Transcript

From Gas Station Cashier to $1,000,000 CEO

From Tommy Mello · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 39 min · 6,793 words · 74 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "From Gas Station Cashier to $1,000,000 CEO", an episode of Tommy Mello published January 31, 2026 (39 min, about 6,793 words). It mentions 6 people, works and ideas, including Shireen Basadi, The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondoll CEO, Home Franchise Concepts, The Art of Joyful Living, EY.

What this episode is about

Shireen Basadi, a billion-dollar CEO and best-selling author, shares her inspiring journey from fleeing Iran at 17 to becoming a successful entrepreneur who has raised over $900 million in private equity. Emphasizing the power of empathy in leadership and resilience in overcoming adversity, she now empowers others to turn challenges into opportunities for growth and success.

Key takeaways

  • Empathy in negotiation isn't weakness; it’s the secret weapon that uncovers true motivations.
  • Shireen Basadi's journey shows that resilience isn't just surviving—it's thriving against insurmountable odds.
  • Survival isn’t the end; it’s a launchpad for unstoppable momentum and transformative leadership.
  • Coddling is for the weak; empathy empowers and enables leaders to connect at a deeper level.
  • Fleeing war at 17, Shireen turned adversity into ambition, reminding us: our beginnings don’t define our ends.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 5:00: Shireen Basadi, Home Franchise Concepts
  2. – 10:00: Home Franchise Concepts, EY
  3. – 15:00: The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondoll CEO, EY
  4. – 20:00: Forbes 30 Under 30
  5. – 38:54: The Art of Joyful Living

Notable quotes from "From Gas Station Cashier to $1,000,000 CEO"

  • Shireen Basadi is a billion-dollar CEO, best-selling author, and keynote speaker who defied impossible odds.
    about Shireen Basadi · at
  • My book was I was speaking at the I was fortunate enough to be invited to really good conferences at events. I'm in winner of entrepreneur of the year with EY. So I spoke at EY…
    about EY · at
  • The book after that because I think I did a really good job with them. My son just got Forbes 30 under 30 last year.
    about Forbes 30 Under 30 · at
  • It's called The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondollar CEO. I wrote it again exactly for the reasons I mentioned earlier, which is to help others. It's a.
    about The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondoll CEO · at
  • It could be the E-Myth Revisit, I don't know. Any book that really affected you. There are a few. So, the art of joyful living, autobiography of yoga is definitely one. So…
    about The Art of Joyful Living · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Shireen Basadi — Person · Main guest · 2 mentions · first at
    Primary interview subject sharing her immigration story, rise to CEO, private equity experience, leadership philosophy, and recovery from a life-threatening brain tumor—framed around resilience, empathy, and adversity as a 'superpower.'

Books & papers

Companies & orgs

  • Home Franchise Concepts — Company · Business focus · 4 mentions · first at
    The company Shireen Basadi led to nearly $1 billion in systemwide sales, central to her success story.
    After surviving a life-threatening brain tumor, Shireen now helps leaders turn adversity into unstoppable momentum.
  • EY — Company · Referenced work · 2 mentions · first at
    Shireen's early career at EY as a CPA, foundational to her business acumen.

Places & events

  • Forbes 30 Under 30 — Event · Referenced achievement · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as an achievement of Shireen's son, indicating her influence extends to her family.

Full transcript with timestamps

Empathy may be misunderstood as weakness. It is not weak. Empathy is not about coddling people. It's about meeting them where they are. Think about it. If you're negotiating with someone, who does a better job of negotiating? Someone who can understand their opponent, where they're coming from, what win looks like for them, where their challenges may be, and can work with them or somebody who doesn't.

Brave, resilient, unstoppable. Shireen Basadi is a billion-dollar CEO, best-selling author, and keynote speaker who defied impossible odds.

All human beings have a clearly diagnosed condition that is terminal, and that is life. After fleeing Iran alone at 17 with no money and no family, she went on to raise over $900 million in private equity and lead home franchise concepts to nearly $1 billion in systemwide sales. Not only being opportunistic is important, but also understanding your weaknesses.

After surviving a life-threatening brain tumor, Shireen now helps leaders turn adversity into unstoppable momentum.

And it's become my passion to give back, to do good, to give people an opportunity to own their own business and own their own lives.

