Classic Episode Welcome

Announcer 0:01

Welcome to the Leading Conversations Classic Podcast. We've searched the episode to find some of the best just for you. If you've been with us from the beginning, you may have heard some of these. If you haven't, enjoy this classic episode. Welcome to the Leading Conversations Podcast, sponsored by the Excel Leadership Network. On each episode, JD Pering will have conversations with church planting pastors and leaders from around the country. You can learn more about how to connect with Excel at the end of this podcast. Let's join JD now and listen in on this leading conversation.

Meet Scott And His Story

J.D. Pearring 0:45

It's time for another leading conversation today with the Excel Leadership Network. And I am privileged and proud and excited to have uh maybe the smartest person I've ever met, and that is the legendary Scott Pering on with us today. Scott, how are you doing? Good. I doubt that's true, but I'll take it. No, that's the the way it always was, is uh people would say, yes, Scott's the smartest person I've ever met. And I felt that way until your younger brother Jake uh just decides that he's gonna challenge that every every shot he gets. So uh but hey, tell us tell us your story. I'm I'm looking forward to hearing your story. How did you come to Christ? Tell us about your upbringing. I think I was there for a lot of it, but uh what happened?

Scott Pearring 1:31

You were a set of great upbringing, uh moved a couple times, right? You started a church in Colorado, then the Bay Area, then Sacramento. So I remember those those three locations and was involved from the in the church from a very young age. I remember setup and takedown when we met in movie theaters and schools and anywhere that we could find a building. Um, yeah, so very involved in youth group, Sunday school was one of the leaders, helped um helped for youth group a lot, helped with the slides and the skits and some of the production stuff for Sunday morning. And yeah, we accepted Jesus at an early age, probably seven or eight, not sure exactly, but around then, and then got more serious about faith in high school through some summer camps, and then ultimately at UCLA, which I'll share a little bit more about later on. But um, yeah, was always in and around the church and never strayed too far.

Life As A Church Planter Kid

J.D. Pearring 2:33

You never did that we knew about anyway. Hey, uh what was uh what was the like the best thing and the worst thing about being a church planter's kid?

Scott Pearring 2:46

Good question. I think the best thing as I look back on it now is the entrepreneurial spirit I learned from you and mom, and the just kind of can do attitude doing hard things, right? It's not easy to plant a church and raise the money and the the people. So that attitude continued in me through you know starting the business and moving forward. So that's definitely a positive hardest thing, maybe the strong opinions and judgment of other leaders and the very high standards. You know, on one hand, it's a blessing that hold yourself to a high standard, on the other hand, it was probably too judgmental, in my view, as far as you know, the music's not right, or this person wasn't as great of a speaker as we hope for, or you know, this guy's getting in my way. Just some of that kind of pioneer spirit that was a little brutal, I would say, was impactful.

J.D. Pearring 3:53

Um you you're a pretty confident guy. You were telling me the other day of what where your confidence comes from. What

Confidence And A Loving Home

J.D. Pearring 4:03

part? Just the part you said that uh mom built into you pretty strongly.

Scott Pearring 4:08

Yes. Yes. So loving home and mom, you know, Lori Perring, very loving, encouraging. Had us thinking that me and the my three siblings were God's gift to mankind, as far as you know, being really skilled in whatever we're doing, skits at church or math homework, or being creative and coming up with little science experiments. So that was helpful. You know, looking back, I I didn't, besides a few puberty, you know, tough high school years, I didn't question my worth or purpose much at all.

J.D. Pearring 4:48

Yeah, I'm not gonna ask you about your dating life that started way earlier than it should have. Let's let's just go to that. Um, so talk about uh what happened with you at UCLA.

UCLA Doubts And A Turning Point

J.D. Pearring 5:00

You said you want to mention some stuff there.

