Unlocking Full Potential: The Intersection of Peak Performance and Personal Harmony

Welcome to Legacy Builders, strategies for building successful family enterprises. Brought to you by Beacon Family Office at Assante Financial Management Limited. I’m your host, Cory Gagnon, Senior Wealth Advisor. And on this show, we explore global ideas, concepts, and models that help family enterprises better navigate the complexities of family wealth.

Today, we welcome Purdeep Sangha, Director of Sangha Worldwide. As a North American leader in business and human performance and co-host of the groundbreaking TV series “Mind Your Own Business,” Purdeep advises top Board Members, CEOs, and entrepreneurs globally while showcasing businesses from the disability community. His expertise spans from effective business strategy and operational excellence. Described as “an absolute powerhouse and true genius,” Purdeep’s personal passion lies in helping men discover their power as Complete Men who achieve ultimate performance and fulfillment as business leaders, husbands, fathers, and individuals.

My goal is to be the most curious person in today’s conversation with Purdeep Sangha, where we explore the delicate balance of achieving ultimate performance while maintaining harmony in our lives. Purdeep will share insights from his work guiding professionals to operate far beyond the limits most settle for, using a distinctive approach rooted in neuroscience, performance psychology, and ancient teachings. Together, we’ll discover how individuals can develop the skills and courage needed to address relationship dysfunctions that hold them back from living their fullest potential, both in business and personal life.

Now let’s dive in!

Cory: Well, welcome, Purdeep. We’re excited to have you here today to share your wealth of knowledge and experiences with us. Let’s dive in, shall we?

Purdeep: Yeah. Absolutely. Thanks for having me, Cory. 

Cory: Imagine you’re delivering the commencement speech to the graduating class of 2025, and you have the chance to inspire them with your story. How would you begin your speech to convey the incredible lessons and expertise that you’ve gained along your career?

Purdeep: I guess I would start with never underestimate human potential. That would be the beginning part. I think at a young age, I was fortunate enough to grow up in an environment that not only had challenges, but a lot of opportunity as well. Growing up in an orchard, just being around nature, and having that mindfulness element of just being with my own mind and nature allowed me to be able to tap into that. And I think it’s particularly important today because we are in a distracted society. And so that enables us when I say that, I’m talking about being mindful. Being able to spend time with ourselves in quietness without distractions enables us to be able to really tap into who we are, first of all, which I think is the most important thing. Finding out who we are, what our likes are, what our dislikes are, who we are at the core, because that creates alignment in our life. And from my experience, that is just something that I’ve lived through, I just had the fortunate opportunity to have people in my life, experiences in my life that enabled me to live out to my full potential, and experience a life that I was meant to live. So that would be the starting phase or beginning part of the speech, you could say.

Cory: Amazing! And so when you think of underestimating human potential, what does that look like in society? What are people doing when they underestimate what’s possible?

Purdeep: I’ll give you stats based on our research, because we’ve done a lot in this area. If we’re taking a look at business professionals, because that’s our area of expertise, the average business professional is operating between 30 to 70% of their potential. Someone said this when I was actually in the corporate world, and it still burned into my mind here, where someone senior to me said, you have way too high expectations, and you have way too high expectations of people. And having the background that I had at that time in performance psychology and neuroscience, I knew that that wasn’t true. But there was a moment in time, probably for a couple weeks, where I questioned myself where I said, was that person right? Are they correct on this? Am I just being an overachiever? Am I expecting too much of myself and of people? But when I really looked at it, sat back, and observed the environment, the information, and the data, because that’s one of the most important things. I’m, you could say, a scientist at heart. I said, no. Most people don’t have high enough expectations of themselves. So it was a complete opposite.

I’ve always been the highest achiever in my peer group, whether it’s corporate world, academically, or from a physical perspective, sports or whatever. And so I do have a strong belief, because I know this. If you talk to other people within the area of performance psychology, they will tell you the same thing. Most people are not living to their full potential. There’s so much opportunity for an individual to be able to step into that. So that’s what it looks like in society. We’ve really sat down and said, don’t expect too much of ourselves, and don’t expect too much of people. You know, people are lazy. That’s not necessarily the case. We just have not been shown, trained, and coached on how to really step into our potential. But if you take a look at the average person in the business world and compare them to the sports world, there’s a stark difference, because they are being pushed past their limits. They are using elements of performance psychology and neuroscience to really enable sports athletes to reach their full potential in sports.