Get ready for a master class in resilience, leadership, and perseverance in the face of adversity. Welcome back to the Mellow Millionaire. Today I got Shireen Basadi. She is the CEO of Home Franchise Concepts, the author of The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondoll CEO. Shireen is a billion-dollar CEO and a best-selling author. At the age of 17, she uh fled from Iran and arrives to the US with no money and no family members. Today she raised over 900 million in private equity and leads home service franchise concepts to nearly a billion dollar in systemwide sales. Along the way she survived a lifethreatening brain tumor, learned to walk again and emerge more empathetic and a resilient leader.

Today Shireen is a sought after keynote speaker, board director and author. And it's amazing to have you on today. Thank you.

Thank you. Thanks for having me. It's exciting. So, you you uh you're you're kicking butt in kickboxing today. A little worn out, huh?

I am. I am. I shouldn't have done it. This was my second class. I was like, maybe just took a lot of energy out of me.

Well, let's just dive into, you know, how it all got started. You know, I got a lot of friends from Iran. There's a lot going on over there right now. Some very close people to me. You immigrated here. Um, can you just talk us through the beginning, the challenges, and where you're at today, what you're looking forward to?

Yes. Uh, this is a definitely a very trying time for Iran and anybody who cares about human rights. So, I want to acknowledge that. And I do want to say that I experienced this regime firsthand. I was born and raised in a very nice familyloving family in Iran when things were smooth, normal until the revolution happened and chaos ensued and as a result we lost all sense of safety. I witnessed atrocities, executions for 40ome years they've done the same thing. So, but I saw it firsthand and personally I was arrested twice. Once I was just walking on the street and I guess they just didn't like the way I looked. And the second time they stopped us when we were traveling with my sister and friends and went through our bags and found a book in my suitcase and that's all hell broke loose. And so that was something to deal with. It's interesting because to your point decades later I actually wrote a

book. So revenge is sweet. It was because of both of those and of course there was a war that ended up happening between Iran and Iraq that when I was 17 years old, my parents decided in order for me to build a life that they thought I could, it was time for me to leave. It was a decision that to me felt very sudden. They probably had thought about it for some time. And so I had to very discreetly say goodbye to everything. I had to say goodbye to my siblings. I'm the youngest of five. to my dad, to everything I knew, all the friends and family, and pack everything I own in this world in a in one suitcase at 17 years of age. They put me on my mom's passport, and we left Iran. So, we landed in Turkey because it was the one place we could go pretty quickly. And there, my mom found me a home that a woman had a room for three girls and left me there. So here I was at 17 with no parents, no friends. I didn't speak

the language. I had never been away from home. I came from a loving family, very little money and not even a passport. And so and the situation at the home changed pretty rapidly where the woman turned really cold, food was scarce, we had to use buckets to shower. It was hard. I realized there was a fork in the road. Do I roll over and let the circumstances own me or do I reach for hope? I reached for hope and I thought I am going to go to the United States. I'm going to find my way to the United States. I landed at LAX. I was excited and then I'm like, well, now what? What am I going to do now?

I took a job as a cashier at a gas station. And this was not the nicest area. It was a bulletproof gas station cashier's booth because it was not a nice area. like you had to be very careful. I remember vividly the day where I was sitting there alone at 6:00 in the morning on a Christmas morning feeling sorry for myself, demoralized, wondering why I was so unfortunate at such a young age. And then something shifted. Maybe it was my perspective that was wrong. And with that, I started really dreaming into I'm going to run a big company someday. I'm going to run a big company. Because if you think about it, a little girl in the corner of a gas station, you know, bulletproof just with the name Sheree Bazadi, why would you think that way? But that was the essence. And that knowing was the reason I ended up being able to build what I ended up building. That knowing pulled me through. I ended up going to college

full-time, working full-time. I ended up becoming a CPA. I wanted to always work for a big accounting firm. I ended up being able to I worked with EY and I was doing really well and there I thought okay well if I stay a few more years I may become a really good auditor but I wanted to run a big company so it was time for me to leave and learn about operations. That was a very difficult decision like to the point that I would sit in my car and I'd be asking myself why I'm making those decisions but I did because I knew I was going to run a big company. So I ended up um joining another organization. It was a bank there. I rose up to CFO of a pretty goodsized bank. You know, we were originating a hund00 million of loans a month. We had a billion dollar of loan servicing and this is late 90s. So these numbers were substantial. Then there I learned a lot about operations. Rather than taking another CFO position that I

