Abdulla Kudrath | Broke Immigrant to Multi-Industry Mogul: How He Built 14 Businesses From Scratch

Summary

School of Hard Knocks Podcast

Episode: Abdulla Kudrath | Broke Immigrant to Multi-Industry Mogul: How He Built 14 Businesses From Scratch
Date: September 11, 2025
Host: The School of Hard Knocks (James, Jack, Josh)
Guest: Abdulla Kudrath (AK)

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Overview

This episode features Abdulla Kudrath—emergency room doctor, entrepreneur, adventurer, and multi-industry mogul—who shares the remarkable story of his journey from broke immigrant to building and managing 14 businesses. The conversation explores how pivotal travel moments shaped his mindset, his guiding philosophies for health and wealth, lessons on leadership and hiring, the nuances of diversification, cultural perspectives gained from global travel, business partnership pitfalls, and even advice on dating as a driven entrepreneur. Throughout, AK’s humility, candor, and clarity on responsibility and self-awareness shine.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Managing Multiple Businesses & Time

[00:00; 23:36]

• AK currently owns and operates 14 businesses spanning healthcare, hospitality, entertainment, and more.
• Emphasizes the need for constant reprioritization: “Sometimes it’s like rapid fire. It’s like a busy day in the ER…You have to reprioritize. Always.” (AK, 23:36)
• Delegates to executive assistants and learns to separate from hands-on roles by building strong systems, admitting: “I’m still learning… but I’m finally getting to that point where I feel so much more relieved because of the systems that I’ve built.” (AK, 25:03)

2. Life-Changing Moments: From Medicine to Entrepreneurship

[01:34; 04:39]

• A trip to Uganda and Kenya with a church group exposed AK to overwhelming medical needs with limited resources. He learned the power of creating systems to help more people.
  • “On that trip, I started getting better at creating a system that could see more people more efficiently…if I can create institutions, then I can do a lot more, even when I’m gone.” (AK, 02:13)
• Earlier, a formative Amazon expedition nurtured curiosity for biology and shifted his academic focus from computer science to medicine.

3. Passion, Persistence & Changing Direction

[04:39; 06:37]

• AK’s initial career interests ranged from cybernetics to computer science, before discovering a true calling in medicine through travel and introspection.
• He credits finding his “passion and direction” with the motivation to overhaul habits, social circles, and study discipline, leading from poor grades to graduating top of his class.

4. Health = The Foundational Wealth

[07:02; 10:13]

• AK shares a philosophy echoed from years as a physician: prioritize health over financial success.
  • “If someone told me, hey, AK, you can't be a millionaire, but I can give you great health. I'd take it in a heartbeat.” (AK, 08:08)
  • Anecdotes of hugely wealthy patients willing to trade fortunes for health reinforce the message.
• Advocates daily gratitude (“When you have health, you've got a lot. You're a rich person if you've got good health.” – AK, 09:12) and caution against losing time and wellbeing in pursuit of financial goals.

5. Family, Upbringing & Principles

[10:13; 11:36]

• Growing up in a modest immigrant family, AK learned contentment, imagination, and strong principles over materialism.
• Core values centered on seeking knowledge, hard work, and goodness—principles that would inform leadership and business culture.

6. Diversification & Strategic Entrepreneurship

[15:59; 20:19]

• Diversification was purpose-driven, based on passions for learning and curiosity—not just financial gain.
• AK recommends most entrepreneurs first double down on what they know, only diversifying for genuine passion and only after developing strong analytical and hiring skills.
  • “Should you diversify? The default answer I will say is, no, don’t…Take it as far as you could possibly take it…But I would be bored doing that, to be honest.” (AK, 17:04)
• Hiring for new ventures requires an operator with direct experience (“If they've never done it before, the answer is no.” – AK, 17:47) and a balance of culture and track record.

7. Leadership, Responsibility & The Blame Game

[21:55; 30:41]

• AK embodies extreme ownership: “If the patient dies in the waiting room, it is your fault…That’s one thing my dad really taught me. He never allowed me to blame anyone or anything for anything at all.” (AK, 25:12 & 25:36)
• Cites Sun Tzu: “The general that loses his emotion loses the war.” (AK, 25:53)
• Taking responsibility empowers improvement, creates better outcomes, and avoids ego-driven pitfalls.
• Leadership means leading by example, building culture through action, and supporting employees.

8. The Transformative Power of Travel & Exposure

[31:37; 36:15]

• AK credits travel with broadening perspectives, breaking routine, and catalyzing new thinking:
  • “It challenges you. It breaks your routine. And when you break your routine, you really expand your thoughts.” (AK, 33:42)
• Recommends even budget or local travel for its personal growth value and exposure to different ways of life.

9. Cross-Cultural Insights for Business & Life

[36:45; 41:04]

• Travel has informed AK’s approach to relationships and business:
  • “You always offer someone something to drink. In fact, you should take it a step further and put the glass of water in front of them.” (AK, 40:02)
• Emphasizes the importance of taking time to build relationships before discussing business, echoing practices from the Middle East and Asia; attentive hospitality and respect build trust.
• Learning cultural nuance helps in negotiation, problem-solving, and networking.

10. Betrayal, Partnerships & Money’s Influence

[42:02; 47:48]

• Experiences of being let down in business—especially by overpromising or character changes after financial success.
  • “I believe that money corrupts people as a default.” (AK, 42:41)
• Partnership mistakes—especially 50/50 agreements with friends—are often based on naivety about human nature.
  • “Everyone, oh, let's do a partnership… we're friends… That's dumb from my point of view now.” (AK, 45:41)
• Advocates clear roles, defined profit-sharing, written contracts, and protecting against ambiguity.
• Warns against nepotism and blurring lines between friends/family and business for the company’s good.

11. “You Can Be Kind, Don’t Be Nice” – Drawing Lines

[48:14; 49:54]

• Distinction between kindness and being a pushover: maintain boundaries, strategic distance, and always prioritize the responsibilities of leadership.
  • “Employees are not friends. And if you blur the lines, it's gonna bite you in the ass because they're gonna walk all over you.” (AK, 49:54)

12. People & Relationships – Observations from a Global Entrepreneur

[52:27; 56:09]

• In business and life, study people, their history, references, and friends—mirroring hiring principles.
  • “Show me your friends and I'll tell you who you are.” (AK, 56:30)
• Even in dating, apply evaluation and vetting—look for a history of stability if you want support, or risk if you want excitement.
• Reflects on heartbreak and hard times as necessary components in the making of great individuals.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “If someone told me, hey, AK, you can’t be a millionaire, but I can give you great health. I’d take it in a heartbeat.” (AK, 08:08)
• “If the patient dies in the waiting room, it is your fault.” (AK, 25:12)
• “The general that loses his emotion loses the war.” (AK, quoting Sun Tzu, 25:53)
• “Should you diversify? The default answer I will say is, no, don’t…Only because you want to.” (AK, 17:04)
• “Show me your friends and I’ll tell you who you are.” (AK, 56:30)
• “You always offer someone something to drink. In fact, you should take it a step further and put the glass of water in front of them.” (AK, 40:02)
• “You can be kind, don’t be nice. There’s a difference.” (Jack, 48:09)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

| Topic | Speaker | Timestamp | |------------------------------------------------|-----------------------------|-----------------| | Managing Businesses & Time | AK | [00:00; 23:36] | | Pivotal Africa & Amazon Trips | AK | [01:34; 04:39] | | Passion and Academic Turnaround | AK | [04:39; 06:37] | | Health as True Wealth | AK | [07:02; 10:13] | | Family & Upbringing | AK | [10:13; 11:36] | | Diversification Advice | AK | [15:59; 20:19] | | Strategic Leadership & Hiring | AK | [20:36; 22:47] | | Extreme Ownership / Blame Game | AK | [25:36; 31:37] | | Power of Travel & Exposure | AK | [31:37; 36:15] | | Cultural Lessons in Business | AK | [36:45; 41:04] | | Betrayal, Partnerships, Money Dynamics | AK | [42:02; 47:48] | | Kindness vs. Being Nice / Nepotism | AK, Jack | [48:14; 49:54] | | Relationships and Dating for Entrepreneurs | AK | [52:27; 58:17] |

