tyrone: welcome to the podcast! today, iãvegot sean from manila at the moment, he usually is in bangkok but heãs flown over to manila.iãll let him tell you the story behind why heãs in manila right now and why heãs notin bangkok. i came across meeting sean through dan andrews and seanãs a lifestyle entrepreneurand iãm really excited to share his story with you because heãs got a very interestingstory. it will encourage you to look at a
bangkok to do, different way of being in the business andalso looking at having a lifestyle and combining both of those together. so, welcome to thecall sean and itãs great to have you on! sean: itãs great to be here, thanks. tyrone: letãs start off with just maybe sharinga little bit more about your story to the
audience to tell them a little bit more aboutwhat currently youãre doing or letãs take a step back. where did you start and how didyou get to where you are right now? sean: so originally, iãm from the unitedstates, portland oregon. i graduated in a university like three years ago and i didthe traditional thing. i got a desk job, i worked in finance, suit-and-tie and it tookme about six months to realize that really, it was not the route i want to be going. istayed in that job up until the end of last year and finally i was like, ã¬you know what,i canãt handle this anymoreã–i have to do something more interesting, more adventurousand so.ã® i left my job and thatãs when i got in touch with dan and he said, ã¬hey,iãve got this opportunity in south east asia,
building some businesses and i want someoneto come out here and help me do that.ã® so i come again, here i hopped on a flight andhe basically said to pick a city where you want to go to and i said i want to go to thailand.i said i want to go to thailand so i hanged out in thailand for a month and i was kindof stuck. tyrone: and you also got a popular blog aswell, location180. i was actually following your blog for sometime and you got some reallyinteresting stories you share on there. whatãs got you started writing in the blog? sean: well the whole reason i started theblog was because i knew i wanted to make a change and i had no idea what to do. i waslike i have got all these thoughts going through
my mind, i wanted to travel and i wanted todo something entrepreneurial. i just kind of said iãm going to start a blog; iãm goingto start writing and see whatever it takes me. i started it last may, itãs may 2009.if you go back, the first posts were kind of about lots of places. iãm talking abouttravel, trips iãve taken in the past, and also some random stuff. finally, i got intouch with some of the right people and got to find a niche that really seem to be workingfor me. that was the coolest part of the whole blog ã³ it helps you build up a sports system.by the time it came to make a decision to leave the job, i had all those people to helpme out, all supportive of it. thatãs a nice by-product blog that i wasnãt expecting.
tyrone: thatãs nice. what weãre you doingas you said before youãve decided flying to bangkok, what were you actually doing inunited states? sean: i was a financial analyst. i work fora small money management firm so iãm basically crunched in numbers. i was researching stocksand helping decide whether or not they were the right things to be purchased for clients,some things like that. but, part of the problem was itãs such a small company that you knowi was fresh out of school and theyãre like ã¬you didnãt really know what youãre talkingaboutã–ã® kind of thing. i never really gained detraction. theyãre able to pay a littlemore attention or raise the youth but i didnãt think it wouldnãt work out better. it wasjust wasnãt the right type of business for
me. tyrone: okay, but youãre still having a secureincome back there. youãre living a decent life over there and to take that leap of faithand to jump over to bangkok to do what youãre currently doing. it really took a lot of gutsdidnãt it, to do what you did? sean: oh, it was terrifying. i remember theday when i left my job, i was like ã¬oh crap, now what do i do?ã® but, it was amazing howquickly things turn to fall into place. we didnãt know that in a week iãll have otherjob opportunities, iãll have opportunities to travel and find friends. i really kindof found that when youãre in a position to start embracing opportunities, youãre neverreally going to find them. when i was in my
job i wasnãt really looking for new things.but as soon as i didnãt have that burden, then all sorts of things started to open upfor me. tyrone: itãs amazing when you actually setyourself free from one place and you go into a new place, it just changes everything. sean: absolutely. tyrone: i notice youãve been sweating there,is it hotter there in manila at the moment? sean: itãs a little hot here. itãs likewe donãt have an aircon and now, iãm not seated in front of the fan anymore. itãsdefinitely right up cooler there in bangkok. tyrone: all right, letãs talk a little bitmore about currently where youãre at. youãve
flown into manila and what was the story behindthat one. itãs only been in the last week since it happened. sean: yes, so basically iãve been in bangkokfor the last four months, and thereãs been a little bit of civil unrest. thereãve beena lot of protests going on and everything has kind of come into ahead during the lastweek or so, ten days. it was at the point where my apartment building happened to beone block away from very keypoint of confrontation between the protesters and the military. iwoke up one day and i went out to lunch and there was like 50 soldiers marching down mystreet and by the end of the night there would be constant gunfires, constant explosionsand i fell asleep watching clashes go off
