Don't Do Nothing

[00:00:00] Joy Gendusa: We have just under 400 staff right now. Who? I went to school with, Mark Jacobs. Oh. Andy Warhol would come and hang out outside my school. 

[00:00:07] Aaron: Wait, can we just stop for a second? 

[00:00:10] Joy Gendusa: The numbers going down, metrics going down. That is just not acceptable. I never feel like I do enough. Even when I was a wayward teenager, I knew one day I would be successful.

[00:00:20] Aaron: People can make decisions and they can own their job. They wanna know they did something and created something. And 

[00:00:25] Joy Gendusa: you can read and read and you can say, this is amazing. But if you don’t apply it to your life, you’re not going to have an amazing life. Mm-hmm. You’re just going to have read about something that could be amazing.

[00:00:35] Brad: Alright. Welcome to another episode of the Don’t Do Nothing podcast. Today we have an incredible guest. Miss Joy Gena. So, joy is the founder of a huge company called PostcardMania. She started it in 1998 when she didn’t have two nickels to rub together, and now does over a hundred million dollars a year in revenue.

[00:00:58] Brad: Uh, she’s also on the board [00:01:00] of an amazing, uh, I mean, I don’t even know what it’s called, but community. 

[00:01:04] Joy Gendusa: It’s a school now, but it’s it’s a tutor. It started as a tutoring center. Yeah. And it’s also a school now, but it’s very, it’s called the Community Learning Center. 

[00:01:11] Brad: And Joy has been on the board for 15 plus years.

[00:01:13] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:01:14] Brad: Uh, she also is the founder of Direct Mail 2.0. Mm-hmm. She’s a wonderful wife and a mother of two boys. Mm-hmm. Joy, thank you for being here today with us. 

[00:01:24] Joy Gendusa: I’m excited to be here with you. You guys are incredible. Thanks. Really incredible. 

[00:01:29] Brad: Thank you. Well. We, I mean, we get to see a lot of you like out and about.

[00:01:35] Brad: Um, 

[00:01:36] Aaron: I know, I know. I’ll tell you one thing that I know. Yeah. Like when I came here, I know you guys hire a lot of people. 

[00:01:42] Brad: Yes. That, that’s 

[00:01:43] Aaron: literally the first thing I was gonna say. Honestly, I think you’ve, how do you know how many jobs you provided, like in this area? Like inception, like since 1998? You 

[00:01:51] Joy Gendusa: mean all of them?

[00:01:51] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:01:52] Aaron: Yeah. I have 

[00:01:52] Joy Gendusa: no 

[00:01:52] Aaron: idea. It’s a lot though. It’s a lot. Have 

[00:01:54] Joy Gendusa: no idea. We have probably, uh, just under 400 staff right now. 

[00:01:58] Aaron: That’s amazing. That’s all us people. [00:02:00] 

[00:02:00] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. We don’t have any remote people. We have a very small amount of remote people. That’s local people in the Clearwater community. 

[00:02:05] Aaron: Thank you for hiring and giving people opportunities.

[00:02:09] Joy Gendusa: Yeah, my pleasure. 

[00:02:09] Aaron: I mean, that is, it’s unbelievable. That’s actually how, like, that’s how your name comes up most. Like That’s right. 

[00:02:13] Joy Gendusa: Okay. 

[00:02:14] Aaron: Just 

[00:02:14] Joy Gendusa: people working there. 

[00:02:16] Aaron: Um, so that’s how I know mostly of you is just people like Wow. A lot of people. That’s a lot of people. Yeah. 

[00:02:22] Joy Gendusa: It’s a lot of people. I’ll tell you something, I’m very fortunate because my executive team, all of them have been with me a very long time, and that’s probably.

[00:02:30] Joy Gendusa: My, my personal little superpower is that mm-hmm. I can get people to want to work for me. Very smart, very capable people for a long time. And, uh, that makes my job so easy. 

[00:02:43] Brad: Yeah. And, and one thing I’ve noticed is your company, you guys put a lot of attention on the staff and on the, I don’t even know what it’s called, the cul, I mean, the culture, the 

[00:02:54] Aaron: work 

[00:02:54] Brad: culture.

[00:02:55] Brad: Yeah. Yeah. So you don’t know this, but back in [00:03:00] 2022 when, uh, my wife and I were, were trying to like, get our construction company to grow, uh, your, what, what you’d basically call like in other companies, like, basically like your head of HR actually gave us a tour of PostcardMania. Angie. Angie, yeah. She’s amazing.

[00:03:16] Brad: Uh, and she helped my wife a ton as we were growing our company. Like just on, just kinda like a side, like she’d run into a situation, she’d ask Angie, Angie would help her. Um, so you and your. The way that you built the culture of Postcard Man has actually helped my company a ton. 

[00:03:34] Joy Gendusa: Well, that makes me really happy.

[00:03:35] Brad: Like that’s kind of, has been like our stable datum coming up. 

[00:03:40] Joy Gendusa: Well, I thank you. Love that. You’re welcome. And I, that really makes me happy, so thanks for telling me that. 

[00:03:43] Aaron: Yeah. Can I say that we’re in the same boat? I don’t know. Do you, do you like, is that part of like her job, like helping other companies or, or what like 

[00:03:50] Joy Gendusa: No, it’s not part of her job.

[00:03:52] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. But we, I have the viewpoint that there’s, I mean, if you wanted to come and duplicate my exact business, I’ll show you everything [00:04:00] because Good luck. There are 30, right? There are, yeah, yeah, yeah. There are like, what, 35 million small businesses in the us. I have 127,000 of them as customers, but there’s so much business out there for everybody, and I feel like.

[00:04:15] Joy Gendusa: Small businesses are my passion. Mm-hmm. That’s who my customer base is. That’s what I am. I’m a small business person until I hit 500 staff. I’m still in small business and I intend to stay that way. And, um, I don’t know. I love them. I love people who hustle and do whatever it takes and pull themselves up by the bootstraps.

[00:04:35] Joy Gendusa: And that’s why I’m so admiring of you two as well. 

[00:04:39] Brad: Oh, 

[00:04:40] Aaron: thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So I’m just saying Angie has also helped us. Like 

[00:04:42] that’s 

[00:04:42] Joy Gendusa: nice. 

[00:04:43] Aaron: Our HR is called like, Hey, what are we, you know, she’s an discussing situations. Yeah. And I’m like, I don’t think we do that to other people. Like, I don’t think that’s the reverse.

[00:04:51] Aaron: You know what I mean? So I just wonder if that was part of like, you, like, Hey, we’re gonna help the community. Is that like out of, I don’t know how that happened. Yeah. Is that her own thing that she just 

[00:04:59] Joy Gendusa: [00:05:00] started helping people? We’re all very much like that. Yeah. The executive team. Yeah. I mean we’re, we’re just like that.

[00:05:05] Joy Gendusa: I don’t know. We’re all very helpful people. I mean, if somebody called you and needed your help, you would totally help them. That’s true. So if I’m asked, if we’re asked, we help, you know, it’s not. It’s not in the policies. 

[00:05:16] Aaron: Okay. 

[00:05:16] Brad: Okay. Amazing, amazing, 

[00:05:17] Aaron: amazing. 

[00:05:18] Brad: Okay. And so, one, one other thing that I kind of left out of the intro is you are also a Scientologist 

[00:05:25] Joy Gendusa: of course.

[00:05:26] Brad: And I wanted to know how did that happen? 

[00:05:30] Joy Gendusa: Ah, let me tell you my, my story. 

[00:05:33] Brad: Yes, please. 

[00:05:35] Joy Gendusa: I did my first course when I was 12 years old. 

[00:05:38] Brad: Hmm. 

[00:05:39] Joy Gendusa: I was, um, the kid who got in trouble in school all the time for passing notes for not shutting up in class. Uh, thankfully back then nobody was labeling children a DD or a DHD and throwing them on drugs.

[00:05:55] Joy Gendusa: That wasn’t happening yet, thank God, when I was a little girl. Um, but what [00:06:00] happened was, um, my mother’s best friend, her son quit school and joined staff at the Church of Scientology in New York City. 

[00:06:11] Brad: Hmm. Wow. 

[00:06:12] Joy Gendusa: And. She was freaked out about it. So she went to the library and she took out all of this, I don’t know, whatever you wanna call it, garbage on cult on like all of this data.

[00:06:25] Joy Gendusa: And she just laid it out on his bed. And when he got home, he said to her, well, mom, if I’ve learned nothing from you, I learned that if you wanna find out about something, you go to the source. You don’t listen to what other people say. Mm 

[00:06:41] Brad: wow. 

[00:06:42] Joy Gendusa: Right? Yes. So she said, well that makes sense. And he said, well, why don’t you just do the communication course and once you do that course, I’ll have a conversation with you about Scientology.

[00:06:56] Joy Gendusa: So she called my mom and she was like, you gotta do this course with me. I’m not doing it [00:07:00] myself. So that’s what happened. And so my mom and Robbie, his name was Robbie, his name is Robbie. He, uh, they got. Together. And they went into the city, ’cause I lived in Long Island. They went into the city every night and they did a communications course.

[00:07:14] Joy Gendusa: And when my mom finished that course, she said, I want my daughters to do this course. 

[00:07:19] Aaron: Wow. 

[00:07:19] Joy Gendusa: Mainly because she felt like I needed to learn how to communicate so that I wouldn’t keep getting in trouble for being fresh, you know, and all the, all the things that I as a, and I was 12 at the time. So I went and I did the communications course.

[00:07:36] Joy Gendusa: And there is a drill that you do where you are sitting across from a person and you basically what you’re doing, they’re taking communication and breaking it up into every little part until you have an actual conversation, right? Mm-hmm. So you know that when you’re talking to someone, if they’re looking in your eyes, you feel like you’re engaging with them.

[00:07:58] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. So that’s a big part of it. Mm-hmm. But in order to [00:08:00] do that, you have to be comfortable. 

[00:08:01] Aaron: Yes. 

[00:08:02] Joy Gendusa: You have to be comfortable. So the very first drill, you have your eyes closed and you’re just sitting there. Drilling being comfortable and it takes a bit. 

[00:08:10] Aaron: Yes, indeed. 

[00:08:11] Joy Gendusa: It’s not, people are not comfortable, especially now with social media and everybody’s looking at a screen.

[00:08:16] Joy Gendusa: People are not comfortable talking to another person. 

[00:08:19] Brad: That’s right. 

[00:08:20] Joy Gendusa: So this was the very, my, my first thing I ever did as a 12-year-old. And I didn’t go there thinking, oh yay, I have to go to school more. I was like, oh, I’m here. I’m in trouble again. And my mom’s now gonna take me to make me do this. Okay.

[00:08:34] Brad: Is that what you thought? You’re like, oh, great. Extra 

[00:08:36] Joy Gendusa: school. Except Totally extra school. Extra school. So I did this course with my sister, who’s 17 months, my senior, and I had my eyes closed. And while that was, while I was doing that, I had an experience, which is called Externalization. And that’s where you as a being, are no longer in your body.