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Tone & Takeaways

AK’s tone throughout is equal parts humble, earnest, and analytical, blending stories from personal and entrepreneurial battles with thoughtful, actionable advice. His worldview is grounded in gratitude, responsibility, curiosity, and principle-driven action—earning him, as the hosts say, the title “real-life most interesting man in the world.”

For entrepreneurs of any stage, this episode is a masterclass in not only building wealth but building character and perspective along the way.

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Transcript

[Jack]

You have what, 13, 14 businesses. How have you been able to manage your time across all those different businesses?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Sometimes it's like rapid fire.

[James]

You've been to how many countries at this point?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I don't keep count, but it's going up.

[James]

More than 20, probably.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Oh, yeah. That changed my life, and it still changes my life. It challenges you. It breaks your routine. And when you break your routine, you really expand your thoughts.

[James]

You've adopted this mentality, if the patient dies in the waiting room, it is your fault. So it seems like you're not somebody that's going to pass blame onto other people.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

That's the one thing my dad really taught me. The general that loses his emotion, loses the war. I'm like, man, this guy's quoting Sun Tzu on me.

[Josh]

Being across all these different places and being a part of all these different ventures, like, what would you say is, like, just the most fascinating thing you've learned about people?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

You always offer someone something to drink. In fact, you should take it a step further and put the glass of water in front of them. And two. And I always do this.

[James]

Has there ever been a time where you've trusted a certain person and they've completely done you wrong in business?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

That's. I'm glad you brought that up.

[James]

What's going on, everyone? And welcome back to the School of Hard Knocks podcast. I'm James and I'm here with Jack and Josh and. And we have another incredible guest for you guys today. Or should I say he's the most interesting man on the planet, and I firmly believe it. We're here with Abdullah Kudrath, otherwise known as ak, out here in Houston, Texas. AK is not only an emergency room doctor, but you own not five, not 10, what, 13 businesses now? Probably a little bit more.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Just got two more.

[James]

You just got two more. And it also has probably one of the craziest car collections I've ever seen in my entire life. You know, we're out in your hometown in Houston, Texas. Thank you so much for coming on today.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Pleasure.

[James]

It's great to be here. But, you know, I kind of want to get things started with you is, you know, you had a pivotal moment in your life where I believe you were on a trip in Africa.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

There was one in Africa and one in the Amazon jungle.

[James]

One in the Amazon jungle. But where at the time you were a surgeon or you were an emergency room doctor, and you kind of realized, you know, the work that I'm doing back home is kind of for.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

For.

[James]

For one person. I want to be able to kind of serve many. Can you kind of take us back to that trip and that pivotal, life changing moment that you had?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah. And we were just talking about that off camera, that it's good to take trips not just to relax, but to be inspired.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And I got asked to take this trip to East Africa. I was in Uganda and Kenya with a small group, a church group that would help the children's home and the. And the women's home. And they came across a lot of sick people and they really wanted the doctor to come. So I got invited. I said, sure, sounds like an adventure. Sounds like an opportunity to help. But when I got there, it was busy. We were seeing like 250 people a day. People would, like, hike for miles.

[James]

How many people was on your team?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Like nine.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Nine.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And they weren't really medical, but I taught them to do certain things, like do the point of care labs, read my handwriting for a prescription, order take out the medications, count it so everyone could help. But while out there, it was a bit of a beatdown. 200, 300 people a day because there's no doctors in that region. But on that trip, I started getting better at creating a system that could see more people more efficiently. And then it was on that trip that I realized that as one person, you can only do so much. But if I can create an institution, if I can create organizations, then I can do a lot more, even when I'm gone. So that trip, yeah, it definitely had me thinking in a new direction. And started. I started. I came back to the States and I started seeing things differently. Not just how to be a doctor, but how to be a part of a system and how to build that system.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Yeah.

[James]

Where did the inspiration to, I guess, pursue medicine originally come from?

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[James]

Like. Like, did you know that growing up that that was kind of, you know, you have that dream job. I want to be a baseball player. Was it early on that you were like, I want to be a doctor. What was that moment?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Oh, it was late, very late. You know, sometimes kids will say, I want to be a doctor. Right.

[Jack]

What did you want to do?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

You know, in fourth grade, if you asked me, I said, I don't even know how I knew these words. I said, a cybernetic engineer. Mainly because I love the movie Terminator and Robocop and all these robot movies. And I thought it'd be so cool to be involved with building robots or robotic parts for humans.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And then, you know, I was a kid, but then growing up, I was more Computer science, because I was good with computers. And it took me to my second year into college to realize that my. We all have our passion. We have a calling. It wasn't computers. I liked it, but it wasn't my calling. And that's when I decided that I wanted to be a doctor on another trip. And that was a trip. I randomly ended up in the Amazon jungle with some researchers. And one of the researchers was an ecologist. And they casually invited me, and I said, trip to the Amazon. I should go learn how to make a man out of me, see what I'm afraid of out there.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And it was a bit of a stretch because we didn't have a whole lot of money at the time, right. And the ticket alone was 1700 bucks. But I told my dad about it, and he says, yeah, I think you should go. I think he realized at that time in my life, I didn't know what I was doing. And he thought maybe exploring would help me.

[James]

Get out of your comfort zone a little bit.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah. Because I was totally a homebody. And so he paid for my plane ticket and I went out there to the Amazon jungle in Brazil for almost three weeks. And getting out of my routine and being out in nature. I never cared about nature. If you see a bird now, do you think twice? That's a pigeon. It's a crow, right? You go out there and you see these, like, beautiful, colorful birds with huge beaks and long streaming tails floating across you. You have to take notice. Now I'm noticing something. I never really cared about biology. And I started asking some questions, like, why? Why are we the way we are? Why is nature this way? Why this butterfly is camouflaged? This one's so bright. Why? And I started reading. I started becoming fascinated with biology. And I think that trip kind of set my sights on biology and. Or learning about the universe that we live in. And then a little bit more traveling. I started thinking about being a doctor. I was like, maybe I. I want to learn how we work, how we break, how we can fix it. So I said, okay, maybe being a doctor is for me. And I did some volunteering at the hospital, in the er, and I loved it. But my grades were terrible when I started college, so something had to change. But now that I had this passion and this direction, I was able to make the change. I changed my friend circle. I changed my activities. I love that game, Grand Theft Auto. I. I deleted it from my computer because it was taking too much time.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And I changed my life. And I stayed at the college campus. And until I studied to a certain point and thank God I was able to graduate top of my class at the new university I transferred into, which kind of balanced out my bad grades from the community college.

