Lance Heft was born the son of a steelworker in a small Pennsylvania blue-collar town. Redheaded, freckle-faced, different, and tenacious from day one, he had a passion for helping others and a love for being a leader and entrepreneur.

Early on, Lance thrived on business; at the age of seven, he began to make money collecting newspapers in his little red wagon and recycling them for profit. In the fourth grade, Louise Shingler Zulick, his all-time favorite teacher, saw a light in Lance that she thought was special and encouraged him to continue to be his own person.

She wrote the inspirational words of William Shakespeare, “To thine own self be true,” on his report card, as well as a comment that Lance had helped her be true to herself also. This was a pivotal moment for both of them. From that day on, Lance used these powerful words as a guide for his life.

Lance was driven to finish high school a year early and did so by taking night classes at a local college. He began several businesses during the last two years of high school and ran them between his classes. Upon graduation, he set his sights on the prestigious Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. His upbringing was quite different from other SMU students, most of whom came from wealthy and privileged backgrounds. Yet, he shared an important trait with his affluent peers: a “go-for-it” attitude.

At SMU, he became friendly with the son of an oil refinery president, who saw Lance’s potential and later offered him a position. Learning the oil trade took Lance to Paris, Kuwait, and London, where he lived for a time, and nurtured a love for travel. As Lance experienced the world outside of his small-town beginnings, his dreams grew as did his business knowledge and sense.

In the following years, he built many successful business ventures in real estate development, mortgage brokering, ski tour operation, retail, stock trading, construction/building, and two restaurants. He opened several lucrative boutiques importing handbags from Italy. The challenge of making each business a success was clearly his passion.

Today Lance heads a thriving medical device company in Pennsylvania; he is a member of the Society of Industry Leaders in this field.

His greatest joy is in helping others find their passions and put those passions to work in their life. His most recent solution-based program, Your Turn to Win: Getting on the Straight Road to the Life You Desire, is a book/CD package that reveals the action steps for others to design the life of their dreams. It is unique in that it addresses the whys of failure while focusing on solutions and actions. The program was developed from the real-life steps that Lance has always followed to create his winning life. Once learned, the program can help you accomplish anything you want in your life such as a new business, career change, better relationships, financial freedom, happiness, or better health.

Every day Lance follows the words of Louise Shingler Zulick—“To thine own self be true”—and, recently, he found a way to honor his beloved teacher. Mrs. Zulick is a breast cancer survivor. So Lance has established the “Your Turn to Win” endowment for the American Cancer Society as a tribute to this amazing and influential woman and teacher. Lance continues to give back in any way he can, sharing his wisdom and many gifts with the world. He is an ordinary person—who has taken his life to extraordinary places. He dedicates his life to showing others the way.

At forty, he no longer merely wants to see his own reflection in the mirror, he longs to see the positive change he can reflect in others. This is his life mission now.

Lance and his wife of fourteen years, Heather, enjoy traveling and have traveled together throughout the Caribbean, Europe, and South America. For every birthday, Heather has given Lance the gift of an experience or adventure. He has learned to sky dive, became certified in scuba diving, achieved his pilot’s license, and learned how to sail and hang glide. The father of two beautiful daughters, he can’t wait to show them our amazing world.

The Heft family lives in the idyllic countryside of Pennsylvania in the dream house that Lance built for the family.