Do Not Waste Your Fall: The Morning I Was Removed as Managing Partner

June 16, 2021.

I woke up at 5:04 a.m., like any normal day. I had a regimented morning routine back then. Hydration. Exercise. Some Wim Hof breathing. Prayer. Reading.

By the time I was out of the shower, my cell phone rang.

It was a corporate executive VP I was expecting at my office later that morning. It was time for us to renegotiate our recruiting and production targets, so the call itself was not unexpected. What he said was.

"Josh, we got into town a little bit early today. Can you meet us at the Marriott?"

That Marriott was about a tenth of a mile from my office. I told him I was almost ready. And as I hung up the phone . . .

Have you ever gotten that sinking feeling in your gut, like something really bad was about to happen?

Yeah. My stomach was on the floor.

This episode is part of a series walking through the themes of The Kairos Code. It is the hardest one I am going to do in this series. I am telling it anyway, because it will be of high impact, and because you deserve the truth.

The entire eight-minute drive from my home to the Marriott, my head was tossing back and forth. Why would we meet there, a tenth of a mile from my office, unless it was something bad? Then I would think, the office was crushing it, putting up numbers never seen before. Why would they get rid of me and jeopardize that?

That eight-minute drive felt like an eternity. I know you have had moments like that, where you cannot really explain it. You are just in your head.

I walked confidently into the lobby with my iPad in hand, in case I needed to take notes or pull up numbers. I shook their hands. As soon as I sat down, the executive VP looked at me.

"Josh, there's no easy way to say this. We're moving in a different direction, and you are no longer managing partner."

Time slowed down.

I looked around the lobby and noticed a couple of familiar faces. Security detail for the corporate executives, people I had known for years. Evidently they were there in case I became a problem. For a brief moment, it felt like being in a movie.

When I came back to reality, the VP showed me two pieces of paper. Minimal words on them. He asked me to sign one.

I had just enough wits about me not to sign anything in that moment. I told them I had trusted them my entire career, and that today I was not signing anything until I spoke with my attorney.

I do not think I was in that Marriott for more than a few minutes. It could have been fifteen. It is such a blur.

I got in my car to begin the eight-minute drive home, and I did not make it far before I had to pull off into a parking lot.

I could not see. I could not see because I was bawling.

My whole world had just fallen apart. My mind was still racing. How was I going to explain this to my wife? To my dad, whose legacy was built before mine?

Then my phone started blowing up. Texts. Calls. Voicemails. From my team. From my leaders. From advisors I had built from nothing.

Corporate had called an emergency virtual town hall across the offices I still held leases on. They announced I was out, and in the very next breath, they introduced my successor. This had been premeditated.

I appreciated the love from my team. And it tore my heart open every time my phone buzzed.

Because I missed my people. That was the hardest part. I missed leading them. I missed pouring my life into theirs and helping them develop into more awesome versions of themselves. That is what brought me so much joy.

Fast forward to today. I get asked often, "Do you miss it? Do you miss owning the firm? Do you miss leading in the financial advisory world?"

I still talk to some of my cohorts, managing partners across the country who are still in their seats. Every time I do, I realize I actually do not miss the job.

I still miss my team. I talk to some of them regularly. I miss the camaraderie. I miss advancing their lives. I miss what we were building, and that it got cut short.

The job? No. I do not miss that.

You Do Not Fall in a Day. You Fall in a Thousand Quiet Decisions.

Nobody tells you this about the fall.

You do not fall in a day. You fall in a thousand quiet decisions that no one saw you make.

Some of those decisions were mine. Some of them were made by other men and women. Some were made in meetings I was never part of.

But every fall is a compound of decisions made long before the day the knock or the call came.

Sit with that, whether your fall is behind you or still ahead of you. It did not start this week. It started with small choices. The conversation you put off. The warning sign you explained away. The pace you kept because stopping felt like losing.

None of those choices feel like a fall when you make them. They feel like a normal Tuesday.

So take an honest look at your quiet decisions. Which ones were yours? Which ones were made by other people? You cannot control the second list. You can own the first one.

