Sohin Shah (00:00)
Ray, do you want to introduce yourself for the listeners?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (00:02)
Yeah, I'd happy to. I'm Ray Harrigill and I'm here with my wife Monica and together we ⁓ own and operate the Sunray companies based in Madison, Mississippi.

Sohin Shah (00:11)
When you think back to your early career, what were some of the principles that you built your business around?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (00:17)
When we first started our company, was a single unit restaurant operation, one small restaurant making hamburgers and french fries. It was built really off of the people that I was working with. As that business was successful, trying to look at the people that I had, thinking about how can I do more, how can I take a step forward. To take a step forward, I had to replace my efforts in

to be able to open something a second, you know, so you really focus on the people that are around you and how you can help them at that point really help you and that's kind of how it started of saying okay I need to move forward who can I who can I train and develop to to help us grow?

Sohin Shah (01:01)
Monica, you went through the OPM program as well about 10 years ago. That's a unique experience you all share. How does that dynamic play out in your personal and professional lives?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (01:04)
I did.

I think it was one of the best experiences I ever did. I had no formal business education unlike my loving husband and I was at a pivotal point in my life of trying to say, what's next? In OPM, I guess ratified a lot of things that we were doing, but also made us go a lot deeper and think about how we would continue to grow and expand and continue to grow our company.

but also our systems processes and people, right? So that was one of the keys. And I think that OPM helped to give me that vision or that thought process of, okay, here's year one, here's year two, here's year three. And Ray did a lot of those cases with me as well at that time because we've always been in it together. I would say, if I do something and...

I feel like he has to do it too. But if he does something, I want to know too. So we share everything. So it was kind of fun. And we had decided at that point, let's take what we've learned and see how we implement it and what that does for us over the next seven, eight years. And so that's what we did. And now it was time to say, OK, how do we go to the next level? And he said, well, I'm ready. I'm like, OK, let's do this.

Yeah, I we wanted to meter it out where we felt like we could take advantage of it. I didn't want to go with it was the same information for us or because we were aligned and working together. And so we felt like I didn't need to go immediately and I didn't want to make the investment of time and money if there wasn't a return to it as well. And so we felt we worked really hard on implementing a lot of those things over the last 10 years which went really well for us.

And then I felt like, okay, maybe it's time, one, we can get some more information and then frankly, maybe a little regeneration and a little getting me outside of my box to go back and rethink how we do things, why we do things, but also what's available in the world. Because I think the longer you work, you get very good at working on very focused things. And you work inside the box in a way to be very effective, but you stop seeing the rest of the world often.

And I think with OPM for this first session, it did what I hoped it would do, which forces me to stop and look at the whole world again, maybe like I did when I started. where all things were possible, the world was limitless. And so going back now at this point in my career and saying everything's possible, the world is limitless is pretty important. And so kind of regenerating ourselves is ⁓ an important part of being successful.

I think our professor Ananth Raman said hope is an important part of taking the shot, as he says. Hope is a strategy because you have to have this hope and belief that something can be done, something can be created. And most entrepreneurs take that huge jump with hope and faith that they can make it work. And most non-entrepreneurs never will.

Sohin Shah (04:07)
Given the two of you all have been involved in this business for about 20 years now, what I understand, talk to me about some of the harder decisions you all have come across as founders. Not about what to do, but what not to do. How do you stay grounded enough to make those calls from principles as opposed to pressure?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (04:24)
Good questions. We've actually been in it longer. Thank you for thinking we look so young. Monica started in her career in 1998. I was still in school, you know, going through and then I started our company in 1996, December of 1996. So we've been at this for a long time. Inevitably in any business, real problems come up and real crisis come up.

And I think having your guiding lights of principles and ethics are really, really important to know who you are and what you stand for before those things come up. Because those beliefs will impact the decisions you make and they'll guide the decisions that you make. And it's really easy in a hard situation to make a bad decision.

And I think you have to know, go back to your core of who you are and say, I'm making this decision even though I know it's going to be painful and it's going to cost me money or recognizing that you made a mistake and paying the consequences of it. That's a discipline too, because it's real easy to justify unethical actions when you're in a pinch, right, or under pressure. And we try very hard not to do that. And we're not perfect. Everybody has shades of gray. Somebody explained to me one time.

