Today we’d like to introduce you to Larry Broughton.
Hi Larry, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today.
It’s been a pretty wild ride, for sure! Although I’ve been doing lots of keynote speeches, book writing, corporate training, and mentoring entrepreneurs, leaders, and high-achievers in recent years, I’ve spent most of my professional career owning a hotel management company and other small businesses.
I’ve had an interest in understanding business and the ingredients of high achievement since I was a child, so I suppose I had caught the entrepreneurial bug before I knew the meaning of the word “entrepreneur.” I had dabbled in small money-making side hustles both pre- and post-high school graduation. I entered the US Army a couple of years after high school and developed a keen interest in international relations and public policy. I had served about eight years on Special Forces A-Teams (the Green Berets) and thought my future would be at the State Department or in holding public office. My first job off of military active duty was as a Night Auditor at a small “no-tell motel” in San Francisco, which helped pay my way through college. While studying Political Science and working on a variety of political campaigns, I realized that it was truly the entrepreneurs who were the world-changers—not politicians and bureaucrats. It was entrepreneurialism and capitalism that had risen more people out of poverty across the globe than any other social program created by government. As this awakening was taking place, an investment group purchased the motel where I was working and converted it into one of the country’s first “boutique hotels.” I was falling in love with the hotel industry, as it fueled my curiosity for business with exposure to marketing, branding, operations, leadership, team building, finance, and deal structures.
After working a few years with the firm that bought the motel, I was made a partner in the company, and we grew the portfolio to fourteen hotels in a fourteen-year period. I ultimately left that organization when I recognized my personality type is more as a primary leader, but I was stuck in a secondary leadership role. I charted out to start my own firm in 2001, which, as it turns out was a tough year to launch a new hotel company (the dot.com bust, national recession, SARS, the tragic events of 9-11). Because of our hard work and smart decisions, we turned around some woefully underperforming hotels and became known as turn-around artists in the boutique hotel space.
I started getting invited to speak at hotel industry and entrepreneur conferences and to appear on several business shows on network and cable television. At that point, leaders and entrepreneurs began asking for business, leadership, and mindset mentoring and training from early-stage start-ups, C-suites at public companies, professional athletes, and even The Pentagon’s Office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. It became clear there was a need for no-nonsense mentoring programs for people who were seeking more from life than a “system for success.” I began writing articles and books on the topics of leadership and entrepreneurship, then launched my mentoring and public speaking business while operating my hotel management company.
Since then, I’ve dedicated my life to helping people and businesses to reach their fullest potential.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
In a word, “no.” Though the instinct for many of us is to run from the struggle, the truth is that struggle is a necessary ingredient to growth, innovation, meaning, and abundance. I’ve ridden the rollercoaster through several recessions, economic devastation, divorce, suicide of business associates, the pandemic-driven shutdown of the hospitality industry, and the recent death of my 17-year-old son. Sure, there were momentary wonderings of whether it was all worth the struggle, but I’m blessed to have learned the lesson early in life to simply fight on.
There was a season after I first launched my hotel company when I no longer had a mentor, nor did I participate in a mastermind. I was the smartest and most experienced person on my team, which is the fatal flaw of leaders and entrepreneurs. It took the wake-up call of losing virtually everything (including my family) during the 2001 recession when I had just $84 in the bank with payroll due and capital calls looming for me to hire a business mentor and join a mastermind. Since that time, I have always surrounded myself with people who are bolder and brighter than me and actively sought the wise counsel of mentors.
In the early days, the biggest challenge was not knowing what I didn’t know about my industry, scaling a business, entrepreneurial leadership, raising capital, deal structures, setting personal/professional boundaries, etc. Additionally, as my business grew, I always felt I was in over my head professionally, intellectually, emotionally, and relationally. I simply thought I couldn’t keep up with our own business growth, and finally had the epiphany that when the rate of external growth outpaces the rate of internal growth, chaos is imminent. On the advice of a business advisor, I chose to seek out formal mentors. Ultimately, I hired a mentor and joined a high-quality mastermind where I could confidentially discuss my most significant challenges, opportunities, and ideas with folks who were further down the entrepreneurial path than me.
