about chris

Most approaches have it exactly backwards: survival first, growth second, your life third — one day, eventually, maybe. Everything on this site exists to run that sequence the right way round.

the short version

Where the philosophy comes from

Clarity, learned the hard way.

When my wife died from a brain tumour, I became a solo parent to two children while running the business. That kind of event reinforces what matters most – life & family first. But that doesn't mean sacrificing any business ambitions. When it's designed right, the business can provide everything you want – it is the vehicle. Life is the purpose. And most of what's written about growing a business has it exactly backwards.

So the sequence I work to starts with the life: get clear on what you actually want, put a number on it, then structure the business to deliver it on your terms. That's why every engagement here starts with what matters to you — not an arbitrary growth target.

in case you were wondering

Why "Mentors", plural — when it's just me?

Because it wasn't always. I co-founded Strategic Mentors with a business partner, and for years we licensed the framework to consultants — a genuinely plural firm. Then technology caught up with the idea: we started running one-to-one work over Zoom about four years before the world was forced to, and suddenly geographic reach didn't need licensees, and a licensing operation was complexity we no longer had to carry.

Financially, the bigger model was appealing. But when you have a Financial Moat, you get to choose your workload — so I chose the simpler one. When my partner retired, the model evolved again: high value, low complexity, one mentor. The name stayed. If a plural name run by one person bothers you, you now know the story — it's the philosophy on this site, applied to this business, twice.

The philosophy, in practice

The product, working.

These days I work four to five hours a day. The rest goes on ultra-marathons, music, and travelling in the RV – with a business that keeps producing while I do. It's not flashy – because it's designed for a lifestyle I want, not to impress anyone else. That's the method applied to my own firm. And each week, The Multipliable Letter shares what the method looks like in other owners' businesses too — real examples you can borrow.