← Lost Boys
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- [00:01]
Anthony
I think you're on mute.
- [00:03]
Scott Galloway
Workday starting to sound the same.
- [00:06]
Matt Ebert
I think you're on mute.
- [00:07]
Scott Galloway
Find something that sounds better for your career on LinkedIn. With LinkedIn job collections, you can browse.
- [00:14]
Anthony
Curated collections by relevant industries and benefits.
- [00:17]
Scott Galloway
Like Flexpto or Hybrid workplaces so you can find the right job for you. Get started@LinkedIn.com jobs finding where you fit.
- [00:28]
Anthony
LinkedIn knows how to savor every last.
- [00:32]
Matt Ebert
Drop of summer with Starbucks. From bold refreshers to rich cold brews, the sunniest season only gets better with a handcrafted ice beverage in your hand. Available for a limited time, your summer favorites are ready at Starbucks.
- [00:47]
Anthony
Welcome to Lost Boys, the podcast where my friend Professor Scott Galloway and I dig into the unique challenges young men are facing today and what we can do about it. Our guest is Matt Ebert, the founder and CEO of Crash Champions, one of the largest automotive collision repair companies in the United States. He is someone who's built an extraordinary business from the ground up, and he is creating opportunities for young men that often get overlooked. In this episode, we'll explore the tangible solutions and positive pathways for young men who are struggling. Today. We'll highlight how the skilled traits like the auto collision repair industry can provide rewarding careers, financial stability, and a sense of purpose for young men. Matt talks to us about Crash Champions programs that are training and mentoring young people today and how well paying blue collar careers can offer young men a path forward. Today, here's my conversation with Scott Galloway and Matt Ebert. So joining us on Lost Boys is Matt Ebert, who is the founder and CEO of Crash Champions. And Matt, I wanted to bring you on with Scott and I today to talk about your life story and what you've done. I mean, basically you had a blue collar job, you've turned it into a trans state franchise. I expect that this franchise will go national in the United States. And Scott and I have been talking in this series about men, the foibles of men. I don't want to recant Scott's history or my history, but probably started out in a circuitous way, getting to where we are now. I think you've done the same thing and I would love to have you share your story with us. So let's start there. How'd you grow up and how'd you get into what you're doing now?
- [02:40]
Matt Ebert
Sure, yeah, I grew up really humble beginnings. Grew up in a small town in central Illinois. Didn't come from any money. We were pretty poor actually, but got into the collision business because I wrecked my car and needed to learn how to fix it, went and asked somebody to teach me and really from that skill, been in the industry to some degree ever since. And so didn't really grow up with a preconceived plan of what I was going to do when I grew up, but learned skills that I was able to find something that I ended up love doing. And it worked out really well for me.
- [03:23]
Anthony
You know, one of the things you said to me the last time that we spoke is that it was touch or go. You know, Richard Branson once said to me that one of his high school teachers said, you're either gonna end up in jail or you're gonna end up as a multi billionaire. I mean, and Branson obviously ended up as a multi billionaire. But the point being that there was a lot of things going wrong in the early part of Richard's life. There was some things, frankly, going wrong in my life. Scott can share his story, but tell us your story and tell us when the light bulb went off for you. Tell us what you were doing.
- [03:59]
Matt Ebert
Yeah, for me, when it came to. On this subject of how young, what troubles young men might be facing today. You know, my, my parents divorced when I was three years old. So, you know, I might. I didn't see my father that often. My stepfather was a, a good, a good man. But we, we were very different. We think very differently. There wasn't that, you know, he was really great to me as far as making sure we, we had a home and, and food to eat. But as far as that closeness, like I hope that my, my son and I will continue to have, that was not really there for me. But there were always the, you know, the uncles and the grown men and all of them were around me in the blue collar trades. And so for me, that's what I saw and what I knew. There wasn't some high expectation to have to, you know, go accumulate a big net worth. A lot of life's planning was around being able to provide for what would eventually be my family and, and be a good person. And the blue collar was what they all knew. So there was the happiness that you wanted to gain in life and the satisfaction from doing good work. And the blue collar trades do provide that. You get to see immediate results in fixing a car, for example, that was wrecked, you get to see the transformation of that and that would bring us satisfaction from, from work, which is one of the reasons why, why I loved it. So, not sure if I directly answered what you were looking for, but for me it was A little bit of not clear direction on what I was going to do when I grow up. Kind of looking around and seeing what I could see. And then after learning that skill came the whole desire to, okay, now how do I do really better in life with this? How do I. I had the entrepreneurial spirit and wanted to own my own business, and then, of course, wanted to grow the business.
