Unscripted Small Business Interview With Chad T. Jenkins
Unscripted Small Business Interview With Chad T. Jenkins
Chad T. Jenkins of SeedSpark on Collaboration, the VCR Formula, and the Fast Pass to Entrepreneurial Growth
Episode of the Unscripted Small Business Podcast | Host: Jeremy Rivera | Guest: Chad T. Jenkins, Founder of The CoLAB
“Stop trying to grow through effort. Start focusing on what you have, combining it with what others have, and ask one question: How do you want to split the outcome?” — Chad T. Jenkins
Meet Chad T. Jenkins
Jeremy Rivera: Hello and welcome to the Unscripted Small Business Podcast. I’m Jeremy Rivera and I’m here with Chad Jenkins, who’s going to introduce himself and his unique business model by focusing first on his life experience and business experience that should make us trust him as he explains what it is that he does.
Chad T. Jenkins: Awesome. Jeremy, it’s great to be with you this morning. Thanks for having me.
Jeremy Rivera: So tell me a little bit about your life experience, where you were that got you to where you are, and then introduce where you are now.
From Fence Posts to Fast Passes: A Childhood Built on Leverage
Chad T. Jenkins: I mean, I grew up in South Carolina on a small farm and I did stuff that you do on a small farm — dig post holes manually before we had a tractor with an auger and put up barbed wire fence. So it was me, horses and a bunch of land and trees. That was it.
But around eight years old, I felt like I should have been born in the middle of Manhattan because my mind moves pretty quick. I thought, goodness, I’ll never get out of here. And then all of a sudden, something really changed. I began to see all the resources that existed — not really as what they’re called or used for — but I had this burning question:
“How could I use what I see and combine it with something else and create value that somebody will pay me for?”
That question is one I’m still answering today. But it’s provided a decent amount of value.
Going to horse sales, there were a lot of people that wanted to sell horses. There were people that help you sell the horse — the auctioneer. And there were people that want to buy horses sitting in the stands. And if this little kid that looks like he’s probably eight to ten years old was riding a horse, most people in the stands thought that they also could ride it — which is not 100% true — but it would make them raise their hand.
So I figured out really quickly that everyone who wanted to sell horses, if they would let me ride their horse for ten or twenty dollars, they would actually get more for their horse. That was the first way that I figured out how to create value for others and get paid for it.
I took that cash and bought my first piece of real estate around eleven years old. I ended up selling it maybe twelve and a half and was able to double my money. And so I continued doing this — identify friction, understand what components exist that I could recombine.
Again, there’s nothing new on the planet. All we’re going to do is recombine what exists to create what we perceive as something new.
The Constant Question That Built a Business Empire
In high school I recognized there was a gentleman responsible for securing land for banks to build their branches on. Municipalities would require them to keep it mowed. Well, I had tractors on the farm. I had kids that went to school with me that could drive tractors — they just didn’t have the same constant question I was asking.
So I did it again. I recombined what already existed. We had trucks and trailers on the farm. We had tractors. I had kids that could drive them. And I had a gentleman who had a bunch of parcels around Charlotte, North Carolina that just needed to be bush-hogged. They’d get fines of $50 an hour. That was very attractive to a very young kid.
You’re starting to see the pattern, right?
Chad T. Jenkins: Beginning businesses — just over 50 or 55 of them over 25 years — they’re all the same exact program. I find friction in an existing industry. I do the same thing every time:
Wireless phones. Data centers. Construction. Plumbing. HVAC. Real estate investment. GPS leasing.
How do you take what already exists and recombine it to create value? And if you understand the depth of market from the value you just created, the old me would turn that into a business.
I figured out, understanding the definition coined by a gentleman in the late 1700s named John Baptiste Say, that the definition of an entrepreneur is someone who takes resources at this particular performance level and increases the performance of those resources.
When I play that backwards in my head, what it really means is: a true entrepreneur is someone who relentlessly seeks leverage.
Why Chad Stopped Starting Companies
Chad T. Jenkins: I began to recognize another pattern. When I looked at the P&L of any business I owned, I was netting 10 to 20%. I took on a lot of risk. I signed a lot of leases, built a lot of buildings, hired a lot of folks.
But I came to the realization that if I take all this risk and I’m going to net 10 to 20%, perhaps I would show up and contribute the best of what I have to give with someone else and create a collaboration — and could likely get 10 to 20% for the vision portion I contribute to the outcome. And I could forego all the extra overhead of HR, software development, financing…
I am part of this thing called Strategic Coach. Dan Sullivan, who is a good friend now, mentioned collaboration. And when he began to explain it, that’s what I’ve been doing since I was eight. All I’m doing is seeing the emergent that happens when you make two things collaborate.
