In this episode of The Good News, host Angie Austin talks with Dr. Cheryl Lentz about the widespread ‘illness of busyness’ affecting students and professionals alike. They discuss how society’s fast-paced lifestyle often leads to burnout, procrastination, and the consequences of not taking time to reflect. Angie and Cheryl explore practical strategies for balancing work, studies, and personal time without compromising one’s mental health and well-being. Later, Angie catches up with Damon John, a business magnet you may know from Shark Tank. They delve into the ever-evolving sphere of artificial intelligence and its transformative impact on businesses today. Damon
Welcome to The Good News with Angie Austin. Now, with The Good News, here’s Angie.
SPEAKER 05 :
Hey, it’s Angie Austin with The Good News, along with my good pal, Dr. Cheryl Lentz, the academic entrepreneur. And recently, we’ve talked about the illness of busyness, how it’s such a big problem in society and in families. And Cheryl, you are a professor. It’s the end of a semester, and you are seeing, like, maximum busyness, and people are pushing it too far, right?
SPEAKER 06 :
Absolutely. I see a lot of students who I’ve been hinting throughout the semester that, you know, you need to look at this. You need to look at this. You need to look at this. You need to call me. A five minute phone call could have improved their grades every single week, but they don’t want to take the time. And now I have students that are on borderline plagiarism issues. I know it’s not intentional. I know it’s ignorance, but it’s plagiarism nonetheless, because they’re not taking the time to slow down and do what’s required. And there’s an awful lot of that going on right now.
SPEAKER 05 :
Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. I got to remember that one.
SPEAKER 05 :
I talked to all of my kids and I said, my friend, Dr. Lentz, is a professor. And she says all these kids try to get into her office hours at the very end of the semester because they want to bring up their grade. And so about six weeks ago, I circled grades that my kids could potentially bring up because at their school, I love this, Cheryl. I don’t know how you feel about it, but it’s kind of a new thing where the school views learning as we want you to learn it. We don’t want you to fail a test and move on. So they allow test corrections. They allow test retakes. They allow you to redo like an entire assignment and try to do a better job. So, yes, it’s double the work, but it’s also double the learning. Like if you fail that you did not learn it. So they give you the opportunity to bring your grades up. Now, in the case of my youngest, she’s pretty much an honor roll student. I don’t really have much to, you know. But with the other two, they have numerous assignments to redo. And they have kind of a, in high school, this organizer teacher, and he emails me this spreadsheet. And it’s like all the assignments they either have missed and haven’t done yet or that they need to redo or a test they need to take. and it lays it out each class each teacher specifically and then they they do a check off when they get these things redone and they do give them kind of like college study time like study hours and so it’s pretty um it’s pretty cool that they um really have time to study at school and so to be honest with you they don’t study much at home which makes me a little suspicious i think they could bring those grades up a bit but so they could take a d like one of my kids is a d right now and something And so she is redoing things. And I said, hey, it hasn’t come up yet. She goes, mom, trust the process. I’ve redone 12 things and they just have to grade them. So she said, just relax and trust the process. But but I said, my my friend, Dr. Cheryl Lentz, says all these kids wait till the last minute to come in to get their grades up and to do what’s necessary. And she says it’s too late. Like you guys need to go in two months, not two days before the end of the semester.