was going to opt in and really take a chance on myself. So I went out on my own and there I was doing what today people call like fractional CFO. The idea was let me understand what I can do on my own. In that process I came across a company that at the time was growing but small and I joined them and there I stayed for 20 years. This is where we were infranchising of home improvement products. Initially of course only one and for years as you know well about the entrepreneurial journey it is very hard the first few years you couldn't pay the bills sometimes until we landed on what I call the secret sauce we started growing and from there we decided to maybe try another franchise concept and created the home franchise concepts as the umbrella company about 2013 it became became obvious that it was time for us to consider exit because the company was of size and not everybody had the same desires to stay on. So

that's where I looked for private equity. It took me a couple of years and it was I can get into all of that experience, lots of experience there. We finally partnered with a really good private equity firm in 2015 and as was planned everybody else was bought out but me. So here I was CEO of a goodsized company but I was also filling the positions of CIO, CMO, CFO and COO all in one person and we had grown over 70% when um an industry that was growing 6 to9% a year as CEO. So now today my life is all about board and service and helping others grow and accomplish what they want to accomplish.

You did it. Yeah, that's quite the story. That's the best come-up story I've ever heard. Um, so private equity usually gives 10 to 15% profit units. Is that where you made the bulk of your money was in the equity or how how did that work? Because you stayed on there, I guess, 24 years,

I 20 years. Oh, 20 years. So 16 year, but you stayed through the next. So you you got when you got to the second transaction.

Yes, definitely. that the second transaction, a lot of that responsibility was on me, right? Those expectations that you set out when you recruit private equity, you have to live up to those expectations. And that's what we did.

When you do a deal, they, you know, a lot of people like, I'm going to get a lot of money. I'm going to be able to kind of live my life a little better. If I'm in private equity and I recruit you or pay a lot of money for you, I'm expecting you to work harder.

Yes. I mean, yeah. They have their own investors, right? They have to show a return. You have to be very mindful of what who you partner with because it is a marriage. You've got to make sure that you get along really well. You know, Tommy, since I've stepped down, I've been on boards of private equity, held companies. I've consulted with private equity, but I've also consulted with CEOs of companies going through the same thing.

I love that. I um I'm very curious about the secret sauce because you were like then we figured out the secret sauce is do you have any details on that or what what does that look like?

You know one of the reasons why I wrote my book was I was speaking at the I was fortunate enough to be invited to really really good conferences at events. I'm in winner of entrepreneur of the year with EY. So I spoke at EY strategic forum a couple of times a lot of places and every time I was invited I thought that what they are looking for are more of uh what the topic was private equity how to raise enterprise value that's what I thought it was but every time anybody who was organizing it would ask me make sure to weave in your story and how you landed here right so of course I hesitated to write and when I finally wrote and I sat in the corner of the family room for two years and I literally wrote this by myself. The idea was what were the lessons that I learned along the way that I used later on.

Right? So I wanted to really reflect and arrive at those lessons. I'm giving you a longer background because the idea of a secret sauce is explained in the book because it it it talks about how many mistakes we made along the way and how we learned from those mistakes that the idea that the adversities that we had along the way made us really really good at what we did because we had so much adversity. The secret sauce was a combination, an accumulation of the lessons learned in those years where we were just trying to grow and it wasn't happening. We changed our systems. We changed our offerings. We changed our pricing. And we changed our lead generation plans. All of those things combined finally worked. It took years to get there, but it finally worked. So, it wasn't one one thing. It was an accumulation of trials and errors and landing on the right um solution.

What scared you the most when you when you got to the United States? And what gave you the most hope? There was so much fear Tommy that I was frozen and thank God in a lot of ways you know I know it's not healthy to be frozen but sometimes when situation is so severe you are better off numbing yourself for a minute to get through it. Of course then I processed those fears later on in life. It's not like I stayed in that state and um that was it. I it started of course little by little family came out my you know f sisters came out like little by little things looked up but when I first started here that those were the fears but what gave me more the most hope was the notion that I explained earlier that I am free to build a life in my career as a franchiseor that's essentially what I did you know help others build their own businesses, find employment, create college funds for their kids. So, it was in in a way

that was my dream come true. Not only would I do something good for myself, but also by others.

What does it mean to you to be in this country because it seems like you're living your best life.

