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What are the stories and motivations behind our local bike shops and those who run them? In this first of a series of conversations we'll be having on this topic, Katya Morzhueva joins Randall to share how she went from growing up in Siberia, to traveling the world (including an eventful stint in China), to founding Cool Cat Cycles and leading group rides in her chosen home of Katy, Texas. Katya's is a story of curiousity, compassion, resiliency, and service to others, and is exemplary of transformative energy that the best shops bring to their local communities. Visit Katya and Cool Cat Cycles at 22010 Westheimer Pkwy in Katy, TX. Episode Sponsor: Dynamic Cyclist (code THEGRAVELRIDE for 15% off) Web: www.coolcatcycles.com Instagram: @coolcatcycles Facebook: @coolcatcycles Support the Podcast Join The Ridership  Automated Transcription, please excuse the typos:     [00:00:00] Craig Dalton: Hello, and welcome to the gravel ride podcast, where we go deep on the sport of gravel cycling through in-depth interviews with product designers, event organizers and athletes. Who are pioneering the sport I'm your host, Craig Dalton, a lifelong cyclist who discovered gravel cycling back in 2016 and made all the mistakes you don't need to make. I approach each episode as a beginner down, unlock all the knowledge you need to become a great gravel cyclist. This week on the broadcast, I'm going to hand the microphone over to my co-host Randall Jacobs. Who's got Katia Morris waver from cool cat cycles in Katy, Texas on the show to talk about the community she's building around the shop and leading group rides in her hometown. Before we jump in, I need to thank this week. Sponsor, dynamic cyclist. As you know, I've been working with a dynamic cyclist stretching routines for a couple of months now working on increasing my mobility and support of strengthening my lower back. Dynamic cyclist has hundreds of cycling, specific stretching routines for you to work through, including some very specific injury prevention routines. I myself am working on the low back injury prevention routine right now. The team at dynamic cyclists has a free trial for all their programs. So head on over to dynamic cyclists.com and check out what they have to offer. Additionally for podcast listeners using the code, the gravel ride. You'll get 15% off all programs. They have both a monthly membership model as well as an inexpensive annual model to cover all your stretching. And strength training needs again, that's dynamic cyclists.com and the coupon code, the gravel ride. Would that business behind us? Let's hand the microphone off to my co-host Randall Jacobs. [00:01:52] Randall: What are the stories behind our local bike shops and those who run them. In the first of a series of conversations we'll be having on this topic, Katia Morzhueva joins me to share how she went from growing up in Siberia, to traveling the world, including an eventful stint in China that we'll get into in a moment, to founding Cool Cat Cycles and leading group rides in your chosen home of Katy, Texas. Katia is a story of curiosity, compassion, resiliency, and service to others, and is exemplary of the transformative energy that the best shops bring to their local communities. We dive right in here. So I hope you enjoyed the conversation. And now we bring to you Katia Morzhueva. [00:02:28] Randall: Do you have like a meditation practice [00:02:30] katya: uh, you know, we can talk about this a little bit more if we start talking about my injury in China. Cuz when you are alone with a broken back, nobody to talk to because you don't speak the language. All you can do is meditate. You know, I, in a, in a irony, like black humor sort of way, a good way to lose weight and become a Buddhist is break a back in a foreign country. [00:03:00] Randall: I'm fortunate in that I had a somewhat parallel experience of breaking my neck in China, I was a bike touring through Hine Island in the South China Sea, but I had zero dislocation. I just ripped a process off a C3 through C five and I was in a neck brace, for a few days and then I saw a specialist and they're like, yeah, you're probably more likely to injure yourself due to muscle atrophy than, to aggravate the injury. And so I was back on my bike in two weeks, which is a very different thing. [00:03:29] katya: Yes, [00:03:29] Randall: so I had version of that Yeah. I'm seeing you shared this picture of your spine with a bunch of rods and pins holding what looks like some of your upper lumbar, [00:03:42] katya: Five vertebrae. Yeah, it's T 12 to T nine. [00:03:47] Randall: Yeah [00:03:48] katya: right. Um, yeah, so I have two plates and 10 screws they're holding five vertu bread together, but it's only one that shattered. So one, actually, the piece fell off and they went in to connect T 12 to 10 and to nine, but then, um, a T 11 to 10. But then the, he was not happy with the result of the surgery, my surgeon. he came back and he said, you want to be active in the future, we want to go back in, redo the surgery, but we will have to connect more vertebrae. And he gave me like half a day to think about it I just went ahead with it. So they went in again, um, you know, 12 hour surgery again, and now I'm like a myoni woman, [00:04:45] Randall: Uh, well, let's, so let's, let's take a step back and kind of talk about how we ended up having this conversation. So um, I think Craig and I had put out word in the ridership looking for, um, you know, recommendations from the community on a guest. And one of the members, uh, had reached out and be like, you have to talk to Kaia. She does, uh, a, you know, an outstanding job building community, uh, in your community out there in, uh, uh, what part of Texas is this? Remind me. [00:05:15] katya: Um, we are west of Houston. We're about 20 miles west of Houston and Katy. [00:05:21] Randall: Yeah. And I had seen, uh, some of the rides that you organize. You have a beautiful shop that you've started, um, you are of Russian descent. Spent some time in, uh, living in China. Uh, really just a fascinating story and a lot of kind of values and ethos, alignments around community and so on. So, where do we start? Where do we want to kick off? [00:05:44] katya: Whew. Um, well, I think we're wanna start in 2016 when we moved back to Houston from China, [00:05:57] Randall: Uhhuh [00:05:57] katya: because that was, um, that was a pivotal moment when decided to get into a business ownership and open a local bike shop, [00:06:08] Randall: this is you and, [00:06:10] katya: And it's me and my husband. Um, we traveled a lot with oil and gas. We both were in oil and gas. Uh, and when we moved back here, um, the community where we are has a lot of potential and there was no bike shop to work with that potential. Um, and I, you know, I would be riding my bike everywhere. Uh, we ended up, Even though we have a child who ended up having only one car, which is very unusual. Um, and as I was commuting everywhere by bike, uh, or I would be working and taking the car and Robert would be riding around everywhere and my son could ride to school. we found out that there's nowhere for us to go is bike commuters, just to get basic service, to get a rack and piners that would fit my bike. Um, and there was a little, you know, there are a couple of places that I thought wouldn't it be nice to have a bike shop right here? Cause I would bike pasted it all the time on my commune and yeah, just come to thousand 17, we opened a shop [00:07:15] Randall: That's, uh, so you, so have you always been avid cyclists, you and your husband? [00:07:21] katya: Uh, no. Uh, but I was, I was always. Not a human powered commuter. my first car, um, I got my first car, I was 30 years old. Uh, and before, before that I lived in about six countries as a resident with oil and gas. I was born in Russia. Um, you know, for my first 20 years of life, I spent as, as a pedestrian walking, using public transportation. Um, even though family had, we had one car, I never used it. Um, and then, you know, Australia, Dubai, New Zealand, uh, traveling all over Europe, never felt like I needed a car. And then we moved to Houston and the reality hits you here and it's just so shocking because I think Houston is epitome or Texas of car dependency in, in America. And it was such a shock to my system and I think largely, Um, that formed me as, as almost an American. I'm an American who doesn't have a car. [00:08:30] Randall: Yeah. It's, uh, all too common for the cities here to have been built. Uh, especially the further west you go around automobiles is the primary way of getting around you. Some places you can't even cross the street cuz it's lanes and there's a fence in the middle. a lot of cities were built, at a time when the automobile was already present versus older European Asian cities where, it's much more walking or horse path oriented. Uh, so, so yeah, it is, uh, something that fortunately cities are, a lot of cities are starting to. backfill, uh, human-centered, uh, transportation infrastructure, uh, and bike lanes and things like this. But, uh, my understanding is that Houston is tough for infrastructure and also for weather. [00:09:13] katya: hmm. Well, you know, in my firm belief, uh, I was born in Siberia, so Siberia is not too far from Polar Circle. Um, in, my opinion, you can ride all year around here. actually if you look, um, at professional cyclists in the US, quite a few of them come from Texas. Um, so Emily Newsom, um, she was raised in Tour de France this year. She's from Fort Worth, that's Dallas. Um, a bunch of people like Beon, MCCA, McCan, they are from, uh, hill country, like Austin area. So, um, I think. The heat of Texas is underestimated. I realized that when we actually moved here, cuz we came from Dubai in summer and we arrived in in August and the second day we went to Zoo and, and everybody was telling us that we were crazy to go to the Zoo Park in August. We're the only people there with a two year old and tow. But we came from the desert and this felt amazing. It actually cools off from a hundred degrees to 98 at night. , is relative. Uh, one thing that you learn when you travel and when you leave is anat in many countries. It all depends on your frame framework. [00:10:37] Randall: And so, uh, you mentioned some of the countries you've been an expat in this. Was this all working with [00:10:43] katya: With oil and gas, yes. In the same company. My husband and I, we met in Neighbors Drilling International. It was the biggest land drilling contractor in the world. I was their first Russian employee working for them in a Russian, in the territory of Russia. But I'm a linguist. I'm not AUM engineer. I have masters and linguistics. [00:11:01] Randall: Oh, interesting. So how many languages do you have? [00:11:04] katya: Uh, I studied a bunch of dead ones. [00:11:07] Randall: Okay [00:11:08] katya: like you have to, uh, ladin an old Greek old Russian old English. Um, I speak English and Russian. Russian is my native. Um, . I speak French a little bit if I, I studied it in college, but it's been such a long time since I actually spoke French. But I think I will pick up pretty fast. I said at Mandarin in China. [00:11:29] Randall: Uhhuh. [00:11:30] katya: Um, I found Mandarin and writing to be extremely interesting. and I would recommend everybody to go and look it up. find that it's like plain Lego where you have a couple of bricks, well, a lot of bricks, and you can build anything you want if you know how to combine those bricks together. It's so interesting. Um, great intellectual challenge. I could not speak Mandarin because I could not understand the tones. Even though I play piano and I have musical ear, I should be able to, I could not, I was never understood. I would go to the market in Dion and try to say that I, I want to buy this, or this is my name and nobody would understand what I'm saying. I know I'm saying it correctly if I was to write it in, transcribe it in in Pinine, [00:12:19] Randall: Yep. [00:12:20] katya: but nobody could understand what I'm saying. [00:12:22] Randall: Well, and there's a certain, um, certainly coming from an English background, there were a lot of sound. Oh, there were a few sounds that we don't have in English. . So getting those mastered was critical cuz the subtlety is, is a critical piece. And then you have the tones and then you have the way that the tones relative to each other. So um, you know, it's really easy to call out a non-native, native speaker because even if they get the tones right, generally they, we, um, you know, the, they won't have the musicality of a native speaker. Um, it was something I had to pay a lot of attention to, [00:12:54] katya: How did you, I know you, you speak Mandarin, right? Or Cantonese. [00:12:59] Randall: uh, I speak Mandarin, uh, fairly fluently and then enough Cantonese to, you know, convince uh, somebody that I speak Cantonese before I switch to Mandarin. [00:13:09] katya: Okay. How long did it take you to capture the tones? [00:13:13] Randall: Uh, I, Hmm. Um, I would say it was like my second trip. So I was, I taught there for a semester as an undergrad, and then I went and studied for a semester at a university, uh, junction University in Guang Jo, for one semester, and really paid attention to tones and got a, a, a firm foundation in grammar and so on at that time. Uh, and so, you know, that made me very aware and I would constantly ask if I got the tones right or check the tones. I had a I act actually let my little pocket dictionary over there, uh, that I would have with me at all times. And so I was, I had to be very intentional about it, but once I got the hang of it, I, it, it was very natural. So for the most part, you know, uh, my tones are pretty good. Like I can order, I can order food over the phone and then show up and they're looking for a Chinese person, [00:14:08] katya: Oh that's amazing Yes Congratulations Uh um my my dissertation and my specialty in college uh was to teach Russian as a foreign language to grad students and freshmen who come to college in Russia to get their degree in Russia but they would come from foreign countries um I have so much appreciation for anybody who can at adult age capture a foreign language you know acquire it to an extent that they can actually freely communicate [00:14:43] Randall: And yet so many people, uh, especially here in the us, uh, do that. There's, know, they don't get credit. It's more like, you know, why, why do you have an accent? Is kind of the response that is often, you know, that people often get and uh, I, having gone through that journey myself, I definitely have a lot of respect. And from what I hear, Russian is especially difficult to learn because of the number of tenses and things of this [00:15:12] katya: Yes Russian is pretty hard Um but I would recommend if you ever wanted to to just immerse yourself and um you'll get it It's hard to learn it on your own for sure uh I assume mentoring would be the same if you just try to use dual lingo [00:15:31] Randall: The uh, the, the grammar of Mandarin is really easy and that helps a lot. So I found it easier than Spanish. [00:15:38] katya: Oh yes But just being able to converse [00:15:40] Randall: Yeah. Yeah. Um, so, okay, so you had a background in linguistics and teaching, uh, Russian to foreigners. Um and then you went into the oil and gas industry, traveled around the world husband ended up in, outside of Houston, Texas, and you have this idea to start a bike shop. So let's what what, is that journey like? Like what was your analysis? Uh, like what has, what has it been like actually running a small business and dealing with the, the ups and downs and the, the risks and the vendors and all this other, [00:16:12] katya: Yes Um well we definitely had no idea what we were getting ourselves into I just had this dream so need to back off back off a little bit and explain Um so you know coming first I arrived in Houston in 2010 and I saw this as an extremely car-centric community society city with no real urban planning Um and then you know then I would go to China Then I returned in 2016 and we moved to a completely different area and suddenly I realized that there are a lot of bikeways here Uh the bikeways were built by um well some are shared use pathways so they're like extended sidewalks uh you can say And some are actual bikeways that follow the bayou So as you know Houston floods this area floods everybody remembers Harvey We have a diversion channel system to remove the water um into the Gulf And uh this neighborhood is crisscross but a lot of bayou e and it's Bayou uh has easements So they actually own the land around the bayou So imagine that this channels uh that Water grass a lot of land and the local management of this channels will afford drainage district are run by wonderful people who understand the value of investing back in the community So they have realized with the help of some bike advocates cuz none of the board members actually ride bikes or not much but they have realized that there's a huge value in investing into bikeways along these channels So all of this community has about 30 miles of bike trails just through our little you know there's about 7,000 homes here So it's not huge and the amount of bikeways per square mile is pretty impressive Uh every kid can bike to elementary school here so with middle and high school it's a little bit more longer to commute But every kid can get to school by bike walk or on a scooter When we came here it's pretty impressive And there's about five elementary schools here but when we came in 2016 I was shocked how empty those paths are Just made me really sad I would be the only person riding around you know to local grocery store or very few other people There maybe were other people I could never see many Um there were a bunch of kids who would go to school but also even now you know we have the streets that are full of carpool parents people who said for 30 minutes and they only have to cross from one street to the other that would do have infrastructure to support their kids bike into school So it just made me really sad And then I thought you know believe there was a bike shop and they they could do some advocacy They could maybe you know help the community to realize the potential that they have to see that this investment is done for them to improve their life quality um and to you know reduce carbon monoxide pollution It's that simple Right Um and We had the resources to do it So you know we started to look around and we thought well let's try So right We opened the shop we get all the wholesalers on board And then um and then it became very interesting because um one thing I did not realize you know speaking of being woman in the in the industry think I had a blind spot for any um like uh misconception about what women can do Uh because you know coming from Russia Russian women deal with uh slightly different issues In the World War ii huge population of Russian men was um just disappeared as victims of war and Russian women had to carry the economy essentially on their shoulders We had female sks we had women factory directors we had female drivers like women could always do everything Uh my mother is a doctor Super typical Um you know there was never an issue that oh well she's a woman and she will have a harder time going to school or whatever my grandmothers have college education Um it was never even a question Um you know working in oil and gas as well I have never felt um that I'm less then Amen And then here ran in a local bike shop in Texas opened my eyes towards some of the biases that are out there And I remember just not even recognizing that and I would just think oh well that was strange interaction which has just happened But I wouldn't have somebody from here And it typically would be a man some of my friends And she would come and say oh you know they talk to you like that because you're a woman So first of all they think you don't know anything Uh they probably make an assumption that you are $8 an hour who just comes here to say hi Bye [00:21:17] Randall: Mm-hmm. [00:21:18] katya: And we're a very small shop So initially when we opened it was May and my tech uh Michael who is African American and an Eastern European woman and we are running a bike shop in a suburb of Houston [00:21:35] Randall: Text [00:21:36] katya: So you can only imagine Uh but know despite all that I think we brought um so much interesting um so many interesting characteristics like from our our personalities and backgrounds that it it works out [00:21:55] Randall: So what has been the, uh, the learning curve as you've been both preneur and in terms of, you know, maybe specifics to the industry or the machine? [00:22:03] katya: Oh gosh Well I'm trying to be positive and all I'm seeing is a Potential for um and I think you know honestly COVID has opened a lot of people's eyes to what's possible when uh you don't have to commute long hours in traffic to work and you can work from home and what's possible um for a local Environments to be built more human centered Uh so many cities in Europe uh have um revamped their urban planning and even here in the US I see potential with electric bikes Um I really hope that understanding of climate change and the human impact in on climate will help as well So in terms of bike commute I see a lot of potential with sports and bi bi cycling is a sport It's a little bit different story This is where I see gravel is playing a huge role [00:23:08] Randall: Mm-hmm [00:23:08] katya: um and adventure by bike Um and that I think is [00:23:14] Randall: with you there. [00:23:15] katya: right and I think that's something that not just I learned as you know as we went into the business I think everybody figured that out in the industry that this is kind of where we're heading uh for um in terms of know just running a small business uh in this part of of um the us mean it's what it is You learn the skills You you you know you help you try to stay positive uh you try to work with community Um yeah it's it's been quite a journey [00:23:52] Randall: So talk about, um, some of the, like what do you carry, what type of shop, and then how have you gotten the word out and how do you engage with the community where you are? [00:24:01] katya: Ryan So we started the idea was to have a community centered shop to help people quote unquote to get out on bikes our initial focus was mostly bike commute so we were the kind of shop that always carried bunch of cruisers step throughs uh single speeds racks fenders commuter backs veneers Cute helmets um you know a bunch of gear for commuters And then we have evolved a lot uh with gravel uh with all I was a roadie even before I opened the shop Um I actually started psych I was in track and field in school and then my knees just started to get really bad when I was In like late twenties I couldn't run as much Um so I you know I had miles and I would ride with him in the trailer and like try to fight the roadies on the local loop with my cruiser bike and a kid and a trainer then I thought well maybe it's time for me to get an actual road bike So I started you know I love the fitness aspect of Cyclone for sure but roads here are pretty unsafe Uh where we are in in our little pocket in It's tolerable You can actually I don't mind doing solo 20 30 mile ride out here with uh a good portion of it being in traffic you can only do it on certain times of the day only uncertain roads The rest of the roads are just so crazy fast and dangerous Uh but we have a gravel levy two miles from the shop you can go there 24 hours Uh it's always empty You will see a bunch of deer very few people You're totally safe And uh we started to train out there uh and then we introduced a bunch of people to the levee and now we have rides out there But my true gravel rides are about an hour from here in the car we drive out in the country And that's when you have your hundreds and hundreds of miles of gravel [00:26:05] Randall: Got it. Very, very cool. [00:26:07] katya: So yeah it it has moved a little bit and then bike packing you know that kind of jumped on board Natural progression I do feel like if you have a gravel bike and then tell it to my customers who come to get a bike and say well think you only wanna do 20 miles of this little gravel path over here but look at this this is what you could do And we have this big photographs of backpacking trips on the walls so people can see and hopefully get inspired and you know and go to one of our cuz we do this beginner backpacking trips I have one coming up this weekend by the way [00:26:39] Randall: Oh, no kidding. [00:26:40] katya: Yeah Mm [00:26:41] Randall: That's great. And it is part, um, so I'm fully on board with you. I've been, I mean, gravel bikes have existed in, in other forms. For a long time people were riding road bikes with 23 roads, long before there was something called a gravel bike. And people have been bike packing since before it was called bike [00:26:59] katya: Mm-hmm [00:27:00] Randall: but the fact that there's this focus on making versatile machines that can, you know, really tackle a variety of road surfaces and have mounting points for different gear and so on, just makes it so well, why not get a machine that can do a lot more? And then it just begs the question, and why don't you get out there and have some of these experiences? And there's a, a lot of people who do good work. So, so having, having a group activity, like what you're putting on, I would imagine just radically reduces the barrier to entry for a lot of people. [00:27:31] katya: Hmm You know I remember uh when I got my first road bike and in general and in it's gonna be a little bit philosophical but me cycling became an entry into society here when we moved from Dubai That was in 2010 when we first arrived in Texas in Houston and I didn't know anybody Um it is people are super friendly here and it's very international and you do start making friends very quickly And you know I had a kid um so you know making friends with other parents was relatively easy but I didn't I wasn't here long enough to start going to school or to get a job I was still uh getting my green card then And I met so many people through recycling My best friends here in Houston were all mad through recycling group but I remember that when I got my bike I was still really shy I didn't know anyone and I ride alone I would ride every single day by myself or have a kid and tow or have you know a babysitter looking or my husband looking o after him And I would go and do loops by myself in the same time just as a way to stay fit And I did that for about a year before I was brave enough to join in a group And I remember I was Intimidated uh when you're a beginner and and you and you don't you don't know if you're gonna be safe out there and you don't know if you're gonna act right and you gonna you know say right things especially you know my language is improving hopefully but you know it's so far from where it could be and just being so anxious about it And then all the friends that I made through cycling were so friendly so helpful I think that experience allows me to be that helpful and friendly face in the shop when I have somebody who comes in and these are my favorite customers my favorite person in the shop is someone who wants to get into biking Maybe they want to get their first bike or maybe they want to start biking for groceries or to work uh because I know what they experience And as someone who taught in college I know how to break down activities into steps so I can just really kind of micromanage their entry Uh I do beginner road rides where anybody's welcome on bike We will talk about what hand to use how to ride together in a group how not to bump into each other how to act with traffic What is the safest road to ride I just love helping people in that way because you never know where are they gonna end up Maybe they're gonna be like me and open a bike shop years later [00:30:27] Randall: It's, I, I can't tell you how many examples, uh, including my own, uh, of people who have used the bicycle. As you know, I, I've said many times on this podcast a vehicle for connection. And so like, you know, I, the, the, the thing that I recall, like the first thing I recall being able to do on my own pretty much at any time for extended periods and really enjoy my own company, was riding a bicycle. the rolling meditation part of it. The going out and exploring a place from a different vantage point. Like if wherever you live, you're going to experience it very differently on a bicycle, especially a bicycle that you can take off and explore the back trails and parks and the roads that you don't take, cuz it's not the direct line between any A and b. and then the community element of it. You know, rolling up next to somebody, striking up a conversation, going to your first group ride, you know, showing up in jorts in a, in an old helmet and a bike that's falling apart and whatever. And then slowly like learning the ropes and going through that, that rite of passage. Uh, and then I also resonate very much with, um, the opportunity for folks like ourselves who've kind of gone through a lot of that journey to just make it easier for others, you know, reduce the, the friction, make it so that there's educational materials, make it so that there are rides that are accessible. Make it so that there's content like this conversations where people can hear like, oh, I'm, I'm. Uh, unique in my slight awkwardness in getting into this. Um, you know, even the, the people that seem all put together and the cool kids on the bikes were, uh, well, I'll speak for myself. I was definitely, definitely a socially awkward awkward in general when I first started riding. And, um, very much the bike has been kind of a, a, a means of, uh, I mean career, uh, relationships all around the world, uh, opportunities and so on. And even if you don't take this extreme path or taking, you know, starting a bike shop, um, just the friendships that, you get cultivated or like the, the healthy habits that get developed, the reduced stress and how that impacts one's entire life. [00:32:43] katya: Well and you know with going back to how we may appear all put together on our rides um I when I first meet people who are interested in something like a gravel rod like say they're roadies and they're hear about gravel rods but they're not sure if they have the skills or if they can tackle this you know climb and the ground under you shifting all the time and you're sleeping And I always say look uh when I broke my back I was still I was told I'll never get a bike again And I was told that if I can I should not And with all this screws that I have in there I'm still out there you know and I'm 42 year old mother and I'm riding bikes and I'm doing this you know crazy adventures My next trace is 280 miles [00:33:37] Randall: All in one [00:33:39] katya: Oh in one go Yeah It's it's an ultra bike fucking thing Shout out to bikes or Death it East Texas Showdown [00:33:47] Randall: All right. When is this? [00:33:49] katya: I uh I'm a month from now so I've been geeking out on tires and setups but I've done that before though it's not my first show so [00:33:58] Randall: of course. Well, well bravo on that. You definitely, I've never done a ride that long. Longest I've ever done was, uh, a 300 k ride when I was, uh, training in Europe for a couple of weeks. And, uh, that was the hardest day I've ever put in the saddle. So [00:34:14] katya: 300 K That would be about 200 miles [00:34:17] Randall: yeah, a hundred. And I think it ended up being like 188 or 189 miles. Um, 180 6 I think is, is 200, 300 K [00:34:26] katya: or off road [00:34:27] Randall: road. [00:34:28] katya: Yeah [00:34:29] Randall: Yeah. So very different animal right Road is easier. Even with the mountain passes road is definitely easier to cut. And I was in a, I was in a Peloton with a bunch of other fast riders and we were like, you know, so I was, I got carried through certain sections. I mean, had to do the climbs, but on the, on the flats we were doing 25 and I was probably putting out 150 watts and just kind of cruising. [00:34:50] katya: We'll be doing 12 [00:34:52] Randall: Yeah. [00:34:53] katya: miles an hour It's off road or 70% offroad [00:34:58] Randall: That's awesome. Very, very cool. [00:35:01] katya: So if I can do it anyone can [00:35:04] Randall: Well, and so I also, I didn't appreciate, this at all. When, um, you know, when, when I first reached out, I only knew about a little bit about your background, um, and, uh, that you had this shop that was very community focused, but, you know, you spent, so you broke your back cycling in China. That's not the, the full extent of your, your China story. So especially as someone who spent so much time there myself, I want to hear more about how'd you end up there? Uh, you were working at, with, for an orphanage there as well. [00:35:37] katya: Uh yeah So with China it was the the time when my husband was still fully involved in oil and gas and um he was Offered an opportunity to manage a huge huge project in Dion that's just across from South Korea On on the Sea Uh there's several massive shipyards so whatever we receive over here a lot of that stuff when it comes from China it comes from Dion or that area generically It's about two hour flight north from Beijing And um yeah we all decided to go So um I was going to school here but I you know I said you know that's such an awesome opportunity to discover that part of Asia I haven't been there before and it's very close to Russia as well So uh we moved and um yes I ended up um I was cycling there ended up hurting myself really bad about a month in South Korea Um my injury quite extensive so I had to be Placed uh in a jet and taken over to Samsung Medical Center in in Seoul for spinal surgeries Um it was easier from Dian It was easier to go to se than to Beijing for the style of surgery that I had because it was faster and I had collapsed lung so I couldn't be on the plane for a long time as well So they needed to move me somewhere where it's close and uh good quality of healthcare [00:37:11] Randall: Mm-hmm [00:37:11] katya: And yeah Seoul was the closest place where they took me And when I returned from so I spent about a month my son and my husband were in China I was in Korea uh in the hospital for about a month Uh then I moved back when I was allowed to walk Um and when I arrived in Darlin I thought well I can't ride my bike uh and I can't I I can't really go anywhere far Um what am I going to do And there was a community Now Dion is not very well known among Westerners most of expats who go to that part of China are Chinese or Cor uh Japanese or Korean So I was surrounded by um awesome awesome families from Japan and Korea We made a lot of friends especially if we could speak Yeah if they knew a little bit of English that would help Um but yeah there were not very many expats at all So I tried to like find myself in that community And there was a little group of women who were going to a local orphanage uh just to help out Um cuz the orphanage was understaffed It's a public orphanage I don't know the number the name Just kind of know where it's located I could not ever read exactly what it said and then I so I would come and I would just help help the nurses help Daise to take care of little kids then I heard that they this orphanage was selected to participate in an program where older kids so age seven and up uh would possibly go to the US and would be possibly adopted in the US at that old I think the limit is 15 years old So between wanna say between seven and two 15 that age group I suggested you know as a linguist I said oh they have to be speaking English a little bit Um because it's gonna be such a trauma for a child even you know we might think with a white person complex that we're doing this amazing thing by removing this child into a Western society but it's a huge trauma cuz they're going from a familiar environment you know people who take care of them they're friends uh and they're dropped in you know this com like on the moon and they don't they can't even express that they're hungry or that they need to go to the bathroom or you know any discomfort that they have And insisted it took about a month to get a permission I think the orphanage was very concerned about teaching something that's not correct I don't know maybe some know it's very political right Um so I had to be I had to be persuasive but also I had to be you know very precise and say look this is what I'm going to do These are the books I'm going to use It's gonna be so simple It's gonna be just conversational language so that the kids don't suffer as much as they would with the separation anxiety from their environment And eventually they allowed me to come I had a group of about maybe 10 kids and it would change some would join and some would leave And eventually um about half of them were adopted in the US and it was uh it the program became so good I mean I would be there several times a week regularly with lessons plans Uh I had typically one of the teachers stay with me The the orphanage uh supervisors stay with me so they get to learn as well And it became so good And the demand was so good for this type of lessons that I trained other uh English speaking women in uh our little community so they could come and do this And there were some women who had teaching backgrounds so they got it really quickly and they could come and work with kids There was documentary made I mean I had a TV crew to come and film I think it was made for the prospective parents to see that you know this orphanage has this program so you will be able to communicate with kids I've never seen the end product but to me that was a sign that something that I'm doing is helpful I was not paid It was just totally volunteering but I really enjoyed it Really enjoyed it and it's something that I know how to do So [00:42:02] Randall: that's. , really wonderful. Truly, truly wonderful. And something that, you know, when I, when you had shared that with me again, uh, was very resonant. One I've, I taught in, in, I taught English was teaching uh, high school students and I got to create my own curricula. I actually had 40 classes and they would rotate every two weeks. So I get an each class every two weeks. And so I would create curricula around, um, you know, there one where we did, uh, song lyrics. So we you know, singing Beatles tracks and things like that Um, and then others were, you know, just a, the creative element of being able to create, uh, um, a curriculum for an audience that was really stoked just to interact. Um and this was back in 2004, so China was a very different place. Um, the changes have been so, . And then also I, I also recall, uh, so I lived in Guang Jo for a period and a lot of the adoptions go through, uh, Shanda in, Guang Jo in, um, it's the, uh, the US consulate there. Mm I think it's Beijing and Guang Jo is where most of them go And so you'll, I remember going to that part of town and seeing, you know, mostly Caucasian American families there adopting these mostly, uh, uh, female Chinese [00:43:26] katya: Mm-hmm [00:43:27] Randall: And it didn't occur to me at the time, um, just how, I mean, just how traumatic, even at that age that is, kids have already gone through the trauma of like not having their mother, [00:43:42] katya: mm [00:43:43] Randall: which. You know, it's something I, I didn't appreciate, uh, until doing a whole lot of, uh, therapy and me meditation and various other things, just how critical that early is. to imagine what you're describing of, you know, someone who's a teenager and mm is, is very much, uh, uh, in many ways formed. Mm-hmm constantly changing, but there's a lot of deeply ingrained patterns. There's language, there's familiarity. Then you go to a place where maybe there's no one who looks like you [00:44:15] katya: Mm [00:44:16] Randall: and maybe it's not welcoming. [00:44:18] katya: mm [00:44:18] Randall: Yeah who, who want to love you but don't know how to speak. Not just language with words, but your language with behaviors and Um, were the, I'm curious, were the kids, um, in general, were they excited about the prospect of go being adopted outside of China or, [00:44:37] katya: They were but they were also very scared [00:44:41] Randall: Yeah [00:44:42] katya: I think And it's it's going it's very sad what I'll say right now But I still remember when we were talking we had lessons when some fa some kids were already selected they knew they were moving one kid is trying to explain push like he shows this poof poof that people shoot that something that he maybe has seen in the movies mass media the guns in America And that's one thing he shows to me and he is trying to explain I'm scared that there are a lot of guns and and maybe I will be killed People shoot in America a lot So I then have to explain and of course their language you know they've been taking classes maybe for six months prior their language is quite limited But I'm trying to explain will not be shot in the America There are a lot of very good people and kind people and they will love you and they will take care of you And look I lived in America I never seen a gun in America never Nowhere on the street there was a person with a gun You will not see the gun But that that's one thing they told me immediately [00:45:56] Randall: Mm-hmm. . It [00:45:58] katya: It's sad This is these are the stereotypes that [00:46:01] Randall: well, and those stereotypes go very heavily in both directions. I remember when I was first going to China, um, Uh, family members being, uh, certain family members being deeply concerned. You know, it's a communist country. And, um, there's all these, you it comes from, comes from ignorance ultimately. Um, but you know, the, it's people often fear what they don't understand. Um, my experience there was profoundly different and, you know, it's been in, in my very limited way in my circles. Like, I consider it a real opportunity to have been, uh, immersed in that culture. It's, it's my second culture and be able to dispel a lot of those myths actually. Um, yes, there's the Chinese Communist Party and yes, it has, uh, you know, a fairly authoritarian bent, but, um, here's a mirror on our culture and in many ways, like you, Communism in China doesn't mean what you think it means [00:47:00] katya: mm [00:47:00] Randall: it's largely capitalist in some ways, more capitalist ways that have their own problems. Um, and more fundamentally at the end of the day, like people are people. That's the thing that I have learned, um, and that I think learning a another language and immersing in other culture teaches more than anything is that we all have, you know, we all have, um, hopes and fears. We all have, you know, basic needs that are largely common, like, you know, and shelter and food and companionship and esteem and things like this. Um, and while culture can result in various seemingly disparate manifestations at our core, there's a hell of a lot more in common. In fact, I, I find that at the end of the day, if I can identify someone, something in someone else, positive or negative, um, That I have it in myself as well. [00:47:58] katya: Hmm mm-hmm Yes You know through all the travels that I've done I've figured out we've really need so little uh to well I maybe I speak for myself but I think most people and I've seen it in other expats um if you have a job you have self-fulfilment fulfillment and you have friends and you have um you know close people that you love and take care of and and that's pretty much all you need And it doesn't matter where you are you can be uh you know in uh beautiful So in China we lived in Shula so you know Shilla [00:48:41] Randall: Yeah. The [00:48:42] katya: right So in Dion Shangrila Hotel had apartment complex next to it and it was just so luxurious right And then in Australia we lived in a tiny little farmhouse uh in the middle of nowhere And I all my life I lived in small apartments in Save or in Moscow Uh and it doesn't matter where you are if you have family good health hopefully um know basic needs are met Uh you're good so simple [00:49:16] Randall: Now this actually brings up, uh, what I think might be an interesting topic, which is, I mean, you're of Russian descent. you lived in Russia, you spent most of life in Russia. Um, there's a conflict between, well, there's a perceived conflict between Russia and the West at the moment. There's a lot of. I think concern in, in American society, uh, and in European society about But, uh, maybe we can, well, I think already this conversation should dispel some myths from, uh, of Yeah. Amongst people who've never heard, uh, you know, truly heard the voice of a, of a native, uh, Russian in terms of just how much love and kindness and so on, uh, you bring to the table. But, uh, What [00:50:00] katya: Uh yeah know my biggest takeaway from this whole conflict right now is protect media and freedom of speech But but for the media especially I have respect for those big resources uh like Washington Post or like New York Times or like b C you know these big channels because once they get controlled by someone uh it's so easy Even in modern society with all the access to information that we have is so easy for them to block it Whoever is in control of the narrative controls the mind controls the politics the Russian society is uh really divided right now And um sorry to say it but I think it's heavily brainwashed And the reason it's brainwashed is precisely because uh all the media were banned the free speech So to speak uh media were banned uh right now The Russian the Russian platform that I personally follow they have been uh broadcasting from Europe since 24th of February When the war started they were banned immediately so they had to move out and start broadcasts from Europe The only way to listen to them in Russia towards them would be through vpn but just very recently they were called pretty much a terrorist organization and anybody who shares a screenshot uh an audio recording a screen grab from a video from the program anybody who shares on their social platform private Like Facebook's band Instagram's band So it would be Telegram Okay Telegram is still allowed If you share you are looking at potential arrest in jail time uh because you are supporting terrorism This is how far it's gone since 24th of February last year Um and you know if somebody told me a year ago that you cannot control the whole of Russian population you cannot switch all of the internet Well now my answer is yes you can If you make people if you if people are so afraid to share um the you know their conversations become very personal They maybe will talk face to face and they will say you know what saw that Russia just has bombed this houses and 10 children died and these were not military um you know groups It was just a house You can say that in conversation but you cannot broadcast it on any any social platform And that's how you just slowly slowly you're closing closing it up And people who are brave enough to speak out they either end up in jail or they get out [00:53:14] Randall: Mm-hmm. [00:53:15] katya: and yeah [00:53:16] Randall: Well, and just for anyone who is, uh, listening and is somewhat sat self-satisfied, thinking that it can't happen here, these same forces are at play in, um, you know, quote unquote democratic societies. [00:53:31] katya: Mm-hmm it can happen anywhere [00:53:34] Randall: can happen anywhere. There's definitely, uh, you know, consolidation of media. There's definitely. you know, certain, you know, there have been times when having certain opinions could, can get you shouted down, can get you essentially canceled in a way. you know, I remember when the, the Iraq war was being debated [00:53:54] katya: Mm [00:53:55] Randall: you know, the buildup towards that. And if you had a dissenting opinion, uh, you were, you know, anti-American. Um well, you know, it's, uh, in, in retrospect it seems like a number of people on both sides of the political spectrum, uh, look at that conflict as not, uh, having born the fruits that were promised [00:54:16] katya: Mm-hmm yes [00:54:17] Randall: Um, and you know, the point that I would make is, You know, we all have our beliefs, we all have our, uh, predispositions. Um, but you know, another form of this that seems quite pervasive here is the bubbles. You know I only you know, I, I only read certain types of media and the other media is bad. And then the people on the other side have the same sort of perspective. And so getting, having a diverse diet, including of opinions you don't like, including of opinions you don't agree with from parties that you, um, don't, uh, necessarily resonate with, but treating them like people who are doing their best and who may look at you in the same way and have some merits in that perspective, uh, I think is tremendously valuable and is also essential in not having a society progress in the direction towards extreme polarity, I factionalism and so on. [00:55:11] katya: Mm [00:55:13] Randall: Oh [00:55:14] katya: You know I think one of the best thing each of us can do to combat our own biases step out of our own echo chambers the more even if you have very polarized opinions around yourself the Opinions you surround yourself with the better your selection is the you know the more the wider the picture you see And even you know being a extremely liberal super left leaning person in Texas um you know I'm surrounded by people who don't feel the same that I do But for you know for many reasons I want to know where they're coming from because there's no way for me to br to build the bridge towards that side If I ignore that side is there you have to see the other bank to be able to reach out to it So I know there is a lot of you know there's so much polarization whereas some people say oh I proudly don't I'm not going to include in my circle This type of person who thinks that way like for me would be a gun owner I would say oh well but hey you want to have as many opinions around yourself and you know to get a full picture And uh you know my message to my son who's 13 and who's super interested in ev in all politics right now um in being of Russian descent as well loves so socialism communism he loves the iconography of it he would wear Russian C C C P U society t-shirt before the now he's not But uh you know my message to him and everybody in his age group is Hey critical thinking is what you want And to develop critical thinking you wanna have a lot of sources of of information know how to process information know how to you know digest it find the key moments and don't just trust the loudest wa voice in the room And in Russia going back to that in Russia right now um all the loudest voices have extremely conservative They're very polarizing It is hard but that gives me even more appreciation for anybody who stands out And there are still people who are out there protesting Uh there are a lot of women who protest cons The wives of those you know guys imagine that Imagine you're an IT specialist or you're a banker You have nothing against Ukraine never had you have relatives over there Uh you are very peaceful never had a gun in your hand You maybe have two kids at home and a dog and then somebody shows up To your office cuz they do it They can script now through offices uh they come to your boss and they bring him the name of the list of names and they're saying we know that such and such works Here you will be responsible for distributing the conscription notes And the boss comes into the room They don't even know what's going on You're just okay guys you were all conscripted because as soon as you receive the paper you acknowledge that you know you've been called and you can't really back out So you can hide and not open the door if they come to your house People literally have been hiding Russian men have been running from their homes There is a guy who build a camp in the woods like in Taiga Forest so that the people don't find him He's got no address Nobody knows where he is because once they see your face and once you receive it in your hand they got you And yeah imagine this Bankers go to war and a month later the wife gets a note that he's dead This is what happens to Russian soldiers and these poor women know now they have kids they have a dead husband in the war they it wasn't his defined uh there is a story of uh of an it or yeah someone from administrative you know side of life who was hired a lawyer to fight his conscription because by law he was not supposed to be conscripted He was killed while the lawyer was protesting his conscription he was killed at the war zone Um not I not trying to you know Russia look like a victim is an aggressor and I'm terribly ashamed what my country does And when people come to the shop and they ask me oh where's your accent from It is so difficult to answer this question like it's always been cuz I don't wanna be stereotyped as someone who's Russian or someone someone at all Like I don't want you to know like I live to so many places who knows what has formed me as as a woman right now but right now especially it's really hard And I always give a disclaimer and I say yes I'm from Russia I support Ukraine I feel like I have to say because I don't want Anybody to think because there are so many who do support the war unfortunately it's hard Um it's very difficult [01:00:23] Randall: Well, and, and again, like to, before we bring it full circle, like, you know, I, I, I sus, I wonder if there are, you know, if, if there are any Vietnam veterans who might be listening who might with some of that experience. I mean, we are immune to this in, uh, in the us And furthermore, you know, in my own travels, um, you know, I've been to places where I've been asked to account for the choices of the government, of the country I come from particularly, um, back in the, you know, 2004, 2005, 2006. Um, and, um, it, you know, as much as, uh, there's an American. Belief in, you know, a certain set of values and like this idea that we, uh, are promulgating these values in the world. Well, oftentimes the things that are, are that the population here is not paying attention to are going counter, uh, to the narrative that's being put out. But, um, we've, we've gone gonna, I think you and I will end up having another conversation [01:01:25] katya: Yes. Yes. [01:01:27] Randall: sort of thing, but to, to bring it full circle, you know, talking about like connecting with people [01:01:34] katya: Mm. [01:01:34] Randall: who have different perspectives and backgrounds and so on. Um, I don't think it's at all trite to say that like, this is an experience that you can have on a bicycle. Like on a bicycle. You go show up for a group ride and you know, you can find rides where everyone, you know, is a skinny, shaved shave legged white guy and Lyra going, going hammering on the road ride. But there's a lot of diversity to be had as well if you find your group and there's nothing quite like the shared ordeal of a long bike ride, um, to break down barriers and help realize the humanity of another person. [01:02:10] katya: Oh, for sure. And, you know, speaking of diversity in Cycline, um, I, I really do feel, and it's, you know, it's not just, you know, thinking someone's tune or what's the phrase that. Adventures. Cycline in general does that, and by that I mean gravel events. So I'm not specifically not saying racing, but gravel events, bike packing events. I feel like my contribution, um, to build in or to help in reach out is because I'm a female and I'm not from here. And, you know, English is my foreign language and I'm just trying to have a good time on the bike. So for me, I'm coming from this, you know, vantage point where I really don't care you look like, how old you are, what your bike is like. I just want us to go out there and have a great time and I want you to have a very good experience. Um, and you know, the fact that Cy. Still perceived as, you know, middle-aged men or younger men, super fed, um, out in old matching kid, you know, beautiful bike. think it's very, uh, retro. I think it's dying out. Um, the people that I see, uh, are becoming a lot more how would just different, you know, come with what you have. And I'm so happy that, uh, at least on the gravel side of things, is really welcoming. There's so many women's clinics, they're, you know, there are these pros who do great videos and they write it in these amazing places where in Jordans and flip flops. Um, I think that is actually super encouraging too. Like everybody, and it's funny, I do some advocacy here where I go out and meet some decision makers, um, for local infrastructure investments. Like when there is some, I just want to a, a meeting about an extension of a highway, you know, stuff like that. I make sure if I can, I make sure to come on my bike in a skirt and like flip flops or not to look at all as a cyclist. Um, just to, to say, look, we look the same. We are the same, we speak the same language. Like there's nothing that really separates me from you. I think there's nothing worse than going to places like that full decked out and Lyra and, and screaming pretty much, I am so different from you. Um, know, at the end of the day we wanna find more commonalities than, you know, something that separates us. And, uh, biking for sure can be both. Uh, and I think that's why I gravitate to commuting by bike. Fuck adventure though I love road cycling for sport. It's amazing. increases my F tp hopefully. [01:05:10] Randall: Yeah, [01:05:11] katya: I follow my metrics. I do my intervals [01:05:15] Randall: well, Katy, um, it's been really, really lovely connecting with you, hearing your story. I'm sure that, uh, you know, some of the members of the community will, will appreciate it as well. Uh, if folks want to find your shop, find information about, uh, the work that you're doing, how, how would they go about doing so [01:05:33] katya: Um, well, thank you very much. It was very nice. Uh, I, I should have mentioned that I got to know your podcast through my 20 hour drive to Colorado, and I listened to 15, 15 episodes in a row, just binged on my drive, so I'm extremely honored. , don't even know how honored I am to be here. Two years ago when I was driving to Timbo, it was Timbo gravel race I would've never, ever imagined. Um, but to find us, um, cool Cat Cycles website, cool Cat Cycles is just one cat and she cycles with c ccc. Easy to remember. Cool cat cycles. Um, dot com and then Facebook page. All my events are on Facebook. We are also ambassadors and right with gps, so you might be able to find cool cat cycles. Uh, there is at least one word there, backpacking route. Um, and then Instagram. Cool cat cycles as well. I answer all the messages quickly. Uh, I love sharing my roots. All my roots are right with gps. My personal roots are public. I'll be very happy to send a bike back in route, the gravel route. I'm out in the country, uh, about 50 minutes from here, twice a week, riding gravel, and I know those roads like my 10 fingers. [01:06:59] Randall: Well, um, for anyone listening who happens to be in the area around katy, Texas [01:07:05] katya: Cat cycles. [01:07:06] Randall: Cycles strongly encourage you to pay them a visit and join one of their rides. And I also just wanna say that it's been an honor and a privilege chatting with you as well. It's one of the joys of this role, and it's something I don't take lightly. So thank you for coming on. [01:07:20] katya: Thank you so much Randall. [01:07:21] Craig Dalton: That's going to do it for this week's edition of the gravel ride podcast. Big thank you to Randall and Katia for that interesting conversation. And big, thanks to our friends at dynamic cyclist. Remember, use the coupon code, the gravel ride to get 15% off any dynamic cyclist program. If you're interested in connecting with me or Randall or Katia for that matter, I encourage you to join the ridership. That's www.theridership.com. That's a free global cycling community where you can connect with other riders around the world. To trade information about roots and rides, parts and equipment. Anything that's in your gravel vocabulary. If you're able to support the show, please visit buy me a coffee.com/the gravel wide. Or ratings and reviews are hugely appreciated. Until next time. Here's to finding some dirt under your wheels. .

