Episode 1603: Interview with Phillip Cantrell Author of Failing My Way to Success

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Scott Maderer: [00:00:00] Thanks for joining us on episode 1,603 of the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

Phillip Cantrell: I'm Philip Cantrell. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent, and your treasures to live out your calling. Having the ability to recognize that real success is found in serving others.

Not yourself is key, and one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this The Inspired Stewardship Podcast with my friend Scott Mader.

What you leave behind that counts is the impact that you make on other people's lives. And, and I sat down one day and I figured this out. You know, we're in the real estate business. We sell real estate, you know, land, commercial, [00:01:00] residential, whatever.

Scott Maderer: Welcome and thank you for joining us on the Inspired Stewardship Podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent, and your treasures for your true caller in the Inspired Stewardship Podcast who will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others, and develop your influence so that you.

Can impact the world.

In today's podcast episode, I interview Philip Kentrell. I ask Philip about how to view significance and success. I also asked Philip about legacy and what it means to him, and Philip also shares with you how to shift your mindset. I have a great book that's been out for a while now called Inspired Living.

[00:02:00] Assemble the Puzzle of your Calling by Mastering your Time, your Talent, and your Treasures. You can find out more about that book over@inspiredlivingbook.com. It'll take you to a page where there's information and you can sign up to get some mailings about it, as well as purchase a copy there. I'd love to see you get a copy and share with me how it impacted your world.

For over 42 years, Philip led teams, built businesses and navigated the constantly evolving world of real estate and business management as the founder and CEO of Benchmark Realty, LLC, what began in 2006 as a single office in Franklin, Tennessee as grown into one of the region's most respected real estate brokerages, now operating across middle Tennessee, Southern Kentucky, and northern Alabama.

His leadership approach is shaped by hands-on experience, not only as an executive, but as a top producing real estate agent who has personally walked the path. He now helps others [00:03:00] navigate along the way. Philip also led operations and sales teams in the commercial printing industry, adding depth to his business perspectives across multiple sectors.

Philip is also the author of Failing My Way to Success Lessons from 42 Years of Winning. And losing in business released in July of 2025. In that book, he shares the candid lessons that only experience can teach. Welcome to the show, Philip. Thank you Scott. I'm glad to be here. I appreciate you having me on board.

Absolutely. I look forward to our conversation today. So I talked a little bit about, in the intro about some of the work you've done as a a founder and there in Franklin working. Several different businesses. I, I know from talking to you earlier, we'll talk some about that today. And I look forward to talking to you about your new book as well.

Failing My Way to Success, and that kind of brings me to the point. I think intros are always kinda like Instagram photos. They show part of the [00:04:00] picture, but they never show the whole story. A hundred

Phillip Cantrell: percent. Yeah.

Scott Maderer: Take people back in time. Why? Why are you feeling called to share this message about failing your way to success?

What, what happened to get you to this point in your life?

Phillip Cantrell: Uh, it's been a journey for sure. Uh, you know, it began in the commercial printing business and industry. If you know anything about it, it's, it is really cutthroat. It's, um, that's where I learned to be efficient, client focused. Either that or you don't survive.

It's that simple. Taught me about operations, sales, leadership, how to operate under pressure, and also taught me, uh, that industries can become stagnant. If leadership refuses to adapt. That realization has stayed with me forever, really. And it as I transitioned into real estate, I realized that the way they were doing things in this industry didn't really make a lot of sense.

So I wanted to do things differently. I started out as a top producing, uh, real estate agent, but, uh, couldn't ignore the. Outdated and [00:05:00] sometimes dysfunctional business practices or brokerage models within the industry. So in, in 2006, I founded Benchmark Realty, which is kind of the capstone company, uh, with the goal of building something different, uh, something rooted in transparency and fairness, uh, and and support for all those around us.