[00:08:58] Joy Gendusa: You’re outside your body. And I, and I [00:09:00] know people have had this all the time, it’s, it’s just something that occurs for people. Yeah. And maybe they don’t know what it’s called. And I. That was an amazing thing for me. So we went on to do the rest of the drills until I felt like, oh, I know how to communicate with someone.

[00:09:14] Joy Gendusa: And it was, it was great. And that was that. And I had this thing that, wait, can 

[00:09:18] Aaron: we just stop 

[00:09:19] Brad: for a second? 

[00:09:21] Joy Gendusa: So 

[00:09:21] Brad: good. 

[00:09:22] Joy Gendusa: I, I didn’t, I didn’t say anything to anyone about it. ’cause I didn’t know what it was at the time. I didn’t know what it was. It was just, I, I, I could see myself sitting Wow. You know, doing the drill with my sister and I, I had this feeling of, I don’t even, it was peace.

[00:09:40] Joy Gendusa: Mm. And it wasn’t. And I was a very troubled 12-year-old. Mm. Um, I grew up in my pa I’ve never seen my parents have an argument. I grew up in a very calm and beautiful environment. Mm-hmm. I was the tornado, the problem child. The never happy crying. Just, just [00:10:00] not happy. And, um, I felt like this. Peace, you know, just this piece.

[00:10:06] Joy Gendusa: And I did, I couldn’t tell you anything more than that. ’cause think of it, I was 12, think of a 12-year-old. No, I was a kind of a smart 12-year-old. I did, I was, I did read the Born Identity when I was 12. Okay. I didn’t realize that that was a big deal till I had a 12-year-old. But anyway, I digress. So, so, uh, I did that and then I, then the next thing is my mom said, would you like to do some auditing?

[00:10:29] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. And I’m like, what’s that? She’s like, you talk to somebody and they listen and it’s, and it’s called life repair. Would you like to do that? And I was like, N not really. Mm-hmm. And she was like, well, why don’t you just try it? So I’m doing my life repair and I have this auditor, the listener, the person sitting across from me, and I guess she could see on the meter the something, I don’t know what she could see at the time.

[00:10:53] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. But she said, is there something you would rather be doing? And I said. [00:11:00] Yes. All I could think about was Hello Kitty. It was 1976. Oh my and Hello Kitty had just come out. I mean, I know those, you guys were, you guys were, you were like a sparkle in your parents eye. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, hello Kitty had just come out and I could think of nothing else.

[00:11:18] Joy Gendusa: And it was November, 1976 and it was almost the holiday season. Almost Christmas. 

[00:11:23] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:11:23] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. And I’m Jewish, so it was a almost Hanukkah. Mm-hmm. And, and I, me and my little friends would get each other Christmas presents, Hanukkah presents, whatever. And all I could think about was like these little Hello Kitty erasers and pencils and coloring books.

[00:11:39] Joy Gendusa: Anyway, I digress. Um, and so the auditor said that to me and I answered, and she said, well, you know what? You should come back here when you wanna do Scientology. And that was the end of Scientology for me as a 12-year-old. 

[00:11:54] Aaron: Wow. 

[00:11:55] Joy Gendusa: I said, okay. And I left. Now. During my [00:12:00] little tenure at the Church of Scientology, this gentleman named Michael Mauer.

[00:12:06] Brad: Mm-hmm Mm. 

[00:12:07] Joy Gendusa: Do you know Mike? 

[00:12:08] Brad: I know Michael, 

[00:12:08] Joy Gendusa: yes. Do you know Michael? Well, he was, he was 24 and I was 12. But you seem him a very tall person. I was five seven and about 107 pounds and I was, my mom let me dress however I wanted. So I remember I was wearing little hot pants. ’cause this is 1976. Mm-hmm. And, and, and platform shoes.

[00:12:30] Joy Gendusa: And Michael thought I was older. I’m sure. So he was talking to me like I was a peer. He wasn’t talking to me like I was a 12-year-old. And he was telling me about all of these incredible things that Scientology. Does for people. 

[00:12:48] Brad: Mm. 

[00:12:48] Joy Gendusa: And he was talking about the concept of the planet and handling, you know, pain and suffering on the planet.

[00:12:54] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. And he’s talking to me, I’m 12 and I’m like, uh, you know, I’m like, I, but it [00:13:00] stuck with me. You have no idea how that’s stuck with me. So now fast forward, I guess I was a junior in high school, so how many years is that? 12 to 16? 17. I mean, it was, yeah, probably I was 17, so it was five years. Five years.

[00:13:17] Joy Gendusa: It felt like an eternity. Mm-hmm. Because from 12 to 17, that 

[00:13:19] Brad: is an eternity. 

[00:13:20] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. Yeah. Not anymore. Not now. No more five years is like, yeah. So. I, I, um, at this point I had cut outta school more than I could than I went to school. And I was just smoking pot. The good pot. The old pot, not this pot, the not so strong pot, but not so strong.

[00:13:39] Joy Gendusa: The normal pot. Yeah. It didn’t smell like a skunk anyway, but still, I was smoking pot. I wasn’t, I went to a, I went to a really special high school, it’s called the High School of Art and Design. Mm-hmm. In New York City. And you have to take a test to get into the school. And I was very artistic and I got into this school and it was a blessing.

[00:13:57] Joy Gendusa: And my, my parents, you know, paid for me to [00:14:00] take the Long Island Railroad every single day to go to this school. And here I am, smoking pot and dropping out and, and you know, not going, so in, in March of my, no, it was March of my senior year. Okay. March of my senior year. Uh, no, I haven’t talked about this in like 400 years.

[00:14:15] Joy Gendusa: So March of my senior year, um, I was told, if you wanna graduate, you’ll have to go to summer school. And I was like. There’s no way that’s happening. 

[00:14:25] Brad: Mm. 

[00:14:25] Joy Gendusa: So I decided to quit school and sign, and I actually got my parents, my parents, I had the most wonderful parents ever. They signed me out of school, my parents, and this is a big part of who I am and, and why I’m successful is my parents, because they treated me with so much respect, even though I was an awful, awful person.

[00:14:50] Brad: Wow. 

[00:14:51] Joy Gendusa: Like, you know, my mom would tell me, when you walk in the room, the sun comes out. When you, you can do anything. You can. So anything like, they were [00:15:00] so amazing. 

[00:15:01] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:15:02] Joy Gendusa: And, um, I was just very fortunate and I, I never saw my parents have a fight. They were just, I grew up in this lovely. Like suburban. I didn’t know where the roast beef came from.

[00:15:12] Joy Gendusa: My dad had a business, you know what I mean? My dad had a business. Yeah. He left the house at six. He New York, he was home by six and yeah. And my mom cooked dinner and, you know, it was like very kind of picture perfect. Mm-hmm. Except for the, the tornado of that was their daughter. 

[00:15:27] Brad: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:15:28] Joy Gendusa: So I, um. I, I, I was a mess.

[00:15:32] Joy Gendusa: I was like, what am I gonna do with my life? I just dropped out. I used to be special. I used to be the artist. Now everybody’s an artist. And now I can, I went to school with Mark Jacobs. Wow. Uhhuh, um, Andy Warhol would come and hang out outside my school. Yeah. Mark Jacobs was a, a grade ahead of me, and there were like five Jewish kids in the whole school, so we all knew each other.

[00:15:52] Joy Gendusa: It was like, oh, wow. Yeah. It was like in the city. Everybody was like Spanish, Asian, black, and maybe five whites [00:16:00] and two Jews. I mean, it was really, it was really very mixed race and from a girl from Long Island, I was a little nervous. Yeah. So, anyway, it was great though. It was a great exposure to different people and it was a wonderful experience.

[00:16:12] Joy Gendusa: However, I botched it. 

[00:16:13] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[00:16:14] Joy Gendusa: I completely botched it. So I was smoking pot and walking around the city and I thought, I’m gonna go up to the Church of Scientology because I wanna maybe, maybe they can help me. And so I walked up to, it was a, it was not too far. My, my school was on 53rd and Lexington, 53rd and third, and I walked all the way to 82nd between Park and Madison.

[00:16:44] Joy Gendusa: If you know New York City, it’s only about, it’s not that far. 

[00:16:46] Brad: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. 

[00:16:47] Joy Gendusa: But it, you know, it’s a, it’s a bit, yeah. So I walked all the way up there and I walked in and I was like, Hey, you know, I’m, I’m interested in talking to someone about Scientology. Mm-hmm. So. They’re so [00:17:00] wonderful. The staff were just so wonderful.

[00:17:02] Joy Gendusa: So they said, they put me in this girl’s office. Her name was Linda, and Linda’s just talking to me. I don’t remember the whole conversation, but she asked me, she could tell I was high. So she’s like, do you smoke pot? Because that’s really all anybody did back then. Yeah. And do you get high? And I said, oh yes, I’m high right now.

[00:17:19] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. And I was like, doesn’t everybody who wants to learn more about themselves? And you know? Mm-hmm. And she was like, she did not make me feel bad about it at all. She said, okay. She said, well, the Scientology and Pot don’t really mix because you are, you’re kind of, you’re high. So now we wanna find the real you over here.

[00:17:42] Joy Gendusa: And if you, the pot, it’s just, they don’t mix. If you want to get high, you can do that, but if you wanna do Scientology, you can’t do that. So it’s, it’s, it’s one or the other. But she didn’t, she didn’t say it like, you have to quit forever. Mm-hmm. She said, you just can’t do it while you’re doing a course.

[00:17:55] Brad: Right? Mm-hmm. Right. 

[00:17:56] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. So I was like, okay, how long are the courses? And she [00:18:00] was like, well, some of them are short. I was like, okay. But I was kind of like, no, I think I wanna smoke pot. And I left. Mm-hmm. And I would, I I wasn’t 

[00:18:07] Aaron: like three days. Like 

[00:18:08] Joy Gendusa: That’s a lot. That’s a 

[00:18:10] Aaron: lot. That’s a lot. Yeah, 

[00:18:11] Joy Gendusa: that’s a lot.

[00:18:11] Joy Gendusa: So I left, but then what I, what she did when I left was she called my mom. ’cause you know, back then five years is nothing. And people lived in the same houses forever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So she called my mom and people picked up their phone, 

[00:18:25] right, right. 

[00:18:27] Joy Gendusa: For numbers cell phones. 

[00:18:28] Brad: They didn’t, because there was no caller id.

[00:18:29] Joy Gendusa: There’s no caller id. And the people picked up their phone. So she called my mom and my mom answered, and she said, Hey, joy walked in and. My mom said, whatever you can get her to do, we will be happy to pay for whatever those services are. Um, and so she said, well, I want her to do the purification rundown.