[James]

Where were you going to school?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I started at San JAC and then I went to U of H. Clear Lake. And with that increase in my grades, I was in a good MCAT score. I was able to get into med school because it's of kind of competitive, right? But what that taught me was, again, it's not that I'm so smart, is I. It's that you have to have passion to truly commit to finding the answers or the solutions to get where you want to go.

[James]

So you persisted through, you know, you got through B, you got through medical school and became a doctor now before we kind of get into, you know, you started to build the businesses. When I first interviewed you, you said something profound that I think I've taken with me to this day. And it actually came up in a recent interview that I did with a gentleman, Brian Johnson. He's owned, you know, Braintree, you know, Venmo, and he sold it to PayPal for like $800 million. And his big thing is like, he's trying not to die. But really the root is just like putting such an emphasis on health as an entrepreneur, because so many entrepreneurs, they run themselves into the ground. You've got three culprits right here. You know what I mean? But when I first interviewed you, I asked you about just the correlation of health and on success and just taking care of yourself. And you've seen super successful people that, that came to you that made, you know, millions or billions of dollars, and you were their doctor. But they'd say, you know, I would, I would do anything to have my, my stomach back. They got stomach cancer. What, what is that importance of putting yourself in terms of your health holistically and taking care of yourself, putting that above finances?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I think it's number one, right? If someone told me, hey, ak, you can't. You can't be a millionaire, but I can't give you, like, great health. I take it in a heartbeat. Take it in a heartbeat, right? Or if you have to trade a couple million dollars and you get a diagnosis of some illness, would you take it?

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

So definitely our priority should always be health, right? And that's also important because if that's your number one priority, guess what? You wake up every day really, really happy and you. And really, really content, right? Because sometimes, oh, man, I haven't made this. I haven't got to the level I want. You're kicking yourself in the butt, right? We want to be critical of ourselves when we slip up, but we also want to be grateful for what we have. And when you have health, you've got a lot. You're a rich person if you've got good health. So I do think that's very important. And I'm in a position, a privileged position, where I get to be with people when they don't have that good news. And I can be there to help find it out early and help guide them through that and be a part of that, to help them as much as I can. And being in that position, man, have I seen so much. And it's really opened my eyes as a reminder to that very same fact. Be really grateful every day. You can open your eyes every day. You can take a breath, right? Because we have to be really careful that we're not happy because we haven't made it to where we are. My buddy's got this car. I don't have it, man. He's got a million dollars. I don't have it. Like, I'm working so hard. I don't get it yet.

[James]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Again, we want to analyze our steps and make the changes, but we don't want time to slip us by and health to slip us by. And we are miserable because we don't have xyz, right? We got to remind ourselves to be content and still work hard. And I think that mindset is very important because that happens in here. Nobody else can see it.

[Josh]

These principles that you kind of talk about, would you say you learned this more from maybe your family and how you were raised, or was it your experiences within the medical field?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Great question. I think my parents, we grew up pretty modestly because they're first generation to this country, right? So I remember when we were kids, there's five of us, and if my mom brought home a Snicker bar, we'd cut it into five pieces and we're happy. It doesn't take much to be happy, really. Couldn't buy toys at that time, but we had an imagination. I remember this Rayovac flashlight that was. It looked like a Batmobile, kind of, because it was rectangular. I had toys, I had imagination, right? But because they never. I never saw in them this, like, sadness that we don't have or this discontent or looking at what other people have. It was always just, hey, be a good person, right? Work hard, learn as much as you can. Seek knowledge and it was more like, let's build a principle of existence. And it wasn't like, oh, you got to be rich. You got to be a doctor. You got to make money. That was never part of the conversation, but there was a lot of conversation on principles. And I do think that's helped, maybe given me a structure or a foundation that really helped me in the future to. Then you apply that to everything you do in business, in leadership, if you have a team, if you're doing, like, a company that has employees. So I think all those principles that I learned really helped me understand these. These things as well.

[Jack]

Yeah. I love how we were talking earlier that it was just like, if somebody were to offer you $10 million, would you take it? And most people would say, of course. But then they said the only caveat is you don't get to wake up tomorrow. Everyone's like, get that $10 million away from me. So I love that. I think that's such an important message that people need to really here at the end of the day. I'm sure everybody here has seen the Do Equis commercial with the guy where he's like, meet the most interesting man in the world. I can confidently say out of anybody that I know personally, you by far are the real life most interesting man in the world. And so whether it's from being ER Doc and owning a practice or multiple businesses, I know you do some modeling, some TV stuff, you travel around the world. Just for this beginning of the podcast. Can you just kind of lay out for everybody kind of all the different dimensions and sectors of what you're involved in and everything? And don't. And don't be humble for this, because I know you're a humble guy just for. Just for this. And then we can keep diving into. Because I just want people to understand, you got the real life Dozeckies guy right here.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Well, that's quite a title. I appreciate that because you guys interview some all stars around this planet, right? I mean, you guys are international now, so I appreciate that title, and I'll keep striving to earn that name. But what I think it is is I do have a high curiosity for everything, right? It's like when I'm on an airplane, like, I don't want to talk about what I do. I've said that so many times. What does the guy next to me do? Like, he programs video games for the Spider Man. You know, like, he builds a city for Spider Man. Like, I want to learn about everything. And that's that's kind of helped me get involved with everything and build my skill set on everything. It's about experience to me.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

So, yeah, I love being a doctor, but I didn't want to only be a doctor. I love being an entrepreneur and having medical facilities because now I can treat people without anyone else's permission. If you don't have money, come in. I got you.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Just on the way in here, I got a message from a friend whose son has appendicitis and she's freaking out.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I love to be able to say, well, come in. I want to check this and that.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

So then diversifying, Right? Okay. A lot of knowledge is translational. What I've learned in my business in the er, I've applied to my rooftop lounge. Why do I like that? Because I like to be a host. I want a place where people can have a good time, where people can celebrate their birthday, where politicians can do an event, where musicians can hang out and do their after party. I met so many interesting people, and I've learned so much from them. And then the acting thing is cool. I think it's a challenge. There's creativity in writing a script, which I've done some short stories, and there's like an adrenaline rush getting in front of the camera. And then as you start doing that, people take notice. Okay, you're pretty good at this. You're pretty good at that. Come be in this TV show. Come be in this music video again. You meet more people in different networks. You have more opportunities. So instead of saying no to these opportunities, I'm like, man, this sounds like a cool challenge I can face. And, you know, I love cars. It's not just cars, it's machines. So I got the tank that was cool. And then people reach out. Who is a military tank from England? People from the Royal British Military reached out to me on Facebook and was like, oh, I used to drive those in 1980. This.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Expanded my network again. I've learned a lot. So doing all these different things and never saying no to an opportunity.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

I.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Think it's really expanded my life. It's really broken out a routine. It's really given me a lot of knowledge from other places that I can tie back into what I'm doing. And I'm glad that people like that because sometimes people on social media will see follow my story, see what I'm doing and get inspired, which to me is the most important thing, because I get inspired by people in my life. If they can see that and they're like, man, I always thought about getting my paz license. He's doing it. I'm gonna take my discovery flight. Or, hey, where can I take. Should I take acting classes? What should I do? So I think the key is we should all keep just inspiring each other and presenting things in a way not to flex or brag, but to show the journey. I think that's more useful to people. And they're like, oh, shoot, you're in a place where I want to be. Thanks for showing a window into how to get there, but thank you. I'll keep trying my best to live up to that title.