Today Dannie and Caitlyn are talking with Lindsey Aleson We believe in accessible content and that anyone who wants to learn from this content should be able to. In order to support this, we've had every episode of Season 4 transcribed. The transcriptions are available at the bottom of every episode blog post. SHOW HIGHLIGHTS:Some of the best tools to use in your business.How to combine your creativity with structured systems.The does and don'ts to help non-process people with processes.GET MORE: Website | Instagram FOLLOW YOUR HOSTS: D Website | D Instagram // C Website | C Instagram Get the Side Hustle Starter Kit Episode Transcript Caitlyn Allen: [00:00:21] Hey. Hey everyone. Welcome back to the side hustle gal podcast. We are so excited today because we have Lindsey Aleson of blog. Me lovely. Uh, Lindsey, tell us a little bit about yourself. Lindsey Aleson: [00:00:34] Yeah, so I am a graphic and web designer and tech strategist. Um, I've been doing this for I guess almost four years now, which is crazy. To think about. Think about Um so yeah so I just love helping a fellow female entrepreneurs in the online space with their design and tech and making it not as scary as they think it is . Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:00:53] I love that I've been stalking your website and that you said that you love cats Harry Potter and Disney Yes Um so let's do a round Robin What house are you and Caitlyn say yours too afterwards. Lindsey Aleson: [00:01:06] Oh I'm between Raven Claw in Gryffindor it depends what day I take the test Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:01:10] I love that I'm pretty much a hardcore Slitherin I don't think I've ever gotten anything other than Slitherin but that's super sad because now like Slithering is the trendy house to be in it Hi Sorry Caitlyn Allen: [00:01:25] Okay I'm pretty sure I'm a Hufflepuff uh because I'm lactose intolerant That's funny He's never heard that song at like I don't know what it's like Ron Weasley Oh the parody doesn't somebody say like I'm lactose intolerant I'm a Hufflepuff It's not from Oh anyways no I'm pretty sure I'm a Griffin door I'm actually but yeah I feel like I remember something being like what is it I'm going to Google it while we're having this discussion because I feel like that was That was kind of a funny I believe you Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:02:06] Um so now that we have the important question out of the way and we all can secretly psychoanalyze one another based out of what house we're in Lindsay I'm super curious in how you got started. Lindsey Aleson: [00:02:18] Yeah So it actually goes like way back to when I was 11 years old So I've always been into well my grandpa was an aerospace engineer so I've always been into like building stuff And he surprised me on my 11th birthday with parts of a computer just laid out on the pool table So we bought my first computer And shortly after that I discovered kind of the online space And that was when like Neo pets was big and yeah all those like drag and drop doll websites So I was probably the only 11 or 12 year old with like her own domain and the drag and dropped all website And I just taught myself how to code by like looking at the bet like the source code and using notepad which Is dreadful And I'm so happy that that's not how you have to code anymore Mmm But yeah so then I just kind of went through it and then all through my like college career I kept on switching stuff It took me probably twice as long to get through college because I couldn't decide on a major because it kept on switching But um I decided on journalism and because I love that could do the design and the marketing and kind of pull everything together Um and then I just kinda got your first real job And it was fun at first but I realized I got bored super easy cause you're like stuck in a box So yeah I kind of just went from there and I was kind of into blogging since 2010 so what does that like 10 years now So it's just Yeah it's a lot I just love it I love everything to do with the online space and I've been in it for probably more than half of my life probably most of my life not considering I'm 32. Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:03:48] I love that because you have this secret STEM influenced but still explored like the traditional things that girls do if we go by gender norms but then also the traditional like early two thousands internet behavior things as well So I love that it all weave together into what you do today I am also wondering so you have a pretty girly website and you had those like engineering influences How do you think those two plate pieces play together Lindsey Aleson: [00:04:23] Yeah so I think it comes down into really how I I work and some are really big systems and processes person and um I have a lot of contract positions or I do a lot of client work and it's really hard for me to like if somebody says to do something and I realized like it's not the best way or it's wrong So I always try to leave something better than when I started And I feel that like Analyzing and like always getting like the best way to do something And like the techie really stems from that Especially cause I used to sit on my grandpa's lap all the time when we were talking about like he worked on the space station so I like had the plans who had fixed cars or fix like the electrical socket and stuff which I don't remember any of this now It's been like years but it's just having like making sure it's done right Um and then I am just a typical girl so I liked that I can Do it my way and still focus on what is probably still considered a primarily male driven industry like the tech and and stuff so. Caitlyn Allen: [00:05:21] That's awesome So what all have you I mean you said that you've been in the entrepreneurial world for quite a while What all have you dabbled in Lindsey Aleson: [00:05:31] A lot So um when I first started um I thought I I had a corporate job at the time and I wanted to really focus on web design Right It had been I had built websites for myself but then I had like a really crappy client and I was just like Oh this is just too much Like I don't want to do this I did like just graphic design And so I slowly did that and I kind of took the leap and I had put my job away too soon It was for like issues at the job though like that required it not like I was actually ready and I kind of made it work for a year Mmm But I realized I was so interested in tech so I was doing a lot of tech stuff But through this journey in life still consider myself like a side hustler And I still have so many contract positions right now so it's not like fully my business Um But I have done everything from websites and graphic designs like eBooks and webinars slides and social media graphics to setting up CRM systems to migrate um like email platforms um to figuring out why websites don't work which is always which is always fun So I feel like I've done so much stuff and I just learned I feel like a new system Oh it's on a weekly basis or how to like a new way to do stuff on a weekly basis and I just love it cause I can't do this in the corporate world because we're stuck in a box and you can't grow and expand I feel like. Caitlyn Allen: [00:06:46] I yes I completely or I can relate to that completely I wasn't in the corporate world but I was in the nonprofit world and it just it felt like the same thing over and over there It's so old school what works is what works and you don't want to change any of that And it's just so Boring of course Um what are your favorite systems to use in business.Lindsey Aleson: [00:07:12] I love this question because I am a tool and systems girl so I love click up So for my project management tool also it's kind of like us on in Trello how to baby but as like on steroids It is amazing and I love it for email marketing I love ConvertKit Um let's see For I'm a WordPress person So definitely prefer WordPress or Squarespace or any of the other options that I'm not even going to name Mmm And then I liked Dubsado and tailwind and plannerly like anything that makes your job easier and systematize and save you time I love Mmm Caitlyn Allen: [00:07:49] Ooh I might have to come to you for some click up uh questions Because I use a sauna All of my clients besides one use a sauna and the client that uses click up we're still not 100% sure how to use click up properly So might be coming to you first Some questions Do you have like a YouTube channel or anything like that where you um offer advice for any of those systems .Lindsey Aleson: [00:08:17] Not yet It is in the plans I don't think it will be up by the time this episode airs but I do have a click up course that'll give you access to I don't have the link candy on me but you guys can look at it in the show notes I'm getting ready to revamp it Because click up keeps on making all of these changes and like I've been meaning to update it for a while now but they just keep on making new changes So I'm like waiting but you will absolutely love it if you just have to change your way of thinking a little bit but it'll make so much more sense once you get in it and yeah I love pickup Caitlyn Allen: [00:08:46] Oh my gosh I'm such a systems person too Like that's what I do in my business is I set up systems and processes for my business owners So that's so much fun to hear different people's perspectives because the software or the the things that you're using are Not what I suggest Uh and Danny either I think we all use very different platforms Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:09:09] So I was going to jump in and say from both of you systems people I am still a pen and paper moleskin notebook Slash Google doc person Caitlin tried to get me on Asana I hated it Um I tried to use Trello Hated it I tried Monday Hated it I hate Monday Caitlyn Allen: [00:09:30] I tried San Summa I can'tDannie Lynn Fountain: [00:09:32] I did too Hated it I would love your advice to people who are not process people From both like this is a question both of you can answer but for people who are not process people and or like me not documented process people what would you recommend I guess Lindsey Aleson: [00:09:53] I would have been first So you do have to start somewhere so it's totally okay if you don't have anything yet And it is a learning curve So I know people say there's not really a wrong project management tool but I feel there are certain things that our product management tool should have and there are so many platforms out there that don't have it So like Asana is my second choice I was on a sauna before I moved to um to click up So you just wants to make sure you like hit like does it have sub tasks Do you have due dates Do you have like dependencies Um or just if you're on a team there are just certain things you need to hit make sure but I always start with pen and paper so I love pen and paper You can't see it here but I have a whole stack of on my couch I'll turn I'll turn my camera so you guys can see But it's just like books and papers and stuff on my and tables I a pen and paper and blood person I always map it out on pen and paper first and then I move it into a system because you get So bogged down or maybe confused when you're trying a new system that you don't set it up properly Like I got into click up first and I was like well crap this isn't set up right And I had to like wipe it and redo it from the ground up So start where you are and don't overwhelm yourself and just realize that they're going to start to grow But you also need to realize the importance of it Because if you want to save yourself time or on a team member you do need that stuff on But also don't get hard on yourself because Sometimes people use it as a crutch Well I don't have systems so I can't grow my team yet or Oh I need to focus on this but then they don't actually get the other work done so it's like that fine line in me too So I know that's not like a full straight answer but it's just you need to learn a balance I kind of know it's a Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:11:32] it's a good answer because I think I feel like I probably drive Katelyn crazy because of the way that we manage our podcast is a Google sheet And it has the episodes and then on the far right of the Google she it's literally my shorthand for every step from upload to live with checkboxes in X in a Google sheet that you just clicked Lindsey Aleson: [00:11:54] It's giving me anxiety Right now. Caitlyn Allen: [00:11:56] It's actually honestly it's really not that bad compared to like some systems I've seen like at least there's no system Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:12:06] Schedule is S C H and for show notes is SN So like if you don't know me this shorthand just looks like fricking jibberish. Lindsey Aleson: [00:12:16] There's still something though So that's a start It's not like you're going at it Here's like the questions or here's like the episode and whatever and then free for all right Yeah I have everything mapped out because I have a podcast a joint podcast as well Um so we have it all mapped and click up Who does what I'm obviously the tech girl so I do the editing and I do the graphics and you know like setting all that stuff up and she does a show note So we like have it all mapped out Mmm And it helps but I'm also in click up probably It's always up on mine It's always up on my um computer um whenever I'm working So yeah it's just that's the habit you need to get into It was so hard at first when I started with the sauna but I realized that you just need to have it up and you just need to like now it's second nature I don't open up my computer without having like a Caitlyn Allen: [00:13:05] Yes I completely agree Um and I would second everything that you say The first thing I tell my clients is write out the process on a piece of paper and send me a picture of it Like because that's the only way that I'm going to know what your process actually is Um and if you do it write it write it out Like that's going to be the easiest way for us to move forward figuring out how to do it And I mean If you are nervous about creating a system or an SOP um guys it's only gonna help you like stay on track with all of the things Like I promise you it's worth it to start systematizing your business I swear Anyways I could talk about this for days So could I what what has surprised you or what have you learned about yourself as you've became an entrepreneur Lindsey Aleson: [00:13:56] Yeah That I'm actually way more capable of stuff than I realized So it's like not to be cocky but I always know are smart Cause honestly I put my first computer I taught myself how to code but just being in the corporate world they like again they kind of put you in the box So it's like I would ask to do stuff and it's like Oh no this department handles it Or Oh no we outsource this So it's like I couldn't grow So I think that's why I was drawn to this cause it was a challenge And I realized that with contract positions like I tend to come in as like cleaning up somebody else's message I haven't found like a fun term for that and I don't always want to be like your contractor but I like go in and clean up message and it's like you just get assigned stuff and like Oh crap now I need to figure out what like what to do And it's amazing what you can accomplish when you put your mind to it and you're people like believe in you and you're open to doing it So I have done stuff I never thought I would do or be able to figure out And it is just Yeah And I've gotten more so I'm an introvert and I am shy as well so I know they're two different things but I've gotten more comfortable in my own skin and yeah so like I'm horrible at in-person stuff unless I know it's like entrepreneurs but like on these podcasts even though these are videos or like I have my own podcast and we do summit I'm like all hyped up and I can like chat forever but I talked to like people in real life that have nothing to do with this and I'm just like a wall Flower I'd rather be like with a pet if there's like animals there are with the kids Caitlyn Allen: [00:15:21] That's so funny Dannie are you an introvert or an extrovert ?Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:15:24] So every time I take the NBTI test um my first letter changes So I'm always N F J but the E or the I changes constantly so I'm probably what they call an ambivert Caitlyn Allen: [00:15:43] That's interesting Yeah I'm also an introvert as well and Z so I can totally relate to that though Like most people would not call me an introvert It's super funny Um but I think that is something that you can really play on as an entrepreneur too is are those strengths or weaknesses I think a lot of people are like Oh you're an introvert That's a weakness And I'm like No I can do stuff online that you guys like That word was never possible or that I never even thought I could do and do it very well even though I'm an introvert So Lindsey Aleson: [00:16:19] Cause you like to be alone and yes press and normally during those times I spend learning something new or working on my own stuff or reading or so it's just it's how you like to recharge So people always think introvert means shy or not a people person Well that is so not that is so not the case That's why I always like to say I'm an introvert and I'm shy because it's two different things But yeah like you guys can't see I'm here with my cat like my idea of a good night and is watching Harry Potter or reading depending what mood I'm in and snuggling with my cats on the couch Caitlyn Allen: [00:16:51] That's awesome Yeah I I'm definitely an introvert and I am shy but I'm very good at faking it that I'm not Um so let's walk through a typical day for you What does Are you a morning person Are you an evening person and what does your like system look like for the day?Lindsey Aleson: [00:17:12] So I'm definitely an evening person I'm definitely not a morning person I actually don't even think I got up until like 10 today which is a little bit later than I try So I normally get up at like 9:30 10 I don't take any calls before 10 which I love having that flexibility besides one contract position I had like a 7:00 AM meeting on Tuesdays which kills me But um then I normally hop into I normally talk about my contract work first So I rotate I have I think four contract positions So it's a lot all in different product management system tools So you know I just I just tackle one at a time Um I usually forget to eat lunch Um cause I have just so busy working Um but yeah I pretty much worked from the time I get up till the time I got to sleep And right now it is because I have so many contract positions Um but normally when the boyfriend gets home we go have dinner at my mom's because she lives in the same apartment complex So which is nice Um and he works super early so he also wants to go to bed early which kills me because I like Set in bed with my mind racing But I yeah I pretty much just take it one step at a time one focus at a time and I have it all mapped out and click up So even for me like that's my system So I literally have check this product management tool for this company check this product management tool for this company so I can check stuff off my list while still being one one minded Because like I am using so many tools right now It is crazy Caitlyn Allen: [00:18:40] Do you ever get overwhelmed with the amount of tools or the amount of cleanup projects that you have and how have you figured out how to streamline that Lindsey Aleson: [00:18:50] Um I do So one of the main things because I am in so many tools is the main thing that I did was I do map it out and click up so I don't forget So right And what I've learned is so I'm sure we're very similar probably have a bunch of tabs up I felt an online entrepreneur thing So what I do is all like Say one one team I'm on uses Monday and I really don't like it but I'm used to it cause it's been like a year now But it's like I just take it out into its own tab and I have my time tracker and the Monday and just all of that stuff So I try to keep it as One track focus as possible Um and then the main thing is if I realize I'm getting overwhelmed is to take days off Mmm So I live in Southern California so I love going to Disneyland So I already have some days plan to like go like on February 2nd I know this won't air yet We're going to go on the new star Wars ride Um that just opened up that I heard is amazing Um but just kind of plan those in or realize if you need to take a break especially Like for me again being introverted when there's so many people interaction or so overwhelmed sometimes I just need to relax that it's Oh okay I feel we beat ourselves up and that's when more stress happens and it's taken me a while to realize that And most of the time if you miss like something small it's not the end of the world Like unless somebody is like literally in a launch but like if something's slightly delayed and you need to take care of your muscle or physical health 100% okay And most clients don't even care as long as you're up front and don't just like disappear and then be like Oh Hey like I you know fell off the face of the earth and didn't get back to you Um so I think that's how That's how I keep one track minded And if I realize that I'm getting stressed or tired cause I know my body signs to take that time off Um because you can't do that again in the corporate world you can't do that I can't be like Whoa you know I feeling stressed today I can't go into work Right So it's a benefit that you have working for yourself and I think you need to take advantage of it Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:20:44] I love both of these tips I want to dive into the second one but before my brain loses it for the first one um I'm going to share a tool the tool Um there's this tool called work Kona For Google Chrome which I live and die by It lets you create tab groupings and then save the grouping of tabs and you can like one click open the tab collection So I have tab collections by client and I can click on the client and all of the websites whatever that I use for that client open when I click it And that has so minimized my like Tab overdose syndrome That's helpful I have not heard of that tool It's a lifesaver and it defaults to your Google Chrome homepage So like when you open Chrome you land on where Kona and then you choose what tab collection you want to start with Caitlyn Allen: [00:21:40] Yo the pro version is only $6 Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:21:44] You don't even need the pro version if you don't have a ton of collections Caitlyn Allen: [00:21:49] Yeah Just so it's like 10 workspaces for free like yeah Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:21:52] that's plenty Oh my gosh Well anyway to the second point though I think this is huge I think in a weird way Caitlin I think you would agree season four is becoming the season of mental health And I think that as therapy and mental health and anxiety become more acceptable conversations in the broader culture I think the entrepreneurs space is finally talking about this too and the things that you shared like taking a day off taking a step back are huge Even your comment about one track mind I think can actually be A solution here Like what if we Pomodoro our entire day and like not the 25 minute Pomodoros but what if we like one track mind one thing at a time our entire day we've like gotten so sucked into this Multitasking is everything But there was a study done that actually read about working at Google that you lose like 10 IQ points for every task you're doing simultaneously or something like that I love those tasks Caitlyn Allen: [00:23:00] Task switching not good Lindsey Aleson: [00:23:03] Yeah Kills it Kills your productivity and then you make mistakes or stuff's not done Right Um so yeah that's that's pretty much what I do I don't do it in the 25 minutes but I do that exactly Is I Work through my day in those chunks and it really saves me time because people are like well your pickup looks so like busy I'm like but if you take it at once one step at a time like figure out what you need to work on for the day and one step at a time Mmm It is It's huge It's huge Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:23:30] So I want to wrap up with a question that I hope will be helpful to those that are listening You exist at this intersection of design and tech and both of those pieces are meant to simplify our lives Design visually simplifies our life tech like Logistically simplifies our life What one tip would you give entrepreneurs that you've learned from working in this space literally since you were 11 Um to try and simplify their lives Lindsey Aleson: [00:23:59] So I think the big thing is you don't have to do everything yourself and you probably shut it so Um I realized that when people are just starting out though they like to do stuff themselves cause they don't have the budget But not doing it yourself doesn't mean you have to hire somebody necessarily Um like if you're not a designer don't go make your own logo Just go buy a premade one and they're like 25 bucks on creative market right Because nothing harms you worse Then poor design or a poor system that is horrible for a user or a client Um so you don't that doesn't mean you have to go spend I dunno $1,000 on a professional like Branding and I don't even know I don't do branding Um so I don't know what it's like running for but I mean you really shouldn't when you're starting out either though So just take it one step at a time Um again you want to people want to jump to the finish line on everything but it takes steps and just Stay in the step you're in and get the help you need but that doesn't always mean you have to drop thousands and thousands of dollars on something Caitlyn Allen: [00:25:07] Yes Start where you are and then grow But you do not have to like spend all this money when you first start out just because you think that you need to know all the things I yeah I totally Mmm I think that that is a great uh A great thing that many side hustlers need to like take into account is like you don't have to have a website to start your business Like I don't know why people assume that you have to have a website and you have to have all the social media platforms and you have to Whatever It's like you don't have to have a system in place Just do the thing start doing the thing and then grow from there Exactly Oh my gosh this was such a great episode because I feel like you and I are very very similar Um awesome So where can we find you on the interwebs Lindsey Aleson: [00:25:57] Yes So I am in the process of a rebrand but I think it'll still be blogged me lovely.com when this episode goes live Um so yeah or and all the social media is just blogged me Lovely If it changes before the show notes I'll let you ladies know but um that is where you can find me online Dannie Lynn Fountain: [00:26:17] Amazing Thank you so much for hanging out with us today Lindsey Aleson: [00:26:20] Yes thank you for having me It was

Show Notes: Speaker 1: (00:00) Welcome innovators, the simplified integration podcast. This is Dr. Andrew Wells and welcome to episode number 18 scale like a pro with special guests, Warren Phillips, Speaker 2: (00:12) Leonardo da Vinci once said that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication and I agree. You see the problem with the way that most consulting groups approach medical integration is anything but simple. In fact, it's the exact opposite. It's expensive, it's complicated and quite frankly it's exhausting. Enough is enough. There are far too many amazing integrated clinics that are struggling. Well, I'm on a mission to change that. What I've come to find from over five years working with integrative practices is that simplicity really is the secret. The old saying of less is more is true. Through a streamlined approach, I was able to create multiple successful seven-figure integrated clinics and now I'm going to show you how you can do the same. Join me as I share with you the secrets to successful medical integration and practice growth. Join me on a journey to greater sophistication through innovation. I'm Dr. Andrew Wells and welcome to the simplified integration podcast. Speaker 1: (01:10) All right, welcome back everybody. First of all, I want to give a special thank you to my guest, Warren Phillips. Warren, welcome to the simplified integration podcast. Um, first of all, thank you cause I know you're a super busy guy and so I appreciate you taking the time to be on here and share, uh, your brain with us. And I'm really excited because I know that you have an awesome mind for business and also for marketing and I really appreciate you spending this time to, to help other doctors. So if you don't mind, can you give me a little bit of background about who you are and what you do? Speaker 3: (01:42) Well, Andrew, first of all, it's my honor to be here. My heart is, has always been to see other people become successful. And the most, the people that I believe should be the most successful people in the world are practitioners who put their hearts on the line every day and exchange a lot of value sometimes for not adjust, reward, um, all the time. And I like to see that as well, like them to have that great value exchange. And so, you know, my, my background, uh, you know, it's kind of an interesting one. I've been in the coaching, uh, functional medicine, functional nutrition space since 2005 teaching seminars and educating practitioners on systems supplementation, business marketing. This has definitely been my passion for a very long time. And since then, obviously my entrepreneur, entrepreneurial mind has definitely expanded into many other areas in the health and wellness space. Speaker 3: (02:35) But my heart always has been and always will be for the practitioner. So how did that happen and why is that? Well, pretty simply I got very sick cleaning up hazardous waste for living as an environmental consultant in Missoula, Montana, where I didn't have any answers. And back then there wasn't the internet, there wasn't the summits, they wasn't, there wasn't podcasts. None of this. Everything was still on tape, you know, or you had to get it from a university. And the universities really even weren't, didn't exist either. So I was very sick. I had to sell everything. I had moved back into my parents' basement, riddled with chronic fatigue, fibromyalgia, sleeplessness, gut issues, weight gain. I was 210 pounds. Oh my hopes and dreams of getting married and having a family and living that American dream were taken from me. And, but I was a scientist, right? Speaker 3: (03:20) Mass degree published scientists. I'm like, there's gotta be a cause. So, you know, 50 diff, different doctor visits, later, psychologists, medical doctors, designed Tris, physical therapists, you name it. Uh, I was there and the best they could offer me was Effexor and pain meds for the chronic pain, wearing a whiplash donut to bed, um, yelling at God, saying what the F, you know, what's going on with my life? Why is this happening to me? And then later, you know, through research and connecting with great practitioners, I was able to, in the functional medicine space, able to find out that it was the heavy metals, in fact. And it was kind of my gut, but there was no research on it. It was the heavy metals that was making me sick. So once I tested that, and literally even when I did my first urine toxic heavy metal challenge test, I sent a split test to my analytical lab in Idaho that I use for a sample analysis for hazardous waste cleanup and identification just to prove to me that this was real cause I thought the labs were lying to me. So I sent a split sample of my urine. So I was a huge skeptic. And then I became a massive believer. I had a conversion experience, if you will. And I went nuts. I decided, man, we have to take this information to the world. People are suffering and doctors need to be empowered all over the world with this information. And that's how I landed in this space. And then what I found my niche was, was the marketing side and the business side of growing organizations. Speaker 1: (04:51) Well, thank you. You know, I had a chance to meet you, um, in November at your last live it to lead an event. And I actually went there for two reasons. Number one is I had heard of, uh, I know you worked with dr Pompa pretty closely and I had heard of him for a long time and I knew he had did great work but I just didn't know like what I didn't know too much about functional medicine or the or the protocols he was using with his doctors and patients. And so I went there for that reason. But I also, uh, heard about you and half the reason I went because I heard of this guy named Warren Phillips and the way that you're described to me was he's kind of like the, like the wizard of Oz, this guy that works sort of behind the scenes that helps these practices and doctors get these principles out to other people as I'm like, I got to meet this guy and it's, you know, it's amazing. Speaker 1: (05:34) You tell me that story about how you were sick and didn't have energy and your health was failing. Cause when I saw you at that event, dude, you're like bouncing off the walls. I was like, man, like this guy's got a ton of energy. And I remember thinking like, I want that because at that time I didn't tell you this, but when I went to that event, like I had, I was struggling with chronic fatigue, brain fog, not a lot of energy. And I was using a caffeine, try to prop myself up for the day and at that event and listening to dr [inaudible], immediately at that event, I started fasting, which I had never done before. And I'd kind of experimented with intermit intermittent fasting, but didn't really know how it worked and all. So all of these pieces came together. And at that event I started fasting. I read that, um, beyond fastening book that, uh, dr Pompa wrote. And man, I, I, it's amazing man. My energy levels and my clarity, my mental clarity are through the roof. Like, I don't remember being, feeling this good in a long, long time. So I know what you guys do works. Obviously it's worked for you. It's working for me. I still haven't done the five day fast yet. I'm, I've chickened out every time I lead into it. Speaker 3: (06:34) Yeah, it's more of a mental game, but you're getting fat adapted. You know, your, your cells are turning over. They're dying and rebuilding beautiful cells and you're repeating those cells. So you're, you're going to get there. But, uh, the, there is a fear factor there but it's a good one, right? Yeah. My fear factor of my daughter is getting her thumb out of her mouth. You know, yours is going to be a little bit on the fasting and so we all have her down. Speaker 1: (06:57) I'm working on that thumb thing with my son right now. He's three and a half years old. He refuses to get rid of it. But uh, yeah man. So thank you. First of all, thanks for like, I wouldn't have known about this. I wouldn't feel as good as I do right now if not for you guys in the work that you do. And so this, um, this podcast is a, is part five and a five part series and the purpose of this series is for doctors to understand that when they're thinking about integration that there is not this one size fits all solution for integration. And I sent out a survey to my list just a few weeks ago and it was a, it was a two part survey. One survey was a question for doctors who have yet to integrate. And, and by the way like this, this, you can plug in integration, you can plug in functional medicine, you can plug in high volume chiropractic, whatever, like service. Speaker 1: (07:43) You can plug it into this, the survey. And my question was, if you haven't integrated already, why not? And the number one response by far, I think the statute like 87% was doctors were afraid, uh, for financial reasons. It's too expensive to get in. It's too expensive to run and it's not profitable anymore. So that was the number one response. The second row, the second survey I sent out at the same time was for doctors who are already integrated. What is the biggest challenge that you're finding? And the response was different. The response was all across the board. Doctors were saying, um, it's expensive. It's a, it's a beast to run. So it's incredibly bloated. It's complicated. Uh, doctors have a tough time wrapping their minds around how third, third payers work. Medicare and private insurance, they struggle with that. They struggle with leading a big team. Speaker 1: (08:32) And so they've, you know, these doctors decide to integrate and, but they don't realize how challenging it can be when you bring something like that into your practice. So these were things that I had known and suspected, but it was nice to hear from doctors who have, who've actually done it. So, um, what I want to do today is talk about, um, number one what it means to integrate, but also if you're only back up a minute there, when I talk about integration, this is what doctors don't understand is that there are really like three different paths to integration. And so sometimes when doctors say integration is, they have this idea of what it is in their mind. So it's kind of like this. I, I was, uh, over the summer I was helping a friend, um, build a porch on his house and he had this really bad headache. Speaker 1: (09:14) And I said, dude, let me adjust you. I can help you with your headache. And this guy is, he's kind of a conservative guy. He's like, ah. He's like, I'm not, I'm not into chiropractic, no offense. But he's like, I tried it once. Bad experience. Uh, I don't really think that's appropriate. And I said, okay, well Jay just let you just think about this. I said, I've adjusted tens of thousands of people, I help people with headaches all the time. Uh, it's super simple and really safe. So if you, if you change your mind, let me know. I think I can help you with that headache. And he said, okay, I appreciate that. And so like an hour later we're hammering nails in the house and he goes, you know what, I can't stand this headache anymore. I don't want to take medicine. He goes, just do what you do. Speaker 1: (09:51) Give me an adjustment. So I laid him down on a piece of plywood in his backyard and I felt his neck gave him an adjustment and he's like, all right, let me know when you're going to do it. Cause he was nervous and I said, it's done already. This lay down for, you know, get up when you're ready. He goes, what do you mean it's done? I said, it's done. You're adjusted. And he goes, that's it. I'm like, yeah, that's it. And so he stands up, he goes, he goes, wow. He goes, my headaches gone. And I'm like, really? Are you just saying that to make me feel good or is your headache gone? He goes, no, it's completely gone. He's like, that's freaking amazing. He goes, I didn't know that's what it was. And I'm like, yeah, that's, that's chiropractic. So he didn't, he didn't know what he didn't know. Speaker 1: (10:25) He had this bad experience years ago. I did, would never do chiropractic again. And then this one adjustment fixed it. And this guy is like a big mountain biker. Whenever he falls off his bike, he comes to my house, I adjust him and he feels better. So the same thing is true with integration. You know, you hear stories of people who have been ruined in practice with integration. They struggle with it. They're losing money, they go bankrupt. And I'm like, I don't want that for myself and my practice. But a lot of doctors don't realize there's all kinds of different niches with integration. So the first path, and this is kind of if you, if you're jumping on this podcast, on episode 18 this episode, go back and listen to the previous four episodes. So the first path and integration is what I call the simplified integration. Speaker 1: (11:05) This is adding for what for most doctors is what is a part time system. So we use regenerative medicine to help people with joint pain without drugs and surgery. It's a system you can run part-time. Doctors can start this program for less than 10,000 bucks. You can get it up and running in less than 90 days. It's super simple. It's a great way to add a high five to low six figure income for most doctors. So that's the simplest way to do it. You don't have to monkey with insurance or anything like that. The second path is when, this is for doctors who want more from their integrated practice. So this is when we strategically add insurance services that make sense. So, not like, you know, a lot of integrated clinics. I've been guilty of this. We had like 25 different therapies we added in her office, like a super complicated system to run. Speaker 1: (11:49) It was crazy and you don't have to do that. So you can still a smart integrated practice where you're offering a few insurance services, which helps the patient reduce their costs. It helps build up your revenue and it doesn't have to be a complicated system. So then there's part three and more, and this is why I have you on this podcast. Part three is for doctors who say who are already integrated, or maybe they have the business chops to say, all right, I'm at this level now I want to get to this level. So maybe that means they want to double their practice or they want to open a second, third clinic, they want to make a bunch of money. That's what we want to talk about today on this podcast. So let's talk about first of all, what scaling means and scaling in in my definition, is different than growth. Speaker 1: (12:31) So practice growth is when you, let's say for example you're seeing a hundred patient visits a week and you want to grow that to a hundred or a hundred, 175 most doctors can do that with a little, some marketing tweaks, maybe improving their case management, maybe working a little more efficiently or harder. You don't need to scale your practice to do that, but if you want to reach a different level of success, scaling is when you're increasing your output, your sales, your volume, but doing it in a cost effective way and so you're doing it in a way that doesn't blow up your practice or ruin what you owe. It's already working well on your office. Does it, would you say that's a fair description? Worn of, of, of scaling? Speaker 3: (13:08) Yeah, I mean scale, you know, scale to me like growth and scale. I mean they kind of go hand in hand. Um, and, and my thought process but you know, it's celebrated. Um, growth can have consequence consequences. You can always grow. But do you have the systems, the staff, the team to handle that growth? Right. I would say scaling is more of a systematic approach where you, like you said, where you're limiting a lot of those pitfalls. I just want to grow. I want to blow up my practice. That's, that's the growth mindset. Um, a scaling mindset to me would be one that's more systematic, uh, a systematic approach so that you, you have a goal you have in mind, uh, of what you want to do, what you want to achieve and then you, you properly staff and integrate the things that you want to go to get there in a systematic way. So scaling is more of a, a systematic growth is more of a um, a mindset. Speaker 1: (14:06) Yeah, I totally agree. And when you're adding, so doctors typically will think about that after the fact. So after they've integrated, after they've done functional medicine, it's like, all right, I have all these moving parts. How do I make it, how do I remove the bottlenecks? How do I make this thing actually work in a meaningful way? And so, so for doctors listening to this and they want to scale, like is there a, is there a right time to scale it? And if so, how do you know when it's the right time to scale? Speaker 3: (14:31) No, I mean I think everything comes down to mindset and I'm going to keep going back there, right? I think you need to be the type of person that doesn't have fear, right? Because you, you said at the beginning, why don't people, why don't doctors integrate fear? Right. And I've been coaching doctors a long time and some of their, the two biggest things that stop them from scaling or integrating or hiring or you know, all of that, it comes down to ego, right? And the ego, not like I'm, I'm the, I'm the man necessarily, but you know, who's going to take care of my patients as much as well as I can. They, they're only gonna like me. You know, those are just self limiting beliefs. Um, when it comes to, especially chiropractic, I can see that because some are more talented than others and have more experience and I can see that they care for their patients deeply. Speaker 3: (15:20) But it really comes down to a growth mindset where you want to train and equip others to be great, not just you be great, right? You just have to shift that. So, um, and you know, so you've got to have not have that, uh, that, that ego or actually, which is in a lot of respects is lack of confidence in yourself, in your, in your ability to lead. And then the other piece to that is fear. So if you're, if you've a fearful mindset and all you're doing is worrying about, so you're in the stock market for instance, for example, I don't invest in stocks. And the reason why is I can't control that. I can control my business output in a lot of other things, but I don't want to be looking and gambling with money. So I have, I have a fear of that. Speaker 3: (16:08) So I avoid it. It's not something that's gonna motivate me or give me energy in that moment to do something great. So if you're fearful, um, you have to initially get over that fear. And sometimes that, um, C type personalities, uh, practitioners, they need education. They need to get all their I's dotted and their T's crossed. And then there's the entrepreneurial, uh, practitioner who go all in and sometimes fall flat on their face and go bankrupt. Right? But then they get back up again and do it again and then they integrate correctly instead of quickly. So a lot of people do things quickly instead of correctly because they're, they do have, um, an unlimited, uh, mindset. They've done some personal work or they may be born that way. But in the process, one of those mistakes in a growth mindset versus a scaling mindset is that you do something and you're thinking growth, growth, growth. But you don't have the systems and individuals around you and processes. And then in your growth, you destroy your current team and business. So those are some of the things that I see over and over again. And so, you know, I don't know if that leads you into another question, but that's kind of, you know, where, where I land, um, you know, after 15 years of doing this, Speaker 1: (17:24) yeah. You know what you're saying, having the right systems and people around you, you brought up an idea and I've been really lucky in the fact that I've had great people around me for a long time. And, and one of the, um, the keys I think to my success over time is that I'm always plugging into resources. So I always have at least one coach or mentor. I'm always reading at least a couple of books and, and learning new ideas. And what I remember when we went from a cash chiropractic office to a massive, you're, we're running to a seven figure integrated clinics. Had I not had the right people, the right coaches, I'm not only pouring into me, but pointing out all the glaring roadblocks I had. Like I, I didn't know anything about business management, even with a business degree. I had no idea where my blind spots were, where the bottlenecks in my business were. Speaker 1: (18:09) And to be honest, it would have, if I had figured it out, it would have taken me a long, long time to do it. And so very true. Very true. And it's like, I like Tony Robinson. He's like, he's, he always says, you know, I've been a butcher his quote, but don't reinvent the wheel if someone's done it before you just copy what they're doing. And that's, that's always been my mindset. I just, all right, someone's done it better than I could probably do it. I want to copy what they're doing. And so I think doctors who are planning on scaling, I think that's just a critical part of their approach to it is not only having, okay, I want to do this functional medicine or this regenerative medicine program, but who's going to help me get to that level? I want to get to a [inaudible] Speaker 3: (18:47) I can talk to like I have the, when I'm teaching on organizational growth, I have my forties. Um, you know, and there's more to it than this. I mean there's, there's other technical aspects, but I have the forties talent team, uh, team, actually, sorry, I wrote it down here. Talent, team time, tenacity, and there's teaching spots and all of that scale. So if you are of the, you want to scale your business, you want to add, um, you know, more modalities, more insurance, um, because as soon as you go from a cash integrated clinic to a medical, more of the, the billing side, that's a whole different ballgame you have, you've opened up a lot more liability. There's lots of things that go on. I'm not an expert integrating. You are right. I'm an expert at scaling and growing businesses and marketing, right? And cause I believe marketing is everything. Speaker 3: (19:38) Even if you were a, a horrible chiropractor, which nobody on this call is, but even if you were, I could market you and make you successful. I wouldn't feel as good about it. If your heart was right and you weren't the best, I'd be okay with it because it's all about your heart and your intention. Because I believe a lot of being a practitioner and being effective as a practitioner, again, mindset, your intention, your love for that individual, you are the placebo, if you will. You can transform someone's life with your word, with your intentions, with your love, giving them hope. That is the key to a good practitioner. If you're in it for just for the money, it's a little harder, right? And you're really going to have to put those and that's okay. Right? But you have to put those personality types and know the right ones. Speaker 3: (20:19) I use ideal ideal coaching. Um, I think, uh, Allen miners group, I really do a personality profiling on the types of people that I hire. Um, even if it's an internal personal assistant to a functional medicine practitioner that we're placing into a clinic, however that is. So it really comes down to, um, you know, those four, in my opinion, when you're building a rock star team to scale, it doesn't, it really has nothing to do with you. Um, it has your all over it, but it's a scaling, a business really scaling, let's say, not just seven figures. You can seven-figure yourself a little bit all by yourself being a decent manager. Um, rewarding your clients well, having a good, um, you know, culture in your office. But you know, let's look at five to $10 million, right? Let's look at a really big functional medicine slash integrated, you know, STEM cell, like big time clinic, right? Speaker 3: (21:17) With multiple modalities, multiple practitioners. Let's really get there. How do you go from a million to say, two to 5 million and that really comes down to the team you have around you that are implementing these systems that you're, that you're learning from someone like you or you know, an integrated clinic. You really need to have the forties, you've got to have, you've got to find the right talent. You've got to find the, the, the front desk person that has the right personality, that's smiling and loving on people instead of yelling at them because they missed their appointment, right? You guys know this stuff, but you really have to have the right talent. You need to hire and find that talent and not hire your friends, not your family members that really hire the positions that you need within your organization to help you scale in. The more you hire the right people and the more you're removed from that organizational structure where you're the base, they're the top your doctors, the people serving the front lines and your marketing team. Speaker 3: (22:17) And as you go down, you're at the bottom. Really, you're just, the scaling. Scaling is, is looking up, looking and loving. Um, of course it's your end user right there that you're delivering the results that you promised, that they're gonna, that you promise them. So there are the very top, and then you have your administrative staff and it comes down to your executive team and then down to you as the founder, right? So you, you have to have the talent and then you, once you find the right talent space, you want to have a Michael Jordan, you know, practitioner. You want to hire a, um, who I met and I'm spacing his name, who was his protector? Dennis Rodman, right? You're creating this talented team. Then you bring them into a team, you get them working together. Um, say, Hey Dennis, this is your, your spot, Michael. Speaker 3: (23:01) This is what you do. Um, you know, Michael Piffen, this is what, I don't know if it's Michael Pippin or whatever, you know, you do this, this is your job. This is your, this is your lane. And, and put them in a box that they can Excel in that don't give them a job or a, or a position in which they're not going to be successful. Because the bottom line is everyone wants to be successful. Everyone wants to add value. That's why they're working for you because they want security. It's not normally money. You have to pay a good compensation, but they want to be successful. What they want to do, they want to add value. They want to be brilliant, and you have to provide environment for them. So the failure of a, of, of your talent is really back down to you as the leadership role. Are you giving them the resources, training, and coaching that they need to be successful in their position? And are you putting the right people to create this team that wants to win the Superbowl, right? Are you creating an environment in which they're brilliant and they can be positive, positive, amazing environment where they can make mistakes and learn and grow like a child. Um, if they've never done this before. Right? So Speaker 1: (24:05) that's a really good point. Like that that I think is a huge, huge, huge point that you're bringing up as you like. I think everyone can hire people like talent that they think will, will do a good job and you don't know until they actually do it. But then it's up to us to make sure that we'd give them the right expectations and to make sure that if they make a mistake, they know what the mistake was and how to correct it. And so one, one thing that I didn't know when we integrated was, um, I, I never knew what a policy was like a written policy or I, I had no idea what a, like an employee manual was. Cause we, I always like lead and manage from the seat of my pants. And if you hear me say it enough times, like you'll also repeat what I'm saying. Speaker 1: (24:41) But when we integrated, I couldn't do that cause we had 12 employees and I couldn't micromanage each and every employee. So, uh, one of the systems I learned was everything that you want your employee to do, it should be written down. So for example, if you have that front desk staff that you mentioned and they're bubbly and warm and nice, they have the right character, well what do you want them to say when they answer the phone? Because that's going to affect your conversions. And so we would write a script for that. And so when we'd hired that person, it's like, here's the script, follow the script, um, be yourself, but this is what we want you to say. And then to that, uh, that post, we would add a statistic and that we would track those statistics. So how do you measure it? So you're taking these like intangible things and things you want your staff to do, but how do you make it measurable so you can see it on a piece of paper? Speaker 1: (25:25) And so for example, when we'd have uh, um, uh, new leads calling in, let's say we had a hundred leads calling in a month, we would want 70% of those leads to convert into a patient appointment. So if it was 40% or 50%, or like, okay, what's going on with Mary this week, our stats are way down. She must be going off the script. And sure enough like that's, she was saying something different or having having a bad week or there's something that we could help coach her through or lead her through. And so, um, that was, uh, so that that concept of policies and written scripts and having an employee handbook, they can actually reference saying, okay, this is what Dr. Wells wants me to do. It's right here on a piece of paper and we can always reference that. So it took some of the ambiguity out of, all right, we're going to be a great team, but how do you actually, like what, what does that look like? Speaker 3: (26:09) Yeah. That, that's the, that's the classic like entrepreneurial mindset, right? If you're an entrepreneurial practitioner, and many of you are that there's been an entrepreneur and a business owner, but if it's not measurable, it's not real, right? And accomplishment is a big deal in an organizational structure. You want them to be free thinking, brilliant people, but you want them to accomplish, you want to create a system for their box. So they have measured results because the numbers do not lie, right? So you see this a lot in a structure and they'll see how much money there they're making, right? That you're doing, and they might see your numbers and you're being transparent. I think you should be transparent with your numbers, um, to a degree. And they will think they deserve more. Well, it's not based on what someone deserves. It's based on what they accomplish. Speaker 3: (26:56) And if you don't have measurable results in four conversions for these things and you can't manage, um, and then you don't have a group of, uh, team members that will respond properly. So even though I'm not a basketball player, the results remain right? If Michael Jordan, if everybody's doing the right thing, your numbers will be great. Michael will put, you know, points on the board. If Dennis is doing what he's doing and Michael Pippins is doing what he's doing and they're all who's doing the block shots, who's, you know, making sure that this guy isn't scoring like you really need. And that's all essentially script. It's a game plan that you have to happen. It's a measurable number. What is what, how many people did you convert? Well, that's how many, you know, Michael Jordan, you know, or you know, whatever. Right? So that that measurable place takes a lot of the MB and ambiguity. I can't say that word. Speaker 1: (27:50) Ambiguity. Yup. Speaker 3: (27:51) Ambiguity out of your management, right? Because it's not personal, right? You have a great family, a great culture, and some of these big organizations that I, that I walk into, everything is all numbers. And that's really good. Especially for the new generation. They, the millennials, they love. And that's a lot of your workforce now. They love numbers. They love accountability. They love to do well. They'd love to get rewarded, right? They love, they'd love culture, you know? And that's the businesses that are really skyrocketing today. And you need to build that in. So without that you're, you're managing, uh, your, your manager managing nothing. You're managing emotion and you can't imagine you can't manage emotion. Speaker 1: (28:30) Absolutely. Yeah. So that was, so that was the second tee. So you had, you had a talent, the second tea being was at teach. Speaker 3: (28:37) Yeah. Talent and teams. So you're getting your team together and then you have, it takes time. Right. So, so if you're integrating, for example, you have to be patient with this award winning team, you have to give them time to win. And one of the mistakes that people say, you know, is right, right out of the gate. They don't take self responsibility for the team and giving them time to learn and love and appreciate each other and to learn their positions. And they just fire them and they say they're not any good. Right. No self responsibilities from the business owner. Is there any good they're not doing, I tell them to do. They're bad, right? No self responsibility. No, you didn't train them correctly. You don't have the right systems to them. Right. You didn't take, you didn't give them time to learn, right? Because when you build a super bowl winning team, or if you're going to win the NBA finals, right? Speaker 3: (29:26) It doesn't happen overnight. It's intended. It's a longterm play, right? You're not thinking six months out, you're thinking three, four years out to win, right? And you communicate that to your team. We're going to win. We're going to be $5 million integrated clinic four years from now, and this is how we're going to get here. Here's the team you, you project and you create systems to get there. It doesn't happen overnight. So you have to have that, that time factor. And then the last T, which is the most important T out of any T that you ever have in your life, even better than green tea, is tenacity. Um, all research shows that if you want to win at anything in life, if you want to be super successful, if you want to have impact and disrupt, uh, anything, you know, whether it's the healthcare system, whether, you know, I love being disrupted and you have to be tenacious. Speaker 3: (30:21) You have to have a tenacious attitude that you are going to win eventually, that you're not going to give up the first year, that your numbers aren't as good as they are. You're always shifting, educating and working and thinking in a positive way that we are going to win. We are going to win the Superbowl and nothing's going to stop. You have to have that as as a leader underneath you are speaking that into existence and you have to be tenacious no matter what happens cause you can make mistakes. As a matter of fact, you're going to make a lot of mistakes in your practice. Sometimes it may almost cost you your business sometimes. Sometimes it will, sometimes it won't. But if you react to that as a learning opportunity, what did I do wrong? How can I integrate that now into my life and how can I use this learning integrated force. Speaker 3: (31:11) I'm Tony beets from gold rush. You know I love this quote because lessons cost good lessons costs lots. So the more it costs you, it sometimes the better it is for your life and effects. What this mindset, when you can overcome things like a muscle and train it, it becomes integrated into your neurology. And you could go to that next level like, so when I'm building businesses, it was like the, the, the, the star, right? That everyone says seven-figure practice, right? I like the burst their bubble and say the local Starbucks is having a bigger effect on your community than you at seven figures quit that think four, five figures. Think five years out. Think scale. How am I going to get there? Who do I need to hire? How can I get myself out of the road? What can I do to empower more people in leadership? Speaker 3: (32:03) What can I do for my team? It's going to give them the tools that they need to win the super bowl of my community that I can impact this community with today's functional medicine integrative strategy. This stuff works. I'm using it, right? Um, and I'm coaching, uh, like Harry Adelson's going big, right? He's an integrated, uh, naturopathic doctor. I'm helping him with his, uh, premier release of his documentary. He's going big. He's not just thinking small, he's thinking big. He's thinking global. He's doing a huge documentary and book release. That could be some of you listening to this, right? But you have to start somewhere before you get there, right? But you'd have to think longterm, what is my longterm goals and strategies? And are you tenacious enough to get there? So it comes right back to your mindset, right? Do you have a coach that's going to give you the strength that you need, that you may not have yourself? You may not have those skills, but how do you get them? Well, you can read a book, but more importantly, have someone to guide you through someone to be your Sherpa. If you will, do climb that mountain so that you don't die, that you don't bankrupt your business, that you don't, uh, make a billing mistake that puts you at liability. You don't want to do that on your own, right? You do want to have a guide so that you know, part of the answer, Speaker 1: (33:18) I love it, man. [inaudible] or do you have any like resources, uh, on how to do that? Cause I think that's a, that's a very vague question. But that fourth tee that you just talked about, tenacity. I think that a lot of doctors want that, but they don't know what it is, how do identify it or how to get after it. And, and my answer to that would be, I, you know, I think you needed some solid people around you to help either tease that out and then to help drive you through that, those, uh, those tough periods in your business. But what, what would you suggest to a doctor who like, yeah, I want that. I know it's within me, but I don't really know what that is at this point. Speaker 3: (33:54) Yeah. You know, it's tough. You know, you can have conversations with a lot of dots and sometimes it's quite frustrating because you try to bring them to that realization of self responsibility. You try to ask them questions and really have to listen to their answers to see if they're, if they are ready. So, uh, cause a lot of the times it's more, yeah, I can do this. I'm the best I can, I can scale. But the word I is really the, the most dangerous thing if it's coming out of your mouth. Um, if they have an I mindset, that's a big red flag for yourself. So look and say, why am I saying I, you know, why am I not saying we? Why am I not, um, um, elevating others over myself? What is it within me? What happened? You know, what's broken within me? Speaker 3: (34:41) Not to think in a way to get there, right? And to have a, not just a tenacious heart, but a loving, tenacious heart, right? I mean, you can, you can win just with tenacity. Don't get me wrong. You know, you really can Senate tenacity. Angela Duckworth, you can read the book, her book on grit. Uh, that's a really, really good resource to understand that. And it really shows, it doesn't, it's not, it's not how talented or smart you are, uh, necessarily. Um, to when it really comes down to that, to that, um, tenacious mindset. I think a lot of that is, um, it can be grown in cultured, um, through removing limiting beliefs through removing, uh, understanding that you're all brilliant. Like that's another thing that I can speak to everyone listening today. It's like you're thinking brilliant, not in an egotistical way, but you are right and you need to realize that you are, you need to realize how gifted and talented you are. Speaker 3: (35:33) You have to realize that you work really thinking hard to be here, you know, to spend the time listening to this podcast. But so has the people around you, they're also equally as brilliant. They equally need the same love and you know, accolades that you do to get out of, out of the bed every day. But if you're tenacious, you really don't need as much, right? Because you have a goal in mind and you want to win. You know, some of the resources, you know, you just got to get personal work done. You know, you really got to go and find, get to a place where you don't have those limiting beliefs that you know you can get somewhere and you know it's going to be hard. Like marriage for example, right? If you go into marriage, and a lot of us have done this, I did not. Speaker 3: (36:18) You know, fortunately you go into marriage thinking it's going to be easy and fun and you look at it for something to help you be happier. But it's quite the opposite. It's a reflection to make you better, right? It's an opportunity for you to change and adapt and grow and become tenacious, right? And if you go into it with that aspect, you have a beautiful marriage that improves. And it's what can I do? How can I change the language I'm using with my wife? How can I be stronger? How can I change how I'm acting? Who cares what she does? But when you do that, your family grows, right? But it takes hard work and tenacity and self-responsibility. So if you don't have self-responsibility, you think it's all about you, you know? And that's normal. Just don't get me wrong. I still think that right? Speaker 3: (37:04) On a daily basis, I'm evolving just like everyone else in the year, but from a principal standpoint, that's the stuff that escalates your life and your business. It really starts with you and I and a tenacious, loving, kind accepting you, and that is in your marketing. Oh my gosh. It comes from me. You know, at the end of the day that love that attention, you have to have that I believe, to really scale and grow a large business because otherwise you're going to have problems. If your team doesn't like you, you're going to get in trouble with them, right? They're going to come back and become your predators. So here's a big, here's a big deal. As you scale and grow, you talked about policies. Let me just wrap a bow around that because that's a big thing. Don't expect your employees always to behave if you don't have an employee policy. Speaker 3: (37:54) If you don't have non-disclosures, and I've, I've made millions and millions of dollars in mistakes. I've had employees come back and try to blackmail, you know me out of money reporting lies and doing all the crazy stuff. Why? Because I trusted them to be always good and kind. And the reality is not everyone is good and kind. Most are, but you've got to play the game. Like there is going to be a black sheep in the family of your organization that some point that's coming in and once your power, right, if you don't have an personality profile can, can fix that, right? You can find those people, right? And not hire them. They're more of a you and they're going to want to be you and you. You don't want that, right? There's only not to say that you're the, you know, the end all Beto but you really are the, the controller of the organizational structure and you want to create a culture. Speaker 3: (38:46) So long story short, make sure you get non-disclosures. Make sure you use attorneys, you know, do all that stuff. And if you can't afford that, then you know, start saving up, right? Because you and you can write, there's all kinds of ways to get money. I was talking to a business owner the other day, they're like, I can't afford a conventional loan to buy out. You know, this other partner in a business, but they have no foresight to say there's like 10 different other ways for you to funded by that business. You know, through a conventional loan in a bank, right? So there's lots of ways to get there. So the tenacity person would say, I need this much money. I need a hundred grand to start this, this integrated, you know, this next movement I want to get, you know, make sure my billing and all that stuff that's going to cost you like a hundred grand, right? Speaker 3: (39:29) Where are you going to get that money? You can sell fund. Usually you can, if you have a successful clinic, don't. If you want to grow, you know, don't invest into lifestyle, invest back into your business. A hundred grand should be nothing for you. But say you don't, right? Where do you get it? There's lots of ways to get at a tenacious person. We'll find the money to meet the goal. And I also believe that, you know, from a, from a spiritual standpoint, if you're going to do good in the world, I believe God in the universe will bring you the right people and the resources to do that. So that intention, that love and heart man, really important, um, for resources and that energy that you have, that you put out into the world to attract the people into your team, into your world, they're going to help you do something really big, really scaling, beating the crap out of Starbucks. You know, you're going to be, you know, 10 X would have Starbucks can be in your community, right? And thinking much bigger and longterm. Speaker 1: (40:21) Man, I don't know if it was the, uh, the thing that brought manager levels up or just being around you guys. Just it. Dude, it's amazing just to connect with you on this podcast. It's just listening to you and listening to these principles that you're teaching and that you've learned over the years. And in some of these I've learned, um, are so true and so helpful and so needed in our profession. Um, and I, and to wrap this podcast up or, and I'm just really, really grateful for you to be on here. And, um, one of the things, if you're listening, one of the things Warren said, I asked him before this podcast, I said, well, what do you want to do? You have something you want to promote? And Warren said, no, I'm not here to promote. I just wanna help doctors. But I do want you to promote what you do because I think doctors need to be plugged in to the work that you're doing and the services that you guys offer our profession because they're incredibly valuable. Speaker 1: (41:06) And I, again, I came to your seminar for personal reasons. I wanted to get healthier, I wanted more energy. I thought maybe you guys could provide that. But also I just wanted to be around people that, um, put these, these principles that we just talked about into practice because it's, it's uplifting. Um, this last half hour of you and I talking is like, I'm way up here now. My energy levels are way up here, so thank you for that. Um, and so what are, uh, what are some ways that doctors can connect with you guys and the health centers of future, um, maybe just coming out to a limit to lead an event. Can you maybe talk about that? Speaker 3: (41:39) Yeah, I mean, w we've been coaching, uh, practitioners and we're getting more into the integrated space as well. We have, um, you know, we have some resources on sourcing, on really good exosomes and things like that, that I've told you about. So some of the new things that we're doing with, with dr Raffi, so we're getting into the integrated space, but our, our seminars, uh, you know, are, are more functional medicine in nature, business marketing, teaching the fasting principles, the things that, that really move the needle in, in people's health, you know. So that's, that's first and foremost is what our events are about is like what's going to really get people well, what's going to compliment your integrative practice, uh, you know, post, you know, STEM cell treatment, how can you get a topic G naturally so that you get better clinical results. And that's a big thing. Speaker 3: (42:21) You can measure that right, that's measurable and integrate about how much they come back in. And then you can add some of the diet, the fasting, some supplements, um, that we have for, you know, STEM cell production and autophagy. And adding that in and seeing how it changes, you know, uh, the results in your clinic. And we have other regenerative clinics do that with us. So on my one of our, you know, sites you could go to and there's a free, uh, somewhere on the site. I think it's a bar, um, right down below, um, the website for the free just to get an idea of what our seminars look like and the energy that we bring. It's HCF instant access. Um, dot com I believe is the link that I gave you, but you can go to HCF, H H as in Harry, Charlie, Frank HCF, seminars.com. Speaker 3: (43:10) And you can also, there's a probably a green like bar that they can click on and it has, you know, Joseph Macola is on there and a few other practitioners that have brought the heat, um, you know, on different, different topics and you can see us and what we're doing and with clinics and you know, uh, what this energy is all about and we're, you know, it's definitely a movement for us, right? It's definitely, we want to not just empower every practitioner but the, the right practitioner that has a similar heart because congruency is key with everything that you do. So the doctors that we attract really have to be congruent and crazy like we are in this area. Right? Um, I wouldn't say we're the crazy integrated, you know, opposites. We have an integrated office, um, that we, um, one I wanted to launch with you actually I was thinking about because I don't want to reinvent the wheel, you know, a heck of a lot more about integration than we do. Speaker 3: (44:01) But we do have one. Um, we're launching in California, we're adding, you know, a lot of the modalities like the pulse and the, you know, the STEM cell machine and a lot of these different, you know, cash, uh, cash cows if you will. And they work and they help people. So we, we do a little bit of that. So they have those vendors and things that are events. But at the end of the day, guys, what I shared with you really just comes down to you and your mindset and where you're at personally. That's the foundation of all your success in life, in business. And until you get there, I really, you gotta have those, those, those moments in time where there's a major shift, everyone needs to shift. You've got to take a big shift, right? You have to shift your mindset. You have to ship from a growth to upscale mindset, something that's sustainable. Speaker 3: (44:51) You really got to get wrap your head around that. And what does that look like and who are you going to find to help you get there? Right? So that's, that's my end game. Yeah. You can come to one of our events. That would be awesome. Our next one, um, we actually put off a really trying to, we used to do two a year and we're, we're putting off the next one probably till nine months, but the end of the day there's a lot of work that you can do personal, right? Podcasts, you can listen to coaches, you can hire, you can work with, uh, you know, dr Andrew here. There's so many ways for you to find a path to greatness. Cause all of you want to be great. You all want to have success in life but don't, it takes work and tenacity doesn't have to be hard. You can glide through your circumstances. You don't have to strive, you know, you can glide through life. But that, that's right up here guys. It's right between your right between your eyes. And that's where I, at the end of the day, if I could say anything to inspire you guys is work on you and then everything else will flow out of that and your own health. Speaker 1: (45:48) Absolutely. Yeah. So as we wrap up here, docs, if you're, if you're considering scaling, if you're maybe in the scaling process and realize, Holy cow, I didn't know what I was getting into and you need help with these things at any point, please reach out to me if you need help. And that's um, info@integrationsecrets.com, um, our email addresses on our website. And if I'm not the person to help you, I will be happy to refer you out to other people who can help coach you, mentor you, uh, help you through not only the mind, some for some of you, it's the mindset stuff. For some of you just need the tactical part. What are the steps to, to scale properly. And if you need that help, I'll be happy to point you in the right direction. So, uh, Warren Phillips, thank you so much again for being on. I really appreciate you. You're awesome man. You have a great heart. You're one of the smartest people I think I've ever met in our profession. I really appreciate you sharing this time and your knowledge with us. So thanks everybody and Oh, go ahead, Speaker 3: (46:37) owner's mind. Speaker 1: (46:38) Thanks man. And we'll look forward to seeing you guys on the next episode. Bye bye. Speaker 2: (46:43) Hey innovators. Thanks for listening to the simplified integration podcast. Fact that you're listening tells me that you're like me, someone who loves simplicity. And the truth is those who embrace simplicity are some of the greatest innovators. So hope you got a ton of value. From what we covered on today's episode. Be sure to subscribe and share with other docs that you feel could benefit from greater sophistication through simplification and innovation. If you've got specific questions that you'd like answered on this podcast or you've got specific topics that you'd like me to discuss, just shoot me an email at info@integrationsecrets.com Speaker 1: (47:19) that's info@integrationsecrets.com.

