Shane Torres – Be Open with Your Team about Your Business Idea

Mar 7, 2021

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BIO: Shane Torres is the CEO & Founder of Road to $20 Million. He is committed to helping people achieve real estate business success with life balance through valuable resources, business planning, and consulting for both entrepreneurs and real estate professionals.

STORY: Shane started a home building company and roped in his wife as the designer and his friend as the project manager. He got overzealous with the business, took on more projects than the team could handle. This led to penalties from the EPA and the ultimate closure of the business.

LEARNING: Do not force your employees to be like you, or have your personality. Great people still need coordination and leadership. Have a realistic perspective when exploring new business ideas.

“Be upfront about expectations and processes. Also, ensure everybody understands what’s expected of each other.”

Shane Torres

Guest Profile

Shane Torres is the CEO & Founder of Road to $20 Million. He is on a mission to redefine the journey to success and make it attainable for everyone.

Shane is committed to helping people achieve real estate business success with life balance through valuable resources, business planning, and consulting for both entrepreneurs and real estate professionals. Regardless of industry or whether you hope to accomplish $1 or $100 million in production–Shane can help.

Shane knows first-hand that success does not come easy. He faced countless personal and professional roadblocks, but he went from bankrupt, broken, and facing foreclosure to selling $20M in real estate in just four short years. Shane has built a highly productive team at his own company and lives a life he had only dreamed of living.

Shane’s mission now is to help others to achieve personal and professional success and a balanced quality of life.

Worst investment ever

Shane always loved building houses, so he figured it would be a good idea to start a construction business. He brought on his wife to be the designer and his friend to be the project manager.

Getting overzealous

Everything was working out well, but Shane got a little overzealous and went from doing two projects to 20 something projects, building both rehabs and new homes. For the rehabs, Shane was, at the time, using some money lending facilities that had penalties for not getting done in a specific time.

And next thing you know, Shane had six to 10 projects all come up to their maturity date at once. He was penalized a ridiculous amount of money by the EPA because the construction crew had not handled asbestos siding properly. He lost well over six figures in penalties in his first year of business.

Pushing on

Fortunately, Shane had built up some money reserves, so he could weather the storm and not have to close shop as he had done back in 2009.

But, tragedy kept following his business. His friend, the project manager, had some severe health issues, so Shane had to fill in for months, which he did not enjoy.

Time to let go

While holding his friend’s forte, Shane realized that he did not want to continue running this business. He talked to his wife about it, and they agreed that they would close shop once his friend got better.

Shane later spoke to his friend, and he was also in agreement that they close down the business so each could focus on their other individual ventures.

Lessons learned

Do not force your employees to be like you

Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses. Do not force your employees to be like you or have your personality. This will only blow in your face.

Andrew’s takeaways

Be realistic when exploring new business ideas

When expanding into a different area or trying out a new business idea, often, things may seem easier than they appear. This could be quite deceiving, so always try to have a realistic perspective on things.

Great people still need coordination and leadership

One mistake most leaders make is to assume that great people know what to do and do not require guidance. But great people can do exactly what they know how to do and still go off in very different directions. So the job of a business leader is coordinating all your people’s efforts, including the great ones.

There’s a difference between having a company culture and imposing one

There’s a fine line between a company culture built around the leader and imposing the leader’s culture on employees. Understand where to draw the line.

Actionable advice

Do a little more homework before you get started. Once you get started, be upfront about expectations and processes and make sure everybody understands each other’s expectations.

No. 1 goal for the next 12 months

Shane’s number one goal for the next 12 months is to see his commercial development projects get a little farther along.