And never imagined honestly that it would ever grow into operation that, that. It is currently selling about $5 billion worth of real estate annually. But it has and because we put people first and we challenge the status quo, and now I'm in the season of advising and giving back, I guess through mentoring, uh, writing, speaking, uh, I'm trying to pass along the lessons I've learned the hard way, trying to pass along some of the scar tissue I've learned and to help others avoid, uh.

Unnecessary detours and the pain that I experienced, and it's kind of interesting, I'm finding that the largest recipient of that information is the millennial generation. Sure. The, you know, gen X [00:06:00] is probably not old enough yet to realize what they don't know. Uh, millennials are now hitting that 38 to 42 age range, and they're realizing, oh my gosh, I need a mentor.

I need to figure out where this stuff works or where this stuff lands, or I'm gonna have a problem. It's been a really receptive audience. To be clear, I'm still involved in helping run Benchmark Realty. Um, we do have a great leadership staff, but I'm, I'm the guy that they come to and say, Hey, I need a head check.

You know? Mm-hmm. And I, I enjoy that very much. So that's kind of the journey, kind of the story, really the basics of it.

Scott Maderer: You know, the book is called Failing My Way to Success, and you just kind of mentioned. Two businesses, one very successful now and, and then the printing industry as well. Talk a little bit more about your business journey and what has been your journey with success and failure in business.

Phillip Cantrell: Yeah, so, uh, in the book I talk about this actually, and, and in and in put it in sporting team terms, you know, win loss ties, although. There are no ties in [00:07:00] football anymore. But and I have managed or controlled or founded 10 separate businesses in my career. Um, that's a lot of different businesses, but it's only in two industries.

So it's not like I've been jumping around from industry to industry. And in terms of win loss tie ratio, I'm I'm running a four, four and two record. So four wins, four losses, and two ties, which actually in business is probably be considered a. Loss. So yeah, so 19 years in commercial printing, uh, got into that because that was the family business.

Uh, not family company, but family industry. Uh, and my dad and I started a commercial printing company in, uh, 1982. And we sold that company in 88. Learned a lot about partnerships along the way. I talk about that a lot in the book about being very careful who you choose as a partner, uh, is critically important that it's some, that your partner's got your back, that you're both rowing in the same direction.

[00:08:00] Uh, we sold that company in 88. And, um, I went on to work for other commercial printing companies at the time. I worked for the acquiring firm for a little while, but that just wasn't a good compatibility. So I didn't last long there, uh, moved on to another company. But the, uh. The main thing about commercial printing, as I said, you know, in the, kind of the initial comments there, is that it's a brutal, it's a brutal industry.

You're considered a profit leader at 3% net on the bottom line, and, and the average is only one and a half percent net. Profit, that's an incredible amount of work and effort. You're working, you know, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and the plant did run 24 hours a day, seven days a week. For not much money.

For not much money. So it just didn't really make a lot of sense. It's a commoditized product you know, and, and it is customary in that industry to slit your competitor's throat for a few cents per thousand. [00:09:00] I, of course didn't do that. I would never do something like that, but it was common in the industry and you learn how to deal with it.

So you either grow up fast or you become roadkill in that industry. And that's where I cut my business teeth. So when you're in an environment like that, you either grow or die. And I chose to flourish and grow, but realizing that it was a strain in a constraint. So, mm-hmm. Honestly, as early as 88, I began, uh, began investing in rehab investment properties.

You know, they call that flipping now, but that's A-H-G-T-V invented term. So we, uh, we, I started investing in those on the side, and I'm, I'm a heck of a trim carpenter. Not the highest and best use of my talents, but I can sure do it. But, you know, I'm, I started that business, uh, on the side, moving into the properties, working on 'em nights and weekends.

Doing most of the work myself, and then realized that I needed to spin that off into a separate business with a full staff. So I was running two parallel careers. Mm-hmm. Uh, commercial printing [00:10:00] leadership as well as, uh, rehab investing company and, and then in, uh, I guess it was, uh, Y 2K. Year 2000, I said, we got we gotta break this off and pick a boat, get on the canoe, or stay on the dock, choose one.

