Afterburner Financial - "On Time On Target" - Financial Planning and Investment Strategies

Running the Bases today with Steve Ankerstar the CEO & Founder of Afterburner Financial and “OTOT” - “On Time On Target” - a financial planning and investment services agency from Round Rock, TX.  OTOT - On Time On Target is the platform that Steve Ankerstar launches his financial strategies services.  Steve started Afterburner Financial 6 years ago - shortly after his career as a fighter pilot in the USAF, and he’s been going strong ever since.

Steve shares his story of growth, financial strategy and insights in the industry.  Can you make sound investment strategies during a world pandemic? - “Yes” says Steve! You’ll hear from Steve his thoughts on what he would have done better and sooner as a new service agency. 

Do you think you have what it takes to be an entrepreneur?  Steve has a simple test that he uses on others to gage their resiliency - do you have what it takes?  Listen and take the test!

Steve also shares a few stories of his experience as an F-117 fighter pilot.  In case you’re wondering, that’s the Stealth Fighter.  Steve has an amazing story from the 2002 World Series.

It’s an engaging show as Steve rolls through his challenges and successes as a 20 year USAF veteran and successful financial services entrepreneur.  We discuss self-confidence, resilience and risk management - You have to know what can take you out of the game! 

Learn more about Afterburner Financial and OTOT - On Time On Target at https://www.ototnow.com/

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Transcript

OTOT - On Time On Target

Randy Rohde: [00:00:00] running the bases with small businesses. I'm Randy Rohde. And I have a passion to work with small businesses and I love baseball. So I thought, Hey, let's bring them together. So every episode, I sit down with local entrepreneurs, business builders, and small business owners to talk about their wins and wefts their tools of the trade 

and to give actionable tips to other  business managers, we'll cover the bases with entrepreneurship, operations, sales, digital marketing innovation, plus a little fun baseball talk.

Thanks for joining us today. Settle in, grab your Cracker jacks and you know what they say?

Some of my favorite words, playbooks. Very nice.

There we go. Love that little flare right there.

Hey, thanks for joining us today. Running the basis. Small businesses. I'm Randy Rohde and our guest today is a 20 year veteran in the air force. In fact, flew the stealth fighters. One of only a handful of people in the world, is the founder CEO of after burner financial. And you can also catch him on his newly launched podcast on time, on target, happy to have on board today.

Steve Ankerstar. Welcome Steve. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:01:42] Thank you so much, Randy, for having me on and, looking forward to the show and let's play ball right. 

Randy Rohde: [00:01:48] Hey, I love it. You even get into the, the baseball motif. Very nice. listen. Hey, so Steve, before we jump into learning about your experience and business, financial planning, have to ask you about your career as a jet fighter pilot and your contribution in the shock and awe campaign and the war in Iraq.

So tell us a little bit about that. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:02:10] Well sure you bet I, a little bit of a cheesy start to the story, but I was a junior in high school. Top gun came out. So, walked out of that theater and said, that's exactly what I need to do with my life. And, some folks chuckled about that and my parents cautioned me to have a plan B if you will.

Well, but after many years I finally got into pilot training and earned my way into a fighter jet. And, flying fighters is a dream job. It's the, there's really nothing else I would rather do. I wish you could do it for more than just a handful of years though, before you're too old and too slow to continue to do it.

but I was able to serve, I flew a couple different airplanes. The, the F 15 was the first one I flew. And then I flew the F 117. And like you mentioned, if everybody can flash back to 2003 mid March, Donald Rumsfeld had the shock and awe campaign. And that was basically when we opened up what I call round two, or, round two of Iraq.

And we went in there obviously in 91. but back again at 2003, and I flew the opening night strike there and, dropped a bomb on a communicat communication center North of town and was alone and unafraid there at the beginning of the war. So it was. Pretty great experience. 

Randy Rohde: [00:03:22] That is incredible.