my window with all the bombs going off. itwas pretty intense situation and it only got worse, my neighborhood has been basicallyburnt in the ground. i spent the last few days in bangkok over a friendãs house onthe other side of town and finally the military decided to move in on the main entrapmentwhere the protesters were. that was when everything really went down and i just didnãt see wherethe safe place be. i believe the country anyway is facing some visa reasons so i was likewell, where can i go? i called up dan and said iãm coming to manila. five hours later,i was on a flight. tyrone: so youãre in manila right now catchingup with dan. letãs jump now to whatãs happening with yourself and dan where youãve come ontothe mba program with dan. has it been six
months yet? sean: yeah, i think he started it in novemberso about six months ago. tyrone: okay, maybe to share with the audience,what is this tropical mba that youãve been participating with danãs business as well? sean: behind the idea of the tropical mbais that you can go out and you can spend two years of your life and get $100,000 to geta traditional mba. obviously, you get to learn stuff but youãre not learning in a lot ofreal, hands-on things that you need to know to run a business. and so, he said you knowwhat that systemãs broken ã³ i can come out here, i can bring someone in and i can payfor their general living expenses, teach them
how to build a business and everybody getsabout that. so, iãm coming out here and brought me to very high level of their business ã³basically said jump in. youãve been kind of getting cents in the first couple of weeksof the areas where you can add some value. anytime i needed help with anything or hadany idea that is, theyãre always there. really, itãs kind of being served by mentors. wework from building these businesses together. itãs a cool, unique program and over thecoming years, i would expect a lot more things that will be driven this way because i knowthat the value that iãve taken from this program is equal, if not greater to anythingi would have got from traditional education. tyrone: awesome. it sounds like things aregoing really well for you. were you expecting
to be at in six months time since the start? sean: i donãt know where i expect it to bein six months but iãm really happy with the place that iãm in. like i said i kind offigured out what iãm going to be doing that comes alive. itãs a six-month program andwe continue to work together ã³ just a matter of whether i stay in thailand, or like inmanila, will i go back in the states. itãs cool to have that flexibility that not manypeople do. itãs all been exciting. tyrone: definitely. it sounds like becausethe business is that you and danãs business is very mobile, you can run the business toanywhere. thatãs the reason why danãs in the philippines and then his partnerãs insan diego, and youãre over thailand.
sean: yeah, thatãs right. tyrone: and youãre able to manage your mobilebusiness. sean: so we work with a team of people herein the philippines who are awesome. i think thatãs been one of the most exciting thingfor me to be coming out here. sitting about 20 feet away from you right now, i get tosit down and work with them on a day-to-day basis these people that iãve been talkingto 4-5 hours a day, i never thought i get to meet them personally, thatãs pretty fun. tyrone: thatãs awesome. well, letãs delveinto outsourcing which is a key topic that i think a lot of people are interested in.because now youãve got first-hand experience
with them physically sitting in manila rightnow, what kind of things currently the business is doing outsourcing to the philippines andhow does that been very beneficial for yourself and also to the business? sean: essentially, weãve got a team of fivepeople right now i think. weãve got two very dedicated developers, a designer, and alsocouple of people doing general kind of link building and article marketing kinds of tasks.itãs cool because you find people up here who are motivated, they really want to work,theyãre well educated and they speak english. you donãt have that communication barrierã³ thereãs a lot of people that you might have had in other developing countries. soitãs really been a beneficial thing for our
business to see weãve got to have those dedicatedskills for the design, development and all that stuff and we can do it in much affordablecost as opposed to what would be in california, something like that. tyrone: what are we looking at, say for examplesomeone whoãs just started out in outsourcing and theyãre intersted in finding developerslike youãre looking at right now it maybe for wordpress, php, drupal, any of those technicalstuff, what would you say itãs like the cost of hiring someone in the us compared in hiringsomeone in the philippines? sean: well, i mean for any decent developerin the united states, thereãs such a wide range. thereãs people who are college studentsthat are having their another investment or
there are people doing nothing and then youãllget professionals making six-figure incomes. i would say that the average person in theunited states is charging or making $50,000 a year, when you look at what you can getout in the philippines, granted some of the numbers get thrown around that there are reallyexpensive amount ã³ 100 bucks a month, 200 bucks a month, those are little unrealisticwhen youãre trying to hire high level skills. but still, certainly not $50,000 a year. itãsmuch more affordable. tyrone: definitely, that means that youãrebe able to leverage potentially a lot more with still hiring one person. in united states,you could hire up probably five instead and you can get as much time done quicker as well.
sean: with the amount of money you aim forone person in united states, youãre getting a team of people that cover a variety of skillsthatãs here. tyrone: absolutely. so far from your experienceof working with them, whatãs been the differences between working with westerners and to peopleworking in the philippines. whatãs the culture or whatãs been the work ethic with them.how did you find working with them? sean: one of things i found in the philippinesis that from the moment i step foot in manila, it seems like california. itãs very americanizedhere especially compared to thailand or any other developing countries. itãs got peoplethat for fun they drink coors light and watch the nba. you can relate to them more thanyou can relate with other cultures i think.
