We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jeremy Turner a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Jeremy, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What sort of legacy are you hoping to build. What do you think people will say about you after you are gone, what do you hope to be remembered for?

As a leader, it is my job to develop more leaders.

I am hoping my legacy will be that strong leaders are built through my organizations. Leaders that aim to serve those who follow them. I qualify potential candidates for my teams based upon the following traits: humility, work ethic, curiosity, team ability, empathy, drive, and integrity. With these core traits any man or woman can become anything they want in the world. We do not hire for skills. Skills can easily be taught. We hire for these traits and then create a very strong culture where people are in a safe space to fail. This process takes a little longer to bring new recruits up to speed, but the staying power, loyalty, and trust amongst the team members is strong and long lasting.

I want to replicate my leadership ideals in others and see them become more successful, quicker than I did. That is success to me. I want my leaders to treat others respectfully, encourage others to take risks, support others as they take risks, clap for others when they win, privately coach others when they lose, reinforce positive encouragement, and make sure to cut ties with those who are not living by our core values quickly to protect the culture of our teams.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My father is a pastor from Ohio and my mother is a country bumpkin from Kentucky. They gave me so much space to make mistakes growing up but were there for me to support me mentally. They didn’t give me any handouts and by 17 I moved out of my house. I worked many different jobs from a young age and also got into a lot of trouble. I spent my summers in Wolf County Kentucky riding motor bikes and horses. I spent my school seasons in Dayton Ohio roaming the streets. I’ve seen many different walks of life.

I graduated from high school early and joined the Army. During my service I earned my MBA as well as working construction on the side. After those 8 years I got into banking. I left Chase Bank after my sister overdosed and my managers told me I was not allowed to tell people “God Bless You”. Since there was no room for God at that bank, there was no room for me.

I took my last $3k and purchased a little beater truck. I spent some time working for a friend’s company and decided to do my own work. That year I built my own equipment due to lack of funds, donated blood to pay for food, knocked on doors to win jobs, worked craigslist jobs to cover my bills and essentially the story began.

5 years later my first company is knocking on the door of a $1m revenue year and I’ve began a second company that should land around $1m in 2025 as well.

I’ve sacrificed friendships, time with family, mental sanity and any sort of social life for years. I believe in balance in life, but also that sometimes to do great things you must forego that balance. I studied systems and processes late into the evenings and designed my way out of the day-to-day work. I’ve shaken thousands of hands. I’ve called tens of thousands of people. And I’ve sent hundreds of thousands of emails.

I am most proud of starting from the dirt and seeing people I am developing who can reap the rewards without the sacrifice I had to make. I love my people with all my heart. I told God 5 years ago I would completely sell out to him and building these companies in his honor. God has seen fit to reward me.

Everything is in glory to God.

Any advice for managing a team?

Create the vision. Chart the Path. Teach them to steer and row the boat.

The vision gives everyone a common goal. The core values helps people make tough decisions and helps us evaluate who belongs on the team. The mission statement gives us a reason to achieve our goals and KPIs. The systems and processes are the vehicle that brings the team to the goal The team members and key performance indicators are the fuel in the vehicle.

“See the vision, master the system, clone yourself, repeat” hangs on our walls in our War Room. Everyone is accountable and through those metrics they can increase their pay and destination.

Constantly remind people of the game you are playing together. We are not selling pressure washing or roofs or concrete sealing etc. We are selling an emotional need that needs fulfilled. Apart from that it is vital to constantly remind people WHY we are doing what we do

Are there any books, videos or other content that you feel have meaningfully impacted your thinking?

Toilet Paper Entreprenuer What is Your Why
Think and Grow Rich
Talent War
Profit First
Pumpkin Plan
the Obstacle is the Way
21 Laws of Leadership
Extreme Ownership
How to Win Friends and Influence People
Rocket Fuel
Essentialism
Fanatical Prospecting
Teh Dichotomy of Leadership
The Power of Positive Thinking
The E-Myth Revisited

Contact Info:

• Website: applypressuredayton.com
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-turner-mba-us-army-veteran-entrepreneur-603742209/