What do future CEOs need to know before starting business? In this episode, Cameron Herold and Neva Lee Recla offer tips for future CEOs. Cameron started business at a young age, by the time he was 18 he had run 14 small businesses. He is awesome and inspiring. Listen in on the show to find out different tips and tricks for future business leaders.

Hi, Neva. How are you?

Good! How are you?

This is great. Thank you. I’m really glad to be able to do this.

Yes, it’s going to be a lot of fun.

Awesome.

So what are your superpowers?

My superpowers. I think one of my superpowers are the things that the school system told me were my weaknesses. The school told me that I couldn’t pay attention. And for me that means I see everything.

My superpower is that I have attention disbursement. They used to call it attention deficit disorder.

So because I see everything, I know what’s happening with my customers, the suppliers, the market, even the little spider on the floor sitting in front of me right now. I know what’s happening with my website. I see everything, but I don’t get too preoccupied. My superpower is that I have attention disbursement. They used to call it attention deficit disorder.

That’s one of my superpowers. I think another one of my superpowers is that I’ve really understood how to network and how to meet great people and how to build relationships with great people. When I was young, I got one of my first, well, I think my first real job, I worked at a golf club. I worked at a private golf course, and I got to meet about 600 men and women who were very successful that were members of this private club. And because I got to meet them and got to know them and about to listen to them and got to watch them, that helped me launch my first business when I started a house painting business. So I’d say my superpowers are one of my weaknesses and my ability to network.

That’s really cool. Those are good superpowers.

Thank you.

So when you were younger, did you go to a typical school? Or did you choose to do homeschooling?

No, I went to a typical school. Back when I was going to school, we didn’t really know of homeschooling. It probably wasn’t. I don’t think I ever heard of homeschooling until I was a little bit older, until I was starting to have kids. 

I went to a typical school. I moved to six different schools in nine years. And I, are you leaving?

Yes.

I want to say goodbye to my son who’s going away to University, so you’re going to have to give me two seconds.

Okay.

My kids are important to me, too. Hang on.

Come here, you. Mason. Have fun, okay?

Yes.

All right, bud.

Bye.

My son’s going back to University, and I’m not going to see him until Christmas time. So what was the question?

So now my question is..

I went to a real school, a typical school. I went to six different schools in nine years. I never felt like I fit in. I didn’t do very well in school. I was always getting 62%, 65%. I would study really hard, and then I would get poor grades. But I always had these entrepreneur ideas because I was always buying things and selling and trading things. And I just saw things differently. And I knew in my head that I was smart, but the teachers kept telling me I was stupid because my grades weren’t very good.

Yes. So I’m homeschooled, but I used to go to school. And I don’t remember a whole lot of it, but I remember I went to two schools. 

The first one, it just really wasn’t for me, and it felt a little bit too challenging for me. And then the second school was a bilingual school. It was not very fun. It was kind of like training to go to prison to be honest because we couldn’t speak. Bubbles in your mouth, hands behind your back. When you had to walk, you had to go up against the wall. You had a room about to go to the bathroom, and you had to march whenever you walked anywhere as a group.

That’s hardcore.

Yes. And so I lasted a day and a half there. The second day, I was in the parking lot crying. And then my parents decided, “No, we’re not going back.” So I enjoy being homeschooled, and it’s kind of cool how you were able to see how school isn’t for everyone, you know?

And I think we also have a lot more access to information than we had when I was younger. When I was growing up, we just had the encyclopedia. We had 12 books and all of the information in the whole world was supposed to be in these 12 books. And now we have the internet, and we can learn so much, and we can connect with other people. We can talk. Look, you and I are in different countries right now talking over video to each other. We didn’t have that ability when I was younger. It’s pretty amazing now.

Yes, it is. It’s cool seeing how social media works and seeing how it can connect people with people. And for example, my best friends lives in England. And so, she’ll come up a little bit, and then we’ll visit each other and stuff. But besides that, we can’t really text each other, so we use Instagram. And that’s our way of communication.

It’s cool seeing how it’s kind of advanced even though it’s been around. To me, it’s cool knowing how much you can do with it.

I think it’s interesting to watch how social media, technology, and videos can help people to collaborate with each other to solve problems and to work on projects together.

I think it’s interesting to watch how social media, technology, and videos can help people to collaborate with each other to solve problems and to work on projects together. Where we used to have to be in one office or one school or one city, now you can be anywhere in the world and have teams and employees and suppliers and customers anywhere, and we can all connect remotely, which is pretty powerful.

Exactly. And I think that it’s cool especially because some people wouldn’t have ever met if it wasn’t for social media. And great things can happen because you have that form of communication. That’s one of the really cool parts of it.

That’s amazing.

So before we wrap up or go into the break, what are your tips for people or kids who want to become future CEOs?

My tips for kids that want to become future CEOs would be to remember that as you get older, every adult is just a kid trapped in an adult body, that every adult is nervous, every adult is shy, every adult is scared. Every adult is worried that we still have a lot of the same worries that kids do, but we just look older. 

Secondly, to remember that you really, really, really, if you keep it simple, it will grow. Business isn’t complicated. Have a good product. Take care of your employee. Take care of your customers. Charge enough money that you can make enough money, and keep doing those things. Business is pretty simple. I think we really often over-complicate things.

Yes. And I think that’s great advice, especially since in business, like you said, it is really simple except sometimes, we over-exaggerate it, and so then it’s challenging. And I think it’s cool, being able, especially as a kid in business. It’s cool being able to see how simple it is. And that kind of shows me that anybody can do it because there’s quite a few entrepreneurs out there who started at a very young age. As a kid, when we’re still trying to figure out your entire world, business is kind of a fun way to go about things, you know?

Yes, that’s a great way to learn as well. You do business ventures and you learn a lot of things. I did a Ted Talk 10 years ago about raising kids as entrepreneurs, and it’s all about all the little businesses that I ran as a child and all the business lessons that I learned from. And those lessons still stick with me today.

That’s really cool. So we have to wrap up a little bit before we take a break. So where can people go to find out more about you?

To find out more about me, they can go to my main website, cameronherold.com. And then they can also go and get all of my books on Amazon or Audible.

Awesome. Definitely go check him out because Cameron is so, so awesome. We’ve been talking with Cameron Herold about tips for future CEOs. We’ll be right back.

To listen to the entire show click on the player above or go to the SuperPower Up! podcast on iTunes.