And especially the stealth fighters, which I remember when those, launched or when the news kind of first published that plane, that is the coolest, baddest looking, plane I've ever seen. And like you, I love it. Top gun. And I thought that was amazing, but that is like you, it is a one seater.

you were the only guy in the plane and you're flying in dark and unseen and you were just, I don't even know what that experience would be like, because you are the tip of the arrow, right? Well, 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:03:58] it's a mindset shift from those of us that, to be able to fly the F 117, you have to be an experienced fighter pilot in another airplane.

first,  for about three to four years of experience and in all the other fighter airplanes. Yeah. You show up, you make loud noise, you beat your chest. Do you, I'm still the enemy that you're there. And then, On a good day. They'll all just run away from you. And so it's different from being such an offensive minded type fighter pilot to a defensive minded person where you're trying to sneak in a undetected and do your work, and then, run out of there as fast as you can after you've dropped your bombs, obviously, cause they know the gig is up when stuff starts blowing up around them.

Randy Rohde: [00:04:39] that is amazing. Well, thank you for your service and, and your time, serving, the country. Truly appreciate that. So let's jump in. Why don't you tell us about after burner financial, how did you get started? What do you do? All of that fun stuff. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:04:54] Sure you bet. Well, I would say, first of all, we'll start with the name that's my, not wanting to let go of my fighter pilot past and, in the business you get to about 40 years old and that's when they take your airplane from you and they put you behind a desk and you can lead others and continue on up and stay in the military for a long time.

And if you choose a, but a lot of folks that once they take the airplane away, we kinda wrap up. what we're doing and go off and do these stage two in life and, thinking for entrepreneurs out there, whether it's the military or sitting in the corporate world, if you're in a very structured scenario, like I had been, and I'd worked very hard and I'd done very, done well, but at the end of the day, I had no real effect.

Fact of my own financial future. I was limited by the system you needed. It can only move up so fast in the system. so after about 20 years of following orders and, not being able to strike out on my own and do things exactly like I wanted to, that's what drew me to my own business.

And I was a lifelong. Investor, basically individual stocks for a long time. I got started when I was in high school. So it was really a passion of mine. And the closer I got to retirement from the military, I found myself mentoring folks, 18 to 22 that fresh out of high school or fresh out of college and say, Hey, if you start now, It'll change your life and show them the numbers.

And so I said, I was getting such positive feedback from doing that's what I wanted to do for my second career. so that's why I started as a financial planner and an investment manager. I do both, with afterburner financial, but for the business owners out there, It's just me.

So I'm the solo preneur. If, you buy into that term or a, sole proprietor, LLC is how I'm structured. have the licenses hung out the shingle and off I went and waited for the phone to ring 

Randy Rohde: [00:06:45] for you. So, so the love of numbers didn't start, just recently. So you've been a long time, digging in.

To investments and, and, loving, building wealth. So, and you do more than just, A personal financial planner, you actually invest, you do all of the kind of stock analysis and, all of that activity 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:07:10] I do. And that's fairly rare. Most folks that strike out on their own either pick.

One or the other, they either do the investment management and outsource the financial planning or do more likely to do the financial planning and then outsource the investment management. I think it comes from my background in the military, flying a $50 million plane by myself. I have no problem taking on the responsibility.

for both roles and I want to make sure it's done correctly. so I can get into, a pretty intimate relationship, financially with my clients to really understand, what they're trying to do with their money, the relationship with money, and then build a portfolio around basically investments they believe in, versus if you walk into a more cookie cutter investment firm, they're going to put you in a.

Yeah, 15 to 20 different mutual funds or index funds. And you really don't know what you own at that point. and it's hard to know who to cheer for. so I tried to get people a little more personalized experience and a little more in depth, with their investments. 

Randy Rohde: [00:08:11] good. So, and then, Kind of answers.

I was wanting to go in a little bit and just ask, why this type of, and what your unique solution is in it. I think you've probably actually described it already, which is, as you bring the combined effort or focus, that's both investing and financial, so planning. So that really is your unique value proposition as a, in the industry.

Steve Ankerstar: [00:08:39] Sure. And then I also believe in investible themes or focused investing. There are several names for it, but I try to, instead of, yeah. owning the entire market and all of the ups and downs with the market, we focus portfolios in certain areas. if the individual has the risk tolerance for it.

so when you run into situation, like back in March, it's actually. A boon and you can make a lot of money, if you're more nimble and willing to move in and out of positions. and again, there's a lot of people don't like that. A lot of people say it can't be done. I love the challenge and I can assure you that it can be done.

but that's, that's my passion and that's what I've always done with my own investment. And it's treated me very well and just in baseball, the best hitters in the game, three or four out of, you get three or four hits out of 10, 10 at bats. Yeah.

