Fighting Off The 'Should Gremlins' | Rob Taylor (Dad of 4, Coach, Founder of Dads in Business)

[00:00:00] Rob: Is it a surprise we're feeling so much guilt when if you're employed, you have to be in a place. If you work for yourself, you have to keep pushing.

Something has to give somewhere. So it's not surprising for me men in particular are feeling. Overwhelmed, they're feeling guilt, which then leads to shame, which then leads to loneliness. And it's just, it's a real vicious cycle. And I wish people had catched themselves when they say what people should be doing and shouldn't be doing.

So if you want to live like that's cool, but maybe it's not right for us.

[00:00:31] Adam: Welcome to Startup Dad, the podcast where we dive deep into the lives of dads who are also leaders in the world of startups and business. I'm your host, Adam Fishman. In today's conversation, I sat down with Rob Taylor. Rob is a growth and sales advisor and the founder of Dads in Business. Dads in Business is a supportive network of content, resources, and community to help busy dads better manage themselves, their family, and their business.

And to generally help them do better. Rob is also a husband and the father of four kids, including a newborn. In our conversation today, we spoke about balance, boundaries and how they don't teach dad in school. I learned about Rob's journey to create Dads In Business and how he felt quite alone after becoming a dad for the first time. We talked about the concept of should gremlins, those things that make you feel inadequate or guilty and how to manage them. Where dads can learn about fatherhood with such limited resources available and some of the most impactful conversations and advice he's received on the Dads In Business show.

I hope you enjoy today's conversation with Rob Taylor.

I would like to welcome Rob Taylor to the Startup Dad podcast. Rob, thanks for joining me today.

[00:01:53] Rob: Hey, Adam, thanks for having me. It's a, It's a pleasure to join you from all the way across the pond.

[00:01:57] Adam: You may be only my second or third British guest. So this is a very big honor across 60 or 70 episodes. But yeah, I mean, I'm excited to have you here. I wanted to jump right off, you know, some folks who are listening to this may not have heard about you or dads in business. And so tell me a little bit more about your professional background and what you've been doing to help dads out.

[00:02:23] Rob: Yeah, sure. So, I guess Dad's In Business as a concept, as a project is, well, first and foremost, to help me out as well. Cause was probably the first in my social circle to have kids. This is going a bit back now. My oldest is 10. So this is how long I've been sort of toying with I guess conversation about being a dad.

I noticed that there wasn't really anywhere to go and talk. There wasn't really anywhere to go and socialize what it's like, being the first thing, you know, your sort of social circle to have a dad. It was just like, right, I'm going to carry on regardless. This kid has happened to me. It's something that happened to me rather than, you know, what we grow through, if you like, even though we wanted the children and stuff, it was kind of like, as a bloke, it was very much had to just carry on and get on with it and carry on regardless.

At the time I was still employed rather than self employed. And here in the UK, we get two weeks maternity leave, two weeks off. And I always remember going back to work for the first time I worked in the events industry. So it's quite social. A lot of late night working, shifts all over the place.

I always remember my first day going back and my boss and colleagues looked at me at the time. And it was like, have you got a nice time off? I thought, oh, that was off. Well, that was interesting. Because you know, you don't realize, I certainly didn't realize until a few weeks down the line that, that life changes irreversibly when you have kids.

And I don't think anyone prepares you for that particularly. My dad passed away when I was 20, 21, which probably plays out a little bit in in my approach to things moving forward but move forward into working for myself. I had my 10 year old who was two at the time, and my wife was pregnant with our second and I got made redundant which was a bit of a kick in the teeth, to be honest, when you're charging ahead, trying to work and work and provide and play that role.

So there was roles playing out. I have to be the man to provide. And then someone said, well, we don't need you at work anymore. So we're selling the business and making you redundant. And that kind of pulled the rug from under my feet a little bit. And my wife. You know, we were just finding our feet with a growing family.

And I thought, right, well, that's that I'm going to figure it out on my own. And I kind of put my line in the sand and said, that's that never again, while I'll be told I'm not good enough and I'm going to go and do it myself. I didn't know what that was at the time. It was very much. I'm going to go and do it myself, but what is it?

So figuring out how to pay next month's bills became a very quick arriving priority it was very much a burning platform in that case. But you muddle through and get there a week in front and a month in front anything right now. I've got three months ahead of myself. This is great nice one what I didn't realize at the time because I didn't look sideways or backwards was kind of well I've just been saying yes to everything.

Just been saying, yes, yes, yes, yes. I'll do this because work's my role and money's my role. And busy is a measure of success. I don't know if you guys hear the same thing about how busy you are becomes the measure of how successful you are. So I was saying yes to everything with work, whether it was creating opportunities or not but I was busy.

I could go back home and tell the missus how busy I was, but the missus wasn't particularly too grateful that I'd not been home for bedtime five nights in a week, or I've not been home for tea or dinner with the kids. So I remember going to a session ironically on a Thursday evening when I probably should have been at home and a colleague of mine at the time, a professional men's development coach, was doing a session around burnout.

It's like how to spot the signs of burnout. And I was, I found myself nodding along to every point on the screen thinking, that's me, that sounds like me. Oh dear. Oh dear. Maybe I need to take a pause and find out where I'm going wrong and why. And I did that and I kind of thought, well, it can't just be me.

It can't just be me that sort of struggling with the work responsibilities, getting told you need to be at home, knowing what the budget is for the household. Is anyone talking about this? I was like, well, who's there to help? And what I found was there was a lot of health service provision for those who really need help, which is great, absolutely wonderful that that service exists, but I found there was a big gap from people who either don't speak about anything and say they're fine and hopefully they are, to the wheels have come off on a professional intervention and there was nothing really in between. And I thought, well, why aren't we just talking about this? So I started writing blogs about a bit around my journey and things I'm learning and figuring out as I go. And then I started doing that on YouTube with other guests around parental support specifically for dads.

What can dads do? Money management, boundaries, positive psychology, all the sort of stuff and practical things that a man and a dad can actually do something with because I find a lot of conversation around the wellbeing space. Adam is very, it's quite wishy washy. Do you understand the phrase wishy washy?