I share the story of my life and this is exactly why I wrote the book. It opens the doors for others to share theirs. I can't tell you how many times I've given a speech or gotten off stage and when I sat down after a an award presentation, there was a gentleman sitting next to me. He was a banker. He was an executive at a bank, you know, a very run-of-the-mill bank executive classic look, right? And he was crying and he told me his life story. The point of it is we have as human beings so much more in common than we don't.

Everything we've built in this world from the clothes I wear, from the furniture I sit on, from this computer that I'm using, people have done together through collaboration. This is what's made humanity humanity.

That's one scary thing about raising kids is although I want them to go through adversity, uh, and I think that's what made me and you is the adversity. It's like I don't want to spoil them. I want them to work for stuff, but where's that line drawn of like you're gonna like you got to get a job early, of course, and you're not going to get I'm not buying you your first car and you're going to pay your way and you're going to learn responsibility, but what's the fine line? Because I don't have kids yet. I'm engaged. I'm just curious.

I think that would be my next book or the book after that because I think I did a really good job with them. My son uh just got Forbes 30 under 30 last year.

Oh, nice. There you go. I know. And my daughter is fantastic. So, and I've been asked this question. How do you have your children experience adversity? I always talk about this is the subject of a lot of the keynotes I deliver is the superpower of adversity because I think adversity is a superpower. There's three questions I always ask every single guest. I got a lot more questions after this, but I ask it right now. What's one piece of gamechanging advice you wish you knew in your 20s?

Oh, own your successes. Own own what you're doing. I think oftentimes, especially, you know, when maybe people come from poverty or a background that's a little bit um less embraced by society or or if you're a minority or if you're a woman, sometimes you shy away from owning your successes. What's why that's important is that one, you declare it to the world, but also you declare it to yourself. And I didn't do a lot of that. So what would be an example that you wish you owned in your 20s and how would you how would you own it in your words?

So I worked my butt off and I would do great work on projects. Let's say when I was working at an accounting firm I would work do great things on projects but I would never make it clear that it was my doing. So even if in conversations if somebody else would talk about a specific project and how well it was done I would just let it be. If you had to start over, let's just say today you you got your relationships, you got $10 million. Where are you putting the money?

Oh, I would put it put the money in with as as a fund to help invest in entrepreneurs that are up and coming.

So like um venture capitalist type things basically, but not quite a venture capitalist because I wouldn't be a venture capitalist, but yes. What's your biggest professional dream at the moment? It sounds like you're working on a couple more books. You're loving the public stage. What's what's the next 10 years hold for you? What are you looking forward to?

I am passionate about getting the message out. And the message out is message is this one. I mentioned it earlier. the superpower of adversity. Encouraging people to understand because you know the world is filled with challenges adversities especially today, lots going on that it is not only possible, it's useful to use those adversities to grow through and from and that you can accomplish, build, live your vision because you can. So, I'm passionate about delivering these messages with practical ways and strategies that can get you there and just getting the word out, giving people hope and the ability to build what they want in life.

You know as well as I do, it takes a lot of failure. I mean, you're living check to check. You're working 24/7. You might take out an equity loan. You're borrowing money. I mean, what do you tell to people? And by the way, I'm not trying to kill the dream. I just want to say it's tougher than people think. And you should plan for five or 10 years instead of plan to be rich this year.

Exactly. So first of all, not absolutely entrepreneurship is not for everyone. And entrepreneurship is not the only path to success. Part of what I do with my speaking and a lot of it is actually work uh speaking at organizations and companies. You you can build a career and a life working with an organization of any size. So the idea of adversity is a superpower applies to all of those things. The idea that you can at the same time working at a company find places where you can find your joy and be able to grow and accomplish. Of course, there are some people that it just can't help but be entrepreneurs.

And of course, that's another interesting path to take. I love it. Um, what's interesting, so you started out as a CPA, you moved to CFO, and then you chose to become a CEO. What do CFOs typically misunderstand about leadership and what do CEOs often misunderstand about finance? I

want to start with CEOs. I'm shocked and amazed at CEOs that so many of them don't really understand finance that well. It's fascinating to watch. Whereas I feel like with my upbringing because I came from a finance background, I was so wellversed on the numbers. But I'm just curious from your perspective, what do CFOs not know about what the CEO has to deal with and what it's like to be a CEO?