like i said, the fact that most of them speakfluent english here, it makes everything much easier from both the social land of businessaspects. i feel like iãm able to talk to them, get to know them and joke around withthem and that translates over to a good business relationship. i kind of getting involved witheverything that weãre doing and been excited with the projects and i think thatãs themost beneficial things weãve done in trying to build the business. tyrone: thatãs excellent. since you mentionedabout talking about projects, a lot of people probably are also interested in finding outhow do you go about managing the projects. like say for example youãve got a team offive people now and obviously you wouldnãt
be just managing with one person day in dayout, you probably have been dealing with multiple staff or team environment, what are some ofthe systems youãve got in place thatãs able to help you work from bangkok or anywherefrom around the world that has enabled you to move through these projects quickly andget them completed on schedule? sean: generally, one of the most importantthings we do is we try to setup channels of communications so that people are bombardedwith constant messages. weãve got our team of people back in san diego, theyãll be sendingto us and we get 20-30 emails a day from the day of request. by filtering those throughsomeone like me or having them sort out which are the high priorities are and then transferthat into team, theyãll be bombarded of messages.
theyãre receiving of messages from a dozenof people so itãs really by organizing business in that sense. i think itãs definitely helpedto increase the productivity as well as the clear communication. also, we found that usingskype is one of the best ways to coordinate with people. to talk whether itãs conferencecalls, group chats, or quick questions, by setting up their skypes so that all they cansee is their work contacts. itãs really an effective tool which is just sometimes underratedby other people. tyrone: absolutely, communication is crucial.youãre basically acting us a filtering mechanism for the business to be able to get the workdone and make sure itãs been sent over to right department or people so that work canbe done on time and completed. do you use
a project management system to do all thator do you just communicate via email and skype? sean: we also use the basecamp. thereãs definitelysome pros and cons there and weãre also in the process of seeing if thereãs somethingelse thatãs better out there but thatãs what weãre currently using. tyrone: thatãs great. iãve heard over topeople who are outsourcing over to the philippines and using basecamphq as well so itãs quitea simplistic system thatãs something that we understand. also, if i remember correctly,dan mentioned that youãve got an office so have you, has your team or your company havepurchased a building? or is it just an old building and you setup an office or is itjust youãve hired another company to do this
for you? sean: that was one of the biggest reasonsi cannot hear timing lies thatãs worked out. weãve just moved in our office last weekthatãs actually i said it more looked like a call center than an office. there was anotherexpat here out here that had some space and dan talked to him. couple of days later, herewe are. itãs really cool for the team to be able to come working on a centralized location,hang out with each other. i think it does a lot with productivity. itãs like aftera while, not seeing anybody, you get a little lonely in your home office. itãs definitelysomething that will help the social culture of the business. i think that having themto come in here four days a week could really
be good for morale and productivity. tyrone: excellent. so over time as the businessgrows, as yourself starts to grow the business and take a step back, what is it that youãllneed to do to get yourself outside the business to be able to achieve that lifestyle of beingable to live the 4-hour, 10-hour work week working at most two hours a day. this is ithink something that a lot of people want to know because as youãre going through thetropical mba program, youãre learning how we design the businesses so weãll have theflexibility of lifestyle. sean: exactly. tyrone: how do you think we can achieve that?
sean: well i think thereãs a variety of waysthat we can do it. i know from me personally, iãve got my own personal website, iãve gotmy own personal project thatãll be coming out there and thereãll be big product launchthat iãll be doing in the next couple of months that iãm excited about. by creatingthe passive income on a personal level, that will enable me to have the income and littlebit of security and flexibility of my life from the general business standpoint. i thinkthe most important thing is being passionate about what youãre doing. i come in here andi work, helping grow businesses and i donãt necessary feel like itãs work. you got the4-hour, 10-hour work weeks and i donãt think any of those are necessarily true. i thinktim ferriss probably works more than anybody
who has every read his book. i think continuingthe scale of the business or the things that we should focus on most is creating scalableprocesses that we can outsource or have other people do and we can be a million-dollar orfifty-million dollar business, but the same general level of work is involved. once youget to that level and things start changing, as long as you got the right processes inplace, itãs going to automate things and free up some of your time and youãll be ingood shape. thatãs what weãre trying to do here. tyrone: dan and yourself have been talkinga lot about scaling. define ã¬scalingã® in your terms.
sean: define scaling in my termsã– i thinkthe most important thing is being extremely queer about what youãre trying to do. sowhen you create a process for instance one of the things we do is article marketing campaign.iãve got a very detailed process for knowing exactly what needs to be written, what theterms are and where they should be submitted, if i could give that to one person, 10 peopleor 50 people or how many people working on it and they can look at that and know exactlywhat they need to do, then thatãs scalable. things like that, itãs basically saying weãregoing to do all the work now so in the future, thereãll be no additional work that needsto be done in terms of growing the business. definitely you can grow it organically byhaving the same process in place.