[00:18:49] Joy Gendusa: And my mom said, absolutely. Whatever, whatever you can do to help my daughter. We’re a hundred percent behind that. As I said, I had the most amazing parents. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And so, [00:19:00] um, I came back and, um, like a few days later, I mean, it’s like nobody, they weren’t calling me. I didn’t have a cell phone. They weren’t nobody.

[00:19:09] Joy Gendusa: I just came back a few days later and I was like, okay, like what do you, what kind of course do you think I should do? And I, she did have me do a couple of courses. I did the ups and Downs in Life course. 

[00:19:20] Mm-hmm. 

[00:19:21] Joy Gendusa: And I did the course called, uh, personal Values and Integrity. 

[00:19:25] Brad: So 

[00:19:26] that course is un unbelievable.

[00:19:29] Joy Gendusa: 1000% changed my life. Those two courses. One, I mean a thousand, I can’t even a a million percent. Mm-hmm. A gazillion percent. Yeah. I, I didn’t even know what personal integrity was. Mm-hmm. I didn’t even know what the definition of that even was. Mm-hmm. It was a foreign concept. So that was the beginning of the end.

[00:19:52] Joy Gendusa: I mean, that was the beginning of the beginning. The beginning of the beginning, I should say. Yeah. That was, that was my, when my journey started, really, for real. [00:20:00] So I was almost 18 at that time. 

[00:20:03] Aaron: Did you end up doing, you did the pur, uh, around then, 

[00:20:06] Joy Gendusa: or I did, yeah. I did it right. I did it right away. I did the, I did the two little mini courses.

[00:20:10] Joy Gendusa: I did the purification rundown. My parents got me some more auditing so that I could clean up all the crap I had done to myself over the last five years. And, and then I joined staff and, um, that was the most amazing experience where I really learned how to be part of a group and how to work and how to take pride in a job well done and feel what it feels like to be part of a group that cares about people and cares about each other.

[00:20:39] Joy Gendusa: It was, it, it was the basis of how I even started my company was that experience of being a staff member. 

[00:20:46] Brad: That makes total sense. Yeah. 

[00:20:48] Aaron: Wow. By the way, I, I don’t know. You haven’t, but I did the similar thing at actually around the same age. I went on staff right around 18, and that was, I mean, again, that’s the stuff you [00:21:00] learn there is, is.

[00:21:02] Aaron: When you can work, like, when you can volunteer. Right. Because it’s a volunteer. It’s a volunteer job. Job, okay. When you can volunteer for long hours 

[00:21:09] Joy Gendusa: mm-hmm. 

[00:21:11] Aaron: For a purpose that’s more than just yourself. Mm-hmm. It’s very easy to work. I mean, I don’t know. That’s, that was my experience. So, so when you see that was like the foundation for your business?

[00:21:19] Aaron: Like what, what kind of stuff did you learn? 

[00:21:21] Joy Gendusa: Oh my goodness. 

[00:21:22] Aaron: There 

[00:21:22] Joy Gendusa: I learned so many basic things. I mean, I learned, so a Harvard wrote volumes of books on policies of how to run the Church of Scientology. 

[00:21:34] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[00:21:35] Joy Gendusa: And in the eighties, this voluminous amount of work was kind of exported mm-hmm. By various Scientologists to help business people grow their businesses.

[00:21:47] Joy Gendusa: So I learned a small piece of that voluminous work as a staff member just in, in course format. Mm-hmm. So, you know how to, how do you. Ask [00:22:00] for something you need, you know? Mm-hmm. Like how do you, you know, just all the different things. What are the communication lines? What, how do you work within this division, to this division, to this division?

[00:22:11] Joy Gendusa: You know? And really it was more, I learned really what it feels like to work hard, get a product, how to get a product. When I say get a product, it’s like what I have in me now comes from staff, like down stats, any, the numbers going down, metrics going down, that is just not acceptable. And I learned that as a staff member.

[00:22:37] Joy Gendusa: Like we, we need to help more people. Yeah. We need to get more people help less, not less. The work ethic was, so I, I think I always had a good work ethic, but I didn’t have it. It was kind of an innate thing. I liked work, but. I didn’t have the purpose, you know? Mm-hmm. And even with my business, like I have a very strong purpose to help small businesses.

[00:22:59] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. [00:23:00] That is what my company does. And I could never have done what I did without Arun Hubbard’s Management technology. I mean, not possible. I’m a, I’m a high school dropout. Mm-hmm. I have no college I had, and we had no internet back then. The only thing I had were those green volumes, those books to, if you look at my, my volumes right now that are on my shelf in my office, there’s a million little tabs and post-it notes, because any time I ran into anything at work that I didn’t know how to handle, I could find the answer in those books.

[00:23:39] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:23:39] Joy Gendusa: And it’s really the only thing I have, it’s the only thing I, I know really. I don’t know anything. 

[00:23:46] Brad: So I, I, I, in getting like. Your viewpoint. Like, it, it’s, it’s interesting to get the picture of you, like as a young girl in New York City, an artist really, [00:24:00] right? Where like, I get that you were, you were on staff and that, you know, like instilled like work ethic.

[00:24:08] Brad: But how did you go from like, basically an artist to now you run mult, like a massive business and have other businesses that other, an artistic company. You have people running company. Of course it’s an artistic company. Yes. But you’re the top. You’re the top. You’re an I, super high powered executive at this point.

[00:24:25] Joy Gendusa: You know, I, I’m innately an executive. I didn’t know that either. I had no idea. 

[00:24:31] Brad: Mm. Yeah. 

[00:24:31] Joy Gendusa: But I, I am, but now that I’ve met so many people that have started businesses, I saw, I went, no, I’m, I was actually. Kind of good at this. Like I knew what policies to look for the whole 

[00:24:41] Brad: time. 

[00:24:42] Joy Gendusa: Pretty much. I mean, I, I wanna say, I mean, it sounds kind of crazy ’cause I, I didn’t know I had those skills.

[00:24:48] Joy Gendusa: There’s this dude, do you know Robert Schwartz? No. Okay, so Robert Schwartz is a guy who, back in the day, he had like 300 kiosks in malls. And he sold, [00:25:00] I think it was chain, maybe it was chained by the inch. It was like fake gold jewelry only at Christmas time. Wow. Like October, November, December. And then he would shut down.

[00:25:08] Joy Gendusa: And then I worked for him and I, I, um, helped him staff these, these kiosks. And one day he had to drive me home from work for whatever reason or recall. And he, we were chatting and chatting and chatting in his car before I got outta the car. And he said, why don’t you have your own business? 

[00:25:29] Brad: Mm. 

[00:25:30] Joy Gendusa: I looked at, I go, I, I have no idea how to have a business.

[00:25:33] Joy Gendusa: Like, why would you even say that to me? I was so. Like, it was so not real to me that I could ever have a business and I was already a mom. I already had the boys. And, um, but now in hindsight, I see now that I’ve had so many staff and I see what he saw in me, and what he saw in me was what I got from staff.

[00:25:57] Joy Gendusa: He’d saw me have, take full [00:26:00] ownership of a post. 

[00:26:02] Brad: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. 

[00:26:02] Joy Gendusa: You give me something to do, I’m going to own that post. I’m going to make it go right and I’m going to do it as a professional no matter what. 

[00:26:11] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[00:26:12] Joy Gendusa: Now, I didn’t know at this time that not everybody operated that way. 

[00:26:17] Aaron: Yes, I am. I feel you.

[00:26:19] Aaron: Hold on. Yeah. I have to say, yeah. I know I’m interrupting a bit, but like I, I, I volunteered at the church for a while and then I got like my first like, job outside the church. Yeah. And I was shocked. I was shocked that. And I’m sorry if you’re one of these people, but probably if you’re listening to this podcast, you’re not Okay.

[00:26:36] Aaron: Yeah, no, no. Probably if you’re listening to this, you’re not this type of person, but I realized that the majority of people do not wanna be at their job. Like, I get a job, I came in and these guys, at least again, I, they look kinda miserable. Yeah. Uh, sometimes falling asleep at their desk, not doing their, like, like, it was bad.

[00:26:57] Aaron: Like there was one time this guy, he literally was falling [00:27:00] asleep and his supervisor, right. Our boss came and he is like, Hey, dude, why are you sleeping? He’s like, I wasn’t sleeping. What are you talking about? And then I, I was shocked and I came into this thing. I knew I’d never worked at a, at a, at a normal job.

[00:27:12] Aaron: I’d only worked at the church and I volunteered, but I took the job and I, it was funny, within a month and a half, like. 45 days in, I finished this thing that they hadn’t done for three years. It was like this backlog that they had for three years. They hired multiple people because I just worked. I got there and I worked.

[00:27:30] Aaron: That’s what I thought people did. 

[00:27:33] I like, I I, I just, I agree with you. It, it’s so, it’s like, seems 

[00:27:40] Aaron: pe people are not like that. 

[00:27:42] It’s, 

[00:27:42] Aaron: there are some the most bizarre, of course, some, are there some really good people out there? No. Like when we go, obviously we hire, we have a team and of course like we go through people and we have an amazing team.

[00:27:52] Aaron: A lot of them wanna work. A lot of ’em do. Fantastic job actually. I think all of them. Right. Otherwise, you know, we wouldn’t be here. Exactly. Um, but it also [00:28:00] takes a lot of interviews, a lot of talking, and that’s my business. Right. Obviously I’ve been decently successful. Right in the top whatever, 1%. Okay. The one percenter, I’m like a one percenter.

[00:28:11] Aaron: I think all, all of us here are one percenters. Okay. Um, but. In other businesses, I feel like the guys that don’t succeed and don’t get to the top 10%, top 5%, top 1%, that is their staff. That might be them, the business owner, right. That is not wanting to get something done. I don’t know. What do you guys think?

[00:28:29] Aaron: The business, I what Can’t don dunno what’s going 

[00:28:32] Joy Gendusa: on. The other business owner does wanna get it done. They just don’t have the tools. They don’t, they don’t. What I’ve run into when with other business owners is, um, they don’t have a good organizing board organ org chart mm-hmm. Where they’re not delegating, um, duties properly.

[00:28:47] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. Yep. So that’s a big thing that just people don’t know how to do. Everybody, when you’re growing your business, everybody’s a catchall. Yeah. You know? Mm-hmm. They’ll just, I’ll do it, I’ll do it, I’ll do it. And it’s chaos. So because of the [00:29:00] Hubbard Management system, I was able to immediately, from day one, start keeping statistics.

[00:29:06] Joy Gendusa: Yes. Of like every, everything that we did to make a sale. Like I, I just knew I had to count, like how many phone calls did it take? Mm-hmm. How many people did I have to talk to? How many, you know, when I was doing everything myself, I just figured it out and then I would have a hat, I could write it up.

[00:29:25] Joy Gendusa: This is what you have to do. So I all the, I wouldn’t know what that was without. Mm-hmm. The hub management system, the administrative technology. So I feel like they’re just, the business owners are just missing information. Mm-hmm. Staff, we, are you familiar with the motivation scale? 

[00:29:40] Aaron: Yes. 