And I chose to get in the canoe and paddle like heck. So the rest is, as they say, is, uh, is history as far as real estate goes. Made a lot of sense. When I got in this business, I looked around and I said, I am not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but the way you guys are doing business makes no sense to me at all.

So I brought the business principles that I have learned in, in, uh, commercial printing and applied them in real estate and. By golly, they work. You know, you, because business principles are universal, right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So, you know, you just have to think outside the box. And that's one thing that a lot of folks kinda get tunnel vision when they're in an industry.

And this is going down a real rabbit trail here, but it's one of my hot [00:11:00] buttons. You know, they, they get tunnel vision. They say, well, it's always been done that way in our industry. So it must always be done that way in our industry. I'm gonna encourage her to, uh, to tell people to look outside your industry for best practices.

Mm-hmm. Um, there are things that, you know, okay, so it's widgets, it's not real estate, but business precepts are universal. And I talk about this in the book quite a bit actually, that, uh. You really can learn a lot if you just raise your head up and look around and listen to podcasts like this one, uh, where you can learn from other people who have, have traveled the journey before.

Scott Maderer: Well, and I think that's one of the values too, of, of finding mentors, coaches mastermind groups where there's people from other industries. What, there's different ways you can do it, but the Yes, the concepts, you know, books, all of that podcast. But that idea of you've got to be. Getting input sometimes from people that don't seem like they would be a good fit, you know, in [00:12:00] terms of they, they aren't necessarily the person that's done the exact same job as you, but sometimes they'll ask the question that everybody in the industry doesn't ask that question because it's obvious, and then they ask it.

You go. Huh. You know? Yeah. That is a

Phillip Cantrell: good question. Sometimes industries become, and pardon the expression here, but sometimes industries become inbred. They become so accustomed to singing to the choir that they ignore the congregation and, you know, that's, that's a. Probably a bad analogy, but you know, you have to get outside the box.

Mm-hmm. You have to cross pollinate. That's probably a good way to put it. Cross pollinate. And and part of that is, number one, developing a mindset of being constantly curious. Uh, why, why are we doing it this way? You know, the last thing you ever wanna. Here as a business owner in response to why are we doing this way?

Is because we've always done it that way. Those are bad words. So getting outside the box and being constantly [00:13:00] curious and reading a lot. I mean, I probably read, uh, 50 books a year. I'm a big walker. So I do a lot of walking and I, instead of music, I always have a, a podcast or a book or something in my ear that's teaching me and learning me in, in invariably I can learn something from somebody else and I'll keep doing that till the till the Lord calls behind.

Scott Maderer: So speaking of that, one of the other things that I like to highlight is the intersection between our, our faith journey, our life journey the business we're in, you know, the way we think about the world and how those are related. So would you share a little bit about how, how your faith has affected your business and vice versa?

Oh, absolutely. Uh, well,

Phillip Cantrell: they're, they're. Inextricably linked. And anybody who says they aren't is fooling themselves. And I just a little history, I was raised Southern Baptist still am actually. But growing up I had a drug problem. [00:14:00] My mother drug us to church every time the doors were open. And, uh during college, I kind of drifted off as most people do when they, I went to a small private Christian school and once I got to college, I kind of went wild.

Came home, started the business, tried to get my life back on track, seemed to be doing okay. Um, married a, a girl who was a, a Catholic. Uh you know, I was Southern Baptist and Catholic. So that part in the Bible about being, uh, an equally yoked, uh, it's true. You've gotta make sure that you're appropriately yoked to the right party.

Yeah. But then, uh, eventually I, that ended in divorce, obviously, as it never should have happened to begin with. And then I returned to the church, and now I'm pretty active in, uh Clearview Baptist Church over here. You know, my faith has always been a quiet under curtain undercurrent, I guess is the best way to phrase it.