As an investor, you're not going to bat a thousand at all. but if you can get up into that 60, 65% and take some pretty heavy positions, you can really make a lot of money, very quickly. So that's what I do for folks. That's my passion. And then I'll outsource things like, tax. Preparation and tax loss, harvesting, and as well as some of the estate planning things, since I'm so busy, tied up into the weeds of the investment management, I have to rely on others for, for some of the other things out there.

Randy Rohde: [00:09:57] Right, right. So I know so much of the stuff that you do is. I think is fairly complicated and intricate because, the world of finance and all of the different types of that, not just investment vehicles, but strategies and things, that employers is crazy. It's almost like baseball. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:10:16] Yeah. Well, and the rules keep changing.

Right? You don't like baseball 

Randy Rohde: [00:10:19] too. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:10:21] I do have to say if you think when people are, because a lot of folks take shots at my particular philosophy, but if we think back, how did our parents and grandparents invest? They were in individual stocks. They had heavy positions, usually with the firm that they, they worked with, the proverbial box full of stock certificates in the closet.

so. Yeah. And some people don't like individual stocks and I certainly don't try to talk people into it, but if people see the value in it, then yeah. Let's, let's get people in individual stocks and have them build a portfolio they can believe in. 

Randy Rohde: [00:10:53] Right, right. I think now we're not a financial talk show, but, I will say know, we could probably spend hours talking about finance and investing.

I just think this is like a crazy time in the market because the market is I don't know if it's completely, I don't think it has yet completely rebounded from the kind of pre COVID yet. but the market continues to rise. Gold is at it just set like an all time record the other day. And I'm trying to like, okay, usually that doesn't.

Kind of go in sync, hand in hand like that usually gold goes up when the market is down and it's just a very crazy kind of climate, I think, from an investing standpoint. And I'm not going to ask for advice, but I don't know. It is. It's gotta be a challenge for you, I would think. And in your business, and steering clients and handling that.

Now you're a fighter pilot in the background. So you're used to that danger, but, it would make me very nervous. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:11:59] Well, a couple things and you're right. We, largely since the eighties been a beat over the head with, I'll ask you that you should own a bunch of mutual funds and just own the whole market.

And don't try to attempt to make any surgical plays within the market. And if you do that, then these times of high volatility or the sell off of COVID-19 back in March. That's nerve wracking. that's so stressful for folks that are basically just staying on the coaster and closing their eyes during those times.

but if you can be a little more nimble, a little more focused, you'll find that there's lots of opportunities. And to your point that sure the market is, it's not quite rebounded all the way for some of the technology stocks have outpaced where they were. and certainly gold going up. And what I told folks back in March is, money is like water.

So it has to go somewhere. So a lot of the money that's basically sloshed out of the market when everybody was selling hard at. And, in the beginning of March, that money sat on the sidelines for just a little bit, but then it found its way right back in the market. And that's why, the market recovered.

And then the Gold's basically on its way up for, the people are concerned about the election and in the divided nation we have in some other. Things at hand, it's a tenuous time going into a tenuous elect elections.  

Randy Rohde: [00:13:20] all right. So you've been in business. So you launched after burner financial.

I love the name, in 2004. and so you've seen, you've been around the block. you're what we would call in the baseball terms. You're a veteran, a grizzled veteran, been on the bus a few years. So, and we know it starting a business, running a business. It's tough. So, what have been some of the challenges that you have had to overcome during the last, 16, 17 years?

How did you do it? what were some of those things? 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:13:53] Right. Well, and a quick correction arrow was 2014 that I started at  so, so six years, but I do feel like I'm a grizzled veteran from the experience. And I would say that probably resonates with other folks out there that have been. Been in business for more than just a few years, is that it feels like a long time that I've been in business.

I will say that some of the challenges I faced is I came from a background where, self-confidence is generally, a very strong point with fighter pilots. And so battling all of the unknowns was okay, not too nerve wracking, but what I was surprised about is the, I hung out the shingle and I expected the phone to ring and, I put out the website and I expected people to go to it.

And what I really had no idea how to do was market myself, other than wear a flight suit and walk around and expect people to, hand over, their lifelong money and trust me, because I flew airplanes. So it took a lot. It took a long time to put the analogies in place about risk management.