We all have it, but we try to minimize that as much as possible and make the right decision with the circumstances that we have. So, I mean, there's countless examples of through the years of mistakes that we've made that we had to absorb. Financial mistakes, human capital mistakes. You look back and you think about some of the people that you terminated that were not optimal. Not optimal choices, not optimal in the way that you did it, not optimal in the way that you saw it at that time.

So hindsight is beneficial to an extent when you look back and think about certain things about how it models your behavior for the future. At the same time, you can't get caught up with the past preventing you from making decisions for the future too. So it's kind of a balance. And I know Monica has thoughts on that too. She's shared similar things. Yeah. I mean, we think a lot alike. So there's very little that we don't.

We stay focused on our core values, and we stay very focused on our integrity. And we also know that everyone's always watching. So we have to make decisions that exemplify who we are, even though in the heat of the moment we may want to say, I don't want to make this decision like this today. Ultimately, your leaders are watching you. And if you bend it, then they're going to bend it to the next degree.

Right? Like, so if you bend it 5%, then you can be assured they're going to bend it 15%. So you cannot bend. And if you give 100%, they're going to give 90. If you give 105%, they're going to give 95%. So in that philosophy, you always have to remember that even in the heat of the moment, stay true to your core values, stay true to your integrity, and stay true to the long-term goal. It's not the short-term pain.

It's the long-term goal. Like, what is the result of this in a year, three years, five years, 10 years? And then I have this one thing that I always say, no regrets. Like, I don't want to go to bed at night thinking I have a regret about the way I behaved or treated someone. So I don't want to do that. Life's too short.

Sohin Shah (07:36)
and Ray, you make these risky decisions, let's call them, how do you go about thinking about the decision? Are you more analytical, more instinctive, or do you have like a trusted inner circle? I know you have each other, but anything beyond that?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (07:50)
That makes a big difference, be

honest. Having a business partner and life partner that you're totally aligned with is really, really important. And so we've been very blessed to have that. A lot of people don't. So we are each other's trusted advisor. We're very well aligned in most everything that we think and say and do. There's the occasion that I make her mad, and that's not smart. Or vice versa.

But most of the decisions we make are instinctive and analytical in our own realm. We don't pursue a lot of outside ratification for what we do or the risks that we take. Most of that is internal. We have, in the past couple of years, worked harder to include our executive team in some of those decisions. And that's an interesting journey because we're trying to teach them some of that. And it's hard.

It's really hard to take really great operations people and people that are very loyal to us and very good to us and teach them to think the way that we do. And so we're working on that because we would like for them to have some of those skills and aptitude, but it's a harder journey. So different personality types, I think sometimes our operations people are not entrepreneurs in that way. So it's not just entrepreneur starting

a new business, it's kind of how we run our company. We're entrepreneurial in the way that we think. That's harder to replicate across an organization, I would say.

Sohin Shah (09:11)
it's a little more personal for you all because of course you all work together but it's a family-owned company I don't believe you all have outside investors so you have the benefit of thinking long-term and taking decisions which can pay dividends maybe a decade later

Ray & Monica Harrigill (09:18)
No, it's just us.

You know, it's a pro and a con. We do have the benefit of it's just for us, we don't have to answer to shareholders. That's great. At the same time, it throttles your growth because we don't have outside equity. We've only grown from retained earnings and from debt. And that's good. But it also throttles how much you can do or take on. And so our growth has been a lot more measured. And when you are ambitious,

about growth and you see something for the future you're kind of like ready to go let's do it let's do it let's do it and and that that happens for us sometimes where you Monica said we need to do it and I'm like we can't afford it you know I don't I don't feel like that's the right move and so we have this conversation sometimes because leveraging up further there's a risk to that and we both are inherent risk takers but we're controlled risk takers and I think me in particular I'm probably a little more

⁓ risk control than Monica is. She's a go-getter about, we can do it. And so, and I'm like, hey, yeah, we can, but let's make sure we don't over-lever on this deal. Let's not get ourselves into something we can't work out of. Because inevitably, something will fail. You're gonna lose. It's just, if you've been in business long enough, something will fail. know, nobody ever writes a business plan that says, I will lose money and close this down, right?