I just spoke to someone yesterday whose wife is in this area. She’s a neuropsychologist, and both him and his wife were athletes. And he said, you know, it was really interesting when I shared my work. It’s really true because he’s in the business world now. And he said, when he transferred, transitioned from sports, because he played semi-professional sports, to the business world, it’s like everything just stopped. All the positive psychology, all the performance aspects, all the pushing yourself past your limits, and really being there for each other, just stopped. And it was in the corporate world, it was a completely different environment. So that’s just a practical example.

Cory: And so when somebody’s living to their full potential, what does that look like? Does it mean that they’re just doing more, or how are they actually looking at it and saying, I know what my potential is?

Purdeep: So the potential, we take a look at it from two different aspects. One is the harmony that they have in their life. And that harmony aspect is ensuring that the things in their life are actually working with each other. So it could be their relationship with their spouse and with their kids and their work. All of those things, finances, health, all of that is working in, I like to say coherence with each other because there’s a synchronization. The other aspect is that they’re high performers. They’re pushing themselves past their limits. They’re growing. They’re challenging themselves on a consistent basis. When you have a combination of those two, you have a higher quality of life. And that’s essentially what I’m talking about when it comes to potential, is having a higher quality of life in those two areas of performance and harmony.

Cory: Relating that back to professional sports and the things that are being done for athletes, what is it that we can do in the culture of ourselves, our families, and our work environment, to bring some of those aspects in and help us live to that potential?

Purdeep: I think the first thing is to know that it is a skill. It’s a skill that can be trained, that can be learned. So that is the most important thing, and the easiest thing that I related to is, for example, financial literacy. Many people are not financially literate until they actually get older. They’re teaching that in schools now, but it’s a skill that’s taught and learned. It’s a life skill. Same thing with a relationship. The unfortunate thing is that you don’t learn that in school in terms of how to have successful relationships. You learn the hard way. So performance is a specific skill set that can be learned. So educating yourself on that is very important. And you can do your own personal development. You can read books, whatever it looks like for you, but there’s an opportunity for us to grow into this area. That’s the first thing I would say that people can do.

The second, and I always shortcut, I always tell people this is probably the fastest, not necessarily the easiest, but it’s one of the most effective ways, is to search those and find those who are really experts in the areas. Because you want to find the most credible resources with people that have done that, or teaching other people to do that, so that you can consume that knowledge and information, and you can shortcut that curve of actually improving your skill set. That’s what I do. If there’s any new area of life that I want to learn something about, I always look out for the best person, search them, and then identify their resources and learn from them.

Cory: You mentioned how to have successful relationships. I want to relate this back to some of the items that you mentioned, how you would begin your commencement speech in that relationship with yourself. And so can you talk of some of those skills and maybe behaviors that allow people to have a better relationship with themself?

Purdeep: It goes back to that old, ancient saying, “know thyself,” which most of us do not know. We get caught up in our roles. We get caught up in expectations that other people have of us, and it takes us typically like, for example, when we work with individuals, we use the analogy of an onion. How most people are living is like the outer layer of the onion, but what’s really true to them is in the inside. So they have to peel back all those other outer layers to get to the true core, and that requires us to do a lot of digging and introspection on that part.

That’s when I wrote the book, The Complete Man. Everything in The Complete Man is it starts from within. Everything starts within. And most of us are not aligned, I would say, in our lives. We have forgotten who we are. Most of us maybe haven’t even been in touch with who we are. And some of us are even afraid to find that out because it may not align with the life that we have right now. Because we’ve been living decades a certain way, whether it’s being with a certain type of person or as a partner or in their career or the friends that they’ve developed or whatever that might be. A lot of people are just not sure of themselves, so it really takes some digging.

An exercise that we do, and I do this every year myself, is that we get people to go away for at least one or two nights, and three or four if they can really get away from, step away from the work of the family members. And just by themselves, like, for example, I go away for every year four days by myself where I don’t have my kids, I don’t have my wife, and I really sit down and think, what do I want from life? Who am I really? What are the things that are bogging me down? What are the things that I need to change? And I don’t think about the roles that I have in my life. I really get down to who I am. And I always then layer on my roles. What’s my responsibility as a dad, as a husband? How do I want to give in those roles? Right. Then It starts for me, and then it works the other way around, whereas most people are starting with the roles that they have, and then they have very little left for themselves.

