In episode 30 of Built by Margin, Laurie Chen shares key insights from her upcoming book Risk Worthy - decisions compound. Most people think of compounding only in financial terms, but the same principle applies to the choices we make every day—how we spend our time, what we prioritize, the risks we take, and the future we build through repeated action. This episode unpacks why small decisions are rarely small, and how their long-term effect often matters more than the immediate result.

Drawing from her upcoming book Risk Worthy, Laurie breaks down the difference between short-term optimization and long-term alignment. She explores the idea of qualitative ROI—the return that comes from making decisions that shape your character, expand your capacity, and move you toward your best possible future, even when the payoff is not immediate or easily measurable. This episode is a reminder that the best decisions are not always the safest or fastest ones, but the ones that compound into the life and business you actually want.

Whether you’re a founder, CEO, operator, or someone in a season of meaningful decisions, this episode will challenge you to think beyond isolated moments and start viewing your choices as part of a larger pattern. Because over time, your decisions don’t just affect your future—they create it.

QUOTES

• " If you are making decisions that actively choose your best self and your best possible future, those decisions will compound as part of the process of fulfillment. Our decisions compound over time. The question is - what are we allowing to compound?" - Laurie Chen

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 29 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen shares key insights from her upcoming book Risk Worthy. — bold outcomes are rarely built through reckless leaps. Using startup failure data as the backdrop, Laurie breaks down why founders, angel investors, and venture capitalists still make asymmetric bets despite long odds and frequent losses. The deeper lesson is that risk becomes worth pursuing not when success is guaranteed, but when the path allows for learning, adjustment, and downside protection along the way.

Laurie unpacks the principle of starting small and iterating fast through examples from business and entrepreneurship. Drawing on Eric Ries’ lean startup framework, she highlights the importance of testing hypotheses, measuring results, and knowing when to pivot versus persevere. She also walks through how Amazon began with books before expanding into broader retail, how Facebook scaled from Harvard to the world in stages, and how Chesapeake Bay Candle founder Mei Xu built a $75 million company by validating demand with low-cost experimentation and gradual operational refinement.

The episode closes by connecting these lessons to the broader Risk Worthy framework: the best risks are not unmanaged risks, but risks with guardrails. Whether in startups, sports, or personal reinvention, meaningful progress often comes from choosing one measurable signal, defining success criteria early, and creating fast feedback loops that reduce costly mistakes. Laurie challenges listeners to think beyond upside alone and instead build decisions around experimentation, metrics, and disciplined iteration that make long-term success more likely.

QUOTES

• "Choosing one signal you can measure within a short set of time, like 21 days, and defining the success criteria ahead of time, will lead to more effective and efficient experimentation." - Laurie Chen
• "The world celebrates the headline - the acquisition, the valuation, the championship, the breakout success. But what often gets missed is the structure underneath it: the small test, the early signal, the short feedback loop, the disciplined iteration, and the willingness to adjust before the cost of being wrong becomes too high." - Laurie Chen

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 28 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen shares key insights from her upcoming book Risk Worthy. — In this episode, Laurie breaks down one of the core ideas from Risk Worthy: Why Numbers Matter — numbers don’t drive the decision—but they absolutely protect it. If Risk Worthy is about qualitative ROI, purpose, alignment, and growth, why do numbers still matter?

Laurie walks through the four pillars—Best Self, Best Possible Future, Variance Engineering, and Start Small / Iterate Fast—to show where financial discipline, metrics, and constraints belong in values-led decision making. You’ll learn how numbers act as a dashboard (not a dictator): they prevent recklessness, reveal what’s compounding over time, help you cap downside risk, and improve the quality of your experiments when you’re testing a new direction.

The episode closes with a simple, practical “10-minute Risk Worthy Numbers Check” you can apply to any decision (career, relationships, business, or health): define your budget (money/time/energy), name an acceptable loss, and choose one metric that signals you’re compounding in the right direction over the next 30 days.

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01:20] Qualitative ROI and financial discipline.

[00:03:06] Numbers in decision-making.

QUOTES

• "Design the systems that make the numbers work for you, and make the measurement of your success consistent and the success of your outcomes more attainable, perhaps even inevitable." - Laurie Chen

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 27 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen interviews Dr. Greg Pursley, a business coach, author, and CEO, who discusses the pivotal moment that led him to transform his business into a sellable asset and how he now helps entrepreneurs break through mental barriers to achieve sustainable growth.

Tune in for insights on gaining clarity, boosting income, and creating lasting impact in your business.

QUOTES

• "If you don't have a strategy, then it turns into chaos." - Dr. Greg Pursley
• "Most people underestimate the potential of growth because they don't base it on data in the market; they base it on what they hope will happen." - Dr. Greg Pursley
• "Accepting is the part that a lot of people skip." - Dr. Greg Pursley

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

Dr. Greg Pursley

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drgregpursley/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drgregpursley1/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 26 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen interviews Jaben Makings, the founder of Onnix Investments, as he shares his journey of disrupting the real estate investing world by redefining how agents and investors collaborate. Risk Worthy isn’t reckless — it’s calculated. In this episode, Jaben Makings breaks down how he evaluates off-market deals, builds a team, and makes decisions that compound.

Tune in to discover how strategic financial decisions can drive profitability in your business.

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01:05] Real estate career pivot.

[00:04:01] Profit margins and business growth.

[00:08:08] AI's impact on business operations.

[00:10:15] Team building and accountability.

[00:14:27] Revenue versus profit differentiation.