[00:07:32] Adam: Oh, I do. I do.

[00:07:35] Rob: It can become a bit meaningless. And I found if sessions or if events or spaces were created around mental health support or wellbeing, I'd go to one. And if there were women there and there were people in a worse position than I was, I'd just sit quiet. And feel like that place isn't for me. So I started opening up sessions locally where I'm in Sheffield in the UK.

Just for dads. Like, oh, if you're a dad and you're ambitious, you're at work and you're trying to figure out how you can juggle all these plates, it's tough. Isn't it? Well, let's just get together and have an atta cause male loneliness is an issue. Dad loneliness is an issue. And I don't think until someone does something about it, it's going to get any better because we're all just blokes at the end of the day and nothing will get done.

So, so Dad's In Business is there to to try and inspire a bit of conversation. We have a strapline where we aim to help busy working dads bring the best of themselves to home and to work through self study, conversation, articles, resources. Going to workplaces and helping create that conversation there as well.

So there's lots going on. There's other great people like yourself doing stuff as well. What I don't do is profess to tell people how to be a dad. Cause I don't really know that myself. It's more about just creating a conversation and meeting great people like yourself and get the conversation going.

[00:09:01] Adam: That's awesome. And I'm so glad that there are folks like you doing this work. And I think what's really Interesting about what you just said is that huge cavernous gap between people who tell you that everything's fine and just go about their day. And they're kind of tucking a bunch of things under the rug and people who have completely fallen off the cliff and need professional help.

And there is a really wide, you know, middle ground there. So that you don't end up on that one side of the spectrum or the other. So I'm really glad that Dad's In Business exists and you have a book too. Did you write something called the Book Of Dad?

[00:09:39] Rob: So what that is, is on a holiday, actually a couple of, probably two years ago that you're going to figure out how my mind works now. And it can be a little, it can be a little left of center. So I'll explain how I got there. So the book of dad, we figured out from our work that we were doing with employers, we collect feedback and polls and figure out what's going on with the folks that we speak to.

We found out that all sort of contributions from the spaces we were holding, were falling into four broad categories. So broadly speaking, dad life is made up of your work life. It's made up of your money life. It's made up of your family life and relationships, and it's made up of your self life. You. Usually it's the self that goes first, you know, you'll find yourself saying things that I used to do that, or I remember when I did that. It's a warning sign that we're probably forgetting ourselves a little bit. I certainly fell into that trap. So we find out that the feedback falls into those four buckets.

Now on my holiday, I thought, well, those four buckets. Okay. What's a year. If I want to create a year's worth of content, that's 52. 52 weeks divided by four is 13. Oh, okay. That's interesting. So I could write 13 specific challenges if you like, or topics relating to each of the four. And then suddenly we've got 13 weeks focused on work, 13 weeks focused on money, 13 on relationships and 13 on yourself.

And I thought, well, okay, well, if that's just a journal saying, go and do something, it doesn't really mean anything. So, so what I did on my holiday that I mentioned a couple of years ago is I wrote my application to it, to each of the 52. I was great fun on that holiday. I, I wrote 52 almost like one pages explaining what that challenge or what that topic meant to me, because what I didn't want it to be is like, go and do this and you'll be just fine. It's like, well, it has to be relevant to me because I've lived it. So let's just get it out of my head and onto the paper. So from that became the Book Of Dad, which is as close to a journal as you get. Again, I find journaling sometimes a bit challenging for people to get into because it goes back to that mindfulness thing, which can become one of those wishy washy things.

But I think it's related to a topic to focus on that week. It becomes something very tangible and you can measure it afterwards. So there's the Book Of Dad journal that exists. And then I told you, I think strangely sometimes I thought it was 52 challenges is there. There's 52 cards in a deck of cards.

So I'll make it as like a gamification as well. So, so there's also a Deck Of Dad, which is almost conversation starters, which is kind of inspired from my eldest during COVID because we were lucky at that respect that we had the best summer. In 2020, it was wonderful summer. And we were fortunate as well.

Like we had a garden at the time, just a little garden at the back of our house. And my oldest at the time, I remember it ever so well, he'd go out and he'd set his little table up in his two small chairs and say, right, dad, I want to ask you anything, I was like, okay. And he did this off his own bat. I was like, and it became a daily thing where we'd sit in the afternoon to break the afternoon up for 10 minutes.

He could ask me anything and I'd answer it. And then, yeah, that moving forward was like the inspiration to the deck and to the book, because there's topics in there that probably will not get spoken about. We might think about, but don't really focus any time and energy on. So, so yeah, that’s where we’re at.

[00:13:07] Adam: What's an example of something that your oldest son asked you at that table?

[00:13:13] Rob: Do you know, he didn't go down the birds and the bees route or anything like that, which…

[00:13:17] Adam: I'm just very curious about, well, he was, he must have been what, about

[00:13:21] Rob: Five or six, I think, like that he showed a lot of interest in when I was his age, I remember him asking about. He was dead into the WWF, so WWE a few years back. So he'd ask me questions about who was your favorite wrestler? Have you seen them live? Where did you go? What did you do? Why do you do what you do for work?

What do you do for work? Who do you talk to about work? And they're just like genuine curiosity things that it was pulling out. And he'd sit there with a glass of water and be like, that's interesting. That's interesting. And go again and again. This is. It's kind of cool.

[00:13:53] Adam: I love that. I love that.

[00:13:56] Rob: Luckily he didn't ask anything too risque. It was more curious about what his dad's doing. It was good fun.

[00:14:01] Adam: I love that. That's amazing. All right. So I wanted to ask you about your family. So you have a partner, you've a wife and four kids and you are the proud father of a relatively newborn. You've got a seven week old which is why we're doing this show now and not seven weeks ago.

[00:14:19] Rob: Thank you for rescheduling, by the way.

[00:14:21] Adam: No problem. I'm glad you're on the mend. Yeah, when you have four kids, you just, your house is just like a hurricane of illness. So I'm glad that you're better now. Well tell me how you met your wife and tell me a little bit about your kids.

[00:14:36] Rob: We've been together 20 years now, which we've been together 20 years and we've been married for 12, 13 this year.

