What are some of the biggest sacrifices you’ve made to get to where you are today?
The toughest thing about running a business is that you have to be all-in, and that means missing out on other things. For almost eight months, I’d leave for work at 1AM on Monday, drive up to Pennsylvania for the week and get back home to Virginia late on Friday. It was a tough eight months until we could finally make the move up to Pennsylvania.
What’s your advice for others hoping to do what you’ve done?
Set a vision and commit to it. It has to be big enough to keep you working at 11PM. It has to be big enough to overcome criticism from those around you. And once you have that vision, you have to commit to high standards of discipline to achieve it. Every single day, you need to hold yourself to the highest standards.
If you could start over, is there anything you would do differently?
I would hold people accountable to high standards from the start. I would double-down on the belief that relationships are the most important aspect of work. That’s always been our belief, but I think there’s more we could’ve done early on to reinforce that.