SPEAKER 06 :
Exactly. I mean, case in point, I have a student right now who we do not have independent study courses, but he tried to submit five of his weeks and assignments all in the last week. And he did a really piss poor job because he didn’t have the ability to look at week four and then redo it. And then we look at week five and then to have that steady process throughout the term. If you try and complete all of them without that learning mechanism, all he did was do the same mistakes and five different assignments all at the end. And that’s really not allowed. So The challenge is, is that I do appreciate that at the high school level. I offer my students a one-time pass in all of my classes, regardless of level, for the ability to say, hey, I knew this is something that you probably, and again, I’ve been doing this for 23 years, I can recognize malfeasance usually from intention, right? They’re not planning to do it, but they’re just not slowing down. They’re not taking the time. They’re not taking the details in there. And so I’ll offer them a pass. But after that, I have to reintroduce them to the real world. The real world is not going to give them that second opportunity. Their boss is going to expect them to get it right the first time. And I will tell you, I lost a hundred thousand dollar job because I didn’t get my proposal right the first time. So it’s a double edged sword that I think it’s good skills to prepare them for. But to be careful that as they get into the real world in college and beyond that, we don’t offer many opportunities to reduce. We just have to be a little bit careful that they’re going to come to expect that expectation. So good, good news, bad news kind of thing, you know.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, good news, bad news kind of thing. Yeah. Well, you know, I’m thrilled that this is, you know, going, you know, better for me with giving them your advice and just kind of getting on them because I’m emailed their grades every single night, all three of them.
SPEAKER 06 :
I think that’s great because that’s a project manager’s opportunity as it’s going on as opposed to what happens in my classes is they kind of like, oh, my God, it’s the end of the semester already. Well, now I have to negotiate and I don’t want to have to pay for another class and And now the panic sticks in. We have this plan your work, work your plan. And that’s what you’re teaching them is have a plan at the beginning of the semester. And then every day you’re just work your plan, work your plan. You just, you know, it takes a little time and set up at the beginning. But then every day, you know, you’re supposed to do and you don’t have to stress about trying to fit, you know, eight hours into a one hour schedule in week eight of the semester, you know?
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. All right. So what else are you seeing with busyness with these kids? You mentioned a sleep issue.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, I have a good friend of mine. She just released her national podcast and it scared me and I just sent her an email the fact that she was going and going and going and going and her book comes out and she’s doing all the spec speaking and she’s going around the world and doing those stuff and then she’s just not giving herself enough time to rest and she fell asleep behind the wheel.
SPEAKER 03 :
Whoa.
SPEAKER 06 :
And I just listened to that and she goes, I put my daughter in jeopardy and she goes, the next day my daughter went out and took her test for her driver’s license. She goes, I should never be able to do that and part of that is because I didn’t take care of myself. And sometimes, you know, I’ve said this before, you have to go faster. You have to slow down. And that illness of busyness, as you indicated, is brilliant because we don’t take the time to slow down. And I know you’ve said this sometimes that, you know, my daughter just needs to rest. Amen. The body needs time to heal. The mind needs time to heal. And I am convinced that how many people are pushing the candle and now they’re falling asleep behind the wheel. They’re falling asleep at work. They’re falling asleep during dangerous times that, are easily prevented if we can just take a little time to you know what get those eight hours of sleep take a few times yesterday I put the kayak on the water just because I needed to get out it didn’t do well but I’ll explain that in a minute but I finally forced myself to go out and have some R&R because I needed it it was too much stress in the office And the more stress you have, the worse you become for your next client.
SPEAKER 05 :
Is it warm enough in Chicago for you to put the kayak in?
SPEAKER 06 :
It was 57 degrees. It was kind of warm. I usually don’t put the kayak in if it’s less than 60, but it was kind of close enough. And I’ve been dying to find out if my fixing the kayak worked. And, well, it wasn’t the Titanic. I didn’t go swimming, but it didn’t work. Yeah. My kayak still has a hole in it and it’s just slowly. But my point is, is I prepared for that. I only went down the channel. I didn’t go to open water, but I needed to get out. And it was a calculated risk. You know, it’s something that the water is such healing for me.
SPEAKER 05 :
Oh, I love it. You’re such a little lady. Do you unload that thing yourself? Is it light?
SPEAKER 06 :
I do. I’ve got a kayak. I’ve learned the whole process because if I can’t do it myself, I can’t do it at all. And so I figured out a system for this. And it really helps if there isn’t a hole in the kayak for my system. After three days of fixing it, now there’s another attempt that friends of mine have offered. But, you know, things don’t last forever. I will not give up my day job as a professor. I’m not a kayak fixer. But the fact is, I tried and what I was able to accomplish to slow the leak down, I just didn’t stop it.