[James]

One of the things that fascinates me about, you know, kind of your diversification, as you can call it, is it. It was very strategic, being that, you know, you started, right, as a, you know, physician, as an emergency room doctor. Obviously, we're making a lot of money doing that. But you're like, if you look at the kind of the different verticals that you're in, a lot of it's complementary to your skill sets and the things that you really have a passion for, whether it's, you know, you're building and kind of owning emergency room facilities. Right. You talked about how with the lounge, it's like, one thing that you acquired is having hospitality, taking care of people, being that kind of hosting thing. How important is. Has that been to your strategy when diversifying and kind of thinking about that's that next business I want to go into, Right. You've owned and operated tons of different companies, but how important is it to kind of have that strategic approach when you're doing so? Right, because in our case, right, it's like, we're great at media. We know how to market. We know how to, you know, but it's like, if we went and tried to go build a hospital, we'd fucking fail, because we don't know anything about hospitals. But with you, there's a very. There's a very strategic approach to your diversification. Can you kind of break that down?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yes. And this is what I've learned a lot over the last. I'd say three years. Okay, first question. Should you diversify? The default answer I will say is, no, don't. Don't do it. Keep pushing forward in your field and. And become an expert and take it as far as you could possibly take it. So then why would I diversify? Or why should you diversify only because you want to? Not for the money, not for the. You want to learn new stuff. So, one, you have to have a Passion for learning something new. But from a business point of view, if you want to really grow your empire, I would say in nine out of 10 cases, the idea is to stick to what you know and really scale it and grow it.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Okay.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I would be bored doing that, to be honest. Like, it wouldn't be fulfilling. Could I do 20 medical facilities and make a lot more money and sell them a big portfolio? Yes, I'd make a lot more money. But then that's all I would have to show for it, Right? That's not me. So that's. Now I decided, okay, I want to diversify. What skill has helped me? Because if I were to, like, I just bought an RV park, The deal came in like a friend owned it with a partner. The partner unfortunately passed away. The family wanted to sell the shares they offered, negotiate a good rate. I'm like, that makes sense. And sometimes when you make money here, you want to keep reinvesting and growing as opposed to paying taxes, Just kind of keep rolling it. And I was like, that's kind of cool. I like tiny homes. It's got a lake. Let me be a part of the RV park and let me have a secondary plan to do these cool capsule homes around the lake, right? So it's the passion that brings it. But what do I know about RV parks? Nothing. So I had to develop a skill over the years on how to, from a overview level, analyze the principles of a business and then see the parts where I lack information and get really good at hiring somebody who is the main operator. That's still hard because when you first start doing it, you will hire the wrong people because they will tell you what you want to hear and you have no insight. So you'll hire them and you'll quickly realize it's not working and you have to replace them. So there's this, like, slow period. So that skill starts developing over time. If I could break that down into the simplest teachable points, is this when you're hiring an operator or somebody to do a position, one is, if they've never done it before, the answer is no. They're going to tell you what you want to hear. But if they don't have a track record, and it can't be they were a part of this, and no, they've done this. They've done a startup, or they've done an RV park, or they've done rental for the office space or whatever the company is, or they ran a rooftop lounge. That was the same kind of category of clientele as far as it's upscale versus more chill, then you hire the right person and you always background check, always background check and still know that they may not do the job well because you didn't know how to oversee them. Again, another skill you'll learn how to develop metrics that you can go back and check to see if you're heading in the right direction. So, great question. It's not easy and sometimes it takes the school of hard knocks, right? You gotta try and you gotta fail a little bit. But you wanna really mitigate your failures and mitigate your losses by following those principles. So.

[James]

So it's safe to say though, when you are looking for talent, when you're looking for the people to kind of go and fulfill certain roles, you don't really care too much about the interview.

[Josh]

You care.

[James]

Not that you don't care about like the interview process, but you care more. So have you actually done this before? Do you have results to back up? You know what I mean?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Step one is you gotta look at their history. Don't. I mean, if you really want to give them a chance and take the risk, sure. But do you really want to take the chance with the business? Depends on the position of the business. So really vet people from their history, go back and get references and see how they did. And you know, I think that will really. Now the interview is also important, right? Because there's certain. Some people have rode a wave and you might find some people personality red flags that just don't fit with where you're going, right? Because everyone has their own leadership style. And when you hire a manager, they represent your leadership style. If they treat your employees badly, you picked them, so that makes you look bad. So you know your leadership style. So you have to either find somebody that's like you or find somebody that fixes your rough edges. Like maybe you're too strict with things or you're too knee jerk reflex, you're working on it. Find somebody who's not like that because you know it's a problem.

[Jack]

Culture is a big part of hiring. It's like culture is almost just as important as experience in a way. Like you kind of have to have both. It's like you do, you do the interview and like it's a great culture fit. But like they're saying, oh, I can do this, I can do that. But you don't know for sure until they start. But if you, if you just have them submit their portfolio and you look at the work that they've done, you have no idea if they'd be a.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Good fit for the team, 100%. And culture is really important. And let's talk about that for a second, because what is culture? I've seen hospitals bring in these, like, essentially these consultants, and they talk about culture and like, oh, we want to be a family, we're this, right? So what changes? All talk to actually building a culture. What does it take in leadership to do that?

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

It takes leading by example is what I found, right? If you come in and you see some. Some trash, a napkin on the floor and you pick it up yourself, you don't say anything. People are like, oh, damn, the owner had to do it. We need to step up our game. There's different strategies, right? But leading by example, right? And also being there for employees. So when they come to you with a problem, you're truly trying to be on their side and be fair and help them out. Just like if it was you on the other side of the table, what would you do for it? Like, what would you want?

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

That's how you build culture. Step one, right? And those principles we talked about that we learn about, where does that. How are you going to be a good problem solver? It's your core. Are you honest? Do you do what you say you're going to do? If there's confusion, side with them because you weren't clear, right? And do you really care? People can feel the difference, right? So who you are as a person. Person will translate into your leadership, and then that will translate into building a culture that people will rally around.

[Jack]

I've always been curious because we talked about diversification, but you have a point where you have, what, 13, 14 businesses? And how are you able to kind of manage your time? I know that team's very important, but how have you been able to manage your time across all those different businesses?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah, I still struggle with it. Like, sometimes it's like rapid fire. It's like a busy day in the ER when you're working on shift, right? There's no set schedule. The rooms may all be full, the waiting room may be full. You got hallway beds, you got a helicopter dropping someone, you got an ambulance coming in. Where do you go? So you have to reprioritize. Always. Every day I wake up, I reprioritize every single company. And sometimes, like, okay, what is the absolute most important things I have to do for every company? I gotta spend my day doing that, right? But never forgetting everybody else. Because in the er, if a patient dies in the waiting room, that's still on me, right? So I've got to learn ways to keep an eye on everything. Maybe come up with systems and employees that are not on the company side, but on my executive side. Like different types of executive assistants that are assigned companies. And I'm like, hey, if you see this, let me know, or I need you to do this, or this is what I want you to watch for. Because I can't look at all these accounts. And it's something I'm learning. If I don't get good at that and I'm doing jobs myself, I'll never have time to. I'll turn my back on other businesses and they'll be harmed. So I think I'm still learning. And I'm sure there's people, like, there's people out there with like 500 companies right now. Granted, they're not involved at all, right? I'm kind of building my way up to separating myself from companies with good systems. But it is. It's taking two or three years, but I'm finally getting to that point where I feel so much more relieved because of the systems that I've built.