Cory: Life is a tangled web of these roles, relationships, and expectations from within and from others. As you go away, and you mentioned the word distractions and how distracted society is, how do you ensure that you’re in the right mindset for those four days? Peel back that onion and remove those expectations. Because I could see there could be a lot of fear, and it could create a lot of anxiety if somebody was left on their own without some of these skills, and understanding how they are going to spend that time.

Purdeep: And especially for high achievers, because going away for four days and not really doing much except for doing some introspection can be scary. It could kind of feel like it’s worthless when you have all of the stuff happening in business and your personal life. The most important thing is you understand the importance of this. So the “why” behind this, the purpose behind it is the number one thing. And knowing that four days, or even two days away, is going to have a massive positive impact and impact on the rest of the year. It can accelerate things significantly. So looking at the reward and the benefit as a result of that.

The other part is picking somewhere nice, Picking somewhere where you want to go, somewhere that is of interest to you, somewhere where you think you’re going to be able to even do some activities. So it’s not like you’re going to be sitting idle in a hotel. You can go out and visit different places that you have interest in. So making it enjoyable, because part of this experience of life and finding yourself is finding and identifying what you truly enjoy. Because many of us have forgotten the things that we enjoy, or we don’t have the time or freedom to do the things that we enjoy. So those are parts of it.

The third element is you can always do this with someone else, a partner. When I say partner, it could be another person that is going on a similar journey, and you can spend some time. Like, I know people like, if we’re doing a group program, we get people. If they want to partner up, they can partner up. They can go away and partner up together. That way you have someone along that journey by your side if you have any questions and you don’t feel like you’re alone.

Cory: Thinking about the preparation for this time away, what do you do to prepare with yourself, and maybe with others, to ensure that you’re supported, and that these days can actually be as successful as you want and need them to be.

Purdeep: The most important thing is, we don’t get them to do any pre-work before this because we really want them to have a clear mind, but it is really about making sure that setting up your final week before you go away so you don’t have to think about work or your personal life while you’re away. And setting up the week after so that when you are back, you still have a few days of free time to be able to catch up with work before you go back into the normal, you know, the rat race. So it’s getting set up so you are clear of mind before you get into it and are able to, and you just don’t get back and throw yourself right back into the same routine and habits. That’s the best way to get prepared for it.

Cory: And so thinking about the commitments that people have made, and I think about, in family enterprises, we’ve got all these expectations on ourselves, of others. We’ve made these commitments. And in some instances, large investments that depend on execution. And so there could be some fear that somebody’s going away, and they’re coming back, and they’ve changed. Their ideals have changed, and their commitments have changed. And it can feel like “I’m not sure that we can handle that.” I’m not saying that that’s how this experience ends up. But how can you prepare others around you, and maybe create that culture where other family members, other people in the business, are doing the same so that we can support each other once we understand what we enjoy, and a little bit of that understanding of ourselves.

Purdeep: That’s an important one. And that’s part of the conversation that happens in the IPA community for example, is you want to make sure that it’s not just one person that’s doing this. This is an exercise for each individual family member that’s part of the business, or part of the family that’s important in these conversations. So, conversations. You can make this as an exercise for more than just one person. So if it’s siblings in a family business, then you can get each sibling to do the exact type of exercise. And then ensuring that there’s some kind of family strategy as well. That’s the other part to this as well, because it’s not the individual just coming back and saying, hey, I’ve changed, and all of a sudden, this this is what I’m going to do, and this is not what I’m going to do. It has to align with the family’s overall strategy. So combining those two elements is very important.

Cory: What would be success measures, coming back and knowing that this two days, or four days, or whatever the investment was, was truly successful? And I I think of it as you said, this is an annual thing. So we’re probably reflecting back of the year, or the quarter or probably a point in time that’s a distance away, and reflecting that this was a great investment and worthwhile.

Purdeep: So the number one thing is how you feel when you get back. Do you feel more clear? Do you feel like you’re more aligned? Do you feel like you have this inner, because it’s an exercise of inner reflection, but it’s also letting go of all the stuff, that burden that people hold. So there’s a cleansing part of this too, because we carry that burden around on our shoulders all the time. And if we continue to carry it around, it’s going to bog us down, which most people do feel bogged down by responsibilities. So having that freedom and feeling free is one.