I wrote it down — I still have it on a Remarkable — it was in Toronto when I wrote it:
“The next organization I create will be based upon collaboration. It will be building collaborations. And it will go global.”
That’s been about a year and seven or eight months ago. Since that time, we haven’t created any more companies. I took one of my existing organizations — SeedSpark — whose name has always been about growth and leverage. Seeds don’t do anything if they don’t collaborate with what’s already in the ground. If it doesn’t rain, the seed just sits there and doesn’t germinate.
Under SeedSpark I’ve created this thing called the CoLAB. With over 600 businesses represented in the CoLAB, it grows probably two to five a day. They’re here to collaborate. They’re here to contribute what they have and combine it with what you have to reach an outcome of growth that you never could by yourself. And everybody gets paid at the end.
In 25 years I started just over 50 companies. Now we’re just over 700 collaborations in just over a year and a half. I basically found the fast pass to the entrepreneur Disney ride.
“A true entrepreneur is someone who relentlessly seeks leverage. There’s nothing new on the planet — all we’re going to do is recombine what exists to create what we perceive as something new.” — Chad T. Jenkins
Two Kinds of Entrepreneurs – And One Answer For Both
Jeremy Rivera: I find entrepreneurship an interesting challenge because I think there’s probably two populations of people. Those who kind of have that crazy spot in their head of not fitting into the normal nine-to-five — and then there’s a second class of people who don’t know that there is an alternate option. Like they were raised and said, hey, you’re going to go to college, you’re going to get a job. Get a good job with health benefits. And then they get into it and they realize they’re suffering.
I talked to one guy at a buffet and it turned out that he had this huge idea for a restaurant. I said, why don’t you go do that? And he said, “I need a million dollars just to get started.”
I don’t think he really needed a million dollars. It was just a road bump he put up for himself to explain why he was at a company he hated, working for somebody that was paying him not nearly enough. So how do you address those two sides?
Chad T. Jenkins: For the folks that are listening — no matter which camp you fall into — the answer is the same.
The awareness that’s holding you back is you have a WHO deficiency.
I define WHO as an acronym: With Help of Others.
Let’s say that he started that restaurant and you and I exported the P&L from that restaurant. Every one of those things listed on the P&L are just collaborating with each other to create the outcome. It is just a math formula. That’s it.
The only thing that cash does — that proverbial million dollars — is pay for somebody’s vision or buy somebody else’s capability. What if he just let other entrepreneurs participate in the outcome of his $1 million per year improvement? At the end of the day, it’s all a collaboration.
The VCR Formula: Vision + Capability x Reach = Success
Chad T. Jenkins: I have a formula that a very good friend of mine coined — his name is Dean Jackson. It’s called the BCR Formula, or as I like to teach it, the VCR Formula:
Vision + Capability × Reach = Success
Vision — every human on the planet has ideas. The gentleman at the buffet did have an idea. He might not have vision clarity yet, but if he worked with someone to get there, he’d understand how to really formulate his unique value.
Capability — there are four types:
- Ownership: the capability you own (like a piano)
- Ability: your skill to use it (Elton John vs. me)
- Capacity: how much of it sits underutilized
- Cash: because with cash, the only thing you can do is pay for someone else’s vision or buy someone else’s capability
Reach — there are four types of reach:
- Access to Eyeballs — You may send out 3,000 invoices a month just to process them. Those are 3,000 pairs of eyeballs. That’s an asset.
- Access to Minds — Maybe you post on LinkedIn and people comment. That’s reach.
- Access to Hearts — Think Kylie Jenner and Kylie Cosmetics. She had 240 million followers. Her friend had the idea. Her friend’s dad ran one of the top cosmetics manufacturers in the world — who had excess capacity. When Kylie said “the lip kits are ready,” it broke the internet.
- DNA Level Reach — When you find a product or service that is so embedded in the market that it doesn’t exist without another entrepreneur’s component. That’s leverage at its deepest.
You can spend a bunch of time running ads, slowly getting people to know you, like you, and trust you. Or you can just have Kylie say the lip kits are ready
The Who Deficiency — And Why Most Entrepreneurs Stay Stuck
Chad T. Jenkins: Be attentive to the friction that you see. How many people listening to this have ever sat in a restaurant and their glass has gotten empty, and they’re running processes in their head about how the waitstaff could have done this better?
That right there is entrepreneurial thinking. We just haven’t been given a formula to harness it.
I wrote a little book called Friction Fuel. That friction is a leading indication for you of collaboration — that’s all. Because if you were to find that other entrepreneur and say, “Hey, I got a great idea,” and work out how you split the outcome, you’ll find that you don’t need to run down to the bank.
The biggest constraint that I see is that entrepreneurs are trying to grow from current forward versus future backward.
