I've built four companies and sold one. I've sat in the room when owners doing $300K and owners doing $50M made the decisions that changed everything. I coach owners on making the right calls, and on keeping the discipline, the boundaries and the family that make the money worth having.
companies I've started with my own money on the line
the range of owners I've advised on the decisions that mattered
one marriage, one family, all the way through
of volunteers mobilized through Inside Outreach
I got the order wrong once and almost lost everything. Now I help owners get it right the first time.
I poured our family savings into a clothing brand. Then my wife told me she didn't feel safe or valued. That one hurt, because she was right.
So I shut it down. Went back to a job. Spent two years learning how to be a better husband and dad. Then the business started growing.
Turns out the order matters. Faith. Family. Then business.
Read the whole story in the bookThis isn't counseling and it isn't consulting. It's coaching on the decisions, the disciplines and the boundaries that grow a business without costing you your soul or your family. I've been doing this for years for friends and for owners who asked. For free. Now I'm doing it on purpose, for a handful of owners who want it. And I've done it in my own life the hard way first.
Sell it in five years? Hand it to your kids? Step back and let it run? Most owners have never said it out loud. We start there, because every decision after depends on it.
If the company falls apart when you take a week off, you don't own a business. You own a job. We fix that, so it can run, grow or sell whether you're in the room or not.
The hire you're unsure about. The partner offer that sounds too good. The $50K you're about to spend on marketing. You bring it to me before you pull the trigger, not after.
I've lost sight of this one myself, and it nearly cost me everything. Growth that costs you your marriage or your kids isn't growth. We keep the order right: faith, family, then business.
One bad hire costs you more than six months of this. So does one partnership you shouldn't have signed, or one more year running a company nobody would buy. Plan on a year, because that's how long a real turnaround takes. Six months is your way out if it isn't working.
Once a month, we sit down. First question: did you do what you said you'd do? Then you bring the decisions on your desk. The hire, the price change, the partner offer, the thing you've been avoiding. You leave with a call made on each one and a short list of what's yours to do before we talk again.
When something real lands that can't wait, you reach me directly. The offer that showed up Tuesday. The key employee who just quit. The contract you're about to sign. I'm not a weekly check-in and I'm not going to hold your hand. I'm the person you call before you make a decision you can't take back.
One goal we set in month one and measure against every call. For the HVAC owner it was a company somebody would buy. For the birthing center it was a business that didn't need its founder. Yours will be yours.
Six-month terms, because you should always have a way out. But plan on a year. Six months is enough to see the business change direction. A year is what it takes to make it stick.
I'd rather you know exactly what this is before you fill out the form.
Most coaches have coached. I've built, and I've sat across the table from owners ten and twenty times my size while they made the calls that made or broke them. When I tell you what to do about a partner, a hire or a sale, it's because I've made that decision myself or watched what happened when someone got it wrong. Then I'll hold you to it.
You do. I'm in your corner, not on your payroll. I'll help you see what's really going on in your business, decide what to do about it, and make sure you follow through. If what you really need is someone to run your marketing, my agency Red Palm does that. This is different.
Most of the businesses I've grown are trades. But the problems are the same in a salon, a dental office or a law practice: getting found, converting leads, hiring people you can trust, and getting your life back. If you own a local business doing real revenue, apply.
Yes, and I already do. Revenue changes the zeros, not the problems. A $30M company with an owner who can't step away, a partner deal about to go sideways, or a marriage running on fumes needs the same clear thinking as a $3M one. I'm not going to tell you how to run your operation. I'm going to help you make the three or four decisions this year that actually matter, and make sure you're still standing when you get there.
Six months is the minimum, not the plan. It takes about that long to change direction and about a year to make it stick, so we work in six-month terms and I'll ask you to plan on two. You always have a door out. $3,000 because you get me, not a program. One good decision, a hire you didn't botch, a partnership you walked away from, a company you can finally sell, pays for the whole thing many times over. If I don't think I can get you there, I'll say so on the fit call.
I'll be straight with you. I'm new to charging for this. I'm not new to doing it. These are three owners I helped before this was an offer, because they asked and I couldn't help myself. Three different problems. Same approach: look at the whole business, make the hard call, do the work.
The whole business was built around one person. If she walked away, the center walked away with her. Nobody buys that.
What we did. Rebuilt the business around the name, the staff, the services and the quality of care instead of the founder. Plus a list of internal changes they worked through over two years.
Result. Sold the company for millions and retired. A goal they'd written off as impossible.
He was taking over his dad's practice. A guy with a bigger book of business offered to “help”: bring your clients under me, I've run one before, we'll work together. Sounded generous. It wasn't.
What we did. I told him not to do it, and laid out exactly how to take the firm on himself.
Result. He kept the business, ran it his way, and has tripled his income.
A hard-working owner stuck at a number that wouldn't move. Good at the trade, no plan for the business.
What we did. A year of working on the business together. Marketing, systems, the stuff that makes a company worth buying.
Result. Sold the company for $2.2 million. He's now building his next one in a new city.
Names left out on purpose. These are real owners, and I'd rather protect their privacy than use them as ads. None of them paid me. That's the part that's changing.
Daniel was the partner who took the idea Katie and I had for RE:defined and helped make it come alive and birth a shop people actually came back to. He doesn't just advise from the side, he has a genuine desire to see you succeed. If you're thinking about working with him, bring the vision and let him handle the parts people often neglect, which leads to great ideas with poor follow-through.
Danny was there for me during one of the most difficult times in my life as I transitioned out of the National Football League. His mentorship as a business owner helped me to establish myself as a leader in the non-profit world mentoring high school and college students.
Tony StewartFormer NFL tight endAs someone who's spent decades around stars and public figures, I've seen how easy it is to gain the world and lose yourself. Daniel is living proof that holistic success and unwavering integrity can go hand in hand. He doesn't just talk about faith, family and purpose. He walks it out, daily.
Jamie JonesGrammy Award–winning singerFor anyone tired of the grind culture that leaves you empty. Daniel lays down real wisdom about how to build a meaningful life, not just a profitable one. This isn't hype. It's healing, hope and hard truths wrapped in a testimony that actually delivers.
Ruslan KDYouTuber, artist & authorDaniel's story echoes what my lāhui taught me: when we sow seeds of service, integrity and faith, the land and lives we steward flourish. Transformative success often begins by walking barefoot through the dirt of real human need with vision, humility and kaiāulu spirit.
Blanche McMillanHui Mahi'ai 'Āina, Waimānalo
Achieving true success without losing your soul.
An insecure army brat with a speech impediment who wore hand-me-downs. The business I had to burn down. The marriage I almost lost. And what success really looks like when it's built in the right order. Peace. Purpose. Legacy.
Everything I teach, I've done with my own money on the line. Including the part where you build it, sell it, and it keeps running without you.
I only take on a few owners at a time so every one gets my full attention. Tell me about your business and where you're stuck. If it's a fit, we'll set up a call and figure out if working together makes sense.