And it's everywhere. Everything I do I don't [00:15:00] go for flashy. I don't go for performative. We're warned specifically in the Bible about the Pharisees and their public prayers and, and their thumping their chest and saying, look at me. So we have to be really careful about that, but it's foundational and everything.

I mean, it's given me the endurance to keep going when business world got brutal. When the deals fell apart or when I had to make difficult calls as a leader that impacted other people's lives. I mean, it's fundamental in you include your faith beliefs into that process. And it's reminded me to treat people as individuals with their own stories and with their own struggles, not just as producers or problems to fall solve or workplaces, uh, sorry, profit centers to fix, you know?

It helped me balance justice with mercy and, and truth and grace and all of that is because of my faith journey, and ultimately it's reframed my. My idea of success and my belief is that it's not about what I accomplish, but [00:16:00] how I serve and who I became along the way. Um, mm-hmm. You know, one more thing I can't emphasize this enough, really, is that the importance of humility and avoiding hubris is faith-based.

And it is critical to being successful in business and critical to serving others. I mean, every single time. Every single time I've become enamored with my own talents and success, the Lord knocked me to my knees. Literally every single time I got the big head, I was blindsided by some event that blew my legs out from underneath me.

And that happens every single time. So it's critical. It's critically important.

Scott Maderer: Mm-hmm. When you think about you know, significance and success and the, the way we look at 'em, you know, often so many folks. Look at success in business. First off, people will look at someone like you now who has a very successful business, and they go, oh, you know, they got lucky.

You know, you know, they, [00:17:00] or, or they must have done something unethical or they, they had to have done something wrong to have gotten where they are. They took advantage of other people. They. They did things that maybe they weren't supposed to do. You know, what, what's your answer to folks that kind of see folks that have been, you know, gotten to a place where, at least from a worldly view, people would say they're successful and what that looks like for 'em.

Phillip Cantrell: Yeah, that's, uh, that's interesting. And I, I, again, I'm, I'm sorry I keep calling out the book, but I talk about this in the book and, and the overnight successes that people seem to be enamored with in the media today. You know, uh, whether it's in their career or in business, or whether it's in their career in whatever industry, it seems like somebody pops up and all of a sudden they're suddenly famous.

But if you, if you peel back the layers on that, it's like peeling back an onion, right? Uh, if you peel back the layers on that, you realize that. That's, uh, overnight success after 20 years of hard work. Mm-hmm. Uh, or 30 years of hard [00:18:00] work, in my case, 42 years of hard work. Um, so, you know, I see it, but I make zero apologies for it because I have literally worked my fingers to the bone to get where, where I am today.

But what I try to do. It's helped people understand how all this fits together. Uh, you know, when, honestly, when I was younger, I, I, I too focused on winning. I focused on the winners. I thought nothing else matters. I chased the metrics as it were, sales goals, office growth, revenue. And to be fair, we hit a lot of 'em because of the intensity with which I focused on it.

But, you know, as I got older and took a few more hard knocks. I realize that those accomplishments don't satisfy for long. Money is a false God. Uh, if you chase the money, you will not be satisfied for very long. A true success. It has less to do with a scoreboard and more to do with the impact that you're making on others' lives.

Now I define success today. I define it purely by the lives I've touched. The agents who built [00:19:00] great careers because of benchmark. The young leaders I've mentored mentored, sorry, my southern accent. Yeah. They'll figure it out. Yeah. If somebody comes to me and says, you help me believe in myself again, then that for me is significance.

That's a win. That's what we're doing this for, and that's what lasts. You know, money is nothing more than the scoreboard, the measure of your success to others, period. Plain and simple. Focus on the service and the money will always take care of itself. So, you know, John Maxwell is one of my mentors, and one of the things he says is that you can have signe success by yourself, but significance takes others.