[00:14:46] Adam: Okay.

[00:14:47] Rob: I knew of her in school, but didn't know her in school. And then just, I think, what was I? So I must've been near 20 when we get together.

Yeah. So a 20 year old in a local pub, she just passed by one of the bandit gaming machines and I bought her a Budweiser and the rest, I guess is history and we've just, yeah, we've just gone on great ever since. You know, 20 years is a long time. It's half my life now. And we've been with a person that's crazy.

And then we started with our family at 29. Yeah, I'll have been 29 cause I always wanted to be a youngish dad. I guess probably cause mine went when I was 20 and there's probably some connection to that. But I was like, all right, now I want to be a young dad, get involved and get stuck in, play football with them, soccer with them as they grow up and really get involved with that.

And yeah, second came along and I thought, cool, I'm happy with my lot. Now I've got my two boys, good stuff. And then things happen and surprises happen.

[00:15:45] Adam: Things happened.That’s how #3 and #4 came about.

[00:15:47] Rob: Yeah, yeah, no, I must've been involved. So I must take half responsibility for this, but yeah guess my wife probably deep down, not too deep down would have liked a girl, but to be honest, I'm kind of glad we've got boys.

I think. They're all boys by the way, all four of them are boys. I think if a girl would have been introduced, it would have really made the dynamic different. And as we were saying, just before we hit record, I mean, what they're doing is really finding their feet. And they're sorting their roles out now, you know, even the.

The third one, I'm still getting used to saying that the third one who was the young is now also a big brother and he's loving that role. He just turned six. And he's loving that role. And who was the middle one is now a big brother twice. So it just really changes what goes on in their world as well.

[00:16:36] Adam: Your wife is a special education teaching assistant. Is that right?

[00:16:41] Rob: It's interesting, isn't it? She's naturally gravitates to helping kids, but then stresses out with her own. It's very,

[00:16:47] Adam: I mean, that's the story of my life.

[00:16:49] Rob: Yeah. So she's so good with empathy and care of other people’s, not that she isn't at home, but with other people's kids.

So it's a natural fit for her, really. I think. She really wanted to find a role at a job that I guess made her feel like she was achieving something, doing something. And I think care and teaching assistant is what is one of those things that she thrives and she loves it. Because before that she was just working for her mom and dad doing bits and bobs, not really bothered about it and just finding herself bored.

Yeah, this new challenge is exciting for her. She'd been doing it a couple of years now. But yeah, she loves it. Helps a lot of kids out and the feedback she gets from the kid’s parents is important and it's good, but I think she absolutely loves it when kids who have difficulties recognize her as their help their person, their go to, so it's quite, it must be so rewarding for her.

It's like, yeah, really quite exciting.

[00:17:50] Adam: What was the decision making process around getting to four kids or was that something where you were just like, oh, well, I guess we're having four kids now?

As someone who only has two. I'm always very curious about somebody who's doubled me up on the number of kids that they have. So,

[00:18:08] Rob: Yeah. Well, I was a hard no on number four. But you know, she. Yeah, wanted it a heck of a lot more. She wanted to go around that, that rodeo once more. And yeah, I, the law of averages suggest if you don't do anything about it, it's going to happen eventually. And it did. So it was not an easy thing.

It caused friction. It caused a lot of upheaval because it was something that she did desperately want to do again. Which to be honest, I desperately didn't want to do again. So there were opposite magnets in that case. But now he's here, he's good. We're settling and we're finding our feet and we're doing our thing and finding our roles again, I think, and finding a.

[00:18:52] Adam: Yeah.

[00:18:52] Rob: Our own place in the family it's going to come a time where we have to find our place with each other as well, because it you know, it's like with two is so time consuming. So demanding, even as they grow up more you know, my oldest is 10 commands so much of my time. It's like my shadow football training, playing football, going to the football.

The other two swimming lessons, swimming lessons, school drops. It's just, it's the things you have to do, isn't it? And

[00:19:21] Adam: Yeah,

[00:19:22] Rob: There's four of them. There's no economy of scale. 

Adam:It’s actually diseconomy of scale, it’s the opposite

Rob:Yeah, it multiplies. it doesn't dilute. So, yeah, so yeah, the conversation was was challenging. Not an easy one cause I was happy with where we were.

But you know, now, like I said, now he's here, she's seemed more at peace with things and yeah, we're good. I think it was a good idea.

[00:19:48] Adam: So one of the concepts that I learned about our prep for this show is the “should” gremlins which I, Have no idea what the "should” gremlins are, but I'm fascinated by this term. So tell me what are the “should” gremlins and what does this have to do with parenting?

[00:20:06] Rob: Yea, so, so I really like this concept. And it comes from a place where we were doing our own research and secretary research around what's going on with dads what we're thinking, what we're feeling and guilt kept coming up as a common theme. I feel guilty when I'm at work, I feel guilty when I'm at home, I feel guilty cause I'm tired I feel guilt when I'm shouting at the kids, I feel guilt cause I don't earn enough money.

I feel guilt here, guilt, everything was just like playing into this guilt. And I could sort of resonate with that and I thought, okay, that's interesting. Is it, where's it coming from? And I just thought, well. It comes from so many external places, because this is where I coined the phrase the “should” gremlins because for example you go up to the playground on school drop off or school pick up or my wife would be up there while I'm at work and hear things like, oh Rob should really be home in time for dinner more or Rob really should make an effort and do some more school drop offs, or the kids really shouldn't be on iPads that much, or the kids really should be doing more maths, or Rob really should be earning more money. And these things genuinely get said, they'll genuinely get put on WhatsApp groups.

Everyone voices their opinion. And what I found from these, these little gremlins in my ear, where - I'm living my life to what everyone else says I should be doing. And it's not what I've agreed and built expectations around with the one that matters and that's my wife. You're playing it out for everyone else's existence.

They should be doing this. Shouldn't be doing that. Should go here, should go there. And that is for me is what creates a lot of guilt. He shouldn't be working so hard. He should work harder. It's like, well, who do I listen to? I'm either doing too much or I'm not doing enough. Like you should be earning more money.