Grace Decides the Warning Shot or the Full Impact. You Decide What Comes Next.

Some men and women get a warning shot. Some get the full impact.

I got the full impact that day.

Grace decides which one you get. What you do with it is up to you.

Do not waste your fall.

If you are reading this and you have already fallen, do not waste it. Do not play the victim. Learn the lesson. It is the most expensive tuition you will ever pay.

If you are in business, if you are an entrepreneur, if you are experiencing this thing called life, there is going to be a fall. You do not get through this life unscathed.

You are going to lose loved ones.

You are going to lose businesses.

You are going to lose sleep.

You are going to go through health challenges and marital challenges. Your kids are going to go through challenges you cannot get them out of, challenges they have to walk through themselves.

That is the truth.

Now, knowing that, what type of man, what type of woman, are you going to show up as?

Are you going to show up as the victim? "This happened to me."

Or are you going to show up as the victor? "This happened FOR me."

The truth is, in the middle of it, it is not going to feel good. You are going to be at the bottom of a pit. I call it the pit of despair. I was there for a while.

You have no answers. Everything coming to mind is a bad thought. You do not know how you are going to get out of that pit. You scratch and claw. You plead. You barter. You beg. And none of it gives you the answers or the hope you need.

You have to walk through the fire.

I am not telling you to manifest some bad thing into your life. I hope you live a joyful, exuberant life. I still do, even after some major, major hardships.

You Were Never Meant to Walk Through the Fire Alone

If you are reading this and you know the knock is closer than you are letting on, get around other men or women who have been there.

Do not do this alone.

I did. I did it alone for far too long, and it almost cost me everything real that I had left.

That is why we built Bridge Builder Mastermind. It is a small group of people who are taking hits and continuing to go. Some have been terminated. Some have sold their business. Some have been through divorce. Some have been through addiction. Some are still holding on to that last thing.

All of them are honest. None of them are performing. I love that group.

It is hyper-local to the Wisconsin area. If you want to be part of it, learn about Bridge Builder Mastermind. We would love to introduce you to the people in it.

So, back to June 16, 2021. The day my life split into before and after.

I would not wish it on anyone. And at the same time, I would not trade it for the man it made me become.

Both of those things are true.

I have even wrestled with the thought that maybe I do wish it on people, because I know it will make you better. That is not my wish. I just know that when you go through those hard things and you choose to walk through that fire, you are going to be better on the other side.

Action Items From Today

1. Write down three quiet decisions from the last year that you made and no one saw. Circle the one that is quietly compounding in the wrong direction.
2. If you have already fallen, write one sentence that starts with "This happened FOR me because . . ." and finish it honestly, even if it is hard.
3. Name the lesson your fall has been trying to teach you. If you paid the tuition, make sure you learn the lesson.
4. Ask yourself whether you are getting a warning shot right now. If you are, decide this week what you will change before the full impact comes.
5. Reach out to one person who has been through a fall of their own, and tell them the truth about where you are.
6. Take the Life Quotient Assessment to see where you stand across every area of your life.

Five Bridges Challenges

Spiritual Bridge: Sit with God this week and ask what He wants you to learn from the hardest season you have walked through. Grace decides the impact. Ask for the grace to use it well.

Internal Bridge: Notice where you have been telling your story as "this happened to me." Rewrite one part of it as "this happened for me," and read it out loud.

Relationships Bridge: Pick one person you have been carrying something alone around, whether it is your spouse, a friend, or a mentor, and let them in on it this week.

Go Deeper with The Kairos Code

Everything in this article comes from a bigger framework I lay out in my book, The Kairos Code.

The Greeks had two words for time. Chronos is clock time, the minutes we track and the hours we never seem to have enough of. Kairos is the opportune moment, the one that matters.

The book is about learning to live in Kairos. That means walking through the Five Bridges in order: Spiritual, Internal, Relationships, Environment, and Legacy. You stop trading your business for your family, or your family for your business, and start building a life where both can grow.

If this article hit home, the book will take you further.

The Kairos Code is available in paperback and hardcover, and now on Audible.

The Moment is NOW.

Inspire & Impact,

Josh