tyrone: itãs really having like say for exampleyour flowchart of step by step documentations. all the things are in place to train the peopleso that they can take this all and you donãt have to repeat the process over and over again,or coming back to sean for example to do the work. sean: exactly. especially when you got oneperson doing it, by the time you bring on another person to do it, the first is an expert.instead of me training them, itãs them training them and it grows that way. thatãs workedout well so far. tyrone: all right, weãve talked a lot aboutthe benefits and closures of outsourcing. what about some of personal issues or thingsthat youãve come across or challenges for
outsourcing the business? sean: i think that a lot of the challengesthat arise from outsourcing are the same issues that will arise in traditional business. forinstance, generally speaking people out here are extremely motivated, extremely hard working,but then youãll also get a lot of people who arenãt. youãll have a lot of peoplethat are working home, they can say like ã¬you canãt see me, you donãt really know whatiãm doing.ã® and sometimes theyãll tend to slack off a little bit. you really haveto keep an eye on those types of people and make sure that theyãre not just trying totake advantage of you. weãve run into that a little bit but not really and generallyeveryone weãre working with are extremely
motivated and they really feel are part ofthe team. tyrone: have you had any issues recently orin the past with hiring people? what are some of the things that you may have. have youhad someone whoãs started or after a week or so it just didnãt work out? sean: i think with dan i got first involved.generally iãve been working with the same team since i got here. weãve actually hiredone or two more people since iãve been here and we havenãt had to get rid of anyone.i think he first started with a little bit of a learning curve trying to figure out exactlyhow to do business some things like that. he could probably tell you about that morethan i could but so far itãs worked out well.
i think one of the keys that you can run throughis thereãs people who speak extremely fluent english and they sound like theyãre fromcalifornia and there are others who can speak it but can still have the strong accent. sometimesif you try to talk to them on the phone with a bad connection over skype it can be a littlebit difficult to understand. so i think communication eventhough if itãs much easier here in thephilippines opposed to some places like thailand, still itãs definitely one of the bigger issues. tyrone: absolutely. have you hired anyonefrom thailand by the way since youãre over there? sean: not from thailand. generally eventhoughiãm physically in bangkok, pretty much all
the work iãve been doing is back from statesand over here in the philippines. tyrone: is there any future expansion intoother countries or is it just going to be solely focused on hiring people from the philippines? sean: you know thatãs a good question! ithink right now in terms of what weãre doing, i think the philippines is where itãs at.i think in terms of the quality of talent, affordability, i think thatãs really thedirection that everythingãs heading. i think we might see more expansion in the statesback in our san diego office but i think generally in terms of a lot of stuff weãre doing, weãregoing to be really focused in the philippines trying to get things in the next level here.
tyrone: fantastic. weãve talked a lot aboutthe business side, plans and the past and futures of the business, what do you havefor yourself sean. what are your future plans in terms of lifestyle, fun activities, andtraveling stuffs like that, what are your plans? sean: iãve got all sorts of things planned.iãll be doing the course over the next ten years. one of the biggest things is when istarted my blog location180, i put a list of stuff that i do want to accomplish on earth.all the fun things i want to do in my life and so iãve been slowly kind of plowing awaythose activities. i think that the more time i free up through the passive income stuffand bigger businesses i get, the more i get
to work on the fun stuff like skydiving, goingscuba, those kinds of things. tyrone: you got a big bucketlist thing therei remember. sean: itãs like a hundred items or somethingright now but itãs been interesting. iãve been randomly crossing things off. i wentto the airport and i had no idea where else i got to go so that happened just last weekand i was still debating between hongkong and singapore. i thought i gave dan a calland came up to philippines. that was one thing and i had a benefit coming here. well, itlets me have a good time and still gives me the freedom of time and i think thatãs themost important thing. definitely iãm right past so far so iãve been doing this for thenext four months and for the next 40 years.
tyrone: absolutely, sounds awesome. thatãsfantastic. if anyone wants to get in contact with you sean, how can i contact you and wherecan i go to find out what you currently do? sean: well the best ways to contact me arethrough my website which is www.seanogle.com, s-e-a-n-o-g-l-e, or you can email me at sean@seanogle.com.those are probably the two easiest ways, iãm with my computer all the time so iãm nota real difficult person to get in touch with. very cool, one other thing that i will mentionis iãve been doing a tropical mba program and i was per semester. thereãs a secondsemester, dan is accepting applications for that. itãs a little bit different. itãsbasically giving the opportunity to come down to a tropical island in the philippines, haveall their expenses paid down there and we
work on projects 2-3 hours a day, while continuingto work on whatever projects theyãve got for themselves so itãs really unique opportunity.if you go to tropicalmba.com, you can find about that. i know that this opportunity haschanged my lifeã–so much. itãs been honestly the best thing that could happen for me. ifyou give someone else an opportunity thatãs something similar, thatãs pretty cool. tyrone: thatãs awesome. i love to share thatwith everyone. i think thatãs a great thing. for anyone who wants to find out more, justgo to tropicalmba.com. i think we can also get in contact with dan andrews as well andheãs got a lot information, highly recommended. well, sean, thanks so much for your time today,itãs been a pleasure to interview you. thanks
for sharing all your inside tips on outsourcingto the philippines and iãll definitely catch up soon again. all the best! sean: thanks a lot, i appreciate it.
