Anything But Typical

"We think that we are providing benefits to somebody and incentives. Actually, we're creating little fires and warring factions." - Kevin D. Monaghan Most organizations incentivize key employees with creative pay & perks like equity splits. Better pay + better benefits = obviously happy employees who stick around, work hard, & grow the company. t's easy and great math, except for the fact that it doesn't work. As Kevin c...

“I hated it, hated it with a passion.” — George Ramsay When George looks back on music lessons of his youth, he remembers only misery. Stuffy piano teachers, monotonous scales, and the dread of upcoming recitals made faking sickness a weekly occurrence. Music lessons were the enemy, and he’d do anything to miss them. But watching a high school friend learn from a teacher who taught improvisation & the rock music he loved ch...

“It’s important to us to help people see that they matter.” – Christina Bartolotta Christina & her husband, Titus, are no strangers to business success. From car sales to consulting, this dynamic duo seemingly does it all & very well. Today, you’ll find them in the kitchen of their newest endeavor & one of Lake Norman, NC’s newest & deeply loved restaurants, Rise Cafe. Serial entrepreneurs with a passion for growi...

“I love our business model. It’s one where we can be truly honest with our clients.” Broc Buxton When cousins Jeffrey Wanner & Broc Buxton were growing up together, neither of them imagined that Broc would eventually join Jeff in building a company that would revolutionize the way other small businesses select professional employer organizations (PEOs). But as they matured, they recognized important qualities in each other th...

“I want people to recognize my passion for things – my passion for living, my passion for ensuring other people’s success.” — Reece M. Arlin, MBA When this car-loving, fitness-focused, self-proclaimed “terrible employee” graduated from college, he was certain buying & operating a gym was the path before him. But like most entrepreneurs, his first big plan never materialized. When a good friend suggested they start a marketing...

“I just want to be known as a good guy.” – Palash Desai Most Ivy League business school graduates turned Silicon Valley execs aren’t known for their big hearts. Big profits, yes, but compassion & love for others take a distant back seat. Not so with Palash. In the middle of a very lucrative engineering career, he dropped it all to buy a two-person cleaning company in Charlotte, NC. Did he love cleaning? No. Was Charlotte hom...

“So much of what I gain is from helping people in bad situations. Our clients, 95% of them are going through the worst time in their life.” – Jan Barefoot It isn’t unusual to hear firefighters or police officers talk about serving others on their worst days. Still, Jan Barefoot doesn’t wear a uniform or jump into action following a 911 call. She isn’t a first responder at all. But she just might be the brains behind figuring ou...

“I love life. I love to make people smile.” – Wilton Rogers III Growing up on a farm, Wilton got his very first taste of entrepreneurship: selling eggs to his mother’s friends at church. But it wasn’t the money that made his heart soar ($2 was his weekly profit!). It was the happiness he felt providing something people needed. That joy became his greatest form of payment. Multiple business opportunities would come & go throu...

“When you don’t have a choice…the one thing you do get to choose is who you get to do it with, so don’t do it alone.” Robert F Williams In the 1990s, when financial deals & payouts came easy, Bob’s life looked like a page from a storybook: beautiful family, a booming investment business, and thousands of successful deals. But his story, like any good one, contained a plot twist: Struggling with frequent travel away from his f...

“People follow me for advice, but when I get feedback, it’s more about something business unrelated.” – Damon Burton If you don’t know Damon, you may be wondering why over 32,000 people follow him for advice on LinkedIn or flock to read his book, “Outrank.” If you do know him, you’ll know why seeking his advice is a no-brainer. This SEO expert has beat million-dollar companies at their own game & offers proven strategies for...

It’s easy to look at Renee & think that the comforts of Easy Street & a golden parachute allowed her to build the 13th largest woman-owned business in the Charlotte area & the only woman-owned industrial business in Union County (not to mention authoring a book & forming a foundation), but nothing could be further from the truth. A small-town girl introduced first to banking & then manufacturing sales, Renee c...

A quick message first: We had audio issues for the first 16 minutes of the show. We cleaned it up as much as possible, but you'll notice a difference. Apologies for that!

"It's really about fit & relationship." — Brad Batten When Johannes Zwick & Bradley Batten first met at Davidson College, neither imagined a future as partners in private equity. But these fraternity brothers turned friends had important partnership trai...

“I would love for people to one day, potentially, say that Mike put a piece of God in them… This is the goal of my life.” — Michael Metcalf Jr. 

Mike doesn’t mince words when it comes to his perspective on life. Maybe it’s because he witnessed the unthinkable as a young child or faced physical adversity on the football field at App State. Maybe his grandmother, “the smartest person I ever met”, provided much inspiration. We’ll nev...

Ty Harmon, Founder and President at Harmon Construction, overcame hardship and instability growing up. His mother was never able to own a home. Ty went onto the construction management industry. When he was ready to step out on his own, Ty made sure to never forget his childhood. Ty's company is focused on giving clients "the exceptional construction experience." In addition to commercial and retail construction, Harmon Constructio...

“It’s OK if I have a day where I work for 15 min.” – Chris Claflin. That’s a mind-blowing statement coming from a successful entrepreneur in property management, where words like “hustle” & “growth” flow with ease, but that’s the heart of Chris Claflin. It wasn’t always. One of 7 children born to a blue-collar household, Chris was schooled in the virtues of hard work & company loyalty. He followed those teachings all the...

This is a special episode of the Anything But Typical Show. Our own Gary Frey has published a book titled: Silence The Imposter Syndrome- 7 Weapons To Silence Imposter Syndrome. In this episode, Gary takes us behind the scenes of what it takes to get a book published.

We talk about the options to publish such as self publishing, an independent publisher, and a large publisher. We go into what Gary's book writing journey looked like...

Devan overcame childhood struggles with the help of baseball being a driving and motivating force in his life. It helped him stay out of trouble, strive for freedom early in life, and get to college. When Devan made the pros, everything was on track. So when he got released, Kline needed to figure out what was next.

With no money and no ability to get a lease, Devan began holding boot camp workouts in parking lots and abandoned the...

“Have the courage to suck.” – Brian K. Anders That’s uncommon advice coming from an engineer, but not every engineer has a heart like Brian. Nor do they have his experience. Brian gained his grit loading trucks at night to pay for school & his passion for client service watching his wife change lives as a private investigator. He rejected corporate life to relentlessly pursue his dream job in forensic engineering, despite hav...

In this episode, co-hosts Ben McDonald and Gary Frey discuss imposter syndrome in business and in life. Gary has written a book titled Silence The Imposter Syndrome, coming out October 2023. We talk about how imposter syndrome has been present in each of our lives. Ben shares what it was like being a 22 year old athletic director surrounded by 60 year old career academic leaders. Gary shares a freeing moment he experienced through ...