Mindset First: Interview with Mike Bahun, Founder and CEO of Fundraising University
I recently went one-on-one with Mike Bahun, founder and CEO of Fundraising University
Adam: Thanks again for taking the time to share your advice. First things first, though, I am sure readers would love to learn more about you. How did you get here?
Mike: From an early start in life, sports has always been a passion of mine. I was a former professional athlete from a single-parent home, and coaches gave me mentorship and a path forward. My time as an athlete has helped me understand that life is performance-based, and when you learn to accept that and the ownership spirit of ‘hey, my results are up to me,’ success will follow. This acceptance and ownership, experience, love of sports, and wanting to give back, all evolved into Fundraising University. The company is a natural extension of who I am. I took the opportunity to create Fundraising University not only as a goal to support my family and achieve financial independence but also to help coaches across the Midwest provide their athletes with the opportunities I was afforded. That’s my ‘why,’ and I can’t think of a better way to spend my time than supporting coaches and kids.
Adam: What experiences, failures, setbacks, or challenges have been most instrumental to your growth?
Mike: My belief is that there are no failures. Every experience, setback, or challenge is an opportunity to grow, learn, and pivot. For every 5 risks you take, 1 may work out. If you take no risk, then there is none to work out, and then there is no success to achieve.
Adam: How did you come up with your business idea?
Mike: What inspired Fundraising University was the opportunity to stay connected to the supportive role of coaches. To give back to the coaches who gave me the opportunities that I was afforded, and being in the student-athlete environment daily, which is something that is important to me on every level.
Adam: What advice do you have for others on how to come up with great ideas?
Mike: Educate yourself. Never stop learning. Never stop wanting to grow. Be open and expose yourself to varied experiences. Live life, following through on your vision, and take risks without fear. Have an entrepreneurial mindset. When you have an idea, be tenacious in making it happen.
Adam: How did you know your business idea was worth pursuing? What advice do you have on how to best test a business idea?
Mike: As a former athlete, I experienced the importance of fundraising, and that there will always be a need. I knew it was worth pursuing when I was coaching. As a coach, you see the need, and the impact, that fundraising has on activities and sports teams. I think the best way to test, in the beginning, is to do as much as you can yourself. Whether that's you being the customer or interacting with that concept as much as possible. It was easier for us because we're a demonstrated service, but as a group concept, it can only be done by engagement. Specific engagement to the process is what I think gets you to the simplest answer, as it allows you to get to the real truth.
Adam: What are the key steps you have taken to grow your business? What advice do you have for others on how to take their businesses to the next level?
Mike: We have had incredible growth that comes from our organization as we mature and fine-tune our process. We have grown on every level. We have simplified things and improved results. Management has experienced business ownership skills, and leadership makes decisions on growing a brand versus growing sales. We have really grown and improved everywhere simultaneously.
Adam: What are your best sales tips?
Mike: At Fundraising University we practice the core principles of Action Selling. We focus on the customer, their needs, their perspective. We have a structured approach, a detailed step-by-step system for managing sales calls as well as the entire sales process. We teach the philosophy of the ‘Five Buying Decisions.’ This is the idea that every customer, consciously or unconsciously, goes through 5 decision-making steps before making a sales decision. We stress the importance of identifying and addressing the customer’s needs through effective questioning and listening. We provide a service of solutions, and focus on building trusting relationships.
Adam: In your experience, what are the defining qualities of an effective leader? How can leaders and aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level?
Mike: An effective leader maintains daily engagement with their team. They communicate clearly and often. They are knowledgeable and skilled in their role. The more skill you have, the more control over your time, and inherently, the more money you make. The person that starts every day focusing on the process of growing will have success – as success is measuring the process not just the outcome.
Adam: What is your best advice on building, leading, and managing teams?
Mike: I look for individuals who are competitive in nature, who are coachable, organized, empathetic, and self-starters. We focus on engagement and ownership spirit. We see training, management, and development as active - it is something that is constantly occurring and growing.
Adam: What are your three best tips applicable to entrepreneurs, executives, and civic leaders?
Mike: I think #1 is the focus on mindset. We need to anchor, chronologically, on these three things. They all matter, but it's a mindset first, then a skill set, and then understanding the rules of entrepreneurship. They cannot happen out of that order, so at first, and where people don't spend enough time, is the development of the mindset. For example, one of our core rooted systems at Fundraising University is teaching a system called ‘Ownership Spirit.’ Based on mental performance pillars and mental training, we are putting ourselves in the right frame of mind and perspective. If we have processes and systems where we can regulate ourselves, then skills can be developed. If you're not regulating yourself and getting into a place where you can accumulate skill, then it's going to be a really cloudy path. It's just understanding the rules of entrepreneurship, and the rules of your business. What that really means is becoming an expert and having the insight of what you're doing. So it's mindset first, then it's a skill set, and then following and becoming the rules and an expert inside that process.
Adam: What is the single best piece of advice you have ever received?
Mike: It's the start that stops most people.
Adam Mendler is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker, educator, and nationally recognized authority on leadership. Adam is the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one-on-one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal-winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations. Adam has written extensively on leadership and related topics, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders. A Los Angeles native, Adam is a lifelong Angels fan and an avid backgammon player.
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