You should be able to take a holiday. You should be doing this, but then you should also be back for lunchtime school, pick up school, drop off. It's like, well, is it a surprise we're feeling so much guilt when if you're employed, you have to be in a place. If you work for yourself, you have to keep pushing.

Something has to give somewhere. So it's not surprising for me that men in particular are feeling overwhelmed, they're feeling guilt, which then leads to shame, which then leads to loneliness. And it's just, it's a real vicious cycle. And I wish people had catched themselves when they say what people should be doing and shouldn't be doing.

So if you want to live like that's cool, but maybe it's not right for us. So that's where the “should” gremlins come from, the little menaces.

[00:22:36] Adam: Yeah, I imagine these like little, little “should” gremlins like dancing around on the tabletop or something like that. This is an image that I have to go ask chatGPT to make it for me. Um, what, what do you do to combat the should gremlins Cause you know, they never stop.

Right. So you have to always keep them at bay. What has worked for you to combat that?

[00:22:59] Rob: So you can't stop them. But I think what, it's not something I've perfected because yeah, I still get the guilt. Oh, people are saying, I shouldn't be doing this. Oh my God, they say I should be somewhere else.

It happens still. But for me, it's about working with those that are closest to you at home. I think when I purposely sat down with the missus, the wife and said, what do we need to achieve? What do we need to do? Do we know what our budgets are? Do we know what our financial needs are of the house? Do you know what I want to achieve in business or travel or wherever, do you know what that is? What do you want to achieve? And then how can we work together to do it? It's not okay. Well, have to be grownups about it and think, well, there's going to be seasonal pressures around work. For example, you know, you might be really busy in the autumn and winter. Okay, great. That means there's going to be implications on you at home that I'm not going to be around as much, but here's the reason why, and it's not just getting busy for busy sake.

It's understanding that your demand at work might peak and trough, but if you're saying, okay, well, I'm going to be a way more here at the peak. When there's a trough, I will aim to do school pick up three times a week, once a week, even. Does that make sense as an agreement between us? And I think if we can sit down and actually agree what as a unit we need to do, we know what's expected of me.

We know what's expected of the other half. And if we're then moving on together, those little shoulds that happen outside that we can't stop, they become less noisy and less I guess less meaningful because if all we're doing is going about our work here, but I'm busy. And if everyone doesn't understand that's their fault.

And then the wife or your partner's here going, well, where is he? Which he's never around. Perhaps if you just speak and say, okay, this is what I want to do. This is what you want to do. This is what we need to do. How can we figure it all out? And I'll almost run it like it's own little business in a way.

Yeah. This is your own enterprise. What are you going to do with it? Set your own rules.

[00:25:07] Adam: You're living by mutual expectations of you and your partner, as opposed to the expectations that other people have of you. And you can sort of, if you're aligned between the two of you, what you need for your family. You can tune out all the “should” gremlins that people are lobbing in your direction

[00:25:25] Rob: Yeah. To a point. Yeah. I mean, again, I just, I'm not going to lie and tell people I'm perfect with it. I've, yeah. When people's certain people say certain things, they own. Yeah. Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I should be doing something else, but then just try and connect it back to your own goals and expectations.

And then it gets a heck of a lot easier.

[00:25:44] Adam: Yeah. What's the earliest memory that you have after becoming a dad?

[00:25:50] Rob: Probably the fear of what the heck do I do now? What on earth is this? I just, yeah I think my first born was, he arrived late evening. So I think the missus stayed in the hospital with him. So I remember driving home.

It was April. It was very foggy and it was dead in the night. And I remember driving home a little bit stunned. So I put some music on really loud. I can remember the CD or I put some music on really loud, got back and my mom were there looking after the house.

And we had a bottle of champagne between us and I thought, I don't know what's going on, but I'm just going to go with it, see what happens. And yeah, just, I think that sense of the world's changed, was just crazy. I think in hindsight, probably a little numbness to it as well. Probably like, I don't know what this is.

I don't know how I'm supposed to do it. No one's shown me what to do. Just get on with it. But yeah, I think that just sense of, oh my God. What do I do now? Was probably my first memory, which I won't tell my oldest.

[00:26:58] Adam: Or your youngest, don't tell either of them.

[00:27:02] Rob: Yeah.

[00:27:02] Adam: Well, that's actually a really interesting segway into another thing that we taught that we sort of talk about in the prep, which is, you mentioned this concept, they don't teach dad in school. And this sort of dovetails with this earliest memory you have of like, well, what the hell do I do now?

There's no instruction manual. They didn't teach me this. There's like no pamphlet. I mean, there's a pamphlet, but it's pretty useless. So what does it mean to you that they don't teach dad in school? And I have a feeling this is some of the genesis of Dads In Business and what you do.

[00:27:37] Rob: A little bit. Yeah. Cause I often find that I don't know what it's like in the States, but I often find that dads or new dads are often painted out to be this buffoon, this like, oh, this clumsy, this clumsy thing. Oh, dads are in the way again. Move out. Let the moms do the job. And I do think there is a massive gap in preparing someone to be a dad.

An example. I mean, you mentioned, oh, there's no pamphlet for it. We went to antenatal classes. I'm not sure if you call them the same in the States but sessions that you go to, to prepare the woman for giving birth.

[00:28:13] Adam: Yeah, we call them Birthing classes in the States, but yeah, same, thing.

[00:28:17] Rob: Yeah, yeah, but something similar, something similar. And we went along and husbands and partners are invited and encouraged.

And I thought, okay, I will go give it a try. I'm the eager new dad. Let's go and see what they do. And it was basically an hour and a half of breastfeeding propaganda. And it was just like, you must breastfeed. You're a poor parent. If you don't breastfeed, you need to breastfeed. If they cry and cry and cry, you must not stop.

You must do this. This is insane. And they even, and this is where we, I think we sat the first session to the end out of politeness for the person hosting it, they gave me a knitted boob and said, this is how you breastfeed. And I just thought, this is insane. This is that. Insanity, I show me something I can do is that I can't do this.

What can I actually do? And we left and didn't go back for day two. And so I asked, it's just not always that it's just not very good. And ever since then, I've just been thinking about where does a new dad turn to, to prepare? What would have been helpful. You know, yeah. The man always decorates the bedroom and builds the cot.