⁓ Everybody writes a business plan that says this is going to work and we're gonna make a great return. This is a really great idea. It's basically what a business plan says. And it doesn't always work out that way. So you have to be prepared to mitigate the downside. And I always think of that kind of my responsibility of making sure that we can take the hit. And I would say he's more analytical. So to answer the ultimate question in his decision making, he's very thoughtful. He's very...

well-rounded and balanced in his decision making. I'm probably a little more, I'm also analytical but I will also go with my gut. Like I'm a little bit more in that way passionate or have that gut feeling of, yes we should do this now. And then he's very analytical which balances us. It works. Now she says that and she said earlier that she didn't have business training but she was actually a chemist. She was a chemistry major which is very structured analytical thinking.

So she's downplaying it. She's really the more analytical of the two because I could have I could not have taken chemistry. So well, I mean, I think it's a different type of analysis, right? Like and then in our decision making, ultimately, I defer to him on growth, growth, finance, accounting, construction, building, development, all of those things. I just if he says this is what we're doing, I'm like, OK, this is what

doing because that's really his, we call them swim lanes. It's like this is his swim lane so if he's doing it then I don't need to do it. Like a lot of times he'll copy me on an email and he'll say did you read it? And I'm like no but you did so why should I? Like you've already read it that's in your, I'm okay thanks for copying me. And we're both generally that way by the way. think that's an important thing to note for any couples that are interested in business is that

We do have the swim lanes, we do trust each other, we do not do the same work. And so a lot of times our team will assume that we both know the same thing. And it's like, I haven't talked to her today, I've been in my office all day and she's been in her office or, you know, in team meetings and I have no idea what she actually did today. And I don't need to know unless she needs to tell me. And so you have to have a lot of trust in your executive team. And that's particularly important as a couple to run a business together.

I think part of our success with that is that she built and ran her own company with her dad, ran her dad's company independently from when we started our company. And so she was an executive in her own right before she fully joined our company. And I think that is very important that there's a mutual respect and mutual skill set of each partner, whatever that may be. And I know for you, you work with your brother and I'm sure you all have a similar.

relationship with a trusted advisor and someone who each pulls their own weight and does their own work and you have to create space for that. So we've been fortunate to find.

Sohin Shah (13:30)
It's great that you all have a way of working together and getting to an agreement. What happens if the two of you all have a different perspective, maybe on a new opportunity? Who has a final say or how do you come to a meeting of the minds there?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (13:45)
He has the final say. I'm

okay saying that because that's his swim lane. That's the thing that I trust him to make the right decision. So ultimately, I'm not gonna question his decision. If he says, we're not doing this, I might say, I'm not happy about it, but I hear you. And then we move on. It's just pretty much that simple. We might argue for a day, but then it's over. It's okay, let's keep moving. He feels passionate about it. I feel passionate about it, but...

I mean, I think we know it's business. it's choices and if I trust him completely to make those choices, then I need to trust him completely to make those choices. I have an opinion, I've stated it. And the same in people dynamics. Like when we deal with people, he trusts me to make those decisions. we might discuss it and I think we normally agree. He may think I'm being a little...

headstrong about things sometimes. But then he just lets me do it, right? Like he's like, well, that's your choice. You work with them more than I do. Yeah. And I can't always second guess those. So we're aligned, you know, 99 % of the time we have the one percenters where we may disagree or have a discussion and we move forward. you know, it's, it doesn't ever feel like we're misaligned in any way. And so I think we both

Sohin Shah (14:41)
You

Ray & Monica Harrigill (15:02)
respect the boundary of the other in being able to say something and acknowledge that and incorporate that into the decision that's made. never feel like I've trumped, but you trump card on anything that she said or vice versa. mean, we arrive at the mutual agreement and that's kind of how we work. And then if there's something I really think we should do, I'll just repeat myself, you know, like women normally do about 10 times.

Sohin Shah (15:27)
I wont agree with that because my wife is going to listen to this podcast.

Ray & Monica Harrigill (15:30)
It's okay, see I'm a

woman so I can say it and be comfortable with it. And she's a strong woman. And I'm okay being comfortable with the fact that I'm going to own that. Yeah, well she's a very strong business partner and strong minded so don't misinterpret anything.