- [06:07]
Anthony
Before I let Scott jump in, though, tell us about the car crash at age 16. What the hell happened?
- [06:12]
Matt Ebert
I actually, I fell asleep. And the first time I wrecked a car, and then the second time I was going too fast on ice and hit a bridge. I think both times I told my parents I swerved for some animal or something else. So just being young and. And dumb.
- [06:34]
Anthony
But it was a big. It was a big touchstone for you, right, because it put you into the collision business, right?
- [06:39]
Matt Ebert
It did. And for me, it was a huge problem because a car to me meant freedom. Like, I. I had a pretty strict upbringing, didn't get to do a lot of things. And so, like, the car meant freedom to me. I still remember the first time I was in a car without my parents and able to go do kind of wherever the car would take me. And so losing that car was devastating to me. I, you know, I was doing. At 16, I was working at McDonald's and then working with the guy that was teaching me to do bodywork at night. After that, I needed the ability to get around, and I was in a small town, and where all that action was was 10 miles away in another small town. So I had to have a car to do it. So for me, it was a bit of a panic of did I make a mistake? And at that time ruin all my current opportunities going on? So I wanted to get it fixed pretty quickly.
- [07:36]
Anthony
You know, Scott, I brought Matt on because it's a non traditional success story. You know, you and I were told by our parents, go to school, try to get educated, go build your business. But Matt took this different route. It's almost like in the game of life, Matt was like, okay, I'm going straight to work.
- [07:54]
Scott Galloway
Yeah, it's Matt, first off. Really nice to meet you. So we spend a decent amount of time talking about the struggles of young men. And people have been nodding their head for a few years now. And as we evolve this dialogue, we're trying to move more towards solutions. And one of the solutions that consistently comes up is a recognition that two thirds of our young people, and probably more like 75% of our young men, are just not going to get a traditional four year liberal arts degree, they're just not going to. As much pressure there is on families to pursue a college education, as much shaming there is when a kid isn't cut out for college. The majority of young Americans aren't going to get a college degree. And even greater percentage of males, young males. The good news is that the trades and the real economy, my understanding is, has tremendous opportunity for people with vocational skills such as yours. And so what I'd like to know is one, what was the training like? What were. How did that happen where you learned how to. I know why you learned how to fix a car, but who was involved in helping you develop that trade? And then fast forward it to today. How do you find an upscale young men and women? I would imagine the majority of them are young men because while on the democratic side we like to pretend there is no difference between men and women. There is. And men, one of the few things we seem to kind of be better at is working outside with mechanical things. What do you do now to try and recruit people into this and be as transparent as you can in terms of the kind of money they can make and what kind of qualifications?