tyrone: welcome to the podcast! today, iãvegot sean from manila at the moment, he usually is in bangkok but heãs flown over to manila.iãll let him tell you the story behind why heãs in manila right now and why heãs notin bangkok. i came across meeting sean through dan andrews and seanãs a lifestyle entrepreneurand iãm really excited to share his story with you because heãs got a very interestingstory. it will encourage you to look at a
bangkok to do, different way of being in the business andalso looking at having a lifestyle and combining both of those together. so, welcome to thecall sean and itãs great to have you on! sean: itãs great to be here, thanks. tyrone: letãs start off with just maybe sharinga little bit more about your story to the
audience to tell them a little bit more aboutwhat currently youãre doing or letãs take a step back. where did you start and how didyou get to where you are right now? sean: so originally, iãm from the unitedstates, portland oregon. i graduated in a university like three years ago and i didthe traditional thing. i got a desk job, i worked in finance, suit-and-tie and it tookme about six months to realize that really, it was not the route i want to be going. istayed in that job up until the end of last year and finally i was like, ã¬you know what,i canãt handle this anymoreã–i have to do something more interesting, more adventurousand so.ã® i left my job and thatãs when i got in touch with dan and he said, ã¬hey,iãve got this opportunity in south east asia,
building some businesses and i want someoneto come out here and help me do that.ã® so i come again, here i hopped on a flight andhe basically said to pick a city where you want to go to and i said i want to go to thailand.i said i want to go to thailand so i hanged out in thailand for a month and i was kindof stuck. tyrone: and you also got a popular blog aswell, location180. i was actually following your blog for sometime and you got some reallyinteresting stories you share on there. whatãs got you started writing in the blog? sean: well the whole reason i started theblog was because i knew i wanted to make a change and i had no idea what to do. i waslike i have got all these thoughts going through
my mind, i wanted to travel and i wanted todo something entrepreneurial. i just kind of said iãm going to start a blog; iãm goingto start writing and see whatever it takes me. i started it last may, itãs may 2009.if you go back, the first posts were kind of about lots of places. iãm talking abouttravel, trips iãve taken in the past, and also some random stuff. finally, i got intouch with some of the right people and got to find a niche that really seem to be workingfor me. that was the coolest part of the whole blog ã³ it helps you build up a sports system.by the time it came to make a decision to leave the job, i had all those people to helpme out, all supportive of it. thatãs a nice by-product blog that i wasnãt expecting.
tyrone: thatãs nice. what weãre you doingas you said before youãve decided flying to bangkok, what were you actually doing inunited states? sean: i was a financial analyst. i work fora small money management firm so iãm basically crunched in numbers. i was researching stocksand helping decide whether or not they were the right things to be purchased for clients,some things like that. but, part of the problem was itãs such a small company that you knowi was fresh out of school and theyãre like ã¬you didnãt really know what youãre talkingaboutã–ã® kind of thing. i never really gained detraction. theyãre able to pay a littlemore attention or raise the youth but i didnãt think it wouldnãt work out better. it wasjust wasnãt the right type of business for
me. tyrone: okay, but youãre still having a secureincome back there. youãre living a decent life over there and to take that leap of faithand to jump over to bangkok to do what youãre currently doing. it really took a lot of gutsdidnãt it, to do what you did? sean: oh, it was terrifying. i remember theday when i left my job, i was like ã¬oh crap, now what do i do?ã® but, it was amazing howquickly things turn to fall into place. we didnãt know that in a week iãll have otherjob opportunities, iãll have opportunities to travel and find friends. i really kindof found that when youãre in a position to start embracing opportunities, youãre neverreally going to find them. when i was in my
job i wasnãt really looking for new things.but as soon as i didnãt have that burden, then all sorts of things started to open upfor me. tyrone: itãs amazing when you actually setyourself free from one place and you go into a new place, it just changes everything. sean: absolutely. tyrone: i notice youãve been sweating there,is it hotter there in manila at the moment? sean: itãs a little hot here. itãs likewe donãt have an aircon and now, iãm not seated in front of the fan anymore. itãsdefinitely right up cooler there in bangkok. tyrone: all right, letãs talk a little bitmore about currently where youãre at. youãve
flown into manila and what was the story behindthat one. itãs only been in the last week since it happened. sean: yes, so basically iãve been in bangkokfor the last four months, and thereãs been a little bit of civil unrest. thereãve beena lot of protests going on and everything has kind of come into ahead during the lastweek or so, ten days. it was at the point where my apartment building happened to beone block away from very keypoint of confrontation between the protesters and the military. iwoke up one day and i went out to lunch and there was like 50 soldiers marching down mystreet and by the end of the night there would be constant gunfires, constant explosionsand i fell asleep watching clashes go off
