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The Kelly Roach Show

1130. From Drowning CEO to Visionary Leader: How John Briggs Scaled His Business with Faith, Family & Strategy

The Kelly Roach Show

Kelly Roach

Smallbusiness, Selfdevelopment, Confidence, Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneur, Personaldevelopment, Buildyourbusiness, Salessuccess, Improvementcourses, Business, Financialfreedom, Marketing, Personalgrowth, Salesgrowth, Wealth, Entrepreneurialsuccess, Sales

5928 Ratings

🗓️ 15 May 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

What does it really take to scale a business from 7 to 8 figures – without sacrificing your family, faith, or sanity?

In today’s powerful case study, Kelly sits down with longtime Legacy Leaders client, John Briggs, founder of a tax and accounting firm with over 250 team members. 

John opens up about his journey from overwhelmed entrepreneur to visionary CEO, how he grew his firm from $2.7M to $30M+, and how he used a combination of mindset shifts, strategic hiring, and unwavering values to build a thriving team-led company.

This episode is a masterclass in legacy-driven leadership for anyone who’s tired of being the bottleneck and ready to rise.

 


 

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

  • Why John was “drowning” at $2.7M—and the moment he knew something had to change

  • The single tool that changed everything (hint: it’s not flashy, but it’s foundational)

  • How John built a 250-person firm without becoming the golden handcuff boss

  • The power of letting go of control (without losing your vision)

  • Why every core hire might take 3-5 tries—and why that’s normal, not failure

  • How John shifted from technician to leader and built a faith-and-family-first empire

  • The importance of locking into your own vision—not the industry’s default model

  • How Legacy Leaders helped John move from fire-fighting to long-term focus

 


 

Timestamps:


02:30 - From private practice to 250+ team members
05:45 - The breaking point: working with a business psychologist
08:15 - Why success means nothing if you fail at home
11:20 - Drowning at $2.7M and not seeing a path forward
13:10 - Discovering the power of the 10x org chart
16:40 - Learning to trust others and delegate with confidence
20:55 - Letting go of guilt around failed hires
23:50 - Why most entrepreneurs quit right before the breakthrough
26:30 - Reframing success: It’s not about ease, it’s about capacity
29:00 - Advice for entrepreneurs at every level: it all starts with vision

Resources:

The Kelly Roach Show is your business podcast that gives you quick, actionable trainings for business growth, sales growth, and leadership. Kelly teaches about the entrepreneurial mindset and how to leverage building an unstoppable team with high performance strategies for rapid and sustainable business growth.

 

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Welcome to the Kelly Roach Show, the place for no fluff, easy to implement 20 minute or less

0:11.4

business and leadership lessons to help you build a sustainable business that scales.

0:17.3

Lead with integrity and create a lasting legacy.

0:21.7

I'm Kelly Roach, former NFL cheerleader and Fortune 500 executive turned eight-figure entrepreneur.

0:27.7

Let's get started.

0:29.2

Welcome back to the Kelly Roach show.

0:30.9

So today you are in for a special treat.

0:33.4

This is part of our series on doing deep-dive case studies seven and eight figure clients that are absolutely crushing it in the marketplace today.

0:43.5

A lot of you have asked what is actually working right now.

0:48.6

And so in one of our recent workshops, we did a deep dive interview with some of our top performing clients across

0:56.4

different industries, different markets and different price points so that we could not

1:00.9

just tell you what's working in the market today, but really unpack the nitty gritty details,

1:06.5

pull the curtain back, peel the onion back, and help you see what you can use in your business

1:11.7

to absolutely crush it.

1:13.2

Let's get started.

1:14.3

So I'm super excited to have John Briggs here with me today.

1:18.8

John has been one of our legacy leader clients for, is this year four, John?

1:23.1

I think we're going on year four.

1:24.9

I might be five.

1:26.3

Oh, my gosh.

1:29.5

It's like we grew up together or something,

1:34.6

you know? We're just stuck with each other. We're just stuck with each other. Well, John,

...

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