- [09:38]
Matt Ebert
Yeah, I appreciate that. You know, really I'm. We've been on a campaign to kind of champion blue collar work because I think in the past couple decades the push for going to college is the way to do well. There hasn't been really a conversation around what opportunity there is. And I think for us, we're helping people in a time of need, which is what a lot of service businesses are doing. And you know, AI isn't going to fix a car anytime soon. And so there's tremendous opportunity in it that people just don't know. So, you know, an average technician makes over $100,000 a year. You know, it doesn't make them millionaires unless they, you know, want to go beyond just fixing the car with their own hands. But you know, there's opportunity of starting a business and growing it, et cetera, just like there was for me. But for the skill itself, you know, it pays better than people think. And there's that stereotype around, you know, the blue collar work and quote unquote, dirty jobs that, that we would like to tear down because college isn't for everyone. And we just would like people to know what kind of opportunity there is. For me, it was again, a small town, so you kind of knew everybody. And I knew a gentleman that did bodywork for a living and he did work on Other cars kind of on the side at night in his garage behind his house. So I asked him, would he show me how to fix my car and in exchange I would do some work for him. And that work for him involved helping him on the cars he was fixing, which he would then show me the task and I would do it. Today we're building mentorship programs where we're inviting young people to come into the company and we teach them they can learn on the job, they can earn money while they learn, they don't have to go go into debt to learn this skill. And you know, in fairness, we are recruiting women. We would love to have more women in the trade. It's just they don't like us that much. So we, we, we in turn have campaigns to, to, you know, programs like Women from Crash where we're trying to attract women to the industry because they're really good in, in when, when they, when they try it. That doesn't mean, you know, that we don't want to continue to bring in, in men and have them learn a skill and do well. And because of the size of the company, it doesn't stop with just the, the skill learning of the, of the fixing cars. We have all kinds of, you know, support departments, IT finance, the facilities that need taken care of. We have management and leadership positions throughout the country. So all of these need filled and primarily, you know, it's a come up through the industry, a management team that hasn't been college trained. And so we have to build programs that teach leadership skills, communication skills. Like I think a lot of what the struggle is today is and you know, social media and the Internet and things like that are just exaggerating it or making it a bigger problem is just the ability to communicate with one another. The human to human connection, the ability to give and receive feedback. All of that is things that we see in, in the workforce today of all ages. And we're, we're working hard to find solutions for those things.
- [13:24]
Scott Galloway
But let me, let me just take you back. When I was a senior in high school or junior in high school, on my walk home, there'd always be this open garage door and this young man in there with a journey or a Boston, you know, rock T shirt. And of course he was like one of those guys and this is how life was in the 70s. He'd scream at me, throw a beer at me, call me a pussy on my way to school and then on the way home like invite me in. And I think he was the first guy that ever gave me a bongload. And I say that affectionately. And he was that guy. He just wasn't going to go to college. He just wasn't going to. He didn't like school. He wasn't good at it. But when my mom's Opal Manta broke down, he was like right over there with his makeshift tools in fixing it such that we didn't have to go to a mechanic and give up our car for two days and spend money we didn't have. And, you know, there's a lot of guys like that. And I. So put yourself. You're a 10th grader. You're a 10th grade boy or girl, you're just probably not going to end up in college. But you like fixing. You're good with your hands. What is the path? Is it auto shop? Are there apprenticeship programs? Is there an entity that helps figure out training for young men and women to place them in organizations like yours? What can you offer up? There's a path for kids. If you're in the 10th grade and getting straight A's, there's a path to college. Your college counselor starts telling you, this is what you need to do. This is take the sat, the psat, the sat. This, this is your weight class. This is how you might be able to afford or not afford. These are the schools you should apply to if you can, because, I don't know, it fashion that path for the 10th grader who's thinking about maybe vocational work would be the right path for me.
- [15:20]
Matt Ebert
Yeah. So there's a couple different directions. There are trade schools, if you want to go into them after high school. For our company, we have an internal apprentice program called step where we bring you in with no skills whatsoever. We supply some tools and we teach you. It takes a couple years to learn. Now you can stand on your own. After a couple years. It takes more like three to five to be really good. But, you know, you get paid while you're learning. And we're not the only company doing things like that. For other trades, there's, there's. In the construction trades, there's always been apprentice programs that young men can go into. The big change, when I was young, you had those things in high school. So, you know, my school was small, so we didn't have much of it, but you could take a welding class, you could take a building trades class, like from, you know what I know a lot of that doesn't exist.
- [16:23]
Scott Galloway
Wood shop, metal shop.
- [16:25]
Matt Ebert
Yep.
- [16:25]
Scott Galloway
And all those things have disappeared. Or that's my Sense.