Day: 015 Date: Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2020 Note from Aimee J.: The world is a better place with you in it. Believe that! Topic: What it Means to be Enough. Action: Live your life proudly and unapologetically! Affirmations: You are Awesome. You are Loved. You are Needed. And most importantly, YOU ARE ENOUGH. Resources & Links: Your Personal Hype Man ; Alexa Skill: Your Personal Hype Man ; Your Personal Hype Man on iTunes Let’s Connect: Leave a Voicemail ; E-mail Aimee J. ; Aimee on Instagram ; Aimee on Facebook ; Aimee on Twitter ; Aimee on YouTube ; Aimee on LinkedIn ; Aimee on TikTok ; Aimee on Snapchat ; Aimee on Pinterest ; Transcript: Hey fam, it's your girl, Aimee J., your personal hype man and friend here today to see how are you doing, what's going on? What is new in your life today? So yesterday, I talked about how it's okay for you to not be 100% and I 100% mean that even today. But after I recorded that, I got some, I got to think in, you know what if people don't understand when I say you are enough, what does that mean? And some people might be confused. I was confused for a little bit. And so I thought, you know, why not talk about its day because it's Wednesday, January 15th, so why not? Right? Um, it took me a while to accept the fact that I am enough. And by enough it means that who you are as you define yourself for yourself is what the world needs. And that's what I mean by enough. People will have their own opinions and thoughts as to who you are. That's irrelevant. That's not important. You can't see it. But I'm, I'm waving my hand at that because it's not important who you define yourself as. Is what matters, right? I define myself as a woman, as an Orthodox Christian, as a 39 year old going on to 40 right? As an Indian, as a Malayalee from, from Kerala, India. That's how I define myself. There are nuances in those definitions though, right? Uh, I'm single, I'm straight. I have these, these other definitions that, you know, I like softball. I like baseball. I like the Ravens, like the Orioles. These are things that are defining me and that makes it my definition and that makes it enough for me. But that's also enough for the world. The world doesn't get to define who I am. I define who I am and who I define is what is enough for this world. Because each and every one of us is unique. There are no two people the same. I don't care if you're a triplet, a quadruplet or a sextuplet or whatever other uplets there are. Or if you're a twin, y'all are different people. And I can say that because I'm a twin. I have an older twin sister and we are identical twins, but we're not identical. We may look alike, but we are different when it comes to the core of us. Look alike, similar interests, but we are different. Our experiences shape us. Our experiences are what helped define who we are. But for my experiences I wouldn't know that I'm a pretty good baker but for my experiences I wouldn't define myself as someone who enjoys podcasting. She, she doesn't do that. She's not a podcast or she hasn't had that experience. Right. That's what being enough is. I continue each day to learn more about myself and define it. But you are the one doing the defining not somebody else. You are the one who decides who you are, not somebody else. You are the one who is living this life, not somebody else. They are living their own life. So I wanted to come back and just kind of check in with you about that guys cause it's very important. A lot of us suffer and struggle with our identity and who we are. And I'm telling you are the definer of who you are. Other people may want you to be something that you are not. If you aren't. If you define yourself not that way, then you are not that way. And it's, it's, it's tough to hear that. It's tough to say that, uh, for some people. But it's true. It's true. Some people don't like to identify themselves by their race. I'm shrugging my shoulders, shoulder, eh, it's not common, but that's their choice. It's a little different, but that's again their choice, right? Some people deny their culture, some people deny other things. That's their choice. They're not wrong for the choice they make just because you disagree with it. It's their choice who they are is their choice. Some things may not be understandable by all. That's okay because again, it's their choice. And how you choose to define yourself is okay and is enough for this world. So this is a bit of a heavy topic. I'm not going to keep you guys for the whole like 10 minutes or anything like that because you're still awesome. You are still loved, you are still needed. And however you choose to define yourself across the spectrum, across the genders, age, religion, sex, you know, favorite TV shows, whatever, however you choose to define yourself is enough for this world because that's who this world needs. And the thing I want to make sure you guys understand, just because you define yourself one way doesn't mean you don't stop to be the best version of yourself. Being enough doesn't mean you, you just sit back and let life happen. You try to be the best version of yourself. So even though I'm telling you you are enough as you are the way you are, you can still be the best part of yourself, the best version of yourself. It's still important to do that. It's still important to grow and learn. If you choose to define yourself as someone who is lazy and a couch potato and who doesn't do anything. All right, cool. Then be the best lazy couch potato who doesn't do anything. I'm gonna still twist it the way I need to twist it, right? The point is, guys, you are still enough. The fact that people want you to be the best version of yourself doesn't change the fact that you are enough as you are. You may not be good one thing, but you could be good at something else. Right? Life is about learning those things. You aren't limited to the definition of a 39 year old female Indian Orthodox Christian that I am more than that. I may be enough at who I am, but I am more than just that definition and you have to get to know me to know what that means. All right? So keep that in mind. Remember, you are awesome. You are loved, you are needed, and again, you are enough as you are. That's straight from your friend and your personal hype girl. All right. Till next time, which is tomorrow when we check back in, don't forget, Keep Chasing.

"Everything is awesome! Everything is cool when you're part of a team!" - so goes the impossibly catchy song from the Lego Movie. In IT, we are often expected to be caught up in that same spirit - hyped up on the adrenaline of fixing systems, catching hackers, and inventing new stuff. These expectations - which come from external sources like our boss or company or IT culture at large, or internally from assumptions we've taken on as personal truths - can fly in the face of how we're actually feeling. When our feelings turn from just being "a little tired", "a little frustrated", or "a little sad" to serious challenges like burn out, rage, or depression, it can be hard to admit, let alone seek help or ask our coworkers for support and understanding. And yet religious, moral, and ethical traditions are rich with stories of people coping with the exact same challenges. In this episode, we're going to get brutally honest about the mental health challenges we've faced and are facing today as well as what lessons from our faiths we can carry with us to provide insight, comfort, and even strength. Listen or read the transcript below. Destiny: 00:00 Welcome to our podcast where we talk about the interesting, frustrating and inspiring experiences we have as people with strongly held religious views working in corporate IT. We're not here to preach or teach you our religion. We're here to explore ways we make our career as IT professionals mesh or at least not conflict with our religious life. This is Technically Religious. Music: 00:24 "Everything is awesome! Everything is cool when you are part of a team. Everything is awesome..." Leon: 00:31 So goes the impossibly catchy song from the Lego movie and it we are often expected to be caught up in that same spirit hyped up on the adrenaline of fixing systems, catching hackers and inventing new stuff. These expectations can come from external sources like our boss or company or it culture at large. We're internally from assumptions we've taken on as personal truths and can fly in the face of how we're actually feeling Yechiel: 00:56 When our feelings turn from just being a little tired, a little frustrated or a little sad to serious challenges like burnout, grades, anxiety or depression. It can be hard to admit or let alone seek help or ask our coworkers for support and understanding. And yet religious, moral and ethical traditions are rich with stories of people coping with the exact same challenges. Josh: 01:15 In this episode we're going to get brutally honest about the mental health challenges we faced and are facing today as well as what lessons from our face we can carry with us to provide insight, comfort, and even strength. I'm Josh Biggley and the other voices you're going to hear on this episode are my partners in podcasts, crime, Leon, Adato. Leon: 01:35 Hello. Josh: 01:36 And Yechiel Kelmenson. Yechiel: 01:38 Hi again. Josh: 01:39 Hello. All right, so this is a bit of an odd episode for us. Um, I mean this, this feels a little heavy. So before things get to, you know, heavy for us, little shameless self promotion. Leon, why don't you lead us off? Leon: 01:55 Okay, so I'm Leon Adato, uh, I'm a Head Geek at SolarWinds. You can find me on Twitter @LeonAdato. I blog and pontificate on all sorts of technical things at www.adatosystems.com and identify as an Orthodox Jew. Yechiel: 02:11 I'll take a next, uh, I'm a Yechiel Kelmenson. I'm an engineer at Pivotal. Um, you can find me on social media at @YechielK, um, if you want to read what I have to say, it's on my blog at RabbiOnRails.io and like Leon, I'm an Orthodox Jew Josh: 02:26 And I'm Josh Biggley. I'm currently an enterprise monitoring engineer, but by the time this episode drops, I'll have started a new role as a senior tech ops strategy consultant at New Relic. You can find me on the Twitters, uh, at, @jbiggley. Um, I don't actually have a place where you can find me other than I would say Twitter, LinkedIn. I I've taken to, to posting a fair bit on LinkedIn. Um, and I identify as an ex Mormon, Leon: 02:52 Um, and I'm obligated to point out to everyone who might be scribbling madly to try to write that down, that we will have show notes and it will have all those links and everything else we refer to in this episode. So please don't worry, just sit back, relax and listen, just to enjoy the conversation. So I, I have to say that this entire episode was actually inspired by a comment that Josh made during one of our other podcast. It was episode 28, which is titled Release to Production. Once again, we'll have a link to that in the production notes and around the 12 and a half minute mark, Josh said this: Josh: 03:26 And then in my own family, right, I suffer from depression and my work toward getting promoted happened to coincide with a really difficult depressive episode. Leon: 03:37 So Josh, I want to start off by talking about that specific moment. Um, do you find that you're talking, you talk about your mental health often. Josh: 03:46 I mean, you know, mental health, um, I, you know, as this episode title fight, the stigma, um, says is perhaps not something that I've talked about often. Look, I've, I've dealt with mental health issues, um, at least going back into my late teens. Um, it's something that, that kind of ebbs and flows for me. It's something that I'm comfortable with talking with my family about what my immediate family. Uh, and there are a few other people in my circle of trust who I've, I've talked to my I talked to about my mental health. Leon: 04:21 Okay. So that being the case, you know, you, you're not mental health forward when you have, hi, my name's Josh and here's my depression is not how you do things then. Then I have to ask because it, you can hear in the clip. It was just something you said and it was a point that you were making as part of a larger conversation and we move, you know, and we moved on from it. But I have to imagine that that had to feel a particular way to say that on the air like that. Josh: 04:49 I think the advantage of doing a podcast is that you record it and then it's done. And then you, you almost forget that you say it at least until I do the transcriptions. And by that point, Leon: 05:01 by the way, thank you. Josh: 05:01 You're welcome. And by that point, here's the thing, when, when you're struggling with something, um, confession is good for the soul. And I honestly, I do believe that it is good to share. I mean, did I intend to share at that particular moment? No, I didn't. Do I regret sharing? No, I don't regret sharing. Leon: 05:29 Okay. Which, which takes me to the last, you know, basic question about that moment, which is have you gotten any feedback, you know, on, on social media or in, you know, on the blog that's associated with Technically Religious or anything, you know, or even just comments that you've gotten one-on-one. Josh: 05:44 Has anybody come in and said, wow, you know, you said that and X, Y,Z , you know, uh, I haven't, and, uh, honestly, listeners, I'm a little disappointed. Uh, I know that mental health is a real struggle for people. I know many, many people, and we'll talk about this a little later, who struggle with mental health, whether we're talking about full-blown depression, whether we're talking about anxiety, whether we're talking about, you know, unhealthy levels of stress, whatever it might be, and nobody reached out. Um, I think the stigma is very real. And so, you know, if, if you're struggling or if you want to talk, you know how to find me. Leon: 06:26 Right. And I think that goes for certainly all three of us. And I, I would also say that, um, the, the Technically Religious, uh, speaker cast at large, um, one of the things we've all been very open about is, is saying, look, if you have a question about anything that you are dealing with struggling with, have a question about, curious about, we're all pretty, Oh, we wouldn't be doing a podcast if we didn't want to talk about it. Josh: 06:50 That's right. And we do like to talk. I mean, we're, we're pretty good at it. Leon: 06:54 So that's on sort of the, the podcast technical social media side. Have you shared these kinds of things in religious contexts? Josh: 07:03 Um, no, no, no, I haven't. Eh, and, um, yeah. Uh, and there's a reason for that. Um, in my, my religious community, um, as I said, I'm ex-Mormon, uh, now as our listeners know, I've, I've been transitioning since this podcast started. Um, there is a very toxic culture of perfection. Admitting that you have a mental health struggle is not a minute, is not looked at. It's looked at as a weakness. All right. Um, I F my personal experience, um, included some really fantastic people, but I also met some of the most cutthroat people that I've ever encountered in my entire life. And when you showed that soft underbelly, that weakness, your fear was that they would got you. Um, and here's the thing that's not unique to Mormonism. Um, I expected that is anytime you get a group of people together, you're going to find those, those individuals. I mean, in some organizations they may be more, but there's probably one, at least one in every organization. And for me, ultimately the, the question that I, I had to ask myself was, am I, am I generally comfortable with sharing this, um, within my religious context? And the answer was no. I mean, it's not that I didn't share it with people who shared my religious beliefs. I certainly had those, those moments, but it wasn't something that I got up in the middle of a sermon. I was like, yeah, yeah, I, I suffer from depression. And those things just didn't happen. Leon: 09:01 Right? So I think it's, it's important to point out, and, and I've said it in a very particular way on this podcast a couple of times a Judaism and apparently Mormonism also have not found the cure for the common asshole. There's still gonna be, you know, individuals who are jerks regardless of their religious affiliation. And that's, you know, that's the truth. But it's got to be hard when you are talking about, uh, w when you're having conversations around ethics and charity and Goodwill and kindness to know that there is a line in the sand that you're just not comfortable crossing that by all accounts shouldn't be there. Um, so in the Orthodox community, my, my first and my visceral experience with talking about mental health, and it's not the only one, but it's the one that comes to mind every time, is that when, when mental health comes up, um, where a lot of people go is that admitting to or getting help for mental health will make it harder for, uh, children to get a shidduch or get a match for a marriage, um, either for themselves or for siblings. So a lot of families will sweep those kinds of things under the rug. And again, it's not just don't talk about it, it's also not medicating children for everything from attention deficit to, to anxiety, to oppositional defiance disorder to anything. Because the medication itself is an admission of a problem and that can get out in the community and that can be seen as a challenge. I'm not saying it is a challenge, but I think that a lot of families immediately, that's their first worry is my kid won't be able to get married because of it. Yechiel: 10:47 Yeah, I definitely seen saying as far as the Orthodox Jewish community, that's probably the biggest obstacle in terms of talking about mental health. Um, and then on a secondary, uh, you know, started saying secondary and isn't that it's not as big a problem as the shidduch problem. Um, I find also that people have a hard time sort of owning up or admitting that they have, that they have issues because there's like, there's so much stress put on, on, you know, believing in God and trusting God that everything is good, that everything that God does is good and therefore you should be happy and you should be confident and you should be. Um, the umbrella term for it in Judaism is betach baShem to have trust in God and you feel like when you don't feel that way. When you feel, when, when you do have depression or anxiety or whatever it is, you feel like there's something wrong with you. Like if I was religious enough, if I took these ideas more to heart, I wouldn't be feeling this way. I wouldn't, you know, it's a, it's a failure on my, on my part as a person, as a religious person, not realizing course that it's a health issue, like any other health issue. And just like getting the flu doesn't mean that you're trusting God is lacking. So it doesn't getting depressed me. That is a problem in your life. Leon: 12:04 And that's, and I think we'll, we'll talk more about that in a little bit about, about how things can be addressed. But yeah, it's, it's really hard when a crisis of mental health also becomes a crisis of faith because I think those two things have a really easy time of feeding upon each other to make the entire situation much, much worse. Josh: 12:24 So I'm curious, something that, that comes to mind, um, that, at least on the surface appears to be a commonality, is this idea of the gospel of prosperity. And you see it a lot in Christianity, right? It's the whole idea that, well, if I'm, if I'm obedient enough and if I give enough than if I serve enough, then God will give me. And if I'm, if I am poor, if I'm sick, if I struggle, then you know, obviously I'm not doing, or even worse, you know, if you Yechiel, you know, if he's struggling, well obviously he's not. Uh, and then we get into that judgment that is unfortunately very prevalent in Christianity. And, and for those who are, who cannot see Leon, he is, he is writhing and agony here. Leon: 13:18 I only learned about prosperity gospel a year or two ago. I never heard of it before. And the whole thing just, I can't, I still can't wrap my head around it because it's not, it is absolutely not a Jewish concept. Um, and it, that's not what this episode is about. Josh: 13:39 That's interesting though because it's, at least within Mormonism, there is a lot of veneration about leaders and you know, how do we follow those leaders? And one of the things that at least if you go to your local bookstore and cause they still exist, there are places you can actually buy books that aren't online. I know it's weird, but if you go to your local bookstore and go to the self help section, you're going to read a titles from people who are leaders in their spaces, right? And we look to those people for inspiration. Today I was on LinkedIn and uh, uh, Jeff Weiner, who was the CEO of LinkedIn, shared a post, uh, and we'll put it in the show notes, but he was asked about what his leadership values were. And I thought that these were really interesting because as, as we're talking about this stigma or the potential for a stigma around mental health, um, if I had mental health struggles, I would want to be an environment with a leader like this. Here's what he said, "Be compassionate, be authentic, be open, honest and constructive. Be of service others. Lead by example, inspire." I thought, Holy cow, that that is what I want would want in a leader. And if I had a leader like that, then I would feel comfortable opening up to them and saying, look, these are my struggles. This is what I'm dealing with. Ken, how can I help? Or how can I continue to work and work through these struggles? I dunno, uh, Yechiel, what values do you have or what attributes do you value in, in others professionally, whether fellow engineers, managers, leaders? Yechiel: 15:38 Obviously in addition to having their technical ability, I think if they can't share that tech and global, I said, I don't have the empathy to, to look back and bring back, bring people up with them, you know, um, then, uh, they're started sort of uselessly. Um, there's a whole thing going on in Twitter now about 10X engineers. And I heard someone who said it that defined it very well. 10X engineers that someone who writes 10 times more code at 10X engineers, someone who can teach 10 times 10 more, 10 other engineers who can create 10 other engineers is sort of as a force multiplier. So if you don't have this empathy of, you know, if you don't have the communication ability and being able to bring other people up behind you, then what are you worth? Josh: 16:27 Hmm. I like that. Alright. Leon? Leon: 16:28 Yeah. Um, so in terms of professional values, I think it's all the things that are unfortunately labeled soft skills, which says everything that you need to know about how an organization perhaps views them, um, which is wrong. I think that people's ability to connect on a human level is significantly more important than their ability to do any particular technical trick. Um, or I guess I should say that if I need a particular technical skill that's a consultant or a contractor that's not a colleague, a colleague is somebody that I wanna build a relationship with. And, and Josh, to go back to your point from earlier on, I want to be among people that I am, I would be comfortable sharing those parts of my experience, not saying my life. I am not saying that you have to work with people at work who you're buddy buddy with, but you have to work with people who you can be vulnerable with in a work context where I can say, I don't know, or this has me frustrated or I'm really frightened about taking on this task. I'm, you know, I'm apprehensive about this. And you have to be able to say that, not because it's important to be vulnerable or whatever, but because if you, if you can't say that, then you're going to either avoid doing things that are, uh, opportunities for you to grow in your career and your skills, or you're going to do it anyway, and you're going to sort of do it in that sort of blind haze of panic and you may not execute well. Whereas if you have a team where you can comfortably say, I'm having a really hard moment right now, can I have, can I have five minutes? Can I have half a day? Can someone sit with me while I do this? You may not have to do anything, but I just need, I need a buddy on this. You know? Um, when you have a junior engineer who comes in and says, I've actually never, you know, done this kind of coding before and can feel comfortable saying that and the team and say, not a problem. You know, I'm going to sit right here. I'm gonna do my own thing. But when you have a question, I'm right here to answer it for you. You know, that's again, that's a vulnerability in a work context that I have to be comfortable enough to say that's the things that I value are people who, who foster those kinds of conversations. Josh: 19:03 You used a, a phrase there, um, or an example where you said, I'm not comfortable doing this thing. One, that is a really tough thing to do professionally, but it reminded me of one of the very last experiences I had in Mormonism. Um, so for context and Mormonism, there are no, there is no paid clergy at the local level. Um, they do practice lay ministry. So that means that the, the leader of your congregation is, could be your accountant to, it could be, uh, he could play a plumber. In my case, um, the, the leader of the congregation I attended as, is actually a fellow it pro, um, works for the provincial government. Really nice guy. Um, but my responsibility in the congregation was as the clerk. So I, I had a chance to invite, uh, people at the direction of, um, our Bishop to, to give sermons on Sunday and we call them talks and Mormonism. But we've actually there, there are many sermons and you'd be assigned. Everyone in the congregation ultimately gets assigned. And I remember we assigned a topic to a woman who's been a member for a very, very long time, um, you know, many, many decades. And she approached me probably a week before she was supposed to give her her talk, her sermon, and she said, Josh, I, I can't do this. Like, I, I can't speak on this topic. Uh, if you're interested, the topic was the physical nature of God. Right? Um, and so, you know, Hey, it's a heavy topic, but she's like, I read this and I'm, I, I don't, I don't understand it. And my response to her was, then talk about what you're comfortable with. I mean, pick parts of, you know, the reference material that is good for you, and then deliver that. But in your, in your comments, Leon, I was struck by how rare that might be. You know, oftentimes we're told, well, you know, just, just go ahead and do that. Um, so my next question for both of you is, we've talked about these values that we, um, that we want to see in our colleagues, in our managers professionally. Are they any different than our religious observance? Yechiel: 21:16 Not necessarily. Um, and Judaism, there's, there are two kinds of commandments. Um, there's been a bein adam lamakom, which are commandments between man, between a person and God. And bein adam lechaveiro between a person and another person. So the first category would be commandments around prayer, around the holidays, things that are between you and God. Um, the second one includes things like, do not steal, be nice to each other, help each other out. And the Talmud is full of quotes that say that if someone says that I owe, you know, there's a quote about the ethics of our fathers. If a person says, I only have Torah, then he doesn't, then even Torah, he doesn't have meaning. If someone says, yeah, I'm just going to study and learn Torah all day, that's my thing. Uh, doing things and, you know, being nice to others. That's that, you know, that I'll leave that for others. Then he doesn't even have the Torah because the Torah is all about helping others and being good with others and being good to the world. So, yeah, so just like an it, having the, you know, having the, the brilliance is nothing if you're not going to share with others, if you don't have the humility to pay it forward. Leon: 22:28 Right. And, and as an example of that, um, you know, when we're talking about rabbis, you know, the, the congregational leaders, and, and we'll get to that in a little bit also. Um, well what that really means in a Jewish context, but if a rabbi isn't comfortable getting up as part of his discussions, whether it's a sermon or a class or a lecture or, uh, a conversation, um, and say, and this thing happened, and I was, I didn't even know where to go with that, or I was feeling really overwhelmed or it really scared me. You know, any of those things. Once again, same thing as we talked about with the IT people. If they're not comfortable admitting to that, you know, quote unquote weakness, then that's, um, that's problem. If they're laboring under the misguided assumption that they have to be infallible, that is not going to end well. Yechiel: 23:27 Yeah. Uh, actually reminds me of something like my teacher brought up a lot. Uh, one of the foremost commentators on the Torah Rashi, Rabbi Shlomo Itzhaki, who lived around 900 years ago in France. And he, so he's like the foremost commentator on the Torah, every pretty much every homeless you'll find at any synagogue has his commentary there. And there's actually a pretty famous, uh, one of the verses, Rashi quotes some line from the verse and says, I don't know what this is teaching us. And my teacher said, you know, why did he bother saying that? If you don't know, just leave it out. I mean, you're not, why do you have to tell us? So how many did you say that, you know, it's true. There were probably many other places where Rashi didn't know any, he didn't say anything, but he made a point to say it at least, at least once. So that we should know that it's okay to say, I don't know. Josh: 24:18 I liked that. I liked that. So what happens when we encounter in our professional, personal, religious, you know, community environments, people who look at these values that we have, that we, that we desire and others and be like, I don't care. Wait, I, I'm going to violate these values. I mean, I can tell you what happened to me that led to my transition out of Mormonism when I saw people within Mormonism, uh, specifically leaders of the church who were acting in a way that had I acted locally, my wife would have been mad at me, my fellow congregants would have been mad at me. My Bishop may have pulled me in and said, Hey, Josh, like, what the hell are you doing? Like this is not the way you behave. Um, I certainly would have been judged. And so when I saw that from others, that began my spiral down up. I don't know which direction, uh, at the time it was down, but now I feel like it was up. Uh, and, and ultimately out of Mormonism. So, I mean, Leon, Yechiel what happens, what happens when we're, we're, we're, our values are violated? Yechiel: 25:23 So I think like Leon mentioned earlier that, you know, no one found the carry out for the common asshole. Um, you realize that you know these things, you know, these people exist and they are not the people that we want to be around. If it's possible, like you did so cut them out of your life though that does come from place of privilege and how it always is that an option both in religion and in it, not always can you just leave your job or leave your congregation or leave your community. Um, but if you can do it, if you can't try to distance yourself as much as you can. Leon: 25:59 I know that Josh, your, your transition was, you know, there wasn't like, well that was the one thing, you know, there was a lot of things that led up to this, this decision. So I don't, I don't want to characterize it as well, if only you had done this one thing that you wouldn't have those problems. You know, again, it was like all real problems. It was complex and had a lot of moving parts. Um, I think that if, if anyone listening has an experience with somebody where, you know, again, they violate these values that the religion as a whole holds as fundamental or that you personally hold as fundamental. I think the thing is to remember that they're one individual, that they're, you know, that, that they don't make up the sum total of a community, IT community or, or other. If you find yourself in an environment where those values are upheld and lauded, you know, the, the so-called toxic environment, you know, bro-grammer culture in an IT department or um, you know, or, or toxic management or, uh, or just a really unhealthy congregational life or a congregation that, that espouses a value that isn't intrinsically negative, but it's not something that's helpful for you, um, to remember that you, you do usually to Yechiel's point, usually have a choice. And that choice doesn't have to hurt. It just, it might be different. And to give you a very innocuous example of that. And I've talked about this on our podcast before, I, I read Hebrew very slowly. I'm, I've been working on it for a long time. I'm getting better, but it's still slow. And so when I find myself in a congregation that values the speed with which the prayers go, "we can get morning services done in 20 minutes. It's great!" You know, when, when I'm in there like, Hey look, I found somewhere that's not my place. This is really not for me. Um, and as you know, if I'm, if I need to be in that environment for whatever, I just sort of tough it out. But I know that as soon as I can get out of that environment, I, that's, that's what I'm going to need to do. It's not helpful for me. It's not healthy for me. It doesn't do anything for me. So that's again, that's an innocuous version. If you are in an environment that is exacerbating your mental state, um, either because you know, what you're hearing in the pews is mimicking the, the mental negative self talk that you have going on in your own head or it's making you feel more anxious rather than less or you feel like you can't share anything about who you really are with the people around you. Then, you know, it may take time, but you need to know that there are other communities, there are other places to go in most cases. Again, I'm not diminishing the, the long journey that Josh, you and your family have gone through. Josh: 29:04 No. Yeah. I think that Maya Angelou really sums up something that I wish I had known before and I, I didn't know who my Angelou was before I began my faith transition. But among other notable quotes, she says, "When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time." And I think that that's really powerful when you are, when you're looking for people who you need to trust. Um, especially when it comes to our mental health. Um, if someone tells you, I am not someone who's going to protect you, um, and you see that, don't bring them your struggles because they're there, they're not going to be healthy for you. Leon: 29:46 Can't wish people into being the person that you need them to be at that moment. Josh: 29:50 That is right Leon: 29:50 We know you can't listen to our podcast all day. So out of respect for your time, we've broken this particular conversation up. Come back next week and we'll continue our conversation. Doug: 30:00 Thanks for making time for us this week to hear more of Technically Religious, visit our website, TechnicallyReligious.com, where you can find our other episodes, leave us ideas for future discussions and connect to us on social media. Josh: 30:14 At Technically Religious, we usually have something funny to say at this point in the show, but mental health is nothing to take lightly. If you are struggling, please reach out to a family member, friend, or a healthcare professional. If you are in crisis, please seek immediate medical attention. You are not alone. Fight the stigma.

Dr. Alan Wolfelt's website:centerforloss.comResource Optimization Network website: https://www.resourceoptimizationnetwork.com/Follow us on twitter: @KwadcastLike our Facebook page:https://www.facebook.com/Solving-Healthcare-with-Kwadwo-Kyeremanteng-103665294393881/Please send your comments/feedback to kwadcast99@gmail.comTranscript for this episode:Kwadwo:                             00:37                     Heather Bousada, welcome to the podcast. Thank you very much. Um, do you remember how we met? Gosh, that was a long time ago. Long time ago. Cause if you off the hook, I don't actually remember how we met, but I do remember how I met your husband. So to the listener, I was playing hockey game and he, he didn't know, he didn't know who I was and I, I approached him after the game after a hard fought game, which I think we won by the way. You guys were dirty. We were done. And I approached Chris and I said, Hey, I know your wife. And he's like, what did you just say to me? Oh I really know your wife.Heather:                              01:31                     And then he did recognize you. Yeah. And that I explained that to everybody in the teleconference one. Yes. Unknowingly.Kwadwo:                             01:40                     Well thanks for doing this Heather. It means a lot. And so maybe we could start off with what does a day in the life of the Heather Bousada look like, whether it's at the hospital doing what you do or in your work with grief.Heather:                              01:57                     Yeah. Uh, well it's busy. It's very busy, but, uh, most of my time spent in the palliative care and the palliative care team and I also work in medicine and I've worked with you in ICU, but, uh, I, you know, my love and passion is palliative care and grief. So a lot of my days spent with the palliative care team, meeting families and patients and talking about terminal illness and impact it has on the family and their goals and their hopes and their dreams and basically what's happened to them and providing them support through that very difficult timeKwadwo:                             02:32                     and crazy hours long days is thatHeather:                              02:36                     they're long days, they're long days. And sometimes I walk out of here pulling my hair and other times I'm like, wow, I feel like I was able to make a difference, you know? And that feels good. Yeah,Kwadwo:                             02:45                     absolutely. One thing that I do appreciate that you guys do is, you know, I run into, I'll have a family meeting or two in the afternoon and I feel emotionally I'd, no, I actually just physically, emotionally and physically exhausted. You're doing this every day.Heather:                              03:05                     Yeah. Well we all are in healthcare, aren't we? We're having really difficult conversations all the time. I don't think, I think, uh, one of my colleagues I was talks about if we only had a GoPro, I don't think people would believe what we go through in a day in terms of the conversations that we have. They're really detailed. Intimate people are at their worst times often, right? And trying to make really serious decisions, um, on, not sometimes for themselves, but oftentimes families are having to make that for their loved one and they, they're not sure what to do when they're feeling stressed and scared and they're not understanding how, or, you know, looking for support. And feeling in a world that's not part of their typical day. Right? Yeah.Kwadwo:                             03:49                     Imagine you literally can't imagine being in the spots that and, right. Like, it's not something that you think about, dream about, it's just,Heather:                              03:58                     well, people don't get practice at this right now, let's say to people like, it's not something you sign up for. And then all of a sudden you find yourself in the hospital having to have conversations about end of life, either for yourself or your family. And it's, it's a, it's, you don't get practice at it. Right? Yeah.Kwadwo:                             04:15                     So we'll talk about some of the details of, you know, these difficult conversations in a bit, but you have a expertise in grief counseling and what are some of the things that you wish more people knew about the grieving process?Heather:                              04:34                     Yeah, that's a, it's a huge topic. You know, it's, it is my passion and not only for patients and families, but expecially for health care providers. You know, one of my passions lately is that, uh, as healers, we need to be okay, right? We need to, we're doing some really serious work here. And if we're not understanding, you know, for having to go through our own grief and mourning through loss of a family member, you know, I see it all the time, I see at the hospital and people are coming to me and you know, oftentimes they feel like what is going on. You know, I used to be able to take care of five, 10 people. Now all of a sudden just taking care of one person, I feel like completely overwrought and I don't know what's going on with me. Right. And sometimes just having conversation about what it is and what's happening to them, to their body, to their mind, um, really kind of helps take off.Heather:                              05:21                     Oh, OK. Cause we're not only a death denying culture, but we really, um, you know, there's that whole, whether it's implicit or explicit out there that you got to buck up, right? You got to buck up, you got to get on with it. Um, you know, have a stiff upper lip and you know, people are looked at as courageous if, Oh, they look so strong. They haven't even cried. Not everybody cries, but there's that sense of, you know, if you're only being strong, if you're, you know, just keep moving forward. But the interesting part about grief and mourning is it's not about moving forward. Everything we do in grief and mourning is about going backwards. So I mean, if you look at grief and mourning, and I think that's an important part, I, well one I want to start with a lot of my approach degree from morning is from dr Alan Wolfelt.Heather:                              06:06                     He has a companion and approach and that's where my training is from. Um, as a social worker, I've also, I've gone down, there's a center for loss and life transitions and it's actually really a wonderful approach. And I, I heard dr Wolfville years ago and you know, just working in this field, I, when he talked about what grief and mourning as in going from the head to the heart, really it was what it's about. And it's that, um, that journey that we experienced that it just resonated with me, but it's throughout our system, right? So like if you look at brief families or the hospices, the Canadian military, the American military, they have also adopted this approach because it's a, it's meeting people not from the head and the intellect. It's meeting people with the heart, right? It's companioning somebody and companion is means to break bread and it's like sitting down with somebody and actually saying, you know what, I'm not necessarily the expert in what your relationship was with that person or what you went through, but I have some tools and I have an open, compassionate heart to be able to explore. What was that loss like for you? Right.Kwadwo:                             07:11                     I feel like that's a big fear for a lot of people. It's like when you know somebody has experienced a loss, I can't count how many times people say, I do not know what to say to them. I do not know what to do. I don't know what to bring. I, you know, it's, it's awkward for awkward for some people, some people, and even as a palliative care doc that in certain circumstances where it's like, you know, I literally, I'm not sure what to tell this person.Heather:                              07:41                     Yeah. And there's actually, we can talk about that a little bit later, but I think it's important to start off with like, you know, there's a lot of jargon out there, you know, brave man grief, mourning, like people throw out the words, right? But it's really, it's important to understand what the concepts mean, right? So that you can make some sense of it. So when you're looking at at, for instance, bereavement, it's a loss of a loved one. But what, what's really fascinating about the word is it actually means that the Latin root word of it means to be torn apart. So, um, you know, it's amazing whether it's here or people would call me when I was doing my private practice with grief counseling and in some shape or form, they would be describing that their world has been blown apart. Right. Um, and that's basically what it is, is that your world's been torn apart.Heather:                              08:28                     But the, the, the grief is important cause it's the grief is there are internal thoughts and feelings. So unless you're a sociopath, you're gonna feel that loss, right? When you love somebody, I mean, grief and love are the flip side of the same coin, right? Cause if you love somebody, you're gonna feel that loss. So it's the thoughts and feelings. But where we get stuck is people just have that feeling, right? They have that feeling, but they're not sure. So they're not sure how to process it. Right? And we don't get taught that and everybody's teaching them to, Oh, just move on. Right? But where the real work is in the morning, right? And that's the part that, um, that I tried to help people understand and, and how to kind of go about doing that. Like the morning is the outward expression of that grief.Heather:                              09:11                     So emotions need motion. Um, so the more that you, it's a social, a shared response to loss. Sometimes it can be specific to one's culture or rituals that you might do. But unless you're sharing that loss and expressing it and um, and I see it all the time with patients and families, once you get them to start talking about that relationship and who that person was, you can see the movement, right? It's a natural unfolding. You know, people think of it as like mental health. It's grief and mourning is a natural thing that we all go through, right? Unfortunately we like to avoid pain and suffering, but we will experience it and it can't get people around it. You got to go through it. But in that journey is as a really kind of beauty in it in terms of recognizing what you've experienced and how you then integrate it. I mean, grief is, if you really look at it, it's, it's moving from one of physical presence, um, to one of memory. That's the ultimate shift that what you're doing in the morning work, right? So again, you're moving that from physical presence to one American memory and you're integrating that into your new life, right? There is no new norm. There's a new normal now, right? You can't go back to the old normal as a new normal. So you're integrating that.Kwadwo:                             10:28                     Wow. So there's a lot there. So one thing actually, so Heather maybe talk a bit about what to expect when you're going through that process. Yeah. Obviously there's going to be a lot of distraught pain, you know, there's that new normal as you described, but what are some of the things that people might expect?Heather:                              10:57                     Yeah. Like for yourself and other people. Yeah, and that's what I find fascinating is um, people don't understand, like people think, assume it's a, it's just an emotional response, right? But it's the totality of your whole being, right? It affects you physically, cognitively, socially as spiritual ritually. And especially if, if I make reference to the healthcare workers, we need to be game on, right? So like as yourself, as an ICU doctor, you need to be there. You need to be present. But if you're going through a lot, us, you are, um, not only physically your body, you get extreme fatigue. Uh, you exhausted your appetite. You know, 80% of people lose their appetite, 10% gain another 10% that are neutral sleep disturbance. You know, so often people will tell me, you know, they're quick to go to bed to sleep cause they're so exhausted, but they wake up frequently, right?Heather:                              11:53                     Um, so you're not getting a lot of sleep. Your immune system's down, right? Cause you're in this critical state, like you're in this hyper arousal because you've got this in either an impending loss or a loss, right? So, um, physically it's affecting you emotionally. You've got like multitude. There's no, you can find many different feelings at once and it comes in waves, right? Um, and cognitive is, it was interesting part, especially with healthcare is that healthcare workers is you, you know, we multitask, right? We're constantly multitasking and, and life and death. Like you're making life and death decisions. Um, and you all of a sudden you're, and it's, there's a lot of research on it and uh, people will start to, uh, you'll find it's difficult to concentrate. Um, it more irritable. Uh, the multitasking often goes right out the window. Um, so all of a sudden you're like, wow, you know what's, and that's where people often in healthcare come to me and say, I don't know what's going on, but you know, I was used to, I would could do this with my eyes closed.Heather:                              12:54                     Now I can't even, um, you know, concentrate on, on two patients that I have. Um, I mean I, for a personal example, I remember I've been in palliative care like for 19 years and I remember when my own mom was, um, uh, terminally ill and she was in the hospital and I went with my team to go meet a patient and the doctor and the nurse and myself when we sat down. And sometimes you're not aware of it, right? Cause you're so in grossed and what's happening that you're not really aware of how difficult it is for you. So I remember sitting there listening to the nurse and the doctor talked to the patient a conversation I have every day and I couldn't even process what they were saying. At least I had the wherewithal to go, wow, I shouldn't be here. Yeah, I need to step back.Heather:                              13:42                     And, and I did, I stepped back. I mean it cause it's cognitive that couldn't wrap my brain around it. Like what was going on, what was being said. Um, yeah. And this was fairly recent. Oh, about four years ago. Yeah. Um, and uh, recently with my dad. But uh, yeah, it, it, uh, it's, it's good to recognize it. Right? It's important for, uh, for people in general, but especially for healthcare workers that they're not doing a bad job. That there's nothing wrong with them. They're going to the natural processes of grieving. Right. Yeah. We talked a bit about this beforehand. It's a very unique scenario for health care providers to try and take care of others. Yeah. You definitely, yeah. You know, like for the reasons you mentioned prior about how unique it is for health care workers, you're literally taking care of people. You're seeing death and dying every, yeah.Kwadwo:                             14:52                     And then when they experienced the loss, when they're not able to think as clearly when they see that emotional tie to their dad or their mom or whoever might have experienced loss, you know, I don't know if we talk about that enough. I don't know if we support each other enough.Heather:                              15:12                     And I don't think, I mean, I don't think it's through bad intention. It's, again, it's a, it's a S a social, cultural Mileah of, of Western society in general. We don't tend to talk about pain and suffering. Dewey, you know, we talk about being happy, being independent and um, eh, so to talk about pain and suffering, we don't, when we don't often teach our children about it either. Right? So I'm often talking to families about how do you help children through the loss or the are about to lose someone important to them because we're not taught. Right? So all of a sudden when we're faced with it, we don't know what to do. And as health care providers in general, um, you know, whether your community or in a hospital, uh, we want to take it on. But if we're not understanding, we should be the very role models and understanding because we're going to be out there trying to heal others and if we are not healed ourself are not going to be up to speed. Right. Yeah.Kwadwo:                             16:06                     It's, it's very much that cause the culture in medicine. Like I try not to get too personal, but you know, when I, I found out my dad passed away, it was a Thursday while I was on ICU and it didn't even occur to me to get somebody to cover, you know, it was just sort of ingrained in me like that plug away. And I didn't even tell anybody. Okay. I told them one person actually TP, just a just thing. So I just want it to have that kind of, um, security in case things became overwhelming during that time period. But, uh, yeah, it's for whatever reason, it's that culture, it's that talk about it, let's grind away at what we're doing. Even, you know, healthcare aside, even had a conversation with somebody that, that recently relatively recently experienced a loss, you know, and it was kinda like you alluded to at the beginning where it's like, I just want to do a bunch of stuff that keeps my mind off it and all I think about this and maybe it's worth diving into more, what are the consequences of not letting things sink in of always running?Heather:                              17:34                     Well, I mean, when you look at, um, the six central needs of mourning, like through the companioning model, one of the things is, um, acknowledging, um, the reality of the death, right? And they're not stages, right? You can come back and forth, back and forth, but primarily initially you're trying to acknowledge the reality of the death, right? And depending on the circumstances, um, that may take weeks, right? So like for instance, if people don't actually get to see the body, you know, say somebody died overseas and they regret it, that acknowledging the reality, the reality of what that the person is gone. Again, remember, grief is about one of physical presence to one a memory. So you haven't actually been there to see it. It's hard to integrate it into ourselves. Right? So, um, and then, you know, and then we start to identify or start to, um, embrace the pain of the loss, right?Heather:                              18:31                     And our body and our mind has this wonderful ability to be able to do that. So like it's about encountering innovating. So it's okay. Like our mind can't take it all in at once. Right? So our mind has a guy call it nature's anesthetic. So when we need initially have the loss of somebody, we, our body has this way of kind of numbing us a little bit and it's just because it otherwise it's too overwhelming and it ends as that numbing starts to kind of wear off a little bit and the reality of that person gone starts to set in that the pain really comes out. And that's actually the hard part. Like that's actually when I would find, I would get calls for grief counseling was around that stage. So, you know, somebody passed on, they have all this family and friends coming to provide them with support.Heather:                              19:19                     Um, and their new normal hasn't really introduced themselves yet, right? Because they're still living in that world of that person being there. Cause everybody's around, right. And then as people start to go back to their normal day lives and people that are the person, the bereaved person's left and they just looking around going, Whoa, what happened? You know, where is that person? I'm, you know, I'm used to getting up every day and having a coffee and then we head off to work and then we come home and we do this. That's not, that's not there anymore. So then the pain starts to come in. And that's when people would call me and they'd say, I don't know what's going on. Like I thought it was doing okay, what? Now I'm just like, this is awful. This really is painful. And, and, and that's when I'd say, well, I can't get you around it, but you know what?Heather:                              20:07                     There's a way to go through it. Right. And that's where the remembering that, you know, the morning comes in remembering the person who's died, right? And it's that work. And I see it not only in grief like a post-death, but I see in palliative care, it's really kind of that wonderful transition, you know, where you see families initially like, wow, I can't believe this is happening. No, it can't be in there in crisis. Right? And they're questioning the diagnosis and the prognosis and what's going on and they're in this state of helplessness. Right? Um, and then as you develop this kind of, um, time to give them space, uh, to answer their questions, provide education and support and of honor the process that's going on. It's this beautiful movement that you see, right? As they shift from the head to the heart and acknowledging that person's about to pass. And I love that, you know, after like a while, and you walk in the room and they're all sitting around the bedside and they're sitting vigil and they're sharing stories and they're laughing and they're crying. You see that morning work coming in, right? And that starts there. And it's really quite a beautiful process. And it's not that they want their loved ones to pass, but they're, they're acknowledging it, right? And they're giving honor to that person. And that's a really wonderful thing to be doing.Kwadwo:                             21:23                     Yeah. And I mean, I could speak also from the clinical side. I think you would agree with me on this being part of that, being in that privileged part of being, of watching them go navigate through these tough times. And the very reason I got into palliative care was those moments and the life where you're sitting with the family, you're talking about uncle Gus funny jokes at Christmas and that funny outfit he wore at Halloween and you're laughing and you're crying in here and you're just, you're being present.Heather:                              22:05                     Yeah. You're honoring the joy. The love. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, it's, it's incredible. I know. Cause people haven't say, well, how can you work in palliative care? It's, I'm not, it's not about the dead, it's about the living, right. It's about honoring the living and uh, it's that, it's that it's life, it's life affirming. Right. And it's really quite life affirming. Yeah.Kwadwo:                             22:26                     So maybe we could speak to what to do to help our fellow employee, our fellow nurse or a fellow loved one, navigate through this process. Cause once again, come like I alluded to at the beginning, sometimes a lot of people just don't know what to do. They want to say to, you know, send them a song. Do you, you know, I can write a Paul, what do you do? What's the best advice that we could give people listening.Heather:                              22:58                     Yeah. Well, you know, whether you're talking to a colleague or families that are going through it is it's important just to meet them where they're at, right? That's the first step. Um, because again, like grief is about, I'm going backwards before going forwards. It's about saying hello before you ever say goodbye. And what we tend to do is in our society in general, we tend to want to move things forward, right? Sometimes that's because it makes us feel better. But really that person, like when you're working in healthcare, people will often notice that, uh, families will keep going back to questions and keep going back. Well, why did that happen? And did, did we do the right thing? And, and it can be frustrating sometimes cause you think, Oh my God, I've told them how many times. Right. But it's because mourning there actually. And that's where I say, okay, you know, just take a moment because they're going backwards.Heather:                              23:51                     I just had a family recently and lovely daughter's sitting vigil by the bedside and they kept going back and I kept going back. And then finally I just sat down and I said, can I describe a little bit about grief and mourning to you? And I did. I sat down and I talked about what is grief, what is mourning and what we need to do in that process. Um, and uh, I said a lot of it is about going backwards. And I said, and that's what you're doing. So I'm going to honor that and I'm gonna answer your questions, but I want you to know that that's what you're doing right now. And they just kind of went, Oh, okay. I see. Okay. Cause otherwise they think, well, why I'm going crazy. These questions are driving me nuts, you know? Yeah.Kwadwo:                             24:30                     That really is enlightening because I got to tell you, without knowing this as a clinician sometimes I'm like, I've answered this question three times. I'm like, what's happening? And I always related it to being in shock because of all the things I going through, which is totally understandable. But what you're saying makes a lot of sense. We James downer, he's initiating an ICU study actually on bereavement and this was quite eye opening for me. Like ICU. A lot of the families have tons of questions after they leave us and you know, not being on that side, like I've never had a loved one in ICU and I wouldn't know what it would be like to hear that information on, you know, your loved ones dying and trying to process all that, you know, and in that time frame. But hearing James speak to the matter, it's like a lot of these people are, have questions after they have all these kind of, uh, concerns that, you know, there's no real process to, to help navigate and, and my whole, I mean, the whole point of doing this podcast, the whole point of doing what we do is to help others and to help them reduce their pain.Kwadwo:                             25:55                     And so, you know, it's, I hope this is at least helpful also too, a lot of the clinicians out there hearing these things and, you know, it really comes down to being, making time, being present, not giving the bullshit answer of like, all you'll get through it and we'll move through this, you know, your warrior move forward. But to sit with them, you know, sit with them and hear them out and we don't need to give a rah rah speech every time we see them. It's just being present, acknowledging it's hard.Heather:                              26:27                     Yeah. It's especially difficult in ICU because the unexpectedness often, right. Right. So that's another flavor entirely around it. So, um, again, so they're in that unexpectedness and so moving from the head to the heart, it's not about what, you know, it's what you feel right in grief. So when you've got somebody in a try, usually a tragic situation in ICU and uh, that, that kind of reality of the loss is going to take them a little bit more time. Right. It's, you know, it's gone from zero to a hundred and like one minute of their lives often. Right. So, yeah, that's a whole other flavor as well. Um, and trying to, to help them through that. So yeah, they're going to have a lot of questions cause they're trying to kind of, their mind is trying to connect with their heart in terms of what just happened and just then trying to acknowledge that person. Right. So hadn't how that's transformed and transition for them. So sext or work for sure. Yeah.Kwadwo:                             27:34                     You've experienced loss in your life. You lost your both parents relatively recently, especially your dad was just December, December, coming up and coming up here and I want to know how it's affected you as a grief counselor or a social worker in hospital. Do you feelHeather:                              28:00                     it's changed?Heather:                              28:03                     Um, well, typical social worker is going to redirect it back to you, but uh, yeah, of course it does. It, it, uh, you know, that's when I talk about the beauty and grief and mourning, people go, wow, was she talking about, um, but when you've had a loss yourself, like we can all kind of relate to it, right? You know, there's empathy and sympathy, you know, sympathy is, you know, I feel sorry for you. Empathy is, let me understand what you're going through. And the big buzz word now is compassion is meeting somebody heart to heart. You know what? Suffering is a shared risk. We all go through it, right? We all so when you've gone through a loss, and if you don't mind me saying, so quad Joe, I remember in your Facebook after your, I think your dad's anniversary. Okay. To talk about, um, I loved what you wrote because you said, um, that it made you a better doctor.Heather:                              29:00                     And it's not like you're going to sit with your families and patients and like whale and cry, but you know what it is to be human and you know, what loss means and how painful it can be and that we all are in that together. You know, the world's a mystery. Do I have all the answers to everything? No. Do you know, but we, we recognize in our fellow man that that sense of pain and suffering and, you know, when I'd have like the F the patients or clients that I had in grief counseling, I think almost everyone said to me something along the lines of, you know, I never really understood it, you know, um, until I felt it myself and I feel more for other people. Yeah. I can relate to their pain more. Like one lady had said to me, uh, you know, so-and-so lost their mom recently at work and last year I would've probably thought, Oh, whatever, just hurry up and get back to work. Yeah. But she said, you know what, now I look at her and I, I go over and I give her a hug. And I said, wow, this is hard, isn't it? Yeah. You know, welcome to the club kind of thing. You know, the shared human existence. And uh, that's the beauty I'm talking about. Right. And to connect again to say, wow, you know, this is how we, this is what we go through. Right?Kwadwo:                             30:20                     Yeah. I, I gotta tell you the, after going through it, the way I see people that are now going through a loss is, I want to say it's a completely different, but I am, I'm there, I understand more where they're coming from until the empathy and the compassion. It's inevitable. And one thing that I did totally appreciate is you take it almost tell by how someone hugs you if they've experienced lost themselves recently or not. Like the like meaningful bear hug would usually come from people that like, I know what's going down, I know how you feel around. Um, but yeah, it's amazing. Like I that did give me personally a lot of solace knowing that you can make good out of the bad situation. I mean, it sounds cheesy, but I truly believe I'm a more compassionate, compassionate, dark. Now. I think I'm more present when someone's telling me about loss and now I give less of a damn too. I'm like, I don't think I'd be doing this show if it wasn't for experiencing loss and knowing how, you know, like can just be done. And so let's live nowHeather:                              31:45                     for [inaudible]. You did the, you, you took the time to do the morning work. Right? And that, that's where sometimes people get stuck because they don't know what it is. They understand they're feeling this awfulness but they don't know how to move it. Right. And what you did learn about that and you shared, you had a social response to it, right? You share to everybody what it was like for you and you worked with your family and you started to move in that process. And it's not that it wasn't painful, but in, in some respects you were able to move, right? You moved from that physical presence of your dad to want a memory. Cause I mean, death ends a life. It doesn't end a relationship.Kwadwo:                             32:24                     Interesting.Heather:                              32:25                     And yeah, that's, that's really powerful. And because it does it, you will forever have a relationship with that person. It's integrating into that your new normal and your new identity that they're not there in your life anymore physically. But they're still really powerfully there all the time. I mean, I know with your dad and even with my mom, as I get older, I can look back at my mom and go, Oh wow. Yeah, she's just, we're all just human beings trying to do the best we can. Right. You know, and as you evolve and you go through your own life transitions, you go back to that relationship, right. And you see it differently. It evolves just like as you evolve.Kwadwo:                             33:05                     Yeah, no, it's, it's true. This is why I want to do on the show. I like, I'm a bio to care doc. I'm an ICU doc. I see death all the time. And after experiencing it at a, with my father, it was, I didn't know all this stuff. I didn't expect all this physical, spiritual, mental difficulties that were to, uh, that I experience. And so I really think it's important to share this with people, to be able to be open, to be there for their fellow man or woman and be less of a denying culture. And I really think we will go a lot further if we approach this with open arms.Heather:                              33:58                     Yeah, absolutely. And by not only the, you know, the public, but especially as healthcare workers, we need to kind of honor that. What that happens to each other and to be, do we all have to be grief counselors? No, but do we all have a responsibility and maybe, uh, to be more aware so that when we see our fellow colleagues who would go, Hey, yeah, okay, I get it. I get it. Okay. They're not just being lazy or they're just, they're just self-pitying. There's actually something going on in there. Like, even like people just sitting vigil, like when they're sitting with their loved ones dying, I will say to them, you know, I talk a lot about self care to them because even though you're just sitting there, you're running a mini marathon inside, right? Because so much is going on and processing and there.Heather:                              34:45                     So I remind them, I said, you know, you're mint, your body's physically running a mini marathon. Make sure you drink, make sure you get some rest. You gotta be good to yourself. Um, and it's the same thing when we're grieving, right? There's a lot like it's, so if I, if you had a broken leg, I wouldn't be expecting you to be running around the hospital. Just, you can't see it. You can't see when somebody's grieving. Right? So, but I, it's what dr Wolfelt says, he actually gives out pins. I love it. It says, uh, if you're in grief, you put a pin called under construction. Yeah. And it just gets your mankind to say, Hey, you know, I'm slower right now. Be patient with me. There's a lot going on in here and you can't see it. But it's there. Right.Kwadwo:                             35:26                     So you, you even brought up a point too when we were talking earlier about the house, just some cultures, like, you know, they're grieving based on attire. So it's like part of the culture toHeather:                              35:38                     be able to whether visual or, um, take time with the loved ones. But that's part of, yeah. Well that's a fascinating part is that we've, we've moved away from that, right? People used to die in the home, you know, grandma and grandpa lived with us or extended family and uh, they didn't tend to die in the hospitals. Like what 70% of people die in the hospitals now it's often removed. So it's often away from us. So, um, you know, before people would die, the was a national part of life, right? And now it's kind of removed from us. Um, and before like, like maybe what, 80, a hundred years ago, uh, if you're a widow, do, you'd be wearing black and you'd be walking around. But what's wonderful about that is you'd be walking around in your black attire and you would start to do the morning work. Cause people would stop you and say, Hey, you know who passed away?Heather:                              36:34                     Was it George, your husband? Yeah, I did. And he started talking about George, right? And then you're that shared response to loss. It starts to evolve and you get to talk about that person. And so it's a wonderful thing, right? But we've moved away from, we're not supposed to talk about it, so I'm comfortable. Um, and that's healing. It's incredibly healing. That's incredibly healing. And you know, people often have, you know, just a little tidbit, like people are afraid to say, Oh, I saw so and so when I don't want to say anything. Uh, I know they just lost their mom, but, uh, I don't want to remind them of the death. Well, I'll tell you what, they know that person's died, but when you say something to them, what you're doing is you're reminding them that person lived and that's the part that really needs to be done.Heather:                              37:21                     I remember recently actually a shout out to cam on a five and medicine. Um, yeah, as I said, my dad passed away in December. And is this a, this is part of what I'm talking about is she did this, and I don't even think she knows, maybe she does now. Um, but I was sitting at the five nursing station just charting and uh, she came over to me and I forgot that she taken care of, both of my parents were in their hospital and then she started talking to me about travel or something and then she started to say, Oh yeah, your dad's from Scotland and you told me about this. And he said this. And he, she started sharing stories and I was like, wow, that's my dad. He was like, wow, he is in the room for a moment. It's like, I got a piece of my dad.Heather:                              38:03                     And I was like, wow. She just did some amazing morning work and she didn't even realize it. That's, uh, that's the funny part is when I talked to nurses or other healthcare providers about grief and mourning, it's just sometimes as simple as like going into the room of somebody who's, you know, terminally ill and picking up the photo frame and saying to the husband, Oh, I love this photo. What's going on here? And then you see that kind of often stiff and often I've, I don't think I've ever remembered anybody not wanting to share. Right. And then they start talking about that person and um, they're, they're moving, they're, you know, they're trans and that's what we, it's so important. So vital.Kwadwo:                             38:41                     Wow. I think, I hope it serves a little bit as a inspiration to a lot of people seeing patients out there like take that time. It doesn't, it's a little like, you think I'm learning about doing, we shows and so far it's like they really is a little things like literally looking up that picture and saying, wow, look at that. Look are from a few years back.Heather:                              39:08                     Yeah. Oh yeah. Do you see the smile on their faces when you do that? Yeah. Well, it's kind of like, you know, people don't really want to know what you have to say unless they know you care. And like more like for physicians that's really important, right? Cause you're sitting down giving really bad news and you're making recommendations and if you're doing it from a, you know, intellectual kind of, this is what it is and people aren't going to respond as well. But if you sit down and say, Hey, you know, this is tough, tell me a little bit about whoever it is in the bed and then start to work from there and say, okay, well this is what's going on. And they feel like that person's in the room, that they're not just a number and just another person to take up a bed. But they're real, that they mean a lot to them. Right.Kwadwo:                             39:53                     Wow. Some good shit. Yo, I hope you all are buying in. Um, last couple of things, uh, while I have you have there. Okay. So just to give some context, Heather's got like, I don't know how many guardian angel things on our, on our, uh, [inaudible] lanyard on your land planning yard when you're, yeah, she got about seven guardian angels on her lanyard, which is like weighing her down actually. She actually walks with a limp. It's crazy. Um, so just to give you a sense of how giving and how much love she gets at the Ottawa hospital, but can you share a story where, you know, you've been appreciated because we, you know, we appreciate you all every day, but like,Heather:                              40:47                     yeah. Um, yeah, I'm so bad at names, but I never forget a story. Like I almost remember stories when people tell me them, well, I guess recent, like I always, if somebody passed at the hospital, I always make a point of giving them a followup call because it's not part of my protocol, but I think it's essential because all of a sudden you've got all this support at the hospital, people are coming in and talking to you, and then your loved one dies and then boom, you totally disconnected. Right. And they may have questions and worries. So I always generally give them a call after. So,Heather:                              41:24                     and I love to hear about how they're doing. But I think recently I had a family. Um, if father husband was dying, two older sons and a lovely family, just, just beautiful the salt of the earth. And you can see how much they loved this man and you could see it walking in the room. And that, that journey I talked about where it was like, Oh my God, what's going on? Can't we do this? Can't we do that? You know, that like that helpless. I think one of my favorite quotes in grief is, uh, by C S Lewis, he wrote Narnia. I used to have it in my grief office. Um, no one ever told me that grief felt so much like fear. Wow. Cause it is, it's, it's absolute like, it's, uh, an insult to your identity. It's an insult to your safety and security. And it's an insult.Heather:                              42:13                     Well, men, since [inaudible] insults a strong word but affects your sense of meaning, right? So much unknown. People are terrified and you see that and there's no where in this world where you feel more helpless when you're not able to stop what's happening and you're watching this deterioration. So I S I witnessed this family, um, in that state and then as we evolved and we talked and we shared and they have some education and understanding of our own what's happening, that really cool family just kind of sat in this tight two bedroom in the hospital. But I would open up the curtain and I would just go, wow, this is so much sacredness right here. Wow. You guys haven't nailed. Like even though it was in a tight, awful kind of setting, they made it beautiful, you know, just that honor. And you could hear the stories and the children were coming and um, we actually, I got the kids to do a hug blanket, which is something I love doing with the kids.Heather:                              43:11                     So, you know, if the kids can't be there all the time or they need to feel part of it, you know, you're old enough to love your old enough degree. Right. That's very important. So I've got the kids do a hug blanket where they kind of draw their arms on it and write all over the blanket and then they put it over the grandfather. So they had done that. And so you walk in there and you'd see this beautiful blanket and all the kids riding on it and everybody just loving this man, you know? So when I called afterwards and I spoke to the family, uh, they had sat Shivah and they had brought out the hug blanket. So when people would come over and, you know, people come over and pay their respects and all that, they would bring out the blanket and they'd share about it.Heather:                              43:50                     I was so touched. I was like, wow, that's beautiful. Like that was really, uh, that just, yeah, that was really beautiful. Wow. Eh, before ending, I know there was another, speaking of about some pretty cool initiatives at a conference you went to recently. Yeah. The normal, if you want to mention that. Yeah. Well, grief and mourning in general is really misunderstood and it's, um, in a lot of myths and misconceptions about it. And oftentimes when you just really trying to sit and tell people about it, they really feel more understanding about what's happening. Um, and it's been kind of one of my, um, ones I want to bring more forward to the healthcare community cause we're supposed to be at, man, we're supposed to be the mentors. We're supposed to know what this is all about. This is what we deal with every day. But yet there is a loss in that.Heather:                              44:45                     There's, there's not a lot of understanding around it for, um, you know, especially for each other. Right. And we really need to bring that forward, um, to support each other as we go through these really difficult times. Right. Um, and not to feel that what's wrong with us and I'm going to lose my job and you know, we need to be supported and no matter where we are, what other, what agency or what company we work for, we all need to feel that way. Um, but when I went to recently the Canadian hospice palliative care, or did I have to say that Canadian hospice palliative care association, they had a conference recently here in Ottawa and, uh, because it's been one of my babies about, and, and I think it's partly because people like you and other doctors and nurses and managers have come to me because they are like, what is going on with me?Heather:                              45:31                     I don't understand this. Like, wow, like something I just assume everybody knows go. No, it's really not understood. And then we start to beat ourselves up. You know, what's wrong with me that I'm not moving on. And, um, so I wanted to bring this more to our workplace. Right. How can we help other, each other cause, and so part of this conference there was, I went to one of the workshops and I was really excited. Uh, it was a lady, uh, just spoke to her, Karen Brownrigg. Actually, I did ask her if it's okay to say her name on this. She said, yeah. So under the Canadian hospice palliative care association, they have something called Canadian compassionate companies. So they recognize that this grief and taking, you know, the stress of caring for somebody who's terminally ill, it's a chronic condition. So the policies and procedures that are in most institutions in places of work are behind the times because they're not aligned with how things are now in society.Heather:                              46:28                     Um, you know, modern technology, advancement of science. I mean, you see it all the time, how we people are living longer and often living longer though with chronic illnesses and often debilitating States, right? So not only are you, uh, trying to, uh, attend to your family member, your loved one, um, but this can be an ongoing issue, right? And our policies aren't in place to help support that. Um, and if you show you support your employers during those times, you're gonna have more retention of them. Uh, you're going to have, um, attract more people with, uh, good qualifications to want to be working there. When you maintain that good, healthy work life balance, people are happier. And when you happier employee employees, you're gonna have better care. Right? So it's, it's actually so the Canadian compassionate companies, I'm just learning about it, but um, they can actually come to the HR and start to educate and bring in policies to workers who are going through this. So when you have, when you have a policies and procedures around it, the culture starts to change, right? Because then it's normalized and validated that, yeah, this is hard. You know, I care about your psychological safety cause if you're safe, everybody else here is safe. Right. And that's important not just for our colleagues but for our patients and families. Right. So I was really excited about it and like that. Yeah.Kwadwo:                             47:52                     I think it's definitely worth mentioning because it's, I want to say innovative. It's, it's, I wouldn't say this is common practice in areas amongst companies and amongst healthcare providers. So anything that's going to help people get through these tough times and provide better, ultimately provide better care we should embrace.Heather:                              48:14                     Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. So yes.Kwadwo:                             48:21                     Been a dream. I really, I can't express the work that you do and how meaningful it is that we see it day to day. I'm going to speak for, you know, like my ICU colleagues, my palliative care colleagues, my medicine colleagues, the work that you guys do, it's underappreciated, undervalued, and it goes in. It's one of the most important things we provide. And I just want to say that you do amazing work and whatever we could do to get the word out to how important these things are, including grieving, we need to do it. And I hope this is just a hopeless, I hope this helps.Heather:                              49:08                     I hope so. I hope it moves things forward. Yeah, that would be great. And I'm there to help it out as much as I can and vice versa. It's been so great working with you, Kwadwo over the years. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Thanks so much. . 