SPEAKER 05 :
So we did something I remember was kind of like a mash and then you heated it up. And on one of our canoes when I was younger, I can still kind of picture the grid in the mash that we put on it. But I’m sure you’ll figure out something with your friends. But I know that you get a lot of joy out of that. I do too.
SPEAKER 06 :
And I have to slide you know i have to slow down because and i have to force myself and you would think fun is not something you should force yourself with angie and it’s sad but for those of us who are kind of alcoholics or recovering workaholics you know that we want to have that ability to just have a balance nobody died wishing they worked more and nobody died wishing that that they wanted to have that so the steady balance of maybe you don’t need to be a straight a student But you have to just progress, not perfection. Every time you just get better and better, that’s what we faculty are looking for, both personally and professionally. And I think we need to take our own advice before we, like my friend, fall asleep behind the wheel. That scared me beyond words.
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, one of my friends that I don’t know the circumstance of what happened to her son, but he was coming back from college alone. And this has been several years now. And he is in rehab, learning how to eat again, how to walk again, how to… He just had a seizure two years into all of this. His brain injury was so traumatic that He’s really had to relearn everything. And we’re two years in and he’s still in his wheelchair, but you’re still working on walking. And when she shows his training, you know, that physical therapy that’s doing it is so taxing on him and so difficult that I can see why there’d be the urge to give up because it’s so painful. But he just keeps pushing away because he wants to walk again and, you know, regain everything. And with that stroke, you know, he’s in his early 20s. He’s got I’m sorry, with a seizure. Um, he can only smile on one side right now, but hopefully, you know, that will, um, change as you know, the days go on because this is a new part. But so all of this, I, I don’t know the circumstances, but I’m assuming late at night that he may have fallen asleep at the wheel because it was an accident by himself. Um, again, I’m jumping to conclusions, but this is something I worry about with, you know, kids and pushing themselves too much. I recently did kind of a list of program by myself about how we wear this busyness as a badge. And they had this, uh, uh, one of the top violinists in the world, he was playing in a subway with a $3 million violin and all these people were rushing by him and he only picked up a couple of bucks. And it’s like, if you knew that you were watching one of the top musicians in the world with a $3 million violin, would you slow down and watch? And the whole thing was, he kind of had a hat on. They made him look a little scruffy. The whole thing was, and he was playing a piece that like not many people apparently can play. Um, that you know people didn’t slow down enough to realize the beauty right there like in front of them you know and the whole point of this was can we slow down a little can we build in the fun because we’re missing out on so much that busyness isn’t a trophy like a badge of honor that we wear but i tend to think it is i think a lot of us overachievers are like the busier what we are the more important we are more valuable we are or we can tell all our friends do i have this that yeah Exactly.
SPEAKER 06 :
Isn’t that amazing? I struggled with that years ago that there’s a sense of accomplishment that if I don’t accomplish something, I’m not worthy, that I have to check the box. And I’m doing a lot of speaking lately. And it’s the point is we are phenomenal just the way we are, regardless of what we do. It’s the being part that we are amazing. We don’t have to prove to anybody. Now, it’s wonderful that we can accomplish some things. And I will be proud of all of the accomplishments I’ve had, but at what cost? And what I’m suggesting is that nobody ever died wishing they’d work more. Everyone wanted to be able to have the relationships, the family, particularly if you don’t have one, to cherish those as opposed to seeing it fly by because we only have five minutes to do something. And you want to be able to take the time because memories are those that are going to last a lifetime. And I think too many people are, well, I’ll be happy when I get there. No, the point is not that. the end destination. The point is the journey. Can you be happy along the way while you’re getting there? I think that’s the secret to life. And many of us have life wishing by us too much going. Is it really worth all this busyness? That’s why I love that the illness of busyness. You’re right on the mark here, my friend.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, it really is the illness of busyness. And I think that we can kick this. And I guess that’s a great challenge for you listening to for me and for Cheryl. You did it with your kayaking. What can we do today that would really be fun? And there is a lake near me that I found, a reservoir that I can park at a park and walk in and walk the dogs around it.