Scott Pearring 5:03

Yeah, so faith-wise, there was, I'm not sure that I've shared this with you. Um I got involved with Campus Crusade very early and was was there, I was involved with that circle and then the ultimate Frisbee circle, and a pretty good kid. I didn't have a lot of desire to drink or party or do crazy things. Um, but I started to fall away from crusade. It was just less important, there was other competing priorities, and I remember this was like my little faith test. It was a Thursday night. I was in Westwood and I was planning to go to the to real life, which was Campus Crusade's weekly meeting, and I was debating whether I was gonna go or not. And it was this like moment where it's, you know, am I gonna go? Am I not? I wasn't really feeling it. I didn't have that many friends there. I, you know, was having some faith questions and reading some books on atheism and all these people kind of breaking away from their faith after having similar upbringings to me. And so I'm in Westwood. I just finished at the Starbucks there tutoring someone, my little side job, and I wasn't gonna go. I made up my mind, okay, I'm not going to real life tonight. And who knows what I was gonna do, but I wasn't going there. And then I was gonna walk back past the Starbucks, and there was this girl outside that was talking to a homeless guy. Okay, and I was very interested in that because with crusade, I've done some homeless ministry, and it was this little Asian girl who caught my eye, who's talking to this homeless guy and riding a longboard, which was totally what I did. So I was like, whoa, what's this is interesting. So I talked to her, her name was Paula, and then we got into a great conversation, and turns out she's a really strong believer, and she had some prophecy gifts, and she um introduced me to a couple friends, and we were talking about faith things, and she was a great listener, and um, it was just a really cool moment where I felt like God brought me into the fold. You know, I felt like this was a tipping point where I was either gonna go left or go right, and he kind of like brought me back home through the encouragement of a local believer. Like, and it was funny, you know, like you know, a cute Asian girl who's riding a longboard who he knew would cut would catch my eye, that like brought me in. So I don't know how bad or dark it would have gone if I would have turned left instead of right, but I I really felt known and loved, and you know, like God saw me there and said, you know, hey, here's what I have for you.

J.D. Pearring 7:56

Wow, I did not know that story. That's that's uh that's cool. The Asian girl on the longboard. That makes that's how you get uh Scott's attention.

Scott Pearring 8:08

I I guess so, and God knew it, and you know, he he pulled me back, and then after that, that was the end of a lot of my questioning.

J.D. Pearring 8:17

Hey,

Choosing To Serve His Brother

J.D. Pearring 8:18

um, can I ask you this question? Uh uh you decided, I I think it was after the first year, that you were not gonna stay at school during um the summer breaks because you wanted to be home and you wanted to serve your brother Jake. Can you talk about that? Um, what was that about?

Scott Pearring 8:40

Yeah, good memory. I haven't thought about that in a while. So Jake's four years younger. I think he looked up to me in some ways. You know, he played tennis at high school and was involved in similar clubs as me. So I think I felt a little bad going to UCLA, moving, you know, 400 miles south after both my older siblings stuck around at Sack State. So I still had the relationship with them. Um, you know, I chose to move. So I think it was important for me to keep investing in Jake through his high school years when he was discovering himself and um just be supportive and kind of still live some of the home life dream, going to beaches and hanging out and not having responsibilities or an internship or anything like that. So that's what brought me back, probably several of those years.

J.D. Pearring 9:32

That made an incredible impact on Jake. And I think for us too. It's like here's this guy, um, college kid, who's just being a real servant. So that was that was really cool. Now, um, there was a time where mom and I were in full-time ministry, your parents are in full-time ministry, your brother's pastor of the church, your sister's a missionary in China, Jake's on staff with Campus Crusade, and you're not, you know, we said you're the guy that's gonna make the money to support us all. Uh talk about your calling to like into the

Discovering Financial Planning As A Calling

J.D. Pearring 10:05

financial world. What was that? What was that about?

Scott Pearring 10:08

So I had no idea what I was gonna do until my junior year at UCLA. I came in undeclared, then I decided statistics, and I thought, what am I gonna go, accounting or actuarial? And then actually, you introduced me to Dave Bennett, a part of the Excel Leadership Network, and Dave brought me in for an internship with his financial planning firm. So it's the first time I ever learned about financial planning, and I remember it sitting at an Olive Garden in Roseville with him, hearing about his business, thinking, wow, this is incredible. I mean, it can be independent, on your own terms, you're helping people, you're making a good amount of money, you can give to kingdom causes. Like I was really, really interested. So that was in 2009 and my junior year of UCLA, and then I was all in after that. Never looked back, launched the business the next year, right when I graduated, launched Seek First, the name of my small company. And um, yeah, it's been solid. So I just feel so blessed to have been connected with Dave and that he took the time to mentor me and bring me up and coach me for several years there when I was getting started.

The Brutal Early Business Years

J.D. Pearring 11:16

What was launching a business like for you?

