How Adam Coffey Turned $4M Into $14M and Built $2.5B in Business Exits
The Mike Litton Experience
Mike Litton
5.0 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 18 July 2025
⏱️ 73 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
What does it take to go from Army radar tech to building multi-billion-dollar businesses? In this unforgettable episode of The Mike Litton Experience, we sit down with Adam Coffey — 3-time CEO, private equity expert, and bestselling author of The Private Equity Playbook.
Adam reveals:
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How he became Soldier of the Year
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His rise from TV repairman to running GE divisions
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How he led 58 business acquisitions and exited with $2.5 billion
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The shocking moment that launched his CEO career
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His philosophy on risk, legacy, and the real truth about private equity
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What most entrepreneurs get wrong when it’s time to sell
This episode is packed with real-world advice for founders, CEOs, and anyone chasing success. You’ll walk away with tools, mindset shifts, and powerful business insights.
Don’t forget to subscribe to our channel, hit the bell, and follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and everywhere podcasts are found.
Learn more about Adam Coffey at adamcoffey.com
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | event. Give me my wheelbarrow full of gold and I'm going to go off and do something else. The |
| 0:06.0 | problem is they've spent their whole life doing this. Yeah. And they're going to have a non-compete. |
| 0:11.2 | So you know, you give them a wheelbarrow full of gold and they're back at square one. And I'm like, |
| 0:15.3 | why do that? You know, why do? And what do I do now? But I think predominantly for me it was the military provided an education. |
| 0:23.1 | The military forced me to grow up, discipline, teamwork, leadership. |
| 0:26.8 | And I was soldier in a year in in in 1984, which was a big deal. |
| 0:33.6 | And as a matter of fact, I remember when I got out of the service until that point, he's like, you know, what the hell are you doing as an engineer? |
| 0:40.9 | You know, I'm a guy in my 20s who is at a glass ceiling making six figures. |
| 0:47.6 | And, you know, I'm doing really well and, you know, starting to get into management and leadership. |
| 0:52.9 | And so he offered me a shot, a two-digit number plus your net worth as a two-digit number, |
| 1:00.7 | the percent of your net worth that's tied up in your company. |
| 1:04.1 | And so I'm 60. |
| 1:06.0 | And like most entrepreneurs, if they've got 80, 90 percent of their net worth tied up in their |
| 1:10.2 | company, you add those |
| 1:11.3 | two numbers together, you know, maybe it's 80 plus 60. That's 140. If it's over 130, too much risk. |
| 1:18.2 | Too much risk buried in your business. We want to sell it. Did you know there's a technology that's |
| 1:23.6 | actually an app on your phone that uses sound waves to tell your brain what you want |
| 1:28.0 | your brain to do. |
| 1:29.5 | We had a young man that was a guest on our podcast, the Mike Litton experience, who had a traumatic |
| 1:34.4 | brain injury. |
| 1:35.3 | He was sleeping three hours a night. |
| 1:37.3 | He's using Newcom now and he's sleeping more. |
... |
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