Today's episode I'm going to be talking about how bad do you want it. So I speak with a lot of folks, whether it's about um, finishing their dissertation or it's about they want to start a business cause then I'm starting my own business or any number of goals. Um, and, you know, it comes to a point where they say like, you know, I've been doing this, this, this, this and this and I've been putting all this work and time into it and I'm not seeing any results. And so, they may start or you may start to question yourself and say, is this even worth it? Maybe it's not for me. And ultimately what it comes down to is you answering a question. Do you want it bad enough? There are so many people. Um, I've watched their careers in different arenas and it took them so long to get started. Like one of them or like just get the recognition that they deserve, I guess. Um, one of my like favorites is Jennifer Lopez, right? Alright, Let's see. First you see her on like In Living Color as Fly Girl. And I would say like her big break came as um, as Selena when she was, she was cast in place in Selena in the, um, in the movie. And she sung the songs or I don't, I don't know if they will let her sing. I can't remember. Anyway, but she did and that movie was huge. Right. And then from there she continued, she was in Anaconda. I feel like these movies were right around the same time and I think as Money Train. And then she just started going in her acting career and then she started to record music. And while folks were like, okay, we see you as an actress, we don't necessarily see you as a singer. Like it's cute that you're doing these like little pop songs and you know, like can listen to it and the car. Love Don't Cost a Thing. Um, I'm blanking on other songs right now, but to get what I'm saying. And people like Jamie Fox and other people kept like making fun of her and saying she can't sing. Right. But she was still, I mean, she was still getting recognition for acting. She was getting recognition for her fashion. Um, we all remember the infamous Versace green dress. Um, but yeah, she was getting recognition in that way, but you would see in like interviews and stuff that she was like, you know, it really hurts my feelings that people would talk about me and I can't sing and I've been singing since blah, blah, blah. And she's been making all of this traction doing all these different things. But I still feel like folks didn't see her as his like huge superstar that she actually was right. Because while she wasn't getting like all of the , I mean, even Mariah I carry right throwing shade of, I don't know her, um, like all these folks, but like her career has lasted for 20 plus years and not only lasted, we're not talking about like she's barely hanging in there. Susan has been making money, money. I mean movie after movie roles have gotten more, um, complex. Even she, I mean she still does a little romantic comedies and stuff, but she also does more like, like for real acting roles. I mean she stays in a movie. Um, and she stayed recording and can sell. I mean she just wrapped up her us leg of her tour for her 50th birthday. I mean she's 50, she looks 20, um, right and sold out all over. Alright. Whatever she does is successful. And um, I think about her often cause I feel like you just may seem like a tangent now, but I think about Jennifer Lopez often when I get stuck in my own head and I'm like, oh, this isn't happening fast enough, it doesn't matter all this work that I'm doing, it is not making a difference. And I just think about like she's been out here grinding for years and years and` years and success is not going to always look like the way we think it's supposed to look like. Right. And you have to ask yourself, are you, are you, do you want things to look a certain way because, because you want other people to think something. You want other people's admiration. Are you doing it for your ego? Right? Um, people been talking about like vanity metrics. Are you doing it for the likes of the followers? Right? Are you doing it for those things or are you doing it because it's just something like as a goal you actually want to achieve. You want the result that you're after and it comes to a place of which one do you want most more? Um, being honest with yourself about that. And then, two, really accepting what it looks like to really have the thing that you're working towards. Like really looking at other people who are doing the things that you want to do, who have accomplished the thing that you are going after. Like what did that look like when they accomplished it? Now? What their life looks like now, but what did it look like when they finished? So, um, for most of you listening, we are talking about finishing your dissertation and I want you to even think about your chair or someone you admire in the field, right? You may see them on Twitter or you may have a conversation with them or you may see them at conferences or what that and it just looks so, I mean, it looks like they livin' their life, right? They get it. And every time you look up they're getting this award or not award and, or they're announcing this or they're publishing this and that and they have this book coming out. It may look like that now, but I mean, scroll back on your timeline, scroll, scroll, Scroll to the time that they defended and if that, if they were still posting when they were as a doctoral student, if there's anything that you can find, or even if you can talk with them about when they finished their dissertation, when they graduated, ask them who that person was. What did that person look like? What thoughts or feelings of frustration did that person have? Right? How much were they publishing then? How do they feel about their abilities? Then what are people saying about them then? Because you keep trying to compare yourself to someone who is two, three, 10 20 years ahead of you. You're comparing yourself now to that person who they've worked up to be instead of preparing yourself to who they were at the same moment that you are. And I can sit here and say, no, you shouldn't compare yourself to any one else. And, that's what we do as humans. And so if we're going to do that, I just wanted you to get the message of don't do it to who they are now or who they pretend or present to be on social media. Look at who they were at the same level that you are. Okay. Um, so that was complete. I just didn't want it to share that cause I, that wasn't even in my notes without j lo, but I do every time I look at her career, I've been watching her youtube channel and I'm just like, that's so amazing. And to finally get to a place where you don't even care that folks can't see it. When you have outlasted them, you have outwork them, you have have outperformed them, you make way more money and it's not about that. I just, I think that's very interesting though. Like most of the people who talked about her are not even, they're not even, no one even knows what they are anymore. But for my own story, um, I have two. One is when, um, which is episode 19, which, so I won't go into much detail about it in this episode, but I definitely say check out episode 19 where I talked about my first semester and failing my first semester and going to talk with one of the professors there and how he, I felt like at the time completely just, I dunno, crushed my whole world, pretty much told me, you don't need to belong there and he didn't understand. Um, and how I was ready to quit. How I was ready to go, like find another job and think like this, this phd program was not for me. I'd definitely want you to listen to that episode to hear what I've learned from this situation and how I had to, I asked myself, do I want it bad enough and how I had to get over myself and continue to go after completing the goal of getting my phd. The second situation that I think a lot about is, um, when I was getting into even like realizing that I could have my own business, right. This was years and years ago of I saw this other woman online and she had, she was doing so many things and she was documenting her process of like quitting her job and traveling the country and what would it be like to live out of a suitcase? Right? She wasn't even thinking about starting a business, but then that morphed into a business because other women started to ask her like, how did you do it? Um, and at one point she had offered free videos. Like, I mean, not videos free calls she said that she was gonna give 10 free calls to women. Um, and that she wanted to talk to them. That it would be completely free and just to help and not to sell them anything, which sounded it was a lie, but that's not the point. Anyway. So I, I, I signed up cause I was like, I'm going to do it. I'm going to be brave. I'm going to take a step and I'm going to sign up for this call. No, I don't know what I'm supposed to talk about. But I mean, she's been talking about helping other women. So of course she would have all the answers right. And I'm just going to take this step of calling her. And so we got on a call and she was like, well, what can I help you with? And I dunno, I was stuck. I was like, I don't know. I don't know. I don't even know what I'm supposed to ask. I don't even know what it means to start your own business. I just see other people doing it and I just want that. Um, and she was like, well, I'm looking at your website and you know, you don't post you, you're not, there's no, this maybe you posted. Um, like three things at the time I was doing youtube videos about random things. I can't even remember. I can't tell you. Um, and she was just like, I don't even, there's nothing I can even do to help you. You're not, I dunno, I just remember leaving the phone call feeling dejected. Is that a word? Feeling like how dare she I've been working really hard. She doesn't know how much it took me to even get on a phone call with her. She doesn't even understand how much it took me and how scared and how much thought it had to even make those youtube videos. She didn't even give me any um, props or like Kudos for even showing up. She just, I just was pissed and I remember thinking like, I'm going to prove her wrong. She told me I wasn't going to be successful. I can even tell you she actually said that or not. But this was so long ago that I don't remember. But I just remember having this attitude of like, I'm going to prove her wrong because she doesn't know what she's talking about. I'm going to get it together. And I was all motivated and I wrote out all of these plans about how that's going to have this awesome business and how, you know, wisdom would be like, how, how can you know what to do now but you didn't know what to do before the phone call? But you know, motivation is a whole different thing when you like when you're determined as a whole different thing. But I was, and I wrote all this thing, these things out and I did some stuff. And a whole year went by and I was still in the same place that I was when I first scheduled that call and it came back around that she was offering the calls again and I had to sit down and be real myself. How bad do you want this business? You say you want so bad and maybe you can relate to that. Maybe you're sitting there with your dissertation, maybe you started your own business and , you're just like, I'm in a place, I'm stuck. I don't even know. I'm overwhelmed. I, I, I don't know what to do. And you, you're thinking that you should quit or give up or you know, throw in the towel. And that's what I want to talk about today of like what happens when you're at this point and how to get out of this point, especially when you're, you know, especially like thinking about dissertations and stuff like that. Cause you've come too far to only come this far. I know you've seen that across the internet and I don't even know who originally said that. You know, Internet quotes goes, it's hard to find the original source, but either way. Um, so the first thing I would say in terms of what you have to become aware of, because in order to solve a problem, you have to know what the problem or problems are. And so I want to talk about that. So the first thing is becoming aware of your ego and checking your ego. Um, I use this quote, I say this quote a lot from Eric Thomas to hip hop preacher himself is that you owe you an explanation. I'll say that again. You owe you an explanation. So like me going back. So that story about the business coach or even about that professor, I kept saying like, they didn't do this. They sent me up. I'm like, you know, they didn't do this. It wasn't supportive. They should have did x, y, z. Instead I should have been like, what did I not do? How did I not show up? What did I not say? I had to answer to myself. Because you can't control other people. You can only control yourself. And so you have to look at you and say, what did you not do that caused this result that you're at right now? So you're feeling stuck and overwhelmed. What did you not do? And not in a "woe is me" or a shame spiral. It's more about being real with yourself and being honest and saying, man, I could have showed up. I didn't show up in right. Like I said, I was going into, um, those times that I schedule it. Um, I didn't post on Instagram. Like I said I was going to do for my business. I didn't read those articles that I got, um, from so-and. So I blew off my accountability partner and I didn't write, I didn't show up to my coaching call that I signed up. Like what did you not do? Like being a really real about that. Right? And checking your ego. Um, the second thing that like that would help you become more aware of your problem is really thinking about what results have you been producing. I honestly believe like you probably like you've put, been putting in time and you've been putting in energy and you've been doing all of the things in your life. But my results are not showing up, I believe because I did it like you know my story, I talked about it in last week's episode about how I was spending all of these hours and hours. Like I did that for my dissertation and I did that for my business. And both of those things came to a point where I had to be like, okay, we cannot keep putting in all of these hours without having anything to show for it. So let's be really clear about what was results are we trying to produce. Right? So it's not just a matter of I'm going to show up to this writing group and I'm just gonna write, I'm gonna work on my dissertation. But like exactly what is it that you're going to work on? Like are you going to work on your - Like you're going to have a completed problem statement or you're going to have a completed outline for chapter two. Are you going to write an edit your chapter, the re like are you going to really think about which methodology is going to be best? Like how by the end of that time that you're working, what will you tangibly have by the end of that time? That's how you need to be focusing your to do lists and how you need to be thinking about structuring your time. Because it's not enough to sit there and say I'm working on it cause you'll be doing all of these things. Oh let me write this. Oh let me read this. Oh let me go check this email. Oh let me go check this post. That's you spinning your wheels without actually doing anything. So switching your mindset from a to do list who are results lists, like what will you half do, you know, etc. And then the third challenge, which is probably part of the problem, is doing it alone. We as humans are not meant to be alone, but you probably think it's better if you do things alone. You probably think like, nobody's here to help me anyway. Right? Going back to my stories, like no one's gonna help me. Um, or you don't have something that you believe in that's bigger than yourself. You have to believe in something bigger because that's going to come to a point where you get really clear on what you want to do, what you need to do, and you start getting some results. But then you start looking at who you are right now or where you are right now in way where you're trying to go or who you're trying to become. And you're going to be like, man, I don't, I don't know if this is going to work. I don't know. And then you're going to have to believe in something that says, I don't think I can do it, but with the faith of whatever, whomever, I'm going to get there. You have to believe. And that's something, something for Scott, whatever is helping you to get to that point. So being aware of your ego, getting results, focused and finding something bigger and giving yourself something to believe in is really going to help you understand really where you are, the problems you're having and the challenges. But I want to take it, um, a step further and really talk about like what it means to, um, figure out if you want to bet enough and how to get there. So, you know, um, if you've been around any length of time I have the get it done framework is three steps, three areas where you focus on that I use with my clients that I use on myself, not just with writing dissertation but like all areas of life. Um, that I say I asked myself whenever I'm out of alignment or, um, uh, I'm stuck on something. What are these, what is three areas looking like and am I, is there something I'm not paying attention to? So the first one being mindset. Remember I talked about your ego and like getting really putting that in check you you ha like yes, that's important. The first step is getting real about what did you not do? What is the explanation you owe yourself? But then the tangible thing that I do every day is I need a mechanism to become aware of my thoughts because I believe that your thoughts control your, your emotions control your actions, what you actually, what you do every day. And those behaviors and actions that you take everyday create the results in your life. So before when I said how do you get results focused, when you figure out this is where I want to go, then you have to come back, takes a few steps back and be like, who do I have to be in a, who do I, how do I have to think in order to get those results in my life? Where does my mindset have to be? So every day to get there because just can seem like, well that's a big thing you said tangible. So everyday what I do is I do a brain dump. I just write for like five minutes. I just write down all the thoughts that are coming to my mind, comes to my mind. And I used to then call the model, which was by Brooke Castillo from the life coach school. If you're a client, you should be using your daily pages to help you through this process. But I pick a thought and I look at that thought and I said, when I see this thought or I say this thought to myself, how does that make me feel? And this feeling when I feel this way, what do I do as a result of feeling this way? Then those are my actions. And so the actions that I take, what is that given me in my life? So, um, an example would be say, I think I can't do this. That's my thought. I can't do this. My emotion that I would feel from saying I can't do this. It's defeated. I feel defeated because I can't do this. And because I felt defeated, I may then do my actions would be like, well, um, I may, uh, not show up to my writing group. I may not read anything because I can't do this. I feel defeated. Right? I may not show up to the writing group and then because I didn't show it to my writing group means I didn't do, I didn't make any progress on my dissertation. That's the result I have. So lack of progress can relay all the way back up to the thought of, I can't do this. So I, that's, that's really quick and dirty. We could talk more about that. Um, we talk more about that. Um, when I'm with clients and whatnot, we talk a lot about mindset. When you work with me, that is mainly what we're working on is mindset because you can only go as far as your mindset will allow you to, and that may seem like a lot in life. I don't need to do that. Just tell me what I need to do. I could tell you exactly what you need to do, but you want to do it. You know exactly what to do right now, but you're not doing it. And the reason why you're not doing it is because of your mind. You're not managing your mind well enough. I have given people exact detailed outlines for their dissertations. I had told them like exactly what to do when they sit down. I have walked them through step by step, sitting in a chair, open your laptop, pull out a document, put this sentence there, do this. Like I've given them that and they still can't do it. Why? Because of their mindset. And if you don't have, if you're not having something, a way to work through that, all the doubts and stuff that come in, you won't get to your goals. You won't. So I'll get off of that. So that's the first thing is mindset. The second part of the get it done framework is systems. So what are your systems? Any a clear plan. So what are you trying to do? I didn't trying to finish my dissertation proposal. When are you trying to finish it by? I don't know. November 30th great. What's going to be your schedule to get you there? When are you going to write or, or, um, do dissertation things? Do you have a clear schedule? I always suggest that my clients have 10 to 15 hours a week. No more than a four hours in one day that you're working and that you do something, you break up things in small chunks because you do not need to be working. If you're doing something more than 10 to 15 hours a week, you are wasting your time. You're most likely procrastinating. You're most likely doing everything else, but what you're supposed to do, you're not focused. Yes. Yeah. You're not doing things for yourself to fill yourself back up. And I'm, I'm willing to bet that some you feel awful. You look awful now like in the weight per se, that you just look probably look real tired cause you feel tired and so get on a really clear schedule that you actually are here too. And then have a clear routine, a routine that when you sit down to work on your dissertation or Your Business or whatever, that you know you do the same steps. Like when I sit down to work on like this podcast for instance, I know I need my laptop out and my laptop, I put my microphone into my laptop, I have a piece of paper, I write out, this is what the script is going to be in the script has a formula like up a story. I'll tell you where you may get stuck in and I'll tell you what to do and then I have something I want you to do as a result of the episode and I change it up a little bit, but I know that those are steps that I can follow to getting going. What are the steps that you follow no matter what? When you're sitting down to write or you're sitting down to do whatever your goal is? Yeah. Do you open up your laptop? Open up a document? Because what I tell my clients is open tab, open up a new document, set the timer on the phone for 10 minutes, brain dump everything that you have, no matter if it's related to the dissertation or not. Take a five minute break and then reread what you have and start to edit it into something. Because my thought is that once you start to brain dump, you're already in the mindset of like you're supposed to working on a dissertation. Your thoughts will naturally go towards your dissertation, but for whatever reason, if it doesn't, then that's not gonna happen for that day. And you can put that down and come back so it later. Or are you gonna just wait until your next writing schedule. But I mean writing date, but that's why it's important to always be on a schedule because your brain knows and has built in time for you to make progress. Even if one of those days or whatever, you're not feeling it or it's not happening. Maybe you have life going on. So systems. So we talked about mindset and systems and then the last part of the get it done framework is community. Again, we're not meant to be alone. So having a way to have some weekly support and accountability is helpful. So if you have a writing group, is it really being honest with yourself? One, is it really supportive and help them keep you accountable or is it more like social hour or does it make you not feel comfortable in some way? Um, and there's another r, are there some things that you can do? So are there some parameters that you can set? Um, do you all need to be more persistent? Do you need to like hold off talking or put a timer limit on talking? Is there a way that you can build in to share wins with them? They'll be like, yes, I got approved to collect data or yes, I found the right methodology. Like who are your group of people? Yeah. And it's important to be around people who challenge you and is also important for you not to be the smartest one in your circle. Because if you are, if you're the smartest or the most dedicated or the most consistent one, you're in the wrong circle and you need a new circle, you need a new writing group. Um, because again, you can only go as far as your mindset and your mindset is highly influenced by those you spend the most time with. So whenever it comes to your dissertation and you're with the same writing group, but they're not really to as serious or dedicated about it, didn't you that we'll feed or rub off on you. So how can you find a group that's going to challenge you and support you? A hold you accountable and you feel like my bad, I don't, I don't know. That's I what I have and I'll have access. I got to take what I have and I want to offer you an opportunity to join right away. It's my weekly writing accountability group. Folks. Uh, most folks are working on some form of their dissertation, but other people are using it just so they know that they have dedicated time to do dishes. Uh, planning for the week, meal prep for the week. We, um, we meet twice a week, but I just encourage people to come at least once a week. So we meet on Sundays from four to 7:00 PM eastern standard time and we meet Wednesdays 7:00 PM to 10:00 PM eastern standard time. Um, it's encouraged that you're there the whole time, but if not, because life happens and that starts to get late. We understand people leave early or come in and out. Um, but it's that time is there for you. We start off each call with something about mindset or a some productivity tip or just sharing like what's going on in that week. We spent a good 15, 20 minutes just catching up with one another, encouraging one another, and then we spend the rest of the rest of the time just talking. I mean, excuse me y'all. Yes. So this live, most of the time after that 15 or 20 minutes I'm working, everyone keeps their camera on so you can see other people working because there's something about the brain and being able to see people, uh, working away or typing that tells you like, oh, I need to get back on it. And then if someone sees you doing something else, probably send you like a private message. Like, hey girl up, you do it. I'll probably, I'm most likely I'm doing it like, Hey, what you doing? You look like you're like watching TV. What's happening? You need to talk, you need to check in. Cause you know, sometimes people are going through a lot and they just need somebody to talk to. And then we, I like sometimes we'll have conversation if I have time because I'm also doing work and things. And so, um, catch up with people to help them through that and be supportive. And usually I find like a good 15-30 minutes of talking, people can then get start working and you would be surprised what you can get done in an hour or two hours or three hours. Like people are writing whole dissertations up in here. And so we, the Check-in Sundays and Wednesdays are usually the days where we're like, oh shit, we need to get something done. Sunday is like the beginning of the week where you're like, okay, I'm going to have this plan, I'm going to get done. And then Wednesday night comes and you're like, oh, I haven't done anything. I should. I have assignments. And so those have, we have found, I mean we've been doing this almost a year now and found that those two days work really well, especially while we're in the middle of the semester. So if this sounds like something that you would love to join, you want to be a part of, just the link will be in the show notes or you can come on over to Instagram and DM me at @MarvetteLacy, or you'd go to the website, Marvette lacy.com. Links will be there for you to sign up. We would love to have you. Um, and that's gonna do it for this episode. I didn't intend for it to be this long. The latest ones have been long. You're welcome. But that is how I'm going to wrap up. Um, and so next week, do something to show yourself some love and I will talk to you then. Bye for now.

Work in IT for just a bit, and you’ll know that there are some days when everything just clicks, but sometimes (maybe a lot?) it doesn't. Similarly, there are days when we show up to the synagogue, church, or dojo and we are focused; versus days when every moment seems like a slog through the mud. But... maybe we're expecting too much. Is it reasonable to expect most days to be unicorns and sunshine and hot java? What does our religious/moral/ethical POV teach us about how we set our expectations for a "normal" day in IT?In this episode Leon, Josh, Doug, and new voice Steven Hunt discuss these ideas and explore whether there are there lessons we can take from one area of our life to the other about how to get through (and move past) a bad day - whether it's in the office, in the gym, or in the pews. Listen or read the transcript below.   Leon: 00:00 Welcome to our podcast where we talk about the interesting, frustrating and inspiring experiences we have as people with strongly held religious views working in corporate it. We're not here to preach or teach you our religion. We're here to explore ways we make our career as it professionals mesh or at least not conflict with our religious life. This is technically religiousJosh: 00:21 Work in IT for just a bit and you'll know that there are some days when everything just clicks, but sometimes all right, maybe a lot it doesn't. Similarly, there are days when we show up to the synagogue, church, or Dojo and we are focused versus days when every moment seems like a slog through the mud, but maybe we're expecting too much. Is it reasonable to expect most days to be unicorns and sunshine and hot java? What does our religious moral, ethical point of view teach us about how we set our expectations for a "normal" day in IT? Are there lessons we can take from one area of our life to the other about how to get through and move past a bad day, whether it's in the office, in the gym, or in the pews. I'm Josh Biggley. And the other voices you're going to hear in this episode are my podcasting partner in crime, Leon Adato.Leon: 01:11 Hello everyone.Josh: 01:12 Another regular voice on this show. Doug Johnson.Doug: 01:15 Hello.Josh: 01:16 And our newest guest to technically religious Steven Hunt.Steven: 01:19 Hey, how's it going?Josh: 01:20 All right everyone. So this is the point in the show where we're going to do some some shameless self promotion. Um, so again, I'm Josh Biggley. I'm a Senior Engineer for Enterprise Monitoring. You can find me on Twitter at @jbiggley and uh, ya know, faithtransitions.ca is a website that I recently started with my wife for Canadians, uh, who are going through some form of faith transition. Doug, anything you want to, uh, to, uh, talk to us about?Doug: 01:47 Uh, I'm Doug Johnson. I'm CTO for wave RFID. We do inventory management using radio waves in the, uh, optical shop. Uh, I've recently dropped off of just about all social media. So the only thing I've got right now is a cooking website called .cooklose.com. So if you'd like recipes head on over.Josh: 02:05 Right. Nice. Steven.Steven: 02:07 I'm Steven Hunt, I'm Senior Director of Product Management at Data Corp software. Uh, you can find me on Twitter at, @SteveWHunt. Uh, and when I actually have the site up and uh, I haven't let it lapse in payment, you can read my blog on RamblingsOfATechJunkie.com.Leon: 02:24 So it sounds like it's my turn. Uh, I'm Leon Adato. I'm one of the Head Geeks at SolarWinds. You can find me on the Twitters @LeonAdato and uh, you can also find my blog adatosystems.com. And for those people who scribbling madly either Ramblings of a Tech Junkie or Cook Loose or any of those, we're going to have that in the show notes. So don't, scribble no more. Just listen and enjoy.Josh: 02:46 I mean, fine. Yeah. Find your zen this, this is going to be a good episode because some of us have bad days at the office, right?Leon: 02:55 All of us, all of us have bad days at the office. [Laughing].Doug: 02:57 Regularly!Leon: 03:00 Right? Um, actually, OK. So, so I actually think we should start a little bit elsewhere, not in the office, not in the tech office at least. Um, but I want to start in with our religious, moral or ethical, uh, or basically non technical point of view because I think that's where we recognize that things are hard and we are either more or differently prone to address them. Um, what I mean by that is that I think many of us recognize that sometimes worship or prayer can be hard. Um, first of all, there's the mechanics of it. Um, I know I still, uh, having gone from being not particularly religious Jewishly to being orthodox still eight or nine years later, struggle with just the mechanics of reading Hebrew and knowing what part of the service we're in and knowing what's supposed to happen. It, it is still a thing for me. Um, and that's hard then. But then there's also moments when just the thing I'm confronting or, or praying about or working on myself about is hard too. Um, I don't know. What do you, what are do you folks think?Josh: 04:12 I think that's, I, you know, that last part, right? And it does, this is one of those moments where it doesn't really matter if, if you're talking about your religious or your moral or your ethical pursuits when you have to step back and, and try to do some, some self-examination, some introspection that is really difficult to do. Uh, I just went through some training, uh, for leadership, uh, at my company and it was all about really taking a look at yourself and deconstructing the things that you think you do well. Um, and then this, this wonderful and gut wrenching experience of asking your peers, including, uh, your, your reports, your managers, the engineers who work with you to give you anonymous feedback. I guess I could have really couched that, uh, you know, that list of people by asking people that I knew were going to give me positive feedback. But I mean, isn't the reason that we engage in those, those exercises is we want the, the harsh critiques. We want to know, uh, even where our enemies know where we're at. I don't know that, that's not something that I'm, I'm sure that people really embrace. Right. How is it normal to want to, uh, to, you know, to have that feedback from others? I mean, is that why we go to deity because we expect, uh, him, her, it to, to give us the, the harsh reality when we're not getting it from others?Doug: 05:45 I think so the hard thing for me is really knowing whether you're doing it right or not. I mean, Leon was saying, you know, there's, there's a way you do things in the Orthodox world. Well in the Chris, uh, Evangelical Christian world, there is not necessarily the right way to do it, although, Gosh, yeah, there are enough books on prayer say, to go ahead and, uh, keep you reading for the rest of your life and you'll never pray again.Leon: 06:12 [Laughing]Doug: 06:12 The problem is, you know, how do you, you need to learn how to do it in a way that makes some sense. I mean, I, I keep coming back to God knows everything. Why does he need me to pray to him to know? And I understand that it's, you know, it's for me, not for him, but still, how do you do it in a way that gets me into the, uh, you know, the right way to do that. So you know, the how to can get in the way of the actual process itself.Leon: 06:44 Yeah. I think there's, there's many moments when you were like, what the hell am I supposed to be doing here? You know, and not just, not just do I stand up or sit down kind of what the hell do I do, but also like, okay, where, where are we going with this? You know, when my, when, when a track coach says, run that way as fast as you can and jump over those hurdles, then it's pretty straight forward. But it's a little bit less clear.Steven: 07:08 No, I was gonna say that, that's one of the things that, that, that I struggled with growing up a Southern Baptist when you were mentioning the, the aspect of what, what am I doing here? How I don't, I, it just doesn't feel right. This doesn't, you know, fit. That was, that was something I constantly dealt with. Right. And then coming, coming to a conclusion that, that I just, I don't have an identification with any deity. I don't, you know, it's not something that fits me. And, and I guess if you will, casting that aside, um, you know, it, it, it changed a little bit of the way that I think, the way that I look at it, I, I stopped trying to fit into a mold that wasn't me and started to be more myself. Right. And that's something that, that it was, it's, it's a, it's a struggle. It was a daily struggle. It was a very difficult concept to deal with. And that's where bad days were more consistent at that point in time for me.Leon: 08:02 And I think there's a, there's, to put it in a, again, a workout context, like some, for some people spin classes never gonna work like this, just not gonna, but for those same people rowing or curling or.Josh: 08:16 Jazz-ercise!Doug: 08:16 Laying on the couch!Leon: 08:16 Or [laughing]Steven: 08:18 Well, that, that's, I, I do Crossfit and Crossfit. It's not for everyone. Right. And a lot of people make fun of crossfit constantly, but, but for me, it fits, it, it, it, it gives me the workout that I'm looking for. It gives me the, uh, the, the, the health benefits that, that ultimately I'm looking for and I just enjoy doing it. But if I were out there trying to be a runner and I am not a runner, it would be a terrible thing. It'd be, it'd be horrible. I would, I, first of all, I don't know the first thing about running effectively. I look bad. I, my, my times are terrible. And so you, you gravitate to what feels natural to what, what works for you.Leon: 08:56 Okay. All right. And I think the interesting thing is that when you're talking about, you know, a health regime, a health regimen, um, that's one thing, you know, you can, you can sort of find your space. But I think when you're talking about, you know, religious, ethical, moral, the variety of choices you have is limited. If you feel drawn to, um, whether you feel drawn to a god concept or a philosophical concept, your choices are limited. And so if you doesn't feel right, you know, that's again, that's the bad day at the office. What, what is that like, how does that work in that religious ethical context?Steven: 09:33 It mostly takes you were you working through you, you, you have to come to terms with who you are, what you feel, what you think, um, and, and that helps you ultimately, uh, reconcile with whatever that is that, that, that's bringing you down at any given time.Leon: 09:51 Okay. So, so other bad days, uh, in the non tech office w uh, what are some other experiences you guys have had?Doug: 09:57 We were just talking about, you know, finding, finding your, uh, your, uh, regimen, your what religion you're going to be, but you know, once you found the one that works for you, everything's all perfect from then on, right?ALL: 10:12 Exactly.Doug: 10:14 Those are the bad days that man, I mean like all of the, so I've picked the one. All right. I'm an evangelical Christian. I, you know, I've, I've, I've, I take, took the pill, I bought the, drank the Koolaid, whatever, you know, but not to the point where I..Leon: 10:30 ...have had the frontal lobotomy.New Speaker: 10:33 Exactly. I, it's just, you know, I, I still think I still have my freaking Philosophy major that just makes me question everything. And there are just some days where it doesn't go well. Um, I mean I, I actually haven't been going to church lately cause I've had some health issues. I've had this vertigo thing last time I went to church, this is, you know, I'd been stable for awhile and I got there and I drove to church and I got there and the church was getting set to start and all of a sudden the room started spinning. What do you do? So I went over to the prayer corner, which is outside there and put my head down and close my eyes and I look like I was praying through the whole service for the service and everybody thought I was hyper-spiritual but I just, you know, the room was moving.Leon: 11:22 [Laughing]New Speaker: 11:22 So it's, you know, after, after 25 minutes the drugs kicked in and I was able to go home and that was my last big service because I had a bad day at the service, not because of the service, but just my body chose that it didn't want to do that that day.Leon: 11:39 I think one of the big things there was that you didn't let it throw you. Like, I think some people would say it's a sign, you know, or something like that. You didn't let it know, no, this is just my body being my body.Doug: 11:49 It's all right. Oops. And like I said, there's some people who, who saw me that day, but I think I'm really, really spiritual now.Josh: 11:54 Interestingly, the one of the hardest days that I had in my religious observance. Uh, and for those who have not, um, have not listened to any of the previous episodes first, shame on you. Go back and listen to all of our backlog. Yeah. I grew up Mormon and I, I was, uh, I would say I was an Orthodox Mormon, sometimes ultra Orthodox for 41 ish years. And I was reminded of the moment that I realized that Mormonism didn't work for me anymore. Uh, I was on Facebook today and I saw a woman in one of the support groups that I, that I'm in who posted having read some things and she's like, "I have realized that my entire world is a lie". I can still remember the exact moment. I can remember where on the plane I was sitting. I can remember where I was looking at and like looking out the window, I remember kind of like, you know, the lighting, like everything in that moment when I realized that walking away from Mormonism was the thing I had to do, that there was no going back. That was a hard day. And that's one of those pivotal moments and I think we all have them. At some points in our lives. And Steven, I loved hearing that, that you had a moment where you went, "I don't think I belong here anymore and I have to walk away". We all have those moments where we either choose that we're going to stay and we in, we entrench ourselves because it's what we want or we have to make a decision to walk away. You cannot live in the upside down. It does not work. You, you, you have to live in reality. Uh, and if you get pulled back into that, that gray space in your life, you have to confront it. And that, that's my, I'm a, I'm very passionate about people embracing their pursuit of whatever it is. And it doesn't matter if it's the cult of Crossfit and yes, Steven, it is a cult. I want you to know that.ALL: 14:00 [Laughing]Steven: 14:01 You're 100% correct. It, it absolutely is,Josh: 14:05 But whether, you know, it's, it's the cult of Crossfit or the cult Christianity or the cult of Mormonism or, you know, whatever it would ever, those beliefs, those indoctrinated beliefs are, you have to decide if you are going to live them or if you're going to go live something else. Uh, the people that I found most frustrating when I was a Orthodox Mormon was the people who were like,"Yeah, you know, I really, I'm okay with these parts, but I don't really want to do the hard things. And, you know, showing up to church on Sunday is kind of fun and it's, you know, but I don't want to put the work in!" And I'm like, "You know, you gotta put the work in!" So yeah, you gotta do the hard things.Leon: 14:45 Yeah. And I think that there's, there's a difference. I'm going to challenge what, what's been said. A little...Josh: 14:50 No, Crossfit is a cult.Leon: 14:50 [Laughing] Ok, I'm not challenging that part! 100% in agreement, but I think that there are moments when you realize that something is simply not you but I think that a lot of folks, um, you know, especially in relilgious context, because it, uh, feels somewhat optional, uh, but in other contexts as well it, uh, to what you were saying Josh, its a little bit challenging, its a little bit uncomfortable and so I'm not going to do it. And, and, so I have a story about that. I was, uh, walking out of Synagogue, and there was somebody who was new, and you always know the new people, just because they are, uh, new, and, uh, the regulars are the regulars. And this new person has just shown up and they were there and, uh, they were walking out and the Rabbi said, "So, you know, what's your name?" and got to know him and, so, "How ya doing?" And the person, very honestly, said "Ya know, I just wasn't feeling it. It just wasn't working for me. Maybe this just isn't my thing?" And, I'll never forget, my Rabbi gave him, sort of, THAT look. You know, that stern, over-the-glasses, look, and said "You know, aren't guaranteed two-scoops of epiphany in every box of Shabbat-Crunch cereal." Ya know, you're, you don't, maybe you have to put a little work into this before you gonna feel it in some way. And, and, I want to put out that a bad day in the pews, a bad day, um, especially when it is one of your first days, A), is gonna happen, but sometimes it's not a bad day, but it's just a regular day. That those euphoric days that, maybe, we were sold on thinking we were supposed to get every single time, Doug, to your point, ya know, "Boy, I can't be as religious as that guy with his head down in the corner! Wow, he was really intense! How do you do that, I didn't feel anything like that!!" Ya, he wasn't feeling it either, but you didn't know that.Doug: 14:50 [Laughing] It's true!Leon: 14:50 Umm, ya know, I think that, that you have to recognize that, that those are some days! Umm, whether they are every day or most days or just a few, ya know, you can't show up just once to the gym and walk out looking like "Arnold" or whatever. It's gonna take a little bit of work. So, uhh, right, wrong, different, what do you guys think?Doug: 14:50 I think that, sometimes, the expectations are that we're going to an awful lot more of those epiphanies than really we should expect. One, one of the things that interests me, because, I, I read through the Bible more than once a year. I mean, just continually reading through it, and I am amazed how rarely God talks to even the people that, I mean, Abraham, he, he would speak to Abraham and then he would go off doing his God thing somewhere...Leon: 14:50 [Laughing].Doug: 14:50 ...for 20, 25 years. And Abraham is just chugging along. Most of us, if God doesn't appear to us in a dream and at least once every three weeks we, you know, get worried about it. It's like, no, you're not gonna have that many epiphanies. You just, you need to just sort of keep at it.Josh: 18:01 I think that's an interesting point, right? Yeah. Sometimes when we go into situations, whether we're, you know, we're pursuing a new, uh, political belief, uh, I followed the Greens for a long time, then left and now I've headed back. Or whether you're, uh, you know, uh, a moral philosophy, religious observance, we see the people who have been practicing that, uh, that lifestyle for years and we have this expectation that we're going to walk in and suddenly be like them. We're going to know all the right things to say, we're going to know all the right things to do. We're going to know what not to do. Um, you know, apparently bringing a Styrofoam Cup to the Green Party's, um, meeting as a bad idea, you, those sorts of things, right?Leon: 18:48 Who knew!?!Josh: 18:48 Right? Um, you know, shuttle left the, a 12 cylinder Jag at home, but those are the things that aren't, that are hard. And we have this, we have this, this, uh, instant gratification problem, at least in Western society where we expect that because we want it and because we really, really want it. It's just going to happen. And that hard work isn't there. But I, I will. And I'm going to put on my parent hat now. So I'll tell you that the, the most, uh, difficult things that you do will often be the most rewarding. I, I, I know I'm making fun of that, but it really, the hardest things I've had to do in my life have been the things that when I overcame them were really the most satisfying. And I think that that's for religious observance as well. If it works for you, do it. Um, I mean, don't be a jerk, but cause that's a bad thing. We already [stumbling] Nah, I'm not gonna go there. I'm like, do, do the thing that is hard because you know it's the right thing to do.Leon: 19:55 Yeah. Um, okay. So, so Steven, I'm going to call you out a little bit just cause, uh, I know that weightlifting is one of the things that you do and uh, I will fully admit that I do not, um, if I say that I'm in shape, it's simply because round is a shape.Josh: 20:07 Amen.Leon: 20:07 It however everyone else in my family were weightlifters and powerlifters and football players and things like that. I was the runt of the litter. And, um, so I, I know just from osmosis about it and there's always that moment when the, the new, it's always guys, the new guy walks into the gym and you know, either loads up way too much weight on the bench press or just is, you know, arms are puffed out, chest is puffed out. And, in a bad gym, everyone steps away in a good gym, everyone steps forward, but they're all aware that this guy is going to hurt himself or someone else or the equipment. Worst of all the equipment. Um, and I dunno, Steven, if you have any experiences with that.Steven: 20:54 I mean in, in Crossfit constantly, right? It's where the Crossfit is known for poor form, bad movements and people doing it wrong, like doing lifts wrong. Um, and, and to your point, a, a bad gym is, is one that lets you keep doing it. They're like, "Hey, that guy is, you know, he's, he's here, he's lifting", uh, or "She's here. She's lifting". Um, the good gym is the one that says, hey, take a, you know what you're doing right here. Let's make an adjustment. And the people that, uh, that want to get better, that they want to make that evolution, they receive that criticism. Well, the ones that, uh, think they know what they're doing and don't want to hear any, any constructive criticisms, they may not show up next time or they may lash out at you, um, that there may be steroids involved there. I don't know.Leon: 21:48 [Laughing] Or just, or just bad temper. I mean, it doesn't always have to be drug induced. It can just sometimes even learn, you know, just a jerk. And, uh, and I will tell you that that is not, um, absent from the synagogue as well. Sometimes people come in and they're, uh, clearly uncertain about what's going on. But when someone tries to offer a helping hand, they, uh, respond poorly.Josh: 22:11 I had no idea. Steroids were a problem in Judaism.Leon: 22:13 Right? [Laughing] Yeah, they're, they're not. [Laughing] Right. Okay. So, so I think we've run down, uh, bad days in, uh, the gym, the Dojo, the Pew, the synagogue, et cetera. I want to pivot to what a bad day looks like in it. Um, because you know, just what, what does it look like? Because I'll start it off. You know, some days the machine actually is out to get you, no matter what you try. Um, I, I don't know why I have had experiences where over the course of hours or sometimes days, I experienced rapid multiple system collapse. And what I mean by that is that a hard drive on my laptop dies and also two of the four monitors on my desktop system die and the the washing machine dies and something goes out on the car. Like all systems begin to crumble around and like, all right, I, it must be me this week. I'm just not going to touch anything else. I, I dunno if you've had that experience, but sometimes the machines just don't like you.Steven: 23:24 It was just a revolt that day.Leon: 23:27 I wish. And if they had just told me that that's what it was or that I was revolting, I would have left them alone. But no, I had to go buy a new hard drive and monitor and you know, all that stuff.Doug: 23:37 I mean it happens that way. I always people, people are, we'll be working on something say, well this is going well and I'm going, "Oh, you just jinxed it."ALL: 23:47 [Laughing]Doug: 23:47 "Why would you ever say that?" You never say it's going well because you just set it up to go the, the, the, the computer gods are now going to go ahead and throw a lightning bolt and it will take out your hard drive or something along that line. It just, you can't do that.Josh: 24:04 I once did a SAN upgrade and I think I have, I've actually shared this story, um, on the, on this podcast. So, I did this SAN upgrade, um, at my last employer, um, it was for our vmware environment. We are a managed services provider, so we had a bunch of hosted vms. Um, and like most companies, you know, you did backups, but we hadn't really tested all of our backups so we didn't actually know if our backups worked. Started the SAN upgrade. Suddenly we had no, no drives anymore. Uh, the whole SAN was gone at 20 hours later. I'm on the phone with both vmware and the SAN provider and both engineers said, "We have nothing for you. I hope your backups are good." I mean, you get real religious when your entire, I mean like everything is gone there. There were no LUNs. Uh, yeah, that, that is probably my single worst day at the office. And that was a long day.Leon: 25:08 Right. I'm talking about the demo, talking about the gods, the tech Gods. Um, I've always found it amusing and slightly horrifying that at conventions, um, most notably DevOps days tends to do this because it's, it's multiple talks, one right after another. And a lot of them are live demos and so there's a shrine off to the side, a shrine to the demo gods. And people will come up and make a make offerings and there is serious prayer going. These are people who in any other context would tell you that they were absolutely irreligious that they had no connection, that they were devout atheists or at least agnostics, right? They just have nothing and yet they are making deep obeisances , you know they are bowing down to the, to the demo guys because live demos during a talk like you should never, never do.Josh: 26:01 Like what? What sort of sadists are you guys?Leon: 26:06 [Laughing].Josh: 26:06 Do not do live demos? Oh my goodness that is like, that is like playing craps with the devil. Like, oh.Steven: 26:15 You, you, you have to sacrifice entire server rack to the demo gods for a live demo presentation. It's just, it's a, it's 100% required. I can't think of the amount of times. It was funny. Leon you mentioned, regardless of, you know, if you're atheist or agnostic, you, you, you immediately go to that shrine it if you have to do a demo that day, I don't know. I can't count the number of offerings I made it SolarWinds when we were doing some type of demo during our recordings. And then live demos at an event were just, I couldn't, it was just one of those things that you freak out constantly.Leon: 26:52 As a side note, if anybody's who's listening wants to see something very, very funny, go to the SolarWinds Youtube Channel, Look for the 50th episode anniversary where they do a whole montage of demos going wrong and you'll see Steven having just a really, really bad time with something over and over again. So yes, I think I was there for a few of those. Demo Demo. Extravaganzas um...Doug: 27:18 Yet sometimes it can go well. I mean, when I was writing, um, medical software and one of the things that we did, it was called, it was called the shootout. And so we actually had to demo our software, our medical record software in front of 500 physicians. It was done every year and they put two people up. And so if a physician would stand there and would actually dictate one of the records that, that, that you, you were allowed to preload your stuff, but you had to do it live. And, one year, my partner and I, who is actually now my business partner in WaveRFID, uh, we were the ones that were doing it. I'm was the technical person. She was the lead one and we were demoing Alpha software. It was a brand new version that we were doing in front of 500 docs and it all went out like 10 minutes before it started. We ran down the hall, came all the way back, shoved a new version in and demo'd the thing. But because we did our obese, you know, we said, it's not us. We are so sorry. This is alpha. Please forgive us. We humbled ourselves and the demo went great, you know, so some days it works out if you're suitably obeisant.Leon: 28:29 Yes. Wow. I, yeah, it's, that's, I can't imagine, I mean you call it a shootout because you're just like, "Just shoot me now". Yeah. Um, wow. That's insane. And it, and I think that if you've been working in it for any amount of time, you know, there's, there's similar stories like that. Um, and okay, so pivoting from demo and machines, there's other parts of being in it that are bad day to, um, I, I think that many of us wish for a world that we grew up watching or some of us grew up watching in star trek where everyone in the engineering, uh, in the engineering area was incredibly competent and everyone got along. Even if they didn't always get along, they still got everything done and a, they were all focused on solutions and stuff like that. And the reality is that in IT shops, uh, across the globe, politics is a thing. Trademark all rights reserved. Um, sometimes it's not the machine that's out to get you, it's a coworker or another department that simply wants your budget or whatever. And we have to put up with those things also. Um, so that's another thing that causes a bad day is when you don't actually get to do your job because you're dealing with the politics of doing your job. Or the process, you know, it doesn't always have to be a political, you know, show down necessarily, but it's, you know, do I really have to spend the next hour and a half doing timesheets or expenses or, you know, five year forecasting, you know, because that's always useful in it. I can't forecast five months accurately, but you want five years. Great. Great.Josh: 30:11 Yeah. So I, I remember being a brand new engineer a long time ago, 20, 20-ish years ago now, and thinking all, all I'll need to know if I can just memorize the OSI model. Like I can have, if I can just memorize the OSI model, it's gonna be a thing. Um, I mean, I, I know the OSI model, I can't remember the last time I had to reference it. Um, but that, that's it. Like sometimes the things that are hard are, are of our own making.Leon: 30:43 I will say that the OSI Model I reference all the time talking about bad days at the office because every tech project I've ever worked on has failed at layers eight, nine and 10 OSI model, which is finance, politics and compliance.Josh: 30:59 YesDoug: 31:00 I've had the benefit of working mostly for myself. So the only political problem I've have is convincing myself to get myself doing the job. But when I did work for a large corp for awhile, I was given a project where I had to go ahead and make this thing work with an existing service. And this existing service was controlled by somebody who was saying that, well, we're going to be replacing this and this was his little area and he didn't want to share it with anybody and because it was going to be replaced, um, I couldn't use his old service, but the new service wasn't going to be ready in time for us to do the rest of it. But he wouldn't give me what I needed to go ahead and use the old service and he wouldn't let me be a Beta site for the new service. So that I would have it. And so here I am and there's no way I can do this thing without using this service. And there's one guy who owns it and it was his,Steven: 31:57 That's why star Trek, uh, is, is, is fantasy. Because having to interact with other human beings to, to get something done doesn't always bring out the rosiest of situations. You, you, you have to, you have to interact with someone and they have other priorities that aren't necessarily aligning with your priorities. Um, heaven forbid that, that you have to have different priorities because what you need to get done, you need to get done now and what they need to get done, they need to get done now. And if those don't align, then it, then that clash is going to happen you, and if it's not happening in the timeframe that you ultimately need it to be bad day popping up immediately without warning.Leon: 32:38 So you're saying the of Star Trek was not the phasers or the tricorder or the faster than light travel, that that's all normal. That's reality. The fantasy was that everyone got along all the time.Steven: 32:48 Yeah, absolutely. Like [laughing] we have phasers now don't we?Josh: 32:51 Well see, I know what we're missing, right? We're, we're missing the obligatory red shirt that, that guy who won't give you access to his, his software. You just pulled a red shirt, you know, over him and you throw them into the meeting because we all know what happens to, you know, the guy wearing the red shirt.Steven: 33:08 I thought Josh was going to go the other way and say you kill the person with the red shirt.Josh: 33:11 I'm Canadian!New Speaker: 33:15 [Inaudible].Josh: 33:16 I'm not that evil yet.Doug: 33:19 He wants them killed, he just won't do it himself.Leon: 33:22 Okay, so one, I think one last thing that I want to talk about as far as it bad days is, um, is when we, the bad day has to do with the next thing we have to do. And I don't mean just like the thing on our tack, task list, but the thing we have to learn, um, you know, just putting that out to everyone who's listening and, and you three, you know, how many times have you resisted learning about the next thing, whether it was cloud or object oriented programming or ITIL or IP version 6 or something like thatSteven: 33:55 All the time. Every day. I don't have time.Leon: 33:59 Okay. So you resist it because like I have enough on my plate.Steven: 34:02 It's usually, it's usually comes down to that just trying to get something new in your knowledge. Bank a is oftentimes budding up against everything else that you have to do. Um, and, and once you set aside the, the, the urge to just ignore it and you actually consume that information, you learn that net new thing. Um, I, I can remember when, when I was doing consulting for, for Citrix projects and having to learn when they, they had just acquired this new company, NetSix, and, and here comes this new, uh, VPN product and it's like, "I'm dealing with virtualization over here. I don't want to deal with a VPN product!" And, and just putting it off and putting it off and putting it off. And next thing you know, like here you go, you've got to learn it. We've got to have a certification in it. There's no, no other way about it. It's like, "Ah, OK, all right, I'll learn it." And then next thing you know, you've got this great new technology you get to incorporate in your, your knowledge stack and you have way more opportunities, uh, that oh, that opened up for you to do more things either from a consulting realm or for your company. You can enable, you know, new capabilities, new functionalities. But we push it aside cause we just don't have timeDoug: 35:20 I was going to say that actually even goes back to some of the, we were talking about in the religious side. I mean there's, I love learning new things, but I want to learn the new stuff that I want to learn. And sometimes what your, the environment that you're in says no, the thing that you need to learn now is x, whatever this, whatever x happens to be, it can be in the IT world for this next thing you need to learn this in the religious world. You really need to get, you need to work on your prayer life, you know? And so people from the outside are telling you, here's what you need to do. It's for me, it's real easy to learn something new if it's something I want to learn. But it's, you know, as Stephen was saying, it's like if it's something you have to learn, you may not get around to it until somebody from the outside goes ahead and sort of cracks the whip a little bit and then won't. But once you've gone ahead and pressed through, it's like, oh, this is great. Yeah.Leon: 36:16 What was I so worried about?Doug: 36:18 Oh, no, I always knew what I was so worried about!Josh: 36:21 Cool. It's interesting because I've built my entire, my entire career off of the phrase, uh, "I don't know". Uh, my, my second job, uh, that I got, I had this, this panel interview in which I was asked a series of questions to which I did not know any of the answers because I had only been in the IT field for, for a professionally, for a year. Um, and as I laughed, they said, you know, is there anything you'd like to say, uh, you know, before we end the interview. And I said, "I'm sorry that I didn't know the things that you asked, but if you're willing to teach me, um, I'd love to learn." And I really think that, that for me, defines what I want to do and what I tried to do in IT. I don't, I don't know everything. I still am, I'm terrible at scripting. I really am. Um, but I can do an awful lot more now than I could five years ago or a year ago. And that's that for me, whether we're talking about a pursuit of an IT lesson or whether we're talking about the pursuit of some, you know, ideology, whether it's physical or mental or spiritual or intellectual, go out and approach it with the, "Hey, I just don't know, like it's hard. Um, and I don't know it yet, but damn it, I'm going to learn." And those are the people for me. You know, we talked about those engineers, those idyllic Star Trek engineers. I would rather take an engineer who said to me, "Josh, I don't know how to do this, but I'm going to go figure it out." And then comes back and says, "Hey, here's what I've got. Let's collaborate. Get it done." To me, that, that is a thing that takes those really hard things to do and makes them so much easier.Steven: 38:06 Completely agree.Leon: 38:07 Okay. So last piece, and this is actually I think where, um, uh, a lot of the learnings, uh, are going to happen. We've talked about bad days, uh, in our non-tech life and we've talked about that days in our tech life. What lessons can we carry or have we carried over from one to the other. It might be something that you knew really well in your tech world that you carried into your religious or ethical or moral life or vice versa. And Josh, I think to the point you just said, um, is a strong one. I think as IT people, we are more prone, we are more comfortable saying, "I don't know that" whether that's "Hey, I don't know, Active Directory" or "I don't know why that that just happened, but I'm going to find out." I think that we are generally speaking, we don't feel emotionally challenged to say things like that. Um, but I think that there's a huge resistance for some people in some cases to say, I don't know, in a religious or you know, ethical or philosophical context. Um, and maybe that's the fear that if I, if I say, I don't know, there may not actually be an answer. And if there isn't an answer to this one question, maybe the entire religious structure is somehow false, which is sort of an irrational fear. But I think that it's one that people have. And so the answer to that is just don't say, I don't know, which doesn't work really well either, but, uh, people fall into that trap.Josh: 39:39 Yeah. So I, ironically, the thing that I, that I did that led me away from my religious observance was to embrace uncertainty. Uh, you know, being Ultra Orthodox, I was so certain that I knew the truth that when I no longer could look at the facts and say that I, that they were true, it was, I had to step away. So my lesson, uh, I'm, and I have to, cause I'm a cheat here. One is to "Embrace the uncertainty" and the other is "Sleep on it." No, no. Like seriously sleep on, I cannot count the number of times where I've spent my entire day banging my head against a problem. And then when, you know, I'm just going to go to bed and then you get up the next morning, you're like, oh, that's how you solve this one. And I don't care if you're talking about IT or if you're talking about, you know, a problem at home or with a colleague or with a friend, or just sleep on it, man. A good night's rest does everyone well.Doug: 40:38 I found that, um, the, one of the things that I learned in coming more from my religious life into my technical life, um, the thing that makes me have the worst days during religious services is watching everybody around me worshiping the way that they worship and it being all about them. And you know, they're just, you know, hands up and whoop-ti-do and all that kind of stuff I'm like, just drives me crazy. Um, but then I realize it's like, okay, but here I am. I am letting their weirdness stand between me and God and I just need to sort of like, stop, roll myself back, let them be them, and then go ahead and have my, uh, my experience with, you know, getting this done, the service. And, when you take that into the IT world, there are people that have got opinions and they're, you know, we gotta do it this way and yeah, everybody's an expert and all this stuff and you're trying to work on a team and I can sit there going in my head, these people are freaking idiots.Leon: 41:42 [Laughing]Doug: 41:43 But I then go ahead and roll it back and say, nope, this is just me. Let's go ahead and work with this and you know, there, but, and I can go ahead and take that tolerance that I have made myself learn in the religious world. Otherwise I would hate my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ and bring that so that I can be better on a team. I, I was a terrible team person in my thirties and forties I mean, you know, I got stuff done, but because we'd slam it through and now I'm actually really, I'm good at coaching people and working with them because I know that my tendency is to be judgmental even when it's not justified.Steven: 42:24 Yeah, for me, the, I think the, the biggest lesson from religious nonreligious work standpoint is you just got to view things through a positive lens. Like if you just take and go into your day, I'm not thinking everyone's out to get, you know, not thinking that, uh, that the, you know, that whatever you're going to have to deal with that day is going to be difficult or hard, um, that you know, that is not going to ultimately affect you negatively if you just walk into that situation or that day with, with that positive lens, you're like, you're going to have a better day. But, but as well, everyone else around you is probably gonna have a better day because you're in a better frame of mind. Or at least I know that when I've got a bad day going on or I don't feel you were really great, I'm usually making everyone around me miserable. So if I can avoid that at all costs, I feel like, that's usually something I should, should, should attempt at leastDoug: 43:23 Share the wealth, either positive or negative.Josh: 43:26 Always positive, always positive.Leon: 43:30 So something that, uh, I learned recently. Um, it was an insight from, uh, from my rabbi, Rabbi Davidovich. Um, he, so every morning in the Orthodox Jewish, uh, service, the morning service, uh, you go over the sacrifices, you just sort of read through the text of what the sacrifices are and how they're handled. And right at the very beginning, it talks about how, uh, the priests go in and they take the ashes of yesterday, sacrifice out first. That's what they, that's what they do. And that's right at the beginning of sort of this section of the, of the prayers is, you know, the, the Kohanim, the priests, they go in, they took the ashes and they took them all the way outside the camp and they dumped them. And Rabbi Davidovich's insight to that was, that's a metaphor for how we treat yesterday's experience. Um, that you could have had a horrible, awful, painful, gut wrenching, useless, unproductive day yesterday. And so when you show up the next day for prayer, you might feel like, oh, I just, I can't, what, what, what am I supposed to do? I, I can't have another one like that. And this piece of text is telling you no, no, no. That was yesterday. Take the ashes, dump them outside the camp. They're, they're, they, they don't belong here anymore. Today's prayer has no resemblance. It's an entirely new set of sacrifices and entirely new set of work that is not contingent on or related to yesterday's work in any way. By this, by the way, at the same time, if yesterday was an amazing day and you've got an incredible amount of stuff done and you were really focused and you really had an amazing prayer day, those ashes, they also get dumped outside the camp you that today the, the proof of how today is gonna go is how today is going to go. Nothing about yesterday affects or reflects or is a precursor to how today is going to go. And that insight from the religious context is one that I think is, is something that I can use a lot in, uh, in my it work, whether it's writing or whether it's giving a talk or, uh, Steven, to your point, having a, you know, going in and doing another video. It doesn't matter if yesterday's video was a complete train wreck, you know, flaming dumpster fire today is a different day to record. It might be a different date to record what I did yesterday poorly, all over again because we can do that, but it's, it's not in any way reflective of what happened yesterday. Um, and that allows me to break free or get clear of the bad feeling from the day before.Josh: 46:19 I love that. That is beautiful.Leon: 46:21 Any final words, final comments, final insights that you want to share before we wrap this up?Josh: 46:25 Crossfit is still a cult.Leon: 46:27 [Hysterical laughing]Steven: 46:31 With that, thank you guys for having me this time. I, Leon, thank you for staying on me to ultimately get me get beyond here and the do, uh, do one of these sessions with you guys. Um, I, I will definitely try to make it, uh, more in the future.Doug: 46:46 And my final insight is if you're having a bad day, it's probably you.Leon: 46:53 Nah, I'm good!tDoug: 46:53 Nine Times out of 10, if I'm having a bad day, it's me and I just need to, I mean, and the good thing about that is if I'm having a bad day, nine times out of 10, it's me. And if there's one thing I can change, it's me.Josh: 47:06 Thanks for making time for us this week to hear more of Technically Religious. Visit our website, TechnicallyReligious.com where you can find our other episodes, leave us ideas for future discussions and connect with us on social media.Leon: 47:19 A wise person once said, don't let a bad day make you feel bad about yourself.Steven: 47:24 That was Grover Grover. Grover, from Sesame Street.