But the second is being consistent with what you committed to coming out of those two days, three days, however many days it is. So that consistency is the second most important factor, is you’re going to be challenged when you get back. Other people may like it, may not like it, and it’s easy to get back into the normal routine of things. So those are the two biggest factors, which is how do you feel, and how are you actually changing your behavior and being consistent with it.

Cory: From an accountability perspective, talking about doing this as a family or group, what sort of things have you experienced? Families, when they’ve done it well, held each other to this and said this is very important, that we each do this, and that we come back and we are consistent and more aligned with ourselves.

Purdeep: It can happen in two different ways. They could be less aligned because people can come back and say, this is something I truly don’t want. For example, it could be a second generation person saying, I don’t want to take over the business, or I don’t want to be part of the business, or I don’t want to be in this role, whatever it may be. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, because that needs to be talked about and brought up sooner than later, because that individual, if they weren’t aligned with it internally, then it would have just caused them more angst and issues later on in life and just builds. So that that could be one.

But the other part is greater alignment, obviously, a greater understanding for each other. There’s a feeling of being refreshed. You probably have more strategic, innovative, and creative ideas coming out of this. So those are the positive benefits that come out of these types of sessions for individuals.

Cory: And going back to professional sports, there tends to be some planning involved, of “here’s what we’re doing with the individual, with the team,” and there’s a sequence of events. It’s not “we’re we’re just going to do this whenever,” there’s typically seasons within sports. And so within business, and you talked about strategic alignment and maybe even strategic planning. Are there times in which we can align this activity with other activities that we’re doing to see benefits, and that potential increasing as a collective rather than just an individual?

Purdeep: That’s a really good question. When we work with individuals, we tend to align it with their business cycle. And so if you do this individually as a person, you if you do this a couple of months before your business cycle, ideally, this is how it should work. You do this individually, then you do this from a business strategy perspective a couple of months before your new year starts. And so you should have your strategy done three weeks before your next year starts. So that’s the ideal timing. You don’t want to be a quarter into the year and do this. Well, I shouldn’t say that. You can do this, but if you want to do this on a regular basis more consistently and make it part of the routine, then I would recommend doing it a couple of months before the business strategic planning.

Cory: Amazing! And going back to siblings or working together, I’d see this as it could be easier to do if we were talking about a single business leader. Maybe we’re talking about a founder or a single entrepreneur, but now we’re bringing multiple people in. Do you have some success stories where you’ve seen this work really well, and brought people tremendous success on a personal, relational, and business level?

Purdeep: I can give you one. Two brothers. They have an accounting firm down in The US, for example. Two different offices in two different cities, and they were both very successful. But one of them, for example, had a challenge in his own personal relationship, so his marriage, and so that was impacting the energy and time that he had to really help grow the business. So in his approach of doing this process, he identified what needed to change, and what needed to change was he needed to change his relationship. And from this perspective, he actually made the decision to leave the relationship.

So by leaving the relationship, not that it changed anything in the short run, but in the long term, the next year, he felt more refreshed to be able to go through this exercise again, had more energy for him and his brother to be able to drive the business forward and actually grow the business at the level that they needed to grow it at. What we see a lot of the time is someone, or one or more people, it could be pretty much everyone, that feels bogged down by something, which is impacting the overall team. So the result is, typically, that we’ve seen from experience, is that when you go through this exercise, people come out with more energy collectively, which helps the overall business.

Cory: And so in that case, it sounds like him as an individual grew in a different way than him and his spouse. His spouse maybe stayed stagnant. He grew and learned more about himself. Is that a risk where we see people who just are very resistant to doing this work, and maybe they’re being left behind, and we can see that? You talked about that we don’t learn how to have relationships. Maybe his spouse hadn’t learned some of the things that they needed to do to be in that relationship. Is that a risk, that we’re surrounded by some of these people who aren’t looking to be high achievers and live to their fullest potential?

Purdeep: Yes. And I’m going to be very straightforward and direct with this, because we’ve done a lot of research in this area of relationships as well. And what we’ve identified is the vast majority of people, particularly, we’ve done a lot of research with men in particular, many men. And I’m not saying this doesn’t apply to women because it does in many cases, but many men do not leave their relationship because they’re afraid they’re going to lose their kids, or half their wealth or more. So they stay in a relationship, so that’s not functional. Whether they are the cause of it or not, let’s just put that aside, but they are afraid to leave it. They’re afraid to really step up and sometimes even acknowledge and bring it to light to their spouse that “hey, look. I don’t want to be in this relationship.” And I can tell you eight out of 10 guys feel that way. So there’s a high number of men out there that are in relationships that they’re not satisfied with, that they just feel like they’re stuck. And I’m sure there’s a high number of women as well.