my window with all the bombs going off. itwas pretty intense situation and it only got worse, my neighborhood has been basicallyburnt in the ground. i spent the last few days in bangkok over a friendãs house onthe other side of town and finally the military decided to move in on the main entrapmentwhere the protesters were. that was when everything really went down and i just didnãt see wherethe safe place be. i believe the country anyway is facing some visa reasons so i was likewell, where can i go? i called up dan and said iãm coming to manila. five hours later,i was on a flight. tyrone: so youãre in manila right now catchingup with dan. letãs jump now to whatãs happening with yourself and dan where youãve come ontothe mba program with dan. has it been six
months yet? sean: yeah, i think he started it in novemberso about six months ago. tyrone: okay, maybe to share with the audience,what is this tropical mba that youãve been participating with danãs business as well? sean: behind the idea of the tropical mbais that you can go out and you can spend two years of your life and get $100,000 to geta traditional mba. obviously, you get to learn stuff but youãre not learning in a lot ofreal, hands-on things that you need to know to run a business. and so, he said you knowwhat that systemãs broken ã³ i can come out here, i can bring someone in and i can payfor their general living expenses, teach them
how to build a business and everybody getsabout that. so, iãm coming out here and brought me to very high level of their business ã³basically said jump in. youãve been kind of getting cents in the first couple of weeksof the areas where you can add some value. anytime i needed help with anything or hadany idea that is, theyãre always there. really, itãs kind of being served by mentors. wework from building these businesses together. itãs a cool, unique program and over thecoming years, i would expect a lot more things that will be driven this way because i knowthat the value that iãve taken from this program is equal, if not greater to anythingi would have got from traditional education. tyrone: awesome. it sounds like things aregoing really well for you. were you expecting
to be at in six months time since the start? sean: i donãt know where i expect it to bein six months but iãm really happy with the place that iãm in. like i said i kind offigured out what iãm going to be doing that comes alive. itãs a six-month program andwe continue to work together ã³ just a matter of whether i stay in thailand, or like inmanila, will i go back in the states. itãs cool to have that flexibility that not manypeople do. itãs all been exciting. tyrone: definitely. it sounds like becausethe business is that you and danãs business is very mobile, you can run the business toanywhere. thatãs the reason why danãs in the philippines and then his partnerãs insan diego, and youãre over thailand.
sean: yeah, thatãs right. tyrone: and youãre able to manage your mobilebusiness. sean: so we work with a team of people herein the philippines who are awesome. i think thatãs been one of the most exciting thingfor me to be coming out here. sitting about 20 feet away from you right now, i get tosit down and work with them on a day-to-day basis these people that iãve been talkingto 4-5 hours a day, i never thought i get to meet them personally, thatãs pretty fun. tyrone: thatãs awesome. well, letãs delveinto outsourcing which is a key topic that i think a lot of people are interested in.because now youãve got first-hand experience
with them physically sitting in manila rightnow, what kind of things currently the business is doing outsourcing to the philippines andhow does that been very beneficial for yourself and also to the business? sean: essentially, weãve got a team of fivepeople right now i think. weãve got two very dedicated developers, a designer, and alsocouple of people doing general kind of link building and article marketing kinds of tasks.itãs cool because you find people up here who are motivated, they really want to work,theyãre well educated and they speak english. you donãt have that communication barrierã³ thereãs a lot of people that you might have had in other developing countries. soitãs really been a beneficial thing for our
business to see weãve got to have those dedicatedskills for the design, development and all that stuff and we can do it in much affordablecost as opposed to what would be in california, something like that. tyrone: what are we looking at, say for examplesomeone whoãs just started out in outsourcing and theyãre intersted in finding developerslike youãre looking at right now it maybe for wordpress, php, drupal, any of those technicalstuff, what would you say itãs like the cost of hiring someone in the us compared in hiringsomeone in the philippines? sean: well, i mean for any decent developerin the united states, thereãs such a wide range. thereãs people who are college studentsthat are having their another investment or
there are people doing nothing and then youãllget professionals making six-figure incomes. i would say that the average person in theunited states is charging or making $50,000 a year, when you look at what you can getout in the philippines, granted some of the numbers get thrown around that there are reallyexpensive amount ã³ 100 bucks a month, 200 bucks a month, those are little unrealisticwhen youãre trying to hire high level skills. but still, certainly not $50,000 a year. itãsmuch more affordable. tyrone: definitely, that means that youãrebe able to leverage potentially a lot more with still hiring one person. in united states,you could hire up probably five instead and you can get as much time done quicker as well.
sean: with the amount of money you aim forone person in united states, youãre getting a team of people that cover a variety of skillsthatãs here. tyrone: absolutely. so far from your experienceof working with them, whatãs been the differences between working with westerners and to peopleworking in the philippines. whatãs the culture or whatãs been the work ethic with them.how did you find working with them? sean: one of things i found in the philippinesis that from the moment i step foot in manila, it seems like california. itãs very americanizedhere especially compared to thailand or any other developing countries. itãs got peoplethat for fun they drink coors light and watch the nba. you can relate to them more thanyou can relate with other cultures i think.