Scott Maderer: That's right. And you know That's right. I think you're kind of saying your own version of Yeah, that too. It's, it's significance by definition. Can't be. Had all by yourself. That's right. That's right. And you know, that's what

Phillip Cantrell: we leave behind. Because you know, it was the old saying, you know, how much did, uh, [00:20:00] so and so leave when he leave behind?

When he died? How much money did so and so leave behind when he died? The answer is all of it. Yep. You know what you leave behind that counts. Is the impact that you make on other people's lives. And, and you know, I sat down one day and I figured this out. You know, we're in the real estate business. We sell real estate land, commercial, residential, whatever.

And in the 17 years of the history of, uh, benchmark Realty, we have managed handles processed, had our hands on a hundred thousand transactions. Okay, so let's do some math here. You've got at least one buyer and one seller. You've got at least one buyer, one buyer agent, and one listing agent typically.

Okay, so suddenly you're at 400,000 lives that have been impacted. Then you figure out the families of those, and then the families of those, and the, and the the mortgage guys and the home inspectors and the title guys, and the, you just multiply [00:21:00] that out and you're looking at that a hundred thousand transactions in 17 years of just.

Putting your head down and going to work foot worrying about the rest of it. What have you got? Well, you've got millions of lives potentially that have been impacted. That's your legacy, not the dollars in your bank account. And that's what you gotta focus on. How much more can I impact people with what I'm doing on a daily basis?

And, uh, staying focused on that, even when times are tough. And I believe it's your faith that helps you keep focused on that when the times are tough, when you're faced down in the dirt. And, uh, talked about this too, you know, you get the success in business deals with a day-to-day mundane. It's not in the great swinging from the trapeze.

It's not for the great accolades. It's the staying comfortable in the dirt with a mundane day-to-day tasks and the interment inner incremental improvements that we make as we go through the journey that has the greatest impact. And you [00:22:00] look up one day like I have, and you're saying, oh my gosh, this is cool.

Scott Maderer: This is really cool. You know, one of the things that I've seen from a lot of entrepreneurs is, you know, there's, there's kind of an interesting dynamic that I've seen in the entrepreneurial spirit and to some extent it's necessary and to another set. It's dangerous and I wanna hear your take on it.

And it's the fact that entrepreneurial minded people have a tendency to look at every situation as if it's gonna work out the best way possible. You know, they, they hope, hope springs eternal and you know, every, every situation. Right. Which, again, to some extent, that's a good thing. And then there's also a downside to that.

What is your take on folks that are out there in business and that balance between always having that moment of yeah, it's gonna work out. And also tempering that with. The reality of, [00:23:00] but it doesn't always work out, well, I mean, was one of the boxers, Mike Tyson said everybody has a plan until they get hit in the mouth.

Phillip Cantrell: Hit in the mouth, yeah. And, you know, that's kind of, uh, that's kind of how business is and that's kind of how life is actually. I mean, you know, life is a, or business is a microcosm of life. But just to be clear, you have to believe in yourself. Mm-hmm. You have to believe in your own capabilities. If you, if you have a self-image issue, if you have a self-doubt question, you need to stop and go fix that.

Um, because that will be, that will sabotage most of what you do. Now, there is a difference in self-confidence and hub. Hu hubris is arrogance, you know, borders on arrogance. So you have to temper that, but you do have to be self-confident and you have to be willing to, uh, to get back up. You know, the guy who wins is, or the gal who wins is the one that gets up, gets back up one more time, and they got knocked down.

So it's [00:24:00] really. It's really that simple to me, um, you know, I, early on in the career, I saw the setbacks as personal failures. I internalized them, proof that I wasn't good enough and didn't try hard enough and something was wrong with me. But, you know, over time I started to understand that those setbacks were simply part of the process.

They're like mile markers right on the road to wisdom. And wisdom is where is the land of success? Now when something goes sideways, the first thing I I do is I stop. I pause and I ask, what is this lesson here to teach me? And the mindset, mindset shift from judgment to curiosity is key. And that's what I'm talking about here.

