Podcast Summary: The $100M Mindset – How to Think, Lead, and Scale Like a Real Entrepreneur

Podcast: The $100M Entrepreneur Podcast
Host: Brad Sugars
Episode: The $100M Mindset: How to Think, Lead, and Scale Like a Real Entrepreneur
Date: October 22, 2025

Episode Overview

In this solo episode, Brad Sugars, founder of ActionCOACH, dives deep into the essential mindset shifts entrepreneurs must make to scale from $1M to $100M and beyond. Through personal anecdotes and actionable insights, Brad unpacks why the right mindset—and continual personal growth—is the core driver at each stage of entrepreneurial success. The conversation is structured to help ambitious leaders recognize the traps at every level, the necessary leadership evolutions, and the abundance mentality required for exponential growth.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Evolution of Entrepreneurial Mindset

(01:10 – 03:35)

• Three Stages of Thinking:

  • $1M Mindset: Survival, hustle, working hard, being great at your craft.
  • $10M Mindset: Leadership and systems, building and empowering a team, getting out of the way.
  • $100M Mindset: Vision and leverage, long-term strategies, abundance mentality, and scalable systems.

• The Paradox of Success:
  What gets you from start-up to $1M often becomes a liability beyond that point. The “do it all, no one can do it as well as me” attitude doesn’t scale.

“The business can never outgrow the owner.”
— Brad Sugars, (01:30)

2. Goal Setting & The Power of “Not Knowing How”

(03:36 – 06:10)

• Brad emphasizes that ambitious goals should feel out of reach; knowing exactly how to achieve them means they're more like to-do list items.

• The Success Formula:
  Dream → Goal → Learn → Plan → Act

“When you set a goal, you should not know how to achieve it. The killer of most goals is how... The formula that works is dream, goal, learn, plan, act.”
— Brad Sugars, (00:01 & 05:20)

• Key Milestones:
  • When do you stop being the technician and work on the business, not in it?
  • When can the business run without you at all?

3. Breaking through Plateaus: Bottlenecks & Systems

(06:11 – 09:30)

• Hitting the $3M Wall: Many entrepreneurs become bottlenecks—building teams but keeping everything dependent on themselves.

• Build People, Not Just a Business:
  To scale, entrepreneurs must invest in building and empowering their team.

“If you build the people, they build the business. My dad said it to me, real simple... you get the people you deserve. If you don’t build your people, how can they build it? And to build them, you gotta build you first.”
— Brad Sugars, (04:40)

4. Systematization and Leadership

(09:31 – 12:44)

• Leadership/Systems Phase: Develop operating systems that make the business independent of you—a sellable, self-sustaining asset.

• Business vs. Job:
  If the company requires your presence, it’s a job, not a business.

“If you have to be there, it’s not a business, it’s a job, and you work for a crazy person.”
— Brad Sugars, (09:47)

5. The Leap to $100M: Vision, Leverage, and Strategic Planning

(12:45 – 17:12)

• Leverage and Vision:
  Adopt long-range planning (3-5-10 years) and move beyond incremental improvements.

• Research-Driven Strategy:
  Understanding competitors, total market size, and aligning goals with actual opportunities.

• Abundance Over Scarcity:
  Investment, partnerships, and continually expanding the value you build.

“You’ve got to become an investor... The abundance mentality—the more you build, the better it gets.”
— Brad Sugars, (13:50)

6. Learning, Risk, and Reinvention

(17:13 – 19:21)

• Obsessive Learning:
  Consistently devour new information—books, podcasts, best practices—to stay ahead.

• Risk and Failure:
  Embrace failure, rapid iteration, and the willingness to reinvent people, processes, and solutions at scale.

“You gotta be willing to break things. You gotta be willing to break it down to build it back up. The systems that work at a million are not gonna work at a hundred million.”
— Brad Sugars, (18:15)

7. Personal Journey & Leadership Transitions

(19:22 – 23:08)

• Brad shares how his personal growth paralleled his company’s evolution:
  • Early focus on being the hardest worker masked gaps in systems.
  • Micromanagement didn’t work; he had to relinquish control.
  • Eventually, he replaced himself as CEO with someone more qualified to scale.

“Third phase is where I had to fire myself as the CEO and admit... you want to hire someone who is overqualified, someone that can do this for you.”
— Brad Sugars, (21:42)

8. Building for Value, Not Just Cash Flow

(23:09 – 24:50)

• Building a Capital Asset:
  Shift from a focus on income to building a business that can run and thrive without you, and can be sold for value.

• Ego Management:
  Letting others do things—possibly better than you can—and growing beyond your own limitations.

“80% done by someone else is better than 100% done by me.”
— Brad Sugars, (24:22)

9. Closing Thoughts & Call to Action

(24:51 – End)

• Brad reiterates the necessity of continual self-development as the prerequisite for enterprise growth.
• Encourages listeners to share and apply these lessons with their teams.

“You’re going to grow into a hundred million dollar business. Why? Because you’re going to become $100 million entrepreneur.”
— Brad Sugars, (25:10)

Notable Quotes

• “The business can never outgrow the owner.” (01:30)
• “When you set a goal, you should not know how to achieve it. The killer of most goals is how…” (00:01 & 05:20)
• “If you build the people, they build the business.” (04:40)
• “If you have to be there, it’s not a business, it’s a job, and you work for a crazy person.” (09:47)
• “You’ve got to become an investor... the more you build, the better it gets.” (13:50)
• “Third phase is where I had to fire myself as the CEO and admit... you want to hire someone who is overqualified…” (21:42)
• “80% done by someone else is better than 100% done by me.” (24:22)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:01 – The challenge of setting ambitious goals
• 01:10 – Three stages of entrepreneurial thinking
• 05:20 – Goal setting formula: Dream, goal, learn, plan, act
• 09:47 – Systems and leadership; the business vs. job distinction
• 13:50 – Abundance mindset and investment mentality
• 18:15 – Risk, reinvention, and learning at scale
• 21:42 – Brad’s personal journey: firing himself as CEO
• 24:22 – Letting go: 80% vs. 100% mindset
• 25:10 – Encouragement for entrepreneurial growth

Tone

Brad maintains a candid, motivational, and practical tone, mixing direct advice with hard-earned lessons and a push to think bolder, plan deeply, and act fearlessly.

Bottom Line:
This episode is a masterclass in the evolution of the entrepreneurial mindset—ideal for leaders striving not just for incremental gains but for genuine, transformative scale. Brad Sugars lays out both the psychological and operational roadmap needed to grow into a $100M entrepreneur.