[00:29:41] Joy Gendusa: Okay. Of course. So the motivation scale, and 

[00:29:43] Aaron: we’ll include it.

[00:29:43] Aaron: I’ll include the page number. Okay. It’s in the book Scientology oh eight. Yes. The book of basics. 

[00:29:48] Joy Gendusa: Yes. So the, the top of the scale is duty. Yeah. And that’s a, there’s only four levels on the scale, and obviously when you get a job, you’re doing it [00:30:00] because you need a paycheck, but you also have, why do you need a paycheck?

[00:30:04] Joy Gendusa: It’s a duty to your family. That’s right. It’s a duty to pay your bills. And if you operate at that motivation, 

[00:30:10] Brad: yes, 

[00:30:11] Joy Gendusa: you will do a much better job. Mm-hmm. Now the second one down is personal conviction. And personal conviction is also fantastic. Mm-hmm. If you hire people who have a personal conviction, meaning mm-hmm.

[00:30:22] Joy Gendusa: They’re gonna do a good job because they better do a good job. Mm-hmm. Because they 

[00:30:25] believe 

[00:30:25] Joy Gendusa: it’s right. They believe it’s the right thing to do, and it’s very personal. Mm-hmm. It’s, they do it because if they don’t, then they’re gonna feel like they’re an idiot or something. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So those two motivations are what we try to hire.

[00:30:38] Aaron: Yep. 

[00:30:39] Joy Gendusa: For the most part. So we, we, you know, have some questions that we ask to see if we can determine where they are on that. Scale, duty is the highest, then personal conviction, then personal gain. So if you hire someone, and all the, you know, you know, when you interview people and they’re like, well, how many vacation days do I get?

[00:30:56] Joy Gendusa: And, and what, how much PTO and how much and what are [00:31:00] you gonna do for me and when am I gonna get my first raise? And we don’t hire those people, 

[00:31:03] Aaron: right? 

[00:31:04] Joy Gendusa: We want someone who’s interested in actually working. Mm. So there’s, there’s a way to, you know, and obviously we want personal gain. I’m not saying, but that’s 

[00:31:14] Aaron: not the only, that’s not why to have a job that’s, that’s called 

[00:31:15] Joy Gendusa: the 

[00:31:15] Aaron: benefit, 

[00:31:16] Joy Gendusa: right.

[00:31:16] Joy Gendusa: That’s like 

[00:31:16] Aaron: a one 

[00:31:17] Joy Gendusa: per, but that’s not your motivation as a person. 

[00:31:20] Aaron: Yeah. 

[00:31:20] Joy Gendusa: You know, what is your motivation? So people have different motivations. It’s not just the job, it’s mm-hmm. How their motivation in life, right? Yeah. So, so I’m, why do I have a company? Because I employ all these people and I, I have a duty to make sure that I am profitable so that these people.

[00:31:38] Joy Gendusa: Can get their paycheck. Mm-hmm. I mean, at this point in time, you know, I, it’s, the duty is why I do why I keep doing it. 

[00:31:46] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:31:47] Joy Gendusa: You know, I mean, I still have a good time and it’s fun, but, you know, I have married people that work for me that are relying 100% on my company to mm-hmm. Pay all their bills and buy their nice cars and do, make their [00:32:00] donations to their charities that they love, and I better, you know, that’s my motivation.

[00:32:06] Aaron: That’s beautiful. 

[00:32:07] Brad: That’s amazing. 

[00:32:07] Joy Gendusa: What’s your motivation? 

[00:32:10] Aaron: You know, I, I, we’re in, we’re in the same boat. I, I just, I have to say like, I, I think when, when we were smaller and just starting. There was definitely a, you have to have money. Like you can’t 

[00:32:25] Joy Gendusa: Right. 

[00:32:25] Aaron: You can’t 

[00:32:26] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:32:27] Aaron: Not have a place to live. 

[00:32:28] Joy Gendusa: Right. 

[00:32:29] Aaron: You know?

[00:32:30] Aaron: But it’s interesting because even getting money, you can do that out of duty, meaning, 

[00:32:34] Joy Gendusa: right. 

[00:32:34] Aaron: Yeah. At one point. That’s right. I need to have money so I can help. Well, my, we know Whitney, you know Whitney, my wife, 

[00:32:44] Joy Gendusa: she’s amazing 

[00:32:45] Aaron: and beautiful. She’s, she’s incredible and beautiful and incredible and amazing. So she wanted to have a baby.

[00:32:52] Aaron: I did not think I was ready to embark on that journey. How 

[00:32:57] Joy Gendusa: many kids do you guys have now? 

[00:32:58] Aaron: Before now? 

[00:32:58] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:32:59] Aaron: [00:33:00] I, I, I, she made me ready. Okay. Uh, in various ways. Okay. So, but here, here’s the thing. Here’s the thing. Um, 

[00:33:07] Joy Gendusa: you, do you feel like you need I had a, 

[00:33:09] Aaron: I, no, no. I had, I actually thought. Because we don’t have money, we can’t have a child.

[00:33:14] Aaron: And she was like, no, no, we are gonna have a child. That’s 

[00:33:17] Brad: the same thing 

[00:33:17] Aaron: for yourself. Yeah. Like, I, like, I, I thought like when you have the money, then you can take the responsibility. Right. And the skill’s a bit different. You go like, okay, I will have to be a husband and a father and provide for my family and we will have a baby now let me figure out how to do that.

[00:33:39] Aaron: Right. It was a bit, it was a bit reversed. So I was, I was stuck on, we don’t have enough money. Mm-hmm. I can hardly pay the bills now with a baby. We will be screwed. Right. That was my, that was like my thought process. And, and she basically gently got me to, you know, take responsibility and I was also gonna, the church and I, I was doing some stuff and I [00:34:00] realized I had a moment in the church.

[00:34:01] Aaron: I’m like, well, she got, we did, she, she got pregnant. She, uh, and but not much changed. She was pregnant and like I was still going. I’m making 20 bucks an hour, she’s making $22 an hour. We have a baby coming, we’re living in California. It’s a lot of taxes. It’s not an, and you can’t really like, it’s not like a good great many years situation ago.

[00:34:20] Aaron: Was 

[00:34:20] Joy Gendusa: that, 

[00:34:21] Aaron: uh, my daughter is 11, so 12 or 12 years ago. Yeah, about 12 years ago. You’re 

[00:34:26] Joy Gendusa: such a crazy success story. 

[00:34:28] Aaron: A little bit of a change. So it’s, it’s been, it’s been a lot of changes, but I wanna say like, I had a moment. I was at the church and you know, we do some interesting things in the church and I was looking around the room and I was just like touching things and just getting like in communication with the space and this, and I don’t know what I was doing.

[00:34:49] Aaron: It was something that I’m supposed to, I’m following some steps I’m supposed to do. And I just had a moment when I said I am a father [00:35:00] Whitney is five months pregnant. I’m actually already a father. I’m not gonna be a father. Like there’s a human being in that belly. Whether you believe it or not. And, uh, and I, I’m not acting like it, I’m not doing, I’m not in the sense of duty.

[00:35:18] Aaron: I, it was kind of happening in front of me and I was watching it and in that moment I kind of whoop woke up and I’m like, I gotta get to work. And that’s when I’m like, okay, how do I make some money in this? And within six months my income tripled. I started Amazon about 10 months after that, and it just started going like crazy.

[00:35:35] Aaron: But anyway, I just like is my duty, this child will be successful or have opportunity because of me and only because of me. And there is nothing that will get in the way. And that’s what happened to 

[00:35:45] me. 

[00:35:45] Joy Gendusa: Yeah, I love that. That’s incredible. That’s, and it’s the same, it’s the same story for me. My, I had two little boys and the school system was terrible and I needed to put them in private school.

[00:35:54] Joy Gendusa: And I was just like, that’s, it’s my duty to take care of them and to make sure they have what they need. [00:36:00] And I really had my parents also as such great. Examples, you know, to follow. And I was like, I can’t, I can’t be like lower, what is the word I wanna use? I wanna say down sta or less, you know, have lower statistics than my parents, you know?

[00:36:16] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. My dad was successful. 

[00:36:17] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[00:36:18] Joy Gendusa: To be a good example to my parents. Even like, I had this duty, like, I can’t ask them for help. I have to do it myself. I have to make them proud of me. I was such a pain in the butt when I was a kid. I was such a pain in the butt. And so I really wanted to, when I found Scientology, I was like, this is my chance to make it up to my parents, to thank them for everything they’ve done for me and be successful.

[00:36:41] Joy Gendusa: And that was, I had that duty as well. So Duty is a great motivator. 

[00:36:45] Brad: So Good. Totally. Okay. So a second ago you brought up the school system. Mm-hmm. You have been on the board of the community learning center for over a decade. Clearly that’s like, that whole situation is something that’s really important to you.

[00:36:58] Brad: Mm-hmm. What, how, [00:37:00] how did that come about? Like what. What happened where you’re like, I gotta do something about this. I’ll 

[00:37:04] Joy Gendusa: tell you what happened. Yeah. It’s a good, it’s actually a, I haven’t thought about this story in a long time of how did I get to the community learning center? So my younger son, um, was kind of going from like school to school and not doing well at all.

[00:37:20] Joy Gendusa: And I, I didn’t know what to do because I didn’t have, I was building my business and I couldn’t homeschool him at all. And so I had heard about the community learning center and I went over there to see, to check it out. And the gal who is running it said, well, I wanna give you, I want to give you a test.

[00:37:41] Joy Gendusa: I wanted to get my son tested to see where he was at, education wise. Mm-hmm. Like what grade level was he at? 

[00:37:47] Brad: Mm. 

[00:37:47] Joy Gendusa: And I knew he was behind, I think he was about nine or 10 at this point, maybe 11. And he wasn’t winning in life. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It broke my heart. So I was like, what am I gonna do about this? So I went over [00:38:00] there and the ed, the executive director said, I’m, I’m gonna give him a test to see where he’s at.

[00:38:06] Joy Gendusa: And I was like, I’m not putting my son through a test. You have to give me the test first so I can see what he’s gonna go through. So I took the test and at the end of the test she was kind of dumbfounded. She was looking at my test scores and it was reading comprehension and reading. It was a reading type of test.

[00:38:28] Joy Gendusa: And she was like, where, how old can I ask you how old you are? And I told her when she was like, when were you born? And I said, I was born in 1964. And she was like, okay. Did you have teachers that were, um, elderly when you were learning to read? And I said, yes, I did. I had old lady teachers when I was like in kindergarten, first grade, second grade.

[00:38:46] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:38:48] Joy Gendusa: She said, you know that in 1964, they changed the education system in the United States from phonics to something totally different. I don’t know what you call it, but [00:39:00] basically they were teaching you to sight read. So you would see the word cat and you would memorize that the word cat was cat, but you didn’t learn it as cat.