Okay. But what else? Yeah. What else can they do? Are they getting their house in order? Are they getting their finances in order? Are they getting the agreements and expectations with the partner in check? Do they know how much time they're going to take off work? Do they know what they're going to do with their careers?

What do they want to achieve from being a parent? What type of dad do they want to be? Not this sort of preparing, oh, go and paint a wall, but preparing mentally, preparing your mindset, because as I mentioned, I was the first out of my circle pretty much to, to have kids, so I couldn't borrow off anyone.

I couldn't say, what did you do here? It was. You're on your own kid. Off you go, figure it out. I just think - I haven't got the answer for what that looks like yet, but I can't help think that there's, there is something missing You know, yes. The women are abso, they're, they're pushing a human out they deserve all the credit and support and everything that they get.

But that doesn't negate dads, it should be a provision of something there. And have you seen anything, Adam, that exists around that preparing to be, or is it a gap that only I can see?

[00:30:36] Adam: No, it's definitely a gap. You're right. I've talked to maybe one dad on this program. Dan Doty who is working on something about this called Fatherhood Ready. And it is basically an instruction manual for dads, I mean, not quite literally, but he's working on this concept of like, what can you give dads to prepare for fatherhood?

But it's new, you know, it's a brand new project. So no, I don't think that there's a lot that exists.

[00:31:05] Rob: That's it's crazy, isn't it? Yeah, it's unbelievable. One thing I've Sort of dabbling with, again, it's in the very, very early stages is like some sort of quiz survey focus to see what type of dad you might be.

Because do you know, I mentioned about the four buckets the work, the money, the life and the self.

I don't think any of those is wrong to, to be a priority or your lens at life. You know, I look at my life probably through the work lens first. Because I'm self employed, it dominates a lot of my time and I'm quite ambitious and I want to test myself. So, so that's probably my lens on life.

There's other people that I know where family is probably their lens on life. They'll sacrifice everything else to do this first. I don't think any of those are wrong. But I don't think any of them are fully understood and I think we try and shoehorn ourselves into what a dad should be based on perception, stigma, society, what people say a dad should be.

And just something I'm toying with very early days is that assessment to almost identify what type of dad you might be? Because I didn't know, and if someone would have helped me identify that would have been really helpful because I'm trying to shoo myself into this. I'm the perfect dad and I'm home for dinner every day.

And I do the school run, the school drop. There's some of that stuff I just don't enjoy doing. I do my share of it, but my priority, my fun, my engagement, I'm a better dad. If I could focus over here as well.

And I think therefore we sacrifice things without realizing we should be sacrificing we're focusing on the wrong thing.

And I think if someone prepped me to think, well, okay, answer these 30 scenarios, scenario A is this, what's your response to that? And each of the responses is. A work response, a money response, a family response, or a a self response, it helps you understand more how you're going to be moving forwards, but not only you, your partner as well, because they'll understand what makes you tick.

What might risk causing upset and stress because this is world changing thing happening. I need to know where I'm attacking it from. I think that will be really helpful for people to, to get a grip on.

[00:33:19] Adam: Well, I can't wait for you to release the quiz of dad, it's coming.

[00:33:25] Rob: We'll see. It's still, it's still a lot of work, but we'll see. We'll get there.

[00:33:29] Adam: Yeah. No, I love that concept. If we can do scientifically valid you know, personality assessments and things like that. We can certainly do this for fatherhood. So, I wanted to ask you because they don't teach dad in school. What's One of the more surprising things that you discovered after becoming a dad, or maybe it's after having a second or a third or your fourth kid? But I'm curious what's one where you were like, oh, didn't see that coming.

[00:33:57] Rob: I think the night times are incredibly hard. One of the hardest things is a screaming child in the night. There's something about the dead of night and how it can create huge anxieties and stress and anger. I've just never gelled with it at all. I thought people joke about, oh it's, it's going to be hard when you're getting up at night.

I don't think anything can prepare you for that. like torture. When they do not stop, it's like what he's fed, he's been to the toilet, he's winded and he still won't stop. It's like, what on earth do we do now? That was probably the most, oh my God moment. This is very real. This is our responsibility for at least 18 years. And we are are, maybe 21 where you are.

[00:34:43] Adam: Hopefully, at age 18, they're not still crying and coming to your room, but maybe, you know, maybe I don't know.

Rob: And hopefully they figured the toilet out as well.

Adam:That's right. But, you know, that's real. I remember with our kids, neither one of our kids were very good sleepers when they were really young and we would be up all night with them trying to get them to sleep. And the sun would start to go down and we would kind of get this anxiety, like, oh.

The night is coming again and we know what that's going to entail and it's going to entail not sleeping one or both of us. Yeah, there was like a huge anxiety around that. And we eventually made it through. We did.

[00:35:26] Rob: That's interesting. They have that sense of dread. It's not even the. It's not even the being woke up. It's the anxiety before you even go to bed, knowing that you're going to get woken up. Yeah. That looming dread of sunset. It used to be such a nice thing before you had kids where you could sit down and have a glass of wine or something and chill out.

Adam: Nope

Rob: Not anymore.

[00:35:47] Adam: Changing topics for just a second, you've interviewed a lot of dads for your YouTube show. And I'm curious if you could share with me and our listeners some of the more popular or impactful content or conversations that you've had on the show.

[00:36:07] Rob: Yeah. So the podcast video series, sort of came about because I was trying to write about things that I wouldn't. I wasn't an expert on, I couldn't help. I couldn't answer it. So I thought, okay, well, who can help? And the power of LinkedIn and social media and networks meant that I could almost search for a topic that was irritating me at the time, go and find an expert about it, and talk to them. Whether that's an expert in, I use the term expert loosely.

A lot of the people don't like to be called experts an expert in business. So for example, one of my favorite guests early on was a chap called Matt Smith. He was on a TV program. I was watching at the time called Undercover Billionaire or something. He wasn't the billionaire. But there was a guy called Grant Cardone who was guesting on that as like the secret billionaire.