SPEAKER 06 :
have to be a long time either I mean walking the dog I did yesterday too for Gracie it was maybe 15 minutes you know my kayak thing was maybe an hour it wasn’t the whole day you know many people think they have to like well I’m going to go to Great America or I’m going to go to the thing it’s like no all I need is about five minutes to read a book to go out and see the sunshine to play with my dog to you know, go out with a friend or something. It doesn’t take a lot of time, even if it’s just five minutes. Boy, what five minutes well spent, you know?
SPEAKER 05 :
Absolutely. All right, Dr. Cheryl Lentz, where do people find you and look into? You help people write books, you’re a professor, you are a speaker. How do they reach you?
SPEAKER 06 :
DrCherylLentz.com. Couldn’t be simpler.
SPEAKER 05 :
Dr. Cheryl Lentz dot com. And we’ll have to think of something fun to talk about next week. Dr. Cheryl joins me pretty much weekly for the last. How many years has this been?
SPEAKER 06 :
Almost five years. Yeah.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. It’s been a while. It’s definitely been a while. All right. Talk to you next week. Thank you, Dr. Cheryl. Take care. Bye bye.
SPEAKER 02 :
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SPEAKER 05 :
Hello, friend. Angie Austin here. Well, if you watch Shark Tank, you’ll be happy to know that we have one of the stars of Shark Tank joining us in a few minutes, Damon John. We’re going to talk about AI, how to use it in business and a little bit about his business as well. All right. A little good news for you. First, I found a really sweet story. It’s about I love the elderly. I just have a thing for older people. And this man’s name is Mark Cody. He is not the older person. He started an organization in honor of his grandmother called Gramborghini. And you’re like, well, does that have something to do with grandmother and Lamborghini? Yes, it does. He’s from England. Mark is. and his own grandmother apparently was really suffering loneliness and depression, and she took her own life. That’s not the good news. He decided that he would help other grandmothers and grandfathers, for that matter, and a Take up an effort to reduce social isolation by giving him a once-in-a-lifetime thrill. He’s calling it a turbocharged effort because he always told his grandmother that he was going to take her for a ride in a Lamborghini, but he never got that chance, but he’s giving other grandmothers that chance. into this charity called Grand Burghini. And I saw him on Instagram, and Mark Cody was taking out this sweet lady in her 80s, and she was just beside herself. And he said these moments, that’s what life is all about, these moments that are like life-changing moments, and just kind of getting him out of the house and giving him a little thrill. So he made a few phone calls, and he connected with High-end car owners – and I think he’s one himself because I saw him driving one of the Lamborghinis – he said, what started out as a daft idea trying to do some good and raise awareness in a wild and exciting way for people who get forgotten has blown me away with the response, he told the UK’s morning show. We’ve had to step out of the car and say – I feel like a rock star. Or we’ve had them say something like, I feel 20 years younger. I feel 50 years younger. He said it’s just so heartwarming and overwhelmingly emotional to see people’s reactions. So there’s a social group called Friendship Lunches. That’s also really cool. So Mark partnered with this other organization called Friendship Lunches that also gets people together and gets them out of the house. And then they partnered with them in order to get the Grand Burghini out there and get more elderly people out on the road. Let’s see if I can just play a little bit of this story for you because – I don’t know. Something about the elderly and getting them out there and letting them have a little fun. I just love it.