Sure. Sure. As a CFO, I think you have to understand that leadership is about understanding people. Even in the age of AI, we still run the show, right? So in order to lead an organization, you have to understand how to work with people and that requires a lot of communication across different functional areas. I wrote a piece and it is something that I'm really passionate about in that a good leader is like an orchestra conductor. Our job is to making sure that every musician is in the right seat. So you don't have somebody who knows how to write, you know, played a flute playing the violin. Like that's not how it works. It's the same with organizations.

Sometimes we put people in the right wrong places and we think they're the wrong people, but it could be they're just in the wrong roles or the wrong responsibilities. The job of a leader at the end of it all is to harmonize it all, which means communication, which means staying on top of things, which means connecting with the different parts of the organization.

You know, it's pretty interesting. I read a book by 50 companies, CEOs or private equity companies that did five times money invested. They did a lot of studies and they came up with this concept of rowing the boat in the same direction and having five to 10 things that's going to keep a strong internal net promoter score while also grow revenue and profitability and just a great culture. How did you kind of deal with that as a CEO? Yes, one of the best things we did is what I explained earlier about a listening tour. So took I took the time to go through different parts of the organization and had more or less similar questions with an open-ended discussion we would have with teams. So what we made sure we did was not just talk to the executive team but go into the various parts of the organization started within the organization then we spread out and expanded to our franchise owners to our consumers and I and our

suppliers. Basic few questions that we asked were these who are we like who are we not about just their department but who are we as a company as a brand. The second question is why are customers and clients buy from us? And the last one is where is it that we want to go? Who do we want to be? In addition to all the other discussions and what we found was exactly to your point, there were discrepancies and gaps which was probably where most opportunities lived. What we found is that people that had come on board later on as the company had grown had a different notion that people had been that had been on earlier on and the connections had been lost over the years as the company had grown.

So there there were gaps but then there were also commonalities. The good news is that there we had enough common to build on. And so with that, we knew our mission was to clarify and make sure that we are all clear as to who we are, why our customers and clients are buying our products or service, and where we want to go.

What qualities do you prioritize when you when you're hiring leaders, especially in the high growth that you guys were in? I want to say they want to first fit the core values of the company for sure. But I generally am very keen on bringing people that truly genuinely believe in doing good work. So please, no financial engineering, no no finding quick acute ways around window dressing to making the company look good because I think you have to build something that's foundationally sound and that will give you ultimately the best return on your investment, but also people that are interested and eager and be at elevating other people because that is your job as a leader. especially if you're coming in as an executive, you've got to have a real genuine keen interest and as at elevating others.

I want to jump into something that I'm really curious about is um in 2009 you went through this this brain tumor and and uh obviously you realized tomorrow's not promised in the process there and you had a brutal recovery. um what changed in the way you look at life and work and family and what what changed the way you look at through the lens after something like that happens.

So in my family we talk about life before and life after and life after is so much more so much better so much more authentic so much more me. So it was a gift that I didn't ask for but it was a gift nevertheless. I had a brain tumor that was lodged between my optic nerves and it only responded to surgery that was eventually done endonasally through my nose and it was a 10-hour surgery. It was a very difficult surgery, but they successfully removed the tumor which was threatening uh my vision and of course my life. What happened after that though was the they take a part of your septum to cover the skull to the hole that they drilled. Apparently, that was leaking and we didn't know that. So, 10 days later, I was rushed back into the emergency room with having lost all of my spinal fluid in my skull, which to my physicians afterwards uh taught me that that's sudden death.

You're you're not supposed to lose your uh spinal fluid in your skull. So, that would be spontaneous. You would spontaneously stop breathing or your heart would spontaneously stop beating. The only thing they could do was to rush me in and uh fill that hole and hope that I would make enough spinal fluid to live through it. And every day I would, you know, of course I was in high ICU for a long time. And every day I would have a CAT scan in the morning, CAT scan in the afternoon because it was very much touch and go. All of the bodily systems were going arry. I had a fever for a few months. And so after all of the ordeal and having survived through it because it was very much life and death because of the ordeal that I had been through, I really was having a hard time finding literally my balance. So my recovery when I finally came home was about how do I how do I start walking again? And talk about