[00:19:15] Risk-taking in business growth.

[00:22:31] Recommended leadership books.

[00:26:38] Shiny object syndrome in business.

[00:28:38] Unfocused Thinking in Business.

[00:32:55] Instagram collaboration and growth.

QUOTES

• "The biggest thing I've learned since hiring people is that you teach people how to treat you." - Jaben Makings
• "But when you own a business, especially in the first couple of years when you're still a startup, and you're still scaling, there's going to be a lot of risk with a lot of the decisions that you make." - Jaben Makings
• "You need to make sure you're filling your mind with positive stuff because if you let your mind wander and think for itself, it's typically gonna side with fear and anxiety." - Jaben Makings

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Jaben Makings

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jaben-makings

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jaben_makings/

Onnix Investments: https://onnixinvestments.com/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 25 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen interviews Fahim Talukdar, VP of Finance at Praetorian, as he shares his unique career journey, starting from commercial and personal banking to his current role in a cutting-edge cybersecurity company.

Tune in to learn more about Fahim's experiences and the evolving landscape of finance in the corporate cybertechnology space.

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01:17] Career path in finance.

[00:05:05] Startup finance and forecasting.

[00:10:16] Remote work culture challenges.

[00:14:00] Tools for finance and accounting.

[00:17:22] Upgrading ERP systems.

[00:23:47] AI opportunities in finance.

[00:27:42] AI in financial modeling.

[00:30:24] Human judgment in financial metrics.

[00:34:57] Key performance metrics for CEOs.

[00:37:21] Importance of networking in finance.

[00:41:34] Insights into income.

QUOTES

• "You have to be able to adapt. You have to be able to be real with stakeholders and provide them with... guardrails to end up with an overall plan that makes sense." - Fahim Talukdar
• "What we don't want to do is just be kind of stuck in how we do things, and then there's something out there on the market that's a game change,r and we didn't know that." - Fahim Talukdar
• “If you do good work, if you make good connections, that those connections tend to open doors for you down the road.” - Fahim Talukdar

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

Fahim Talukdar

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fahimtalukdar/

Praetorian: https://www.praetorian.com/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 24 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen shares key insights from her upcoming book Risk Worthy. — In this episode, Laurie breaks down one of the core ideas from Risk Worthy: your Best Possible Future — and why it’s the missing filter most people need when making high-stakes decisions.

You’ll learn the difference between Best Self and Best Possible Future: Best Self is about the thoughts, energy, and character you bring into the world, while Best Possible Future is about the outcomes and life vision you’re building toward — your “vision board fulfilled.” Laurie explains how your Best Possible Future helps you evaluate risk through a simple, grounding question: even with uncertainty, does this move me closer to my long-term vision?

From there, she connects the concept to real decisions with real consequences — building a life-changing product, investing $100K into a startup, or choosing the right business partner — and introduces the idea of qualitative ROI: when a decision is aligned with your Best Self and Best Possible Future, you can trust that the logistics and numbers tend to resolve over a long enough horizon.

Finally, Laurie challenges the timeline assumptions behind your goals, drawing from Peter Thiel’s “Why can’t you do this in 6 months?” and Benjamin Hardy’s argument for compressing timelines to force focus, simplification, and 80/20 thinking. The episode closes with a powerful question: Is your Best Possible Future ten years away — or six months away? And what would change if you had to find out?

Key themes: Best Possible Future framework, qualitative ROI, risk-worthiness, 10x vs 10-year thinking, timeline compression, simplifying for vertical progress, decision-making under uncertainty.

QUOTES

• "The question that both Peter Thiel and Benjamin Hardy lead me to ask is: is our best possible future 10 years away or is it 6 months away? Cutting the time leads to more honest and more critical assessments about achieving the best possible future." - Laurie Chen

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

WEBSITES

Risk Worthy: https://www.riskworthy.co/

Advanced CFO: https://www.advancedcfo.co/

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/

In episode 23 of Built By Margin, Laurie Chen interviews Sean Travis, a former firefighter-paramedic turned entrepreneur and founder of Ecom for Heroes, based in Hermosa Beach, California, as he discusses the challenges he faced, including burnout and personal loss, that led him to take a leap of faith into entrepreneurship.

Tune in to hear valuable insights on entrepreneurship and the intersection of passion and purpose in business.

TIMESTAMPS

[00:01:06] Transitioning from firefighting to entrepreneurship.

[00:04:39] Teaching and coaching first responders.

[00:09:56] Overcoming imposter syndrome.

[00:11:41] Imposter syndrome in entrepreneurship.

[00:16:01] Daily habits for creativity.

[00:20:46] Financial growth and strategy.

[00:23:08] Cash flow forecasting importance.

[00:26:26] Client contract strategies.

[00:32:49] Client contracts and communication.

[00:35:01] AI's impact on business growth.

[00:39:19] AI product discovery dashboard.

[00:43:26] Optimizing treatment protocols with AI.

[00:45:12] AI tools for business efficiency.

[00:48:43] Google Gemini integration benefits.

QUOTES

• "Believing in reminding myself daily that I am enough." -Sean Travis
• "You cannot find the solution with the same mindset that gave you the problem." -Sean Travis
• "If you're going to pick one, pick one that integrates the most with your life."-Sean Travis

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS

Laurie Chen

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lauriechencpamba/

Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/lauriechencpamba

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriechen/

Sean Travis

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ecomforheroes/?hl=en

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ecomforheroes/

WEBSITES

Built By Margin: https://www.builtbymargin.com/