It's helped me more, lead more calmly, reco, recover faster and help others do the same around me. Because you know, if you're a leader. People are following you. They're, they're watching what you're doing. They're watching your reaction. And many times when something, [00:25:00] um, negative, catastrophic, or hits you really hard from left field, other people are looking to you to say, okay, how is he reacting?

And what shall I do? How shall I follow? And that's key. You just gotta remain calm. Take a deep breath, okay, this stinks, but how am I gonna react to it? And what am I, what do I need to learn from this? And how do I need to modify my processes in my business so that when the next time this happens, I've got an automatic piece of paper I can pull out and say, okay, this is what we did last time.

This worked, worked this time. And it's about

Scott Maderer: control, so there you go. What other mindsets have you seen as kind of a shift from your early days in business to today that you think are vital for folks to have success and significance? I think, I think

Phillip Cantrell: the more, the older I get, and I think this probably has to do more with birthdays than business expense business experience.

Uh, the more birthdays you have, the more you realize to [00:26:00] think that you've got more time behind you than you have in front of you. So you have to be, that you have to begin setting your scenarios up or setting your organizations up so that they're not dependent on you. And I, again, I've. Let's be honest, Scott, I have made every mistake that's possible to be made in the world of business.

Uh and not all of them that I recover well from. Um, but most of them, over time, I have learned to accumulate that knowledge, put it in the memory bank and realize that, okay, I can employ that somewhere else. But walking mid-level careers, lower level careers, people tend to see to walk with their eyes on their feet.

And at my age, my stage, I have learned to walk. With our eyes on the horizon to look out there, to try to be strategic in the path that you choose so that you don't hit every pothole in the road. That, that's a key thing. I mean, it's, [00:27:00] and that was a hard one because I was a go, go, go, go type A, if you've ever done this chart stuff.

High D like off the chart, high D, that was me. Wanting to direct, wanting to control, wanting to be in charge. I think we talked about this earlier. You know, I'm an extreme left brainer. Everything must be linear. And what I've learned is the world doesn't function that way. Mm-hmm. And if you try to ram that down other people's throats, you're gonna alienate people and you're not gonna get the whole team moving forward in the same direction.

Or, as I say, rowing and rowing the boat in the same direction. Those are key. Those are key. Extreme high Ds are less than 10% of the population. Um, I know it, I'm an aberration. No, it's

my, my wife, uh,

Scott Maderer: and entrepreneur circle. It's higher than that. Yeah. But, and, and you know, 'cause it takes a certain amount of getting results and getting it done to be attracted to being in business for yourself.

But, uh, in the world in general, it's about 10% of the population. And Tom's,

Phillip Cantrell: Tom's Fast I have. Gone home. And I [00:28:00] my partner with my partnership with my wife is key to everything I do. She's my support, she's my sounding board, she's my everything. And, uh, if you read the book, you probably realize that 'cause I dedicated the book to her.

Mm-hmm. Um, but the, uh, the main thing is that, uh, I'll go home and I'll have a conversation and sometimes it's, you know, frustration. It's something that happened that day. And she'll say, well honey, you got to remember that. Not everybody's like you. Not everybody thinks like you. I'm like, dad, come it. Well, why not?

And I'm sure under her breath, she's buttering and thank God not everybody's like you. I tell

Scott Maderer: people there's a reason that it's only 10% of the population because God knew better

Phillip Cantrell: what you're talking

Scott Maderer: about. If it was a hundred percent of the population, there wouldn't be a population anymore. We would've killed each other.

We would've killed each other already. For sure. That's awesome. If every, if, if everyone had the lead follower get outta the way attitude, then we'd have a problem. So I've got a few questions that I [00:29:00] like to ask everybody, but before I ask those, is there anything else about this the work you do or failing my way to success the book that you've just put out that you'd like to share with the listener?