- [16:28]
Matt Ebert
Yeah, because of the stereotype that that wasn't good enough for, for young men to pursue. You know, higher education was, was the route to go. And, you know, I don't think higher education is bad either. It's just the unintended consequences of championing one thing. It makes you forget about or look down on another. And that's what we need to make sure that the young people know that there are other great options. If higher education isn't for you, there are things that you can do, make a good living and enjoy, and there are paths, just like you said. So been trying to get the word out and make that known. And now I think the world is coming to a place where parents are more accepting of it. So go back 10 years ago. The problem for me, wanting to talk to a young man or woman about collision work, the parents wouldn't have had it. Right. I want something better for my kids. But I think in a world where the laws of supply and demand are really true, there is a true shortage in all of these industries. Our industry, for example, there's about 180,000 technicians. And because of the age of the baby boomers and that group that have a lot of the population of the techs, we expect a need of over 100,000 in the next seven to 10 years to replace those that will be retiring. And so it's a huge shortage and we're not alone. And so in a world where supply and demand usually is the rule, I expect that these guys will be able to get paid even better as time goes on here.
- [18:13]
Scott Galloway
Yeah, and just real quick, I'm self conscious. I didn't mean to pathologize or stereotype vocational workers as being any more or greater substance abusers than those of us who went to college. We were just doing different drugs and felt it was more wholesome because we went to basketball games and we're doing it in a fraternity. But I have no evidence that those group of people over or under index in substance abuse. So I just want to withdraw the comment. It was inappropriate.
- [18:37]
Matt Ebert
I didn't think anything of it.
- [18:38]
Anthony
By the way, this is what I love about Galloway. I don't really think it was that inappropriate because it was a rite of passage. We all were getting roughed up in different ways and thank God we all pulled ourselves together at the right time. But you had a guy that you worked with on your first job that really impacted you. Tell us about that and tell us about that. There's a different type of collision, Matt, that happens in life okay, this. When people collide into each other and they either become fast friends and business partners or they go their separate ways. You know, we're doing that a lot in our lives. Tell us about that first. First job and how it impacted you.
- [19:14]
Matt Ebert
Sure. So my. My first job, you know, you know, I worked at McDonald's in high school, but. And then I, you know, entrepreneurial mode. Mowed grass and stuff and kind of created my own little businesses. But first job out of high school was fixing cars with the gentleman that was teaching me how to fix cars. My second job was where I really kind of got mentored. I got. I moved in and lived with my grandparents kind of closer to the city of Chicago, and got a. Got a job at a small body shop. And that body shop owner, I learned a lot from him. And I don't know if he on purpose mentored or not, but, you know, he's the one who said, let me show you some of the administrative side of the business. Let me make you kind of my assistant manager. You know, when he was on vacation, he would leave the, you know, the keys to the shop, so to speak, to me, even though I was, like, in my early 20s and probably had zero managerial skills, when I look back on what I would have known then. But I learned those things from him because he was willing to take the time. He saw the ambition in me and recognized it and wanted to reward it and started teaching simple skills on how to talk to customers, how to, you know, how to manage the team, even though it was small in the back. And I wouldn't have learned any of that had he not, you know, started to teach some of it to me.
- [20:44]
Anthony
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- [23:42]
Matt Ebert
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- [24:08]
Scott Galloway
IBM.
- [24:12]
Anthony
I guess this is sort of a question for you, Scott. Like when you're meeting with kids, you're trying to mentor them. What do you say to them? 16, 17, 18, first job. What do you say to them about being open minded to mentorship and open minded to guidance?