[00:39:11] Joy Gendusa: Anymore. Oh, we did phonics. And so I was able to read, it was a test where they would do all these different letter combinations and you had to read them. And I knew my son would fail this test ably. So I, so I, so I never made him do it, but she, she was like, well, like, what do you do? And how, like, how educated are you?

[00:39:34] Joy Gendusa: Like, she was asking me all these questions. I was like, I’m a high school dropout. Mm-hmm. I’m not educated at all. I mean, formally mm-hmm. I’m educated on the, you know, the world of hard knocks and 

[00:39:43] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:39:43] Joy Gendusa: And, uh, and reading. I mean, I, I like to read. So, um, she, you know, she thought, she thought I was too young to have that type of reading ability.

[00:39:52] Brad: Mm mm Wow. 

[00:39:53] Joy Gendusa: So I got very interested in the community learning center and I. It started with my own child where I, [00:40:00] I realized that like I was able to read at a very young age hard books. I read The Born Identity when I was 12 years old and I didn’t know that that was a big deal until I had a 12-year-old that could not read that at all.

[00:40:16] Joy Gendusa: And I was looking at how their handwriting was and how, and what they were able to read. And I went, we have a problem. Mm-hmm. We have a problem. We are being dumbed down. And I just found that I felt very passionate about helping to fix this, even if it’s in my, like tiny little neck of the woods here in Clearwater.

[00:40:38] Joy Gendusa: I, my son never went to the community learning center. He did not actually wind up going there. Oh. 

[00:40:43] Brad: Oh 

[00:40:43] Joy Gendusa: wow. I found a little homeschool for him and he learned the study technology that El Ron Hubbard developed. Um. He became an amazing student and he is fantastic. Completely self-taught, and he’s a successful young man.

[00:40:58] Joy Gendusa: And he’s [00:41:00] very interested in learning. He’s, he is so impressive to me, and not just because he’s my son. Yeah. Like, like just the way you guys are impressive to me. He is also impressive to me. Um, anyway, I can, I can go on and on about my, my child, but, 

[00:41:16] Aaron: but it switched. You took responsibility. 

[00:41:17] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:41:18] Aaron: You went from, Hey, we’re gonna let whatever school teach your kid 

[00:41:23] Joy Gendusa: Right.

[00:41:23] Aaron: To saying. I’ll be responsible for it. And you And you got guidance from the community center? Yeah. Like a curriculum? Is that also part of it? No. You, 

[00:41:31] Joy Gendusa: no, I didn’t get any curriculum. I just started to listen to what this executive director was doing and how she was taking children that have no means to get educated.

[00:41:41] Joy Gendusa: They only have, they don’t have parents that can buy pay for tutoring. I, I was already doing well enough that I could pay for private school and pay for tutoring for my son. But the community learning center was providing this tutoring to kids who do not have that. They do, their parents are working two [00:42:00] jobs each.

[00:42:00] Joy Gendusa: Their parents don’t have the time to read to them. Mm. And these kids are getting in trouble and the only way they’re not going to go down a bad path in life is if they can learn. 

[00:42:10] Brad: Mm. 

[00:42:11] Joy Gendusa: And they have some amazing stories at the community learning center, just of kids that they have taken into adulthood that are, you know, that just give back and give back because it’s just an amazing organization.

[00:42:23] Joy Gendusa: So anyway, I’m very passionate about that. So it’s just here, I’m just on the board. I help this community with the people in Clearwater that, um, the, the kids here. So anyway, it’s just what I like. 

[00:42:34] Aaron: And so that tutoring is, is that still part of like the community 

[00:42:38] Joy Gendusa: learning 

[00:42:38] Aaron: center is like meaning the tutoring?

[00:42:39] Aaron: Like if someone has issues, someone has problems? Oh, yes. Yes. They have no means they cannot pay. Right. They can come in and get tutoring. 

[00:42:45] Joy Gendusa: Yes. 

[00:42:45] Aaron: Wow. 

[00:42:46] Joy Gendusa: Yes, 

[00:42:46] Aaron: guys. Hello. If it like, can we, learning center free tutoring? 

[00:42:50] Joy Gendusa: Yes. 

[00:42:51] Aaron: Learn, learn, learn. Learn words, learn sounds, qualify. Learn stuff. You have to qualify. 

[00:42:54] Joy Gendusa: Okay.

[00:42:54] Joy Gendusa: You have to qualify. You can’t, you, you can’t, you don’t qualify. 

[00:42:56] Aaron: I don’t qualify. 

[00:42:57] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. Your kids are, you have to pay for your kids. 

[00:42:59] Aaron: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:43:00] Not for I, okay. You know, I, you know who I’m talking like 

[00:43:02] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:43:03] Aaron: Anyway. Okay. 

[00:43:03] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. So 

[00:43:04] Aaron: it’s, but if you could pay for it, then even better. So then that way you’re 

[00:43:06] Joy Gendusa: helping at grow too, right?

[00:43:07] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. You have to qualify. But, um, but yeah, they use government assistance and donations from the community. Mm-hmm. We, you know, we have a golf tournament. I’ll hit you up next time. Okay. I, I fundraise for the golf tournament. Do you play. 

[00:43:17] Aaron: I don’t 

[00:43:18] Joy Gendusa: Good, but I think you just pay for whole. Yeah. 

[00:43:20] Aaron: There you go.

[00:43:20] Aaron: There you go. Brad can play. 

[00:43:22] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:43:22] Brad: No one in this room plays golf. 

[00:43:23] Joy Gendusa: No one. Yeah. I love that. I don’t play golf. Do you do play golf? Oh, I will be hitting you up for the perfect center for next year. I can’t wait. I, we, a bunch of us on the board, um, we compete and I win every time. 

[00:43:36] Aaron: Oh 

[00:43:36] Joy Gendusa: yes. In terms of who, who brings in the most sponsorship.

[00:43:39] Joy Gendusa: So I’ve just got two new guys I can go after. 

[00:43:43] Aaron: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, listen, we’re gonna put the, can you do that online too? I’ll put a link. So the community learning center, if you wanna help out, help kids get tutored. Yeah. Um, I’ll put the link down there. Oh, 

[00:43:50] Joy Gendusa: beautiful. 

[00:43:51] Aaron: Yeah, so either your kid or if you wanna just help somebody be a good Samaritan today.

[00:43:54] Aaron: Yeah. Um, go ahead. 

[00:43:55] Joy Gendusa: Yeah, I’m sure they have a link. Um, I, yeah, we have a thing at my company where, [00:44:00] uh, any staff can sign up to take a bit out of their paycheck, even if it’s just $2 or $3 a week, so that we can give it to the community learning center. Nice. And, um, yeah, it’s just, I really feel strongly about that.

[00:44:13] Brad: That’s awesome. So I’m, I’m curious because, you know, you’ve like, you’ve done a lot, but he’s 

[00:44:21] Joy Gendusa: so intense. 

[00:44:22] Brad: Well, whenever, whenever it’s, I mean, it’s with, it’s Aaron. I hang with Aaron a lot. He’s, he’s gotten me more intense over time. So 

[00:44:30] Joy Gendusa: it’s the blue eyes. It’s like you’ve done a lots blue piercing eyes. 

[00:44:34] Brad: Well, my question is, like, whenever I meet somebody who’s done a lot, they’re, they’re always like, oh, I’m only like, I’ve only scratched the surface.

[00:44:42] Brad: Is that your viewpoint? 

[00:44:44] Joy Gendusa: Oh man, you just, you just hurt me. You just put a uh, uh, just stab me in the heart. I never feel like I do enough. I never ever feel like I do enough. I’m constantly, I’m just one of these people that like, I’m constantly feeling like I’m walking around with like, yeah. [00:45:00] Don’t, like, I have not done enough.

[00:45:03] Joy Gendusa: Like, you’re missing all my way home. 

[00:45:04] Brad: Oh, I’m sorry. 

[00:45:06] Joy Gendusa: No, I just feel well, you’re in good 

[00:45:07] Brad: company. I 

[00:45:07] Joy Gendusa: think I just never feel like I, especially, you know, from having been on staff, I just never feel like I do enough, no matter how much I donate, no matter how much I volunteer, no matter how much I do, there’s so many people in need.

[00:45:18] Joy Gendusa: And I am so fortunate, not just because I found Scientology, because that is the, the main thing that has steered my life in the right direction. 

[00:45:28] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:45:28] Joy Gendusa: But just having the mental acuity and wherewithal mentally and spiritually to take that road. Mm-hmm. I mean, the, the road is there to the road. Is there, the path is there?

[00:45:41] Joy Gendusa: People look at the path and go, I don’t wanna do that path for whatever reason. Yeah. You know, there’s a, there’s, you know, pe a lot of people drink the haterade. I don’t know what that’s all about, but there’s definitely a road and I, for whatever reason, thank you, God, you know, for putting me on that road because.

[00:45:59] Joy Gendusa: I [00:46:00] wouldn’t, uh, be where I am without it. 

[00:46:01] Brad: Yeah. It, so in terms of the future mm-hmm. What are you trying to get done? Like, what’s, like, what’s, what’s next for, for Joy, whether it’s business or like, you know, in the community? Like what, what are your plans for the future? 

[00:46:17] Joy Gendusa: Gosh, I’m so, I’m 

[00:46:18] Brad: such a, a private 

[00:46:18] Joy Gendusa: person.

[00:46:19] Joy Gendusa: Give gimme. 

[00:46:19] Brad: I know, I know. I’m, that’s a, I realized that’s a very private question, but I, I’m like, 

[00:46:24] Joy Gendusa: I, I’m, I’m a private person, so how should I answer this question? Let’s see. Well, you know, I’m gonna keep building my business ’cause I love doing it. 

[00:46:32] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:46:33] Joy Gendusa: I really enjoy doing it. Um, I do have, am passionate about helping people find the path and I really appreciate that you guys have given me the opportunity to talk about my wins with Scientology because it really, it really is a way, it’s a really workable way to take yourself out of the mud and, and into a, a very beautiful life that you can be proud of.

[00:46:57] Joy Gendusa: And, um. I hope I [00:47:00] can do that. I, I, I’m better doing it at one-on-one, so, um, oh, I see. Yeah. Uh, I’m not really like a podcast out there kind of person, but I’m happy that you guys are, 

[00:47:13] Aaron: you are as of today. As of today, you are too, as of today. Um, so when you started the business 

[00:47:22] Joy Gendusa: mm-hmm. 

[00:47:22] Aaron: Right. Did you imagine you would be where you’re at right now?

[00:47:29] Joy Gendusa: Interesting question. Interesting question. I, as a child, thought to myself one day I will be rich. 

[00:47:40] Brad: Mm. 

[00:47:40] Joy Gendusa: Never knew how I was gonna get there. Even when I was a wayward teenager, I knew one day I would be successful. Mm-hmm. I didn’t know what that looked like. Mm-hmm. I didn’t know how I was going to get there, but I had this idea that it would occur somehow.