one step at a time. That was it. Or one step forward, two step back. That was it. You know, my I had all these grand visions in life. Some way someday I'm going to run a big company. Blah blah blah blah. Well, my vision at the time became, can I go around the coffee table someday? Can I go upstairs someday? And I couldn't really speak that well because everything was broken. My entire face was broken. I had I was just really sick. All of that made me slow down. I had been working so fast to survive and grow and all of those things where I hadn't really taken a break, taken a time to observe. So when you can't talk really well and if you can't move too fast, you become an observer. And that what that did was that it heightened every sense in me from the way from that point on I could see people better. It's kind of strange to explain, but when I would see people, I could just feel them more,

understand them more. Everything was every taste was more um felt after as as I was recovering. I could hear, but it was just all of the senses were heightened. But just as importantly, that pause made me take stock of what's working and what's not working and how I truly do want to live my life. Somebody, an older woman back in the day said, "Shireen, sometimes people get a nudge to make changes and sometimes people get have to be hit over the head by a 2x4." And I got tipped over the head by a 2x4 to wake up. Every change that I made from that point on as I recovered was for the better in my personal life, in my uh family life, in my business life, growing and you know being really excited about creating a platform of brands blah blah. All of that happened after that brain tumor.

What would you say? I mean that was 17 years ago. I mean, your senses were obviously went off the charts. You slowed down. You You're where your feet are. You You got to be happy. I mean, you made it through life-threatening surgery. I mean, it must be like this new life that you were able to kind of birth.

Yes. So you know then when other challenges show up in life including business challenges or could be personal you have a point of reference that goes well is it going to kill me but if it doesn't and you survive through them it puts things in perspective. So when we were for instance kneede in growing the company really fast we created the platform we did technology platforms we did micro marketing platforms while one of my board members were saying sharen you're trying to change the engine as you're driving 80 miles an hour you have the stamina or the wherewithal to do those things because you have perspective because you always can tie it back to we're trying to do something better.

It's not life and death. When you think about success, obviously there's finance, but there's also fitness, faith, friends and family, developing your future self. Do you do you switch perspectives? Because I found myself off balance on purpose, chasing the finance goals just because we didn't have it in my life and I made a promise when I was four. I was never going to let money tear up my family like it did when I was a kid. But what changes like obviously health becomes a huge priority and probably you're looking more like I want quality time with family and quality time means turning off your phone and spending time. So what where are you at today with that?

So even back in the day when I was a young um say CPA working at EY I had a very clear understanding of what was the most important to me and that was relationships on my personal life. I always used to say if I have children I want to be an engaged mother. Those are the core values that were non-negotiable to me. I'm not sure why exactly why I landed on it. It could be that I came from a post-nit family, but it could also be that I lost them. So, I understood how significant relationships are in life. Therefore, luckily, a lot of decisions that I made, talk about saying no. I did say no to opportunities often that didn't fit my ability to be present for my family. Luckily, that's always been the underlying factor. Today I've I'm reaping the rewards. I do have good relationships which I'm grateful for.

And that experience helps me hopefully help others do the same. We we're talking in today's world a lot more about work life balance, which was not even a thing, you know, decades ago when I had children. So, it's good to hear. But it's not just a work life balance. is really being clear as to your core values and staying close to them. Much like core values that you define for a company, there are personal core values that you can hold dear. Money and finance are great. They're great. Nothing wrong with them. But much like when you build a company, Tommy, you built it because you you you're building a good company and you reap the rewards.

You're not going to show up every day and say, "I'm doing this for the money." you're it's showing up every day because I'm going to build this and grow it. It's the same in your personal life. I do believe that money is the reward of doing things well.

Yeah. You know, for me, time blocking for the whole year has probably become one of the most important things. I try to set up the whole year with the non-negotiables and a lot of that has to do with family.

I love that you're making it a priority. Yeah. You got to do it because life gets in the way. So if it's planned on and it's in the calendar, it's like you block that time. And here's one thing I found about great leaders, great family people is they time block so well. Like non-negotiables. This is this is like my date night. This is where the day we're going to go to church and pray. Like they do a great job of that.

When I was given u decisions to make about my time, I would bounce it off of is this the best thing for my relationships? So I would make decisions even when it comes came to travel and doing business um meetings. I would I would make sure that it doesn't didn't interfere too much.

I'm just going to ask some last questions here. So there's a lot of people that I found lately in this new day and age and I never felt this but this burnout and they feel overwhelmed. They feel stuck. I know you mentioned you felt stuck and it was like a good thing for you because you got to almost be paralyzed in this moment to kind of refind yourself, but what's the best way when just things aren't going right and you feel like you're unlucky and why is God doing this or whatever is going on? What's the best way to come out of that?