- [24:29]
Scott Galloway
I find that young men are desperate. They're very open to it. What's interesting is I find they're more open to men who aren't their fathers. No question, there's a healthy separation kind of hormone that gets released into a 16 or a 17 year old such that it makes the separation from the family easier. So I have, you know, this is a flex. I have hundreds of men's men contacting me, young men every month asking for my advice. I don't think my boys have ever asked me for advice. I mean, and when I try to give it, they just roll their eyes and, you know, I'm the lamest person in the world to them. What's interesting though is their friends will ask to meet with me and get career advice and, and what I've tried to do is, is pair my. You know, I remember my son being so impressed with one of my friends and saying he was just. And I, quite frankly, initially, it sort of made me jealous and sad that he admired this other man so much or would appear to be more than me. And what I realized after a minute, when common sense kicks in that I should try and create some situations where they get a chance to spend time together. Because what I find is oftentimes when I mentor young men a, I find they're really open to it. And also they're everywhere. Especially the route to finding them usually is finding the single mothers in your universe and saying, would your son like to join me for a baseball game or hang out? I'm washing my car this weekend and they're all over it. And these young men are usually really receptive and open to advice and hanging out with someone. So that's not, I find that's not the problem. I mean, they're everywhere and they're open to it. The issue, I find, like it sounded like you had the key, Matt, and that is you had grit and you were ambitious and you wanted to learn. I feel like we're producing a lot of young men right now who almost don't even have the basic skills to communicate, to look someone in the eye, to wake up on time and get out of the house and show up and work. And I was on the board of Panera Bread and If we made 10 offers to people to show up, I think something like three or four. This is, They've signed paperwork, they're showing up Monday at 9am for training. Three or four of the 10 would even just show up. Like seven wouldn't even show up. So there's something going on with our young men and there's all sorts of theses. They're maturing later, literally, their testicles are descending later and girls are menstruating earlier. The maturity gap is broadening, and a lot of young men just don't appear to have the kind of skills that Matt demonstrated. My sense is you can get up in the morning, look reasonable and show up and try and learn and try and show some effort. Maybe show up 10 minutes early, leave 10 minutes late and be open to learning. You're going to find work. So what I try and do with these kids is do a series of just tests, because the kids I work with are really. I wouldn't say, yeah, they're struggling, they're aimless. 1. We're going to put some of that human capital your time. If I find 8 to 12 hours in their phone, Matt, I don't know if you've ever done this. Their phone is the enemy. Get off of TikTok, get off of Coinbase and Robin Hood. You're not investing, you're gambling. Try and modulate your porn. I don't tell young men to stop porn. I think that's unrealistic. But try and modulate it. And we're going to take all of that capital that time and we're going to reinvest it into three areas. One, fitness. Like, Matt, you look. You look, you know, you look like you could kill almost anybody. You look strong.
- [28:12]
Matt Ebert
No, I need to be more better on the physical fitness part of it, to be honest, because I'm so busy. But appreciate that.
- [28:20]
Anthony
I mean, you look like a tan Dana White to me.
- [28:23]
Scott Galloway
The guy looks like a retired. A retired UFC fighter.
- [28:27]
Anthony
Anyways, you're the guy in the bar where Galloway walks in. It's like, I'm not going near that guy's girlfriend.
- [28:33]
Scott Galloway
You know what I mean? I'm asking him to break up a fight. I don't want to get cameras.
- [28:36]
Matt Ebert
Might be a little bit deceiving.
- [28:37]
Scott Galloway
There we go. There we go. But one, the first thing I tell them is they got to get fit. I find that's a great means of staving off depression. Makes them feel better about themselves, makes more attractive to potential mates. I actually find when you're stronger, you're kinder. You're more inclined to break up a fight as opposed to starting a fight when you feel strong and Good about yourself. The second is spending time in the agency of others, whether it's a nonprofit or a league. But the third thing is we got to start making some money. And if you have a smartphone in this economy, you can make money. I don't care if it's a lyft driver, a TaskRabbiter. You know, there are, there are open positions everywhere. So go ahead.
- [29:20]
Matt Ebert
Matt Scott, you said so. So much. So the, the communication thing is huge. And some of it is, Is adults fault. Like, I can tell you, the hardest thing in our apprentice programs is getting mentors, because guys don't want to be bothered. Guys don't. They don't. You know, you need not just the person who knows how to fix the car, but the person willing and patient enough to teach the. Teach the next guy and communicate it. And we all get so into our own, our own world, however big or small it might be. We're all a little bit selfish about that. So getting people willing to mentor. And I found this in me. Like, I have to really, really work at this. Like, my wife is the great thing for me in raising our kids is my wife is awesome. Like, she intuitively knows to get the kids hanging out with other kids. She's always got people over. She has my friends and our friends over. And my kids get to talk to those adults and interact with. And they're down with us. They're not up in their room or in a separate area playing, so they get to, you know, hear the conversations, be part of it. Where I was raised, a little bit of children are to be seen, not heard, kind of. We're pretty inclusive and she keeps them around. But that communication and also the perception of easy money that the Internet, the Internet makes. And you're not successful unless you have like, crazy money. And the odds of like being like, worth a billion dollars are still pretty, pretty slim. Like, and there's a, there's a little bit of influence out there that makes you feel like you got to pick something that's going to bring you to that or there's an easy button to it all. And even. Look, my success didn't come to the level it did until the last, say, five years. I've been at this since, since I was 16. I opened the first body shop in 99. Like, this is like an overnight success that's been 30 years in the making. Like, most things don't just happen easily and super fast. And the world we live in presents things much differently. So if you're a young man and that's what you got to go accomplish. It can probably be pretty intimidating. But as adults or mentors, what I think is just be willing to engage the conversation. It's not so much them as us sometimes is what I guess I'm trying to say. If we talk to them and get super curious, they will talk, they will engage, but we sometimes just walk right by them, so to speak. And so then what are they to do other than check out, check into the phone and see what they can learn there.