Scott Pearring 11:20

Slow and hard. So when I started the first year, I made six thousand dollars and I spent twenty-six thousand. Okay. The next year I made eight thousand, I spent like thirty-two thousand. So Sue and I are living in a one-bedroom apartment, 440 square feet in Santa Monica. She's working for the county, making 58 grand. You know, we're driving beaters of cars. And I remember looking at her bank account, you know, going down, down, down, down. And she's like, when is this gonna turn around? Like, you're the finance guy, right? How much longer are you gonna invest in this? Because it was just bleeding cash, and I was trying everything, and I had all these audacious goals of year one, year two, year three, but it was just way, way slower than I expected. So I look back fondly on that now, but the there were some tough times where I thought we had like a ripcord decision where it's like, hey, if the bank account gets down to this level, I'm gonna go deliver pizza or I'm gonna like be a waiter or something because it was getting pretty tight there. Well, what happened? What changed? What turned

Dave Ramsey Breakthrough And Rapid Growth

Scott Pearring 12:34

things around? Year, I think God was generous. Uh something about you know, sowing the seeds and hopefully lessons of perseverance. It was year three. I became Dave Ramsey's endorsed local provider in Santa Monica, and I was invited to many churches through the Dave Ramsey Financial Peace University class to come in and speak on retirement and college planning. So over the next four to five years, I spoke in over 140 classes all throughout SoCal and uh picked up a lot of clients who wanted help from that. So that was really the tipping point where it went from zero. I mean, I think at the time, you know, you guys were a client, grandma was a client, but that was about it. I went from having, you know, a couple clients up to having several hundred in a manner of years.

J.D. Pearring 13:23

Uh I remember those days. You were speaking at a church like almost every every other night or something. Did you enjoy that?

Scott Pearring 13:30

I loved it. Yeah, driving up and down from Orange County and even some San Diego and big churches, small churches, just coming out talking to five people or 150 people and offering to be of help. And a lot of people wanted the help. So that was very effective.

J.D. Pearring 13:47

Now, at one point

Paying Big For Coaching

J.D. Pearring 13:48

you came to me and said, Dad, I got this opportunity to hire a coach for just crazy, crazy money. Um, try to talk about that particular situation. I thought I thought you were just a a little um uh uh I thought you were nuts, actually. So to talk about that coaching that you got in because that that really changed, took things to another level for you.

Scott Pearring 14:16

It did, and I got involved with Bill Backrack is the name of the coach. He coaches financial advisors out of La Jolla. And right when I started, Dave Bennett introduced me to Bill and says, he said, you know, work with him, he'll teach you the process and the mindset. So I did a quick program with Bill, and then Bill gave me the full pitch where, hey, do you want the four-year program for you know multiple six figures of an investment to get trained in this? And I talked to Sue, I tried to make it work financially, and right when we could do it, I signed on. So I think to me, I saw the vision, I saw that this could really take me to the next level. I saw the other advisors that were part of that cohort and really thought, hey, if they can do it, I can do it. You know, if Jim or Judy or Dan or Steve can have this level of success, you know, I think I have the raw material if I can put it together and be disciplined. Um, and it was huge. So that's when the business not only, you know, got off the ground, but really got to the next level and the next level and hiring more employees and team members and um upscaling. So yeah, very good decision. It was tough financially for a while, but it was totally worth it.

J.D. Pearring 15:30

Yeah, well, give us a pitch on coaching. Um because that you kind of downplayed how much that cost. It was, I guess it was more expensive than an MBA at USC. Is that true? Yes.

Scott Pearring 15:42

That's what you know, Bill giving us the pitch, he'd compare it to that. You want to spend 200 grand on this? You're gonna spend 240 grand on me, and look, I can look where you'll be. Um, so I'm just all in on coaching. I I think I always have been. I've always had that spirit. I'm a connector creative pioneer on the five voices. So I love to connect, love to create, and love to win to pioneer. Um, so it's it's always easy for me to see my gaps, my deficiencies, which is why coaching is such a no-brainer because it's like I see this gap, I don't know how on my own accord I'm gonna close that gap. So it's easy to surround myself with you know, people who are further down the road than me, more successful and older and wiser, to help me strategize to close that gap. And it's it's really worked. And for me, coaching is fun. I look forward to the weekly calls. You know, there's a level of accountability, it's encouraging, it's exciting. I'm also an extrovert, so it's fun to get on the phone with them and um toss some ideas around. So I've never looked back, and I can't recommend coaching highly enough. You know, finding someone you can drive with and setting up regular accountability calls has made a huge impact for me.

J.D. Pearring 17:04

$240,000.