Oh, live with it. Like you've got to you've got to give it time. You've got to marinate in it and understand where it's coming from. Often times we want we feel something and we just go fast. like let's fix it this this minute. Let's fix it. Let's fix it. But um ignoring it is not going to help. I think you've got to give yourself some time, sit with it, really understand where it's coming from because that's where a lot of growth exists. It doesn't mean you're not you're going to be in that state forever. It just means you have to go through it. It's like any other adversity. It doesn't feel good, but you've got to go through it.

Um what um what are your So you've got your book. Tell us a little bit, you you mentioned it throughout this interview, but tell us a little bit about your book.

It's called The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondollar CEO. I wrote it again exactly for the reasons I mentioned earlier, which is to help others. It's a road map I wish I had when I was growing up. It is inspirational, ties in personal stories, so it's easy to read, but it's also instructional. Uh it's national bestseller. It's won a bunch of book awards. Reviews are great. People say that it's a it's a unique business book because it does have a lot of personal. It's very human.

Uh is there any books that changed your life that like literally like this book made me see through a different lens, a whole different perspective? It could be a fiction book, it could be the Bible, it could be the E-Myth Revisit, I don't know. Any any book that really affected you. There are a few. So, uh, the art of joyful living, autobiography of yoga is definitely one. So, these are not, you would think there would be business books, but it's personal because I feel like mindset is significant even when you're building a business for sure when you're building a business. So, these are to me mindset books.

And then if someone wants to reach out to you, what's the best way to do that? Right? So obviously if they search the unexpected CEO, they can also find me because it also takes them to my website. I have a website with my name. Good luck spelling it. Shireenbazari.com. And I'm on social. I'm on LinkedIn. You um uh Instagram, Tik Tok, everywhere.

Finally, Shireen, we talked about a lot of stuff. I just want to give you a quick opportunity. Any anything you want to close us out with for the audience?

Well, first of all, I want to thank you. This was great. and very lively. I do want to encourage everybody to think that no matter what it looks like with life, with geopolitics, with economy, with every headwind that we're experiencing now, it is still possible to live the life of your vision. It is still possible to build, to grow, to accomplish. It is, it takes a lot of attention and hope, but it's possible. Adversity is your superpower.

I love it. And next time hopefully we get to meet in person. You're gonna be like a a badass kickboxer.

Oh yes. Yes. I'm working on it. Second second class. I love it. Shireen, I had a blast today. Thank you so much for the opportunity and u I'm going to read your book and get to know you more. I hope.

Thank you. It was nice talking to you. All right. Listen, have a great week and u I appreciate everything. Thanks so much for listening to this episode. Like always, we're going to close it out with the Tommy truth, which is a little slice of wisdom from me to you that can help guide you in whatever you're striving towards right now. As your business grows, you got to focus on that bottom line. You got to focus on profit. The reason you went into business is profit. When you start a business, you're really focused on revenue. And profit is kind of like what's in the bank right now.

And so many business owners, they spend more than they make. If you got a great CPA, but you don't have a CFO or a controller, they'll say, "Spend all your money at the end of the year cuz you're going to owe too much in taxes." But now you got no money in the bank to grow next year. You need to know your known financial position and have enough money to handle the growth. Marketing, capital expenditures, hiring. But once you get serious about profit, all the things start going in the right direction and you create true wealth. And that's it, guys. We'll talk to you next week.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "From Gas Station Cashier to $1,000,000 CEO"?

Tommy Mello (Host), Shireen Basadi (Guest).

What is "From Gas Station Cashier to $1,000,000 CEO" about?

Shireen Basadi, a billion-dollar CEO and best-selling author, shares her inspiring journey from fleeing Iran at 17 to becoming a successful entrepreneur who has raised over $900 million in private equity. Emphasizing the power of empathy in leadership and resilience in overcoming adversity, she now empowers others to turn challenges into opportunities for growth and success.

What is mentioned in this Tommy Mello episode?

6 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Shireen Basadi, The Unexpected CEO, My Journey from Gas Station Cashier to Billiondoll CEO, Home Franchise Concepts, The Art of Joyful Living, EY, Forbes 30 Under 30. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "From Gas Station Cashier to $1,000,000 CEO"?

The episode runs 39 min; the transcript is about 6,793 words in 74 timestamped sections.

More from Tommy Mello

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated January 31, 2026.