like i said, the fact that most of them speakfluent english here, it makes everything much easier from both the social land of businessaspects. i feel like iãm able to talk to them, get to know them and joke around withthem and that translates over to a good business relationship. i kind of getting involved witheverything that weãre doing and been excited with the projects and i think thatãs themost beneficial things weãve done in trying to build the business. tyrone: thatãs excellent. since you mentionedabout talking about projects, a lot of people probably are also interested in finding outhow do you go about managing the projects. like say for example youãve got a team offive people now and obviously you wouldnãt
be just managing with one person day in dayout, you probably have been dealing with multiple staff or team environment, what are some ofthe systems youãve got in place thatãs able to help you work from bangkok or anywherefrom around the world that has enabled you to move through these projects quickly andget them completed on schedule? sean: generally, one of the most importantthings we do is we try to setup channels of communications so that people are bombardedwith constant messages. weãve got our team of people back in san diego, theyãll be sendingto us and we get 20-30 emails a day from the day of request. by filtering those throughsomeone like me or having them sort out which are the high priorities are and then transferthat into team, theyãll be bombarded of messages.
theyãre receiving of messages from a dozenof people so itãs really by organizing business in that sense. i think itãs definitely helpedto increase the productivity as well as the clear communication. also, we found that usingskype is one of the best ways to coordinate with people. to talk whether itãs conferencecalls, group chats, or quick questions, by setting up their skypes so that all they cansee is their work contacts. itãs really an effective tool which is just sometimes underratedby other people. tyrone: absolutely, communication is crucial.youãre basically acting us a filtering mechanism for the business to be able to get the workdone and make sure itãs been sent over to right department or people so that work canbe done on time and completed. do you use
a project management system to do all thator do you just communicate via email and skype? sean: we also use the basecamp. thereãs definitelysome pros and cons there and weãre also in the process of seeing if thereãs somethingelse thatãs better out there but thatãs what weãre currently using. tyrone: thatãs great. iãve heard over topeople who are outsourcing over to the philippines and using basecamphq as well so itãs quitea simplistic system thatãs something that we understand. also, if i remember correctly,dan mentioned that youãve got an office so have you, has your team or your company havepurchased a building? or is it just an old building and you setup an office or is itjust youãve hired another company to do this
for you? sean: that was one of the biggest reasonsi cannot hear timing lies thatãs worked out. weãve just moved in our office last weekthatãs actually i said it more looked like a call center than an office. there was anotherexpat here out here that had some space and dan talked to him. couple of days later, herewe are. itãs really cool for the team to be able to come working on a centralized location,hang out with each other. i think it does a lot with productivity. itãs like aftera while, not seeing anybody, you get a little lonely in your home office. itãs definitelysomething that will help the social culture of the business. i think that having themto come in here four days a week could really
be good for morale and productivity. tyrone: excellent. so over time as the businessgrows, as yourself starts to grow the business and take a step back, what is it that youãllneed to do to get yourself outside the business to be able to achieve that lifestyle of beingable to live the 4-hour, 10-hour work week working at most two hours a day. this is ithink something that a lot of people want to know because as youãre going through thetropical mba program, youãre learning how we design the businesses so weãll have theflexibility of lifestyle. sean: exactly. tyrone: how do you think we can achieve that?
sean: well i think thereãs a variety of waysthat we can do it. i know from me personally, iãve got my own personal website, iãve gotmy own personal project thatãll be coming out there and thereãll be big product launchthat iãll be doing in the next couple of months that iãm excited about. by creatingthe passive income on a personal level, that will enable me to have the income and littlebit of security and flexibility of my life from the general business standpoint. i thinkthe most important thing is being passionate about what youãre doing. i come in here andi work, helping grow businesses and i donãt necessary feel like itãs work. you got the4-hour, 10-hour work weeks and i donãt think any of those are necessarily true. i thinktim ferriss probably works more than anybody
who has every read his book. i think continuingthe scale of the business or the things that we should focus on most is creating scalableprocesses that we can outsource or have other people do and we can be a million-dollar orfifty-million dollar business, but the same general level of work is involved. once youget to that level and things start changing, as long as you got the right processes inplace, itãs going to automate things and free up some of your time and youãll be ingood shape. thatãs what weãre trying to do here. tyrone: dan and yourself have been talkinga lot about scaling. define ã¬scalingã® in your terms.
sean: define scaling in my termsã– i thinkthe most important thing is being extremely queer about what youãre trying to do. sowhen you create a process for instance one of the things we do is article marketing campaign.iãve got a very detailed process for knowing exactly what needs to be written, what theterms are and where they should be submitted, if i could give that to one person, 10 peopleor 50 people or how many people working on it and they can look at that and know exactlywhat they need to do, then thatãs scalable. things like that, itãs basically saying weãregoing to do all the work now so in the future, thereãll be no additional work that needsto be done in terms of growing the business. definitely you can grow it organically byhaving the same process in place.