But this isn’t just marriage. It can be a parent-child relationship, because we know there’s a lot of grown adults that don’t want to have that relationship with their parents anymore, because it’s either been toxic, it’s too controlling, it’s not healthy, whatever that might be. Or it could be the other way around where the parent feels obligated to continue to have a relationship with their child, even though the child is dysfunctional because it’s their child. They can’t leave their child alone. They can’t disown their child. So this is a common thing that we see. I would say it’s a number one challenge. It is absolutely the number one challenge in people’s lives. It is their relationships that they have with individuals.

Cory: Thinking about that, just reflecting on my previous question, I was thinking that the metaphor, the crabs in the bucket, the people that are around you that may be pulling you down. And thinking about that, I love the example of the parent-child where maybe there’s one individual who’s saying, I know that in this relationship, I can’t currently live to my highest potential. And so I need to change the relationship. And in that sense, where they’re in business together, they’re family together, they’re working and and see each other day in, day out, how do you get started and not be fearful? That eight out of 10, I’m sure that that isn’t just from a marriage perspective, but there’s so many where people are just so fearful to rock the boat because they don’t know what’s next. How would you approach that? I’m just thinking, you know, that scarcity mindset of, “jeez, this is scary ahead, but I know that what’s working or what’s happening today is not working.”

Purdeep: Okay. So let’s just use an example. I’m just going to use a random one because it could be going either way. A son knows that his relationship with his dad, they’re both in the business, is not healthy. He doesn’t like it. Whether he’s feeling controlled or whatever that looks like. So one of the things, the first step is to do some inner reflection to identify, does the son need to do any work to improve that relationship? That’s where it ultimately starts. And then if the son is doing things and changing behavior to really shift the relationship, and let’s just say the relationship doesn’t shift, then the son has to take the next step and identify, what is the impact of this relationship that is happening, and how far does this relationship transfer into other areas of his life?

So if it’s just at work and can stay at work, and the son can really deal with that because he’s got a healthy family situation at home, then that’s okay. But if he feels like that is causing issues in, let’s just say, his marriage, because it could be. Well, this is very common as well. And in family gatherings, it’s a bigger issue because this dysfunction travels to extended family, and family gatherings and everything, and there’s drama involved. Then the son has to take a look and say, what are my options here? Are my options to continue in this? Do I draw a hard line, right, and bring this up to my father and say, here’s what needs to change. If this doesn’t change, then I’m out.

There has to be options, but the person, the son, has to be willing to make those tough decisions. That’s very, very important. If he feels like it’s impacting life, I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt, most people will just tolerate it. And it just gets worse and worse, and becomes more and more dysfunctional. People get more and more stressed. Relationships fall apart. Health starts to deteriorate. And the business struggles and suffers as well. This is very, very common. The situation that I’ve shared isn’t uncommon. It’s extremely common that happens. And it’s not just a son and and father. It could be a daughter and father, a daughter and mother. It could be so many different ways.

Cory: And so in that situation where it’s affecting other relationships, the system is now seriously compromised because of tension and dysfunction in one area. Where’s the exit? We’re on the freeway. We’re in it, and we’re looking for the clear path out. Where is it?

Purdeep: Well, it really comes down to options. And the willingness of the parties to move forward with an option, with one option. Because one person might have, this is the ideal option for me. The other person is this is the ideal option for me, and they stick and they stay in those, and they never they never get to a resolution. And that’s, again, very common as well. In that situation, it can be, “hey, look, we need to sell the business.” There’s a lot of families that have missed that opportunity, the ideal opportunity for them to sell the business, and then there’s more and more tensions. So that could be an option.

It could be one person stepping out of the business completely. They might still have ownership, but they’re not part of management, for example. So there’s a number of different options from that perspective. You could buy the other person out. There’s a number of different options. People just need to be willing and have the guts fundamentally to be able to move forward with an option and bring those issues to light. But what happens in the vast majority of cases is the root cause of those issues are never addressed, and the options are never executed. So the toxicity remains and continues.

Cory: And going back to your statistic, the thirty to seventy percent of potential, there’s so many people living in this mediocre, this life where they’re tolerating. And so where do you find people are coming to you because they’re fed up with being mediocre?