And then explain my background, before I could actually sell. So if I would advise somebody out there, it's get into marketing earlier. it won't happen magically. I stared at the phone for a long time watching it, not ring, when I could have been doing other things with my time to help my help myself out.

So. Slow start if you will. 

Randy Rohde: [00:15:20] Okay. it all happens. It all comes together though. Right? all right. Well, so as a solo preneur, that's a great term and I know many of the people in our audience are in that scenario. How do you stay focused? what keeps. You moving forward because you don't have an office full of people that you're bouncing ideas off of and, and getting that energy and vibe from.

So how do you keep focused and keep moving? 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:15:48] Well, one thing that I did do correctly and that I would advise others to do is have a written financial plan or excuse me, a written business plan from the beginning. So I did have that written, I did have metrics in place cause I knew that might be a challenge.

Especially through the ups and downs of owning, and running a business. so I had very special monthly goals to meet and of course tracks my progress through all of those goals. And that was my motivator. That was, motivating me because I, I need to meet these goals.

And then also that I needed to trust the system that it will work. I don't need to make. $100,000 in revenue overnight. Cause that's not how it works. but basically set these smaller goals for me too, achieve things along the way. And then, yeah, once a, about two years ago, once I got enough clients, the clients keep me plenty busy now.

So, they ask questions and I'm always, back and forth, communicating. How are you feeling? especially with the election coming up is we just saw. COVID-19 and we made a pretty decent amount of money out of that. Now let's talk about the election and the different possibilities out there and getting the client's minds about how they feel and how much of a ride they are willing to take through that time.

Randy Rohde: [00:17:00] Yeah. I can only imagine having, in your position and having clients, especially coming through the last six months or so, I'd be probably calling you every other day. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:17:11] And that's what your advisors here for. And actually the business grew. Through that time. Cause a lot of advisors don't like that side of the business when things aren't going well, they don't like I related to football, but you could relate it to baseball too.

being the manager's great. And the post game con a media conference when you win, it's not as fun when you sit there 40% of the time and explain, what you got, what your team needs to do better. so. You have to be able to handle both the ups and downs of the job. 

Randy Rohde: [00:17:40] Yeah. Yeah. all right, well, Steve, have to tell you, it is time,

love this part of the show. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:17:53] And 

Randy Rohde: [00:17:55] you are probably really the only guest that I could even think ever that we may ever have, where you have an experience in the, 2002 world series. Who's that I don't know that we'd ever be able to repeat from anybody on the show. why don't you tell us about your experience at the 2002 world series?

Steve Ankerstar: [00:18:22] Well, I was very blessed to do a fly over of games in one of the 2002 world series. And it really happened by chance. when you're talking major sporting events, those are generally reserved for the Aero demonstration teams, the Thunderbirds and the blue angels, but they're beautiful formations, but the blue angels, this was a, the first game was on Saturday and the second game was on Sunday.

The blue angels went. Flew into town and they did a fly by there at Anaheim. And you can picture if you've been to California and the game generally starts around sunset and they were flying into the sun the way the stadiums laid out. if happened to have been there, right down I-5 and you turn right at the certain building and fly on in, and they landed down at Miramar where I was at an air show with a couple of other pilots and another, we had two  f-117's with us and.

They landed. And one of the buddy, one of my buddies was former Navy and knew one of the guys. So we walked over there just to say, Hey, and, and talk to him. And they were like, Hey, do you guys want to do a fly by? And it's just what are you talking about? And they're like, we can't, we aren't legal to do our fly by because of the visibility.

We can't do it in formation and they don't do anything single ship. so it's either six of them or none of them. And they said, do you guys want it? And. My friend. And I said, well, yes, we do, but we need to make some phone calls. So he gave us the Anaheim angels, a handler, if you will, their public relations person, her phone number.

And I called her and said, we're in, but we need to get approval, which might take all night long. but we literally, it took about two hours to run up to, the general officer level at the Pentagon to get us approved, to go and do that. and then I flew over game one. went to game two and after game two, the, after the flyby, cause you always have one person on the ground, calling it in, making sure on time.

Everything's perfect. Like it should be, just like everything else that the game, right? well I was, I had this radio with me and I had my girlfriend now my wife with me at the time. And. This radio is expensive. And I asked my handler, I'm like, is there a place I can put this radio, during the game that's locked up.