Sohin Shah (15:45)
Monica, you did OPM first. How did you come across OPM? Was that a referral from someone?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (15:49)
I had a really

good local friend. actually saw her this week and thanked her again. She had done it actually 10 years before I had. So 20 years ago. So 20 years ago. I think she was OPM 34 or 37, something like that. And she did it. She owned a marketing agency locally and had done some advertising for us in the early days.

we watched her strategically shift her business process. Like when she started, she was, she came, she started her own business, her own marketing agency, and she would do just about anything like food, retail, you name it. And then after OPM, we watched her strategically shift to only government business. Like she's female and she does all aerodynamics, shipbuilding, any kind of government contractor type business.

she moved into that realm and it was interesting to watch that shift. So she said that as she did OPM, she learned to narrow her focus and think about what her, you know, we both had Linda Applegate, you guys did not, and Linda was very dynamic and she would put up the soccer field and she would say, see, this is your soccer field, this is your playing zone. So when you take the shot, you need to look for that opening on the soccer field.

And then you need to go for that area or that focused area. Don't try to hit the whole field at once. And so she does this whole thing about taking your shot but being very, very focused about what that shot is and narrowing your field. She also was one of Jeff Bezos' mentors. she mentored, being a female, she took a lot of the females under her wing and she would really just hone in on what you're doing.

So it was all of that, hearing all of that from Liza and she had told us about it. And so when I'd gotten to this pivotal point, I was like, I need to figure this out. I need to figure out what my next life is, I call it. And OPM helped a lot.

Sohin Shah (17:55)
Monica, your father was an entrepreneur. And Ray, I'm not sure if you are from an entrepreneurial family, but you became an entrepreneur thanks to your love for Monica. Do you see yourself having chosen this life had you not met Monica?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (18:03)
I am.

Yeah, my dad always said when I was growing up, he said, when you put your shoes on in the morning, I want you to be able to decide whether you work for yourself or somebody else. So he told me that repeatedly from when I was very young. And my grandfather was an entrepreneur, my father and mother were an entrepreneur, they worked together. So I always thought I would have a business myself. But I thought that I would go into bigger corporate business. That was kind of the...

the early dream, going to Wall Street, living in New York like so, but no I'm not, I'm living in Mississippi instead.

Sohin Shah (18:39)
And you have a degree in law, right? You're a lawyer by profession?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (18:41)
I'm sorry? Yeah, it's a JD. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I have a, did a formal education was a BBA, an MBA, and then a JD law degree. And so originally I thought I would take that combination and go to wall street. And then, ⁓ we started dating and I didn't want to leave Mississippi. So, so yeah, would, would our business be exactly like it is today, but for her father, probably not, because he was already involved in franchising and,

very dynamic guy and so I learned a lot from him and Monica learned a lot from him. Very tough boss, very old school, but we both learned a good bit from him so I saw that as an example. But how it would have played out without meeting her I don't know, but yes I think it would have been in business in some

Sohin Shah (19:26)
You know Monica, and I were part of a dinner a few weeks ago and he said something to me which has stuck with me. He mentioned that I've told my kids, you have to work very hard to keep the life that you have. And I'm just wondering what's the larger philosophy behind that Ray?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (19:42)
I'll let Monica talk about it little bit. She'll probably be tired of hearing me speak about it. No, no. I mean, I think the larger philosophy is that, you know, we gave them a good life, right? Like, there was never anything they didn't want, just like your children. But ultimately, we don't want to take away their spirit of working hard and of struggling and of becoming...

really self-productive human beings in their own right. What we can give them is one thing, but that's not life. Life is being self-productive, giving back to society, being part of society, creating jobs, impacting people, whatever that means for you, whether it's a school teacher or it's a doctor or it's an attorney, they need to make a difference in the world. We both, I live by something and he...

He does too, but more, you know, as he says that to them, I say to whom much is given, much is required. You have been given a lot in your life. Now you must do a lot with it. And if you don't, you have not lived up to your family's expectations. So I think that's saying the same thing. is. And I think it's important to remember that a gift is not sustainable. A gift is a gift. And, but it's not sustainable. And so if, if your children learn how to work hard and have the value for money, they're going to be fine.

forever and they take joy in producing and working hard. Then you've done your job kind of as a parent and maybe you've given them capital to help facilitate that. But if you give the capital and you don't teach those lessons, you virtually ruin them. And so Monica and I both, we didn't grow up hard, but we grow up, you know, scrappy because Monica was the first child in her family and her parents were college professors and they didn't have a lot when she was growing up as the first child.