Purdeep: Yeah. It’s a really interesting question. So where do people come to me? There’s a number of different stages of people that are doing fairly well, but they know that they can do better, and they’re open to that. We rarely get people that are doing extremely well, because at that time, there’s a little bit of an ego there, and they feel like their success is based on them, which in, you know, rightly so, it could be, but they don’t see that there’s far more potential. We do get individuals that are down and out. They’re stuck, and they’re struggling. Now in that case, there’s typically two types of individuals.

Individuals that are stuck, and they’re stuck for a reason because they weren’t willing to make decisions and act on those decisions. And those individuals that are stuck, and they have the motivation and drive to do things differently. We do not work with those individuals that are stuck and aren’t willing to move forward, and we get those individuals. And we have a better filtering system now, and a better interview process, because we interview our clients before we take them on, whether they’re the right fit for us because we don’t want to just take their money and work with them if they’re not going to move forward.

And there are some clients out there, there are some people that just want to be heard. They just want to vent, but they don’t want to do anything. And those aren’t the right type of clients for us. Those are the clients that need to go see a therapist, or a community group of some kind so they can vent. We are all about action, results, and progress.

Cory: And so in that interview, when you’re looking for that willingness, and if you think about ready, willing, and able, where do you find that? What is it where you can pinpoint to say this person isn’t willing to make that change?

Purdeep: Part of that is the questions that we ask. Part of that is also gut feel, and part of that is actually going through not just one interview, but a couple or even a few where we identify that. Because we have been, in the past, where we worked with individuals where they said, yeah, I’m willing to change. And a year later, they’re still doing the same thing.  And it’s not that we haven’t done our work. It’s not that, but we can’t go in there and do things for them. That is not our role. That’s not what we do. But we’ve had that instance, but we’re a lot more careful. Big part of that is gut feel. Like, I will get a sense. And we get this. We do. Particularly men. I would say less women, more men, that fall in this category, that are coming and saying, I want to change this, but they haven’t done anything. I would say when it comes to that, women are more open to change, and being directed towards change, and being helped with change, than men are, because men can be somewhat stubborn.

I’ll give you another example that happens. We’ve had people in engagements where we started the engagement. Let’s just say they are in this particular category of someone that’s not doing well. Either relationship’s falling apart, the business is going down, or there’s some other issue in their life that’s not good. They will come, and they will seek out our services. We will go through a proposal process and interview process, and you can tell these people need help, but then all of a sudden, something gets better in their life, and then they pull back. And that area of their life that’s gotten better is only temporary, because it’s just a temporary improvement. They haven’t really changed anything. It’s just the situation has just modified itself so that it seems better, or feels better for a little bit. And then they’ll be back again asking about the same thing. And then it’ll get better, and then they’ll pull back. And in those cases, we get that quite a bit for people that are really struggling with situations. So it’s either they commit or they don’t commit. And I don’t get a gut sense of the individuals that are like that, the words that they use, their demeanor, how they respond in communication. I tend to stay away from those types of individuals now because they end up wasting a lot of time.

Cory: Absolutely! And you made a comment about somebody maybe needing a therapist. I just want to bring that into the conversation quickly, of the role of different professionals in this sense, because I think that there’s so much good that can be done from having a psychologist a part of your individual team. And so where do you see the difference in the work that you’re talking about versus when somebody’s gone through and worked with a therapist, and continues to work with a therapist?

Purdeep: We have performance psychologists on our team, for example. So, that’s different than a typical therapist or a psychologist. And we have partners that we do all the time refer out to psychologists because there are people that require deeper work. The difference that we have and the difference in the approach I’ll give you an example.

One of our most recent clients that we brought on had been working with a therapist, a psychologist for six months. In our first conversation, I did a deep dive in terms of the interview process, finding out the challenges. And at the end of the hour, I had broken down things for him from an action perspective. And he said, I’ve been working with this psychologist for six months. I’ve never gotten the clarity that I’ve gotten here within this last hour with you. Mainly because it wasn’t just all about talking. It’s about solution focus and action focus, what needs to happen to make progress. So this is where I draw the line.