So I don't have to carry it to the 1970s technology in wastes, like 40 pounds. Cause I really don't want to lug this thing around while I'm trying to enjoy my first ever world series game. And she goes, I do have a place. And she said, the organist is locked away. She locks the door for the whole game.

And so she talked to her and said, Hey, is it okay? And I put the radio in there and I was stepped out of the organist area and I happened, I'd done some research. I happened to see Jackie Autry step in the hallway. And I said, and she's the owner of the, her husband, gene Autry used to own the team. And then after he passed, she owned the team.

And I mentioned to her, I'm in green flight suit. So, so it was my girlfriend at the time. And, I mentioned good luck tonight. Ma'am and she looked at me and she asked the same question that everybody always asks is, was that you, that just did the flyby? It's well, no, that's physically impossible, but, but I said, it's no, but I did last night was last night.

Okay. And she almost started crying. she came over cause gene Autry was her husband was a pilot, before he was famous. So she came over and gave us both a big hug and then said, Hey, do you want to come into the owner's box and watch the game? And we did and spent the whole game there. And, next to Ernie banks, I'm trying to watch baseball.

And he's trying to ask me about flying fighters. So it was fun. we got to go down on the dugout during the seventh inning stretch and, they played, God bless them. Yeah, Erica. So with, we had two P two pilots there as well as a few of our maintenance officers drove up, maintenance folks drove up.

So it was really a. Really an amazing experience. That was all being in the right place at the right time. Yeah. 

Randy Rohde: [00:22:10] Oh, such a great story. And as I said, I'm sure I will have no other guests that will be able to tell a story like that. wow. what plane were you flying? The, F1 17. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:22:22] That was in the F-117.

So the black triangle plane and it was on, of course there's a, I think four seconds of footage it's still on. YouTube is everywhere. They have the whole game televised on YouTube. So, I can see myself do a little fly by and looked good. Not gonna lie right on time. 

Randy Rohde: [00:22:41] Good for you. Alright, well, congratulations.

And all right, well, let's get back into it. Thank you, Steve. Okay. Any similarities between being a small business owner and a fighter pilot, anything you can draw from your experience 20 years flying versus kind of the flying you're doing today? 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:23:00] I do. Absolutely. I think that's a great question.

I wish more people asked that. I think there's a self-confidence aspect to it. before you step out on your own, I think, one thing when I talk to folks, cause I do some motivational speaking as well. And the first person that asked me, he's Hey, I was thinking about stepping out on my own and the fir I just cut them off and say, Nope, you're not the right person for that.

And then I pause to see how they react. And I say, okay, that was an academic answer. Now, how did that make you feel? Did you feel like, yeah, he's right. I probably shouldn't do that. Or did you get mad? Were you like really ticked off the second? I said that. And who is this guy? And who does he think he is?

I go now, if you had that reaction, you're probably going to do pretty well. So self confidence is the, is the one of them, the two key ingredients that I would say that transfers from flying fighters to a small business ownership. And then the second one is risk management. you have to know what's going to knock you out of the game.

so whatever your industry is, and in financial management, I can lose clients. the market can go down, I can lose clients, but what I can't handle is a compliance violation. That's what knocks people out of the financial services industry. So it, my particular threat, if you will, instead of, dodging surface to air missiles, my particular threat is compliance and making sure that I'm doing everything absolutely by the book.

And taking the time to do all the paperwork, because that's really the only thing that can knock me out of the game. And every industry is different. So as you go into the industry, just think about what could knock you out of the game and have a couple of clients that are small business owners.

And of course I never thought of pandemic. Probably would be one of those situations, but guess what it is, and then, yeah, that's been tough for a while the folks out there. 

Randy Rohde: [00:24:48] Yeah. Yeah. well, that's great. Those are two great kind of, skills or qualities, I think, making that crossover and exchange.

so obviously you're still in business. Do you still fly? 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:24:59] I don't, I decided once, it was flying is so much fun and I love it so much. I kinda, it's one of those, you have to know yourself. And I was going to try to fly for the airlines part time. I have my license, but then I was like, I'm not really doing right by my clients.

If I'm off, if I'm off flying all the time, I thought, well, I could teach here locally. And then I was like, that's probably not right either. Cause I would spend all my time at the airport and not building my business. So I wanted to go all in on my business. And I even told my wife of, 12 years at the time and said, Hey, I'm going to go all in on this.

the stats are that, you know what, 80% of small businesses fail or whatever they are. And I said, I would rather do. I would rather have tried this and then failed. And then I can go fly for the airlines than not have tried it. So I wanted to make sure that I really gave myself all the advantages.