Scott Pearring 17:07

And our net worth at the time was you know, like uh $26,000, and I'm signing this contract. You know, we didn't have a house, we didn't have much in savings, and I I inked it. It was it was a faith decision. But and it but there was an immediate result too, wasn't there? Immediate result, and it was totally seeing other people and thinking one of my favorite verses is uh this goes to the pioneer spirit of thinking, hey, if he can do it, I can do it. It's the verse from David uh who is this unclean Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God? Right. So I kind of think of that like, who is who is Dan or Mark or Bill to have this success when you know I have God on my side? And if this is God's plan, I'm not positive this is God's plan for me, but if this is God's plan for me to have this business and be able to bless others, like it's gonna happen. It's gonna happen for Mark, it's gonna happen for me. So I guess I always had that faith.

J.D. Pearring 18:09

Who is this unclean Philistine? Love it. Hey, I I was encouraged to ask you this question: how can I make enough money to be able to become one of your clients? Uh you're working with the high-end clients.

Scott Pearring 18:24

I don't know. I mean, if God went to bless this business, I don't I don't think I would have enough to to qualify. Um coaching is a big part of that, and then being the tortoise, not the hare, just one step in front of the other, making progress. I find being in successful groups really helps me being around peers. One of my coaching colleagues has this line that he says, as I get older, I pay more and more money to be in smaller and smaller groups. So this guy's convinced, as am I, that it's worth the investment to enroll in these coaching type programs where you're with other like-minded, successful business owners or ministry leaders, especially folks who are further down the road from you, where you could see, wow, if if he can do it, I can do it. Like I still have a it's a very small business. One of the my colleagues in my program, he has this digital marketing business that makes 33 million a year. And this guy's like my age, lives in Florida. So I'm looking at this, I'm like, how the heck did you build this to 33 million a year? It just totally blew my mind because that's so unusual. But seeing that it's possible, you know, opens that that light, that crevice in my mind where it's like, wow, you know, if Tyler can do this, I can do this. And whatever God has for me on the growth scale, you know, it's all possible.

J.D. Pearring 19:56

Wow, that's that's really encouraging.

Financial Therapy And Who He Helps

J.D. Pearring 19:58

And you're not, I mean, you're not necessarily a financial planner anymore. You do how tell us just a little bit about how you do your business.

Scott Pearring 20:05

It's mostly financial therapy now, is what I call it. So we help people who are struggling with any significant financial issue. So people come to us when there's a retirement question or a tax question, or they're moving, or they're trying to find out, figure out Social Security or Medicare, or update their will or trust. So any financial issue they're facing, we have folks on our team that specialize in that. So I have the initial complimentary one-hour meeting with them, and then I can point them in the right direction. So we see all sorts of stories, which is pretty cool. It's not just while we do more work for folks that are better off, we also help plenty of you know middle class, ordinary couples as well, right? They're just trying to kind of get retirement on track, they're trying to make their taxes more efficient. Um, so it's it's nice to be able to help a broader swath of the of the population.

J.D. Pearring 21:02

Okay, and um you uh you work primarily with believers?

Scott Pearring 21:08

Yes, yep, our client community is about 75% Christians. We have a couple Jewish, a couple uh Buddhists, a couple others in there, but it's mostly believers.

J.D. Pearring 21:19

And you're trying to help believers do a better job with their money and solve their problems. So exactly. What advice would you give us

The Money Mistakes People Miss

J.D. Pearring 21:27

financially? What are some things that like most people miss?

Scott Pearring 21:32

Good question. So having a coach is one, having clarity on your goals is two. So most people do not have a clear vision for their future. They've had many conversations with their spouse over breakfast or coffee about when are we going to retire and where are we gonna live and are we gonna pay off the house or not? But most people do not have a clear, let alone compelling vision on what they want their future to look like. So they can't have a plan to Get there because they're not clear on that. So my encouragement would be you know meet with someone who can maybe coach you and help you clarify what that vision for your future should look like. Um, yeah, so that that's the biggest thing. And then kind of the nuts and bolts behind that are spending. Most people have no idea how much they spend every month, and it's a chore to sort through, you know, 300 transactions to get to a bottom line number. So that's something a professional or software could help with. And lastly, not being on the same page with their spouse is something we see like almost every day, you know, different priorities, perspectives, goals, different mentalities. So um a coach can certainly help that kind of level set and align both spouses.

J.D. Pearring 22:53

Yeah, you had told me that you you kind of miss being uh speaking in all the different churches that you were in, and you're thinking about uh maybe wanting to get into churches again.