A lot of the therapists, just like any doctors out there, I’m very careful. Again, I’m very direct. I’m going to say just like doctors, they’re not equal. There are great doctors, and there are not so great doctors, and the same thing with therapists and psychologists. So a person needs to be very careful. But what I’ve noticed in the area of psychology and therapy, because I’m in that space, but more from a performance standpoint, is that it becomes more of a conversation and a talking thing rather than action. And sometimes that is required because some people just need someone to talk to. Sometimes people just need someone to release the things that are on their mind that they just need to maybe have a sounding board for.

So there is a place. There is absolutely a place for a therapist or a psychologist. Not only for that, but there are cases where we work with individuals, whether it’s in a relationship, for example, where we have referred our clients to relationship psychologists or therapists because they need to do a deep dive into their relationship, into their marriage that we’re not qualified to do. Or there’s some kind of trauma or deeper psychological challenge that we’re not skilled to deal with that needs to be addressed, or they have some kind of specific type of condition, like it could be ADHD or autism, or something else that is impacting their performance where we have a certain amount of knowledge, but they need deeper work. There’s so many positive cases where professionals in that area can be brought in and make a positive impact. 

Cory: Absolutely! And I’m sure life changing in some of that aspect where what was that one thing holding them back, and just having that team approach to say, we have a hunch, and we’ve got somebody who can can narrow that down and and help in that area, and then the rest of the team can can continue, once that’s identified.

Purdeep: I can’t think of that enough how many people have one area of their life that is holding them back in many other areas of their life that needs to be addressed, but they’re not addressing it. By releasing that, it is literally like a ball and chain. You’re cutting that off to enable you to have some freedom in life.

Cory: Absolutely! And on that note, as we near the end of our conversation, I’d like to transition to the few questions that I ask each guest before we wrap up. Are you ready for the tough ones? 

Purdeep: Sounds good to me!

Cory: Alright. What is one key strategy that you believe is essential for building a successful family enterprise?

Purdeep: I would say one key strategy that I would highly, if you say a strategy, it depends on whether you see this as a strategy. But there has to be alignment when it comes to the family and the business. That is absolutely essential because if the family isn’t aligned in terms of the direction that the family is going in, and it’s not aligned with where the business is going, there’s going to be a rift at some point in time. It’s a fundamental, it’s so basic, but it’s one that is missed so often. It’s probably the one that’s missed the most often, is there’s a lack of alignment between the family and the business strategy. Both those strategies need to be interwoven, interaligned, because they can’t be separate. 

Cory: Absolutely! And what is the most common challenge that you see family enterprises encountering when it comes to wealth transition and generational continuity?

Purdeep: So the one thing that I see most often is there’s a lot of help that’s happening on the financial side, perhaps, even on the legal side, but I don’t see a lot of work being done on the business side. And what I mean by that is there’s a lot of professionals that help in other areas, but when it comes to actually how to transfer the business or transition the business, the actual business itself, like the roles or responsibilities, you know, who’s going to be the CEO, what does that expectation look like, who’s going to train the CEO, those types of activities within a business, are missed quite often. A lot of it’s assumed. A lot of it happens last minute, and it’s not planned out properly, and it’s not executed. And there’s definitely not enough time given for that transition to happen.

Cory: And what would you say in this world where the meaning of succession is so different? As you said, the financial world, the legal world is focused on this, and the definition and what needs to be done is not clear. What would you say is a strategy to overcome this as somebody would be looking at themselves and saying, I’m in this, or I’ve got these people who are supporting me, I really don’t have somebody that’s looking at the business side of it?

Purdeep: I would say get a seasoned FEA person. This isn’t a pitch for FEA, but I truly believe this. Get someone who is a strong person in family enterprise advising that understands the business side. So that would be my suggestion. Someone that doesn’t just understand the business side, but also understands the wealth and the other aspects. But the business side is very important. It’s very critical for them. I see a lot of individuals, and there’s a lot of individuals in the FEA community that are focused on the wealth, or on the accounting, or on the legal side. There’s very few that focus on the business side.

Cory: Yes, absolutely! And in your experience, what are the top three key qualities that successful family enterprise leaders possess?

Purdeep: So this sounds cliche, but the number one thing I would say is emotional intelligence. Being in tune with themselves, and being able to be in tune with other people in the family. Now that doesn’t mean that you bend to their will. It means that you understand where they are, and sometimes that requires making and having strong boundaries.