[James]

One of the things that just stood out to me in that is you've adopted this mentality, right? Like, if you're part of the executive team, you're running the executive team. If the patient dies in the waiting room, it is your fault. So it seems like you're not somebody that's going to pass blame onto other people despite maybe it was their mistake because you're the person that kind of assembled those systems or put that person there. You're going to be the one that kind of take charge and responsibility for that. You're not going to. You don't pass the blame to other people.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

That's. I'm glad you brought that up because that's one thing my dad really taught me. He never allowed me to blame anyone or anything for anything at all. Never. What's the point? How does that benefit you anyways, right?

[James]

What was his reasoning for that?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

You know, we. I don't know. He must have got it from somewhere. But that's really how he lived, right? So. And it was passed on to me because I was fiery as a young teenager. Like, oh, that guy. I can't believe he talked to me like this. Who does he think he is, right? And he'll say, son, you know, not everybody was raised the same way. Maybe they had their own issues. He's making excuses for the guy, and I want to be mad at the dude, right? I'm like, no, that guy said this to me. He's gonna get himself hurt talking. I mean, this, like, young, passionate, fiery teenager. Right at that time, I was 18, 19, right. And he kept going. He said. He quoted Sun Tzu in the Art of War. He said, well, son, if you don't want to listen to me, you know, think of what Sun Tzu said. And the general that loses his emotion loses the war. I'm like, man, this guy's quoting Sun Tzu on me. And then. And then I kept going. I was mad that time. I don't get mad like that anymore. But I was 18, and I was like. I was like, no, that guy's gonna get himself killed talking to me like that. Because he said something threatening to me. You know what my dad said? He said he didn't accept that. He said, well, then you have a responsibility to protect him from himself. Took the fire out of me. He kept putting the responsibility back onto me. Because he's right, though, right? If you got a bad employee, a bad manager, bad. Well, he. Yeah, there's plenty of blame to go around, but why not tell yourself, like, okay, man, why did I. I did a bad job picking that guy. What did I miss? Well, I need to figure out how to manage them, right, or I need to replace them. What's the best way to do it? If you point all your fingers back at you, it's going to help you a lot more. And here's the tricky part. The blame game is a lot of times fueled by ego. It's your ego because you don't want to take a second to see how you could have avoided that situation or how you could fix that situation. We let our egos get in the way. And for a lot of young entrepreneurs, that's why they fail. Well, that guy this and this, that, and this happened. I had a bad teacher. I had a bad this and that. Who cares?

[Josh]

Something I'm curious about is you're overseeing all of these companies, and something you just mentioned is ego. And you can't have ego. And with a portfolio of companies, I'm sure there's periods where some companies are doing better than others. Some companies are maybe struggling even at times. What have you noticed are, like, the commonalities or the traits of those companies that are consistently successful and perform over time versus the ones that maybe are struggling at times.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Great question. I think, well, there's always a reason why it's suffering, right? You can always make it better. So for. In my case, it's usually a factor of Time I've abandoned that company because I'm too busy doing this and that, right? Or it's poor oversight, a bad system. Or I just need to look at it and drop ego, see where we're going wrong, right? The nice thing about being like, kind of like the main partner or the only partner in a company, you got no one to complain to. If it's your bad idea and you want to stick by, okay, you'll stick by it while your company runs straight to the ground. And you lost a lot of money. Can't happen when you're the only owner, right? You're like, it's not doing so well. What do I need to change? Oh, man, Our SEO is terrible. Okay, let me dive into it. Show me some results. These results don't really make sense. Let me ask a friend who's into this. Hey, what do you think about that? Let me ask two competitors. Hey, give me a quote for this. You have to be dynamic and you have to learn and you have to blame yourself for everything. And then you'll find an answer, and then you'll be very happy with yourself that you fixed it. So I think going in with the idea that I'm messing up somewhere, I'm screwing up somewhere, let me fix it. You'll fix it, and then, boom, the company starts doing better. But it starts with blaming yourself in a good way, not in like a beat yourself up way.

[Jack]

I love this thing that Gary Vee says where he talks about that. It's like, if you take responsibility, like, people that take responsibility for everything in their life tend to be way more happy. Because if you are casting blame or you're saying, oh, this happened for this reason, and this reason, other than just taking it internally and owning it, that's where like, stress and anxiety, all that comes up. Because it's like you're worrying about things that if all. If all this is happening because of other people, you can't control that. And so that's where you start getting stressed. But if it's like you take ownership and you control that, like, hey, this is happening because of me. I take ownership of it. You've now taken control of that bad situation.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah, I think that's right. And that's a good framework, right? Because some people will hear me and say, ak, no, why are you always beating yourself up?

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Or no, it is their fault. They could have done better. They keep going back to the blame game, right? But when you. When your frame of reference is, I don't want a pity party, I'M not feeling bad for myself. I'm just taking responsibility because it actually gives me more control of the situation.

[Jack]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. One, we did a podcast and one of the big, you know, one of our first early podcasts, and one of the big themes there was that, like, you know, for young entrepreneurs and people starting out or people that are super ambitious, they need to get out of their hometown, they need to go see the world and someone that's well traveled, I'm sure that you could probably speak to this as well. Of, like, if we're speaking to that young person, they're. They're living at home and they haven't really broadened their horizons. What advice would you have for them to expose themselves? Because we had a quote before we started this podcast. You can only grow to what you're exposed to. And so what are some advice that you have for somebody like that that's maybe hesitating to, like, leave their environment?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I think that's a really good point because that, that changed my life and it still changes my life, right? I break my routine, I go on a trip, even if it's a fun trip, I'm going to a wedding, I'm going with some friends, right? Sometimes I like to travel by myself. It's different, you know, like, I have a friend, like, oh, how do you do that? I'll never travel by myself. I actually like it. It's very introspective, right? You can't rely on anybody. You got to figure everything out yourself. It challenges you. It breaks your routine. And when you break your routine, you really expand your thoughts. Life can run together so fast when you're stuck in a routine, and then, boom, next thing you know, the week is gone, the month is gone. If you traveled for a month, does that fly by well when you're there? But think about the lifetime of memories you've built in a month that would other otherwise you wouldn't have remembered one week from the next and exposure. But also facing a fear, because if you're not traveling already, ask yourself why. Maybe you're intimidated by it and you don't realize it. Maybe you're avoiding it because you don't want to get out of your comfort zone, right? So when an opportunity comes that requires a little bit of sacrifice to do a business or take a risk, how are you going to get out of your comfort zone? Because you've never challenged yourself. So I think all these drills that you do with yourself are training you for that challenge, that you'll get it's training you to get out of your comfort zone. And travel is a great way of doing it. Now, if you don't have the money to travel, you don't. You can do it on the cheap.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And you could do it safely. You can do it locally. America is beautiful. We've got incredible state parks. You don't have to go across the world to travel and see something beautiful and ponder by a lake or wonder at a huge mountain range. You can do that with a short drive. So I do recommend that people expose themselves to the natural beauty of this world and break out of the routine so that they can give themselves a moment to think in a new direction.