- [32:07]
Scott Galloway
So I just want to put a fine point on that. And that is. So here's a stat. In New York, there's big sisters and Big brothers, both wonderful programs, right? They pair a woman or a man with someone younger who could use some mentorship. There are three times as many women applying to be big sisters as there are men applying to be big brothers. And when you think about it, if you look at the statistics, the need is much greater for young boys. Boys, it ends up while being physically stronger. They're emotionally and mentally much weaker and are just struggling more. And what you said is really powerful. And that is if we want to be better mental, if we want better men, we have to be better men. We have to get involved. We have to seek out and find young men who don't have a lot of male involvement in their lives and get involved in their lives. And the, the other unfortunate thing in our society is that there is a unnatural suspicion and a taboo that surrounds men who want to be involved in a boy's life. And just to be blunt, I think Michael Jackson and the Catholic Church have fucked it up for all of us. I think there's a general assumption that if you're a 35 year old male, maybe you're not married, maybe you don't have your own family, but you have that kind of paternal or fraternal care to give. I think there's a lot of young successful men and they don't have to be ballers that would like to help a younger man out. But people suspect them. People think there might be something wrong or something up there. And so they're somewhat remiss. I was on Bill Maher and I gave this speech about how we need to get involved in young men's lives and he went, whoa, I get involved in the 15 year old boys lives. And people think I'm sort of perv. And I'm like, that is exactly the problem. That is exactly the problem. And it's also quite frankly a bit homophobic. When I applied to be A big Brother in la. The vetting process was the following. We need to speak to a girlfriend. And then they would call the girlfriend and basically ask a series of questions to try and figure out, make sure I wasn't gay. Because the assumption back in the 80s was that if you were gay, you weren't supposed to be around boys. And all the evidence shows that gay people do not over index around pedophilia versus the hetero community. And so we've lost a whole group of potentially wonderful mentors for young men because we've decided that it's especially taboo if the gay community wants to get involved in a young person's life. So there's this social dogma around wanting to be involved in a young man's life or a boy's life. And also, quite frankly, to your point, Matt, we just aren't stepping up. We just aren't taking enough time to. We aren't seeing it. There needs to be a zeitgeist, the recognition of the problem and then an onus. There's an onus on wealthy people, I think, to get more involved civically or give money back. I think that's a wonderful zeitgeist in America. And while some of our most wealthy, unfortunate people don't practice that, most do. But there is not the same. There needs to be that same level of zeitgeist that once you're Matt, you know, Ebert, and you have success and you have this skill and you are managing your own kids lives fairly well, you have an obligation to find another kid. And I think we need to instill that. And to your point though, there just isn't enough of it. There really isn't enough male mentorship. Anthony, did you have any thoughts or comments on what Matt just said?