Phillip Cantrell: Well, yeah, I'll, um, I'll just give a cautionary note, I guess for lack of a better description, it's. Very raw. It's honest. It's uh, uh, some have called it brutally honest. Others have called it like, it's a conversation with your grandfather who was the one that wasn't a tell, wasn't afraid to tell you that what you're doing is stupid.

And of course, I'm not quite that overt about it, but, uh, it's not sanitized or filled with a bunch of theory. It's, it's a series of real stories and real lessons from real failures. That's where the wisdom lives, in my opinion. It's not about avoiding mistakes, it's about how to grow through them and come out stronger on the other side.

So I tried to write it as a book for leaders, entrepreneurs, and really anyone [00:30:00] who's felt that there's, they're one step away from giving up, especially, I mean, that's critical. There's gold in those moments. And, and I wrote the book intentionally to be read with a highlighter in hand. You know, if you, if you buy the book, and I'm not.

Buy the book if you want to. That's up to you. I didn't write the book to sell a bunch of books. I wrote it to help people. And I said this on the front end, that if I hear from one person that it helped them or saved their career or saved their marriage or whatever, then I'm gonna consider the success even if I never sell a single book.

Now, as it turns out, it's number one bestseller right now. So, you know, and it kind of interesting the, uh, the category where it ranks highest, and this was completely unintentional because. This is, as I said, raw and unvarnished. I spoke from the heart, so my heart is my faith journey. It is now ranking very high in Christian business books.

Sure. And that was not my target, but that's where it landed. So it was, it's [00:31:00] awesome. I think.

Scott Maderer: Awesome.

Phillip Cantrell: Yeah,

Scott Maderer: so my brand is inspired stewardship and I kind of run things through that lens of stewardship, and yet I've discovered that's kind of one of those words that can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people.

So I like to ask, so what does the word stewardship mean to you? That's a big one.

Phillip Cantrell: You asked me that question ahead of time and I had to really put some thought into this one, but I, I think basically stewardship is about responsibility with purpose. I mean, that's a grandiose statement. But we have responsibility and we have to have purpose.

It's about recognizing that the talents, the resources, and the people entrusted to me aren't just for my own gain. Therefore me to care for, to grow, to pass on to others who come behind. That's a big deal because what we leave behind, and I said this from the beginning when I started this journey, was people of my status, of my level, of my okay success, [00:32:00] uh, have a tendency to just take the money and go to the farm.

I mean, I see that a lot and I think that's not the way to do it. We need, we have a moral responsibility to reach back behind and bring those others who are following behind us through the fire and help them avoid the pain that we experienced. I mean, stewardship honestly reminds me to ask, am I leaving this world better than I found it?

If I can't answer that consistently with a yes, then I have failed in my journey. I failed in the meaning of stewardship to me, and all of that needs to be done as quietly and anonymously as possible without accolades. And Harold.

Scott Maderer: Well, that kind of brings me to the next question, which is my favorite question to ask everybody.

Imagine for a moment that I could invent this magic machine, and with this machine, I was able to take you from where you are today and transport you into the future, maybe 150, maybe [00:33:00] 250 years. But through the power of this machine, you were able to look back, see your entire life, see all of the connections, all of the ripples, all of the impacts you've left.

What impact do you hope you've had in the world?

Phillip Cantrell: Well, I hope they remember my name, you know, at least my, my grandkids and great-grandkids. Anyway. But I honestly hope that universally people will say that I helped them believe in their own potential that I created or at least helped create organizations that have survived, that continue on where people felt valued and equipped to succeed in their lives and that then.

This is important to me also, that they realize that I wasn't afraid to tell the truth even when it wasn't easy, because I believe people deserve honesty in everything they do. And then ultimately, I want my impact to be measured not by what I built, but by who I built [00:34:00] up. I think if I can say that, and I don't know that that's gonna survive the 250 years, but at least in the next couple of generations, if they can realize that, if they can say that, then I say, I have my work here is good.

