Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Rick Phillips. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Rick, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s talk legacy – what sort of legacy do you hope to build?

I hope to be remembered. Period. Now that would be something!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I suppose I’ve been called “the idea guy”. That’s nice as I do seem to have many. My path has always been to pursue the ideas I like, and try to make them into monetizable ones, whether bars and restaurants, events and festivals or tv/film/podcasts.

I have done consulting for others on their ideas, but ultimately there always comes a fork-in-the-road, where you tell them to go one way and they want to go the other, and then when inevitably things do not work out as they didn’t listen to you, it becomes clear that consulting sucks unless you have final say over whatever you’re doing.

So I chose to stop that and just develop my own ideas and businesses.

Any advice for managing a team?

Give them a finish line. Too many managers focus on an overall buy-in. Your employees need to “get wins” and if they are only focused on the 40,000 ft view of the owner, they never get the wins or pats on the back, to feel like they’re succeeding. These base hits are essential not only for the company growth but for team moral.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I am constantly pivoting at of my vast appetite of interest in many things and subjects. Therefore pivoting is a natural state of being for me.

When Covid first hit and my bar had to close and my events had to be cancelled, was when I pivoted into Podcast production with a friend of mine.

Since then we have built a great production company selling our journalistic and episodic shows to the big distributors such as the Spotify’s and Apple’s.

We create and produce the shows and let the bigger players deal with the distribution and ad sales.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.criminalmidedmedia.com, www.mercbaraz.com, www.palomapunchout.com, www.aztacofestival.com
• Instagram: @criminalmindedmedia, @palomapunchout, @mercbaraz, @tacofestival, @unjust_justice