And he took Matt Smith under his wing. I thought, oh, this is really interesting. As a business owner, I was, I was right interested in it. I'm aware of a lot of Grant Cardone's work and I thought, oh, I'm gonna watch this to see what he does. And, you know, so much of it's staged in these things.

But there was a lot of good stuff in it, and I thought, oh, that's a bit interesting. I'm going to see if he's on LinkedIn. This chap, Matt Smith. So I connected and he accepted the phone. Well, that's good. Well, message him again. Say I liked his show. And very quickly he agreed to say, yeah, cool. Let's jump on and talk about managing a multi multi businesses having kids.

I'll share my experiences and we'll talk about it. Cause he's written a book called Serial Dadpreneur. So I thought, Oh, it's a great fit between what we're trying to do. Dad's in business and yeah, let's have a, let's have a chat. So there's some really good stuff in that one from a business perspective, but then I've explored the whole range of the four topics.

So money management is a really interesting one. One of my favorite authors I spoke to called Mike Michalowicz who writes Business books for business owners. So Profit First around money management is one of them. So I got to speak to him. So I was a bit of a fan boy talking to him. Cause he's one of my favorite authors in a business space.

But then there's more practical money management. So. Investment management household budgeting and planning boundaries. I spoke to a senior exec at Amazon about how he creates boundaries and manage teams across time zones. So again, real practical stuff around that. I had a great chat recently, a fascinating chat, with a chap who was a sleep coach.

Helps people get better sleep. Do you know he didn't sleep for 17 days? 17 days he was awake.

[00:38:45] Adam: Whoa.

[00:38:46] Rob: He’s lke, you don't understand what that does to you as a person. It's like, oh my god. I can't think about not sleeping for two days, nevermind 17. So it was a really interesting conversation. I'd encourage people to go and go watch it because he tells a lot of his story around it, but more importantly, how he helps people now get a better sleep.

And then the, a few of the taboo stories, I guess, around your relationship with alcohol. I spoke to a chap over here in the UK about how he helps people remove alcohol from their lives. Not in a similar vein to I don't, I drink often, or I had a problem with it, I'm an alcoholic. There's just some people that want to choose not to drink alcohol.

And that's where he's at. Really interesting practical stuff on there as well. So I think there's about 80 conversations on the channel now. Some really good ones, really, really good stuff coming through. And yeah, just,

[00:39:38] Adam: I'll definitely link to the channel and some of the episodes. I think you sent me a few in advance too, that were like ones…

[00:39:44] Rob: I think I did. Yeah. I think the ones I've mentioned are probably in there somewhere. I was about to open a tab, but I realized I'm not on mute. So I can't look at my own YouTube channel.

[00:39:52] Adam: Oh, that'd be a strange, that'd be a strange echo. So, so, so you know, you must hear in the work that you do, you must hear from dads who have watched something you've done or read something or journaled in the book of dad or use the deck of cards. And they probably reach out and say, you know, this was really helpful.

This had an impact. Can you share a particularly memorable story? That you've heard from a another dad that Dads in Business has

[00:40:24] Rob: We try and capture feedback from most of the work that we do. Obviously you don't know everyone that's reading and looking at your content. There's been a few times where I've walked into spaces with my other professional home, with my other businesses, because the Dads In Business project, it's not wholly commercial thing.

It's what I do for a hobby, but people are aware of that. I do it. And when I've walked more into corporate space where my business hat is on, people are aware that I'm having that conversation and they've often pulled me aside and said, I saw what you did over there. I watched that video.

I can wholly relate to it. And you can tell that they're almost like, I'm so glad I found it because I'm about to go back into corporate world where I can't talk about it.

[00:41:07] Adam: Hmm.

[00:41:08] Rob: It's heartening, but it's also sad and sad that exists, but heartening that there is content out there. That's helping people.

And that's happened more than once. As a collective, we do get feedback from the sessions we do with employers and we make sure that the sessions are hitting the point. People are saying that the spaces that we host are the, this is what's missing. We need a place like this to get together deliberately. Yeah, where it is created on purpose, if you like. People, the one guy was, but this was very cathartic and I had to Google what cathartic was at the time.

I was like, oh my God, what does that mean? It was good. Yeah, but it turned out it was very, very impactful. And then. In the live settings, people have fed back before where we'd get a little group of us together. 10, 15 of us would get together and go for a a Nando's, a chicken or a, you know, a beer or a, just a chat and coffee or what have you.

The feedback there be like, look, everyone's got their own unique stories. But they all fall into one collective pattern and it's men and dads wanting to ultimately it's really no more scientific than that. It's like, let's just get together. Let's talk about it more. Let's normalize the conversation and, you know, see how we get on.

[00:42:32] Adam: Yeah. Yeah. I think that's an important point that you mentioned normalizing the conversation. That's part of the role that I'm trying to play here with this show and what you're trying to do too, which is great. I wanted to ask you about, so you just had your fourth kid, Angus, seven weeks old.

How has your parenting style evolved from one kid to now four kids?

[00:43:00] Rob: If I'm honest with myself I knew I think I'm in a bit of autopilot at the moment, I think is I think because the latest arrival, Angus a seven week old he was lifted out. So it wasn't a natural birth. I wasn't aware of the implications that had either.

It's not something we chose to do. It just happened that way. Things happen. But that was certainly four weeks out of action for my misses and then five and six really to get properly healed up and back to it. Cause it's quite a major procedure as I'm sure most people are aware.

I wasn't aware of the recovery time of it. And when there's. There's three others who also don't want to be neglected because it was important to us that, you know, bringing a fourth child into the house, the other three didn't feel in any way left out and they were absolutely included. So I think I've kind of gone into autopilot where I’ve assumed this, I'm looking after these three while the wife and little one gets better over here. So that means I'm doing all the school certainly school drop offs getting their uniforms ready for the night, the day after, cooking the dinner, doing the shopping, making the cleaning, the rooms where they can try to play with them and involve them and, you know, be the dad, not the dictator to them.

So yeah, I think a lot of autopilots kicking in. So how have I adapted to four? I don't fully know yet, but I think it's easier than I feared it would be when we were having our discussions about having a fourth. Easier is probably the wrong word, more natural. I said earlier, there's probably no economies of scale in terms of the time demands.