Future Backward Strategy: Celebrate First, Then Build
Chad T. Jenkins: I have a little tool called Future Backward. Basically what it walks you through is: you pick a time in the future — say December 15th — and you ask, where would you take us to dinner to celebrate?
Jeremy Rivera: I prefer eating steak at home.
Chad T. Jenkins: We’re going to come to your house and eat steak. When you think about what we’re celebrating — what would you be excited about? Double the revenue? 100%? 300%?
Now here’s the thing: I didn’t ask how many salespeople you have. I didn’t ask about leads. I just said: pick a future moment, and decide what we’re celebrating.
In the next portion of the tool, you have seats around your table. If you had the best possible people on the planet — which is what you have at your fingertips right now in the entrepreneur community — who would you need a seat for? Who do you need to combine with to make that outcome happen?
I realized in 2020 — right before COVID — that there’s likely an entrepreneur on the planet who already has the credit card number on file for every client I ever want to do business with. What if I just called them and said: “Hey, I got an idea. I’ll split the outcome with you for anybody who trusts you already.”
One question before we get started: How do you want to split the outcome?
“Vision + Capability × Reach = Success. Every human on the planet has all three. The question is whether you’re combining them intentionally.” — Chad T. Jenkins | SeedSpark VCR Formula
What SeedSpark’s CoLAB Actually Is
Jeremy Rivera: You’re looking at businesses from $2 million to $35 billion in annual revenue?
Chad T. Jenkins: Yes. The 600-plus businesses already represented in the CoLAB by SeedSpark range from two million a year to 35 billion. When I get introduced to entrepreneurs on a daily basis, they’ll tell me what the sign on the door is. Some even reference their email signature title. That’s wonderful. But I really want to know how you’re made unique.
I want to see you — and I do see you — as the exploded parts view. Like an IKEA instruction manual. You’ve got number 77 and number 123. And if you don’t have that screw, you’re taking a trip to Home Depot. What screws do you have that someone else is missing?
For me it is both: inspire the ones who are starting their journey and help the ones who’ve been on the journey a very long time. I meet entrepreneurs every day who are just tired. They’ve been on the hamster wheel. They’ve had some success, but when they do their planning, they’re simply trying to add 20-25% more revenue — always looking backwards, figuring out how much harder they can push. That’s effort, not growth.
Growth comes from combining what already exists.
How AI Fits Into the Collaboration Framework
Jeremy Rivera: I’ve had 120 conversations in the last year with SEOs, and entrepreneurs, and I find myself every session bringing up the elephant in the room of LLMs, Ai tools, GEO services and their appropriate role — both in the reach diagram and within the capability diagram.
In what ways do you see a misuse of this emerging technology? And in what ways do you encourage the utilization of these tools? My friend Matt Brooks of SEOTeric says: “It’s your most popular but LEAST TRAINED customer support representative”
Chad T. Jenkins: We have elevated beyond the task economy, but most of us have not gotten the memo. November 30th, three years ago — when they launched the first GPT — we began what I would classify as the Idea Economy.
For the last 200 years, we have perceived that value is created when a task is completed. Now I have robots working in every business I have. The task gets done in a fraction of the time.
I call my AI Colabra — because the CoLAB is the community, and Colabra is our proprietary AI that’s been developed on the LLM we’ve created.
If you had a PhD-level assistant in your pocket, 24 hours a day, for $20-25 a month — how often would you talk to them?
I’ll give you an example. A few weeks back I was asked to speak to Coca-Cola on AI. It slipped up on me — I was traveling. Around 3-4 in the morning, I remembered I was presenting to maybe 150-200 people later that day. I engaged Colabra, had a great conversation, and at the end said: “Create me a prompt to take to Genspark. I want this to be McKinsey or BCG level — done by someone with 15 years of senior design experience. And we’re going to present this to Google.”
I tweaked two slides out of 49. And we had more than 50% of the people engage afterwards.
If you’re not engaging AI for what it can do, yes — someone like me, who is empowered by AI, is coming for your job. Not because I’m coming after you. It’s that they made a better hammer. And if I were a carpenter, I’d buy it.
AI is not human. It doesn’t have feelings. It’s an algorithm. But goodness gracious, if they made a new hammer, I’d be the first one to buy one.
Jeremy Rivera: My interview with Zach Kadish, who worked at Conductor as head of SEO, said: “AI isn’t coming for your SEO job — but somebody who is using AI to do SEO is 100% coming for your job within the next year.”
These processes still need human intuition. They need the human connection element. Yes, you can generate 100 times more articles, but you still need the human sorting capability to choose which of those will resonate with your actual audience. That’s the combination — a collaboration of my experience with data, your business, its capability, and its reach. Here at SEO Arcade, we build authority through podcast content and link strategies that exactly follow this model.
Chad T. Jenkins: Yes, sir. Exactly.