- [35:54]
Anthony
Yeah, well, listen, I was in the Big Brother program through the Catholic Church, by the way, had a couple of African American kids in the Bronx, two of which did not do well, one of which now is flourishing. And this is so long ago, guys, I met him at 13, he's 47, he has three beautiful kids, he lives in Hudson Yards, he's running the security for one of those buildings there. But you know, it is hit or miss when you're mentoring too because you know, you've got. When I was up at the Bronx, you had kids who were in single mom families. Maybe there were a couple of kids in the house from different dads. None of the dads were around. And so, you know, it's hard. I guess my last question for both of you guys is you're 16 today but you have your knowledge of the multiple decades of life experience. Where do you go today for this and what are you thinking about? And I'll just use myself as an example. When I was 16 I was like my dad's a blue collar worker. He wants me to go to college and be a white collar worker. I'm going to law school because that's going to guarantee me some base level of income significantly more than my dad. My 33 year old son is like okay, my dad's done pretty well. I'm going to try to get into tech. So I guess for both of you, maybe we'll start with you Matt and then we'll end with Scott. What would you do today? What's the 16 year old Matt Ebert doing in 2025 if you were 16?
- [37:32]
Matt Ebert
Yeah, if I, if I was 16, I, I don't, I, I probably would do the same thing because it's worked out pretty, pretty okay for me. But what, what I, I would say is like it's the, it's the struggle of it all that I've learned to embrace. So I would go back and you know, I, I was just driven because everything was such a struggle always and I wanted to eliminate struggle. Now I completely understand that. That's like the journey of it, that's what makes life what life is like if there's the easy button just to push and, and now I have success. And I think that's part of the problem of what we're talking about too is like we want to eliminate like all the work for it. We just want it AI just gives us the result like immediate right, like there not the whole. Make mistakes and learn from them. You know, have to apologize, have to interact and, and, and clean up a mess or two along, along the way. Like I, I back then thought well I got to find the E. The better way, the easier way. I got to find a way to not struggle anymore. I, I would tell myself look at the struggle because that's where all the opportunity is. Opportunity in this whole world is finding what people want or need and then finding a way to bring it to them. Trying to accomplish something and figuring out a way over, under, around or through the problem is what it's all about. And that's the journey that we always say like life is all about. It's funny because we always just look to the end destination so much. We forget that. And as a young person you're just like over like, and also the pressure to get it right. Immediately like you could you. I think it's crazy that at 17 years old you're supposed to know what you want to do for your whole life like that. That seems insane to me. Like I got married when I was really young. I'm on my second marriage now because that was not the time to make that life decision and get married. It's so much pressure on young people and, and we, you know, life, we think life is so short and it is in scope, but it's also very long. Like you can make a mistake, go into something not like it and then, then go and pick something else and learn that, you know, at, at night or on the weekends while you continue to provide for yourself. There's so many paths to actually figure out what you love and you'll be so much more happier and so much more successful if you find something you love. There's a way to make money at anything. Look at Shark Tank. The, the biggest successes on Shark Tank are socks and a sponge. It isn't some new dynamic, huge rocket science thing. So yeah, there's, there's tech and transformational of the world opportunities, but there's also simple everyday opportunities to make money. Not so much pressure to have it all figured out at 17 is, is, is my thing because to me that's just, that's just crazy. I don't, I don't believe I have the rest of my life figured out right now. I'm more open minded to like what is possible, what might the next opportunity be. And it's hard as a young person because you're trying to figure it all out and the pressure is there from society and everything else to have it all figured out and I don't know that you have to just go to work and support yourself and do things in the meantime. Well, you are.
- [41:08]
Anthony
What do you say, Scott?