And my parents were entrepreneurs, but not wildly successful. So successful enough to educate us both very well and give us good lessons, but not so successful that we were disassociated with the work that went with the reward. And so our kids have grown up in a much more affluent way than we did. And it's been very, very important for us to teach them that life can be tough. You've got to learn how to work. You've got to learn.

you've got to value the people around you. All those are the things required for them to continue to enjoy what they have because the gift may go away. You know, as we told them early on, said, look, we could be broke tomorrow. Things happen, you know, and what we can give you is the ability to make your own impact the world in your own way and make things better. And if we've done that, then if the money goes, then they still have a

think we both really define success of our people growing, seeing them succeed, starting at one level, moving to another, seeing those process and systems and people come together is kind of like a musical. And when we see that happen, that is inspiring for both of us. If we've been part of creating that system process and hiring the people and putting it together and the...

the sum is better than the individual parts, then that's kind of cool. And so we really enjoy that. We enjoy going to work every day. We enjoy being involved with our team. And so for us, at this point, that's success.

Sohin Shah (22:46)
Ray, you mentioned a few minutes ago that you've grown your business through retained earnings and debt. I know a lot of people are scared of debt and they prefer the equity route. Could you speak a little more about your relationship with debt? How you look at that particular instrument for growing a business?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (23:00)
you

You know,

my dad said, my dad said early on, you're only worth as much as you can borrow. Yeah. So that was one philosophy on it, right? But yeah, I mean, unfortunately we're pretty comfortable with debt. I bathe with debt. I get into bed with debt every night. It's with me everywhere that I go and everything that I do, unfortunately, it's been that way for a long time. I think we're comfortable.

Sohin Shah (23:09)
Ha ha ha.

Ray & Monica Harrigill (23:28)
Yeah, I mean it's about – obviously if the first thing had not worked out, the first business had failed, it would be very different posture. And we were fortunate to have a couple of early ones that worked out really well before we had some failures. And I think there's a certain amount of timing and luck in life for things to work because a lot of people try and work really hard and it doesn't work out. And that's a reality. That's the risk.

Right? Risk is a real thing. Otherwise, as I say, everybody would do it. So there's real risk to being in business because it very well may not work out for no particular fault or person's lack of effort, et cetera. So for us, it worked out. We were able to repay the debt and then take on more debt and used it in a purposeful way along the way. And as I mentioned some earlier about not being over leveraged, that's all relative. What's over leveraged to one may not be to another.

And that goes back to the touch and feel and your capacity for risk and how you manage risk. We are pretty, I guess, we have a pretty steady disposition of how we think about debt and how we manage it, but we do carry a significant amount of debt. And we've talked about that, that in the next 10, 15 years, we have to decide how that's worked out. If we just reduce debt, do we pass the debt on to our children?

I've explained to them. I said I can't give you the asset without the debt. They're co-mingled, right? And that's hard because they have to take that responsibility to say yes, I'll take that debt, you know, to go with that asset if they join the business. Otherwise, we have to exit, sell, you know, get rid of the debt, and you have the equity left over. So all that has to be thought through particularly as we approach the end of our career. We're not there yet. We've got a good number of working years left, but you have to start thinking about it.

You have to manage it for sure.

Sohin Shah (25:07)
business. What would you tell him to do differently?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (25:12)
I would tell me to value my people a little more and really focus on the process. Easy lesson to tell myself today, however, the reality when you're in it at that time, you're restricted by your capital and what you can do. I mean, you're scrapping for every single penny just to try to pay people, make payroll.

reserve enough to move on to the next business. mean it's a fight like no other. you know I guess for me having had a lot of formal business education in law education before I started I knew a lot of the right answers. But in some ways I couldn't really do all those things right. You study this organizational theory. You study