The second element that I would say, especially in a family business, having the ability to have tough conversations and draw boundaries and lines is very important, because in families, people overstep boundaries all the time. And that is so unhealthy. It’s not perfect. But let’s just say on a score of one to 10, let’s just say, if a family is overstepping boundaries and they’re at the 10 level, that’s extremely unhealthy. If they’re at the one, or two, or three, even four might be okay. But once you get to five and above in terms of stepping over boundaries, it becomes dysfunctional. So a leader needs to be able to set boundaries. For example, if you have a couple of siblings in the business, and you have a leader that’s one of the siblings, they should be able to say, “This conversation that we are having is a family conversation. We have it in the family. This doesn’t belong at work.” So there needs to be clear boundaries from that perspective.

The third part, I would say, is a strategic mindset. I’m a big supporter of strategies, one of my backgrounds as well. A person needs to be able to have that foresight to be able to think longer term. And not just on the business side, but for the family as well.  And this is something that’s very important because I see this quite often again. They’re super smart people on the business side, but they’re not looking on the family side. These are people that are amazing business leaders from the perspective of driving business and growth and profitability, but they’re not so great when it comes to, “where’s the family going, what is the family?” So someone that is able to have that foresight for both sides, family and business, is very important.

Cory: Fantastic! Before we conclude our discussion today, I’d like to highlight where our listeners can engage in more of the conversations that you’re having, as well as some of the conversations or material that you find would be relevant to the conversation that we had today.

Purdeep: Sure! So I have a Substack newsletter. You could find it at purdeep.substack.com. That’s the easiest way to get hold of me or my information, or some of the content. And I’m most active on LinkedIn as well. Those are the two places. And I would say within the FEA community or the FEC community, Family Enterprise Canada community, I do see a shift now in terms of their direction. And I think going forward, there’s going to be some great resources for family enterprises there as well.

Cory: Fantastic! And I want to make sure that we’ve covered everything today. Is there anything else that you’d like to share with our audience that we didn’t get a chance to touch on?

Purdeep: Well, I think the thing right now, depending on when this episode gets released, is that there are family businesses that may be challenged by these tariff conversations. And what is going to get people through this is the ability to align your family strategy with your business strategy. Because people will panic, they’ll be wondering what’s going to happen to the business, but that has a trickle effect on the family. And so this is the most important time for families to sit down and talk about the future, and how it aligns with the business and vice versa.

Cory: Fantastic! And I think family enterprises are so well positioned to weather the storm and navigate through the uncertainty, just because of the nature of the way that they’re designed. So if they can harness that energy and the power that they have, I think that there’s great potential for them on a go forward, based on the chaos that’s being created.

Purdeep: I completely agree!

Cory: Well, Purdeep, thank you so much for taking your time today, for sharing your expertise and the experiences that you have. It was incredibly enlightening and valuable for me, and I know that there will be listeners who find many nuggets of great information in our episodes. So, thank you for your contribution.

Purdeep: Thank you for having me, Cory, and for being an awesome host. I appreciate it.

Cory: Thank you.

As we wrap up this episode, we invite you to reflect on Purdeep’s insights about operating at our full potential through the dual lenses of harmony and high performance in our lives.

Whether you are part of a family enterprise or provide consulting to family businesses, Purdeep’s approach reminds us that achieving success requires more than professional excellence – it demands self-reflection, courageous conversations, and difficult decisions that align with who we truly are.

Throughout our discussion, we explored how individuals can move beyond mediocrity to unlock their full potential through intentional self-work and relationship assessment. Purdeep emphasized that achieving harmony while maintaining high performance requires both the courage to address dysfunctions and the willingness to make difficult changes. These insights provide business professionals with practical approaches to cultivate not just career success, but a complete life that balances personal fulfillment with professional achievement, operating closer to 100% of their true potential.

For those seeking guidance on maximizing their personal and professional potential, Purdeep is ready to support. I also encourage you to check out his book “The Complete Man” as well as explore the programs offered through Sangha Worldwide. For more information about Purdeep’s work and to support you on your journey, visit the links in the show notes.

Disclaimer:

This program was prepared by Cory Gagnon who is a Senior Wealth Advisor with Beacon Family Office at Assante Financial Management Ltd. This is not an official program of Assante Financial Management, and the statements and opinions expressed during this podcast are not necessarily those of Assante Financial Management. This show is intended for general information only and may not apply to all listeners or investors; please obtain professional financial advice or contact us at BeaconFamilyOffice@Assante.com or visit BeaconFamilyOffice.com to discuss your particular circumstances before acting on the information presented.