Scott's story is a hero's journey. By the age of 19, he played college football at Florida State University for legendary coach Bobby Bowden and was a top-ranked kick-boxing Black Belt champion whose last fight was broadcast by ESPN. Scott's life changed dramatically on November 3, 1984, when he survived a horrendous automobile accident as a passenger in a friend's car that left him paralyzed from the chest down and diagnosed a quadriplegic. Told he would be confined to a wheelchair for the rest of his life, Scott realized his split-second decision to not wear a seat belt had altered his course forever.
Despite his grim diagnosis, Scott refused to be sidelined. After graduating from college, Scott's first career was as a Financial Advisor in the Insurance and Financial Industry, specializing in life and disability insurance and retirement, estate and wealth planning. In his 5th year, he qualified for the prestigious Million Dollar Round Table (MDRT), the Premiere Association of Financial Professionals, which is a 100% commission-driven sales production award that fewer than 8% of his peers qualify for annually from more than 500 companies in 70 countries.
At the pinnacle of that career, Scott experienced another setback, a second automobile accident. New injuries forced him to RE-evaluate, RE-invent and once again RE-ignite his life by practicing and executing what he preaches. That's when Scott decided he would make the tough decision to leave an industry he had so much passion for to share his deeply personal experience and pursue a speaking career that has taken him around the world.
Scott has delivered his inspiring and motivating story in 45 states as well as Australia, Spain, India, Thailand, Bermuda, Costa Rica, Mexico, Brazil, the Czech Republic and Canada, as well as to our soldiers at the Minot Air Force Base. Scott is the author of Vision, Mindset, Grit! Vision refers to your goals and aspirations, the endpoint you are seeking. Mindset is the continual mental preparation and adjustment needed to meet oncoming challenges. Grit is the day-to-day determination to persevere when you are too tired, too sore or too beleaguered to continue on.
Your story and presentation are powerful. You effectively conveyed to our team of roughly 300 attendees that we all have the potential to overcome challenges...Given your situation, you have demonstrated by example that even the most overwhelming of setbacks can be converted to success... You did a very effective job of tailoring your message to our audience; personalizing your story for each of us in the audience such that we are now motivated to push ourselves harder than we would prior to hearing your inspiring words. You also integrated our company divisions, objectives and nomenclature into your presentation quite well.
Through your tragedy and real life demonstrations of unbelievable "Vision, Mind-set and Grit," you have given all of us a precious gift, a most meaningful appreciation of the true value of the human spirit and its capability to overcome any and all odds!
I believe we can learn a lot from the experiences of others, and was looking for a speaker who could help put the challenges we were facing into perspective, and could share the work ethic, attitude and beliefs they followed down their road to success, that my team could learn from. Scott Burrows was definitely the right choice!
Hearing your success in overcoming obstacles through Vision, Mindset & Grit has already put an extra "spring" in the step of our Sales Team...Like every organization, we’re faced with a variety of challenges - both internal and external. Your ability to relate your experiences to our industry specific challenges will certainly produce positive results for our company.