“AI is not human. It doesn’t have feelings. It’s a tool — a better hammer. If they made a new hammer, I’d be the first one to buy one. That’s how I approach it.” — Chad T. Jenkins | SeedSpark
How to Split the Collaboration Pie
Jeremy Rivera: If you had a soapbox in front of America, what’s the one thing that would change their life?
Chad T. Jenkins: Stop trying to grow through effort. Start focusing on what you have, combining it with what others have, and ask one question:
How do you want to split the outcome?
My good friend Dean Jackson has a saying: always show up at the receiving dock, not the procurement office. All the money in any company is already spoken for. If there’s any additional dollars, the owner wants them. But future money is always up for grabs.
So if you show up with an idea that creates future value for someone — something that doesn’t cost their existing budget — how fast do they answer the door?
Business is not that complicated. It’s all value creation. You were made unique. Your business is unique. Focus on what you have and how you can create emergence when you combine with others.
How to Structure the Outcome Split
Jeremy Rivera: Let’s say I go to an agency and say: “I have a better way to build links. Your clients are spending too much and getting too little. I have something that works better.” What’s your methodology for cutting up that pie?
Chad T. Jenkins: Great question. Let me give you the advanced class.
If you take any P&L and map all the components to the three categories — Vision, Capability, and Reach — you’ll notice something:
- Vision (the idea) → typically earns 10-20% of the outcome. Because whoever came up with the idea — whoever owns that business and took all that risk — they’re netting what? 10 to 20 percent.
- Capability (doing the actual work) → typically 60-80% of the outcome. That maps directly to your P&L cost of goods.
- Reach (marketing, sales, relationships) → typically 10-20%. Look at your P&L line items: commissions, ad spend, sponsorships, vehicle wraps. That’s what you actually invest in reach.
So in your scenario — you’re bringing the vision [the idea of a better way to build links, something like the podcast-based link building at SEO Arcade]. You’re also bringing capability (the execution). They’re bringing reach (the client relationships).
You might expect to split 50/50 on the incremental outcome above baseline. Set the baseline first — what are they getting now? Everything above that baseline, when your service creates a lift — that’s the pie you split.
The first thing you do is name it. Go to SeedSpark’s tools — there’s a tool called Name the Baby. Two words that people use to describe the outcome after they receive it. Combined. Register the domain. Now you have intellectual property. Now you go find 25 or 50 other agencies by geography — East Coast, West Coast, Midwest — and before too long, you’re not in the conventional business that everybody else is.
“Show up at the receiving dock, not the procurement office. All the cash in any company is already spoken for — but future money is always up for grabs.” — Chad T. Jenkins | SeedSpark
Where to Find Chad Jenkins
Chad T. Jenkins: SeedSpark.com is the main hub. We have a Kickstarter event — you can register there — that runs twice a month. We’re very active on LinkedIn.
We also have CoLABcon coming up in October — the Super Bowl of collaboration. Hundreds of entrepreneurs come to Charlotte, North Carolina, and walk away with actual collaborations — not just conversations about collaboration.
And my new book, The Code to Collaboration, is available for preorder now on Amazon.
Jeremy Rivera: Thanks so much for your time. I’ve had 120 conversations this year with SEOs and entrepreneurs, and this conversation has definitely been unique and standout. I appreciate your perspective.
Chad T. Jenkins: My main goal is that everybody gets value. I really appreciate the time today. I’ve enjoyed our chat.
“Show up at the receiving dock, not the procurement office. All the cash in any company is already spoken for — but future money is always up for grabs.” — Chad T. Jenkins | SeedSpark
Key Takeaways
- The WHO Deficiency is the #1 blocker for entrepreneurs. Most people trying to grow — whether brand new or 20 years in — are failing to identify the right With Help of Others partners who already have the vision clarity, capability, or reach they need. The gap isn’t capital; it’s collaboration.
- The VCR Formula (Vision + Capability × Reach = Success) maps to your P&L. Every line item on your P&L is already an example of accidental collaboration. When you engineer it intentionally — knowing who contributes vision (10-20%), capability (60-80%), and reach (10-20%) — you can structure equitable outcome splits and grow non-linearly.
- Future Backward beats Current Forward every time. Instead of planning from your current constraints outward, pick a celebration date and work backwards: What would we celebrate? Who needs a seat at the table to make it happen? You immediately bypass existing resource limitations and start thinking in terms of collaborators.
- AI is a capability tool, not a threat — but only if you treat it as the PhD-level assistant it is. The entrepreneurs who will be displaced are those who refuse to embrace AI as a tool; those who will thrive are those who combine their irreplaceable human vision and relationship reach with AI’s speed and scale. The future of SEO leveraging AI writing tools is already here — and those who ignore it are falling behind.