Scott Pearring 23:05

Yeah,

Unlocking Abundance For Believers

Scott Pearring 23:06

that's just I feel like some of my unique ability, I love that to help believers make better decisions. So the name of my business is Seek First. After Matthew, of course, Seek First the Kingdom. Our mission is to unlock abundance. So we believe Jesus calls us to an abundant life, and we believe there's an abundance of peace of mind and freedom and time and resources out there if you can unlock it. If if you don't, you know, the enemy runs rampant in the financial world as far as anxiety and worry and fear, and a lot of people are stuck there. So this vision of helping lots of believers unlock abundance so they can live a more impactful faith-based life is really exciting to me. And I'm exploring, you know, different ways of speaking to kind of get that message out there and see who it resonates with.

J.D. Pearring 23:57

So if a church wanted like an outsider like you to come in and just do a talk on finances, how do they get a hold of you?

Scott Pearring 24:04

Yeah, just reach out to me through my email or the website, um, seekfirstinc.com, inc.com. Um, yeah, happy to do that. Short talk, whatever. If there's an agenda, if they're doing a giving campaign or they want some talk on stewardship, happy to um align it that way too, or just overall helping folks kind of get on track financially. We know I heard the stat 83% of Americans have financial anxiety. That was a Capital One stat like two years ago. 83% of Americans have some type of financial anxiety in their life. So like the message is relevant because we all, myself included, deal with financial concerns and worries and questions. Um happy to help if that would be relevant.

J.D. Pearring 24:55

So you grew up the son of a church planting couple and uh realized uh the financial um anxiety is something we need to just get rid of because you saw a lot of it growing up.

Scott Pearring 25:08

Yeah, I saw a lot of it. The average American has a lot of it with credit card debts, it's just it's an issue and it's getting worse. And uh there aren't always clear solutions, or people don't always know who to trust and where to go. So yeah.

J.D. Pearring 25:25

Well, that's really cool that you're doing that. And uh you've helped us, uh, you've helped us a lot. We don't make a financial decision without calling Scott and saying, hey, should I buy the Diet Mountain Dew or the Mountain Dew Zero? Which should I which should I get? Hey, um last thing, last question. Uh, what's

Managing Leadership Anxiety

J.D. Pearring 25:43

a leadership tip? What leadership tip, you're talking about coaching, talking about some other stuff. What's a leadership tip you would give leaders out there?

Scott Pearring 25:49

Well, I'll tell you what I'm dealing with now myself, and maybe it's relevant for others, is managing my own what we call leadership anxiety. There's a book, maybe some folks have heard about it, Managing Leadership Anxiety by Stephen Cuss. He's a pastor. Um, so in the last six months, I've noticed some of the anxiety within me, similar to some giant tools on um self-preservations and what are you trying to hide and what are you trying to prove? So I've noticed that swell up in me. And it's funny because I would never consider myself anxious. I'm not socially anxious, I'm not depressed. Um, but I realized I have a good amount of like leadership anxiety, like wanting the meeting to be perfect, there's perfectionism rolled into that, there's like control. Um so my encouragement would be to explore that and see if that is relevant. If you're experiencing something like that, there's great solutions out there on you know getting clearer on your identity and bringing it back to who you are and kind of trusting God for the outcome. So that's that's been a current topic I've been wrestling with and have seen some cool fruit from that, kind of starting to break some of the chains that were below the surface that I wasn't aware of on the anxiety side.

J.D. Pearring 27:07

Wow, that's that's really cool. I'm gonna check that out. Well, um, thank you for being here. Thank you for not saying anything too bad about me. That was part of our agreement. Yeah, no, I love Excel.

Scott Pearring 27:18

I love the work you guys are doing. Even though it was hard for me to start my business, when I hear other church planners, I'm like, wow, I'm glad I don't have that job because that is harder than what I do. You know, it pays less, it's more stressful, you got more attacks. So, you know, I'm happy to be a lay leader and cheer you on from the sidelines.

J.D. Pearring 27:40

Wow. If you want uh any dirt on us, uh seek firstinc.com. And I told you he's like the smartest person I ever met. So thank you for being here, Scott. Appreciate it. Love you. I love you too. Great to see you.

Announcer 27:55

Thanks

Closing And How To Connect

Announcer 27:56

for joining the Leading Conversations Podcast. We hope that you found it both helpful and encouraging. At Excel Leadership Network, our focus is on the church planter rather than the church. If you'd like to find out more about us, visit our webpage at Excelnetwork.org. Don't forget to subscribe to this podcast so you don't miss any future episodes. See you next time with another leading conversation.