There's an old joke (and a famous website) comparing programming languages to religions, but the analogy is truer than it might seem at first blush. Logic structures are everywhere in scripture. Pair programming strongly resembles the intensive 2-person style learning found in all orthodox Jewish Yeshivot. And you can say that your religion - the one you grow up with or grow into - is very much like a module you've inherited as a code owner. As Patrick Hubbard, our guest on this episode, says, "It's a balance of acceptance, idealism, reverence and challenging architectural decisions made long ago." Listen or read the transcript below. Doug: 00:00 Welcome to our podcast where we talk about the interesting, frustrating and inspiring experiences we have as people with strongly held religious views working in corporate IT. We're not here to preach or teach you our religion. We're here to explore ways we make our career as IT professionals mesh - or at least not conflict - with our religious life. This is Technically Religious. Leon: 00:24 There's an old joke and a famous website comparing programming languages to religions, but the analogy is truer than it might seem at first blush. Logic structures are everywhere in scripture. Pair programming strongly resembles the intensive two person style learning found in all orthodox Jewish yeshivot. And you can say that your religion, either the one you grow up with, or the one you grow into is very much like a module you've inherited as a code owner. As Patrick Hubbard, one of our guests today says, "It's a balance of acceptance, idealism, reverence, and challenging architectural decisions made long ago." I'm Leon Adato and the other voices you're going to hear on this episode are my cohost and partner in internet crime, Josh Biggley. Josh: 01:02 Hello, Leon: 01:03 Doug Johnson. Doug: 01:04 Hello Leon: 01:05 Cory Adler. Corey: 01:06 Klaatu barada nikto, Leon Leon: 01:09 And my fellow Head Geek at SolarWinds, Patrick Hubbard. Patrick: 01:12 Hey, Leon. It's good to hear ya. Leon: 01:14 And it's good to have everyone here. Leon: 01:16 Um, so the first thing we want to do before we dive into the topic at hand is give everyone a moment for shameless self promotion. Um, so Patrick, why don't you lead us off? Patrick: 01:25 Yeah, so I'm also a head Geek at SolarWinds, which looks like dev advocacy pretty much anywhere else. Uh, you can find me on Twitter at @FerventGeek. Uh, that's probably the best way to find me. I am in too many places on YouTube and a bunch of other stuff because I didn't run away when they broke the cameras out. I'm not sure that I'd make that choice again if I could. And I am a Episcopalian, which means I'm a Christian, but not necessarily the kind that most people know because we're super progressive and we're kind of on a timeout from England right now. Leon: 01:55 [Laughing] Okay, great. Doug, how about you? Doug: 01:58 I'm CTO at Wave RFID, a startup that I started up with my business partner at the age of 60 something. How stupid is that? Uh, it can be found on Twitter at, at @DugJohnson or you can email me at doug@asknice.com. I'm an Evangelical Christian, but not one of those in your face hitting you with the Bible kind of people. But I will talk with you all day long if you, uh, want to have that conversation. Leon: 02:20 Uh, Corey, why don't you go next. Corey: 02:22 Hi, I'm Corey Adler, the constant pain in Leon's side, but during the day I am a team lead engineer at Autosoft. You can find me on the Twitter at @CoryAdler and much like Yechiel and Leon, I am an Orthodox Jew. However, I prefer to call myself the Jew, extraordinary Leon: 02:38 Dah, Dah, Dah. Okay. And as I, as I introduced earlier, Josh Biggley is one of the cofounders of the Technically Religious podcast. Josh, tell us who you are and where you're from. Josh: 02:48 Uh, so I'm a senior engineer responsible for enterprise monitoring. Um, I'm a wanna be a Head Geek. Is that a thing? [Multiple voices: It's a thing!] You can find me on Twitter at @jbiggley. I'm also with my wife, uh, the cofounder of a new website called http://faithtransitions.ca. It's for folks who uh, who are having a, uh, a faith crisis changing their faith. Uh, just a place for there to be a safe place for there to be community. Uh, I am currently a post-Mormon, ex-Mormon, um, former Mormon, whatever. Not Mormon anymore. Leon: 03:27 Got It. Okay. Um, and just a reminder to everyone who's listening that there will be links to everybody's information and any of the things that we mentioned during this episode in the show notes. So no, no need to scribble madly. Um, also these episodes are transcribed for people who may not speak English as a first language or are deaf or hearing impaired or just like to read more than they like to listen. Corey: 03:49 And study for the pop quiz later. Leon: 03:52 And Yeah, you can study for the pop quiz and my name again is Leon Adato. I am also a Head Geek at SolarWinds. You can find me on the Twitters @leonadato or on my blog, adatosystems.com. And I'm also an Orthodox Jew. Um, so I want to dive right into this. So the idea of, when we were talking about this episode, we talked about it as, you know, God as a Service or looking at our religion as code. Let's, let's unwind that a little bit. What are we, what are we saying really when we say looking at our religion, like we look at it as code. Josh: 04:27 I mean I, I want to start off by, by reading the, um, reference on blog dot a-e-g-sub.org. I don't even know how to say that. Leon: 04:39 Aegisub Josh: 04:39 It'll be, don't worry. The link will be there. Right? So, so this is, this is a post that I have laughed over since you brought it to my attention last year. I feel like I saw before but didn't remember it. And I was, as I was reading it today, I was howling with laughter inside because, so here's the entry for Mormonism and it is if you're Mormon or Post-Mormon or Ex-Mormon, you know that this applies to you. So C sharp (C#) would be Mormonism. All right? Okay. I don't code in C#, but that's okay. So at first glance it's the same as Java, but at a clo- at a closer look, you realize that it's controlled by a single corporation, which many Java followers believe to be evil. And that may, uh, that it may contain a theological concepts that are quite different. You suspect that it's probably the, it's probably, uh, sorry. You suspect that it probably be nice if only all the followers of Java wouldn't discriminate so much against you for following it. For context, Java is Fundamentalist Christianity. So Doug, [Leon laughing] you know? Yeah. Why? That's just the way that it works. Leon: 05:50 Okay. Corey: 05:50 That's scarily accurate. Doug: 05:52 I mean, and the reality is the guy behind C# is the guy who is behind Delphi, which is the other language that I, so there ya are. It just all comes together. Leon: 06:01 It all just comes together. So, right. So again, I think it makes it makes a cute joke, right? Um, and I think looking at our programming languages that we love as religions is one thing. But looking at our religions through the context of what we know as programmers I think is another. So again, I just want to, I want to try to unwind that for people who are listening. What do we mean when we say that? Patrick: 06:24 Okay. But hold on a second. I think the Delphi analogy is good and I once upon a time wrote an awful lot of Delphi and you could almost say it in a sort of descendant, um, way that Delphi was great because it was fun, right? It sat on top of the full Win32 API. It linked down to the compiler language that uh, a Borland C++ used. So it was super efficient. So when you transition to C#, and I was also all Java for a long time and when I changed jobs I was like, yeah, I'll hold my nose and do this C# thing for awhile. But it was fun in the same way. And so I think a lot of times with religions, a big part of it is like, are there, are there tenants here or there are there echoes and reminders of something from when I was younger or that was easy at the time. So I'm not sure that that analogy of something that you encounter once and then there's the better version and iterative period and then all of a sudden you find yourself in it later. Definitely with technology it works out that way. Patrick: 07:22 Okay, awesome. So that, that gives a piece of it. Um, anyone else want to take a swipe at why we're doing this today? What, how, how is it that we look at our religions through the lens of code? Doug: 07:32 Oh, they are in the world of code, there are ways that you do things. There are it, there, there are certain things that any language has to do to be a language. And there are also certain things that any religion has to do to be a religion. I mean, any religion that doesn't deal with how you run your life and uh, ethics and how we relate to each other as a person wouldn't be much of a religion. Uh, any piece of code that can't handle a four loop or a, uh, be able to go ahead and handle stuff or go to a procedure or have a goto [pause] kidding! Leon: 08:08 [Laughter] Corey: 08:11 Oh, you scared me there for a second. Doug: 08:13 Oh, come on. You guys are being too good. Leon: 08:16 Okay. Any religion that has a construct that you never, ever, ever want to use because it's horrible Patrick: 08:22 and that it's always going to be the one you're going to use over and over. Doug: 08:25 Oh, you know what I would say most regions religions would have, I can certainly give you some constructs in Christianity I never, ever, ever want to hear about Leon: 08:34 Anyone else want to take a swipe at it. Josh: 08:35 I'm struck by the, um, by the nature of code and religion, um, in that code doesn't play well together. So it's not like you can, um, start using Java and then go, Oh, I'm just going to throw some, you know, some commands in here from, you know, Golang or something. Uh, I mean, I know that you, there are, are, are certain languages that you can do that with, but if you're going to develop an entire, uh, project using Java, you're going to want to minimize things that are not part of, you know, mainstream Java. Religion to me feels kind of like that the same way. There are things that they, on the surface they look like, "Oh yes, these things all make sense!". Yes, there is a god. Yes, these are constructs that help us to, you know, act a certain way and behave a certain way and do certain things. But when you start to pull things apart, you realize that the way that religion is assembled, the way that it's put together is very different. Much like, you know, hey, you can, you can develop our front end app and it looks like it's doing all the same things, but you start to pull it apart and you realize that the pieces that go in to making that application don't look at all the same. Um, so I don't know, I'm not a developer at all, but I, I feel like things just don't fit together well when it comes to religion. You know, we see that we see an awful lot of conflict in the world. Um, you know, in a, in a prior life, uh, you know, Doug and I sitting down in the same room would have resulted in one of us being hit with a Bible. Um, I'm feeling it's probably me, um, being hit, but you know, you understand what I'm saying, right? It's, this isn't religion and, and code. I mean, it's a, it's a Battle Royale sometimes and it just doesn't need to be. Leon: 10:27 Okay. Patrick: 10:28 Well, but how much of that is, how much of that is the religion and how much of it is spirituality? Because if, if, to me, spirituality is sort of the platform as a service here, right? Like it's the set of cloud native service primitives that, that everything else is built on. So that would be a.. Leon: 10:44 I like that its a cloud native. Like it just works so well. Oh, keep going, keep going. Patrick: 10:48 No, the point of the Cloud is we're going to deconstruct everything into a set of service parameters and it's up to you to put it together, right? So then the question is, do you come at it dogmatically and say, "Okay, I'm gonna use only cloud native technologies!" Or "I'm gonna lift and shift from, um, a set of monolithic applications that have made me feel good for the last 30 years." And if there's anything that's opinionated in religious, it must surely be monolithic applications. Um, but underneath it, it's things like mindfulness and it's forgiveness and it's awareness and it's how does this fit in with cosmology and the, the basic tenants of that? Like what is spirituality? I think maybe that's the thing that maybe aligns more with technology and then almost the religion itself ends up being kind of the dogmatic argument if thing that you see in a Linux forum, right? Talking about talking, you know, where people will literally wish they could get in a car and go fight each other over a pattern implementation. But the reality is that the, the commonality is more about those, those base services and then we layer on all of this opinionated, uh, uh, dogmatism that distracts us from the, the core of it. Doug: 11:56 right? I don't disagree with you, but by the same token, in the wonderful world of religion, you can have all of these wonderful, uh, in touch with the world and all that kind of stuff. But you know, the, the, the real acey-spacey kind of stuff that you tend to get with people who don't have a specific religion, they just, they're in touch with their spiritual feels, they actually accomplish very little and in the world of programming, while we can all get down to the core constructs of going ahead and working directly against the metal if we want. The reality is until you pick a language, you hardly ever get anything done and it's until you've got a team of all of a bunch of people all working with the same code base, working with the same language, working together, that's when you actually accomplish stuff. So while there are similar, while there is that base that's behind it all, you don't get much done if you sort of stay off in the sort of loose commonality area. It's only when you get into specifics that things start to happen. Leon: 12:50 Okay, and I just want to jump in here for, for the listeners and for us and say that is at the heart of this episode, which is as programmers we can take our sensibilities as/programmers and then look at it and look at our religion and say, this is, this is the similarity. This is where I can actually deepen my experience of my religious point of view by bringing my technical, my programming sensibilities to it. So that's what this episode is about and we've already started to dive into it. So I want to keep going with this. Um, and really get into some of the specifics. So with all of that said, with that framework laid down, how are, in what ways do you find that our religions are similar to programming languages and/or code? Again, how do we bring our programming sensibility to the table and say, ah, now I can appreciate my religion so much more because of this or that or the other thing. What are some things that strike you? Corey: 13:50 I mean, just the general structure of it all. I mean, religions, organized religions in particular are always very structured, you know? Yeah. I have especially, I mean, you could speak to Orthodox Judaism. We have to go to the services three times a day and you know, and we have to on the sabbath. We have few certain things that we can do, things we can do. The, the, the structure in general of this is how you run your life is always there. We're there and it's something that in code, I mean you understand that there are certain commands that you're going to do. There's that and you understand what programmatically, what that is going to do. Leon: 14:24 So thou shall declare your variables before using them? Corey: 14:27 I've tried to teach you that too many times. Leon: 14:30 [Laughing] Okay! Patrick: 14:30 Wouldn't it be nice if there was a religious linter that took care of the analysis beforehand? Doug: 14:36 But that it is the same thing happens in my loosey Goosey Christianity there it's, it's, while there are rules that we don't have the very strict rules of course, because we're forgiven of everything, right? Okay. But if you actually, "Hey, you know, doesn't matter what you do, you get forgiven and just go ahead and take care of these sins and you're done!" Okay? But the reality is when we go to the service, there's the opening, then there's this many songs. Then, I mean, there's a way that we do it every single time and there's that structure that we expect. And boy, Heaven help you. If you should go ahead and you know, put the sermon first cause people are arriving late, who don't want to miss miss that, the big band in the beginning. And if they missed the sermon, boy they would be on your head. So there's just, again, there's that standard structure even in the loosey-goosey that uh, it makes it work interesting. Josh: 15:29 So I want to build off this idea that's a, that's come, um, that there's, there are differences and similarities between religion. Being the non programmer of the group here. Um, because my God is Google and that's, that's how I survive. Um, I'm, I think that the missing element we have here is a scrum master or a project manager. We've talked about this idea that religion has rules, that we are a, that we have to follow. We've also talked about how programming languages have constructs that we have to follow. But if you don't have someone who is enforcing those rules or who is, um, setting out the paradigm in which you need to participate, then how do you know that you're doing what the other people need to do? So Doug, to your point, if you don't get people all on the same platform, if they're not all using the same, uh, you know, the same version, right? You know, if you're using a Python and you're using 2.7, so is last two dot release?, uh, versus python three, I mean, they kind of look a lot alike, but they're not going to.., there's going to be some, uh, some discord there. So I, I, I feel like, at least for me, if I, if, if I were to come in and be a programmer, I would want that. Um, I would want that scrum master. I would want that project manager. Interestingly enough, within Mormonism there is a scrum master. Um, and some people are going to say, well, yeah, "Sure, Josh, the scrum master is Jesus!" Uh, wrong answer. The scrum master is actually the president and, and a prophet of the Church who today is Russell M. Nelson. He is, uh, the, the sole, um, well he is the corporate soul. So he owns everything within the organization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day saints. He is also The Voice. So what he says is Gospel. Um, I mean, I don't know if you guys look at your scrum masters or your project managers and maybe the same way that Mormons look at Russell M. Nelson, but that's the construct, right? There has to be somebody who says, here's how things are going to operate. Here are the rules. Patrick: 17:51 Okay? But what if Git is a guide here? And not to invoke the obvious, but the whole point of being decentralized, right? Being, um, a set of practices that allows people to collaborate. And I think GoLang there is a, uh, something to be said for if you make the right thing to do, uh, the easy thing to do, people will do the right thing. Like what if it's not about adhering to a judgment that's external, but instead the thing that's great about a great technology or a great language is, is, is one where interacting with it daily, when you look back in hindsight, you feel like you did the right thing, but it never felt like it was prescriptive. Or you were worried that you weren't adhering to a set of programming standards or was that completely annoying architect? It was always about code standards and you're like, "I just hacked the most amazing thing ever and you're going to go on a 15 minute diatribe about the way that I did my comments?". Right? Well what if the best faiths are the ones where you find that you intrinsically live them without necessarily having to go back to requirements documents every time, that they, the the right thing to do is the easy thing to do. And instead it's something that you collectively do as a part of community as opposed to being something where you're worried that the scrum masters kind of assign you a code branch that you really don't want to deal with. Leon: 19:10 Okay. So I'm going to, I'm going to jump in on that whole scrum master idea and project manager idea. Cause I think in Judaism there's a slightly different structure. And the good part is I've got Corey here with me because there's a role in shul, um, in synagogue called the Gabbai. Uh, and the Gabbai is the person who really makes sure that every service is running as demanded as, as it needs to. So, Corey I'll let you... Patrick: 19:36 So basically it's Cron New Speaker: 19:38 uh, well more than that, I'll let Cory, I'll let Corey dive into it. Corey: 19:42 So, the analogy I use, let's use all the time for being, the Gabbai, he is a, he's like a bartender and a great party. You don't notice the bartender unless he screws up the drink. Leon: 19:53 Okay. Corey: 19:54 Very similar fashion. The Gaba gets cause people to leave the service, makes sure everything is running on time, make sure nobody uses, you know, growing up at the podium, you know, and, Leon: 20:09 But also you, the Gabbai knows what day it is and what special elements of the service have to be observed, whether that's a normative weekday or a normative Shabbat or a special holiday. But also that, um, this person has a special event in their life. For example, if there's a groom in the, uh, in the room or somebody whose a child is having a circumcision, then certain parts of the service are not said. But the Gabbai's job is to notice that, and say, "Oh!, we skipped this part!" and everyone says "What?!?" So the Gabbai really is that project manager role. I think, you know, in a large way I could be wrong, but... Patrick: 20:49 So a project manager, not a lead developer? Corey: 20:53 Uhh, I mean especially from an agile perspective, I was, I would disagree with that. Leon: 20:57 Fine. Corey: 20:59 Umm, from an Agile perspective, the project, the product manager is, you know... Patrick: 21:03 Well, cause where I was going with that was a more like a, you know Julie the cruise director, right? Not actually a part of your experience, just making sure that you have a fantastic experience. Basically like a Doula. Leon: 21:13 Right. Corey: 21:14 [Laughing] I like that! Patrick: 21:15 It's the, it's the leader behind the scenes in a situation where you're not supposed to have a leader. Corey: 21:20 So I would disagree about that from an agile perspective where the product manager is really is one informing the team of what needs to be worked on and what needs to be done now versus the Gabbai who is just almost letting everything just flow naturally. Everybody already knows what they're supposed to be doing in the service is just making sure that you know, the i's are dotted, the t's are crossed, you know, not to use the pun or anything because this is a religious podcast. Leon: 21:55 Oh my gosh! [Laughing] "The 'T's are crossed". Oh no! Okay, keep going, moving on. Nothing to see here. Corey: 22:04 But and so the Gabbai is more, is more of an over, is it more of an overseer rather than actually dictating what the product is. Leon: 22:15 Okay, Patrick: 22:16 So they're providing governance. Corey: 22:17 Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Leon: 22:18 All right. Okay. That works. Doug: 22:20 And to a certain extent, I mean, again, while it would be great, you know that you're sitting there doing code and the code is perfect and the language allows you to do it and you're having a wonderful time and all that kind of stuff. You do still need that outside governance. In the evangelical community, it's going to be your elders and your deacons. But basically what it comes down to is, you can have a really crappy programmer coming in and just having a wonderful, wonderful time and they think they're doing great and they're just messing up everything. That's why everybody hates PHP so much is because the, you know, anybody can program in PHP and unfortunately anybody does. So you then need somebody, the scrum master, in this case, a code reviews, any kind of where to go ahead and help them get back on the track and hopefully, uh, to go ahead and write better code or to essentially be a little closer to the rules of the religion, which are there, one expects, for a reason. Josh: 23:19 Just so everyone understands, Doug and I have never worked together. So when he talks about crappy programmers, he's not talking about me. Leon: 23:28 [Laughing] And, and just to be clear, Doug and I have worked together, so if he's talking about crappy programmers, he's probably talking about me. Doug: 23:35 Actually, Doug's worked on enough teams that he has had enough crappy programmers in his life. He's talked to a lot of them. But you know, one of, as in the case being a senior Dev, one of, one of my jobs as a senior Dev or in my current role as CTO, is to go ahead and help my, uh, new developers to go ahead and become better developers to effectively become a senior developer. In fact, one of the best things that you know has happened to me is one of the guys that I coached at, the last place that I was at is now a senior Dev at his current job. He didn't have it when he didn't have it when I met him. And he did have it when he left. So I'm not taking, obviously he had the capability, but he needed guidance. And that's what, in evangelical Christianity, the elders and deacons are supposed to do. They don't, they don't beat you up around the head and the shoulder, but when they find that you're drifting, when you're going in a direction that's not good for you or the community, they guide you back into the path. Leon: 24:39 Okay. And, and we've also started to hit on another point that I think there's a commonality between, uh, programming and our religious life, which is the idea of consequences. So what are your thoughts? Like what, how are the consequences in, in our coding lives? How does that inform our experience of consequences in religion or vice versa? Josh: 25:00 So when we jump into this idea of cost consequences, I want to touch on something that really falls in line with what Doug was just talking about. And maybe it's something that we all have as a blind spot here because, um, to some extent or another, we have a religious observance. But when, when we don't work well on a team, whether we're talking about, um, uh, an agile team or, um, a religion, there are times in our lives where being part of a religion is really problematic for us. There are people who cannot function within, um, the constructs that we want them to function in. And I don't know exactly how to draw this completely back to, um, to programming because I'm not a programmer, but there are people... Doug: 25:48 It's called cowboy coding! Josh: 25:50 [Laughing] Cowboy coding! Doug: 25:51 It is that they exist and it's a problem. These are people who do not work well on a team and they do what they want. They're called Cowboy coders Corey: 25:59 Or Bro-grammers Leon: 25:59 Or Bro-grammers. Josh: 26:02 Well, and I think it's, it's even more than that though, right? This sometimes there is a system that um, you just don't work well and um, and it may take a long time for you to recognize the value of that. Um, for example, for an awful long time I was a Windows only guy. Man, Linux scared their crap out of me because like there are weird words in it. It's like... Patrick: 26:27 There's no pictures. Josh: 26:29 Like people make up funny names. Right? Exactly. And I'm, I'm complete. I was completely flabbergasted by it. It just seemed weird and I was compelled to have to learn a Linux and I mean, somebody on this call used to work for the same company I worked for, wrote some code that I still have to look at on occasion. I mean, I'm just pointing and saying Leon, I mean, not, not saying Leon, not saying Leon. Leon: 26:59 [Laughing] Right? Yeah. There we go. Josh: 27:02 These, these times, right? These times where we realize we have to step away from the thing that we were comfortable with and do something else. Um, that is for me is very much a very close to my heart. Right? Um, there are times when religion just does not work to construct those, those elders out, those deacons to use Doug's terminology, they have failed in their role and you step away from that. Um, and that's okay. Like you, you don't, to go back to what Patrick was talking about, you don't have to keep programing in Delphi just because it's the thing that brought you joy in 1996. Um, it's 2019 pick a new language. Patrick: 27:39 Cool. And I think that's something you're hitting on. Um, the thing that we all forget, right, is that I think everyone, when they are using the language of choice or if they're using the particular faith of choice or let's say religion of choice, is that you, I think a lot of people feel like, oh, this was just destined. I of course have just found myself in the best, most amazing thing ever. But the reality is, yeah, everyone went shopping once upon a time. People selected that and we forget that. And so like when you're looking at, um, especially with Go, um, your, your browsing GoLang libs or you're out looking at GitHub and what are you looking for, right? You're looking for fellowship, right? Like how many contributors are there? How long has this project been, uh, in, in, in a process? How many people are providing updates? How many comments on it? When was the last time the code was updated? So you know, basically how full is the parking lot, right? Right. So you, you, you, you did once upon a time make a choice. And I think part of the, the key is to remember that you should revisit that on a regular basis. Don't ever like just decide, well, this is who I am, this is what I am. I'm never gonna look at it again because then you don't own it. Right? So maybe, maybe that's that going back to the platform as a service thing, but like just with like with code, go back to how many people really actually enjoy this. Ah, do I trust the people who are contributing to the, uh, sub, uh, projects that are a part of this code? Am I willing to dive in and really dig through it? Like what was it? Never decide, "Okay, I'm settled." Like, whatever got you to that thing, that process should be good just as it was with picking a library or hey, there's four to choose from, so the other three have about the same number of, uh, same number of contributors. So what's wrong with the other three? Nothing. Leon: 29:24 I like that. And again, using that sensibility from our programming lives and reapplying it to our religion and saying, well, I do this with my programming. You know, I'm not afraid to do this, to reevaluate my programming. It must really joke about programming languages or like religions, you know, "There's the one true language!" You know. The fact is, is that we are very comfortable when it's time to move on or when we do declared that a language is not suitable for this particular project. It doesn't necessarily shake our world and using that comfort to say, you know what, I'm just going to take a minute. I'm going to think about this religious tradition I, I was born into or grew up into and say, "Am I still there? Is that still me?" I like that idea. Leon: 30:05 We know you can't listen to our podcast all day. So out of respect for your time, we've broken this particular conversation up. Come back next week and we'll continue our conversation. Josh: 30:15 Thanks for making time for us this week to hear more of technically religious visit our website, technicallyreligious.com, where you can find our other episodes, leave us ideas for future discussions, and connect with us on social media. Doug: 30:29 .Net! Patrick: 30:30 Go but optimized for Google, so GoLang Doug: 30:34 Delphi Leon: 30:35 Perl! Josh: 30:35 Guys, guys, please, can we just unite against our common enemy? All: 30:41 PHP!