- [41:09]
Scott Galloway
I, I love, I love all those things. Like I, I think a lot about what the advice I'd give to my younger self and the first thing I'd want to say is everything, you know, worked out. I had a lot of stress. I, you know, I was worried a lot or maybe I wasn't worried enough. I don't know. The, the advice I would have for a 16 year old is think of your. There's a lot of studies that show you're the average of your five closest friends. You're the same body mass index, you're the same income level, same political, same team. So if you want to shape a better, you really think about your friend group and curate it and try and be, you know, men are told to be aggressive with women or aggressive with economic opportunities. Be aggressive around trying to make high caliber, high character friends. I'm the first person on either side of my family to graduate from high school. And the reason I went to college was not because I was brilliant or exceptional, but because my two best friends. Brett Jarvis, a Mormon kid, was a scholar athlete, didn't drink, didn't smoke, didn't party, did nothing and didn't drink caffeine and was just from the time we were 12 he was like trying to get into Stanford and that, that. And then my other friend, a black kid named Ronnie Drake, was trying to get a football scholarship such that he could go to college. So it was just ingrained into me that I need to go to college. And had I hung out with a different group of kids who had different priorities, I don't know if I would have ended up in college. I think it's really important as a kid to try and encourage kids or find an interest, whether it's the school newspaper or Drumline or drill team or just try and find an interest to get you out of the house. Recognize your parents. Some of the advice I give to young kids, recognize your parents are not your enemy. They're almost always your ally. They are pulling for you. They may be overbearing, they may not get it, but recognize. Come to the conclusion here, 98% of people come to recognize when they're older is your parents are your allies, they're trying to help you and their heart's in the right place more than anything now. But what I would say to my 16 year old self now, if I was 16 now, is, and I've said this before, I graduated barely from CUCLA with a 2.27 GPA. And one of the reasons I went on campus, and this sounds crass, but it's true, I would go onto UCLA's campus every day and go to class because that's what you did on campus. Because I wanted to hang out with my buddies, see my friends on campus, and also the prospect of meeting a strange woman who I could invite to a party and at some point maybe have sex with. I was very motivated by mating desire. And if I'd had on demand 24 by 7 porn on my phone, I'm not sure I would have gone onto campus as much. And I'm not sure I would have graduated from college. And if I thought, oh, I don't need to put on a suit and interview, I can trade on coinbase or on Robinhood. I think if there had been a casino, Netflix, a porn site, and an arcade in my pocket at 17, when I was at UCLA, I'm not sure I would have made it to my sophomore year. And so recognize the phone is your enemy. And there are really talented, deeply resourced companies with godlike technology trying to get you away from life, trying to sequester you from life. They are trying to give you a sense that you can have a reasonable facsimile of life on a screen with an algorithm. Really recognize we teach kids, oh, be careful with alcohol. Be careful with marijuana. 6.8% of teens are clinically addicted to drugs or alcohol. 24% are addicted to social media. The addiction, the crack cocaine, the danger is in your pocket and it's an iPhone or an Android phone. Just be aware of that. These people do not have your best interests at heart. And the really successful kids, the ones that are going to have a really nice life, a broader selection set of mates than they deserve, be able to take care of their kids and their parents. It is inversely correlated to how much time they are spending staring at a phone.
- [45:45]
Anthony
Amen. So, Matt, where can we find you? Matt?
- [45:49]
Matt Ebert
Matt Ebert. CC is the handle on all, all social media channels. And then crash champions.com for the company and Apprentice program is talked about on the. On the Crash Champions website.
- [46:01]
Anthony
Well, we, we really appreciate you joining Lost Boys in this bonus episode and Scott and I thank you and we've gotten quite a response from Lost Boys, so hopefully we'll find some things to do together. If someone wants to be mentored by you, Matt, where do they go for that?
- [46:19]
Matt Ebert
Yeah, they can reach out on Mattebert.com and we're putting some, some of that together because I do want to do my best to help others. So there's a great spot right there.
- [46:32]
Anthony
I may be dropping two of my sons off at both of your houses. Okay. And you? I'll pick them back up in 2035.
- [46:40]
Matt Ebert
I'm figuring out this fatherhood thing just like everybody else. I worry that I'm not going to be good enough at it. So I appreciate what you're doing here.
- [46:47]
Scott Galloway
Great. Thank you, Matt. Nice meeting you.
- [46:49]
Matt Ebert
Nice meeting you. Thank you.
- [46:50]
Anthony
I'd like to thank Matt and Scott for this really useful conversation today. And thanks for joining us for this episode of Lost Boys. If you'd like more information, please go to our website, Lostboys Men. Be sure to like, follow and subscribe to Lost Boys wherever you get your podcasts and please share it with someone who cares about this or should care about this. And let's spread the word. Lost Boys is a production of Salt Media and the Casablanca Strategy Group. Barbara Fedita and Ki Zuma are executive producers. Tanya Salotti is our researcher, and Holly Duncan Quinn and Stanley Goldberg are our editors. Special thanks to Christina Cassese and Mary Jean Rebas and Drew Barrows.