[James]

And, you know, I have to ask, because you've been to how many countries at this point, man?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah, I don't keep count, but it's. It's going up.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Yeah.

[James]

More than 20, probably.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[James]

So because you said something beautiful in that last kind of statement, which is that when people think about going on a trip or traveling for a month, they may look at it as like, I'm going to be gone for a couple weeks. But really, like you said, they're building, like a lifetime of memories. And one of Josh's favorite artists, we recently interviewed him, he's a rapper named Russ. I don't forgot where I heard him talk about it, but, like, where, you know, he'll sometimes just go on trips just to get thoughts, to, like, write about things. Because you come back with just such like a fresh, you know, new perspective on life and different things. And so I just had to say, like, I thought that that was a fascinating thing.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[James]

Because if you can see it in your mind and actually see it, then you can hold it in your hands.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

There's a statement that goes along, inspiration for new thoughts. But also, if you can't travel to a very foreign place, take it. Because I love culture shock.

[James]

So that's why I was going to ask, what are three to five places non negotiable that come to mind instantly when I say, look, before somebody leaves this earth, they need to go there. Like some places that you. That taught you a lot about you.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah. You know, I think it's going to be a very different answer for how people are built.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Because for me, I want to go back to the Amazon and just trying to find time where I can actually truly disconnect for three weeks again. But that may not appeal to everybody, like living on a boat and canoeing through the bugs all over you.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

But that was really challenging. My comfort zone, right, It's a wild place out there in the jungle. So to me, that was a must see. And I want to go back. But to other people that may not. But I think wherever you go, right, if you could go to a place that's very different and you're like, whoa, I've taken for granted that there was only one way to do this. And in this part of the world, they do it completely different. Whether it's the way they greet you, the way they. In Europe, they don't hear like, dude, are they gonna bring the check or not? In the restaurant in Europe, it's rude if they bring in the check, that's like they're kicking you out. So you're waiting, no one's coming. And then you realize that's their politeness, right? Even something as simple as that, that challenges the way you see things as polite versus impolite starts making you challenge everything you've done. Just because it's the way it's always been done. It's the way everyone around you did it. You start thinking outside of the box, you start realizing that, let me re evaluate and start from zero on what I'm doing in life and think in a more broad horizon.

[James]

You brought up how just from being in Europe, it's rude for them to bring you the check because it makes them feel like they're kind of kicking you out. But from being so versed and experiencing so many different cultures, are there any other maybe business practices that you've picked up on going to different countries around the world? We've spent some time in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, in Dubai. You know, they're just incredibly relationship centric. They're just such giving people. Are there any other practices that you've picked up that you've kind of brought to your businesses, instilled in your teams as you've been building companies here in.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

The U.S. absolutely, absolutely. And this is common in some Middle Eastern and some Asian countries is you don't jump to the point. That is rude. So here it's like, like, hey, do you have the order? Can you, can you give me, can you ship me this much? How much? That would be so rude in business. In Japan, for example, right. They have a lot of fluff talk now. Americans might be like, dude, get to the point. Like, they're gonna talk, they're gonna start their email with, it's been a beautiful spring and we look forward to the blossom. We look forward to the blossom of what's up, what's the Cherry blossom tree, right? Or, like, if I don't have kids, but say I had kids, and I'm like, hey, man, I gotta go this thing on Friday. Can you watch the kids? I put you on the spot. That's rude. The Japanese person will be like, I wait till you say, hey, how you doing? You got any big plans for the weekend? And I'll say, oh, yeah, I've run into a little bit of a problem. I've got to get to this event. But right now I don't have anyone to babysit the kids.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And then you can volunteer, like, no worries. Bring them to my house and I'll watch them for the couple.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

But I'll never put you on the spot. So understanding that and understanding who you're talking to, you now have an arsenal of ways to speak. Because I'll know this guy if he's from another country. Maybe he's an immigrant, or maybe he likes a certain way. This guy likes to be direct. I started doing it on the most random things. Like, if I had to appeal a parking ticket at my school, I would start with this big, polite introduction. And then my request, humbly. And my friend did his appeal. Well, I don't think I should get a ticket. He got denied. I got mine. I got mine appealed, right? So I started incorporating that in a lot of things that I do. And I feel like that's helped me tremendously in business. And I learned that from watching other cultures.

[Josh]

I think it's hilarious because we were in. We were in Saudi, and I will never forget, we were working with one of the ministries out there, and we were sitting down with an advisor, and, you know, we were, you know, wanted to chat business, everything. But they absolutely insist that you break bread before, you know, you do business together. And I'll never forget, like, we had been eating throughout the day, and so we had sat down, and I think Jack and I ordered a quesadilla. I think James might have ordered like a. Like a small pizza or something like that. And this guy was like, no, no, no. He ordered, I think, damn near half the menu. And we sat down there and we had a absolute feast. And we're all just, like, stuff in our face. We're like, look, you gotta eat the who? You know, you can't leave any food there, right? And so we're sitting down, we're eating. And I realized I was like, you know what? This isn't actually so much of a bad thing of breaking bread and eating with someone before you do business with Them. Because imagine you just do business off of just pure financials or just pure metrics, but not off of actual character. Because especially if you're going to do business with someone, especially for an extended period of time, it's more than just like, what the raw numbers are. It's actually, do I actually like this person? Do we share a lot of the same values and metrics and being across all these different places and being a part of all these different ventures? Like, what would you say is like, just the most fascinating thing you've learned about people?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I like your example. That was really good because. And I believe it, if you're a gentleman or a lady in life, then you're going to be a gentleman or lady in business, right? And that's a really good example. We talk about breaking bread, right? And I kind of grew up that way, too. My dad kind of taught me that. One is, you know, you always offer someone something to drink. In fact, you should take it a step further and put the glass of water in front of them because they might decline out of politeness. A lot of people, we do that. Oh, no, no, I'm good, I'm good. But we might be super thirsty, so just put the glass of water in.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Front of them, right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And two. And I always do this if someone offers me food, I will take a little taste. Unless there's some circumstance, right? Because how bonding is it when you eat with somebody and they really mean it, right? So if I got, you know, even some French fries, right? I'm like, oh, you got to try this. These are good, these seasoned fries. I may not be hungry. Maybe I just ate, but I absolutely will try one.