Robert Orfino, real estate investor and expert, joins Casey Eberhart on the "Expand the Business" podcast for an incredible interview about the present state of real estate, real estate investing, and even house flipping. Robert is a master at leveraging traditional media and social media to expand his brand and marketing message online. Born and raised in New Jersey, Robert spent countless summers on the Jersey Shore.  When not vacationing, Robert worked with his father doing construction. Robert later attended Kean and Rutgers University, and set out to find a “good job.” Aside from his knack for creating things, he has a life-long relationship with education and is constantly seeking self-improvement.  He also readily admits he is a die-hard NY Giants fan and a long-suffering Mets fan.  At the age of 42, Robert had been working for someone else’s fortune for 20 years and began to understand the importance of wealth and how to create it. In 2007, Robert caught the entrepreneurial bug and left his job to start his own green consulting firm. Within the first year of business, the firm was directly impacted by the financial crisis in 2008. However, Robert persevered through the major financial setbacks that followed and began working as a So-Cal contractor rehabbing Freddie and Fannie Homes.   In 2012, Robert took an opportunity to work on flipping homes for private investors. During this time, he flipped almost 200 different homes. Robert continued to work in the So-Cal Real Estate Market until 2014 when it made a major comeback and deals became scarce.  By 2015, Robert sought out a market gap for flipping houses in New Jersey, the number one foreclosure state in the country at the time, and proactively assembled a team to build business back up again. Although the market had been tumultuous for quite some time, Robert saw an opportunity to raise capital for the New Jersey and New York Real Estate Markets and founded a Distressed Real Estate Investor Fund.   Here is the transcript of the podcast interview between Casey Eberhart and Robert Orfino: Casey Eberhart: (00:01) And welcome everybody to today's episode of expand the business. My name is Casey Eberhart. I am your show host for this hour of amazing insight in helping you, the business owner expand the business. So we are super excited to bring to you guys, everything that we can come up with to help you expand your business. Whatever business you're in, whether you're in traditional business, brick and mortar, business, network marketing, investing, whatever businesses you this show is designed for you. So as an upfront, if you want to download a quick audio, on getting more referrals, just head over to www.ExpandTheBusiness.com. Oh, we've got some goodies over there, some surprises for you over there. And I'm super happy to have you do that again, go over to expand the business.com so super excited today because we have an amazing interview with one of my favorite people on the planet. Casey Eberhart: (01:00) Robert Orofino is one of these guys that you just can't help but to learn stuff from because number one, he's super open and willing to share his ups, his downs, his wins, his breakdowns. In order to help you and I expand our business and really kind of create the life that we all dream of. He is a real estate investor. I've happened to be friends with and have known Robert for several years. I know that Adam, and ask him to go a little bit in depth in this, but you know, one of the things that he and his partners have been able to do in the real estate game as they've made, as far as I know, at least three moves. They've moved from New Jersey to Los Angeles, Los Angeles to Houston. And then from Houston they've really expanded out. They have a radio show that's on drive time in Houston, Texas. Casey Eberhart: (01:47) Every single day they've got podcasts, they have webinars, they have meetup groups, they hold live events, they hold live meetings. They've created a real estate investing fund for investors. Maybe you have a little extra money that you're scared of a scaredy cat. I've been in the real estate market. You don't want to, you don't want to get too much exposure. You can talk to Robert and they've created a fun. So people that are scared still have an opportunity. They have their fingers in every piece of the pie in the real estate market that you've probably or possibly could come up with. And if they don't, they're going to go out and really create the network and the relationships to be able to bring that into the fold. So I thought, well we would do today is really have kind of a deep dive in sort of the structure, the blueprint, the layout, the architecture of what Robert has been able to do in the real estate game, especially in the market he happens to live in at the moment. And I say at the moment, which is Houston, Texas. So He's a partner in Mr Texas real estate, which we'll talk about. He and his partner in a minute. And he also runs and owns Dana point marketing. So with that being said, Mr Orofino, welcome to the show was a Robert Orfino: (03:00) pretty amazing introduction. I'd like to meet that guy. Right? So that was, thank you very much for all those kind words. And it is certainly, um, I always point out that Steve jobs speech we talks about, you really can't connect the dots looking forward, turn around and look back. You can see them. Well, you're one of the dots. Casey Eberhart: (03:21) Well I appreciate that. I appreciate that. But those dots are created by all of us being just connecting, right? So thank you for saying that. You're also one of the dots all and my network, but also many, many others. So Robert, take me back, uh, in the wayback machine to when you were in New Jersey and when I first met you, you were a contract investor slash flipper in, uh, and for those of you that don't know the term flipper, it's somebody that buys a piece of real estate, put some equity into it in terms of capital as well as um, um, not only capital but sweat equity contract or build it out, make it pretty, and then turn it back on the market and sell it off from there. Kind of walk me through how you got started as an entrepreneur back in the flipping days. Robert Orfino: (04:10) Sure. So back in New Jersey, I was a, I was a consultant. I was a green consultant, energy efficiency, that type of renewable energy. Um, you know, I was uh, back in for anyone understands it, uh, the uh, green building. But that was, that was I did right. So the US GBC am original member of that. Um, and I did a lot of consulting out there and I said, okay, I want to become an entrepreneur and the green industry's taking off in southern California, so I need to get the southern California. So I left my job there and I started my own consulting business and within the first six months I booked over $300,000 worth of consulting. It was great. And then September, 2008 hit and the whole world got turned upside down financial world. And I was out there alone with not a lot of, of safety net underneath me, just a couple of retirement accounts. Robert Orfino: (05:10) And I, uh, I found myself in a very large hole very, very quickly. By 2009, we had some bad deals and we had some bad partners and um, we had a lot of the projects just stopped. There was a bond on those projects, which means you're going to eventually get paid, but the eventually it could be 2012, 13, 14. Right? So here I am, entrepreneur trying to figure this stuff out, working both coasts and it, it wasn't working and we're going down a slope in a whole very, very fast. I remember 2009, everyone's still sort of in denial, right? And in 2010, now, everyone's like freaking out. In 2011 was the bottom of the market. So in 2011, I had no more consulting gig. So maybe one or two right here. But I had a buddy who was doing construction for Fannie Mae at the time. Robert Orfino: (06:06) There was tons of foreclosures. They're fixing them up. He says, I have too much work. Can you help me run it? So I came out to California full time, took over the San Fernando Valley, and I started with doing deals, doing rehabs for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, um, all those FHA stuff. Um, but by that time I was already 450, $2,000 in personal debt in the, I owed for $52,000. And next to every single one of those, those dollars was my signature. So you can imagine how panicked we were and how crazy everything was. And we got into real estate and started climbing out of the hole. So 2011 wasn't a bad year for us. But then 2012, Fannie Mae says, we're not rehabbing homes anymore. Now back out of business. But I have a construction business. I've gotten loans on that business. I've got employees. And um, I'll just tell you the, the low point for us is we're, I was down to $6,000 in my bank account and I have a $12,000 monthly nut, right? Robert Orfino: (07:10) And I don't have any jobs on the horizon. And I think to myself, I'm not the smartest guy. And from this moment on, I'm just going to do what smart people do. So I did a little mantra about wealth and all that stuff coming to me and I won't bore you with that. Um, but right after I did the mantra and I was driving down the four oh five, you know what I'm talking about, I got to go to, I got to get to Ventura Boulevard. That's where my po boxes, I go to the Po box now 10 minutes after the mantra about all good things of being positive and wealth coming to me. I opened up the Po box and there's a check for $6,000 exactly what I needed to get through the month of February. And from that point on, I do not want to figure it out or double think it or overthink it. Robert Orfino: (07:59) I just do the mantra. Right? And that turned me on and I got through the month of February, I got a kitchen job, I got a bathroom job. And then later on that year I got picked to work for the best way to call as the clearing house where the hedge funds and for those who don't know the hedge funds, Blackstone is a big one, call me homes. There was another one who worked for, they put billions of dollars of capital on the street buy houses and so we literally could have as much construction work as we can possibly handle. We are doing now 11 jobs, nine 11 jobs a month and we're running through that in 2012 was great. Um, 2013 slowed down, but we had made a name for ourselves. So we are the top two contractors in that clearing house and we kept working all the way through 2013, 2014 I started doing some more green work, slowly climbed out of that hole, but I had always now around real estate business, I'm trying to network with these folks and try to figure out how to get more work. Robert Orfino: (09:01) And I started reversing engineering how this whole business works. And in 2015 I said, hey, I'm going to go do this myself, except I go back to New Jersey to do it. And I go and do it in New Jersey for two years. We did fairly well. We flipped a bunch of houses out there. Um, I was all about just creating cash to pay back my debt. They create a little nest egg so that we felt secure. Right? So just like everyone else in 2013, 2014, 2015, everyone's thinking security, right? They want to have security. We're no different. Um, then I started networking and meeting a lot of people we carry on. And then in 2017 I met some friends from Houston. They introduced me to the marketplace. Um, we had a hurricane that came and I was working the opposite and the, all of the leftover deals in New Jersey from superstorm sandy. Robert Orfino: (09:58) So I understood how flooded houses and when a wind damage houses work. Uh, when the hurricane came here, I already had a base here I'd already done and started doing some education stuff. So we decided we were going to move to Houston and I moved there about 14 months ago. I've, I've been here in Houston for 14 months. Since then, we're able to acquire about $3 million worth of properties. I've doubled my net worth. I'm using all the things that I learned from quite frankly, failure on my, on my last 10 years of being an entrepreneur. And so we, we definitely believe there's no such thing as failure. It's only learning. Sometimes the lessons are very expensive. Sometimes you can shrug them off, right? But there's only learning in coming out of failure. And, uh, with that mindset, I was able to partner up with Jason Bible out here. Robert Orfino: (10:53) He had been very successful. Now we started this new venture and like you said, we have a fund. We have our, our own rehab crews. We have a real estate office, a team that we bought. We work with Keller Williams platinum. So we're able to work on all that stuff, uh, in this marketplace based on all the things I learned. And when I say learn, I'm mostly saying I failed in the past. And I can remember sitting in the lobby in, uh, Gora hills. There's a company out there that nobody knows about. They don't have a website, they don't advertise, but they do $1 billion in real estate transactions every year. They touch every single piece of it. And I sat there and I said, if I ever have the opportunity, meaning of the market opportunity, this is what I'll build. And now I'm here in Houston with the opportunity and we're building a very massive real estate machine. Yeah, it is unbelievable to watch. So I have several that I kind Casey Eberhart: (11:54) of want to push in and, and drill a little bit in on. So when you first moved from New Jersey out to Los Angeles, you said that in your first six months or first nine months, I think that you had $300,000 worth of consulting gigs on the books. How, how did that come about? How did, how did moving from New Jersey to Los Angeles, just because we, you know, I live in Los Angeles, we be, we are, uh, we are very, and I'm doing air quotes. For those of you that are listening green out here in California, what, what allowed you to get in the door? What allowed you to book that kind of book of business? Because I think a lot of people are, you know, get so stuck on, oh it, I'm afraid, I'm scared. I don't know where to go. I don't know what to do. I'm terrified of failing. So on and so forth. What allowed you to like break into that $300,000 market? Robert Orfino: (12:48) I want to say within the first 90 days of me having my own business, I picked up two mentors, both sales and marketing and Robert Orfino: (12:58) they said, Hey, forget this, forget this 30 page proposal and all that. There's all the, all there, all the folks that are collecting those proposals are making do is free work. Yeah. And they said, we've got to figure out a way to get to the decision maker. Once you get to the decision maker, have an honest conversation and they'll say yes or no. And that's, that's where I learned from, from two folks. And so we were able to get to some very big decision makers in the automotive world. Dealerships were one of our bigger clients. We are able to meet with again, really, really big companies like sonic automotive, Penske automotive, auto nation. We want to treacly the manufacturers like Mercedes Benz. Um Oh we worked directly for a Volvo and a lot of those, a lot of the green companies that wanted that for that we were able to go right to the manufacturer and talk to them Hyundai and get real honest conversations. What do you, and then ask them, what are you looking for? How can I help? So going out as an entrepreneur, I learned within the first 90 days to forget what I, what I want and ask how I can help and just give me that. Just how can I help? What are you looking for? Do you want a green, a bigger green footprint rate, I can help you with that. And that's how we land that we forgot the forget the whole sales process, finding the decision maker and help them. Casey Eberhart: (14:25) So it was really about building, I mean essentially, you know, uh, I think a lot of people, um, skip the part of building relationships and building out a network of people that you yeah. You know, sir, um, service that network for lack of a, for lack of a better word. You also said something that I think is really interesting and I think a lot of people kind of Miss Nuance, um, because they are being trained and taught by people that went about it the hard way. So you could write a bunch of proposals and you know, you are absolutely right. The people that are receiving those proposals. If you don't know a lot of proposal type, um, work that's given out, the reason those companies send out requests for proposals or RFPs is so that they can get a bunch of ideas from a bunch of different consultants all for free. Yeah. They may ultimately hire one or they may not hire them, but at the end of the day, they've essentially allowed the bigger game players too, give them free advice and may not ever even call them. And what I loved was that you bypassed all of that and really went in and tried to have conversations with people that were meaningful and figure out how to help them when I'm assuming not every single person you are able to help win. But in that event you then went off and figured out how to help them when once they were done. Speaker 3: (15:51) Yeah, no, we got, we got, um, a very, um, polite thank you's, but not very many followup calls. Yeah. Casey Eberhart: (15:59) Yeah. And so, so Robert, as you were, as you were kind of building out that network with the automotive dealers and, and putting those folks, how important in your success today, if we go all the way back in the wayback machine, how important was it or is it, do you think for entrepreneurs, even if they're just a marketing, not just say, but a marketing firm or a sales firm, or they've got a specific product or maybe somebody just a network marketer or whatever, how valuable is the skillset of building an actual network of people? Speaker 3: (16:37) It, it's everything. Well, you know, we all, we hear all the cliches about the network, right? There's a ton of business cliches and we love to post it on Instagram and Facebook, but you have to actually do it right? And you know, your network is your net worth. That is absolutely true. Um, and we just kept building out and out and out. We, we, we would, we would take meetings from seven o'clock in the morning to 11 o'clock at night and we'd be in crazy places. I'd be at five star hotels smoking a cigar on the beach front deck at 10 o'clock at night, and the next morning I'm at someone's, uh, auto body shop, right? And, but it's just constantly taking these meetings and networking and what can I do? Right? Um, what can I bring? How can I bring value to the folks in my network? Speaker 3: (17:29) How do I connect people in my network? Right? How do I make them, I mean, I've gotten, I've sat down in front of the general manager who complains that he doesn't have a good sales manager. I go to the, three days later, I'm sitting in front of a sales managers saying, I gotta get out of this, this place. I'm like, Hey, do you know this new tire? And over here, why don't you give them a call? Low and behold, I got a a sales guy, right? Well, let me just connect. And so when you start playing that person, that connector in the middle, it becomes extremely valuable. But here's the key, Casey and we, we just went over to this with our real estate team this week. We said, someone will come up to you and say, uh, Hey, do you have an inspector? Speaker 3: (18:11) And what a lot of these big real estate firms do like Keller-Williams and remax on, they say, here's the sheet, here's all our our vendors and just go ahead and call them. And I'm like, that is such a great way, because it took someone time to put all that together to build that relationship with those vendors. And you're just about to just share it and throw it out there. Like it's meaningless, like it's worth nothing. And so, you know, I have a personal rule and I've extended that now to the real estate teams really simply. I just had a guy sitting right here in my office before we got on here worth several million dollars. He's an investor of mine. He's given us money, he works with us, he wants to work with us more. Just told me he's going to invest in my next project. And he said, hey, I need a property manager over here. Can you just text me a number? I said, no, email me. And then I'll do the warm introduction Casey Eberhart: (19:07) because here's the way, hang on a second. That's gold. Go go by. W if you, if you are listening to this, I want you to listen to what Robert just said with a, a very cleaned out here because this is probably the best or biggest lesson we're going to have on this. Go back and let's say it again. So you've got a guy that's, these were sort of several million bucks. He's going to invest in your fund, he's going to do some projects with you. He needs a property manager. And instead of just giving him the sheet of, of, of people saying, hey, Robert Orfino: (19:37) or texting it to them, I said, no, email me and I'll do the warm introduction. And what, what, what does that means is I'm in, it's like I'm collecting interest on the currency. He wants an introduction to a property manager for his third ward and, and, and cashmere gardens. I mean he, nothing too. You are, you know, it's a section of town that's a little rough and he wants to find the right guy. And I said, I have the right guys. He's a good guy. And so I'll just give me his number as I know you mean the email and then I'll do the introduction. So I'll introduce both of them so they both understand the value that I'm doing, bringing them together. Here's the most important thing. If I just gave him the number, he may say, Hey, I got the number from Robert Orofino. Right. But that will be soon forgotten. Casey Eberhart: (20:29) Yup. Robert Orfino: (20:29) That email and that warm introduction, we'll sit there and when the property managers got to go back and find John's email address, he's going to look for my email. I don't remember that I handed that over. Now I'm happy to exchange the currency of my network, but I want to get a little interest Casey Eberhart: (20:48) when I do that transaction. They'll both remember me for it, hopefully. Absolutely. And so it's so funny. Um, obviously you and I work together. Um, and I know this, I know this, I'll call it a strategy, although I don't really even think as a strategy. I think it's just at this point for both of us, just kind of a way of being, but you know, here's the thing I used to, I used to, when I would get on stage and present my first slide on every slide deck was a slide that says, if you learn nothing else, it's this connectivity is today's new currency. For sure enough people who will argue as Bitcoin, some people argue that it's real estate. Some people are gold bullions and people will argue that's oil or dollars or whatever connectivity. Your network is. Today's new currency. And so let me take what Robert said and kind of expand it one more layer deep so that like a social bank account. Casey Eberhart: (21:38) When you meet somebody, you have some in your network, you have a social bank account. It's, it's like you've opened a joint checking account with someone. Every time you deposit something into that account, it gives you the ability to withdrawal later down the road. If you try to withdraw out of a checking account that there is no money in or there's nothing in, you're in the deficit, you're in the hole before you ever start. So let's go back to Robert's example of the property manager. Where I would, where I would do it is I would leverage it out even further. So, so I've got a guy in front of me, he says, I want a property manager in the lower ward. Is that what you called it? Lower Ward. So what I would do is I would say, okay, listen, Bob, or Sally sue or whatever the investor's name is, I'm going to make a few introductions of the top three property managers that I would recommend. Casey Eberhart: (22:29) So what I would do is I would call all three of them ahead of time and tell them, hey, you're going to get a call from Sally sue or Bobby investor. I'm going to send an email, but I want to make sure that you know that I vouch for them. They're great guys. I know a little bit about them. So when you call you when they call, you have a little bit of backstory. Then I would do a warm introduction just like Robert said to all three property manager firms knowing full well that the investor is going to pick one, but what the other two are going to get out of it is they know now that Robert's working on their behalf. Number one, it gives him more bank account, more bank account juice in that social bank account. The other thing does is it also psychologically limits the liability that Robert has if something goes wrong with the investor and the one person he introduced him to, so let's say Robert Introduces Bob the investor to a property manager a and something goes to hire a Toro horribly wrong. They get in a lawsuit they hate each other for what Robert is looking for is that extra interest that could also come back to bite him if something goes gets crazy or unravels or they're not great personalities or whatever. If Robert only gives him one investor or one property manager. Then Speaker 3: (23:46) the other thing that that does is if that property manager is not a good fit, then we leave the investor high and dry. He's going to go find somebody else to give him another referral for another property manager. So I always like to give two or three referrals on the same thing so that way all three people know I'm out working on their behalf. But also it gives them the ability to pick the one that works best for what they're looking for. And it's psychologically go, I can go back to the investor or Robert can go back to the investor and say, Hey, I know the property manager Adan work, but you've got B and c here. Or if something goes haywire, you go, hey boss, that's why I gave you three. Let's go back to the other two and see if those, one of them is the better fit, don't to work. But the leverage is massive. Speaker 3: (24:36) So Robert, I know that you used, um, I know that here in Los Angeles you really built out meetup as a platform and started to build your network using meetup. I talk a lot about meetup, I work very in depth with meetup groups and people that organize meetups. Talk to me a little bit about kind of how that worked for your business and how that helped you grow the network here in Los Angeles. So you know, probably listening understands what meetup is and if not, it's, it's a, it's a platform that allows you to organize an event and use that platform to broadcast out. It is a little labor intensive. Um, they don't have a really good email CRM set up internally for you to use. That's probably by design. Um, however, here's the trick. Like I've done it. I, we have many, many meetups across the country. Speaker 3: (25:33) We, a lot of them are webinar based, some are acts or are, are in-person based. And I've, I've seen a lot of the folks in my industry say, well, I'll just do what Robert's doing right? And then three months down there meet up is gone. Right? I pick a lot of those meetups up Soto. I absolutely. So do I. We, we, we pick up these old, these you said meet up all the time, revive them and put them into a webinar based meetup. So you really, really, really have to have thought on content, right? Like you can, you can get your friends to come out to the first one and the ones, your friends who didn't make the first one will probably come out to the second one. The third meetup is really are you getting any traction? Right? And the third meet up might be as small as three or four people, but don't freak out, right? Speaker 3: (26:26) Is the ones that get traction are the ones that stay. People will go to meet up and look at all the past meetings to say, oh look, there was that. This guy knows what he's doing. This guy has traction. You've got to build out the traction. You've got to stay with it for six months. Once you do that and you'll have three, four, 500 contacts, maybe a thousand after six months, um, that you can tap into, that you can work, that you can make introductions to, that you can rely on. And um, you know, in that world, you're gonna find some, as you call them, raving fans and your raving fans will support you in no matter what you do. And so that's a really, really good way to do it. Again, it becomes a little labor intensive. So we've hired someone just to sort of Julian house stuff for our meetups, but it is a very good platform that caused, I don't know, a couple hundred bucks a year. Speaker 3: (27:19) It's nothing much that allows you to start positioning yourself as an influencer or an expert. Right. And at this point, you know, the joke is that me and my partner, it's like we're not going to any room that we're not on stage for now that might sound egotistical and all that other stuff, but we understand at this point in 10 years of doing this that it is much better to the beyond stage than it is to be in the seat. Right? And so meetup allows you to position yourself to share your expertise to the marketplace. Um, and it's a, it's a very, without paying a lot of money to the coaches and all this other stuff, you can positioning yourself as an expert, share your expertise, share with say what you need to say, share too, because people want to know the things that, you know, I don't care if you're a florist or a real estate investor, people want to know. Speaker 3: (28:14) And so you can position yourself as an expert in the delivery, your expertise to that room versus trying to figure out how to get on everyone else's stage. And then when you figured out that a lot of these stages are revenue driven, you're never going to get on that stage. So if you could just deliver your expertise to the marketplace or meetup, we find it to be, and the very, very exciting platform for us to use. Yeah. So let's, let's unpack that a time a tiny bit. So if you're not aware of how meetup works, you guys as an organizer of a meetup, they will basically play matchmaker. So you have a whole bunch of people that are out in the, in your local community that are looking to be around likeminded individuals. And so they go to meetup and they search on criteria, real estate or network marketing or you know, I want to go hikers, florist, whatever. Speaker 3: (29:03) Yeah. I want to go hiking or wedding professionals or photographers or you know, motorcycle riders, soccer players. It's, it's basically a place for people to go find people of likeminded. Well, as an organizer of meetup, it allows you to say, Hey, my meetup is based on these 15 search terms or these 15 categories or criteria. So when you start a meetup, meetup is gonna send out an email to the millions and millions of people that have said, hey, notify me when a meetup starts with this particular topic. You know, I, I'm, I'm a, I'm somebody that wants to knit and quilt and I'm a beekeeper and love hiking, right? Casey Eberhart: (29:42) So it'll, it'll start to match make and it is essentially a free or almost free lead generation machine. Yeah. So what Robert is talking about is he can start a meetup group on real estate investing in San Fernando Valley. Meet up is going to put a bunch of people in there. Now he could email all those people individually. You could email them all as a group. He could set up a Webinar to let them all come to a webinar. He could, um, create an environment for him to bring in other speakers, other folks as well. So if I take this step, take a half step further. If you are afraid of public speaking and you don't want to be on stage, use it to leverage and bring in other folks that might have more knowledge in the particular area that you have. You could say to Robert, hey, um, come on in, come on in. Casey Eberhart: (30:31) Uh, I want to have you do a half hour to my real estate group and he will because he wants to be onstage right now. The reason you want us to be on stage is because there is a phrase in the world of business, um, that not a lot of people use anymore. It used to be used quite frequently back in probably the seventies and eighties, but it goes like this. He or she who has the marker, makes the money. And essentially what that means is most of the time, all things being held constant, the person doing the presentation almost always as the expert and that expert is going to be positioned and seen as the guru, if you will, more than somebody that's just sitting in a chair. Right? So if Robert is doing a presentation in front of 40 people or 30 people or 20 people or 400 people, he is at that point perceived as somebody who has the marker, who's making the money, the, the, the cache and the influence goes to him. Casey Eberhart: (31:28) Now, one other, one other thing that is, uh, a great meetup strategy is Robert said they don't go to events if they don't, um, if they're not in the front of the room, well, here's the thing. A lot of events, they're either going to have to pay to sponsor to beyond or they have to do a big revenue split, so on and so forth in order to get on those stages. Well, what if somebody, like you has a meetup group and you've got 50 people that are all about real estate and you're kind of the guy or the Gal in your local market, and then you look at Robert and you're like, Robert, wow, he'd be amazing to come have speed. Well, here's the thing. He also has rooms where there are people. And so you could do what's called in the business a stage swat. You know, Hey Robert, you come speak on my stage, I'll come speak on your stage. And then, um, it's a great way to leverage of those folks and give the content or give the audience the best possible experience. Yup. That's how it works. Well, you got to put your time in. It is a little labor intensive when you, you've really got to deliver expertise to the marketplace or people won't come. Casey Eberhart: (32:39) Absolutely. And here's the thing, the number of people that aren't consistent, aren't willing to put the work in are super lazy. Those people won't survive, but their meetup groups will survive. So those lazy folks that come in and start it and they do one and two people show up and they're like, ah, this is stupid. I'd rather just go sit in an audience somewhere and listen, um, and network better. Well, here's what happens, guys, like Robert and I, as soon as that organizer gets so lazy that they don't pay their bill or they stepped down as an organizer, meetups are going to actually send an email. I'll say, hey everybody, that's a part of this group. We're desperate to have somebody step up and step in as a leader. Robin, we'll own that group before the end of the day. He's just, if there's 200 people in that group, he's just generated 200 leads in his ideal absolute market with, with, with not being lazy with one click of a button. Speaker 3: (33:33) Yeah. And we think them all the time. We pick them up from, uh, it's, you'd be surprised how many, how Vegan influencers that people are. They let these things drop and you know, guys doing million dollar slips up and down the, the, uh, Pacific coast, that's one drop. I pick it up. I started doing my webinars six months later. He remembers he had a meetup emails me and says, Hey, what happened? I want to, I want to do some more. And it's like, hey man, you let this thing go now, normally if it's in the first 30 days case, I just give it back. Yep. Yeah. Here you go, man. That, that's fine. Sorry. Hey, how's it going to keep it going? This what I do. But if you want to do it, if it's just a real oversight, but I'm met people come back to me a year and a half late. Speaker 3: (34:19) I used to own this meetup. Where were you when you have an obligation? Well if people are, are, are taking the time they're picking you, they're subscribing or allowing you to enter an email box, which is a pain in the ass for everyone. You have an obligation to deliver. And if you're not delivering then you know, meetup season in my way. Yup. See who say, hey you, you didn't respond. This is too bad. But again, it usually in 30 days, okay, you can have it not a problem if it's six months or a year. People coming back to me cause they see the, I've grown the group from 265 to 1500 people. No, he can have that back then. I'm looking, I'm working at now. These people are getting value and expertise for me so we don't, uh, we don't hesitate to jump on some of these meetups when they become available. Casey Eberhart: (35:10) Well, you brought up a really valid point is that number one, um, the labor is really you guys, the Labor that Robert's talking about is, is not as heavy duty burden as most of you are spending on your business anyways. It's about finding a, a banquet room at a local restaurant or a small hotel meeting room or go talk to your Keller Williams franchise and see if you can use their conference room or you know, your insurance agency that has a training room. Heck, we have here in the valley, in the Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. We have a Ford dealership that has an amazing training room where they train all the reps that you can, that you can rent. And then being able to provide as much value as possible. And if you become the person that provides value to the network, the reality is then your influence in that network is going to be huge. Casey Eberhart: (35:59) Right. You know, and it can be a super old school. Like I was just showing my little nephew, I have a 17 year old nephew who, uh, just graduated from film school camp and direct and he wants to be a director and I showed him my own, my old networking book. I used to back in, in the wayback machine. I used to have my network in a three inch binder and that binder had sheets in front of it that had names and phone numbers on it. Then there was business card sheets where I'd put business cards and I'd write notes on the business cards. Then there were sheets that were profiles of people so that if I knew Robert's wife's name was Katherine and he was in my network, I'd write Catherine, what is she interested in? She has an amazing life insurance business where she can help you create a bank for yourself, um, as an investor using the, using the tool of life insurance. Casey Eberhart: (36:48) So I'd write Katherine Orofino Life Insurance, I'd get her phone number, and then I would literally my daily activity that would be to work that notebook. How can I connect people? How can I make connections? How can I introduce Catherine to somebody else's if it's somebody else's network. Right. Because the better off you get at staying in touch with your folks. Staying connected. Now I have been to use a greeting card and gifting platform to be able to do some of that in conjunction with a CRM system in conjunction with kind of old school. Um, your network is so unbelievably valuable in terms of expanding the business. Robert, what tools do you guys use down in Houston? Oh wait, before you answer that, let's, so let's move to Houston. So you basically said, hey, I've got an opportunity in Houston, I'm going to pack up the fam, we're going to move down to Houston and we're going to kind of make our mark in Houston. What percentage of the architecture of your marketing plan in Your Business Plan did you take from Los Angeles and basically start to recreate down in Houston? Robert Orfino: (37:58) Oh, Robert Orfino: (38:00) everything at work. So we immediately started doing meetups for sure. Um, and, and what I was, what I was able to become in, in La, the little niche that I built, cause I was the guy who told you all the dirt, right? All the inside baseball stuff. There's no secrets with me. I, I'll sit up there and tell you, hey, I'm going to sell you a product products, not 1000 bucks. I'm going to make $400 for everyone I sell and it should work for you. And if it work, call me up and I'll give you your money back. Right. I was able to sit, just go, just completely honest with everything we did open books, right? And that was a lot easier, uh, to, to deliver to a marketplace like, like Houston, I was, everyone else is doing the whole, you know, you can become a millionaire and lot, you'll be, have this great lifestyle and all that stuff. Robert Orfino: (38:59) I'd stand up there and say, that's nonsense. That's nonsense. That's nonsense. This is what works. But oh by the way, you've got to put in 35 hours a week. So if you don't have 35 hours a week, it's going to be very difficult for you to do this. And we started breaking things down. This is the real amount of time. This is the real cost, right? And you know, my joke is if, if you can really do real estate for no money down and bad credit, why does the guru won $1,000 on your credit card, right? Because they're making money off of that. Then it's, you're in real estate. Guess what? You need money, right? So you may have a dream of doing this for no money, but I'm, I'm the dream crusher when it comes to it. And then I can really explain why this can work this certain way, what you really need and how your resources need to come together. Robert Orfino: (39:56) And we, we've had people come to our rooms and say, I don't want to do this. I want to do. And I'll say, great, what's your, what's your phyto? How much money did you make a year? How much money you have saved? And they're all bad answers, right? And I turned to him, I'll say, Casey, I'm going to give you the best advice you're ever going to get, that you're probably not going to take. You need to get in your car and drive Uber for the next year and save every dime that you made from Uber so that you can then have a deposit to go buy a house, or you have enough money to start a marketing program. Or You have the money so that you can do a flip. But you're gonna have to put the time in. Most people, you know, come to us and in our world I'll say, hey, what are, how are your sales and marketing skills, right? Robert Orfino: (40:44) These are like the real conversations we have. I'm not very good at, I'm a bit of an introvert. Okay, well you're not going to do well. You've got to break down that wall. And I would highly suggest you just go spend $500 with a, was an organized multilevel marketing business direct sales program where they've got tons of marketing and sales coaching already up on the website, make a small little investment. And I don't care what it is, candles, pills, lotions, oils. I don't care what it is, bottle that program. Because when you follow that program that someone's put a lot of time and effort in, just follow that program so you can get better at marketing one yourself and your expertise and products and too you become a better person on the clothes. And so you can break out of that for $500 versus going down in real estate, man, I feel a charging 25 $50,000 for coaching program. Robert Orfino: (41:42) Stay out of that rabbit hole and for $500 just work on your skills. Know that I'm going to go sell post it notes for the next six months so that I can hone my skills and move into this other space. So we, we give the hard truth and some people respect it. Some people don't. We don't have big rooms of a thousand people like some of these other events because we tell people once they come in the door, hey save here Saturday, there's, there's no magic here. There's no pixie dust. This is all work and resources. And if that's not what you're looking for, I tell him straight up, Casey, you should probably leave right now. Go to the park. It's a beautiful Saturday. Enjoy the day. Casey Eberhart: (42:31) Yeah, you know, you, you brought something really, really valuable and it's obviously near and dear to my heart as well in that, you know, somebody that goes, if somebody comes to me and I'm in the same situation, I have a lot of people come to me and say, Hey, I want to.dot, dot. Finish the sentence. Right? And what it really comes down to is they want to have what somebody else has, but they don't want to do what that person did to get there. They want to leapfrog it or, or, or take the, shortcut it with somebody that understands the power of investing. And I always go back to rich Dad, poor dad, Rich Dad, poor dad, the cashflow quadrant. You know, you want to own businesses, you want to invest in businesses. You know, something like a network marketing business is one of the best investments in terms of return on capital that you could ever get. Casey Eberhart: (43:28) Not only the entry point is not millions or hundreds of thousands, it's usually a few hundred bucks. It's going to teach you skills like marketing, Internet, social media, shaking hands, getting nos, building up your thick skin and the money that you make can be astronomical and it can also be zero. But if you go into it looking at what is the skill I'm going to get out of this experience and not focused on the money piece, it's huge. You know, like I've, one of my best friends, uh, this was when I very, very first started my coaching career. He was one of my very first clients and he said, I, um, I want to start a consulting firm. And so we have this conversation. And He, I said, well, what skill do you think you need as a consulting firm? And he understood the market that he was consulting in, but he had zero skills in sales, right? Casey Eberhart: (44:23) So we didn't really know how to talk to people. He was a super nerd computer. He can write code, he can be total nerd, um, nerd and geek, but he can know interpersonal skills. He had no um, no experience and so I was like, look, let's go find out. This was in Seattle who is rated the best sales training program in the country and let's go to work for them. And it just so happened to be xerox as though he went to work for Xerox for a year and he basically cold called high rise building offices trying to sell them copy machines. The skillset that he generated out of that was massive. Yeah, right. Same with people that, that that you know will say, oh, I'm broke. I'm working in a whole foods for 13 bucks an hour. I have no money. I'm super in debt. Casey Eberhart: (45:16) What do I do case? What do I do? I'll say, go join a network marketing company that the products or services or something that you can kind of get behind and understand that you are there to learn the skillset of building a network, interpersonal communications, how to maybe play a little bit on social media and focus on the return on that dollar for dollar investment and Start Your Business Mind in how do I look at a balance sheet? How do I look at a profit and loss statement? How much money do I put in every month? How much money do I get out every month? The the network marketing space is a mimic of real life business. Robert, you and I have both owned brick and mortar businesses. You know, I've, I've owned a bunch of businesses. You first off, you don't go buy a business for under 500 bucks. Casey Eberhart: (46:05) Number one with employees that have already taken into account websites and insurance and customer service and shipping product development, you're going to do that all on your own. You're into millions of dollars or you can go tap into a company or in a firm that's done all of that. And your job is simply to bring customers and other distributors to the table and then run it like a business. So you've got your goals, you've got at the end of the month, you look and you go, okay, well this month I spent $400 on vitamins, but I was able to move $300 worth of vitamins. So I'm now in the whole 100 bucks. And then I got paid $400, I'm net 300 up and run it and get into the habit of running that business like a business. And so often I think most people will start a business and then they run it like a hobby and then they get irritated and agitated that it, it throws off hobby money and then all entrepreneurial is bad or network marketing is bad or real estate investing is bad. You know, Robert Orfino: (47:04) it happens all the time. And that is one of the key things is to run like a business. Um, you know, we, I'm a big believer, there's a book out there by a Michael Kollwitz a the pumpkin plan. It's a really good sort of, hey this is how I'm going to start and make sure I'm putting the things away. Make sure I understand what a balance sheet is. Difference between a balance sheet and a p and l, right. Cause there is a difference. Um, make sure you understand those things and run it like business for sure. Um, it's almost like you're playing in my head. I, I have a webinar coming up this Saturday called run it like a business because too many people get into the real estate game and don't understand, um, Robert Orfino: (47:43) all the benefits you can get from running like a business. I always say, hey, there's five ways to make money in real estate. It can be a wholesaler between, you can pedal paper contracts around and wholesale a contract, one person to another. You can flip a house. That's HDTV. Look at all the, how beautiful my kitchen is and I'll make some money there. It could be a landlord. Everyone knows where the landlord is. Um, you could be just an investor, a person who just what's funny out and owns the notes or a mortgage, right? Private mortgages, there's a fifth way. If you get to the fifth way, you're doing really well. That's called depreciation. And a lot of people will buy large apartment buildings or are expensive properties just for the depreciation. But we understand that there's a massive tax benefit for real estate and you have not prepared yourself to take advantage of that tax benefit. And you're right, it's a hobby. It's just a hobby. And so when you start running it like a business man, there are two types of tax codes in this country, one for individuals and one for businesses. I'll let you decide which one you think is better. Casey Eberhart: (48:55) Yeah, yeah, Robert Orfino: (48:56) and if you've read that it's the business passcode is better than why don't you own a business? Why aren't you running your hobby like a business? Casey Eberhart: (49:05) We've kind of touched on real estate and network marketing is kind of cool that way. You know, I always crack up. It's like if you're going to buy products or using network marketing company, you guys understand that that's a business you have. You get open up to just a little taste of what Robert's talking about in terms of tax deductability things like your haircut, your, your clothing, your office. Did you use your Internet, your cable TV, your magazine subscription has all become tax deductible for 50 bucks or whatever your distribution distribution thing is. You have been fantastic at attracting and doing deals with partners and I know that a lot of times people get scared from partners. They had a bad partner or their mom's brother's girlfriend's dog catcher was a bad partner. How, how do you help? Not a, do you, I'm assuming that you like doing deals with partners. What makes a good partner? How do you, what, what are some pitfalls? What are, what do you look out for when you, when you are looking to partner with someone? Robert Orfino: (50:04) Yeah, so this is that learning process, right? It was $125,000 lesson. Um, I had a bad partner and I use a lot of my own capital to push a deal forward. Only at the end of the realize that, um, what was being told to me wasn't reality. And so I had spent over $125,000 for some green energy projects and I lost as at all. And then we're going to do that again, obviously. Right? And so I much prefer a joint venture and illimited joint venture, meaning there is a clock ticking. So the most I'll stay married to any one partner at this point is about five years. Right. Even even my, my partner would've been everything. Everything we're doing. Jason is a partner or mine. I've already told him, Hey, I'm done. Like I got a five to seven year horizon. I'm done. You're 10 years younger than me. Robert Orfino: (51:04) You want to keep going. God bless you. Keep me on as a, as a consultant and I'll let me own a little bit and I'll sell my share to someone else. And you feel that you want to bring in, we can get, you can walk away clean on this stuff, but I'm done. I have a number in my head, I'm very close to that number and I'm done. Right. I'll go start a little cafe will be my next business. I like making breakfast. Um, so I, I would tell people that you are going to do jvs joint ventures, you're going to have a really defined the roles in which people are supposed to do. Um, and then have a time limit for the partnership. That's really important. And the big thing is what happens when it hits the fan. Yup. And the way we do a lot of it is we have an attorney journey that we both respect and we say he doesn't like you, the one who was anymore. Robert Orfino: (51:59) So let him in him, let him do the, uh, the wisdom of Solomon move. And I don't have to pay for arbitration mediation or lawsuits. Right. And if he, if he says, Robert, you're wrong. And Jason is right, I can accept it. Right. And so we have the worst case scenario decided upon while we're still friends. Yep. And that's, that's the thing with partnerships and, and you know, be careful, I'll just tell you, in a real estate world, a lot of people will call it a joint venture, but it's really not. It's a, it's another form of passive investing, which is kind of illegal. You got to make sure you're, you're really have a role responsibilities for folks and what they're going to do. And we have, um, you know, and making sure your partners are taken care of is really, really important. I'm making sure that all the goals are laid out moving forward. Robert Orfino: (52:53) It's very hard for partners really to move forward at the same pace you all to beginning and then something happens and this happens. So you've really got to define the roles and what the expectations are. I would be spending probably, I mean, I would literally probably go to a hotel or something and just shut my cell phone off and sit down with my potential partner and stay there for three days and work out every detail. Who's gonna, who's this role? What's this role? Who gets hired first? Who gets hired last? Who through all of it. Really, really planned that business. It's still, when there is a problem with an event, Evan, there always will be. Yeah. Well what does our agreements say? Oh Lo Casey, you're supposed to be doing this. Are we changing the agreement now? Dude, I'll, I can take that onto, I get a little bit more of the, of the ownership. I get a little bit more of the cash. How are we feeling about that? Uh, so having very good partnership agreement. I like to do a joint venture limited five years sort of maximum. Um, then that's the best way to do it. Casey Eberhart: (54:05) Yeah. I was actually listening to, I've become recently, I've become obsessed with a real estate podcast other than do a ever, ever, I try to listen to an episode or so every day, especially as we grow the, expand the business podcast here, and the guy that was being interviewed today was talking about joint ventures and partnerships and that there's essentially a real estate delta, which is three prongs to a triangle. And it is, somebody needs to come and show up with the hustle. Someone needs to come and show up with the knowledge and someone needs to come and show up with the money. And good partnership is when you can come with at least two of those three, those, those three things. But the key is that you don't want to find a partner that has the same two of three or the same one of three of those Delta points that you do Robert Orfino: (54:57) for sure. And most importantly, when we're starting out, be aware of the person who has none of the three be the partner, right. That's, that's a, that's a red flag right there. Casey Eberhart: (55:08) Awesome. So Robert, I want to touch on one last area before, before we let you run. Um, and that is the idea of the importance and maybe you don't think it's important, but maybe you do a of how important is it for you since you guys, since you and Jason are kind of the pinnacle influencers in your ecosystem in Houston. I know you have a, a radio show you do every day, you guys are doing tons of Facebook stuff, tons of Facebook lives. You kind of become the B guys that have been able to cherry pick some of the deals that come through just by your influence. I know that in a lot of situations you're the smartest guys in the room. So I want to flip this and ask how important is it to you to have coaches or advisors or mastermind people where you have somebody that's pushing you guys that's making you stretch, that's making you think rather than, you know, I'll say it differently rather than you always being the smartest one in the room. You're involved in scenarios and situations where you're not necessarily the smartest one in the room, Robert Orfino: (56:14) right? So I will tell you that I wake up every single day and one of my quick little mantras is, is you know nothing Speaker 3: (56:25) and we're going to learn something today. So I take life in general as I'm the dumbest guy in the room and everyone here can teach me something. And it's because when I get caught up with being the smartest guy, I have failed. I have absolutely failed. Now My, my partner, Jason is very smart. He is clearly, Eh, it's clearly 10 IQ points or more higher than me. I could see it in the conversation. I become a very good reader of prison. I can see it in the conversation. I have to ask questions about the formulas in the words. I'm like, Hey, can you go over that? And a little bit different way. And he has the patience to work with me on that. Um, he, he's a genius when it comes to this stuff, right? Um, no I don't. He can't do what I do on a lot of places and we wouldn't be successful if we tried to do this alone. Speaker 3: (57:24) Um, but for sure he's a genius when it comes to business and real estate. It looks at things much, much differently. Comes up with a lot of great ideas. Just being around him is very humbling. Uh, but it's also a very exciting, every day when his outside the box thinking hits my, I've been punched in the face many, many times. Practical thinking we can come up with something that no one else is doing. And so I get coached every day by my partner. We pay for coaching. Um, we are in, we've, we, and I'll tell you, um, I've been asked to coach a lot. Uh, I don't have a for you. Say yes, let's have a chat. Yeah, let's, let me put it this way. I don't cook, but I don't say no. Someone who says, Hey, I could really use a couple hours of your time and I'll say, great, I'm at $7,000 an hour. Speaker 3: (58:23) And they're like, whoa. I'm like, yeah, okay. So you can just join my membership where I kind of give all this stuff away anyway. Or you can join my mastermind, which is where I really like to work. What I have found over this last 10 12 years does that that mastermind format is where I excel because I can walk into a room again with that mindset. I'm a dummy and I'm going to soak up so much knowledge today. Right now I enjoy the one on one hour with my coaches. It's absolutely critical. I need it, but for me, I would rather present a mastermind to the public for real estate and to do coaching because here's the reality of Real Estate Coaching Siren. Good job. I'll get back to, but on the reality of, I know I'm all over it, and the reality of Real Estate Coaching is 90% of everything you need to be a landlord, a house flipper, wholesaler [inaudible] is on the Internet the last 10% really the loading order, how you do things and when, which order is what you will pay people to learn. Speaker 3: (59:33) And in that case it could be a coach, but I would much prefer a mastermind, um, masterminds and maybe have lots of Q and a so you can get your questions answered, throw it up on a Facebook page, like your groups have a question to ask them for the group. And a lot of people give you that wisdom of the group. It's really important for me. Um, I will, I will take on a coach when I have a very specific problem, right? How do I get more contact through Facebook platform, through Instagram, through youtube. And I'll sit down with you every month and an hour and we'll go over it. Are you doing this? Are you doing that? Hey, I just heard someone do a speech on this. You guys go look it up and see if that applies to you. So we'll, we, we like that coaching but in a mastermind event and I know you also run a mastermind, um, those are phenomenal and those masterminds you want to walk into and absolutely take on the understanding that I am the dumbest guy in the world. Speaker 3: (01:00:36) Casey, you mentioned a name to me, Roland. Yep. And I was like, boy, that name sounds familiar. And I went back and I was like sure enough, I'm in his, I was in his mastermind, I paid him, he and Ken Colder did a mastermind together in that room. I was in that room with him when he had just bought the survival opening survival life.com and he was giving my all these knowledge bombs and I was like, for sure I'm a dummy in that room. Well man was I getting my money's worth right now? And being in that room with that mastermind, having access to those people, being able to call an email and text them is critical. I don't think you can do it on your own. I think it's, I think one, it's just foolish. It's, it's, it's, it's foolish to think you're going to reinvent the wheel. Casey Eberhart: (01:01:30) I think there's a lot of people that have the personality type. Well if I'm going to do it, I've got to do it myself. Cause it's the only way it's going to get get really done. And in these mastermind groups, what really occurs is that you're paying or you're investing in access of the people, not only in the group, but access to the person who are running it in terms of who their network is. I mean, you know, Roland now, um, is one of the owners of a mastermind room called the war room. That is phenomenal. I mean, Roland, Roland Frasier is, is one of the most astute business people on the planet. And uh, uh, I can't wait for him to know that this has come up. He'll get it, he'll get it to kick it off and just let me get his podcast a huge shout out. It's called the business lunch. You, you, if you're not subscribed to it, go subscribe to Roland Fraser's business lunch. It is phenomenally Leery, sits down with guys that most people would never have access to and just kind of has a conversation over lunch. It's fantastic. So, um, Robert, before we wrap this up, Robert Orfino: (01:02:34) okay, Casey Eberhart: (01:02:34) last kind of words. I want to give you kind of the floor for a minute or so and just kind of give some advice to the listeners on the show and kind of how they can help expand the business. Robert Orfino: (01:02:45) Uh, I will tell you that obviously we talk a lot about networking and that's a really big thing for us here. Um, by becoming, dropping ourselves into a lot of existing networks and saying, hey, we're here. We're going to tell the truth. We're going to give you sometimes the ugly truth, sometimes good truth, um, just okay. You know, the Internet, the Internet and Facebook and that whole world, that whole social media world is, you know, they're filled with people that look like they're leaving a good life and looks like their business is killing it. But I always say, Hey man, give me 20 minutes with any real estate investor and I'll figure it out. You know, how close they are to jumping off a cliff, right? Because there's a reality there. Um, and I think what happens is people look at this and say, Oh my God, am I, why am I failing? Robert Orfino: (01:03:38) Right? And it's, here's, here's the reality of it. They've all failed. Some of them just fell a lot faster than you. And so they race ahead of you. Um, we think that being in this business is a fantastic way to create wealth. And if you're not in this business for ego boost, you don't need to post. You're, you're betting in Vegas full of cash or pose in front of a lambo or a private jet and you can just go about your business and doing it. So in the Internet world, right, there are people that are creating wealth and growing their business and there are people that are positioning themselves in the marketing world. You don't need to do both. Casey Eberhart: (01:04:24) Yup. Robert Orfino: (01:04:25) You can just put your head down and say, I'm gonna retire in five years. And those are the folks we love to have around us. Um, I'll also say that a big thing for us was, uh, multiple streams of income. I know you hear it all the time, Casey, if you could just focus on one thing, you'd be a billionaire, right? Yeah. I to thy own self be true, understand your limitations. And what motivates you to get out of bed every day and follow through on that. And I know that I cannot focus on one thing at a time. Casey Eberhart: (01:05:03) Me Either. Robert Orfino: (01:05:04) I can focus on being a really good manager

Surely you can’t just ask for what you want? Kevin begs to differ. If you’ve been struggling to find a way to market your books on a shoestring or no-string budget, you’ll want to tune in to this episode for some first-step author marketing advice.TRANSCRIPT AVAILABLE BELOWTHIS WEEK'S NEWS:Introducing Scribd Snapshots: A New Way to Discover The Best Nonfiction Books — Scribd Blog - https://blog.scribd.com/home/introducing-scribd-snapshots-a-new-way-to-discover-the-best-nonfiction-booksAAP calls for closer regulation of Amazon and Google - https://www.thebookseller.com/news/aap-calls-closer-regulation-amazon-and-google-1027576START AN ACORNS ACCOUNT AND GET FREE MONEY!VISIT KEVINTUMLINSON.COM/ACORNSDID I MENTION?Cover your nakedness and your shame with a Written World Tee, now with 100% more Kevin words! http://bit.ly/writtenworld-teesNew to Wordslinger Press, pick up Writing a Better Book DescriptionPick up a copy of Kevin Tumlinson's newest Dan Kotler archaeological thriller at https://kevintumlinson.com/books--THIS EPISODE OF THE WORDSLINGER PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY:Draft2Digital—Convert, publish, and distribute your book worldwide, with support the whole way. https://draft2digital.com/wordslingerWordslinger Press—This is your chance to start your indie author career right. Pick up books and other products to help you build and grow a successful writing career. Start growing at http://wordslingerpodcast.comSupport this show: Subscribe and share!Support us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/wordslingerpodcastPick something up to read that will be tough to put down—Archeological Thrillers, Science Fiction, YA Fantasy and more, at https://kevintumlinson.com/booksTRANSCRIPTWANT TO HELP IMPROVE THESE TRANSCRIPTS? REACH OUTKevin Tumlinson: 00:00 Hey slingers, this is another week of the Wordslinger Podcast. And one you're not gonna want to miss. Stick around and find I, you can get what you want just by asking for it. Hey, you looking for a jump on your own India author career. Yeah.Kevin Tumlinson: 00:14 Kind of confused about where to start. I got the place for you. Check out draft two digital. That's where you're going to be able to convert your manuscript, distributed worldwide, online, and get help. The hallway from the best author support there is. Trust me on this one. So go check out drafted digital@drafteddigital.com slash word slinger.Announcer: 00:37 It's the Wordslinger Podcast where story matters. Build your brand, write your book, redefine who you are. It's all about the story here. What's yours? Now here's the guy who invented pants, optional Kevin Tumlinson, the Wordslinger.Kevin Tumlinson: 01:02 Well, I am Kevin Tumlinson, the Wordsligner. Uh, youKevin Tumlinson: 01:05 are whoever you are the person listening to this broadcast. Uh, so I'm, uh, I'm in the middle, so you may have noticed I didn't, uh, do an episode last week. Um, and I gotta tell Ya, it's, it's probably going to be tough to get episodes out over the next couple of months. I got, I got conferences coming up August. I, I, I literally have a conference every week of August. Um, and, uh, lots, a lot of travel. It's a lot of trying to work everything out. I'm gonna do my best. I'm gonna do my absolute best to, uh, to get you at least one episode a week in there. It might just be a bunch of Solo slinger episodes. Um, and I'm sorry to the folks who I have interviewed that I'm trying to, I'm trying to get through that bad catalog as fast as possible, and I got more interviews coming up.Kevin Tumlinson: 01:57 So, uh, but you know, this is crunch time, uh, for me in this, in this business with, um, basically it's conference season. So, um, I'm gonna do my best though, and I'm looking out for you. Uh, and speaking of that, uh, you know, we've done a couple of webinars now or while we've done one webinar so far for a draft to digital, the d to do d to d a You a as we call it, ask us anything. Uh, the first one went really well and we set up a bunch of, uh, author consultations. Now, unfortunately, I didn't check a box, uh, that needed to be checked in order to evenly distribute the consultations. So for two weeks, two, three weeks now I have, um, I've basically had back to back consultations with authors with no gap between, uh, and no lunch breaks and none of that.Kevin Tumlinson: 02:49 So it's been a very rough couple of weeks. Uh, plus we've had some other, I've had some other things going on here, like a whole family thing happened. Um, so it's been challenging to get everything done and that includes getting the Wordslinger Podcast recorded. Um, but I'm here, I'm back at least today. Um, but one of the things that's come up in the author consultations that I thought would make a great topic, uh, it's a very basic marketing technique or marketing, um, strategy that I think gets overlooked all the time. Now, everyone I talked to, uh, asks marketing questions, they're always very focused on, you know, Facebook ads, uh, Amazon Ams ads, that sort of thing. You know, how do I handle I up my game and get people to buy my book wide or, you know, uh, just discover me and get on my mailing list. And the one thing that I've discovered that, that hardly anyone does is just ask for what they want.Kevin Tumlinson: 03:53 So if you have a mailing list, now, a lot of the VA, a lot of the authors I've talked to at all, you know, they only have like maybe a hundred people, some only have like 20 people on their list. Uh, some have 1500. It is, it's, it doesn't really matter what the size of the list is. But one of the things you should be doing regularly is engaging that readership with personable emails, which we've talked about in the past. When you want to become a human being to these people, you don't have to share personal, private details of your life, but you want to, uh, frame yourself as someone that they can, that they might enjoy knowing. You know, as someone you're having a conversation with. Um, and in these emails you should periodically ask them to share the, the links to get your free book or short story or whatever you're using to get people on your mailing list.Kevin Tumlinson: 04:47 Um, if you're not offering something, some top of funnel offer or incentive for authors to get on your mailing list, you need to come up with something. Um, I just talked to an author just now. I won't, I won't reveal who she was. I, she's, she's a little shy, but uh, she has a free novella. I have no a prequel. It wasn't an Avella cause it was like 75,000 words. So it was a full on book. She'll give that book away for free. She sells it, but she also gives it away for free. If you get on her mailing list a, but she created this a bonus content that was a, uh, sort of a like almost like, uh, an espionage case study kind of thing. Um, and uh, she offered that as a sort of, I'm sorry to her list for not having emailed him for a bit.Kevin Tumlinson: 05:35 And I, I told her to, to package that and offer that as an incentive for people to just get on the list in the first place. That's a great resource. So if you, if you could pull together a little things like that, just content people can't get anywhere else. Exclusive content for being on your mailing list that is attractive to a lot of readers. And, uh, it's also going to pull in the kind of readers that you want, the readers who are interested in this, this topic that you cover. You know, whatever your genre happens to be, um, who are willing to take an action, uh, which makes them much more likely to take the action of buying a book when you have one to promote to them. Now, um, email your list regularly, once a month at least. Um, and tell them it's perfectly okay with you if they share the links to get the free downloads.Kevin Tumlinson: 06:33 Say, ah, look, I am trying to reach as many readers as possible. You know, this is my dream. You can help me achieve my dream. If you share this link with everyone you know, everyone you think would be interested in reading, um, my kind of books and uh, and just do that every now and then. This is a, this should become a, a regular part of your author diet. Uh, you are going to go out and ask your readership and your platform to share, um, ways to get on your mailing list. The mailing list is where the money's at. It always will be. I'm convinced of this. It always has been for sure. So you want to nurture the mailing list before you try anything else. If you're, if you want to advertise and you're not making a lot of sales, I would advise you to advertise Facebook ads or otherwise.Kevin Tumlinson: 07:30 Um, well the focus on growing your mailing list rather than focusing on sales. Now Amazon's a little different. Uh, ams, the, you know, it's all internal. Um, I have my own opinions about Amazon ads, um, and uh, sort of the toll to play an idea. But um, you can do the same thing on Amazon ads. You can have a book that is, uh, geared towards, you know, for example, this author is pretty cool. This book is actually geared towards enticing people to get interested in the rest of her series. Um, I would heavily laden that with, um, you know, calls to action to get on her mailing list. Definitely a CTA to read through in the next book in the series. Definitely want that. But I would make sure that the call to action to get on the mailing list is front and center and then the Freebie that they get at that point should be like that bonus material or something that they can't get anywhere else.Kevin Tumlinson: 08:30 Cause what you don't want is for the author or for the readers to feel cheated to find out that they could have gotten this book. They just spent, you know, a couple of bucks on for free if they had gotten on your mailing list. So instead you're advertising this prequel or the first book in your series or whatever. Uh, definitely trying to promote, read through, but also trying, pushing, uh, to get people on your mailing list. Once they're on your mailing list, you get a whole lot of other options. Uh, you nurture that list in, you'll go far. So, um, so that is part of this ask. Um, you should also ask, asking is always this to me, it's a magical tool. Ask your readers how things are going, how are the, how, how are you liking the books? Take that feedback and learn from it.Kevin Tumlinson: 09:28 So if someone says to you, you know, I like the books, but there's a lot of typos. All right, well there's an area to focus on. You got to get better at editing. I like your books with the covers stink or I like your books. I really love the covers. You might get some positive feedback out of this, which is always good and always motivational. Um, and then, uh, ask you can ask them what you know for ideas. You can say, I'm trying to get more people to uh, to check out my books at the library. Right? Does anyone know any librarians I can talk to? Does anyone know any programs I can be involved in? Um, and you may be able to find this stuff with a Google search, but if you find this stuff through the people you're engaging with it, there's a bond that happens.Kevin Tumlinson: 10:17 So don't be afraid to ask your platform, um, to help you out and frame it that way. You can say, now you're, you should always focus on trying to give more than you get when it comes to your platform. And I'm using platform to encompass emails, social media conferences, you attend, whatever. But uh, you want to try to give more than you receive, right? So give out some free bonus stuff. Give out, you know, make sure you are engaging your, your email list with, uh, tales from wherever. If you're not personally comfortable sharing personal information, then share things about what you're reading, share trips that you're taking chair or not. You don't have to give people insight information about you're going to be out of town during such and such date. But you can come back and share photos, share history that you've learned. If you're a romance writer, share a, you know, funny romantic comedies that you've watched.Kevin Tumlinson: 11:17 Um, you want to share, share, share. You want to get these people to start thinking of you as a friend that they are willing to help. And then you periodically a, asked them to share with as many people as they can. Your link to get a download or whatever. Or, um, you're linked to by a renew, a preorder or buy a new release or something along those lines. And, and be, um, you asked them to buy this, softens that ask, ah, it's not a hard sell if you spent three months prepping to make it right or to even ask for it. Um, so there's an underlying philosophy here. It's something that it's part of, it's one of my sort of principles, right? That, um, you never get anything you'd [inaudible] you're going to, everything you get you have to ask for in one way or another, right?Kevin Tumlinson: 12:16 Even if you didn't intend to ask for it. So the phrase my grandfather used to use is, I never got to think, I didn't ask for, even if it was a punch in the mouth, which I always took to mean, you know, you, you get, you ask for everything you get out of life in one way or another, your reap what you sell, right? If you got punched in the mouth, you probably set that up somehow, even if you didn't sing or do anything to deserve it. You put yourself in these scenario somehow. Right? Um, and maybe that's not true. Maybe someone just randomly ran up and clocked you in the jaw. It, it's been known to happen. Uh, this is not victim blaming. This is personal responsibility, right? This is you deciding you're empowered rather than deciding everything has to happen to you. You, you are deciding, I am make things happen. When you think like that and you're willing to ask for what you want, you increase the odds of getting it.Speaker 4: 13:15 Yeah.Kevin Tumlinson: 13:15 So you may not get it every time, right? You may not actually get what you asked for. You may ask for something and you don't get exactly what you asked for. Uh, but maybe it comes close or maybe it goes off in a different direction and you decide you didn't want that anyway. You know, maybe you could change your mind, but getting used to and getting comfortable with asking, uh, will carry you much further. This is part of a whole bootstrapping idea by the way, that you can use this to promote yourself without having spend money. So that right there should make your ears perk up. So, uh,Speaker 4: 13:56 okay.Kevin Tumlinson: 13:56 There's a couple of concepts at play here and we talk about this often, but your first priority should be to build up your platform as much as possible. Your platform can be defined as, as your reach to a willing audience that that has a higher, that has higher odds of actually going out and purchasing your books. That's going to be your platform. Your mailing list is the biggest component of that platform. The more people you can get on your mailing list, who are sympathetic to you, who are vetted, uh, the better. So your goal there is you want to build a mailing list of people who, uh, who like the type of thing you write and are willing to part with money for it.Speaker 4: 14:38 Yeah.Kevin Tumlinson: 14:38 Which, you know, seems pretty basic and no brainer. And yet nobody, nobody, I'm not going to say that. A lot of authors don't think about it and they don't do what it takes to make happen. Um, so this is all kind of a mindset thing. I'll be honest, it's, it's all, it's all kind of go out and own your author career, right. Be empowered and empowered. People ask for what they want. The idea is to ask, ask, ask and play the numbers game increase your odds every time you ask your odds go up. Right? So that's what marketing is. Marketing is all about increasing the odds that the right person will find your book at the right time and make a purchase. That's what marketing is. Some people spend money to increase those odds. Some people don't. Some people do a mix of both. Um, I do a mix of both.Kevin Tumlinson: 15:37 Uh, but for the largest portion of my career I had, I only did free promotion stuff cause I only had $0 million to spin. So it's not impossible to market your work without money. It's not impossible at all. You, you don't need a budget to market. Uh, but money is uh, in a nice, interesting little reciprocal relationship with time. You are either going to spend time or you are going to spend money. Money is a shortcut. Money means you don't have to spend as much time and you can actually amplify your time with money. But that doesn't make it the end all be all of my marketing resources. That would be, um, your creativity. You know, because even if you have a budget, let's say that you've got $1,000 extra a month, you know, you sell cans or you or blood or, or you have a book income of thousand dollars or you, um, mow lawns on top of your regular job or something, right?Kevin Tumlinson: 16:40 You've just, somehow each month you've cobbled together an extra thousand a month that you can throw into an advertising or rather a PR I, um, marketing budget, I don't want to call it an advertising budget, cause advertising isn't always the right answer. Advertising can be the right answer, but it comes down to how are you going to spend that thousand dollars? What, how do you, how can you most efficiently spend that thousand dollars? And let's just say it's not $1,000. So let's say the best you're able to do each month is an extra hundred dollars. How do you spend it? Well, you know, you can't go do, um, in an elaborate Facebook ad campaign for 100 bucks a month. You can run Facebook ads for 100 bucks a month and you might even see some traction, but it, it, you need to assess, um, how best to apply those funds. If Facebook advertising is going to be the way to go, chances are you're going to need to figure out, um, the best way to funnel traffic from those ads into something that you can use.Kevin Tumlinson: 17:44 I would argue that at that point, the lower your budget, uh, the important it is to focus entirely on your mailing list. And I think that's just, that's just marketing life right there. In fact, with us, we, let's just engrave that in stone. The lower your budget, the more important it is to focus entirely on growing your mailing list rather than on direct sales. Because you can sell to that list over time. Once you have those people captured, you don't have to spend any more money to, to engage with them necessarily. I mean there are, there is some overhead in, you know, the email management systems, lots of tools out there to explore, to help keep the cost down. But in general, if you have a mailing list, you're not going to spend a ton of money, uh, to be able to remain in contact with them.Kevin Tumlinson: 18:38 Um, but you control that list, you control that group. I mean, if it came down to it, I don't advise this, but you could export that list and import it into a special Gmail account and email those people on blind. See, you know, blind copy, right? There's always going to be a way, I'm not always an advisable way, but at least there is a way, right? So, um, that's the, that's our new one of our new commandments. Well, maybe one day, I should write all these down actually, but that's one of our new commandments. This is lower your budget. The more your focus should be on building your mailing list, uh, and asking that list to help promote you to others is how you grow that list beyond having you spend money, right? So if you can only spend 100 bucks a month and you're focusing all, all of it on getting a couple of people on your mailing list here and there, then I'm asking them to go off and be advocates on your behalf.Kevin Tumlinson: 19:39 It's, that's the fastest way to grow without a bunch of overhead. It's a little bit like network marketing that I don't know if anybody in the audience has ever had this experience. I got approached by tons of people who did network marketing, Amway and things like that. I'm not saying I'm not going to pass any judgments on this. Uh, this practice. There are a lot of millionaires out there who built their millions through network marketing. So Kudos to you. Um, it was never quite my bag. However, the principle of it is pretty sound from a marketing perspective. Uh, I just think we take a different, more heartfelt approach than going out and blind recruiting, you know, hundreds of people to do our bidding and be in our, our downline or whatever they call it. Um, and here's how that would work. So you get, you get your readers to download your Freebie, you get on your mailing list and, and maybe they've even gone off and bought a book or two from you.Kevin Tumlinson: 20:43 And if you only have one book, you know, maybe they've bought your book, now you've, uh, you've enticed them to get on your mailing list, you've somewhat vetted them. And if you asked them to go off and share with just, you know, could you just go share with, say, I would always say everyone, you know, but even if it's just two people, if you could just get two people to sign up and get this Freebie, think of two people you like who might like it and enjoy this book or this bonus content or this short story and tell them, give them this link. You can share this email with them. And that's really when you want your emails to be on point, by the way. You want your emails to be, um, focused on, uh, being personable, engaging, asking questions, open loops. We call it, you want people to respond, right?Kevin Tumlinson: 21:36 Uh, but if you, I'm telling you, as you get people on your mailing list, people are, are really kind of wonderful if you ask for help and you frame it that way. Hey, I need your help. Okay, I need a favor. If that favor doesn't cost them any money, then there's a bigger chance that they're going to go ahead and do it. Uh, there's a book and I'm gonna pop over into a web browser real quick and try to remember what the, I know that the title is influence. Um, but I can't remember the author's name right now, so let me look that up. But you want to, you want to get your hands on this book, uh, influence science and practice. Is that it? No, the psychology of persuasion influence the psychology of persuasion. Uh, this is a written by Robert B and I think it's chill, chill, chill.Kevin Tumlinson: 22:31 Deany CIA, l. D. I. N I, um, pick up this book. Read this book, get it on any book. Get it on audible. Uh, wherever you like to, uh, consume your books. Uh, this is a, this is a good one. This is this, there are a lot of ideas in here that are very applicable to authors. One of the ideas was, um, people respond to and ask if you give them a reason, if you say, because, right? So, uh, I think, and I'm, I'm, I may butcher this, this example. So if you read the book and I'm completely off base, forgive me, it's been a bit, um, but they did a test with, um, people in line to use a copier and someone comes along and says, do you mind? Could I get, could I cut in front of you and use the, the copier because I have 10,000 copies to make or I have 10 copies to make.Kevin Tumlinson: 23:30 That's probably closer to what they actually said. Um, so what they found was when people did this and they gave a reason, no matter what that reason was, it, it increased the odds that the person would let them cut. So when you say to someone, um, would you mind sharing this email with everyone? You know, because I'm trying to build up my readership and it would really help me out. Okay. So now they get to be a hero. You're asking them to help you fulfill your dreams. I would even frame it that way if you wanted. I have a dream of being an author. This is the only thing I really want to do with my life. I love writing. I love, I'm so happy that you enjoy my books. Would you help me find new readers by sharing this with as many people as you can think of?Kevin Tumlinson: 24:24 Thank you so much. I'm so very grateful. And so now you're, you're coming to them hat in hand asking them to help you. You've got to get past the ego. But on this, by the way, don't think of this as begging or, or, or anything like that. Asking for charity. Uh, these people agreed to get on your mailing list because they were interested in what you had to say. They're interested in your book. They were interested in your Freebie. They voluntarily got on this list. You asking them to help grow. That list is not charity. It's just to, you know, two people interacting. We do this. The social contract allows us to do this all the time in our personal relationships. Stop thinking of your list as being a bunch of customers and start thinking of them as a bunch of friends of yours and your life is going to change for the better. I promise you start treating everybody on that list like, like you are so thrilled that they're there because you should be everyone on that list. They're more than just numbers. They're more than just the dollars. They represent their living, breathing human beings who care about you and showed it by getting on your list. Nelson, are there deadbeats on lists? Yes. Are there people who aren't going to respond positively no matter what you say or do? Yes. They're not your audience.Kevin Tumlinson: 25:49 They're welcome to leave that list. You have a special club that, uh, that this group belongs to and you want to treat them like that and remind them of it all the time. You are a, you are in and the exclusive, a company of, of wonderful human beings. And, uh, I am so happy you're here. I am your guide in this, in this, uh, community. Uh, but I, you know, I am a also a servant and if you could help me by spreading this around, you would make my dreams come true. People will respond very positively. Um, and the same thing can happen outside of your mailing list. It can happen on your social media, social media circles. But an interesting thing happens on social media. Uh, there's a kind of, uh, it's a little bit like high school. Like if you to say to your friends in high school, I could really use help in math.Kevin Tumlinson: 26:48 Uh, if you went to your friends individually and said that they, they would help you. But if you said that to your group of friends who are all equally trying to impress each other and build their own audiences and, or cliques, uh, you know, and promote themselves at the same time, chances are instead of being helpful and kind, they're going to be cruel and, and hurtful. They're going to make jokes, they're going to make light of it. Or even if they don't go to that extreme [inaudible] sorry about that. Hold on and to clear my throat. Um, even if they don't go to that extreme, they may just rib you and make fun of you a little out of kindness, you know, out of love, quote unquote. Um, just because a, they don't want to openly commit to anything cause they may get approached by others to do it or whatever. So it's the fact that they can be seen when you ask them. I think so you want to ask them more privately in, in an email newsletter is private. It feels like they're getting an email directly from you. So, uh, you can still ask for this stuff with social media and you'll oftentimes you will, you will get some help. But in my experience, it's much better to, uh, to approach your list. One second.Kevin Tumlinson: 28:11 I absolutely hate putting little gaps in there, but when my throat dries out and what can I do, I could edit, not going to do it. Um, anyway, we're coming up on time. Uh, just a couple minutes left. I, uh, I hope that this has been useful to you. Um, this is how I approach everything. And honestly, it's, it's worked so well for me. I, I don't spend much in advertising. Now. I have some promotions coming up that I do. I have spent money on. I have a $2,500 promotion coming up. Um, you know, August. Uh, I spend money on ads, you know, from time to time, not, not a lot, but then, you know, I spend money on BookBub's and I spend money on, uh, the various different, uh, uh, promotion tools. Um, and I, but I do it sort of sparingly and I do it experimentally.Kevin Tumlinson: 29:09 And, uh, I think I can say without a doubt that I get more traction out of, uh, out of this, this type of thing out of asking the more organic way of doing this. And it's more stable. It grows better over time. It does take more time. So don't, don't think this is an overnight kind of thing. Uh, but you can spend tons of money on ads and never see the needle move for sales. I would spend that money. I'd focus. If I were you and I did this, I would focus entirely on a, I'd focus a hundred percent of my efforts on building my list up and then only promoting to my list. Cause if you can get 50,000 people on your list, you know, and they all buy a book, that's great.Kevin Tumlinson: 30:00 So anyway, uh, that's going to do it for this week. I hope you got something out of it. I hope I'm able to give you an episode Friday, but just in case I'm not a, just be aware I'm doing conference stuff. So, uh, reach out if you want to. God bless and I'll see you next time. Hey, how are you doing on money? I know it's a touchy subject, but, uh, I got some that may help you out. See, I'm using an app called acorns and it helps me manage some investing. Uh, put some money back, get a little interest. It's Kinda nice to watch my money grow. So I want to share that with you. Go to kevintumlinson.com/acorns and you'll get some free money. See you there.