My work here is good.

Scott Maderer: So what's coming next? What's on the roadmap is you finish out the year and get ready to kick off next.

Phillip Cantrell: Well, I've, uh, that's a really good question. My wife asked me that when I'm leaving the house most mornings, she says, why are you still doing this? And I said, there's people to help, there's people to help, there's people to help.

I gotta help people. And now she's begun to roll her eyes at that response. Uh, but to be honest, I am moving from being the operator. This is psychologically, I guess, moving from being the operator to becoming the guide. I mean, I've got some. As you know, I, I sold Benchmark in 2020. I had a two year earnout, got all my money at the end of 22, and that was three years ago now, coming up on this [00:35:00] December would be three years, and I'm still here, still hanging around helping to coach the leadership and honestly growing the company and that.

The company has grown tremendously since I basically got out of the way. So I think the people that we put in place have actually done a better job probably than, than I've done. And that makes me very happy. That makes me very pleased. Uh, so, so what I'm gonna do is focus on mentoring leaders, uh, consulting.

Then with their businesses, uh, sharing stories, I get calls on a regular basis. Honestly, I've already got another book spinning up in my head. Preliminarily named Purpose Before Profit because I truly believe entrepreneurs need more than just a business model. They need to keep going. They need to reason to keep going when the money isn't flowing yet, and they can't do that without a purpose and a vision clearly articulated in their head.

So I can help with that. Service to others. Before focusing on profit. That's the [00:36:00] main thing. That's my calling now and helping people rediscover the why behind their work. And I know there's been a lot of work done on that. There's been a lot of, a lot of books written on that, but not from the perspective.

That's kind of spinning around in my head based on how this one turned out and the appeal that this one has had. So, awesome. Just kinda like taking a step back, you know, I told you the story and I'm gonna take a step back and tell you why I, I had the journey that's kind of it. Absolutely. That. I look forward to that one as well.

Yeah. Who knows what the Lord puts in my, in my path though. You know? We just don't know. It could change. Yeah, absolutely. That's right. That's right.

Scott Maderer: So you can find out more about Philip Kentrell in his book, failing My Way to Success over@philipkentrell.com. Of course, I'll have a link to that over the show notes as well.

Philip, anything else you'd like to share with the listener?

Phillip Cantrell: I, I guess I, I do have some closing remarks, as it were. And I wanna be clear [00:37:00] on this, that failing my way to success is not about glorifying failure. It is, the subtitle says Lessons from 42 years of Winning and Losing in Business. So we talk about both, and I'm trying to help people with that journey.

It's about demystifying it not about glorifying it it's about sharing business precepts without lecturing. And nobody likes a lecture but offering stories that the reader can really identify with from my journey. You know, we live in a world obsessed with winning. We really do. But no one tells you what the path to winning actually looks like.

It's messy, it's frustrating, it's full of doubts, full of lack of self-confidence, and yet it's in those very moments, in those very failures when the strongest foundations for success are built. And so if you can, if you can glom onto that, if you can glean onto that. Then you two can, uh, can have success.

The books for anyone who's ever felt left behind, disillusioned, unsure of whether or not they're doing the right thing. And I wrote it [00:38:00] to say basically that you are not alone, and more importantly, you're not done. You have a journey too. The conclusion of the book, if you wanna go look the book up, the conclusion of the book, I think articulates exactly what we're all put on this planet for.

And I'll just leave you with this, you know, and I'm reading directly from the conclusion. Success is not found in pursuing our own ambitions alone. It emerges when we align ourselves with a purpose that serves others, creating value and impact that goes beyond ourselves. And that's straight outta the conclusion of the book.

Then I go on to talk about Psalms one 12, and if you've never read Psalms one 12, you need to go read it. I'll just kind of lay that, dangle that carrot out there and leave it from there.

Scott Maderer: Well said. Okay.

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