In this special post, BOLD Business sits down with College Hunks Hauling Junk co-founder Nick Friedman, who co-authored Effortless Entrepreneur with business partner Omar Soliman. Nick discusses the development of their book, the importance of teaching entrepreneurship to young adults and how he successfuly runs his business with Omar.

BOLD: What inspired you to write Effortless Entrepreneur?
NF: Believe it or not, it stemmed from an Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) event in Las Vegas. One of the speakers was talking about the importance of writing a book, and how everybody who has written a book says they wish they had done it 10 years earlier. Omar had been in that same breakout session, and we started thinking about what we were going to write about. We realized we had all these crazy stories about getting into business, and we knew we could talk about our experiences. It was a three-year process from that EO event to making the book into a real, living product.

BOLD: Tell me a little about the book’s concept. What do you hope to achieve?
NF: The actual inspiration and concept of the book is to inspire entrepreneurship; particularly, to get younger people to look at our story and say, ‘Okay, these guys weren’t rock scientists, they didn’t invent the next Google or Facebook; they took a simple concept with guys and trucks and make it successful by putting creative advertising and systems in place.’ So that became our vision for our business and the book. We want our business to be an entrepreneurial launch pad, and this book is one way to help achieve that. When Omar and I are measuring our success 10 to 20 years from now, we can talk about how many successful entrepreneurs came through our company and went on to do amazing things.

EO: In your opinion, what is the most important message you offer in your book?
NF: It depends who’s reading it. I envision a lot of people buying this book for their kids,who are graduating from college or high school. I also envision a lot of parents buying this book for their son or daughter, young adults eager to learn and grow. The message for the parents is that entrepreneurship is a very viable and exciting direction for their kids to look into. In the past, parents probably would’ve steered their kids away from entrepreneurship because it seemed risky. Today, however, it’s a new option that people should consider if they want to embark on an exciting business journey. And for the kids that buy the book, hopefully they will get inspired and know that ideas mean nothing without action.

BOLD: Most people wouldn’t classify entrepreneurship as being “effortless.” What made you adopt that term?
NF: The idea behind the word ‘effortless’ is that, as an entrepreneur, it feels like you’re doing something that you’re passionate about, that you get a rush from doing. It doesn’t feel like a struggle to get out of bed in the morning when you’re an entrepreneur. Also, we talk about systemizing your business to make entrepreneurship a little more effortless; the more systemized  a business, the less work you have to do to keep the business running.

BOLD: In your book, you mention how you take yourself out of the business to focus on the overall company culture. How can others achieve that balance?�
NF: I think discipline is key in achieving that balance; i.e., being disciplined enough to not check your e-mail after a certain time of day so you can have family time. To be successful in business, you have to have discipline and determination. Put the business in place with systems that allow you to remove yourself from it so you can more easily enjoy yourself. Sure, there are sacrifices, especially when you’re growing the business, but it’s important not to get burned out. You can’t operate at your peak if you’re always burning the candle.

Check back in tomorrow for part two of the Nick Friedman interview.