Islamic expansions, Campaigns, The Mongols, Muslim rulers, Sacred history, Historical objectivity, Orientalism, Hadith criticism   We touch on all of this with Hassam Munir.   Hassam Munir is currently pursuing an MA in Mediterranean and Middle East History at the University of Toronto. He is a research fellow at Yaqeen Institute. He has experience in the fields of journalism and public history, and was recognized as an Emerging Historian at the 2017 Heritage Toronto Awards.   Hosts : Tanzim & Rafael     Please email us your comments, feedback, and questions at: info@boysinthecave.com, and leave a review and 5-star rating on iTunes!   Check out our website - boysinthecave.com   Follow us on: Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/boysinthecave/   Instagram – @boysinthecave   Twitter - @boysinthecave   Become a Patreon today! https://www.patreon.com/boysinthecave   -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hassam's Online Visibility https://twitter.com/HassamM_ https://www.ihistory.co/ https://www.facebook.com/hassammm   ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shownotes Intro:                                   00:00:00             Tanzim:                              00:00:16 Welcome back to another episode of boys in the cave. My name is Tanzim and I'm joined by my cohost Rafael and alhamdullilah I'm joined by someone very special today. So Hassam Munir one year is the, is our special guest today and he is currently pursuing an MBA in Mediterranean and Middle East. History at the University of Toronto is a research fellow at Yaqeen Institute. He has experience in the field of journalism and public history and was recognized as an emerging historian as at the 2017 heritage Toronto awards. So Assalam Walaykum Hassan and welcome to boys in the cave. Hassam:                             00:00:52 Walaykum Assalam thank you so much for the invitation Tanzim:                              00:00:56 JazakAllah Khayr for uh coming on accepting our invitation and actually just doing some background research. I saw you were on, um, you've already done a few interviews, you know, you're in involved with Yaqeen institute, so how has your experience been just doing all that sort of stuff when it comes to, you know, putting your material out there even I'm, I've seen some blogs and articles that you've done as well. Hassam:                             00:01:19 Uh, yeah, absolutely. My entire, um, you know, reason for getting into the field of history has always been about just trying to make that knowledge more accessible because there's, you know, a lot of amazing research that's done at universities, uh, by independent researchers, even by some of the traditional, uh, traditionally trained Islamic scholars around the world. And, but it never sort of reaches the public in a way that they can, uh, you know, easily engage with it and learn from it and find inspiration in it. So I just tried to take information from some of these, you know, thick, dusty books in libraries and these journal articles that people generally will not find or go looking for and try to repackage that information and presented in a way that people, uh, are sort of, um, you know, there's a shock value to it that wow, is this also Islamic history? Is this also what Muslims have done or what Muslims have experienced? Um, and, uh, I think it makes for a much more, uh, thorough and, uh, a much more, uh, you know, appreciated understanding of, uh, who we are as Muslims and what our tradition is all about. Tanzim:                              00:02:28 Yeah. I think for sure starting from the very beginning of Islamic history, and I know this is something that a lot of your research has gone into, the kind of spread of Islam and the nature of that. Um, but one of the things that brought me to Islam was actually studying history. So I study history at University of Sydney and um, mashAllah, I was really, yeah, if you saw my marks, you wouldn't be saying that, but I have the low things. Everything's going all right so far. But I suppose one of the things that brought Rafael:                                00:03:00 me to Islam was my fascination with Islamic history. I remember when I was about 13 or 14 years old, I found this dusty old history textbook in the back of a library at school one day. And I just flipped through it cause it's always been my life. History has always been my passion and, and the thing I wanted to make a career out of. So I remember picking up this dusty old textbook and it had in the Islamic world to 1600 and I think I read that 10 page chapter about 150 times and I just couldn't take my eyes and my hands off it. It was the most fascinating thing I'd ever read. I obviously hadn't heard much about Islam growing up too in a, in a non Muslim family in the West. Um, but picking up this textbook, I was kind of entranced by Islam. Rafael:                                00:03:45 It's symbols and the early history and, and, and it's the way it kind of burst forth this tiny isolated peninsula, uh, that had been of little interest to anyone, uh, for, you know, the Romans, the Persians, no one really cared about the Arabian peninsula and, and, and especially the hedgers, um, and then how it spread to become this empire of science and, and culture, uh, being very important as well. So for people who aren't really aware of the beginnings of Islam and how it spread from sort of, you know, a very small group of Arab, um, and Abyssinian, uh, followers in a very isolated part of the world to kind of global religion that flourished from China all the way to the Pyrenees in France. Um, how did that, how did that happen and what were the sort of, you know, what was the sort of breakdown of, of that transformation? Hassam:                             00:04:48 Um, so that's obviously a very, very large complex question that people, um, you know, you could dedicate your entire life to studying it and people have and you only end up scratching the surface. Right? Um, there's many questions within that. Um, you're right in that it was an incredible, um, transportation, uh, sorry TransformNation I should say at the global level. And um, but it was very much, uh, the foundations were very much laid, um, during the lifetime of Prophet Mohammad. So Allahu la was sending himself. And this is something we sometimes, uh, you know, fail to recognize in this larger question of Islamic history and the spread of Islam, et Cetera, is that the principles and the values and, um, the precedents that were set by the profits of the law while they was selling them and his followers around him, um, have remained the, uh, consistently accessible source of inspiration for Muslims throughout history. Hassam:                             00:05:52 So obviously in this question we have many different questions about and um, Muslims conquering certain areas of the world, Islam spreading to certain areas of the world, uh, through other sort of factors and mechanisms such as trade, such as migration, such as intermarriage, such as influential people in different societies converting to Islam and their followers sort of following them into Islam. So there's these many different factors as well as the scientific production of the Muslims, you know, inheriting all this knowledge from the pre Islamic civilizations and developing it, uh, with the purpose of understanding, um, the creation of a loss of hunter who with Eila, and then also sharing it further back with other civilizations. So, you know, it's a very complex, there's so many angles that we can go on here on this question. But I think a key thing to keep in mind as a starting point is that it is the consistency of Islam that has been exceptional throughout history. Hassam:                             00:06:58 A lot of movement start, a lot of developments happen, a lot of new ideas and ideologies emerge in history. But over time, as they spread to different places, they become very drawn out. They become stretched in to the point that whatever you know, connection, um, whatever original source, uh, they had that brought it together initially. Um, it had become so different and so distant from that that it's almost like you have, you know, different ideologies and it's a completely different thing. But Islam has always been Islam and the core on obviously the authoritative source, the Sunnah of The Prophet SAW as the authoritative source. And the Islamic tradition. So well organized right from the very beginning. You know, the process through which Islamic knowledge was produced, that no matter where Islam went, whether it went to China, whether it went to South America, whether it went to Europe, whether it went to small islands in the Pacific, at different points in history, Islam could be practiced keeping those core principles and those core practices of the tradition intact while also taking whatever was acceptable in the local culture and local customs and bringing that into the way Islam was practiced. Hassam:                             00:08:16 And I think that's part of the beauty of our history. Rafael:                                00:08:19 One of the points I kind of wanted to touch upon fall was that that is certainly been the case. Um, I think certainly, I think probably from a later sort of time, a lot of people would argue that early Islamic history was actually quite fractured. Uh, you know, you had the kind of [inaudible] theological differences. For example, you had like my Teslas and Ashley's, which actually became a very political difference during the time of the manner. Uh, but you also had the kind of insurrectionists, uh, hardy. Jeez, you had the [inaudible] movements and then you had the Condo of Tanzim:                              00:08:56 Plethora of impious Caliphs who didn't really seek to do anything except for advanced their own position. So how, how did you know, how does that sort of fit into the understanding that Islam was traditionally maintained to? Because even people say that motel z lights, like if it didn't get backing from the government, then we would have all been from the Airbus. Yeah. From, from [inaudible]. That's where the issue comes is like, do we truly have that, um, tradition intact and are we really, um, continue that tradition that we see from whistle whistle some or was it kind of dictated by the governments or the powers of the time? Hassam:                             00:09:37 Um, if, you know, it's a point that can be argued. Um, and I think there are some arguments, uh, you know, good arguments that could be made on, um, many different perspectives and approaches to how we answered this question. My argument would be that there has still, uh, been that consistency, um, relative to the way that other ideas, other, uh, worldviews, ways of understanding the world have spread throughout history. Within Islam, there has still been that a consistency and still been that, um, regular, um, you know, consistent reference back to the original sources. So yes, there have been many different movements. Um, there have been many different understandings as there continued to be today. Many, you know, accepted and many non accepted differences of opinion. Um, and I think, you know, once again it speaks to diversity, um, that is possible within the Islamic tradition and how, um, sort of Islam can respond to different contexts and different, um, you know, situations without using its essential reality. Hassam:                             00:10:47 Um, but at the same time I would argue that that consistency has remained. Yes, there were very, uh, you know, um, very pronounced sort of differences between people, uh, practicing Islam or claiming to practice Islam in different ways and different forums. Um, and it's, sometimes it is very clear when, um, they seem to have really pushed the boundaries of what we can consider the Islamic tradition. But I would still argue that there has been, um, this, you know, I think historically speaking from a historical lens, the fact that, um, even today a Muslim from Siberia and Russia can travel, um, and find a must Jude in sub Saharan Africa, in west Africa and go inside the Messenger and they wouldn't need an introduction to what they have to do. The fact that they know that they're do certain things that they have to do, the fact that they know where to stand for the prayer, what is being recited, et Cetera, all of these things, um, the fact that we can expect that to be a normative case, I think that is a very exceptional thing about the Islamic tradition within human history. Because rarely, extremely rarely, and to be honest, I wouldn't, um, find any comparable example of that level of, uh, shared, um, you know, core principles, values, beliefs and practices, um, in any other worldview that has existed and spread so far in the world, uh, throughout Islam, throughout human history, I should say. Rafael:                                00:12:21             I would certainly agree with that in the sense that Islam was maintained, uh, from a very early, from a very, very early time in kind of this understanding of traditional knowledge and knowledge of the tsunami that that was, uh, transmitted through various teachers to all the teachers who kept the, the traditional life. Um, and you know, we still have preserved aspects of the early foundational takes of Islamic law for example, um, that have been authentically transmitted and we still use them as a source today. And I don't think that there are really, as you mentioned, any other major religious or cultural traditions that can claim that. But one of the points I really wanted to ask you about was how did religion inform the early conquests of the Muslim empires, particularly? Um, the one that, that first springs to mind, and it was probably the most significant, was the, uh, defeat the invasion and defeat of both the Byzantines empire. Rafael:                                00:13:19 So the Roman Byzantines in Syria and the Persians, cause everyone understand sort of that Muslims defeated the Persians and the Romans. It was always that prophecy with, uh, I'm fairly sure a full loss of la La Hello. Someone mentioned that, you know, the two great empires and pals of the time would be defeated by the Muslims and people kind of laughed at that, but then eventually they did. But how, how did religion inform those movements? So some people would certainly claim that it was a, a kind of Muslims were implored to go out militarily and expand the empire. Was it, was it, was that the case or was it more kind of, I've also heard people say that it just so happened that the Muslims became embroiled in conflicts with these two powers and then, uh, consequently they, those two powers were defeated by Muslim armies and hence Muslims occupied the lands. Hassam:                             00:14:16 Um, so, you know, one of the things I always like to, you know, emphasize in my research, um, for most topics in Islamic history or history in general, is that we often seek, um, very straightforward sort of, uh, you know, simple answers to extremely complicated situations. If we take the life of one individual, whether today or a thousand years ago, if I take my own life and why I make my decisions, how I make my decisions, how my decisions impact my environment, how am I environment responds and impacts my further decisions? It's a very complicated process regardless of what my, uh, stated, uh, purpose, what my stated inspiration might be. Right. So that's one thing to keep in mind, not to say that this isn't a question that needs to be discussed, but I think that's very important to keep in mind before we jump into that discussion. Hassam:                             00:15:12 Now you mentioned the two sort of primary, uh, you know, commonplace perspectives on this question. I think, um, the latter one is more, you know, the, the, the perspective which says that the Muslims, um, became embroiled in the, uh, you know, the political developments in the region. Um, I think that one is just a bit more, um, you know, leaning towards d, You know, a reasonable interpretation of the sources we have available. Let me put it that way. But at the same time, there was this, uh, you know, this impetus, right? There are, these are Heidi from the profits of the law who leu was along himself that predict these, uh, particular conquests of the Byzantines and assassinate Persians, um, in particular and also Islam reaching particular places. So initially I think the most reasonable explanation is that initially during the life of the profits of the law, who, while he was selling them and his early successors, what the idea was that, um, the message of Islam had to be communicated and in cases where there were, um, limitations on the communication of that message. Hassam:                             00:16:35 Um, and you know, part of the communication of that message was the political situation of the Muslims because from the perspective of people in the Byzantine Empire, indecisive and empire, um, they recognize this suddenly emerging threat just because of how, um, fast Islam spread in the Arabian peninsula itself. Right? So for them it was this serious threat. It wasn't the Muslims, like, you know, a fly sort of going and landing on their nose and them trying to like swat it away or something that initially caused these things, but they recognize Islam and we have a Heidi's and narrations that, you know, tell us to that effect as well that they were concerned. And for example, um, you know, when I was Sophie on, uh, before he embraces Islam, he goes to Syria on a trade mission, a heraclitis. He actually, you know, gives him a little interview about who is this person [inaudible] then he's asking all of these questions because they need this information. Hassam:                             00:17:33 So it wasn't a Muslim, you know, insurgency into these empires that started these conflicts initially. Um, there was this, um, idea on, you know, the end on the side of the Muslims within the understanding and the worldview of the Muslims. And this was normative at the time, um, that they had to communicate this message and this worldview and they had to brush aside some of the impediments. Right. But at the same time, you know, on the other side, there was this more political, um, perspective on the situation that this is an emerging sort of regional power and we have to respond to it. So oftentimes you'll find the Roman armies coming two words Arabia rather than the Muslims going to words Roman controlled sham first. Right? So again, it becomes a very complicated situation once the Muslims have actually established their rule there. And even the conquest, I mean, the word conquest is very broad and very easy to use to explain, um, wary complex events again, but not all places were militarily conquered. Hassam:                             00:18:44 Some places, uh, the Muslim armies were actually welcomed by the local people because they were seen as liberator's from more oppressive rulers who had ruled in that region before. Right. And in some places there were treaties made, there was no conflict, there were treaties made, and then the Muslims receded and went back, et cetera. So there were all these different types of scenarios that played out in different situations. Yes, there's no denying. And I think Muslims sometimes do go, you know, overstep when it comes to denying that there was a, a military and there was a violent aspect to the conquest at times. But when you see, for example, you know, one of my favorite examples is business insider. This online blog. Um, they had this animation that they posted a few years ago on Facebook, which shows the spread of different religions and you know, they show when it comes to Islam, obviously it quickly, this little green splotch on the map emerges and you know, around the year six 22 and then it just explodes and spreads all over North Africa, Asia, everything is everywhere all of a sudden. Hassam:                             00:19:55 And the fact too, I think the important thing to really recognize here is that the spread and the movement of Muslim armies can't be equated with the spread of Islam itself. Because the real question here is many historians will recognize that yes, it was normative for one people to conquer another people than for different particular localities. There'll be under one empire, then there'll be under another empire. And this was how the premodern world, um, worked. Right. Um, but the real problematic question is that well, were all those people then forced to convert to Islam at the point of the sword when those armies actually got there and what these maps and these animations kind of, uh, mislead people into thinking is that just because the Muslim armies within a hundred years had reached Spain and had reached the of China and all these places? You know, even at the time in many places in Arabia, Islam hadn't been established in the sense that the majority of the population was Muslim, much less anywhere outside the Arabian peninsula. Hassam:                             00:20:59 And obviously that's a different question, you know, all together about how did Islam actually spread the pace of it, the mechanisms and factors involved. But I think the key thing to keep in mind is that yes, the reconquest yes, at times that were violent at times of are nonviolent, but the conquest themselves do not represent the spread of Islam or the imposition. The forced imposition of Islam on to any of the conquered peoples and such conquests were normative at the time. And when we speak of them, we're speaking of them not in a prescriptive sense, not in the sense that Muslims today have to get up and replicate that situation, but as a historical phenomenon in a descriptive sense that yes, this happened, we're not going to deny it and we're going to take the relative, uh, lessons that we can from it. Uh, from a historical perspective. Rafael:                                00:21:49 Well, you mentioned that there's historians who have the opinion that by the nature of empire empires to expand like they're with you. I don't think you can ever name an empire in history that was content with its influence. It always wanted to grow its influence and, and grow its wealth and its, and prestige of the dynasties that ruled it and so forth. I think someone asked me, Hassam:                             00:22:10 sorry, one thing I'd just like to mention briefly about empires. I think another thing to keep in mind is that there's a lot of, um, you know, anti imperialism sentiment and anti imperialism, movements, et cetera. Uh, nowadays and many people, um, including myself and others, we've sort of learned in an environment where, you know, imperialism is taught to be a very bad thing. But again, from an intellectual perspective, um, we do have to ask questions about, you know, speaking about the expansion of empires as this really horrible thing that occurred in history. And yet, even today, you know, we continue to live in a world that has empires in different forums. There are multinational corporations that exploit people. Um, there are, you know, foreign policy infants, Rafael:                                00:22:57 Susan wanted states governments and was it any different from an empire? Hassam:                             00:23:01 Exactly. They function essentially to the detriment of conquered peoples. They function exactly like pre-modern empires and we continue to benefit even those of us who claim to be against imperialism. We continue to benefit the clothes. We wear, the food we eat, the cars we drive, we benefit from, you know, the suffering of people who are, uh, having these, you know, imperialist ambitions imposed on them without their free will. So I think we have to interrogate ourselves and keep that in mind as well. Um, that before we, you know, step back and start to judge everyone in history for everything they've done. How do those practices continue today and how do we allow those practices to continue and benefit? Yeah. Rafael:                                00:23:42 The kind of subtle empire that, that, you know, alludes our kind of gaze now. But we somehow manage to criticize a every other empire in history. It's, it's strange, isn't it? I mean, you don't have to look very deep to see the, uh, the empires that are at play that the empires were playing the game of chess in the world at the moment. Um, does even, you know, like tributaries and puppet rulers that are established nowadays that are exactly the same as what happened to our history. Exactly the same thing. But I think it's different words, different, different words, different definitions. And this called, we call it something else. Yeah. It's like they're trying to put fancy meanings to those words in order for us to look as if we're smarter and better. No, we've, we've progressed. Yeah. We're on. Yeah. We've politically reminder. Well, that's not exactly true. Rafael:                                00:24:32 The same ideas as back in those times. I actually wrote Hassan a major essay about the expansion of Islam. And um, I answered the question about how is whether Islam was spread by the sword exactly the same as kind of how you mentioned that understanding of the empire being the kind of political system and empires by their nature expanding. And so I said, if you believe that the empires, uh, that did expand in the name of Islam, we're acting Islamically then the real question is actually not did the Muslim empires expand, but was the expansion of the Muslim empires the kind of religiously correct way or the religiously correct manner and more important than that? What did that expansion actually mean? Like you mentioned, uh, the, the misconception that Muslims were forced to convert. It was even, it was even less than Muslims, uh, that, sorry, that normal, some populations were not forced to convert in on my ad times. I actually read that they didn't like, uh, conversions as much and basically they still levied the GCR, which was the, um, tax for the religious tax against certain new converts to Islam from Persian and Christian backgrounds. Such was the discouragement of conversions because the early or Maya the elite didn't really want the, or didn't really consider the need for their actual populace to become Muslim. Is that, is that true? How, how accurate is that? Hassam:                             00:26:05 Um, well, based on all of the sources I've encountered, um, that's exactly right. You know, for the [inaudible] situation in particular at much of that earlier, you know, quick expansion of Islam from Spain to China that we're talking about did you know, occur in d omega yet period between sort of the six sixties and the seven 50, that century was when most of that expansion occurred. Um, and you know, again, from the sources I've, uh, come across and sort of engaged with it is exactly that, that the, uh, as a matter of policy, um, they liked to, um, sort of, uh, keep de non Muslim populations as they were and actually actively discouraged conversion. And you know, this was for one because it wasn't any kind of, um, you know, this was much easier for the conquered populations to accept because it almost became a sort of, um, secularized expansion. Hassam:                             00:27:05 Right. It is just another empire divorced from the worldview that these particular people stand for. Yes, they might believe in it, but they often, you know, the Muslim conquerors, they wouldn't even live in those cities that they conquered. They would have their own little settlements just outside the city, et cetera. And this is how some of the biggest cities that we know of in the Islamic world, such as Cairo, right, was formed. There was an existing city and there was a Muslim settlement of the Muslim forces outside that city. And slowly the two of them, you know, came together and formed this enormous metropolis in Egypt. Right. And, and so there wasn't, um, that sort of active and in the early stages, a not even, um, Darwalla for example, right? Not even invitation to Islam. So all of this was an, we have to slow down the pace and look at it. Hassam:                             00:27:52 This was an extremely gradual process. The Amelia is in particular coming back to their policy. They loved the fact that, um, they could, um, extract the, uh, GCI in some cases it was the GCO which was the, the payment, um, required from the non Muslim population, um, in exchange, uh, for protecting dem, offering protection to them. Um, and, and, and sometimes it wasn't GCO, sometimes other forms and other forms of tribute and other forms of, um, you know, payment. And we're also established and for the conquered people, this was often nothing new, the same kind of attributes that they had paid to rulers in the past and oftentimes much easier on them than what they had paid to, uh, you know, would it be the Romans or the Persians or whoever that particular, um, pre Islamic ruler happened to be. Um, and again, it's just a, you know, it's almost, you know, silly to keep saying this, but at the same time it's just, you know, baffling how often in our discussions we don't keep in mind how complex this movement is. Hassam:                             00:29:04 Again, like I mentioned, and that's why I like to mention this previously one persons, um, decisions are so complicated. Now imagine the decisions of thousands of people as a, you know, and their interactions and the environment they build and how their environment affects them, et cetera. So in the Umayyad case as well, there is this particular environment where they were encouraging expansion. They love the Jessia and it was during the Ommaya time. I think that, um, the leadership really started to behave like, uh, the pre Islamic, uh, sort of rulers and, uh, you know, in I'm one article of way building, you don't have pirate builders and kings and extracting tribute for and expanding their empire for the sake of just having to claim to this enormous land, et cetera. And when you actually look at it and you know, look at their policies about whether they were trying to convert people to Islam, that wasn't the case at all. And it seems like it almost wasn't a priority for them. Rafael:                                00:30:03 Yeah. I've even heard commentators and historians referred to the [inaudible] and even the ambassador, uh, qualify as being almost comparable to secular rulers in the sense that some of them were even nominally Muslim. Hassam:                             00:30:18             I would see lots of examples. Yeah. Rafael:                                00:30:21 That, that they really had no interest in imposing a quote unquote state religion. And that religion didn't even inform the kind of laws that they often, you know, mandated the Baitullah mother. Didn't I have the like, wasn't that sort of things like that sort of justify that they were, you know, um, religiously inclined if some of them were definitely religious, Saint Klein, for example, Amada monopolies eas, no one can really doubt the piety and genuine faith of California would have been Abdelaziz, but there were 100%. There were, there were, um, Caliphs who had very little to do with any kind of religious, uh, promotion in terms of the populace. However, I think this is something that's a distinction. There were kind of creations of Islamic, uh, culture at the time that were done. So not to promote Islam in the society, but to kind of display the prestige on and the glory of the rulers themselves. Would you, would you say, would you say that's correct? Hassam:                             00:31:21 Um, I would say that's absolutely correct. I mean, if we look at, again, you know, the best, uh, of examples of Muslim leadership, um, the profits of the law while he was sending them, there were no, um, you know, just look at the, any of the descriptions of his own mosque during his time. Right. Um, and, uh, you know, just built of, um, very, uh, basic form of sort of raw materials, et Cetera, whatever it was locally available. And then you see examples of even when these Islamic Empire had considerably expanded, um, like during the time of, uh, automotive, no hotdog, but at the Ella Hawaiian, you see the example of, for example, the Roman ambassador coming to Medina and finding him just laying sort of in the dirt outside of Dumbest Shit, right? So you find all of these examples of their, um, a, of their, of their simplicity, not their powerlessness, but their, and not a false, uh, sort of, uh, you know, management on display of humility. Hassam:                             00:32:25 But they're genuine simplicity because they're, they were investing their time and energy elsewhere. And oftentimes in what you see in the later kings is you'll see these, um, grand, a sort of structures that are to establish their own prestige, um, and sometimes even the prestige. So sometimes it's a mix of boats such as the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, right by, um, uh, I've done [inaudible] given that amount of wine who was considered the first empire builder, one of the early, uh, [inaudible] k lifts. Um, but it does become about, you know, Thrones and glittery buildings. And my favorite example from Islamic history is really the, the Taj Mahal. Right? Um, and you see this building, which had really, you know, obviously it's making a lot of money for India today and has for a very long time, but considering the fact that it, there is considerable evidence that it actually, um, you know, brought down to some extent the economy of the Mughal empire at the time, um, complete, you know, waste and for what? Right. And representing what exactly. So, uh, there were, um, many examples I think where rulers did pursue policies and they did pursue projects that had very little to do with Islam and you know, really took a heavy influence from um, what they saw kings and rulers and other parts of the world and those that came before them. Rafael:                                00:33:52 If you are sort of a, an untied this to my audience, if you are sort of a practicing brother or sister and you do want to look into Islamic history and you want to kind of a judgement for which you want you to look into this standard note, that's one of it. If you want to kind of standard through which to understand many of the rulers look at what the great polymer, uh, wrote about many of the governments of the time and the relationship between the ultimate and the government. [inaudible] was very critical. Uh, I only throw him a love was very, very critical of the Omi ed policy towards non Arab Muslims. Um, in my, Malik had a very fractured relationship with the, the government that even culminated in him, him being tortured. I think at some point, three out of the foyer, memes were locked in jail or tortured by rulers. Rafael:                                00:34:42 Right. So if you want to understand how these rulers generally operated in relation to the religion itself, all you need to do is look at the relationship between side and the receipt with the Turkish government. Yes. Some next level stuff that he did, like he got abandoned. You're exhausted and you know, the stuff they wrote in the process and got Gerald and like nor even just like back in those times, but even the, um, recent times they were secular rulers to the Kemalists editor split. The understanding though that, that what has often happened in the name of the Islamic Empire is very different from what the people who are most knowledgeable in terms of the religion would have preferred or what, what they were actually directly calling for. How does the sort of expansion of Islam as an empire compared to other empires directly? For example, people might look, I often used to draw comparisons, the Mongol Empire, which is also a really important example for Muslims because, uh, the Mongols with us kind of scorge of Islam who obviously sacked Baghdad, they killed more Muslims than I think have ever been killed by any other foreign army. A lot of people thought that the Mongols were even your, uh, your agenda. My George [inaudible] was so dramatic and terrible for the Muslims. Um, I don't think many of us would understand how bad it was. Uh, but then they converted to Islam. Three out of the four Mongo is converted to Islam. But yeah. In terms of the expansion and the influence that Islam was able to have on societies compared to say what the Byzantines were able to do, what assassinated Persians were able to do, how does it compare? Hassam:                             00:36:29 Um, well, you know, Ma, every, you know, empire can be a unit of study in itself. Right. And in, in your sort of, within that context, what was going on and, but then the time period during which that empire existed, what was going on? Um, I think in terms of military, um, or even non military, um, you know, just the spread of an empire's influence, um, Islam, uh, or the Islamic empire. Um, I think first of all, we should, uh, interrogate that term itself. What we mean by Islamic Empire because as you've heard us discussing many of these empires while Dever led by Muslims and, um, primarily, um, uh, you know, had Muslim populations, um, as a matter of policymaking. And when it come to some of the, uh, officiating, no empire business, um, it wasn't too much inspired by actual Islamic teachings, right? So we have particular empires such as the who may yet such as the basset such as the later on, you know, that started joke send the mum Luke's and um, the song gay and the Sokoto in West Africa and you know, more of a reds in, in Spain and in many parts of the world, the moguls in India, et cetera. Hassam:                             00:37:46 Right? So we have all of these different empires. Initially, if we're talking about the initial expansion of Islam and I guess during the Omega Dynasty when most of what we now consider the core Muslim lands were, you know, um, unified, uh, at least nominally under one leadership, you know, the, you may it leader who had his seat in Damascus, in Syria. I think, um, in terms of the expansion, there really is no, um, comparison, right? Um, there really is no comparison in terms of the expansion itself of how fast that expansion was other than, and again, we're talking about the movement and expansion of the Muslim armies here. And I think the one exception would be the Mongols. The Mongols are the only sort of comparable the Roman empire. While we do talk about how enormous it was and how influential it was and how many different parts of the world are touched. Hassam:                             00:38:48 Um, we have to look at the scale here. So when the Mongols were just looking at, um, you know, a few decades for most of the expansions in the early Muslim empire, but just looking at a few decades, right. And the Romans had expanded considerably. Um, but their expansion generally was more drawn out over time. So it took a lot of time for these expansions to, um, you know, the empire to expand and then maybe a rebellion, so cave in a little bit and expand further, et cetera. Um, but again, in terms of, um, cultural, when it comes to cultural influence, then we're looking at a different set of criteria. So in that sense, for example, even the Greeks, the Athenian Empire, right? And we have to remember that the people who introduced democracy where themselves and imperialist people, right? If Damien it was a city, but they expanded and they were an empire, they have all the characteristics, right? Hassam:                             00:39:42 Um, they were expansionist, um, they had a huge influence even though are in terms of what they controlled and how far their influence reach two different questions or influenced reach enormously far. Um, but what they controlled was actually not very much. So these, all of these different variables we can play around with. Um, you know, maybe we can come back a bit to the Mongo question in particular. Um, I think the difference was that there is no comparison. Obviously there's a comparison between the timescale and the sort of, uh, area over which the expansion occurred. But I think there's no comparison in the sort of brutality of the Mongo conquest. They were much more, um, from all of the historical sources. And that's also something worth interrogating because we paint the Mongols as sort of like these I, you know, including into Muslim community, but many people who are more or less familiar with history in general like this unparalleled, you know, sometimes like the only people, you know, oftentimes you'll see the Mongo as compared to our, like the Nazis or something. Hassam:                             00:40:50 Like these are the worst of the worst. Like how bad could it possibly get right. Um, but the Muslim conquest were not as disruptive. They were not as destructive. They were not as, um, not nearly as wild Lindt in terms of, um, just the amount of people, um, killed. And the amount of infrastructural damage caused as a Mongo conquest were. And I think there is that interesting question. Right? And then the Mongo conquest, we're further, so there was that aspect among was for much more violent. Um, and the other aspect is that the Mongols within a few generations, as you mentioned, wherever they had expanded to the assimilated into the local culture and customs and religion, et Cetera, three of the four Mongo cognates as you mentioned, embraced Islam. Um, and in, in China they embrace Buddhism, etc. So they sort of assimilate it locally. Hassam:                             00:41:46 Um, and so that's the two distinctions and that was, makes the early Muslim conquest really exceptional where the Muslims, yes, they did obviously take on a local sort of, um, you know, uh, cultures and things of that sort. But their essence, as we mentioned at the beginning of the podcast, um, the essential, um, values and practices of the people remained intact, um, as well as not having to be nearly as violent to achieve the same amount of expansion in a very similar time scale. So I think that's what really makes what the early Muslim conquest so exceptional even when compared to the Mongol conquest. Tanzim:                              00:42:26 Is it true that a halo people say these spy, it's like three quarters of the world's population are descendants of gangs, car recorders. I don't think it's true or something like that. Why isn't there like a stat like that? I don't know how much the truth is it cause my mom's made a name, he's cons. So I'm just thinking am I descendant of gangs Connersville on because I've got explained to, Hassam:                             00:42:51 there's a lot of fake cons out there. Um, I often have a conversation with people, um, the, by stewing people of, of, you know, um, Northwestern Pakistan and Afghanistan, right. And, and the name con is very common amongst them. Um, and they've allowed this very, you know, aggravated conversation about real cons and fake cons, et Cetera, as I need to be in that conversation. But, um, I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. Um, you hear different is definitely okay. Let me tell you, this is definitely not three quarters. Um, I can, I'm pretty sure I'm not like, you know, very familiar with the field of genealogy and whatever science has attached to it, but I'm pretty sure it's not that. Um, but, um, you know, and, and descended from gangas con personally, um, it's, it's, it's a trope, right? And whenever you encounter all of these tropes that are almost accepted as a fact, we have to be really careful about how we talk about it. Hassam:                             00:43:51 Even in a casual conversation. It just, again, as part of this picture of how horrible the Mongols were, how horrible Kangaskhan personally was, gang has gone as at whatever crimes he may have initiated during his leadership. Kangaskhan has a very interesting life story and if you actually read about his life and read about his interests and, um, you know, tried to get a more historical understanding of his personality. He's a very interesting person. He wasn't just some brute from out of nowhere. And I think especially in the Muslim community, we have to recognize this, right? And a lot of what happened to Muslims during the Mongo conquest, the Muslims have to take their fair share of the blame, not just what they were doing, you know, like centuries before and how they were declining and they weren't prepared for the Mongo conquest. But even the decisions taken on the spot where such sometimes you read about it and it's baffling how blind and arrogant could you be to just brush off this threat to, despite knowing that, you know, the city next door had just been completely ruined and raised by this army. Hassam:                             00:45:00 And then they come to your door and you decide to talk up to them and, and you know, be arrogant and not only get yourself, you know, basically finished, but also the innocent people who, whose leader you were, who you were sort of representing their right. So, um, I think again, my main focus, like I think every point it becomes an idiotic to end off every sort of point I make with, it's more complicated than we want it to seem, including the life of Ganglias Con, the Mongo conquest, and literally any topic, right? So whatever topic, people are most interested in it, pick it up, but then make sure you're not just scratching the surface, tried to go a bit deeper and you'll find that there's much more to learn and appreciate. Rafael:                                00:45:40 Yeah. I think quite simply as opposed to complex. I think that the beheading of the Mongol ambassadors by the Horace Smith, um, was it the suit? Yeah, the horrors. Mid Emmy was probably one of the most significant events in Islamic history. It was one of the worst decisions is basically reversing the last 500 years. So basically the Mongol ambassadors came to the Muslim empire and um, it was quite a friendly kind of invitation, like, oh, hey, you know, where the Mongols were in charge of China now. Yeah. I would have just coming up into your Facebook sup, you know? Yeah. In the DM. Hassam:                             00:46:19             I mean, it was an invitation for, Rafael:                                00:46:20 yeah, it was then the corpsmen. Yeah, Hassam:                             00:46:23 hi. Rafael:                                00:46:27 Yeah. And the Mongols invaded Persia and just completely just destroyed the place and the civilization there. Well, it didn't really recover too. You know, it's pre Mongol, Gloria, and they say that often when you talk about the Islamic Golden Age, a lot of people trace the decline of the Islamic golden age to the Mongol invasions. Though I don't necessarily agree with that personally, but it's one point that, you know, has been mentioned. But Tanzim:                              00:46:55 in terms of just unbusy with talking about more about expansions and stuff, I wanted to kind of, uh, direct the conversation to sort of the early civil wars in Islam that existed. So they sort of were pivotal, you know, it's very pivotal because even it's the reason why we have sectarian divide, right? The Sunni and Shia divide and are most specifically, I just wanted to hone in on, you know, the events of early Rodney on who and warrior rather than on who. So would you be able to, you know, we, so the, the narrative, there's one narrative Twitter, right? So the narrative is that, you know, I'm more, we are already on who was like terrible person and you know, just, I went against the Ali Rodney on, on who and um, divisions happened. And that's why I think the, she is cases, right. The SUNY case is more like was taking a step back because you know, while we all wrote down on who had his own issues, he had an [inaudible] who had his own issues he had. Tanzim:                              00:47:55 And a lot of the scholars say that, you know, you get rewarded for your each to hat even though if it's from a sincere place, that sort of stuff. But um, that's more coming from the scholars. Right. So those are the opinions of our scholars and we sort of taken on board. But in terms of a historical sort of point of view, would you be able to shed some light on that event in particular because it would be interesting to gather thoughts and even how you would come to conclusions or how scholars would come to conclusions about in regards to what makes like what exactly happened? Cause I heard the sources aren't the strongest either. I think that this is probably the most complex of things that you're going to have to answer. I'd love love to, yeah, just even scratch the surface would be really good. Hassam:                             00:48:39 Right. So, um, I'll start off with a quick story. Um, I had a new professor when I was doing my undergraduate degree. This was an introduction to Islamic history, sort of introductory class. And I had a professor and, um, he was teaching this class and he was a Muslim. Right. Um, and, uh, you know, there's obviously non Muslims in their class. There's there, so neon Sheol, Muslims in the class. Um, it's, it's sort of a, a mix as it is in universities. And, um, he was a, you know, because he was discussing early Islamic history, he had to at least do one, uh, you know, um, lecture on this particular, uh, topic of this early Islamic history. And, you know, um, it's, it's thrown around in the room. The bomb was not thrown around because it was very introductory and, and we'd be surprised, you know, a lot of people, um, uh, you know, we see these discussions on Twitter and other places and very heated discussion. Hassam:                             00:49:39 And I'll admit to you, when I was, uh, you know, I have close a, she are friends and grew up together. And when we were very young, we used to like, you know, even as teenagers like go back and forth with these very, in hindsight, it's like that was the biggest waste of my time. And so nonsensical because I didn't know what I was talking about and neither did he. And yet we were having these heated conversations, right? Um, and we're still good friends, but I think so with the professor at the end of the class and during the class, you could notice and it was visibly others looking around. He was confusing some of the people in the class, he was sweating, right? And it wasn't a climate controlled room and everything like that, but he is sweating. And at the end of the class when it's done, he's actually wiping his brow and wiping the sweat off his face. And he said, you know, you guys might noticed, Speaker 5:                         00:50:28 um, this is not just as a Muslim, regardless of, you know, there's this idea that historians have to be objective. But this word objectivity is so problematic because nobody is ever truly objective. We all have certain values and beliefs and principles that we stand by, regardless of what the information presented to us is. Right. Um, we will have to try to be fair, but whether we can actually ever really be objective, whether we try or not is a separate question altogether. And he said, you know, for me, I'm an academic, I taught you from an academic perspective, but this is secret history. This isn't just history for me. This is sacred history. And for many of the people in this room, this is sacred history, right? So when we're talking about this particular, um, question, and I think the reason why there's so much heated debate on it and why passions are so high whenever this topic comes up, um, like you said is probably the most difficult question I'll have to ask, you know, discussing this podcast. Hassam:                         00:51:28 Um, it is because it's sacred history for all of the different, um, sort of sides, for lack of a better term, who were involved right now coming to the actual question from a historical perspective. Um, I think in this case, um, most historians, whether they are, um, you know, more traditionally, uh, trained like Islamic scholars who specialize in history, like for example, in Canada, here we have, uh, [inaudible], um, who did a very, I thought it was an incredible series of lectures, you know, nearly I think eight hours of lectures just on this particular topic on the question that we asked. So we have those scholars and then obviously the academic historian, some of them are Muslim, some of them are non Muslim. So you have these three broad categories, um, more or less, they all go back to the same sort of sources, right? They'll all go back to the, um, such as a 30 hot tub buddy and some of these more, uh, recognize and authoritative sources of early Islamic history, right? Hassam:                         00:52:37 Like [inaudible], Wendy high some of these books. And so you'll find that the narrative itself of the events, what event led to what and what happened when et Cetera is very similar across the three categories, right? Um, but when it comes to interpretation and explanation, that's when the differences occur, right? Between the three groups. So how do you, this particular event happen? How do you interpret it? Right? And obviously for the Islamic scholars, the interpretation focuses on how do you, uh, take the relevant lessons, the moral lessons, right. Something you can apply to your own life from this particular situation. So there's obviously an entire to go into Hassam:                             00:53:26 their, you know, the battle of, uh, I mean starts, I think that we took precursor to that starts right during the life of the profits of the law. We send them. What was the relationship of the profit with these particular people involved, such as, um, Emam earlier the allot one who was actually seeding are out of the allot wine. What was the particular relationship, um, as well as the other personalities such as Amato, even yesod let the last one for example. Um, and moving forward, how did you know the entire is sort of narrative about what happened at [inaudible] immediately after the profits of the law, whether he was an passed away and what happened after that? Um, during the, you know, uh, the NAFA of a Aboubacar and Omar or the Allahu one whom, um, and say, you know, it's man and so you'd the one home, right? Hassam:                             00:54:15 It's a very, very broad topic, but we have to trace the history that far back. So when we get to the [inaudible] of, you know, a mom and you know, not your loved one who, um, what has to be established is that we are not in a position nor should be, want to be in a position to make judgements about people. Right? I think for Muslims, and I'm, I'm assuming I'm speaking particularly to a Muslim audience, whether they are Shia or whether they are Sunni, because I have had those heated debates with my friends as I mentioned. I think what the key thing to keep in mind is that could take, do you feel relevant lessons from them, right? True. Take them from trusted, nuanced scholars. And this is something that each of us has to make our decision about and we can't claim to be ignorant, right? Hassam:                             00:55:06 We can tell when a person is really pushing the narrative. None of us are, you know, that stupid that we will it co or I at least I hope nobody considers themselves as stupid because I would assume nobody is, um, that they're just going to take what somebody tells them, even from the member and not sort of interrogate it and try to understand it and try to implement it into their own lives. So whether you are so new, whether you are shy, engaged with the info information that you are being exposed to, um, from the traditional scholars, um, and work with that and keep a focus on what you know, lessons you are going to draw. Because for, you know, for historians it's a different question about providing clarity, right? And who was, who was right, per se, right? For Muslims, I think it's a slightly different question because we know that justice, um, has already been served that allows justice. There's no escape from it. So whoever deserve whatever they deserved a level, take care of it, right? Um, if that process is not already underway, allow, are, and them, regardless of the individual we're thinking about here. Right? So for us it's more about the lessons we can draw and how we can apply them. If the only lesson you can draw is that you to hate a particular Speaker 5:                         00:56:24 group, you have to hate a particular person. You have to spend the rest of your life cursing this person and cursing that person or only defending this person and only singing praises about this person without actually recognizing that they were a human being and human beings can make mistakes and we should learn from them. Then if those are the only sort of set of things that we can draw from, then the problem isn't in the history, then the problem is in our interpretation at that point, I think there's no point for us to go into further questions of what happened because we are not using that history for the right purpose anyways. Right? And oftentimes you'll find historians, uh, sometimes jump on that facts. So there's one book I will call out by Leslie Hazel or particular historian where it's written in a very, um, in narrative form, right? Speaker 5:                         00:57:10 It's written as like a, this epic story. And in fact, she, the subtitle of the book is the epic story of [inaudible] Split. Anytime a historian sort of uses epic in their title, that should be a sort of alarm bell because they're jumping off of this idea that people are very passionate. The people who are going to read this on both sides of the debate or multiple sides of the discussion are very passionate about this topic and they're already coming with passion. So let me try to play with that, pull some strings, make it epic and write in a particular way that this happened and that happened and this unbelievable thing happened. I think we should stay clear of all of that. Um, for that sacred history. Rely on your traditional Islamic scholars unless you actually want to pursue it academically, that's a different conversation for the average person, I think that's not really a priority. Speaker 5:                         00:58:02 Um, and if there's a priority, like please get in touch with me or historians you trust and have that conversation with us. Um, but I feel like for the average Muslim who is just seeking clarity, look at your scholars, look at what other scholars have said, compare contrast, do your due diligence and uh, pray to a lot to give you clarity about our secret history so we can learn their relevant lessons and then trust that a law has already, uh, established justice in the cases of the people who have already passed away and we can move forward seeing what is best for our particular context. What does, whether I'm Shira, whether I'm SUNY, what does the Muslim community as a whole and what does the world as a whole need from me today? What are the lessons I can draw from this history that I will apply to that situation? And if there are no sort of positive, inspiring, um, constructive lessons, then uh, there's really no further conversation, at least from where I stand to be hot in this, uh, situation. Yeah. Yeah. Rafael:                                00:59:02 Fair enough. I think that's a good starting point for people to understand. The kind of approach that we should have to these topics that you mentioned, the difference between Western, how there's western commentators and western historians, and then there's also Muslim commentators and Muslim historians. And I think that's something that especially you mentioned specific of kind of, um, how, how would you describe it? Trying to create a fitness almost or a drama out of Islamic history to portray it as this, you know, this glorious Hollywood film. But I want to ask you about western historians and their view and their, their portrayal of Islam. Uh, I've done a little bit of work on studying orientalist readings of Islamic history, uh, particularly, and I wonder what your thoughts were. I mean, we, we see things written about the Ottomans. Um, for example, a lot is emphasized on their, on their persecution of minorities. Rafael:                                00:59:57 We see a lot written in India and the subcontinent, particularly about emperors, like, uh, old Rung Zip. And then we, this goes all the way back throughout Islamic history, uh, to, as you mentioned, the Muslim civil wars. And even back further to the Caliphs. So do you think that there's a kind of agenda by some western historians to, uh, create these kinds of negative images to render these negative images of Muslim, uh, figures throughout history and Islamic history? Um, do you think it's a concerted effort? Do you think that it's, why is this the case? I guess, why, why have, have these renderings come out of the West? Do you think the Muslims are kind of trying to paper over the cracks of their own floors, for example? Um, do you think that the Ottomans were as a lot of western scholars claim, um, particularly harsh and discriminatory? Or is that, yeah, just an orientalist kind of portrayal and, and the same goes for all wrongs urban. And the kind of a point you mentioned before about the epic schism. Speaker 5:                         01:01:05 Right. Um, so this is a very, very important question. So I'm glad we came to it. Um, I think, uh, again there's a lot of variation, right? So I think generally, um, historians who are actively involved in a project to sort of, um, display and essentially lies Islam and then display it in a very, um, uh, you know, a narrow sort of minded way. Um, there are certainly historians and people, you know, pseudo historian than people who claim to do that. Um, or sorry, people who, um, do do that. Um, and they make their claim in the fact that, um, they are trained historians, et Cetera. Right? So a good example is, um, Daniel Pipes, right? And I'm not sure if many people in Australia or other parts have heard of Daniel pipes. Um, he is one of the world's leading Islamophobes. I mean that the things this person publishes are, um, really like, like atrocious content. Speaker 5:                         01:02:09 And you would wonder why anyone would take him seriously. But if someone were not exposed to what

Guess what starts TODAY!!!⠀(I'll get to that in a sec.)⠀ But first think:  Do you really stand a chance as a designer/artist/creative who's MAKIN' IT if people can't even recognize your style?⠀ What exactly is your signature?  What does your voice sound like?⠀ I'll be real with you:  when it comes to daily routines I'm literally the WORST.  One night I'm up late, the next day I'm up early.. Discipline just ain't my thing.  BUT!  I really AM a hard worker (... on my own time, lol...) And...⠀ One of the most important things you can do as an artist is:  developing your own Art Style.  Which is why I'm hosting a 90 day ART STYLE CHALLENGE that goes all summer!!!!!⠀ YAY!!!  I'll be sharing daily prompts in my IG Stories and in the Design Tribe FB Group for the next 90 days.⠀ 90 days is really the perfect amount of time to accomplish anything you set your mind to.  Quarterly goals are SO attainable!  They're totally in your reach - yet, you also have enough time to really make some SERIOUS change!⠀ And look, I totally failed at starting the 100 days project so please don't feel intimidated by this challenge.  It's here to help you - feel free to do as much or as little as you are able.⠀ Everyone's schedules are different, which is why I'm making this challenge EVERGREEN.  Woooo hooo!!! Yes, you heard that right.  Join the Design Tribe FB Group and you can refer back to the prompts at any time.  You can do them in order or skip ahead to the same day the group is on.⠀ Use #90DaysofDesign and tag me @LaurenLesleyStudio - I'll be sharing my favorites in my IG Stories! Make sure to follow my hashtag #90DaysofDesign to cheer on fellow artists.⠀         TRANSCRIPT Speaker 1: 00:01 Guess what starts today? Okay, so I'm actually going to get to that in just a second. But first I want to ask you a serious question. Do you really think you stand a chance as a designer or an artist or a creative who's really making it? If people don't recognize your style? I guess I'm asking you, do you have a style? What exactly is your signature? What does your voice sound like? What is your aesthetic look like? I'll be real with you. When it comes to daily routines, I'm literally the worst. And I found myself in this situation where I was leaving my full time job back in January and I was kind of scrambling because I was like, Oh God, like I don't have my own style. What is my style, what is my style? And it's because I didn't really put in the work to starting to develop my own style before I went out as an independent artist. Speaker 1: 01:00 Right. And part of that was because of the situation. You know, I, my husband proposed to me and then all of a sudden we were moving to Alabama and my current job wanted me to continue working full time remotely for a while and I was also planning a wedding. So like on top of all that, I don't really have a lot of time to discover my in develop my own art style, but how'd I started, you know, years ago then I would have been well on my way to recognizing my own style, you know, my, my Instagram would've looked cohesive, etc. Etc. So the point is one of the most important things you can do as an artist is developing your own art style. And that's why I'm hosting a 90 day art style challenge that goes all summer. So it's awesome because it's a summer challenge and I'll be sharing daily prompts in my Instagram stories and in the design tribe Facebook group for the next 90 days. Speaker 1: 02:02 So if you're not a member of the design tribe Facebook group, go over to Facebook. You can type in the URL, facebook.com/groups/design tribe, Lauren, Leslie, Leslie is with an e, y as I've mentioned, and you'll be asked a few questions just to make sure that you actually are a creative and make sure it's a good fit. But I'm just fill out those questions. I am not going to accept anyone who doesn't answer that questions y'all. So you have to answer the questions, um, and joined the group and basically it's going to be so amazing because everyone's going to be posting their 90 day project and you're going to use the hashtag 90 days of design. And in the Facebook group I'll be posting and daily prompts, um, I'll, I'll put it out every Saturday. Yay. Sabado Sabato but I'll, yeah, I'll be putting out the prompts every Saturday and there'll be daily prompts. Speaker 1: 03:03 And seriously, if you know you're overwhelmed one day and you're like, oh, I can't get to my art style challenge, it's okay. Like, no one's going to die. It's going to be fine. And I'm sure I'm going to have those days as well. Just Fyi, I'm not the most disciplined person in the world, but I had to get my act together because I was showing my designs and collections at blueprint, which happened two weeks ago. So yay. So I had my very first exhibit, um, and I, you know, exhibited at this show and it was really awesome. And basically I was like, you know, starting in, starting February 1st I was like, crap, I'm showing, I'm showing my work at the show, but I don't even have a style. I don't have any work. What am I going to do? And instead, so usually when you're under the gun like that and under a bit of pressure, you're able to figure it out and just pull it off. Speaker 1: 03:56 And that's what I did. And that's also kind of, you know, it was my inspiration to create this challenge because I was like, holy crap. Like I was able to create my own style in 90 days. Now is it the best style in the world? No, but it's mine and I like it. It's going to continue to develop and get better and progress. The more, um, the more art I make and the more challenges I do. So 90 days is like really the perfect amount of time to accomplish anything you set your mind to. Quarterly goals are so attainable, seriously, their bite sized, you know, it's not like an annual goal where we were like, Oh yes I have the whole year to accomplish this and you know, it's going to get done eventually. No like you have 90 days, this is happening now. So it's totally in your reach but you also have enough time throughout 90 days to really make some serious change. Speaker 1: 04:49 And that's what I love about this art style challenge is that it is three months. You know, it's not going to take you all year. It's not like a commitment like a four year art school or something like that, but it is enough time for you to make some serious change and some serious progress in your work. And that's what I'm super excited to see. Um, and look, I totally failed at starting the 100 days project. Like, so, you know, I mean, I, I hesitate to even join some of these challenges sometimes because I'm like, oh, I'm not going to be able to do it. I'm not going to be able to finish. I'm totally gonna feel like a failure and I'm here to tell you that I'm making this an evergreen challenge so that you don't feel that way. You are here to, you know, do as much or as little as you are able to. Speaker 1: 05:36 I realized that everyone's schedules are different. Some of you have kids, I don't have kids and I'm still gonna like fail a day here and there at this challenge. So it is okay. I promise. Um, you know, it's, it's going to be evergreen so you can literally do it prompt by prompt by prompt and if it takes you longer than 90 days, that's totally cool because hey, you're still doing the work. Um, I'm just making it a 90 day challenge because that is what I did in getting ready for blueprints show in New York. Um, but my first trade show and it really did work. Okay. Okay. So 90 days is just a great schedule and I am going to be keeping with the schedule just to keep everyone motivated and to kind of keep the group together. But if you need to go at your own pace, it's totally cool. Speaker 1: 06:25 Just go back to the Facebook group, you know, go prompt by prompt. And I'm also going to be sharing these prompts every Saturday in my email list. So if you're not a part of my email list, then you will want to go ahead and sign up for that. Um, and you'll do that by just joining the Facebook group already. And if you're not part of my email list or you're not getting my emails for some reason, just shoot me a private message and I'll gladly add you. So yes, that is pretty much it. I don't have a guest on today. I just wanted to tell you about the art style challenge that's going to be happening all summer long and I want you to join and it's going to be amazing and mixture to use the hashtag 90 days of design and tag me at Lauren Leslie Studio. Speaker 1: 07:11 I'm on Instagram because I'll be sharing my favorites and my Instagram stories as well. And I want to encourage you to also follow the Hashtag cause you know how you can follow hashtags on Instagram now. So follow the Hashtag 90 days of design. 90 is literally the numbers, nine zero days of design. And because I want to encourage you to share each other's works as well. That's how you gain exposure, right? If one person shares my work to their audience and you know, 10% of their audience follows me, then that's amazing, right? And if five people shared my work, then that would be a 50 new followers, you know, so it just, I wanna encourage you guys to share each other's work. I'm going to be sharing your work, but you guys share each other as well. Um, because it's just a really great way to promote each other and give back and just encourage each other and make friends. Speaker 1: 08:08 Right? Um, but you do want to ask people if it's okay. Um, you can, you know, you could put it in your stories that you're happy to share. If people respond to your stories so that way you don't have to go in and DM like a million different people. But that way people can respond to your story and then you can just share your favorite um, piece from their feed just like that. So it's a great way to share works and get exposure. And guys, if you do this art challenge, you are going to have your own art style in 90 days or less. I mean, sometimes it happens really quick once you really commit to making them this amount of work and you're just, you're never going to find your art style if you can't commit to making the work. And like I said, if you miss a day is okay, it fine. Speaker 1: 08:55 You are not a failure but you still have to do the work. Okay, you have to get up the next morning and do it the next day or stay up a little bit later, you know, 30 minutes later or draw something on your lunch break. You know, you have to commit to doing the work and just find a way to do it and prioritize it. So that you can have your own art style, because we all want to be like famous in our own field, right? Like now, like Hollywood famous. But you know, we want to be, we want to do a good job. We want, um, we want to be the best that we can be, um, and have that rewarding feeling. So anyway, thank you guys for tuning in. I will catch you in the next episode. Bye.