[James]

Hey, you can never say no to the glass of water.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

That's right. That's right. I mean, someone's offering you a gift and you're doing a small accept. You're not going to make them hungry by eating that one French fry. Or maybe they want to give you a bite of a burger. That's really bonding. They just hand it to you, you take a bite, right? If you truly believe that they mean it, and they mostly do, don't eat all their food. That's rude, right? See that you ate and they haven't ate. Don't take half of it unless they really force it on you. But take a small piece just to. Just to bond in that moment, just to accept that gift. And I think those type of things you mentioned, the Middle Eastern culture is really big on that, right? And I brought that to some of my American friends. Because they're like, ak, we do it different. Like, I noticed you and your family, like, you guys share this into each other. Oh, you gotta try this, you gotta try that. When you're at a restaurant and I was kind of taught, like, your food is your plate and it's rude to reach or to eat from somebody else's plate. He goes, but I like your way better. So it's, you gotta understand people's sensibilities and then slowly introduce it in the right moments.

[James]

So you studied people, you've studied history, you know, you, you've learned a ton about business, a ton about health, a ton about, you know, money and everything. You've had a lot of businesses go your way, a lot of deals go your way. Has there ever been a time where you've trusted a certain person and they've completely done you wrong in business?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Happens all the time. Especially when you're, when you're first new to business, this will happen to you because you don't know how to. You don't know how to make a choice.

[James]

What was your moment when you were just like from somebody that you didn't expect?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah, you know, it just sometimes people over promise and under deliver, sometimes people will change over time.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Money. I'm a believer of this and I have arguments with my friends. I believe that money corrupts people as a default.

[James]

So. So, because the flip side is that, you know, we were on the prior podcast, the gentleman had mentioned that money empowers and it amplifies the person that you are. So if you're a great person, but you've seen the flip side to where it can take a good person and change them for the worst.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

It empowers you. And when you're in a position of power, can't you become correct?

[James]

Yeah. So that's what happens to politicians.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Right. So I remember one great leader said it's only a matter of time before politicians become corrupt. Because he was appointing governors hundreds of years ago. And so he would always check on his provincial governors because he thought it was only a matter of time. He was taken aback when he finally had one governor that just refused. And the reason why that guy refused and that governor came from a very wealthy background is that he would always make sacrifice for his people. He sold his horse because his people weren't doing well. He didn't wear good clothes because his people weren't doing well. And he said, until the lowest man in my village can do that, then I will do it.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

So that's why I'm not into politics, but if I did, that's a serious job because that's how I would want to approach it.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

But even not in politics, we got to be mindful of that and we got to be mindful of this element of being corrupt. Look at the curse of the lottery. Easy come, easy go. And people say, no, you're being too worried about that. Fine, it's my opinion. I'm just going to bring up the topic so we can think about it.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

It doesn't have to corrupt you, but you have to not be so arrogant to think that you're uncorruptible. Then I think it will corrupt you. It's like the drunk person. I'm not drunk. You look at them, you can tell they're drunk. Like, no way, I'm not drunk. I'm not drunk at all.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I can drive. Give me my keys. That's how I look at corruption. You will think that you're a perfect person. You will think that, yeah, I'm fine. I'm not. So having that healthy fear of it. And I'm not saying can't have nice things. Do it. Face the fear of corruption and it messing you up, but protect yourself and check yourself as you move forward and you gain success. Because if I could gain a billion dollars and be a correct person, I will not take it. I will not, I hope, and I will always say that for the rest of my life.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I would rather keep doing well as best as I can, but maintain my core principle principles. And I think that's important to a lot of young entrepreneurs.

[James]

So looking back, you know, you're super versed in a lot of industries and a lot of different deals, doing business with all types of different people. What were some of those warning signs that you kind of ignored? Going into certain partnerships with people where it ended up kind of unfolding due to that person's character or due to that person. Like you said, under promising, you know, or over promising, under, over promising, under delivering. What were some of those warning signs, red flags that you wish that you would have, you know, noticed.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Looking back, I don't think there's any way I could have known that money would corrupt people, that when they're in a position, it would change them. There's no way I could have known. In fact, I have this new friend who was an attorney, semi retired, 75 years old, businessman, attorney. And when I told him a story once, he goes, what did you expect? I was like, what? He goes, why wouldn't that happen? Do you not understand human nature. So I look at it different. I'm not mad about it. I should have better understand human nature and I should have created my companies in positions that would have prevented against that. And you learn the hard way, right? For example, everyone, oh, let's do a partnership. Let's open this ice cream store. We'll do 50. 50. We're friends. That's what we all do when we're new. And that's dumb from my point of view now.

[James]

So what's the better way to go about that then?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Well, first we need to have a whole charter and a roadmap for this company. Why is it 50 50? Are you really going to do 50% of the work? What does that work? Have we defined it? And what if you don't? Will you lose percentage? Otherwise we're going to make money. I'm going to slack off, you're going to be mad at me and I'm still going to ride your coattail and make 50%. And you're going to have resentment towards me or you're going to get all the attention for the company because people think you're the main guy. And now I feel inferior to you. And that's corrupt in my mind too. All this stuff happens. It's human nature, right? So how do you protect against that? Just like you have a kid. I don't have kids.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Yet.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

You got even a pet. You can spoil it, right? If you give it whatever you want. If you create a bad situation. I'm not saying you got to treat people like pets. I'm just saying you have to apply that same logic, right? Don't create a position. I can be spoiled. If my parents spoiled me, I could be spoiled. Now if somebody spoils me, I'm going to say it's my fault. But they might want to take blame too, because like man, I created the position that he wasn't ready for, right? Don't create positions that aren't thought out. Don't create positions that the person's not ready for instead of doing a partnership. Because I kind of have a feeling that you might slack off because you've never done it before. I'm not going to make you 50% owner, but I'm going to give you 20 or 30% of the profits if you do XYZ.

[James]

So it's safe to say then, and I mean this fully, and then also not fully in the sense, but you have to be a little bit of an asshole in business and not from the perspective of you have to Treat people wrong. But you just can't be Mr. Nice Guy. Otherwise you will get taken advantage of. And I look at the early entrepreneur when they're starting out, they say yes to everything.

[Jack]

You can be kind, don't be nice. You can be kind, but don't be nice. There's a difference there.

[James]

But you have to learn that, though, a little bit. And I think that especially, like, one thing that we've learned this year, we've 100% learned that is that, you know, a lot of people are, you know, in it for themselves. And if you've got tremendous value and worth that you're bringing to the table, like you said, the ice cream shops are great analogies. It's like, dude, if I'm bringing 70% of the value and I've got this, I'm putting the capital down, I'm doing a lot of the work. Why are you getting 50%? You know what I mean?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And then when it comes time to expand and make the second location, guess what? You want to keep the same name. He's coming along with you, and he's running your coattail even more. And now you got to make a new company. And then.

[James]

Right, but. But that lesson is you've had to learn that. It's like you got to be able to put the foot down.