That I could, so I stepped away from flying, but I am waiting for a client to call me up and say, Hey, I just bought an airplane, which is generally not the best investment I could work with that. and they want me to teach him to fly it. So I have all the licenses. I can fly a lot of things out there except for your very unique things.

but yeah. maybe someday now it's just too much fun building the business, taking care of folks and especially during these tough times, and then just start my own podcast too. So yeah. That's, I'm having fun learning there as well. 

Randy Rohde: [00:26:21] Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, that's good. And I hope that client does come through your doors someday.

so you mentioned you do a lot of community speaking and speaking engagements. I'm sure. Probably schools and youth groups. And what have you, why do you do that? And what's your key message that you bring, to those events? 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:26:41] the why is easy? it's my way of paying back. I'm very aware that I got to do something, that a lot of people wanted to do and it's very competitive and I made it all the way through.

so especially to fly something as unique as the F one 17. So my way of paying back to the taxpayers who funded my flying for several years, and I don't even want to show them what the Tablo is on that, but it's very expensive to get our frontline war fighters are, fighter pilots. You need to fly two or three times a week, 10 times, 12 times a month.

That's a lot of money to keep us ready to go for when we're needed. So it's my way of paying back. Or maybe if you will feeling guilty, for all that money I use to become a tip of the spear kind of guy. so I like talking to anybody who will listen. I, when I talk, it's almost entirely about flying.

Nobody really wants to hear about finance stuff. I understand that, but the message, yeah. I like to tailor the, I have a black flight suit that I wear that looks very professional and it kinda allows me to run around and look like a pilot. but whoever. Calls me to speak. I will tailor my message to them.

lately it's been resilience. talking about losing comrades and battle, is the same sort of thing as the, the government shuts down, it's something you just, nobody saw coming. And how do you deal with that on a human perspective to compartmentalize of, okay, this is a terrible situation, but as a leader of either, a small business, especially if you have.

People counting on you or your family. It's that's not the time to shut down. It's the time to work even harder. Yeah. To dig yourself out of whatever situation that you're in. Yeah. I'm with kids almost always trying to motivate them to be productive members of society. So you don't care what you do, but, go be proud of whatever it is you decide to do.

and then in the finance world, if I'm, if I ever show a chart, I show the, it's one chart and I say, kids, if you can understand this, you'll be rich beyond your wildest dreams. And that's one line is your income. And the other line is expenses. I'm like, as long as you keep the expense line below the income line, you won't be robbing yourself or your future, and you'll be rich.

Now. I don't care what your income is. You don't have to make, make millions. You just have to, make a decent income, spend less than that. And you'll be rich for the rest. 

Randy Rohde: [00:28:58] That's a good life lesson right there, thank you. And I love the idea and I think it's so appropriate for today world.

is that message of resilience? it's been so difficult the last six months or so across the world and, and our country, and that message of resilience is, I think people need to hear that, and very appropriate and. Today's environment. So that's great. I'm glad you're out there doing that stuff, and I'm glad you're out there still serving the country.

I appreciate that. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:29:30] Well, thank you. And I agree. I'm particularly sensitive to the resilience, even before COVID-19, after spending so many years in the military and being a commander, we saw a lot of suicides in the military and we still do. so when I start talking about, we'll say, how do you know, how do you get rich?

Or how do I become wealthy? And I always say, well, it starts with you first. Your self worth has to be. In line and if it's not, then all the money in the world won't make any difference. So really it's to take care of yourself first, that's the first step one, then your network of friends and family that needs to be in place.

And those two things need to be rock solid before you ever really need to worry about money because money can't fix either of those things. Right. and that, of course, those. Those skillsets parlay into times like this, where you do have to be resilient and whether it's just yourself or you're taking care of others.

yeah. We need you at your best version of yourself when, in times of need. 

