CATALYST JOHN, INC.
LAKELAND, FLORIDA

The go to guy to grow your business, do something audacious, or launch your coaching career. How I went from cop to business coach. In a rural area, a mine collapse trapping two miners. The rescue attempt began immediately, but the mine did not have the right equipment to attempt a rescue. A company on the other side of the country heard about the tragedy and reacted. They assigned a team to disassemble one of their huge multi-million dollar machines and fly it across the country to assist with the rescue. As soon as they landed, the team began to assemble the machine. When the team arrived at the site, they did not know if anyone was still alive, but they knew they had to attempt a rescue. Rescue teams, engineers, civilians, media, locals, and many others had gathered to help or witness the rescue. You can imagine the site lit up like a football field surrounded by hundreds of people. Both miners were rescued, but as the lights and the roar of the crowd washed over the second minor he asked in shock, “ I struggled to figure out my purpose in life. Even in my thirties, I still couldn’t nail down what I was supposed to do. I did a ton of research on personal mission statements and determined that my mission was to help others be more successful in their lives. (I know, a little too vague to act upon.) My personal mission statement: “ To base my success on how much I help others achieve You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want It wasn’t long before I understood my purpose. At my very core, I am a trainer. When I looked at what common theme was present most of my life, I saw how I was always attracted to training. In the late 90s, I gave product demonstrations about new computer technology and products at CompUSA. Then I worked in the Education and Training Department for Publix Supermarkets in their corporate offices. I left the corporate world, to go into law enforcement and began to excel at training. My first gig was Crowd Management and Riot training. Once that door opened, I was an agency-wide trainer. Soon I was a Driving instructor, then my training resume began to grow as I began to instruct Firearms, Police Rifle, Less Lethal Weapons, Precision Pistol, PIT, and many other courses. Even though, I strapped on body armor every day and wore a gun on my hip, I had the heart of an entrepreneur. I loved training, but I was not sold out to life as a cop. Even though my career was amazing, when I took off the uniform, I became John the screen printer. I had a warehouse where I printed custom t-shirts for local businesses and organizations. My plan was to grow and scale the t-shirt company and leave behind my law enforcement career. As I grew my shop, I had dreams of teaching others how to grow their screen printing businesses. My vision board had “consultant” on it. All this time I had been searching for what “business” to run, but never thought about focusing on what I was supposed to be doing! Everything changed when I discovered my purpose and began to focus on my new mission: train. equip. teach. Dan Miller is the author of 48 Days to the Work You Love. He has an amazing daughter named Ashley who helps him run his live events. I called Ashley and asked her if she had an opening in the next Coaching With Excellence event. She said that she did and I told her to save me a seat. Prior to making it to the sanctuary, I went to an Icarus Session. This guy RJ talked about how he beat Crohn’s disease and was going to launch a fitness business. Later than night, I told RJ that there were some things that he needed to know about how to run a business that no one would ever tell him. I wasn’t trying to sell him. I just wanted to help him do amazing things. What does a cop know about business? You would think a cop would have no business telling an entrepreneur how to run a business, but it was like I was born to do just that. John Sr, my father, was an entrepreneur and an amazing teacher. I grew up in the back of his first restaurant. As a kid, I learned by watching him and he set me up for success by treating me as an owner of the family business. Over the years, we owned and operated three restaurant concepts in my hometown, Lakeland, and an additional two food concepts at the Orlando Convention Center. As a teenager, I went and applied for my first business license. I sold Mad Hatter hats. (It wasn’t as profitable as I had hoped.) After that, I built web sites and offered hosting. My skills landed me a job in corporate America which led me to work for the government. When I joined my agency, I focused on it, but in just a couple of years I was back to the the side hustle and launched the screen print shop. I consumed everything I could about leadership, entrepreneurism, and small business and worked on my days off. As I’m listening to Dan, my phone alerts that I have a Facebook message. Now you are not supposed to stop listening to Dan and check your Facebook, but I did. RJ said that he was thinking about what I said about running a business and he wanted to hire me to help him focus on his business. At my most natural and at my core, I just wanted to help others win in business. My fight is for the solopreneur with the dream, the owner of a microbusiness, the entrepreneur with vision, and the person stuck in a job that they hate. I drove back home and began to develop what became Catalyst John, Inc. I ended up moving into an downtown office and continued to grow my local coaching business. However, I soon began to realize that I didn’t want to just coach people in my city. I want to be able to coach people across the country and decided to begin to find clients outside of Florida. Now I’m working on taking this business to the next level. I specialize on training and coaching entrepreneurs on how to really pursue their vision for their business and their dream lifestyle. It is about helping them focus on their purpose, their plan, and of course – massive profit.