[Josh]

And I think another thing as well is you have to remember that that word is not law. And that contracts and what's written down and signed is law.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Absolutely. And even that is difficult because, say in our contract, it's set, we're partners, 50. 50. And it said, I was supposed to do this, and I'm not. What are you going to do about it? Are you going to sue me? Okay, go spend 20,000 getting a lawyer on retainer. And how long are we going to be in court for? Because I'll spend 20,000 on a lawyer, too. We'll be in court for two to three years, and it's going to be this word versus that. Well, you didn't. This ambiguity here. Their lawyer's going to do, and then maybe you'll settle. Do you want to take on the headache? You will expect it. You will, because you're not. It's like martial arts. Someone could tell you how to fight. Are you gonna go in the ring and win? Maybe, maybe not. So you gotta get out there. You gotta win some, you gotta lose some. You're gonna become better at the kung fu of money, as I call it, and you'll grow.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

But I want to go back to that do you have to be an asshole? I know what the point is, but still, I wanna go back to that and I wanna say you just have to be firm. One, you do have to create distance and barriers, right? Because employees are not friends. And if you blur the lines, it's gonna bite you in the ass because they're gonna walk all over you and, oh, he's my friend. He's not gonna fire me. He's gonna let me be late. And you don't want to be in that position because you don't want to fire him because they're your friend and you're not gonna hurt your friendship, right? So sometimes you have to have strategic distance for the good of the company because you have to wear a different hat, right? You don't want to blend certain things and you don't want to bring in family to run something. I don't believe in nepotism. I don't. If you want to give your family money, give them money, write them a check. But don't bring them into your company if they're not qualified for that job. They've never done it before. I see this happen to doctors all the time. They do it. They do their own clinic and they're like, oh, I'm just going to have my wife run the office. Has she ever run an office, bro? They're going to respect her because it's your wife, but she's not qualified for that position. Hire somebody, get the job done, and just give her money, right? And my docs are going to be mad at me because I'm calling them out, right? But they can probably also secretly relate to what I'm saying, right? I don't believe in nepotism, and that goes into every aspect of leadership. If you're the king and your brother commits the crime and the punishment is you got to chop his head off, do you do it? Do you do it? It's your brother. Well, guess what? You're also wearing the crown, so you have to. My belief is you have to do it. And you say, I love you, brother, and I'm so sorry, but you took that position of king. Nepotism has no place in a company, in politics. And I'm getting super political and, like, existential here, right?

[Jack]

Heavy is the head that wears the crown, right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

But the point is, if you wear that hat or you wear that crown, how much do you respect it and how much do people count on you to do what you're supposed to do?

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

It applies back to business as well.

[James]

We're talking a lot about human nature here, the way people are. Josh, I'm gonna go ahead and give you permission right now to go ahead and ask the question. To ask the question you've held off on for a lot of these podcasts.

[Josh]

Oh, man, we gotta do it.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

We gotta do it. Should I be scared?

[Jack]

Come on, Josh.

[Josh]

Oh, my gosh.

[James]

There's no one better than ask, man.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Come on. Okay, let's hear it.

[Josh]

You're an entrepreneur, and you're coming up, you know, you're starting to make some money. What's your best piece of dating advice to entrepreneurs, Man?

[Jack]

For context, he's asked it on a podcast before at the, like, the wrong time and just, like, the wrong guess. And it just didn't make a lot of sense. And we gave him shit. We gave him shit for it. But I think this would be a great podcast to rip this one for sure.

[James]

What have you learned about it?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Great question. Because dating changes over time. Dating now is different than dating in the 90s and the 50s and the 1700s.

[James]

What about it? So drastically different now as opposed to maybe those eras that you're talking about.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Number one is how do we meet people in the 1700s, your friends or your family introduced you to somebody. They knew their whole family. They vetted them. They could still be a bad apple, but you had this chain of responsibility because now everybody's sticking up for this person. You get to know each other, you spend some time with the families, and then you got married, right? How do we meet people now? On Tinder, on a dating app. Nothing wrong with that. But that person behind the profile, you have no references. They can tell you whatever you want to hear. And my homegirls, they get duped time and time again. They're like, okay, what's going on? I'm like, it's a bad setup because they can tell you whatever you want, and you want to believe it because you're a hopeful person, right? So that's, number one, a big difference on how we find people. It used to be 0% in the. In the 80s, and now it's like 90%. So a lot of changes. Also, expectations have changed, right? And there's so many, like, different podcasts on dating. And some people have this mentality, this mentality, right? So I'm gonna. I'm gonna be somewhere in the middle in it, right? Because not everything is for everyone, right? You hear a lot of podcasts like, oh, you're on a come up. You gotta. You gotta watch out. All these girls are gold. Diggers this and that.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Guess what? There's a lot of guys on the come up that are looking for gold diggers. It's very transactional, Right. It's perfect for them. A lot of guys that are not looking for that. So they have to know what to avoid, what to attract, and how to vet that stuff.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I think you got to know what you value in the other person, right? I value. I don't make enough money. I don't need somebody to be type A. Don't I need somebody to be supportive that would be more useful to me than another person, a doctor or something working their ass off. And I can never see them. Or we have kids and we can never see them.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

And I think you should maybe in general, you should always try to find people that are super supportive. You're not looking for a rival, right. You're looking for somebody that you're greater than the sum of your parts and that's difficult to find. Everybody will take and take and take.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

But you have to watch the little things they do because it's built in how they interact with other people, how they deal with problems, how they deal with situations and see if they're like you in how you handle the fundamentals in life.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Because it's most people who hit. I've seen a lot of these guys who hit catastrophe is because of divorce. Sad. And when they got into that relationship, they thought it was the right one and then they chopped down their empire and they had to build back up again.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

We want to try to plan ahead. Can we avoid always? No. When you roll with the punches, Right. But what we can do is we can really. Don't listen to any one person. Listen to everybody and open your eyes and look out there. Look out there and observe the crowd. Everybody speaks like they know what they're talking about. But a lot of this is all theory.

[Josh]

So I know you said it back in the 1700s, you know, your family would almost hand you a potential partner. How do you go about vetting a good partner now?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

Yeah, I mean, that's. That's the hard part, Right. Maybe their approach is like a business. Let's think about that. Let's think about that for a second.

[Unidentified Host or Moderator]

Right?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

I said if they've never done it before, that's a bad sign. So maybe look back in their history. If they always had toxic relationships, maybe you love a wild ride that's perfect for you. If they have more stability in their history, maybe that was. And you looking for stability. Maybe so A principle of business applied there. Like look, look at references, right? I'm not talking about, I don't know if you can call their ex boyfriends, right? But you can kind of see their friends, right? Show me your friends. That's what my dad used to always tell me. Show me your friends and I'll tell you who you are, right? Their friends are going to have influence on them. If you want a wild party girl, pick a girl that hangs out with wild party girls. If you're kind of a bookworm, find the girl that's at the book club and her friends are just chilling. They like to chill at home, right. Or do more low key stuff, right? But sometimes they'll try to be something that you're looking for, but their friends are not. And what you find is you're constantly pulling them from two worlds, right? So it's a summation of things and it's, it's tough. Maybe that's also like business. You gotta get burned a few times to, to know how to see it, right? But I, I think, I think it shouldn't be something you fear because I'll say this, I'm really happy. I went through my first bad breakup. It was five years. Thought I was gonna get married, right?

[James]

Was it, was it recently or a long time?

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

A long time ago. From like when I was 19 to like 18 actually to 23. I thought it was the one. I'm gonna get married, right? Got my heart broken, right? But I am a different person now because of that. I was physically tough.

[James]

Probably wouldn't be where you are today if it wasn't for that.

[Abdullah Kudrath (AK)]

No, nobody. That's a great point. Nobody will. Every great person went through difficult times. And you ask yourself, if you took away those difficult times, would they still be that great person? No. So shouldn't they thank those difficult times? That's a different frame of mind. We're gonna go through some bad stuff and we're gonna keep going through some bad stuff.