Benefits you learn about all these things that you should be doing with your employees and frankly you can't afford it You can't even know you don't even have time to to almost think straight because you're you're involved in operations You're not you're in the business. You're not working on the business, right? You hear that a lot. you should work on the business Well, that's a fine theory, but when you have no money And you have to volume you have to work in the business just to try to generate a few extra pennies so it's a really hard thing, but

That said, the right answer, and this is true, is focus on the people, focus on the process to get better and better. And I Monica has her own version of that, and I'll her speak to that. I agree with him, and as you're taught at HBS, take the shot. Yeah. What would you tell your younger self? Take the shot. ⁓ That's the one thing I would tell myself. And I'll say that for young entrepreneurs. Look, most of the time when you're young, you really don't have that much to lose.

Yeah, just take the shot. Just do it. If you fail, you fail. And you learn and you move forward. Every business we have been in has not been successful. We have lost a lot of money along the way. I probably would have taken more shots and I realized that I had that little to lose. I think I was just afraid of failing maybe. Yeah, failing's a bummer.

Sohin Shah (27:06)
One thing about leadership you've learned that cannot be taught, even at Harvard Business School.

Ray & Monica Harrigill (27:11)
I would say it's never I, it's we. I always say it's the I to we journey that people make. It's never I. I hate the word I and you hear it and you hear it and you think it's not I, it's we. So it's how we do this together. Yeah. And I would say a real lesson

Surround yourself

with people you are not. Surround yourself with people that have skill sets that you don't possess. Because there's no one person who is well-rounded enough to be all things that a business or an organization needs. And so you have to know that. You have to know what your weaknesses are so that you can find the right people to help your organization be what it needs to be. So in my case, being analytical is great. But...

It's not the human touch. And I get along with people fairly well and that's good and it's fine, but it's not my gift. My gift is more on the analytical side and strategy side that's where my strength lies really. And I do people fine, but I don't always stop to smell the roses and think about my people. I'm always like, what's next? What's next? What's next? And so that's a deficit and I know that. Fortunately, I have a partner.

and other people in our organization love people for people all the time. And I wish I had that true gift. I don't. I don't process that in the same way. It's just not how I think, right? I think when I stop and think about it, yes, I'm concerned and I care about a person in front of me, but otherwise I'm thinking about the next thing and the next thing and the next thing. So it's a weakness for me. Knowing that, that's the advice that you look back and give.

Sohin Shah (28:43)
Amazing. I have one last question for you all. I'm an avid reader. Any books that have influenced you a lot?

Ray & Monica Harrigill (28:49)
a lot along the way and I think there's different books, excuse me, different books and different ideas along your journey that are important and you can't fully absorb them or appreciate them until you actually need them which is why you have to continue to learn and look because what you knew yesterday is different from today you know and so you grow and progress and then your needs become different so I'll let Monica talk about the first book which I know what she's going to talk about which her father

Introduced her to you and me too as well. Yes, we think and grow rich by Napoleon Hill We had to read at the age of 12 and summarize And then our kids had to We did it to our kids too. Yeah, so I didn't find out about the book until this 20. Yes, but we all had to read it everyone in the entire family It's one of the pillars of what he believes you should read. So I do recommend the book. It is good

Sohin Shah (29:22)
Ha ha ha.

Ray & Monica Harrigill (29:42)
I will say the books we've read this year with our team that have been helpful, Extreme Ownership has been a really good book. We work by a process called Scaling Up by Vern Harnish, so we've all done that book in the last few years with our team. That's been important for our organization in last three or four years. It's a good operational framework that we follow. And then the one we just read, which I really have enjoyed too, these are all just, we do a book a quarter with our team.

is we've done Who, and it's a lot about the top grading method of hiring the right people and adding the right people to your team. And it's a really good, manually written book, like a good book. Yeah. And so it's kind of constant learning. And again, I would just encourage people to keep reading, keep learning. Think about going to HBS or other programs to reinvigorate yourself and re-challenge yourself and question what you think you know.

and how you can be better.

Sohin Shah (30:38)
Take the shot.

Ray & Monica Harrigill (30:39)
Take the shot.

Thank you so much for asking us. We're honored to be on your show and we hope it is the first of thousands. So best of luck to you and to your company and it's a real pleasure to call you our friend.

Sohin Shah (30:51)
Likewise, thank you.