But perhaps, just perhaps there is a slight economy of scale in how easier it becomes. Oh, he just needs to pick it up. He needs feeding. He's doing this. It just feels more natural. So slot it in. Hopefully. How did you find it from one to two? Was there challenges there for you?

Adam:Certainly, I mean, you don't have the time to rest because when one kid is asleep, the other one needs something and is awake and they're still too young to kind of fend for themselves. In our case. Now, your 10-year-old might be a little bit of a different story.

10-year-old like, you know, make himself a bowl of cereal or you know, get a snack or maybe even help get younger brothers a snack. But for the most part, there's still kids, right? They still can't do most things themselves.

Rob: Their needs change. A 10 year old needs is still there. They're just not the needs of a two year old. Yeah, so that's probably one thing I've noticed that's, I found one to two very difficult. That's why I asked you, how did you find one to two? I found one to two, like you say, we've just managed to settle one.

And there's another one. Oh my God. Where it was two to three to four. I mean, sleep's done anyway. Don't worry about it. So there's, you feel like you're not missing out on so much anymore.

[00:45:51] Adam: Yeah. Yeah. I want to ask you two more questions before we wrap and get to our lightning round. One is what's a mistake that you've made as a dad?

[00:46:02] Rob: Probably not been aware of what I was saying no to in the early days of working for myself. I think that drive to get busy. Whether it was a good busy or a not good busy, just busy. Because that became a measure of success. That's probably like the regret. If you like, I was kind of like, well, I can't come home.

I'm busy. I can't do the school drop. I'm busy. I can't do this. I'm busy. And it was just, it always became like an excuse rather than anything that was agreed or reasoned with. So that's probably one of, yeah, that sort of the regret. I think you said, isn't it? What's one thing you regret?

It was probably around that. Like just not embracing that balance as I call it around responsibilities is as although I'm over there, that's why. I'm so, so probably that would be one of them. I think let's talk some getting over and adapting.

[00:46:54] Adam: All right. And my last question is more about the future. What's next for you and dads in business? got any big plans on the horizon?

[00:47:03] Rob: I have lots of big plans. It's just finding the time to do them all. Yeah. Yeah. So I think. I mean, I mentioned previously Dad's In Business at the moment is a hobby project. It's something that's helping me figure it out as I go being a dad and hopefully it's helping a few of us along the way. I think what there is with the dad's project is huge potential to, to really impact a lot of people in a positive way. I mentioned very early development of the, what type of dad might you be? I think there's a lot of potential around that. There’s expanding around what type of dad are you? Cause it tripped me up. It's like, well, I don't know what type of dad I am. What type of dad am I?

There's that famous love languages approach. I want to do that for dad languages. Yeah. What type of dad are you? Do you talk from a money lens, self lens? No. So I've got a few things in the sort of development stage around that one for the dad, you might be one for the dads you possibly are, but then one for the spouses as well, how to talk to a dad who is in the money lens, how to talk to a dad who is in the relationships lens, what might trigger them because there's always those things where your wife or your missus or your partner will do something and it really pisses you off.

And then she goes. Why is that annoyed you so much? What have I done? I just think there's so much scope there to try and figure that out and it's not pretending to understand how women work. I don't think anyone ever can. But if you could give something to your partner that said, look, I've done this quiz, it's saying that I operate from a self lens.

Let me, I'm not selfish, but I operate from a self lens. These are the things that might trigger me. These are the things you might want to talk to me about. It's all right. You might want to approach conversations. I can't help, but think it'd be such an amazing tool.

Adam:It would be.

[00:48:51] Rob: That could solve a lot of domestics. That's for sure.

And, And community, I think, dad's community will be mega. But I get so excited about the potential of it that I need to just, one bite at a time, as I say, one bite at a time.

[00:49:05] Adam: So how can people follow along or be helpful to you as you're continuing on with your work and what you're doing to help dads?

[00:49:13] Rob: Yeah. So you can connect on YouTube if you search Dad's In Business, that should crop up. That'd be great to see you on there. The website is dadsinbusiness.couk. You can see all sorts of articles, blogs, feeds around that. There's also a free resource on there for employers who are considering why they should support men and dads, because it's often overlooked for other more topical issues that are addressed, men and dads get ignored.

So there's a resource on that to help build the case for supporting men and dads. You can find me on LinkedIn as well. Dad's in business on LinkedIn, but also me, Rob Taylor, not the most unique name, so you'll find just a picture of my, my, my mug on there, I'm sure. And I'm starting, but not very active to venture into the world of TikTok and Instagram and others but mostly active on LinkedIn and the web and YouTube, that's where I hang out.

[00:50:07] Adam: Sounds good. We will link to all those places in the show notes. Alright, are you ready for our lightning round? Plus, in the spirit of lightning round, I ask you a question, you just say the first thing that comes to mind. And then we move on. And there's no judgment. There's no expectation. There's no “should” gremlins here. So we're good. All right,here we go.

What is the favorite ages for your kids?

[00:50:33] Rob: Five, six and seven

[00:50:34] Adam: What is the least favorite age?

[00:50:37] Rob: new born.

[00:50:40] Adam: Have you ever pretended to be asleep to avoid a middle of the night wake up?

[00:50:45] Rob: Yes.

[00:50:46] Adam: Have you ever secretly thrown away a piece of your kid's artwork?

[00:50:49] Rob: Oh yeah.

[00:50:52] Adam: Have you ever used your kids as an excuse to get out of social events?

[00:50:56] Rob: Yes. Oh God. I'm horrible. Yes, I have. Yea.

[00:51:00] Adam: How often do you tell your kids back in my day stories?

[00:51:04] Rob: Do you know that started to come up more and more often, which I have to catch myself on it. I'm starting to get to that age. I said, I remember when I said, no, don't do it. So. More often than I'd like, I think would be the answer to that.

[00:51:17] Adam: What is the most indispensable parenting product that you have ever purchased?

Rob: Ooo door handle.

[00:51:26] Adam: What is? There's probably a story there, but I'm just going to leave it. What is the most useless parenting product you've ever purchased?