[00:47:55] Joy Gendusa: But when I started my business. I am very [00:48:00] tactical. I wasn’t very strategic. I wasn’t thinking to myself, here’s our business plan and we’re going to be this big, and one day we’re going to have 400 staff. We’re gonna make a hundred million dollars. No. I was like, I need to get the stats up. That’s all I could think about is I need to get the stats up.

[00:48:13] Joy Gendusa: So I did not see this exact life that I have, and I have such an amazing life. I am so blessed. I have such a beautiful life. I have a beautiful marriage, which I could not have done successfully without Scientology. Um, I have beautiful friendships. I have amazing executives and staff that work for me. I am so lucky.

[00:48:38] Joy Gendusa: Those people, they know who they are. If they watch this, they know who they are. I love them to pieces they give me my life. Um. I don’t have to work that much anymore. I just, you know, I’m old. I, I like to, you know, cook. I like to cook. I’m your client. 

[00:48:54] Aaron: Oh, good. Oh, 

[00:48:55] Joy Gendusa: I’m your customer. I’m gonna get those, um, those lake cassette, uh, Dutch ovens.

[00:48:59] Joy Gendusa: Oh [00:49:00] yeah. 

[00:49:00] Aaron: You see? Yeah. 

[00:49:00] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. Oh yeah. 

[00:49:00] Aaron: Those zula. Yeah. It’s like, they’re 

[00:49:02] Joy Gendusa: gorgeous. They’re 

[00:49:03] Aaron: about one fifth, the price and, uh, the, 

[00:49:05] Joy Gendusa: I just spent $600 on a really big one. I know. 

[00:49:08] I, 

[00:49:08] Joy Gendusa: I’ll 

[00:49:08] Aaron: get you one for one fifth the price. Just checking you guys. Anybody on Amazon? 

[00:49:12] Joy Gendusa: No, I’m already your customer. You don’t even, you don’t.

[00:49:14] Joy Gendusa: I, I, I go to your, your Amazon store just to see if there’s anything else I would like to buy. Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:49:19] Aaron: Nice. Thank you. Thank you. 

[00:49:20] Joy Gendusa: Yeah, of course. 

[00:49:21] Aaron: No, cooking is amazing. 

[00:49:21] Joy Gendusa: I know. I love to cook and I love about home in Georgia and I’m there most, I’m, I’m there half of the time. I would say. Um, I wish I was there all of the time.

[00:49:33] Joy Gendusa: It’s so peaceful. 

[00:49:34] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[00:49:34] Joy Gendusa: So, you know, so I’m, I’m, I feel like, you know, yes, there’s tons of things I wanna do, but I’m also really enjoying the fruits of my labor right now. Just enjoying. Relaxing and spending time with my husband and traveling, because I spent a lot of you, you guys are so young. You’ll, you’ll see when you’re 60 something, you’ll, you’re gonna be like, okay, you know, I wanna fly somewhere beautiful.

[00:49:57] Joy Gendusa: And, you know, relax. 

[00:49:58] Aaron: We, we tried to do that. [00:50:00] 

[00:50:00] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[00:50:00] Aaron: Even with all the children. That’s, we just, were like a, a, a caravan that has to go, you know, across. We were just in, uh, 

[00:50:05] Joy Gendusa: where’d you go? 

[00:50:06] Aaron: We went to Turks and Caicos. We went to, um, oh, nice. Uh, St. Bart’s. Uh, I mean, it was fun. Oh, that’s good. It was good with all the kids.

[00:50:12] Aaron: And this, it’s a lot of traveling, a lot of, a lot of craziness. 

[00:50:15] Joy Gendusa: That’s a lot 

[00:50:15] Aaron: of craz. I can imagine. Later in the next phase of life, it’ll be very different. Ah, 

[00:50:18] Joy Gendusa: yes. Mm-hmm. 

[00:50:18] Aaron: But, um, it’s fun. I mean, it’s all the children. I, I’m, I’m happy with all these kids jumping around, running around this and then, 

[00:50:25] Joy Gendusa: yeah.

[00:50:25] Joy Gendusa: ’cause probably Whitney that handles most of the BS with the children. 

[00:50:29] Aaron: I think we both play a good part. I think we’ll play a good part. Yeah, I would ask her a different time. Yeah. Ask. I can ask. You can ask her. You can ask. Um, so like, can you give an example? So in your business, right? Mm-hmm. You said, you, you, you.

[00:50:44] Aaron: Love the small business guys. Right? And you’re like, Hey, I want to help these guys grow and give them tools. And like, can you give an example of like how you’ve helped them? Like what, what is it your business does exactly. I mean, I have an idea, but like, take a person, you go like, Hey, this person, I can help them [00:51:00] so much in this, whatever they’re running into right now.

[00:51:01] Joy Gendusa: Well, it’s interesting because we have so many customers at one time who are servicing thousands of small businesses at one time. So it’s, it’s very, it’s postcard mania is very organized and it’s very process driven. But what we can do for the customer is we’re, we’re mainly a lead generation machine for the customer.

[00:51:18] Brad: Mm. 

[00:51:19] Joy Gendusa: We can do campaigns that are, um, getting their customers to rebuy from them, of course. But mainly we are lead generation machine, so we use direct mail with online ads. Um, we do a campaign that’s a multi-channel campaign. I don’t like to use a lot of marketing terminology. Sure, sure. Um, so. To keep it, but 

[00:51:41] Aaron: it’s physical postcard.

[00:51:42] Aaron: It’s 

[00:51:42] physical 

[00:51:42] Aaron: plus online. They keep target them to, they get both of them. 

[00:51:45] Joy Gendusa: Okay. They get both of them. And it’s very, it’s, it’s very coordinated effort. So that, um, basically it’s the perception that the business is everywhere. They see it on Facebook, they see it on Instagram, they see it on in their Gmail, they see it on YouTube.

[00:51:58] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. They see it, they get [00:52:00] the mail piece. There’s also a call tracking number. We also do, um, it’s called, I don’t wanna give, I don’t wanna say words that people aren’t gonna understand, but basically like if somebody goes to a certain area, like we can. The zip codes 

[00:52:15] Aaron: get the whole zip code. 

[00:52:16] Joy Gendusa: Yeah, no, I’m talking about digitally we can like target people that are going into a certain location for interest.

[00:52:23] Joy Gendusa: You know what I’m saying? Mm-hmm. So, you know, like, like you could, you could target people that are going into Home Depot that are in a certain income range Oh, interesting. That are going to try it, do themselves and be like, I don’t wanna do it myself. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, that sort of thing. 

[00:52:35] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:52:36] Joy Gendusa: So, you know, using the data so we can, it, it’s a very nice coordinated campaign and what’s really lovely for the small business owner is that they don’t have to do anything.

[00:52:45] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. Really, except fill out the design survey and give us information about their business. It starts with a marketing consultant. They talk to a marketing consultant. We ask a barrage of questions so that we can help them the best way possible. Every cam, nothing’s [00:53:00] cookie cutter, everything is a custom campaign, but it’s um.

[00:53:04] Joy Gendusa: It’s kind of like you go through the organization so that we can do it as inexpensively as possible for them. 

[00:53:10] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[00:53:10] Joy Gendusa: Um, we are the opposite of like a big ad agency that charges a retainer and charges a lot of money. You, you’d be surprised at how inexpensive it is to do an incredible campaign, including the postage.

[00:53:22] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. So we built our business on volume rather than, um, high prices and like giant customers. Uh, I, I had, before I started PostcardMania, uh, my company was called Joy Rockwell Enterprises. Joy Rockwell is my previous married name. And, um, and it was called that, it was actually just called Joy Rockwell.

[00:53:42] Joy Gendusa: But then I had to have them, I didn’t really have a name of a company, but the bank told me to say enterprises so that if they wrote j Rockwell Printing or j Rockwell Design, I could deposit any check. And that’s how the name came. And I was doing everything. I was, I was selling the campaign, I was designing the campaign, [00:54:00] I was brokering the printing and.

[00:54:03] Joy Gendusa: I had a handful of really large customers and I felt owned by those large customers. 

[00:54:11] Brad: Owned Wow. 

[00:54:12] Joy Gendusa: Owned, I felt like totally 

[00:54:14] Brad: communicates. 

[00:54:15] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. I had a cell phone when cell phones were this big that I didn’t buy. One of my customers bought it for me and said, I need to be able to reach you whenever I need to be able reach you.

[00:54:22] Joy Gendusa: Oh 

[00:54:23] Aaron: my, whoa. 

[00:54:25] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. That is kind 

[00:54:26] Aaron: of aggressive. That is. 

[00:54:28] Joy Gendusa: He was paying me a lot of money. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I, you know, and I had these two little boys that I had to keep in private school, and so at that time I was, I was married to a I guitar player slash teacher. So, and I didn’t want him to do anything.

[00:54:45] Joy Gendusa: He didn’t enjoy doing. He really loved playing music, but it didn’t pay. 

[00:54:49] Brad: Mm. 

[00:54:49] Joy Gendusa: So I, so I was really, it was put on me to figure out how am I going to give these boys a life because I didn’t have a man to rely on to do [00:55:00] it. And, um, 

[00:55:01] Aaron: and yeah. Now he’s gone. 

[00:55:02] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. Yeah, he’s gone. He’s actually gone. Gone, gone. 

[00:55:05] Aaron: Okay.

[00:55:05] Aaron: Wow. 

[00:55:06] Joy Gendusa: He’s gone. Okay. Yeah. So, um. And he was a, he was a lovely person, but, um, I, I’ve been married for 22 years to my husband, who’s also successful. So I, but we met, he was already successful and I was like, oh, wow. A real man. You know? That’s how I felt when I met my husband. 

[00:55:25] Aaron: Listen, I agree. If the guy’s saying, I’m gonna go do what I love and you’re gonna pay for me, that seems like that.

[00:55:29] Aaron: I, I, yeah. I am not, 

[00:55:31] Joy Gendusa: yeah. 

[00:55:32] Aaron: I will not disagree with you here. 

[00:55:33] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. I was just like, I didn’t even, I didn’t begrudge my ex-husband that that’s what he wanted to do, and I loved him, but I, when I met my current husband, I was just like, wow. Like, he, I was, I was like, dreamy. It was dreamy, like, yeah. So anyway, so I, so I just don’t want it to, I don’t want to, you know, if he watches this.

[00:55:53] Joy Gendusa: Hi Sam. I, my husband’s, I am married to the most amazing man on planet earth, I have to say. Um, he is very [00:56:00] successful. He is awesome. He is awesome. I, 

[00:56:01] Aaron: I don’t know if I, I mean, I, maybe briefly 

[00:56:03] Joy Gendusa: maybe you’ve seen him. 

[00:56:04] Aaron: Okay. Yeah, 

[00:56:05] Joy Gendusa: he’s cool. 

[00:56:05] Aaron: Really talked to him. 

[00:56:05] Joy Gendusa: He’s cool. 

[00:56:07] Aaron: Um, so he has, 

[00:56:07] Brad: he has a cool story as well.