Randy Rohde: [00:30:26] Yeah. So you mentioned, a little earlier and I refer to it as well. your podcast, which you've recently launched on time on target, which also is a, flying, reference military reference, I think. and I'm sure that's part of your strategy for marketing your business and for growth.

why don't you tell us a little bit about that and what are maybe some of the other steps. Strategies you're beginning to employ or have been employing. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:30:55] Sure. I'd love to. I wanted to start this podcast right. At the same time I started my business, but I was too scared. I didn't want to bite off more than, I wanted to take it sequentially because I didn't know if I could make both happen at the same time, but the purpose of the podcast is, and I won't say it's unique to the military, but it's certainly something that's trained into you in the military is.

a lot of people have big goals out there and they're dreamers, but really the roadmap to get you or the flight plan to get you from a, to B is the hard part. everybody can picture themselves as a, wealthy, successful, perfect marriage, a happy family, all those that you can picture those, but it's what do I need to do every day to get there?

And my background in the military, especially when it. Something as complex as navigating enemy air defenses and putting bombs on target on time. that is that skillset of breaking down the end goal, walking backwards to where you are right now, and then planning out every little move and contingencies along the way.

And really thinking through that, a lot of it's eyes closed kind of stuff laying in bed and you can actually just picture. The entire mission and you're taking it piece by piece. You're not just assuming. That this 10 minutes is going to go well, you're doing every little thing along the way.

So the idea behind the podcast is, one of the first 10 episodes that I put out there is, how much money should you have at a certain age, starting at age 25 and then 35 and 45 all the way up until 65 to give folks some marks along the way to know if they are on time on target, instead of just saying.

like w when I talk in some kids, kids, generally adults don't ask them, the kids will say, what do I have to do to be a billionaire? And I said, well, you can't ever, you have to quit your job. If you have one that's step one, because you can't ever make it working for somebody else.

So if you have this high goal, you have to now look at well, If that's the case, I have to start a business that kind of changes the world to be able to get there. so most people's goals aren't that lofty, if you will, or that hard to achieve. but certainly you have to picture what are the little things like relationship you should be doing on a day to day basis to make sure that, Or increase the odds if you will, of staying married to the same person for 30 to 40 years.

So that sort of thing, it's financial base, but it's also just basic goal setting and goal achievement, and how to think about things to make it happen. 

Randy Rohde: [00:33:26] Great. Great. all right, well, how about strategies about moving your business forward? What are you doing? from a marketing standpoint, aside from the podcast.

Steve Ankerstar: [00:33:36] Right. I'm quickly approaching a fork in the, where I have to make a decision with the, financial management business. So, one person can handle about a hundred clients. that's you know, that's from the mentors in the financial industry. so I'm quickly approaching that. So I'm going to either need to say no to new clients.

Or I need to reorient some of my smaller clients to somewhere else. So I have room to bring on other clients, or I need to just say I'm closed to new clients and not bringing anybody else onboard or I'm sorry. That was the first one. Or I need to hire somebody to come in and now be able to serve as twice the number of clients.

And I don't know. Which, which I want to do, I don't know which would be the smartest. And as I was flushing this out with a mastermind group the other day, the one thing it was nice that I had not heard before. but I think is helpful if other people are at a crossroads in their business is they said, you know what, Steve.

Whichever one you choose is going to be right, because you're going to make it right. so I would offer that to the same folks out there, even though I don't know what I'm going to do. I don't have my answer yet, but if you're in a situation out there as a listener, just know that whatever you pick, you are going to make it right, because you're using the same skills that got you to the point to where you are, that they're all right answers.

It's really just, what do you want your life lifestyle to look like? That is a 

Randy Rohde: [00:35:06] great comment. I love that on whatever path you choose will be the right one 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:35:11] will be the right 

Randy Rohde: [00:35:12] one. Yeah. Because you'll make it work. Yeah. it'll happen. And, and I know that's a difficult, process to go through when you're at that juncture.

And you're like, do I grow? Do I stay? And, we had a guest on the show, not too long ago that talked about as well, this whole. Work life balance and the importance of that for an individual and as well for, people in companies. And, that has to play a part of that as well, because, and I know I've, I have, inflicted this on myself so often is that I've I got to get bigger.

I got to get bigger and bigger. Right. I got to drive that revenue and, there's a, an action and a reaction. And, as I would push, there was the reaction that maybe I was achieving that, but, I was also sacrificing, I think, some other things in my life that, Yeah, that was not appropriate.

I will say, the work life balance is something that I've learned, thankfully over the course of the years. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:36:14] Yeah, I agree. And it's tough. It's a tough decision to make. 