[00:51:23] Rob: Oh my goodness. There were all sorts of toys when we newbornds to make them sleep through the night, stop crying, gripe water was this one thing we had. It should stop them with colic. It did absolutely nothing. So any of the newborn products were just wasted.

[00:51:51] Adam: Okay. No for the newborn products. All right. Which one of your kids is your favorite?

[00:51:59] Rob: All of them when they were five, six, and seven.

[00:52:04] Adam: Awesome. What is the most frustrating thing that has ever happened to you as a dad?

[00:52:11] Rob: It's got to be nappy, sorry, diaper accidents in the public places.

[00:52:16] Adam: How many parenting books do you have in your house?

[00:52:19] Rob: So there's a bit of an unfair one because as a guy who runs a dad's project , I researched quite a few, so I have a few for work, but before the Dad's In Business project started. I also probably bought three to try and figure out how to be a dad and they were all just useless.

[00:52:36] Adam: How many parenting books have you actually read cover to cover?

[00:52:40] Rob: Yeah, that's the problem. Isn't it? Probably zero. Yeah.

[00:52:43] Adam: Okay. How many dad jokes would you say you tell on average each day?

[00:52:49] Rob: Honestly, none. I'm rubbish at them. I can't do them. I don't know any. That's the problem.

[00:52:54] Adam: That is the definition of a dad joke is that they're all rubbish. Alright, probably only relevant for your older kids, but what is the most embarrassing thing that you've ever done in front of your kids?

[00:53:04] Rob: oh, I'm not sure.

[00:53:05] Adam: I'm sure they'll tell you.

[00:53:06] Rob: Yeah. I'll have to ask him. I don't know. Yeah. Probably dad danced somewhere or got drunk in front of one of them.

[00:53:12] Adam: We'll get that one as a follow up later.

What is the most absurd thing that one of your kids has ever asked you to buy for them?

[00:53:19] Rob: I think one of the ones watched one of these YouTubers and they had the world's biggest PlayStation five or something like that. So they said, can we have that? But I think beyond that, more just the general theme of expectation that they'll have everything they want because there is no, no sense of value.

So they've got a Ferrari. Why haven't we got one? I want a cyber truck. That's a new one, a Cybertruck. Yes. They see it, they want it.

[00:53:46] Adam: It looks very cool. If you're a kid, especially, it looks like a giant toy. Looks like an oversized toy.

[00:53:51] Rob: You can send it down the corridor. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:53:54] Adam: What is the most difficult kids TV show that you've ever had to sit through?

[00:53:58] Rob: In a modern sense, anything that's YouTube, they are horrible.

[00:54:02] Adam: Pretty bad. Yeah.

[00:54:03] Rob: They're just getting worse and worse. The last one to take the hand off a plane wins it. It's just unbelievable things. I filled my swimming pool with jelly. It's like, oh my god.

[00:54:14] Adam: I've seen that one. I know that one. What is your favorite kids movie?

[00:54:19] Rob: Let's think. There's some good ones, isn't there? That Inside Out's a good one.

[00:54:23] Adam: I agree.

[00:54:25] Rob: That's quite calming for them as well. That's, yeah, I think a lot of the stuff by Pixar's good, isn't it? Because there's something for the adults as well. I think that, yeah, that inside out's probably up there.

[00:54:34] Adam: Okay.

What is the worst experience you've ever had assembling a kids toy or a piece of furniture?

[00:54:40] Rob: Well, for babies it will be the cot, because there's always a screw where the allen key doesn't fit in the gap. So it takes forever to sort of half turn things rather than that. So for babies it'll be that. All those mobiles where you have to, the legs are just everywhere and then it swings and it doesn't work.

So for babies, it'd be that. And I think for, as they get older and their grandparents bring in those big boxes at birthdays, and they're full of like race tracks and train tracks where the bits go missing before you've even assembled it. I think that'd be up there.

[00:55:14] Adam: Okay. How long can a piece of food sit on the floor in your house and you will still eat it?

[00:55:20] Rob: The 3 second rule is definitely out the window. So yeah, if it's chocolate, I don't think it bothers them whatsoever.

[00:55:30] Adam: What nostalgic movie can you just not wait to force your kids to watch with you?

[00:55:37] Rob: Die hard. The first one.

[00:55:38] Adam: Ooh, it's a great Christmas film.

[00:55:40] Rob: Is that it?

[00:55:42] Adam: It is a Christmas movie, yes. How many times have you said, go ask your mother this week?

[00:55:48] Rob: Oftentimes I ask them not to ask their mom because she'll just say yes.

[00:55:52] Adam: I love that. I love that. And finally, you have four kids, what is your take on minivans?

[00:56:01] Rob: Desperately trying to not need or get one

[00:56:05] Adam: I can hear the desperation in your voice.

[00:56:08] Rob: Seven seaters are okay. We can get a seven seater SUV at the moment. They're good. They're fine. I don't want, I don't want a bus. I don't want something with a side door.

[00:56:18] Adam: I gotcha. Even that electric VW, you know, the new one that's out.

[00:56:22] Rob: Yeah. I see. I've got, it's awful, isn't it? It's there's limits. There's limits.

[00:56:27] Adam: Yes,

[00:56:28] Rob: If there's something that drives down to say you've got a large family, it'd be that, and I don't want that.

[00:56:33] Adam: Yes. Alright, well Rob. That does it for the Startup Dad podcast and our lightning round. Thank you so much. You survived Rob, it's been a pleasure having you on the show today. I learned a ton. Great conversation. Thank you so much for taking the time. I appreciate it.

[00:56:51] Rob: Thanks for having me, Adam. Take care, buddy. See you soon.

[00:56:54] Adam: Thank you for listening to today's conversation with Rob Taylor. If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe, share, and leave me a review on Apple or Spotify. It'll help other people find this podcast. Startup Dad is a Fishman AF production with editing support from Tommy Harron.

You can join a community of over 11,000 subscribers and stay up to date on my thoughts on growth, product, and parenting by subscribing to the Fishman AF newsletter at www.fishmanafnewsletter. com. Thanks for listening and see you next week.