how the stock market can get hurt because of them. Because of all these American companies, everybody else gets caught.

That’s how serious it is, but people don’t realize that because they can take it as a joke. Imagine Google, Amazon, Whole Foods, Ralph’s, and Tesla taking this as a joke. It will impact our lives more than we ever thought of. You have to put value on yourself and your company. You have to respect that and respect the image that you project out. That’s when all the responsibilities come into place like paying your taxes.

We’re all young entrepreneurs. We all try to save on taxes. We’re not saying we’re going to go and happily give our money away. If you are in a position where you can and you understand where the money is going and how they’re benefiting you back, then you’re more than just a dreamer. We’re all dreamers at the beginning, but then the dream becomes a reality. When it becomes a reality, it comes with big responsibilities on our backs. From what I understand, this is your point. Getting to that mark, some of us will make it. The point is from there on, what are we made out of? That’s where you prove that you are made for bigger companies and challenges than just making some money or some cool product.

I’m as authentic as I can be. I believe that people recognize that in me. I also try not to be offensive. As I talk to you, your English is good. You’ve already shared it with us. It’s clear you come from another language. You come from Romania. I’m going to share a word that many people in the United States don’t know, but you described it perfectly for me and my understanding of the word. You probably know it because you’re well-read. The word is stewardship.

I believe that the stewardship that you’re describing, where you go from thinking about yourself as a business owner and how the business serves your dreams to now one of being a citizen or a part of a larger thing or a larger ecosystem of the impact that your business has and is part of. That responsibility or that stewardship is not to be taken lightly. I love the way you’re describing how important it is for you as a business owner to take it seriously, that your decisions have an impact on a lot of people, and the way that you run your business has an impact on a lot of people.

How cool is it that we can create a business that is of concern or that has an impact and that we can be responsible stewards of that asset or vehicle called the business? This is cool stuff. Thank you for allowing us to share some of the things and the hard-earned lessons that you’ve earned over the years as you’ve started and run several businesses. I’ve enjoyed our time together.

Can you give us the best way to connect with you if people want to learn more about you or if they happen to be in California or the surrounding areas and want to rent a luxury RV from somebody? I know of no better person than to send them to you. Let’s help people connect with you. How would they do that?

On a personal level, it would be AdrianGhila.com. That is my personal website. For RVs, it’s LuxeRVRental.com.

LuxeRVRental.com is the business we’ve talked about in this episode. Adrian, as a serial entrepreneur, has had other businesses as well. You can connect with his personal website at AdrianGhila.com. Do you have any other parting words of wisdom for our seven-figure business owners who are looking to grow?

Due to the times with COVID-19 and the scare about the up-and-coming recession possibly, the only thing I will say to people out there is this will probably be the greatest wealth transfer. What I mean by that is I mean from big companies, states, and the government. It’s unbelievable. This money will be put back into the market. This is going to be the biggest opportunity. It may probably be even better than 2008 for most entrepreneurs. To whoever is tuning in, be very positive about this. Think about how you’re going to impact from here on and how you’re going to grow because the opportunity is going to be tremendous. I don’t know if we’re ever going to meet this in our lifetime.

I’m positive. I’m working towards passing the COVID-19. I wish everybody good health and everything. From a business perspective, I’m planning every single day after this and especially this summer and afterward because I think the opportunities will be tremendous for smaller companies, which is the audience that you described. You guys stay positive. Be ready for tremendous opportunities coming out. Stay home, educate yourself, and prepare yourself. Work on the next business plan, put all the details together, see your pluses and minuses, and see where you can fit in. Take advantage of the situation because it will be tremendous.

Those are very sound words of advice. I feel like I could spend the rest of the day talking with you and your tremendous business mind. Thank you for spending time with us on our episode.

Thank you so much for having me.

Important Links

• Luxe RV
• AdrianGhila.com