Randy Rohde: [00:36:19] Yeah. Well, good for you. Well, I'm glad you're in the position anyway, so that means you're doing well. so I was rolling into another question and who knows?

So, I usually ask a little bit about, into the future, like where do you see. Afterburner financial in three to five years. Right. And so you're like I'm wrestling with that right now. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:36:40] Yeah. I always thought I have it in my business plan. There's 19 total people, in afterburner financial when it's fully built out and I have their job positions set up.

so the military planner in me, I have that answer. and the, from listening to Michael Kitces, which is the, the. Yeah, I'm sure he's younger than me, but he's the grandfather figure in the financial advisor world, walked down the path of as the founder of a business.

You don't really make a lot more,  from the time you start hiring people until you're fully built out. That could be 10, 15 years and your style, your salary stays the same and it might even drop. if you can't make enough revenue to cover it, he goes and you get all the headaches that go with it.

So I've always pictured it fully built out, but I am really enjoying, just being me. I've worked from home from day one. So this whole, the COVID environment was nothing for me. And if anything, it. It brought my clients up to speed that yeah, we could hop on a zoom call really quick and talk about what we need to, instead of having to, meet for lunch and go through the big dance of scheduling and appointment.

It's no, let's hop on an intake care of it. so we'll see what the future holds. I'm. I want to guard the, the freedom and lifestyle that I have right now, but I also, I do think that I believe in what I do, and I'd like to be able to extrapolate that out into a full enterprise. So. I don't know the end of my story.

All right. 

Randy Rohde: [00:38:04] That's good. well obviously we're hoping that the best for you and all of that, we're coming down to the bottom of the ninth, and, Typically, I love to ask our experienced guest, our grizzled veterans. what advice do you have for the rookies in the game? these guys who are just starting out, maybe thinking about starting their own business, what kind of advice do you have for them sharing from your experience?

Sure. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:38:33] I say this all the time and it's always moved forward and I don't mean on a weekly basis. on a daily basis, there are things. If you have high aspirations, whether it's to become a professional athlete or a fighter pilot, or build out your own business or become a CPA or what era, lawyer, whatever it is, is do something.

Every day, public education kind of starts to train you towards that. And that's for a reason, because you just can't consume all the information, out of nowhere, it takes time and it takes effort daily. so make sure you continue to do that. Once you leave your formal education, whether that's high school, college, or a postgraduate is the same skills that made you successful in school are the same skills that are going to make you successful in life.

if you take a day off because for health reasons, then do so, but you want to get right back to it. as soon as you can, if you want to make that dream a reality. 

Randy Rohde: [00:39:29] Great words. Good advice from the, the grizzled veteran. I don't know. You're not that grizzled, 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:39:35] So I feel grizzled. 

Randy Rohde: [00:39:37] You feel Grizzle, I'm sure you've been around the block.

I'm sure. around the country, in your seat, actually. okay. So I want to give you a shout here again. We've got the podcast. On time on target. and I assume people can grab a hold of that on any of the major platforms, iTunes, Spotify, all of those. 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:39:56] Absolutely. I use Libsyn. So they Mark.

They make sure it's hanging everywhere on time on target, or you can just search my last name. I'm the only Ankerstar, a unique last name. And there's only, I'm the only one with the podcast. So that's the podcast and an afterburner dash financial. You just Google those two words together. You'll see.

You'll see my, you'll see my website. If you like airplane pictures. Check out the websites. You'll see some 

Randy Rohde: [00:40:21] nice, I will do that. And, we'll have all of your contact information as well in the show notes. And so people can, go check that out and connect with you and, whatever fashion that they feel comfortable with.

So that's terrific. Listen, Steve, thank you so much for being. on the show. It's been a great pleasure. I think I could talk with you for hours in regards to flying as I'm sure everybody, even Ernie banks. Right, 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:40:48] exactly. Right. 

Randy Rohde: [00:40:50] All right. Well, listen. Best of luck to you in whatever choice you make, whatever path you go down there.

And, thanks for being on the show. Really appreciate 

Steve Ankerstar: [00:40:59] it. You bet. Thanks. Randy loved being on love, chatting with you, 

Randy Rohde: [00:41:02] right? And as we say, that's the ball game. So thanks for joining us today. If you liked the show, please tell your friends subscribe. And of course, give us a review. And as we like to say, we'll see around the ballpark.

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