[00:56:08] Joy Gendusa: Yeah, yeah, that’s right. That’s right. He told you his whole story. Mm-hmm. He’s, he’s, he’s a, he’s an amazing guy. Yeah. But anyway, I dunno how I got on that, but 

[00:56:15] Aaron: Yeah. No, that’s fine. So, so how, like, do you have an example of like a company like, Hey, you work with him and this happened, like, you know, that kind of 

[00:56:21] Joy Gendusa: stuff.

[00:56:21] Joy Gendusa: I have a zillion case studies on my website, like a zillion of them across tons of industries. So, you know, I don’t know the case studies off the top of my head ’cause I haven’t been in the weeds in a very long time. Mm. But I do know of some, like, we have several that have made the INC 500, not the Inc.

[00:56:37] Joy Gendusa: 5,000. Wow. But the INC 500, which I made, I made the Inc. 500 many years ago. Yeah. Thank you. Let’s 

[00:56:42] Brad: go. 

[00:56:42] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. And, um. You know where we’ve taken them? Well, there’s this one gal, um, who I love. Uh, she sent her marketing director person from Boston to come to my Growth Summit. I do growth summits twice a year. 

[00:56:58] Brad: Oh.

[00:56:59] Joy Gendusa: Um, just for my [00:57:00] customers, we only service about 70 people at a time. Yeah. Because that’s all we could fit in the space. And she sent her marketing fella to come. Uh, do it. And he did it. And he went back and tried to get her to do what he learned in my program, but she was resistive. So what he did do is he got her to come to the Growth Summit.

[00:57:23] Joy Gendusa: So she came to the Growth Summit by the end of the Growth Summit. She was like, I am going to do whatever you tell me to do. I’m just going to do it. And it’s a really lovely story because she did do whatever I said, and she like literally like doubled and doubled and doubled again. And she was able to le leave the business herself and let her son take over.

[00:57:44] Joy Gendusa: And she just got it into such a great condition. And, uh, she gives me lots of credit for that, which is lovely. So it’s, yes, there are lots of stories like that. Um, you can go to my website. Amazing. Brilliant. Oh, 

[00:57:55] amazing, amazing. That sounds I love it. Love it. Okay. So 

[00:57:57] Joy Gendusa: good. I know, I’m very, I, I’m a little removed at this [00:58:00] point, you know, 27 years into the business and a, a team, um.

[00:58:05] Joy Gendusa: Anyone can be envious of the team. I have. I have, yeah. The most caring, they take full ownership. They’re in duty. They’re smart. Mm-hmm. They’ve, you know, my chief revenue officer’s been with me 22 years. His wife is the president of my company. She’s been with me 27 years. Wow. Wow. Yeah. She was 19 when she started working for me.

[00:58:24] Joy Gendusa: Oh 

[00:58:25] Brad: my God. 

[00:58:25] Joy Gendusa: When she’s 47 or something now, and she, you know, I, their children, I was there when they were 30 minutes old. I met their children and now they’re in, you know, one is in high school and one is in college. You know, it’s like they’re, these people are like the best. So, I don’t know. 

[00:58:44] Brad: Okay. So I, I wanna know what, what, what’s your secret sauce for getting people to.

[00:58:50] Brad: Work with you over such long periods of time because that, and I’m gonna ramble a little bit before I let you answer the question. I’ve noticed that with the [00:59:00] people who really go boom, like way, way crazy, stratospheric success is always, they have people who stick around them for a long time. ’cause that’s the only way anybody gets good at anything or can get anywhere near the, the CEO or founder’s level of being able to do a siloed part of the business is they just have to be there and really duplicate you.

[00:59:22] Brad: But it takes a long time to do that. So what’s, what do you attribute that to? 

[00:59:28] Joy Gendusa: I attribute it to. Love. 

[00:59:31] Brad: Yeah. 

[00:59:32] Joy Gendusa: It sounds so bad. 

[00:59:33] Aaron: All you need is love. Okay. 

[00:59:36] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. I, I love them so much and I want them to be very, very successful and I’m very generous and I give them a lot of autonomy. So I, when I give somebody a post that is, I do not micromanage them at all.

[00:59:52] Joy Gendusa: Even if I could see that I would do it a different way or I would prefer it this way, I will generally keep my [01:00:00] mouth shut because I would rather them own the post. Mm-hmm. Than feel like they need my approval for everything that they do. Hmm. 

[01:00:09] Brad: That is something that I, sorry for interrupting, but I, that is something that I just recently realized I needed to change in how I was.

[01:00:18] Brad: Running my company mm-hmm. Is like, no, no, you have to do it the exact way that I would do it to the letter. Like, use my 

[01:00:26] Aaron: handwriting. It’s their job. It’s their job. 

[01:00:27] Brad: Now, Brett, I’m like, use my handwriting. It’s 

[01:00:28] Aaron: not your job anymore, 

[01:00:29] Brad: Brett. Write it. Like I would write it in my bad handwriting, but it’s like, yeah.

[01:00:32] Brad: It’s like that kills the, the responsibility, 

[01:00:37] Joy Gendusa: right. It makes a person not want, it’s like, you know, I could see it on a, on a little, on a level where I have this, one of the designer, he’s been with me 18 years and he like, is the postcard mania Des? He only works on my stuff. 

[01:00:51] Brad: Oh wow. 

[01:00:51] Joy Gendusa: And yeah, so he’s, so my CMO is a genius and she’s gorgeous.

[01:00:56] Joy Gendusa: I don’t know if you know Sarah Kozinski. Does anybody know her? [01:01:00] Stunning. Smart. Been with me 21 years. Can do anything. Can do. She has her own business also, but she stays with me too. Anyway. She, I, I’ll look at a design piece that is my promo, which I hardly ever even look at it. Mm-hmm. Anymore to be honest.

[01:01:14] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. But I’ll look someone once in a while, I’ll go through it and I’ll look and I’ll go, this piece, this is, this piece needs work. There’s a problem with it. And I know what happens. ’cause Matt, the designer is amazing. He’s an incredible designer and he can bang out work. He’s incredible. And I know what’s happening.

[01:01:31] Joy Gendusa: Sarah is saying she’s giving him marketing. She wants something else to pop. She’s directing him. And what’s happening is, at a certain point, he’s just taking his hat off and he is just doing what she’s telling him to do. And she’s not a designer, she’s the marketer. Oh. You see the, you see what I’m saying?

[01:01:48] Joy Gendusa: Totally. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I could just see it on that little level that he just goes, I, I give up. I’m not, I have no creativity on this anymore because somebody is art directing me. Mm-hmm. To the point where I’m a, a [01:02:00] technician. Mm-hmm. And I’m not the artist. And that’s. In that little microcosm, like if you, if I did that with the president of my company, she would have no ownership of, of anything she’s doing.

[01:02:11] Joy Gendusa: And she would feel bypassed. She would feel constantly like she’s not doing it good enough. Now Sarah’s a wonderful boss too. And I would say that’s just a small thing that I see here and there. Matt has designed a million things for us that are perfectly amazing and that she leaves alone for sure. Um, but, and I, when I saw it, I told her about it too because I was like, Hey, you know, you gotta like, you gotta let him, you gotta make sure he keeps his hat on, even though you’re giving him good points.

[01:02:40] Joy Gendusa: He needs to be the final aesthetic on it. But anyway, yeah. Um, and that’s really what I see with my staff is that even now at this size, we didn’t grow very much last year and, and I was not. Into that, but 

[01:02:57] nobody is. Of 

[01:02:58] Joy Gendusa: course. Yeah. But I really took, [01:03:00] like, almost half the year, I, I didn’t work very much.

[01:03:02] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. And, and I, um, you know, it’s like when I’m having a meeting with these guys, they are spectacular beings. I, I have to say the way I communicate is very important because I never want them to feel like, I think less of them because a stat is down. Mm-hmm. I always want to make sure my communication is in such a way that they feel validated because they should feel validated.

[01:03:28] Aaron: Mm. 

[01:03:28] Joy Gendusa: And I feel like that’s a very woman thing. I, I feel like women are, 

[01:03:34] Aaron: yeah. I don’t focus on that. 

[01:03:36] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. That’s 

[01:03:37] Aaron: not like my focus. 

[01:03:38] Joy Gendusa: No, it, 

[01:03:39] Aaron: I’m just, I mean, I, I agree with you. I agree. Keep 

[01:03:41] Joy Gendusa: going, keep going. Yeah. Yeah. And it’s, and it’s my focus. It’s kind of like, and I, you know, I, I feel like, like when I, I’ll give you a little story.

[01:03:47] Joy Gendusa: I had an assistant for a little while who was a boy. He was my only boy assistant. And I love this boy. I love him. I’ve known him since he was a child. But he could, and he could have as a boy, any [01:04:00] communication. Like I could go like, Claudia, I hate the way you did that. Mm-hmm. Like, like, why did you do it? I would never talk to a girl that way.

[01:04:06] Joy Gendusa: Mm-hmm. Never, ever, ever talk to a or any of my execs. He could have it. So I could talk that way to him. He actually needs me to beat him up still. He, he he’ll like text me and be like, I need a joy talk. But anyway, it doesn’t work for me. But he, but it’s like, but a guy can have different communication than a girl.

[01:04:24] Joy Gendusa: And I’ve noticed it with my executives. Like I can say pretty much anything to like my chief revenue officer or my cto. 

[01:04:31] Mm-hmm. 

[01:04:31] Joy Gendusa: They’re men. 

[01:04:32] Brad: Yeah. 

[01:04:33] Joy Gendusa: And they’re just like, yeah, okay, no problem. Whatever. But when I talk to my girl executives, I really, and I’m not even saying anything to them in a bad way.

[01:04:43] Joy Gendusa: ’cause I, I’m, I’m, I’m never the person going, we need to get the stops up. Like, that’s just not me at all. Mm-hmm. 

[01:04:48] Brad: Yeah. 

[01:04:48] Joy Gendusa: It’s a, it’s a. Meaning of the minds. We all have the same purpose and there’s no reason on earth to ever get angry mm-hmm. With someone who’s working for you or trying to hard [01:05:00] and wants to get the product.

[01:05:01] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. So I think that’s why people stay with me. Mm-hmm. Because I, I love them and I don’t wanna create a bad effect on them. Mm-hmm. 

[01:05:08] Brad: Yeah. 

[01:05:09] Aaron: I want, I wanna chime in a little bit. ’cause what she said at the very beginning, 

[01:05:12] Brad: yeah. 

[01:05:14] Aaron: I experienced it when I was an employee, when I could not make any decisions. I, I immediately didn’t wanna be at the job anymore.

[01:05:23] Aaron: Like, it’s, it’s not necessarily micromanaging, it’s that I have an actual job as opposed to like, I could be replaced by an AI or this. So I remember when I’m doing this programming job and I have this idea and I go and I’m creating. Like, now I can say like, my company now is bigger than the company I used to work for.