SPEAKER 04 :
Are you Tony? Yes. Are you coming out for a ride with me today? Shall we get you in? You’re going to take me somewhere nice. Absolutely. Thank you. Come on, my lovely. Ready? Oh, it’s gorgeous. And it’s impossible not to feel alive and smile.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah. It’s just a little snippet with Tony. She’s 85 years young. And then there’s the guy we were talking about starting it there, Mark. All right. I just love it when people, I don’t know, just… Make the effort to do something kind for others. All right. If you are just joining us, this is Angie Austin with the good news. Artificial intelligence is quickly changing how companies operate and how the world operates. And, you know, we really need to keep up. Joining us now with what business owners need to know is Damon John, founder and CEO of Fubo and star of Shark Tank. Oh, I’ve seen him on Shark Tank. Welcome, Damon John. Thank you. Thanks for having me. All right. Let’s I’ve actually really been getting into this. My son’s a business owner. He started when he was eight and he’s 20 now. So he helps me. And then my husband’s a business owner. And I mean, you really need to get this stuff down. So let’s talk about how businesses are adapting because it’s really fast paced the way this technology is changing what we do and it’s helping us stay competitive.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you know, it’s kind of democratizing things. You know, you don’t have to depend on the big boys and the big girls. There’s so many tools out there that businesses have access to. And I think that the small businesses out there, they’re not, they’re not, they don’t know what they don’t know. You know, AI is fairly new to us and they don’t realize that there’s a lot of tools out there that make money. business much easier than just simply, you know, you know, of course you can use it in Google or, you know, you can write a nice letter, but there’s a lot of things that are empowering them so they can go off and do what they do best, which is serving their customer.
SPEAKER 05 :
Well, I’ll tell you every time I watch a basketball game, I would prefer that AI was officiating, but that’s another story. All right. Where do you see businesses right now struggling the most when they try to scale their operations like you did early on with yours?
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, businesses struggle the most. Well, first of all, you don’t have a business if you don’t have a community who wants to buy from you. And that means they like you and they want to pay, right? So you don’t have a business if you don’t have sales. After that, well, what are the numbers? You know, a business is not going to last long if the numbers aren’t correct. And that’s what you’re in business for, isn’t it? To create revenue, to grow the business, to be a better servant to your customers and feed your family, right? And live the American dream. That’s why we’re here talking about the Intuit Enterprise Suite because it gives you access to your numbers and information in real time. The reason I love this is because the fact is 40 or 42% of entrepreneurs are dyslexic, like eight of the 12 sharks like I am. We weren’t taught financial intelligence coming up in school. They didn’t teach us what that was. And when we started a business, we started a business because we wanted to either solve somebody’s problem or bring them joy. The last thing we knew starting a business is we don’t know social media, manufacturing, shipping, warehousing, numbers, and everything else. So now that we have a tool, such as Intuit Enterprise Suite, where it’s right there, information daily, hourly, by the minute, on where your business is at. What’s my margin? Am I spending too much on this? Is my staff being allocated the right way? Do my division heads in my staff know what they’re supposed to do and their margin in real time? Or are we all waiting until quarterly or annually we sit with our accountants and bookkeepers? And even when you sit with them, Don’t you think they want you to be more educated on what’s been going on in your business so they can give you a more accurate answer in real time so you can spend more time working on growing the business? So, again, having these tools and real-time data, it’s extremely important and valuable.