I’ve learned that tenacity eats talent for lunch! I’ve seen lots of people with high IQs living aimless lives of mediocrity because they gave up when the going got tough, while those who possess high EQs (emotional quotients) in concert with a healthy level of tenacity have created lives of meaning and significance.
It’s personally rewarding that others have recognized the power of tenacity and seen a spark of potential in us by awarding our company with several business and leadership awards, including Ernst & Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year and Passkeys Foundation’s National Business Leader of Integrity awards.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Whether we’re talking about my hotel company, my coaching & mentoring business, or my writing career, the common thread that weaves through all my endeavors seems to be recognizing unmet potential where others might see fallow fields. Perhaps this is why when others see a rundown hotel or motel, I see a diamond in the rough that needs some polishing, rebranding, and repositioning. Maybe that’s why I’m attracted to folks who might be the black sheep of the entrepreneurial or business world and invest in them to help them stretch, grow, and blossom beyond what they, themselves, thought possible.
Besides watching my kids grow into amazing humans, the thing I am most proud of is the time I served in the Army’s Green Berets. Every day I carry my Special Forces challenge coin to remind me where I came from, my past, my heritage, and my eternal tribe. It grounds me. I also carry a small pewter globe to remind me of my future, what I want my legacy to be, and the global impact that I can make and am meant to make on the world.
My friend, singer-songwriter Michael Petersen says, “One step in the right direction’s worth a wasted mile behind.” As a mentor, I get to point folks in the right direction. I get to be the voice of encouragement, saying, “Yes, you can do this.” I’m the voice of experience saying, “Yeah, I know this sucks right now,” because I’ve been down the entrepreneur’s path so many times.
We all need someone on the journey with us, reminding us that failure and pain and struggle are all part of success, but as one of my spiritual mentors reminded me some time ago, our journey does not need to include the desperate pushing and shoving that most “success gurus” ascribe. We need someone urging us not to quit a few feet from striking gold, who can also be the voice of reality and remind us when “enough is enough.” It’s always a privilege to see someone come through the pain and uncertainty and take steps toward success.
I strive to live a life of integrity. Anyone who knows me, has been on my team, or has been mentored by me knows that I do everything I can these days to walk the walk. Sometimes it’s exhausting and feels like I’m putting one dusty, bloody boot in front of the other, but I strive daily to live my life with integrity.
It hasn’t always been that way — as the ups and downs of my past demonstrate — and I bring all of that, all of those lessons learned along the way, to every role in which I serve. Whether it’s being a dad or a commentator on a TV news program or running my hotel company, I’m the same me everywhere, all the time. That’s been one of the hardest and most valuable lessons to learn as a human.
Some days it’s easier than others to practice what I preach. On my best days, I bound out of bed because I get to get up, I get to go into the office and work with people, I get to speak to this group, I get to serve. Not the “I have to do this or that” that so many people wake up with.
And honestly, on other mornings, what motivates me to get out of bed is an overwhelming fear of blending into the oblivion of gray mediocrity.
Whatever the motivation, I know that every day when my feet hit the floor, I have another chance to go do something significant.
Is there something surprising that you feel even people who know you might not know about?
Most people are surprised to learn that I’m one of those rare freaks who happen to be an identical twin. My twin happens to be smarter, more successful, better looking, and more charismatic, but besides that, we’re exactly the same.
Additionally, given that I’m now a bestselling author and dynamic keynote speaker, most folks are surprised to learn that I’m dyslexic and an introvert. I’ve had to get very intentional over the years to overcome these obstacles to defy the odds to gain some level of professional success.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.larrybroughton.me
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/larrybroughton
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/larrybroughton
- Twitter: www.twitter.com/larrybroughton
- Youtube: www.youtube.com/thelarrybroughton
- Other: linktree.com/larrybroughton