[01:05:42] Aaron: So like I can validate that. Like my ideas were pretty good. Okay, back then, you don’t know. Like, you could assume, you could assume, but, but here’s the deal. Badass. But here’s, here’s the point, right? Like I go, listen, we’re doing this and this, but my job is this whole program I’m making, building on this site, this program, all this stuff.

[01:05:57] Aaron: And I go, if we just [01:06:00] change like this number, we raise this $5 here, we do this. Like, we’ll be profitable right away. And I, I was creating, I was making this unit, this area that I was given to be in charge of. I had, I knew how to make it work. At least I felt that way. Right? We never could, we can’t know.

[01:06:14] Aaron: ’cause it didn’t happen. Yeah. But, but I, I went to the guy, my boss, and I told him, and he says. You know, we’re just not really focusing on profitability. Right. I’m, I’m serious. I’m serious. This is a venture capitalist thing. Right? Like, and they, and they were using all the people’s money, whatever. And I go like, but it’s like, I can do it.

[01:06:32] Aaron: I did, and I’m pumped. And he goes like, you know, we don’t wanna worry about that. So I didn’t, I wasn’t able to make decisions of what I thought would be helpful for my job and my responsibility. And when you take that away, I think people don’t wanna work there. I didn’t wanna work. I mean, I, I was getting paid pretty good from this other people’s money thing, so I was there for a bit more.

[01:06:55] Aaron: But I think after that point, I think it was six months and then, you know, I had moved off something like that. Yeah. And [01:07:00] it was, it’s like when you come into a place where you’re stopping a person’s decision and ideas. Yeah. And I’ll tell you one thing, at least from what I’ve noticed in our company, people, I, I really, and, and I may maybe not that good, but I try to encourage ideas.

[01:07:12] Aaron: Mm-hmm. What, like, the person has a job and they’re responsible for something so they can bring things up. And I, at least I feel when I was an employee. I like that. I like to be able to make a decision. Mm-hmm. And be like, wow, I created something. Mm-hmm. Not just, you know, I answered the phone and I said, hello, whatever.

[01:07:28] Aaron: I have the script. Or again, I would never, I didn’t have a receptionist job. But like, I think that’s one thing, and I don’t know if, if you, if you’re, you kind of alluded to that, like, people can make decisions and they can own their job and people wanna have that. They wanna know they did something and created something, and not just, we’re a robot.

[01:07:45] Joy Gendusa: It, it’s definitely harder as you get larger and larger to do that. And you put in, you know, hats and policies and, and you know, and the rules. But at the top, the, the. Executive echelon for sure. It’s, it’s giving them that [01:08:00] autonomy really makes them feel like they own the place. 

[01:08:02] Brad: Mm-hmm. 

[01:08:02] Joy Gendusa: And I want them to feel like they own the place.

[01:08:05] Brad: That’s literally what I was about to ask you is do you feel, and this is not like a, like a ownership like equity question. I was just gonna ask, do you feel like they own, like your executives feel like they own the business? 

[01:08:15] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. They feel like it’s theirs. They definitely know it’s mine. I mean, I’m the sole owner of the company.

[01:08:20] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. That’s probably something else that you would like to know, is that I’ve never taken any capital or loans. Well, it was just bootstrap completely. I’m the Yeah. The sole owner of the company that 

[01:08:28] Brad: is badass. 

[01:08:29] Joy Gendusa: Um, but they definitely know that if and when I ever sell that company, they are going to get a, they don’t know how much, but they’re gonna get a chunk.

[01:08:38] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. And because they’ve been with me such a long time and they do take ownership, like they, they, you know, you go through some treacherous times in a business and. They will just take full ownership and work whatever hours and back me up, you know? And it’s just, it’s magical. It’s, it’s different than any kind of relationship that you [01:09:00] could have, you know, because it’s, you know, when you have a husband or a, that kind of a relationship, or even with your children or even with your girlfriends or, or male friends or any friends, um, it’s, it’s a different relationship when you are, you’re in the trenches with these people and working to get a product, whatever that product is, whether it’s results for our clients or higher stats and higher sales for us, or, you know, a new technology that we’re rolling out, like we’re all kind of in it together and there’s no relationship like that.

[01:09:32] Brad: Yeah. 

[01:09:34] Joy Gendusa: You spend 

[01:09:34] Aaron: mostly your life working, I mean, honestly, 

[01:09:36] Joy Gendusa: yes. 

[01:09:36] Aaron: Most of the time it’s working. And those are, those are your crew that’s 

[01:09:38] Joy Gendusa: like, that is your crew. They do, they like working and they like the fruits of their labor as well. I take really good care of them. I really want them to prosper and. You know, and be baller shot callers themselves, you know?

[01:09:52] Aaron: Amazing. Now there’s a question we ask everybody on the show. 

[01:09:55] Joy Gendusa: Yeah. 

[01:09:56] Aaron: In your own words, what is Scientology? 

[01:09:59] Joy Gendusa: [01:10:00] Oh, wow. I should have practiced this. Uh, Scientology is, it’s a religious philosophy, but it’s not something that you study and then think about. It’s something that you apply every day in your life.

[01:10:17] Joy Gendusa: And, you know, when I started my business and I was broke, I needed to apply certain Scientology principles in order to be able to do what I was doing. Very spiritual principles. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I mean, I could, I could share with you, uh, one of my favorites, but it’s like literally you learn something in Scientology and you can take that thing.

[01:10:42] Joy Gendusa: Go out in life and do that thing, whatever it is. And I can give you an example so it’s not so esoteric. 

[01:10:48] Brad: Yeah. 

[01:10:49] Joy Gendusa: Um, and then the minute you apply that to your life and you realize it works, that’s Scientology. I hope that’s crystal clear. It’s 

[01:10:58] Aaron: beautiful. Yeah. That’s share. Yeah. 

[01:10:59] Joy Gendusa: That’s a [01:11:00] perfect time. 

[01:11:00] Aaron: Great example.

[01:11:00] Joy Gendusa: Think of this, I mean, both of you have started businesses, so you know, in the early days you feel like you’re taking like, you know, two steps forward, three steps back. Every, every success there’s been a loss. You know, it’s difficult in the very beginning and it can knock you down and make you feel like, can I do this?

[01:11:21] Joy Gendusa: I don’t even know if I can do this. Am I able to do this? And one of the things I learned, and I learned this, um, in the book, science of Survival, I learned the emotional tone scale. That’s basically where a person is at emotionally. Mm-hmm. And you can be completely in apathy and you hate life and you hate everybody, and you have no future.

[01:11:43] Joy Gendusa: And that’s apathy. And you could be super enthusiastic and excited and you can move all over this scale. Anywhere from apathy all the way up to playing games even, you know? Mm-hmm. So, but so I knew that in order to make the [01:12:00] proper decisions I needed to be at the top of the tone scale. And that if I’m feeling antagonistic or I’m feeling angry, 

[01:12:09] Brad: yeah.

[01:12:09] Joy Gendusa: This is not a good place to make decisions or handle people from. 

[01:12:14] Brad: Mm-hmm. So true. My God. 

[01:12:16] Joy Gendusa: So, so how am I going to stay in Enthusia? How am I going to, when all these things are happening and I don’t have the money to pay this and this bill is due, and how am I, how do I do it? L Ron Hubbard wrote a poem, it’s called The Joy of Creating.

[01:12:37] Joy Gendusa: And I took this poem, it’s very short and I’m happy to read it here. And I pinned it up like right on my computer. And I also pinned it up in my bathroom on the mirror. And every day I would start my day by reading this reference. And I had to actually figure out how to apply this [01:13:00] reference. And I’ll give you the example ’cause this is Scientology.

[01:13:04] Joy Gendusa: So the here, uh, let me read it to you. You wanna read it? Yeah, yeah. 

[01:13:06] Brad: Please. 

[01:13:06] Joy Gendusa: Um, force yourself to smile and you’ll soon stop frowning. Force yourself to laugh and you’ll soon find something to laugh about. Wax enthusiastic and you’ll very soon feel so a being causes his own feelings. The greatest joy there is in life is creating splurge on.

[01:13:31] Joy Gendusa: That’s the entire thing. I said, force yourself to smile and you’ll soon stop frowning. 

[01:13:42] Aaron: Yeah. Yeah. 

[01:13:44] Joy Gendusa: Like literally, I would have to apply this. And I am telling you, by the time I would be maybe an hour into my day, I was flying high, I was happy, excited. And I would do it [01:14:00] On the bad days, I would do it. On the good days, I would go, I am going to wax enthusiastic.

[01:14:05] Brad: Yeah. 

[01:14:05] Joy Gendusa: And I am going to feel it. And I did. And that was the beautiful thing. And a friend of mine, um, worked at, I don’t know if it was Hyatt, I can’t remember which hotel chain she worked at, but she was, I, I shared this with her and she said, you know what’s crazy? They have a policy at this hotel chain that you must be cheerful.

[01:14:28] Joy Gendusa: At all times. And she said people would come into work and they would be, but the policy is cheerful. So they would all get cheerful. And she said the funny thing was is they became actually cheerful. 

[01:14:42] Aaron: Yeah. 

[01:14:43] Joy Gendusa: Because even though they weren’t feeling it, and it was a little the like, you know, you know what I’m talking about?

[01:14:47] Joy Gendusa: Yelling, of course. And you’re smiling, but you don’t, they got cheerful from doing it. So it’s, anybody can do it, you know? And you can say, oh, that’s not Scientology, that anybody can, this is a poem I [01:15:00] read by El Ron Hubbard that I had to apply. Knowing that Scientology is a technology that you apply in your life.

[01:15:07] Joy Gendusa: You can read and read and you can say, this is amazing. You could read Scientology and say, this is amazing. This is amazing. This is amazing. But if you don’t apply it to your life, you’re not going to have an amazing life. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. You’re just going to have read about something that could be amazing.

[01:15:21] Aaron: So Very true. 

[01:15:22] Joy Gendusa: Very true. So that’s my answer to what, to me, what a Scientology is. Taking the data and applying it to my life. 

[01:15:30] Aaron: Amazing. That was a brilliant, 

[01:15:32] Brad: wow. You know, we’ve actually never had anyone share a reference on the podcast. I think we’re gonna ask for that. 

[01:15:39] Aaron: I think it’s a great idea. 

[01:15:39] Brad: Future. Like, that was so good.

[01:15:42] Joy Gendusa: I have more, I have more references I could share. 

[01:15:45] Aaron: I brought so many Good round number two. Joy, it’s been amazing having you. I appreciate you coming, taking out a time outta your day, out of your 400 employee team to come and share with us how you got success, your stories of Scientology. And I really thank you for [01:16:00] your time.

[01:16:00] Joy Gendusa: I am very happy to have been here and to, and to meet you guys and to sit and chat with you guys. You guys are really special. You really are. You’re like my children’s age and I just wanna, I just wanna smoot you, you know, on your cheeks. Very impressive. 

[01:16:15] Aaron: Excellent. Thank you guys. See you next time.