tyrone: itãs really having like say for exampleyour flowchart of step by step documentations. all the things are in place to train the peopleso that they can take this all and you donãt have to repeat the process over and over again,or coming back to sean for example to do the work. sean: exactly. especially when you got oneperson doing it, by the time you bring on another person to do it, the first is an expert.instead of me training them, itãs them training them and it grows that way. thatãs workedout well so far. tyrone: all right, weãve talked a lot aboutthe benefits and closures of outsourcing. what about some of personal issues or thingsthat youãve come across or challenges for
outsourcing the business? sean: i think that a lot of the challengesthat arise from outsourcing are the same issues that will arise in traditional business. forinstance, generally speaking people out here are extremely motivated, extremely hard working,but then youãll also get a lot of people who arenãt. youãll have a lot of peoplethat are working home, they can say like ã¬you canãt see me, you donãt really know whatiãm doing.ã® and sometimes theyãll tend to slack off a little bit. you really haveto keep an eye on those types of people and make sure that theyãre not just trying totake advantage of you. weãve run into that a little bit but not really and generallyeveryone weãre working with are extremely
motivated and they really feel are part ofthe team. tyrone: have you had any issues recently orin the past with hiring people? what are some of the things that you may have. have youhad someone whoãs started or after a week or so it just didnãt work out? sean: i think with dan i got first involved.generally iãve been working with the same team since i got here. weãve actually hiredone or two more people since iãve been here and we havenãt had to get rid of anyone.i think he first started with a little bit of a learning curve trying to figure out exactlyhow to do business some things like that. he could probably tell you about that morethan i could but so far itãs worked out well.
i think one of the keys that you can run throughis thereãs people who speak extremely fluent english and they sound like theyãre fromcalifornia and there are others who can speak it but can still have the strong accent. sometimesif you try to talk to them on the phone with a bad connection over skype it can be a littlebit difficult to understand. so i think communication eventhough if itãs much easier here in thephilippines opposed to some places like thailand, still itãs definitely one of the bigger issues. tyrone: absolutely. have you hired anyonefrom thailand by the way since youãre over there? sean: not from thailand. generally eventhoughiãm physically in bangkok, pretty much all
the work iãve been doing is back from statesand over here in the philippines. tyrone: is there any future expansion intoother countries or is it just going to be solely focused on hiring people from the philippines? sean: you know thatãs a good question! ithink right now in terms of what weãre doing, i think the philippines is where itãs at.i think in terms of the quality of talent, affordability, i think thatãs really thedirection that everythingãs heading. i think we might see more expansion in the statesback in our san diego office but i think generally in terms of a lot of stuff weãre doing, weãregoing to be really focused in the philippines trying to get things in the next level here.
tyrone: fantastic. weãve talked a lot aboutthe business side, plans and the past and futures of the business, what do you havefor yourself sean. what are your future plans in terms of lifestyle, fun activities, andtraveling stuffs like that, what are your plans? sean: iãve got all sorts of things planned.iãll be doing the course over the next ten years. one of the biggest things is when istarted my blog location180, i put a list of stuff that i do want to accomplish on earth.all the fun things i want to do in my life and so iãve been slowly kind of plowing awaythose activities. i think that the more time i free up through the passive income stuffand bigger businesses i get, the more i get
to work on the fun stuff like skydiving, goingscuba, those kinds of things. tyrone: you got a big bucketlist thing therei remember. sean: itãs like a hundred items or somethingright now but itãs been interesting. iãve been randomly crossing things off. i wentto the airport and i had no idea where else i got to go so that happened just last weekand i was still debating between hongkong and singapore. i thought i gave dan a calland came up to philippines. that was one thing and i had a benefit coming here. well, itlets me have a good time and still gives me the freedom of time and i think thatãs themost important thing. definitely iãm right past so far so iãve been doing this for thenext four months and for the next 40 years.
tyrone: absolutely, sounds awesome. thatãsfantastic. if anyone wants to get in contact with you sean, how can i contact you and wherecan i go to find out what you currently do? sean: well the best ways to contact me arethrough my website which is www.seanogle.com, s-e-a-n-o-g-l-e, or you can email me at sean@seanogle.com.those are probably the two easiest ways, iãm with my computer all the time so iãm nota real difficult person to get in touch with. very cool, one other thing that i will mentionis iãve been doing a tropical mba program and i was per semester. thereãs a secondsemester, dan is accepting applications for that. itãs a little bit different. itãsbasically giving the opportunity to come down to a tropical island in the philippines, haveall their expenses paid down there and we
work on projects 2-3 hours a day, while continuingto work on whatever projects theyãve got for themselves so itãs really unique opportunity.if you go to tropicalmba.com, you can find about that. i know that this opportunity haschanged my lifeã–so much. itãs been honestly the best thing that could happen for me. ifyou give someone else an opportunity thatãs something similar, thatãs pretty cool. tyrone: thatãs awesome. i love to share thatwith everyone. i think thatãs a great thing. for anyone who wants to find out more, justgo to tropicalmba.com. i think we can also get in contact with dan andrews as well andheãs got a lot information, highly recommended. well, sean, thanks so much for your time today,itãs been a pleasure to interview you. thanks
for sharing all your inside tips on outsourcingto the philippines and iãll definitely catch up soon again. all the best! sean: thanks a lot, i appreciate it.