SPEAKER 05 :
Now, in terms of AI having, like, as you would say, the biggest difference, like the biggest bang for your buck in business right now, where do you think that is?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, I think that, first of all, it’s using it in social ways, you know. So there’s three ways. First of all, growing your community. Let me give you an example of FUBU back when I started, and let me give you an example of today’s AI. Growing my community, I had to – there was no Internet. I had to find you and sell you a shirt the next day and – You know, how was I going to get a hold of you? How was I going to advertise the market? What if I put out some bad designs or bad clothes, bad jeans, whatever the case is? Well, you know what? I wouldn’t know that thing. You know, I didn’t know there was a swell in the market on how bad it was for 30, 60, 90, 120 days. Well, today, somebody would have hashtagged boo-boo and said, this is what I don’t like. I would have known there was a problem that night because I would have known the community, right? Now let’s talk about selling it. It’s about selling, how people are using AI and using what live selling is happening right now. You can flip open your phone, you can sell live on Instagram, whatnot. You can sell on TikTok shops. Before, what did I do? I had to make it. Then I had to sell it to the store. The store had to put it out on the rack. Did the mother buy it for herself? Did she buy it for her son? Was it for a gift? Was it for whatever the case is? Did she return it? Why did she return it? I would know today… Right now, on the phone, why you purchased it or not, and what you likely didn’t like about it. All right, let’s talk about finance. I would have to wait until I finally got to my accountant to know if these numbers work or not. And why do I know that I was horrible in understanding finance? Because I closed Google three times from 89 to 92 because I didn’t know my numbers. Finally opened up in 92. I turned down my 27 banks. Why? I didn’t know how to show them that they were going to return on their capital. That means I didn’t know my numbers. Well, Hail Mary, mom mortgaged the house for $100,000. Well, guess what happened in six months? The $100,000 is $500 left. I’m three months later in the mortgage. They’re about to take my mother’s home. Why? I didn’t know my numbers. I didn’t realize that I was spending 30% of the money on raw goods, trying to get fabric over here. So I paid that out. I paid another 30% out in people manufacturing clothes and shipping it. And then I was waiting for the stores to pay me, and they weren’t paying me for 30, 60, 90 days. I did not know the numbers. I had nothing to alert me saying, if you’re on this track, you’re in trouble. Or, hey, you need to do more of this.
SPEAKER 05 :
you know i i love though for the time the way that you would get your brand um your hats in particular on people who are well known my son started in shoes when he was eight and then he went over to vintage right so now he’s got athletes coming to his trailer store it is a university buying right out of his trailer or like travis hunter when he got the heisman they went to school together so he got him to start wearing some of his vintage old jerseys and stuff And I love that you did that way before we ever had the TikTok, whatever that was driving it, because these people were seen all over the news. You know, they weren’t seen on TikTok. People, they were seen all over the magazine. So how now do you think businesses should find and look for a solution that really drives growth and scales their business that will work for them long term? You know, not something that’ll just work for them for a month or two and they’ll have to change it up again.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, you know, that’s the best thing about today. You know, you have millions of, you know, influencers in a way, and a lot of people think influencers, Kim Kardashian. Yeah, you know, Kim Kardashian is great. You know, you have $50 million to do a deal with her. That’s great. But you don’t need – let’s say I always use the theory that if Kim Kardashian has 200 million followers, you know, and you’re paying for her – You know, her followers. Well, 100 million of them are on there because they love to hate her. They’re never going to buy what you have, right? Right, right. And if you’re selling lipstick, well, out of the other 100 million, you know, maybe 50 million are women, the other 50 million are guys who think she’s attractive, right? They’re not buying it. But if you are a small business right now and you have 10 mompreneurs that have 10,000 followers apiece and 100,000 followers, guess what? Everybody following that mompreneur is probably following her because she loves her journey. And you’re getting more out of that in conversion than you are out of Kim Kardashian. Nothing against her. So again, you have the ability to start off small with local and great influencers that may only have 1,000, 10,000 people, and you’re getting real-time information on what works. And that’s why I love it. And then you go in and you flip up the phone and you flip open the phone and you start live selling. I don’t care if it’s a charity. I don’t care if it’s a service business. And I don’t care if you’re selling sponges or socks or soda. And you sell directly to your customer. Again, it goes back to now when you’re looking at all these choices you have. You go back to the same thing, into our suite to say, what’s working, what’s not? Where are we making more money here, where are we not? And you’re making these decisions in real time. And again, it’s all about being able to take small steps, fail fast, act, learn, and repeat. That’s what entrepreneurs do the best.
SPEAKER 05 :
I love it. I love it. I’m going to make sure my kids get this interview as well. All right. Where do we go to get more information, Damon?
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, if you want to go and get the exact same product that I love for myself as well as my shark tank company, the Intuit Enterprise Suite, go to Intuit.com slash Enterprise. That’s Intuit.com slash Enterprise.
SPEAKER 05 :
Excellent. All right. Have a great day. Thanks, Damon.
SPEAKER 01 :
Thank you. Thank you for listening to The Good News with Angie Austin on AM670 KLTT.