In IT we know that the only constant is change. And for the most part, that's OK. What is difficult is when standards or processes are framed as immutable, and THEN they change. How do we adjust when the company spends $5million on a data center expansion, and then moves everything to the cloud 2 years later? Or when Windows abandons the GUI and goes to CLI, while Cisco moves away from IOS commands and on to GUI and API-driven interfaces? Does our religious/ethical/moral background help (or hinder) us from accepting and adapting to these moments in our work as IT pros? In this episode Kate, Josh, and Leon try to unpack the question and formulate some answers. Listen or read the transcript below. Leon: 00:00 Hey everyone. It's Leon. Before we start this episode, I wanted to let you know about a book I wrote. It's called The Four Questions Every Monitoring Engineer is Asked", and if you like this podcast, you're going to love this book. It combines 30 years of insight into the world of IT with wisdom gleaned from Torah, Talmud, and Passover. You can read more about it including where you can get a digital or print copy over on adatosystems.com. Thanks! Kate: 00:25 Welcome to our podcast where we talk about the interesting, frustrating and inspiring experience we have as people with strongly held religious views working in corporate IT. We're not here to preach or teach you our religion (or lack thereof). We're here to explore ways we make our career as IT professionals mesh - or at least not conflict - with our religious life. This is Technically Religious. Leon: 00:49 Last week, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints made an announcement which sent shock waves through the Mormon community and tremors throughout many other religious communities as well. We'll get into the details about that in a minute. But it caused us here at Technically Religious to think about how supposedly immutable truths, whether we're talking about replacing Latin with English during mass or Microsoft's adoption of open source, affect us and how we deal with those changes. Joining the conversation today is Kate Asaff Kate: 01:17 Hello. Leon: 01:18 And Josh Biggley. Josh: 01:20 Yeah, it's still cold in Canada! Leon: 01:23 and I'm Leon Adato and it's slightly warmer here in Cleveland. So Josh, do us a favor and run us down just the main points of the announcement from last week. Josh: 01:34 Sure. So this announcement was made in early April, and in order to understand it, we have to go all the way back to November, 2015, and maybe even a little further. So the Organization of the Mormon Church, or the LDS church, or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, is such that it's a top down organization. So the President, or prophet, of the church, he makes a declaration, often he has to get his two counselors and the other 12 men that sit on the quorum of the 12 apostles. And then those 15 men make these proclamations. So in November of 2015, the church released a policy internally, that was leaked, and then they had to address it publicly, that said that any child who had parents who were of the same gender, so you're in a same sex-relationship or a same-gender relationship or if you are trans-gendered - first, they were now labeled apostates. And that's really heavy language within any religious community. There's one thing to have transgressed, but there's another thing to be considered an apostate. And then in addition to them being an apostate, they also said that no child whose primary residence was with those same sex couples could receive any ordinances within the church. So that spans the entire gamut of: You could not be blessed as an infant within the church; to: you couldn't be baptized; to: if you were in the church - there are certain things that you that you undertake within Mormonism, you know, if you're a boy at the age of 12 (and now the age of 11) you can receive the priesthood - just things that you can't do, many of those rites of passage. So last week, and of course we're recording this in the early days of April, so last week the church came out and said, "Hey, that policy that was put into place in November of 2015? We're going to change that policy. And we're going to make it so that now if you are the child of an LGBTQ family, you can be baptized as an infant, you can be blessed within the church, under the understanding that of course the church is going to reach out to you and, throughout your lifetime because you are now officially a member of the church, once you're, once you're blessed and in the LDS church. That's a huge change because leadership within the church and members at large - admittedly myself prior to my transition away from Mormonism - defended that policy with a couple of talking points. First and foremost that the prophet, he specifies what is the will of God. He speaks for God. He's God's mouthpiece on earth. And second that this was an act of kindness, because we didn't want to - as a church - we didn't want to have people, with their children attending the Mormon church where the Mormon church was teaching that their parents were apostates. And then having to go home to their parents and say, "Hey mom and dad...", sorry... I got... hey, look at that. "Hey Mom and mom, dad and dad." Or "Hey, mom and dad, you know, dad and dad or mom and mom. You're an apostate." Or "You know, we think that you should be excommunicated." And all those horrible things that go along with that. So yeah, that's um, that was huge. I was pretty... I'll admit I was pretty pissed off on Thursday. Not because I disagree with the change that children should be allowed to join whatever church they want to regardless of their parents. I was just pissed off because lots of people put a lot of time and effort into setting aside their personal views and trying to make it so that they align with what they were being told from the top of the church. And then the church went, "Hey, by the way, we're going to change." Leon: 05:36 Right. And you'd actually mentioned in an earlier episode when we talked about opposing as you follow, you said that that was one of the things that caused you and your family to move away from the Mormon church for a while. And then you came back and you suffered censure and a bunch of other things for those views. So you directly experienced some of that just for expressing an opinion. Josh: 05:58 Yeah. And that actually goes back pretty far in my marriage. That goes back probably 15 years ago when that particular experience happened. I mean, just to give some context and then, and I know that we want to talk about this as a foundation for IT. And I think there's a great parallel. And Leon, thanks for calling it out. Harold B. Lee, who was the president of the church from July of 1972 until his death in December of 1973, he said this: "You may not like what comes from the authority of the Church. It may contradict your political views. It may contradict your social views. It may interfere with some of your social life. But if you listen to these things, as if from the mouth of the Lord himself, with patience and faith, the promise is that 'the gates of hell shall not prevail against you; yea, and the Lord God will disperse the powers of darkness from before you, and cause the heavens to shake for your good, and his name's glory." So, you know, pretty powerful language from the LDS church. Fortunately in IT, apart from Mac users, right Kate? Nobody thinks that their salvation from any of their other platforms. Leon: 07:09 I think actually, yeah, there is actually a Mac airbook that blocks the gates of hell. Kate: 07:14 It's actually an iPad. Leon: 07:18 Oh, of course. It would be. And that, with making a little bit of lighthearted humor is where I actually want to go, which is the IT aspects of that. But before we dig too far into that can we think - the three of us - can we think of any other analogs in religions that may have been that same kind of thing? Again, I'm not talking about the fact that things change. I'm talking about things that were supposedly immutable, or somewhat permanent, and then the group, the organization sort of pivoted away from it. And, and I brought up one which was the change from the Catholic mass from Latin to English, which you know, happened I think in the seventies, if I remember correctly? I could be wrong because I don't pay very much attention to that kind of stuff. But I remember that it caused quite a bit of a stir, Josh: 08:13 Yeah, the ordination of women in the United Methodist Church, which happened well before I was born back in the mid fifties is an interesting one. Again, linking it to Mormonism. A woman named Kate Kelly founded an organization called Ordain Women. She's a lawyer and an activist and she was excommunicated by the LDS church in June, 2014. So everyone kind of waits for the day in which women will be ordained within the Mormon church or within the the LDS church. I don't know if it's going to happen, but we certainly see that adopted. And that's a huge thing, right? Because traditionally, you know, as far back as tradition goes religions tended to be very patriarchal. Where, you know, men were the heads, the household, they were the heads of the church. And so for the United Methodist to allow women to be ordained officially, even though it had been doing it for a long time, unofficially. That was huge. Kate: 09:04 It kinda reminds me in the 90's when the Catholic Church decided to start allowing girls to be altar servers. I remember there was a cardinal in Boston who had saw these girls serving and before the proclamation came from the Vatican, the story I heard was that he told the congregation, "Get these girls out of here." He didn't want to see them serving and that it was something, obviously 20 years later it has stuck with me Leon: 09:34 With religion you have things that really are dogmatic. Sometimes we throw that word around somewhat flippantly but religion actually is dogmatic. It has, you know, strictures or rules that are, at least in the eyes of it, internally immutable. And so you've got that. But pivoting to the IT piece, I want to talk a little bit about, about that. What are some of those changes? It's not going to change and then it does and you have to suddenly cope with it. What are some of the ones that we've either heard about or experienced ourselves? Kate: 10:08 Well since you guys were poking fun of me a little bit earlier as being a devoted Apple fan girl I will bring up the 2006 when Apple changed from Motorola to Intel processors. That was a huge thing for the Apple community and you know, many of us had spent years structuring these complex arguments as to why RISC processors are better than CISC processors and you know, insisting that megahertz and gigahertz aren't true measures of processing power. And then all of a sudden, like everything for us was just blown away overnight. Now Macs were Intel based and we kind of had to let go of, you know, our are sworn allegiance to the Motorola chipset. Leon: 10:56 That's, I'm going to say funny, not funny ha ha, but I just had, I would never have expected that to be overwhelming to a community. But I can see that the way that you describe it, I can absolutely understand that you had an emotional investment in a particular hardware standard. Josh: 11:16 Yeah. Well, I think that functional workspace, right? You know, Kate, you talked about defending the position of you know, RISC processors. That's why it's good. That's why it's the thing that makes Apple as awesome as it is. And we all go through that. You know, I've been in the industry long enough that I remember walking into data centers and seeing literally big metal, there were mainframes sitting on the data center floor. The idea that we would virtualize? It blew people's minds and I was like, I thought that was a great idea. Let's virtualize, let's get density. I will admit to being a little slower to adopt a shift to cloud because it, it put in place some barriers to entry for me. When I started my career, I loved the idea of networking, although I'm not a networking engineer, but I loved the idea that you could plug in cables and lights would start blinking and things just work. You know, there was, there was a command line and I actually, I had a reputation for asking questions in class, like "How do you do that from the command line?" But it got beaten out of me. I was that guy. But it got beaten out of me because Windows was the thing, Windows and at the time, a Netware were the platforms for for server managers and that's where I was headed. We've made this swing to having to code, and I don't code, but everything is code now. Networking is code, storage code, servers are code, everything is code. I'm made a very firm stance early in my career that I didn't want to code because I wasn't good at it. I'm still not good at it. I feel like I'm fumbling with 14 hands tied behind my back. I don't know what the analogy is. I just feel dumb. I feel like I'm the guy smashing his face on his keyboard trying to make things work anytime I code. So I get it. Those shifts are hard, and they're not hard because we don't, I don't want to accept the shift to cloud. It's hard because it makes me address other deficiencies in myself that I don't know that I'm 100% ready to address. Speaker 1: 13:24 And I think that that's actually a good point is that the change, the changes themselves may not be so troublesome, but they address either inadequacies or perceived inadequacies in ourselves and we don't like that. We don't always like to have a mirror held up to it. Sometimes I think it's not that though. So given a quintessential example, and I think many of us in IT have experienced this, where on Monday the business says, "Hey, you know, this event is occurring," whether it's a merger or an acquisition or whatever it is, "but don't worry, nothing's going to change for you. Everything's going to be just fine." And then Friday, metaphorically, they say, "Oh, by the way, we're shutting down the location" or "You're being let go" or you know, "We're moving this entire department to merge with this other department" or whatever it is. And, whether it happens in days or weeks or months, "You first told me nothing was going to change. And then it did." And that's the part that I think a lot of us have a hard time coping with. Don't tell me that it's not going to change when you know full well that it is. Enough times in business, things change and everyone says, oh yeah, we had no way of knowing that was going to happen. Those changes are unpredictable and so you just deal with them. But when it's clearly predictable, that's the part I think that is more difficult for us in IT to deal with. And I think that's the whole point of vendors offering what's known as LTS, Long Term Support, for something, like "We promise we're not going to pull the rug out from under you for x years." Josh: 15:09 I want to make sure that we understand or at least that we agree that IT is not religion. Religion is not IT. There's certainly some overlap and are dogmatic beliefs on both sides of of the row. But I tweeted earlier today and I'm going to read it, "A gentle reminder that you are more than your nationality, favorite sports team, political party, or religious ideology. Be more than the sum of your parts. Be better than your weakest part. Be human." And I think that that applies to IT as well. You might have been the person who was responsible for gateway computers, probably cause you liked cows. I don't know. Just because that is what you've always done doesn't mean it's what you always need to do. You are more than capable of transitioning and learning something new. And a coworker of mine, Zach, if you're listening, shout out, he will, he will admit that I am not a great scripter, but I'm also more than capable of being taught how to be an okay scripter, you know? Under his tutelage, I've become kind of useful with powershell and I have even remotely built some shell scripts recently. So it's possible you can be something more than what you thought you always were. And that is really a beautiful thing, both in IT and in humanity. Leon: 16:31 And I've written about that in the past. And I probably will again in response to this podcast about that's actually not what you are. You might be, you know, a Cisco IOS command line jockey. You might be, you know, you might know everything there is to know about the Apple platform, whatever it is, but that's not actually what makes you a great IT professional. What makes you a great IT professional is your sensibilities. The fact that you understand how networking works, how hardware reacts with software, how architecture and design and you know an idea converts itself and moves through the pipeline into an actual product. Those are the things that make you a great IT practitioner and those things will persist even when the foundational platform - software or hardware - change. But again, just to drive it back again, the point is that, you know, we know things change, but when we are told something is not going to change and then it does, what do we do about that? So my question does our perspective, our outlook, whether it's religious or philosophical, whether it's moral or ethical, does that make it easier or harder to deal with? Kinds of events that you know, we promise it won't change it than it does. On the one hand, I could see someone saying that if you are heavily religious, you come from a strongly dogmatic frame of view, then you carry with you baggage of what "forever" means. And when a vendor or my employer says "It's never going to change, we are standardizing on x," and then they change. That can feel like a betrayal because I brought along, "No, no wait, you said the f word, "forever", so you know that means something to me and you just broke your promise." That could be much harder than somebody who might not have, like I said, that baggage coming along with it. I don't know what, what's your take on that? Kate: 18:36 We talked about this a little bit before, but what I found was interesting about that question was that as an atheist, I obviously have a somewhat fluid view of, you know, how the world works and how things are. I am also, technology-wise the quintessential early adopter. I'm the first day that it's available. I will consume it, upgraded, download it, in any way that I can get the new stuff. I'm on board. Josh: 19:03 So I think that that makes you Kate an IT relativist. There's this great thing within Mormonism about moral relativism and how it's such a bad thing, which that is a whole different discussion, but I think that the very best IT practitioners are those who can balance a bit of that. Conservativis... can't say that word... Conservativism plus that moral relativism within IT that you see the changes, you're willing to bring them in, but you do it in a way that requires that you parse them through your personal and your community experience and then say, "Yes, that's something we actually want to bring in to our enterprise. We're willing to adopt it." You need to know about it so that you can also say to someone who has read a shiny brochure or seen a vendor pitch about how amazing a product is and say, "Nope actually that's not something that we want to do and here's why." And being able to speak to a multitude of points. I think makes us great IT practitioners, if you are just that sole sourced individual who only knows about one technology, you're going to find yourself in some IT challenges. I've got a great friend, who coincidentally is also ex Mormon and his name is also Josh. Interesting point. It's interesting for me to listen to him talk about his challenges within his career. He's a great DBA. He is actually not just a DBA, but he designs databases and he's worked on a bunch of different areas and he has really struggled because he thinks that he's only in that data space. And I want to say to him, "Hey Josh," which is a little weird cause I'm calling my name, "Hey Josh, you need to understand that you're better than what you think that you are because first, you're willing to look at your career and figure out the parts that are really useful for you and you know where your weaknesses are." That, for me, is the big part. Are we willing to look at what we're doing today and understand both its strengths and weaknesses and then leverage the strengths and minimize the weaknesses by adopting other technologies? It would be kind of like me saying, "Hey, Mormonism is still really awesome," - which I do think. There are some wonderful things about Mormonism, but I also am willing to adopt some ideologies from Judaism. Thank you Leon. And I'm also willing and very open to adopting that moral relativism that comes along with atheism and other non traditional religious beliefs." Leon: 21:36 I definitely think, Kate, that we have a new topic idea on the horizon, which is whether or not being staunchly religious makes you more or less likely to be an early adopter of technology. I think as an IT person, I really want to solve that problem because I like new technology and I would hate to think that I'm predisposed as an Orthodox Jew to like not want to do the things. Of course I could be an outlier. I could. So Josh, to your point, I think that that IT is not like religion in the sense that no matter how strongly a vendor or an organization says that something is never going to change, it's gonna. Right? Yeah. I mean we just know that that's the nature of IT, is that things are going to change and probably sooner rather than later when you look at the long game. However, I think one of the things that makes this issue, you know - "It's not going to change," and then it does - similar in both religious and IT contexts is what we as people hope and expect from that event. Which is, I think, that whoever's making the change needs to be transparent about it. I think they need to be intellectually honest about it. And they need to be consistent about it. And what I mean by those things is that they need to say that "This change is happening. We saw it coming, even if we couldn't tell you at the time, but we're telling you now that we knew it was coming. We just had to," you know, whatever it was, the merger was coming, but we couldn't say anything because blah, blah, blah, legal, blah, blah, blah, Wall Street, whatever. Right? Um, it needs to be intellectually honest. We're doing this because it supports our brand values. It supports our corporate goals. It, you know, whatever. And it needs to be consistent. And I think most of all, if people were hurt by that first statement, this is the way it is. "This is the way it's always going to be." And then it changes. And people were hurt. You know, an example that happened a couple of jobs back for me: $5 million investment in a data center, building it out, putting tons of hardware in there, and then they moved to the cloud. What are you kidding me? Like, we just bought all this stuff and the company did say, "We know we hired a lot of you for your depth expertise in on-premises data center operations. And now we're asking, you - we're in fact demanding - that you move to a cloud based model. We know that some of you are going to be upset by this. Some of you may want to leave. We're going to support you in whatever decision you make, but this is the direction we're going. That kind of statement makes it a lot easier to accept the, "We never will... Oops. We are" kind of thing. And I think just to tie it back to our opening topic. I would hope, although I'm not in the community, but I would hope that a statement is made to the families that were hurt within the Mormon community for, you know, the years of being called, you know, apostates and all that stuff, and say "We're really sorry about this and we're going to do what we can to make it better." I would hope that that statement would be forthcoming. I guess time is going to tell. Josh: 24:55 Time will absolutely will. Unfortunately Mormonism does not have a history of apologizing. The unfortunate reality of some of the current leadership has come out specifically and said that the church does not ask for, nor does it offer apologies. Kate: 25:12 A long, long time ago I worked for MCI Worldcom and, if you recall, it is now Verizon business. It was sold to Verizon about 18 months after the CEO promised all of the employees that he was not looking to sell the company. MCI is also a huge company. It had definitely been in the works. So your comment about honesty really struck home with me. Nobody likes to be blindsided by change, but even more, nobody likes to be lied to about it. Josh: 25:45 Thanks for making time for us this week. To hear more of Technically Religious, visit our website, technicallyreligious.com, where you can find our other episodes, leave us ideas for future discussions and connect with us on social media. Kate: 25:59 To paraphrase and old Greek guy, "the only constant in IT is change."

Most people know what meditation is: cross your legs uncomfortably; get rid off all your thoughts; enter a trance-like state. Right? Um, no. In this calming episode, Ed and Renee debunk some widespread myths about what meditation is and is not. They describe the real science of the practice, how it affects our bodies and our minds, and how we can easily incorporate it into our daily lives. If that wasn't enough, they guide us through some simple meditations right in the episode, leaving us all in a better, more peaceful place.Support the show (https://gozen.com/dearanxiety/)

Why Dave Decided to talk to James Smiley: James reached out to Dave recently and asked if he could do this second podcast with him because of all the things he’s had the opportunity he’s been accomplishing. The best part about it all is that most of what he wants to talk about is the little things everybody easily forgets that makes the biggest difference. Networking happens to be one of those things. James has found he does better than most people because of the QUALITY of the relationships he builds through something he’s always focused on: contribution. Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business: (2:48) The systems for high leverage (4:10) “Contribute” from James Smiley’s perspective (6:30) The Highest Leverage Move comes from using other people with contribution in mind (10:54) James Funnel Hacked his way onto Russell’s radar. Who’s radar do you want to find yourself on? (12:44) Your webpage should highlight exactly what your dream client is looking for, get those stats on there. (15:02) Selling Kevin Harrington when he only gives you 11 minutes (16:20) Network to Network (19:00) Who’s the gatekeeper to your networking (21:38) Network with those you know you are able to contribute to (24:54) Understand how the person you want to meet with thinks (28:00) The Long-Term Play Quotable Moments: (2:22) “What I’ve noticed through life, whether it’s through working with sales, working with sales teams, or helping solopreneurs is there’s a way to create leverage, extremely high leverage,  and it’s a system.” (6:54) “So you can see, if you don’t start thinking about the word ‘contribute’ but you start thinking about using other people’s platform or money, the whole system doesn’t work.” (13:24) “There’s a lot of little things like that which I started doing. And you know you never really know if anybody is seeing it, but chances are if you’re doing the right thing they’re going to take a peak at you.” (16:10) “‘I’ve seen your videos and I like it’, those little phrases show me that my little personal branding and marketing out there synergized with him. So it allowed the conversation to move forward because he had more trust with me.” (20:57) “You have to be on point, like when they look at your stuff would they think ‘James is one of us’?” (22:48) “Networking to network is incredibly huge, especially if you figure out how do I honestly contribute” (30:07) “If you contribute to people in the right way, the relationships and all the things that happen, you can take over your Dream 100 in a way that you never thought possible.” Other Tidbits: A quote from our dear James Smiley, “IF YOU’RE NOT USING CLICKFUNNELS, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?” If your main goal is to make money off of somebody and not improve their lives, business, relationships, health, etc. then they’re going to find out. Once they find out, they’ll find somebody else sooner or later. Tony Robbins, Russell Brunson, James Smiley, and all these other people have 24 hours in their day just like the rest of us. What they’ve done differently though is they’ve found out how to leverage their time to “hockey stick” up. Get the numbers to make yourself “one of us”. You must contribute sincerely for any form of networking to have a lasting effect. Important Links: www.JamesSmiley.comFunnelHackerRadio.com FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar ---Transcript--- Speaker 1:     00:00       Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast, where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets, and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Everybody. Welcome back to funnel hacker Speaker 2:     00:18       radio. This is going to be a ride of your life guys, because I have the opportunity having the one and only Mr James Smiley back on the show. James, welcome to the show again. Woo. What's up? I am so excited. So for those of you guys don't may not know James Out. We did a podcast a while back and I want to make sure you understand this is a guy who's been around for a long time in this whole digital marketing space. He's done over $210 million dollars in digital marketing. I actually in his early twenties, actually I IPO to SAS company, which is super, super cool. Something I have yet to do and has worked with three of the fortune 10 companies. This guy basically knows what he's talking about and he approached me and said, you know, Dave, we did this awesome podcast awhile back, but I've done all these cool things recently and I want to talk about some of the stuff way back when that everyone's already forgotten about and I thought, I love all the deep dark secrets of things that people have forgotten about. So with all that said, James, take us away and let's just see where this is going to go today. Speaker 3:     01:10       Awesome man. Well, I appreciate you. Appreciate Click funnels. If you're not using click funnels, what are you doing? So, um, we ever since it came out, we've moved everything there and it's just been awesome. Appreciate you, appreciate the community and all you guys and gals out there and everything that's going on in the funnel hacker world. So, um, but yeah, you know, one of the things that I've been sharing with our coaching students, you know, we've been super fortunate or blessed or everyone to call it to. We brought on a hundred and three students since me and you last talked, I think it was an August of last year, around the 2017, um, and we do a 15,000 and $5,000. We did a hundred and three students and one of the biggest things that people have been wanting to know and, and it is like how do I get, how do I, how do. Speaker 3:     02:01       Because like, like in business, you know, you, like you have people who have like regular acceleration, right? They just like if you were to graph it, they have a gradual growth or maybe it's like staggered up and down lows and highs. But then there's like those hockey stick moments, right? Where like somebody goes from where they're at and the hockey stick way up and then they plateau and then the hockey stick again. And so what I've noticed through life, whether it was sells, uh, working my own sales teams, running, running with a big company or helping solo preneurs is um, there's a way to create high leverage, like, like extremely high leverage. Um, and it's a system that I really, to be totally honest, I learned it from chat from Chet Holmes who started the dream 100 stuff. And this was a system that he, uh, talked about in, in a VIP session that I was at a, um, I was at a thing with Tony Robbins in chat. I want to say it was like 2013 or 2004. And um, and I learned this, but he's like, this is so, so good that I don't publish this because people can really take it the wrong way. And so, uh, so I wanted to share, Speaker 2:     03:13       have to understand, we talked a lot about dream 100 and even just don't understand the depth of dream 100. It's so much more than just creating a list and send them out a package. So much deeper than that. And Russell spent a whole bunch of time at our traffic secrets course that we did in October down in Phoenix and just blew everyone's mind. And that's why when you were talking to me about this whole idea of, of it being used for good as well as for evil, it truly, truly is and can be. So with that caveat, I want to make sure you guys understand when we're talking about this, we assume that you guys are gonna use this for good and that you're not going to turn this around and uh, destroy people's lives with it. But with that, I really want to kind of dive in. Jane's really kind of go into this whole idea as far as contributing. I know that was one thing that we were talking about. What exactly does that really, really mean from your eyes? Speaker 3:     04:00       So this was back in a chalkboard day. There wasn't whiteboards. And so, um, uh, Chad had wrote the word contribute. He said everything I'm going to now for the next hours, if you don't understand this word, you're going to screw up everything I'm going to tell you because people are going to realize at some point you're taking advantage of them. And when they realize that everything you just did is going to come crashing down on me and then the rebuild, that reputation could take you years, you know, or you may never be able to recover from that. And so, um, so he really, he sat us down and he said, I want you to think about, do you actually have the best intentions for the other person before you do anything before you contact them for you, follow any of this stuff if you don't, if your main goal is to make money, he goes, I promise you this is not gonna work. Speaker 3:     04:52       And it may work on one person, but he goes, eventually it's gonna catch up with you. And when somebody realizes you're taking advantage of them, it's over. And so he really, Harper was work contribute. And that's where this whole system starts with what I teach our coaching students. I'm glad to share this with everyone out there that like what I'm about to share with you, if you don't have that, that, that mindset of like, I want to do this to help someone else more than helping me. Right? Like if, if I can't find that gratitude, like even in this, you know, like, like I reached out to you, um, and I'm using the same process I'm going to share, you're going to see like I'm using the same process, but in my heart I'm like, if I can't, if I don't have complete gratitude, like in me just being able to network with Dave, help his community, how, you know, like if I can't contribute into your world from a pure perspective than everything that I'm doing is going to come crashing down, you know. Speaker 3:     05:52       And so, um, so that's really where this whole starts out is, you know, really focusing on contributing to people. Okay. So that's kind of, there's really a five step system. Um, and so I can just run through those real quick. Is that the awesome? Yeah. Okay. So number one is contributed. So you got to think about like how you come up with your dream 100 lists, all the standard stuff that Russell talks about in his book and all that stuff. Like, like come up with your dream list. Okay. Then then you think, okay, like how do I carve out a few of these people in like, like the most strategic ones, the ones that I can get the highest leverage move. And so I'm just a side note. A lot of people say, well, what is the highest leverage move means basically highest levers. Move means how do you, how do you use other people's stuff? Speaker 3:     06:33       So I called P. A lot of people are opm, other people's money, opt other people's time. But you've got to think more but more. Okay. You can use other people's data, you can use other people's relationships, you can use other people's platforms, you can use other people's intellectual property. You like infinite, right? Um, and so, so, so you can see how like if you don't start thinking about the word contribute, but then you start thinking, how do I use other people's platform or how to use other people's money. Like the whole system becomes warped, right? It becomes about me, about, you know, um, and, and I'm not actually adding value into the community. And so, um, so like, like the, the way that I've seen people get real hockey stick growth, whether it was a company, a sells startup, whatever is they figure out how do I create the highest leverage move with my time or, or with, uh, with, with, with my investment or with whatever, with whatever the asset is. Speaker 3:     07:36       And so I'm like, if I were to go out today, uh, like you, you and I both know, like, like, uh, me, you, Russell, Gary Vaynerchuk, Tony Robbins, we all have the same amount of time. We all have the same amount of, of like no one had 35 hours today. Everyone had the same, you know, 10, 12, 15 hours to work. Like we all had the same amount of time. The only thing is some people figured out how to create more leverage with their time. Right? And to me that is like the true essence of d, 100. It's like how do you create more leverage with your time? And so typically it's using other people's whatever, right? Other people's time, money, network, email list, facebook page, podcast, a coaching group, whatever. And uh, and then in return, like, you know, like, like you're helping them, they're helping you. Speaker 3:     08:27       Okay. So number one contributed to the number two thing that chat started showing us and I've summarized it up into this is okay. So like if I carve out like 10 people that I want to talk to that I really need to network with. Okay. So like, let me just be totally honest here. Okay. I could say Russel, I could say, um, there's some people on Shark tank that I wanted to get ahold of. There's some people, you know, there's, there's some key individuals, right? So, okay. So the first thing I need to do is actually write out like how can I actually contribute into Russell's world? I literally did this a couple years ago. I was like, okay, like what could I do to be different? Like, how can I contribute to him versus like, you know, every time I see him, like, hey man, I got this thing, I got this idea, you know, and you know what man, like if we just partnered up, I give you 50 slash 50 men, you know, and I'm like, come on now like how many people are or be one of those people who's like, you know what, me and my product is so good. Speaker 3:     09:22       Russell. Like if I just got sales I would be good. It's like you just like, I can't, you know what I mean? Like you can't believe it is. I literally got an email from a guy who's actually has a lot of fame, uh, people would know him and you'll be at funnel hacking live and everything else. And it was interesting because he's like, listen, before I fire up to funnel hacking, live on a fly over to meet with, with Russell and just kind of go through a couple of things with the real fast. I'm like, why? And what is the value? Russ is going to get out of this besides, you are going to come to the office. I mean, it was just interested in like, oh, you know what, it doesn't work that way. Yeah. And so, okay, so contributing number one. Number two is I need to figure out how to summarize data that my d 100 is going to, uh, it'd be impressed by. Speaker 3:     10:13       Okay. So this, this one really shocked me because I was like, why is this so important? Okay. So like one thing that, one of the things I've learned around Internet psychology through the years is numbers tend to mean more than just words. Okay? So it's a reason why people will say like, we've reached x amount of people, right? Instead of saying, uh, you know, like even Louie's started here, it's like, hey, you can say, Hey James Smiley's a good digital marketer or a great digital marketer, but when you say numbers, he's done this amount of sales. He's done this, he's done. You know what I mean? It, it registers in people's mind fast. Okay? So if I'm going to really drive a highest leverage move d, 100 strategy, I need to think about how do I move numbers to the forefront of my marketing so that when I'm going to, she's Russell for an example, when Russell, if he eventually ever looked at my site or sees my webpage or sees my facebook page that he will see a number that means something to him or he'll go, oh, like, like chet used to say, you want them to, you want them to start saying he's one of us. Speaker 3:     11:16       Like, so I love that analogy because I think that's really super critical. It's, I were just talking about our to calm a couple of word winters. We have 411 two Comma Club award winners right now. And so it's nice because it again, it groups you into that. Now you're there. One of us. I love that announced. That's great. Yeah. Yeah. And so, um, so like, so like I started a by the way. So Larson told me to, to talk about this more because I told him how I, how I got to know you guys. And Russell, and he was like, dude, this is one of the smartest 100 strategies ever. He's like, you gotta talk about this more. So, um, so, uh, so because I told him how is using data that I thought Russell would like. So like I'd listen to those podcasts, I'd watched all this stuff and I'm like, okay, he's saying like he wants, this is way back when he's like, I want to be the fastest growing SAS company. Speaker 3:     12:11       So then I started using like language, like, uh, I was a part of iop on one of the fastest growing sas companies in Silicon Valley. Like specifically saying that I feel like if I knew Todd Russell, like somebody saw it, they'd be like, oh, he's one of us like in subliminally. Right? Um, and so, uh, but, uh, but for, for other people that might mean like, like, like in the btby world, like somebody may not be interested in how much revenue you make, they may be interested in how many distributors you have or, or maybe they're more interested how many customers you have or something like that. So like, I try to encourage people, like on your website, have data that summarizes something that you, that your dream client is going to go, wow, this. I'm impressed by this. So I heard Tony Rob Russell say once on his podcast, he said, Tony Robin, he has spoken to 10,000 B, two b sales reps. Speaker 3:     13:03       okay? Somewhere. He said that on a podcast and he was impressed by it. Well, I knew because a corporate recruiter had told me this, I had spoken to 12,000 B, two b sales rep. I was like, yes, I'm going to put this on the front of my homepage if Russell ever received that. James is one of us, you know what I mean? And so, um, there was a lot of like little things like that that I started doing and um, and then so and I didn't know, like you never know, like if somebody really seeing it or not, but, but chances are if you're doing the right things, sooner or later they're going to take a peek at you. Right? And, and if these are the little things that make somebody start calling, oh, maybe, maybe he's like us, you know? Um, okay. So the third thing, Speaker 2:     13:44       I'm going to step back on that because I think that helping people understand that they're one of us is such a huge, a huge thing in networking, um, because you'll talk to people talk about, well there's a level b level c level type of relationships. And uh, again, you were talking about Steve Larsen and his whole big thing is, you know, you can reach one level up as I've heard him referred that a million times and I think it's important that as you get to know what your, what your group or your level is, what does that one level above you, what's that one level below you? And whether it's, again, whether you mentioned as far as revenue or, or contacts or whatever the number is, but realize that everybody has some number. I guess these days, a lot of people, as far as we're dealing with a lot of influencers and their numbers are you. How many youtube followers? Yeah. How many instagram, facebook, whatever. That may be, and those numbers basically say, okay, you're one of us and I think this, oh, critical that, and I appreciate James that you mentioned. It's not just revenue, it's not just these numbers can be anything, but the key here is numbers, numbers or something. People very quickly can just, it's a scale and they say, okay, that's, I'm in that same area. I'm in that you're, you're one of us or you're better me or one lower than me, Speaker 3:     14:52       whatever it might be. They at least know where they fit. And I think that's the big thing with a lot of marketing is people want to know where do I fit in this ecommerce or this whole cosmos here. Yeah. I recently struck a big partnership with Kevin Harrington from Shark tank and I won't talk about the whole details, but one of the things I will say is I knew the specific type of numbers he wanted to see and so I move those to the forefront of my marketing, of my, of my personal branding. And um, so I got on a call with him one day and he's never talked to me before and he goes, James, I've heard a lot about you. And he goes, ah, he goes, but I, I hate to tell you this, I got to cut this call short. He goes, I have 11 minutes, pitch me, go. Speaker 3:     15:35       I was like 15, I have 11. Exactly. He's like, yes, you have 11. Go in. And I was like, okay. So long story short, in 11 minutes I struck a big deal with them in the other people on the phone were like, we never seen nothing like that. Even even, um, uh, Kevin's brother Brian or his son Brian was like, okay, I seen all the pits people pitching. I've never seen minutes. And um, but the reason is because I had him preframe through all this stuff. I'm telling you, like I had preframe because of the data. And he said little phrases. He's like, I've seen some of your stuff. I've seen some of your videos. And I like it. Like those little phrases tell me that my little personal branding and marketing out there, it's synergizing with him and that's how I got on the phone with them. Speaker 3:     16:20       And so it allowed the conversation to move forward because he had, he had a little bit more trust with me because he was kept thinking. I think James is kind of like one of us, you know? Um, okay. And then. So number three is, I'm a check called this something else, can't remember, but I call it network with the network. Okay. So like when I wanted to become friends with Russell, I'm like, man, this is gonna be like, hard to get to know Russel, right? So, um, I was like, okay, like this is a total chet holmes strategy. I'm like, okay, who are all the people around Russell? And remember this is like two or three years ago, okay, who I guarantee you I could get ahold of them. And then so I was listening to the podcast and he's like, Oh yeah, I'm hiring this kid named Steve. Speaker 3:     17:04       I'm like, I bet you I can get ahold of that kid. I'm not kidding you. That's the first thing I thought. I'm like, I guarantee you, I get a hold of that kid. Like he's a Newbie, you know what I mean? So, and then I started looking up and I'm like, this is no joke. I'm like, oh, there's, there's this dave guy. Oh, this is Dave Woodward Guy. There's this guy named todd. There's, um, then I, and then I realized there's John Parks. Um, and then like back then he was talking about certain inner circle people. So he had mentioned I'm a funnel that some guy named Henry had done for him and I had no, he didn't even mention Henry's name, so I like, googled, looked on his friend list, like figuring out who the hell is this Henry Guy because he just talked about Henry Henry must be a friend. Speaker 3:     17:47       And so like what I did was I started figuring out how do I contribute to sincerely until all these people's lives. So, I'm not kidding you like this a little bit embarrassing, but it totally like I had you Larson had all you guys on my list and I was like, okay, how do I like sincerely, like, like add into these people's lives. Okay. And then, um, so when I first told, I told, I told this at the, uh, at a mastermind I was with Steve and I said it from stage one. I said this, Steve Goes, that happened, that really happened. Let me tell you what happened. So I told. So the whole idea here, okay, is that someday, maybe you guys will all be talking to Russell in. Somebody will be like, well we should try to get into btby and then someone will be like, why? I notice James Smiley Guy, but I don't know, like nobody really knows him. And then somebody else in the circle would be like, James James Smiley. Like the guy, you know that guy. Oh yeah, he's totally cool. And then somebody else would be like, James Smiley. And this also like the idea is that like everyone kind of knows james and Russell's like, who the heck is named Smiley God? Why do I not know James Smiley? Speaker 2:     18:58       Seriously? Oh my gosh. I can tell you that networking with a network is probably the most understated issue. And people just don't understand how important that is. I've seen that so often in my gosh, in my own business over the years I've noticed that that has been a huge, huge opportunity for me. A kind of also goes back as far as making sure you understand who the gatekeepers are, that you network with the gatekeepers and that's your, you're nice to the gatekeepers. And it's, it's so funny because uh, I mean literally Russell's my officer like four feet apart. I mean I stepped through the glass and it's, it'll be funny where he'll get the same package I will get and I know exactly what people are like, well, if I can't get to Russ, I'll get to dave first and then I'll use dave to get to Russell. And I like, I know the game, but I think it's cool that people are playing the game because I think that's how it's so critical. More people who know you, who have a point of reference in a frame of reference for you, the easier it is to have those types of conversations when, when again, the name comes up, it's not like it's going to come up all the time, but when it does, you want there to be a positive relationship with that, with your name or whoever else that might be. Speaker 3:     20:04       Yeah. Yeah. So, um, so I, uh, uh, I, I said that from stage one time [inaudible] Larson stopped. Everything goes to, he goes, that literally happened one time. He's like, we were talking about like a new version of the website or something like that. And he's like, that literally happened. He's like, two or three of us knew who you were. And Russell said, who's James? I don't know. Yeah. And, and, and, and so I didn't say any of this, but we all know, like people like Russell use the internet, use their phone like with somewhere within the next 24 hours, the next hour, I guarantee you, he looked up to see who the heck is James. Sure. So, so like every one of the listeners to understand like, this is why having your stuff on point in having data summary, because I mean you don't have like an hour for this guy to look at your stuff and you might have in seconds. Speaker 3:     20:55       So you gotta be on point and so you gotta think like, okay, like what is this person? If they were to look at my stuff for 20 seconds, would they go, James is one of us, you know? And so, um, the, so the, and the whole thing around network when the network is like understanding that first word contribute. So it's like how do I actually add value to Steve? How do I add value to John? And so like, I'm like, I didn't know John at all. But um, so there's two little hacks that I've learned over the years or we're doing this over 10 years with network, with a network. One is finding somebody who is, um, I don't know if it's right to say, but finding someone who's younger is easier to network with in finding someone who's an up and comer is definitely easier like it because not only that, you can contribute into those people's world really, really fast. Speaker 3:     21:45       Like you can tell them stuff, help them, give them encouragement. Um, you know, like, like I've sent, I won't say who, but there's multiple people on that list. I've sent them big deals, I've sent them, you know, I signed a deal and I broke or the services out to them. I like message. I'm like, Hey, um, you know, I got this deal in a, all you need is this, this and this, and I can wire you $8,000 right now. Like what? Like, who is James Smiley? Like I don't even know who this person is, right? But, but now, like I built longterm relationships with those people, um, in like, uh, in, like when you really do that, right? It's almost like this becomes flawless because you become friends with the people who your dream 100 person is friends with, you know what I mean? And um, and so, and it's a really cool thing because you don't have to push your way in, you don't have to try to, you know, insert yourself. Speaker 3:     22:37       Like it just happens kind of organically, you know. Um, and so, so anyway, um, so yeah, so networking with the network is, is, is unbelievably huge, especially if you can figure out like, how do I honestly contribute. Okay. Um, one like 32nd story I'll tell you about something I did with John Mckay was I bought 'em fill your funnel a number of years ago. Okay. And um, you know, like I thought that was a lot until, you know, like, like it was like 30, 3,500 bucks or something like that. And it was like, it was awesome. Right. And so, like here I am in this group and I wasn't going to be totally honest. Okay. I wasn't 100 percent sure how I was going to use that content. But one, okay, there's a couple of things I realized. Number one, John was in there, it was messaging in the group a lot. Speaker 3:     23:25       And so like every time John would say something, I would back them up, you know what I mean? Like, like, uh, and so I was, I kind of became friends with them in there, you know, and then I would post like a testimonial or two of like something cool that I did based on something he said. And so I think just over time, like I don't, I don't, I don't think like me and John are like, know we don't really talk a lot, but I will tell you like the few times we do talk it's like he, I think he's like, he's Kinda cool. Like James is like one of us, you know. And um, and so, but I first met him in this group. So I want to say something like, I bought my way in to a relationship with somebody like that because I figured if I bought my way into this, the people that are in there managing this are probably going to be people who Russell knows. Speaker 3:     24:12       You see what I'm saying? Oh, I totally agree. Like whereas some people they just go into it with the, you know, they don't think about those kinds of. Yeah, you know what I mean? They don't think like, not only that, like you're in a group of couple of hundred people who are, you just spent like $3,000 on something. Like you're in a group of cash buyers. Like why would you complain of 80? Like there's, you can build friendships, relationships, all those kind of things. But um, but anyway, but that's, that's like my, the first time I really interacted with John, I just saw, I was like, how do I contribute? How do I contribute? How do I make this fun? How to make this engaging for him. Okay. And then the fourth one is, this was a little bit psychological, but it's like the most ideal thing is if you can understand how the person thinks, because one thing I did not know is I did not know or even think Russell was an introvert. Speaker 3:     25:05       Never thought that. And um, and so I'm glad. Like I would listen to him and go, man, like this dude's an introvert. Okay. So like if I ever meet him, the last thing I want to do is come up to him like, oh my God. You know what I mean? Like in, in the few times I've seen I'd been around him and seeing people approach him. I'm just sitting there laughing, going, I have no idea. Like they're well meaning good people, but they have no idea. Like, you know, I was at the Mellon texts event, I think, and Russell's crushed it there. And uh, and then he was out in the hallway I think, and there was like 20 people around him in a circle. And so I walked by that day I walked by, um, and uh, and so I'll just Kinda, just for time I'll, I'll put four and five are kind of similar. Speaker 3:     26:00       So a four is like, you want to start mirroring the person. This is a lot of Tony Robbins stuff like marrying the person. So like, um, so one of the things that I did at that event was a, I noticed that you guys would always have a camera person and a lot of times it's you or somebody like holding the b roll camera, right? The vlogging camera will like, I'm message John Before that event. And I said, hey dude, I'm, what camera are you guys using? And he said, I don't know man, let me check it out. Because we were friends. He was like, dude, let me check it out. So he came back and told me the camera you're using so that I told my camera girl, I'm like, hey, they're using this camera, go buy it. And then she was like, Hey, I can get one that's just slightly better. Speaker 3:     26:43       I'm like, that'll be even better. Like the upgraded version that will be better. And then, uh, so we bought the same tripod. It's the same camera. And guess who, the only two people at this event were who had camera people, you and me. And so I did that. So because I knew that I would be in the vicinity of Russell and I wanted to try to get his attention in a non, like, you know what I mean? I wanted to try to get an intention and so I was like talking to Caleb and people like that. And I remember seeing Russell in the corner of his eye look over at us and he's like, I guarantee you he's probably going, who's the other dude with the camera? With a camera person following them around. Like, who the hell does this guy like, I don't know, maybe he knew, maybe he didn't. Speaker 3:     27:29       But um, uh, but I distinctly remember him, like continuing to look over and we would connect a little bit. And then, um, uh, so when he was out in the hallway, uh, I, I saw him and I told him, I camera goes, I was a communications committee. And I was like, Hey, so, so we walked out and uh, and so I'm walking out, my camera person is following me and there's literally 20 people around, Russell and I can just tell he's like, I mean everybody, I'm sure it was like super nice and cool, but he was just drained. He was just like, dude, get me out of here somebody. And so I walked by him and he kind of looks at me out of the corner of his eye and uh, and he just kinda like opened his shoulder just I think he just wanted to see, like if I was going to say it, say what's up or whatever. Speaker 3:     28:14       And uh, and of course, like I'm looking at him, so I reach over and lean in really, really softly. We shake hands in, right when we shake hands, that whole group went dead silent. Oh sure. Everybody was like, what the heck is this guy? Right? Like, Russell just stopped the conversation to have shake somebody's hand. And uh, and I remember shaking his hand in and I said, hey man, I said very soft and comp because I understand his personality. And I'm trying to like mayor his personality or how he thinks and so I was like, hey man, I appreciate you letting Steve Come to my event. He crushed it on stage. Thank you so much for, for letting him do that and I just appreciate you. Basically I just told the guy, thank you, that's all I did, you know, and I just remember him looking at me and he was just like, he just said thank you James. Speaker 3:     29:06       And he's like, thank you for doing that. And it was just like really cool like bonding moment and um, and so, so it was just, it was, it was the coolest thing because like all that work had built up to a, to a handshake, you know what I mean? There's so much value in that and I think so often people are in this game for the short term and it's like, what can you do for me? What can you do for me? What can you, for me? And like that's not how this game works. This is a long longterm play. Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate that a ton. Jane's. Yeah. And so I guess I'll, I'll kinda wrap it in this way and saying that, um, you know, you guys featured how you, how we were using click funnels and be to be on the clickfunnels.com home page for a while. Speaker 3:     29:50       I will tell you of 103 students, we had a majority of them, the original, because we survey, a majority of them had said, well, we saw you on the clickfunnels site. We looked you up. So I just want this whole conversation and coming full circle if you contribute to people in the right way, like the relationships and all the things that happen, like you can win over your dream 100 in a way that you never thought possible just by contributing into their world it just by adding value into the world. And so anyway, um, so yeah man, I'm super grateful and thankful for you guys. I mean just to, uh, to share a number like our practice, that coaching practice that's $766,000 and, and, and, and I'll say like all that happened because we, we, we focus on contributing. I love that, you know, so I appreciate you guys man so much. Speaker 3:     30:48       Well James, thank you. And I appreciate you being so kind to contribute to our audience and our community as well. So any other parting words? Um, appreciate you guys, man. Appreciate your audience and everything. I'm a Jane Smiley Dot Tom is the homepage and all that stuff. If you guys want to check out anything but uh, whoever, whoever it is that you, uh, your dream client is, you know, if you got that person, I would just say this to any of your followers. If you have that person or those people at that company and it like it, it's like it doesn't leave you, it doesn't leave your mind. You're like, I got to meet that person. I got to. If I could just get that relationship. To me that's, that's like the confirmation in your heart that you're supposed to build that relationship, right? Like the fact that like, I'm not thinking about that person. I guarantee you no one else is like you. You are the person who was supposed to build that relationship. The fact that it doesn't leave the fact that you wake up, you go to bed, you in meetings, you're daydreaming about that person or that relationship like that is the person that you're supposed to meet and work with and if you focus on contributing, you can get there. Oh, I love it. Well James, thanks again, James Smiley.com. Check them out. Thanks James. We'll talk soon. Appreciate it. Speaker 4:     32:03       Hey everybody. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts. If you don't mind, could you please share this with others, rate and review this podcast on itunes. It means the world to me where I'm trying to get to as a million downloads here in the next few months and just crush through over $650,000 and I just want to get the next few 100,000 so we can get to a million downloads and see really what I can do to help improve and and get this out to more people. At the same time, if there's a topic, there's something you'd like me to share or someone you'd like me to interview, by all means, just reach out to me on facebook. You can pm me and I'll be more than happy to take any of your feedback as well as if people would like me to interview more than happy to reach out and have that conversation with you. So again, go to Itunes, rate and review this, share this podcast with others and let me know how else I can improve this or what I can do to make this better for you guys. Thanks.

There’s a Difference Between School and Real Life: This week on Track Changes, Paul and Rich sit down with Allan Chochinov, chair of the MFA in Products of Design program at the School of Visual Arts and founder of design network Core77. We talk about who is really teachable, building good design from huge problems, the vast applications of "design thinking", and how much time is wasted on meetings. Allan shares two incredible medical UX-design moments that he's witnessed— building an at home diagnostic tool for HIV testing and creating a quick-attach prosthetic limb. Both of these scenarious required empathy towards consumer experiences and pragmatism. These small design gestures can have a big impact.   Paul Ford You’re a— you’re a sensitive, in touch person. Rich Ziade [Crosstalk] Are you in your fifties, Allan? Allan Chochinov I am, yeah. PF It’s a little— RZ You look great! PF [Crosstalk] When you realize . . . AC I’m gonna be 57 soon. PF Yeah. RZ What?!? PF I know— it’s [snickers] we’ve had this conversation. RZ Oh he’s had LSD— PF Look at the beautiful hair— AC My mom’s— [inaudible over crosstalk] PF Yeah, some grey. Some grey. RZ I— I can’t see his face right now but the forehead is tremendous. PF No, no. Alan just won a lottery on this front. RZ Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Are we recording? PF We are. We’re talking about— RZ Steph, feel free to put this stuff in [laughter]. PF [Chuckling] We’re talking about how handsome Allan is [voices fade out, music fades in, plays alone for 18 seconds, ramps down]. Allan Chochinov, a key person in New York City tech and design for a long, long time. Let’s talk about that in a minute but the first thing to talk about, really, is you run a program at the school of visual arts. [0:56] AC Yup. PF What is the name of that program? AC Uh [music fades out] the name is MFA in Products of Design. PF Ok. That— [yeah] ok. Let’s break that down a little bit [laughs]. AC We should. We intended for it to be uh future proof and [uh huh] it actually came true because— well, I mean the idea was that everything is a product of design [mm hmm]. So each and every kind of design: uh graphic design; industrial design; service design; interaction design, social innovation design; tons of business design— PF So a new design— like, you know, suddenly there’s a new kind of way— AC Well, yeah, radically, you know, multidisciplinary or generalist anyway [ok] but what’s interesting is people see the word product design they think that we’re an industrial design program and we do teach industrial design— PF Like make a teapot kind [yeah] of thing, yeah. AC But the fortunate thing is that, I guess about four or five years ago interaction designers kind of like stole the term product design from [snickers] industrial designers— PF Actually that’s— boy, we did, didn’t we? AC Which is— it’s either like funny or heartbreaking depending on which side you’re on. PF No, it’s funny for us. Yeah. We’re— we’re enjoyin’ it. AC So many of my colleagues spent their whole lives trying to, you know, help people understand what an industrial designer was, you know you would— you would say well, “We’re— we design product.” [Oh!] Product design. That was easier. Now it’s just like, “Oh, what platform? Facebook?” PF [Exhales hard] We destroyed everything with that— RZ “We” is a lot— PF No. But you know how many times have we said “product design”? RZ We jumped on it. We did jump on it. [2:17] PF Yeah. AC You know? Many people have said everything is interaction design, everything experience design. So— PF It’s true. AC Alright. PF Alright, so tell us a little bit— this program, it’s a graduate program? AC Yup. PF And it has how many students— AC There’s about 18 students a year. Uh it’s single track; every student takes every course, uh no grades which is really helpful uh cuz we want maximum risk and, you know, it’s point of departure is that uh and, you know, we’re really upfront about this that like everything’s broken. And so that everything can be uh reimagined. We’re I wouldn’t say cynical about best practices but we’re certainly interested in doing things in a way that we haven’t gotten good at doing them. PF You gave me a piece of advice once um [uh oh] um that— No. It was very, very valuable. It was just that there’s a real difference between life and school. AC Yeah. PF And that when you’re in school and you’re learning that’s not practicing for the real world, exactly, it’s not like, “Here: learn these incredibly necessary skills for tomorrow,” some of that has to be there but for the most part it’s like, “Let’s break things; let’s figure it out. I want you to be thinkers.” AC Yeah. I— I’m still really sympathetic with that um I think you need, you know, especially grad school, it’s just a two-year program, and, you know, they’re grownups, they’re people who chose to come back to school so there’s a strange— like when I’m meeting with potential students or prospective students and, you know, they have this idea of this place where they wanna be after grad school [right]. So they’re trying to find either the right grad school to get them from where they are now to this vision of the future or whether grad school at all is the right sort of medium to get them from here to there. Uh but the problem is that grad school’s job is to like mix you up, in that, you know, couple years between where you are and where you wanna be and, in fact, even within the first, you know, two months, where you thought you wanted to be like probably won’t look very interesting anymore [sure]. And also— you’re gonna— grad school’s other job is to show you all these other potential futures that you didn’t even know existed, many of which, as you know, don’t even yet exist. [4:16] PF What are some of the things they do in this remarkable journey? AC You know, we have a— a real mix between very purposeful, very social projects and very fanciful and projects around— we actually have a course called Design Delight. PF Ok. AC Um you know a couple projects that stick out, Smruti Adya’s one of the projects she did— she was doing a project around prosthetics [mm hmm] uh and limb loss and limb difference and um a lot of these theses they can really turn on one sentence, like one of their subject matter experts or one of their, you know, user interviews will say something that will change everything. And so she was interviewing um a woman who had lost her leg and she said, “You know, late at night um when I have to go to the bathroom, uh sometimes I crawl to the bathroom. [Oof] Because it’s just— yeah. Because it’s just so onerous um—” PF “I don’t wanna put my legs on—” Yeah sure. AC And you know, that’s, you know, it really made an impact on Smruti and I think in like one or two days she just banged out this device, it’s actually— it’s on the website, called Swift and it’s essentially just a white tube that can expand a little bit and you would either print it out at Shapeways— you could, you know, measure and— and order a size or maybe there would be several sizes at— at Amazon and it’s just like this opportunistic limb that you can slip on, not have to crawl to the bathroom and then return to bed. So, those kinds of products are amazing to me because there’s not a— there’s a— it’s like an incredible lots for incredible little [right] um and I just love the idea of the power of design where you could make a small gesture and get an extraordinary impact from it um— RZ Usually I— I think what’s— AC And the visuals are very convincing. I mean like you— you should see the work. RZ I mean oft— oftentimes that— when the design or the design arm of some big company, it’s usually driven by markets, right? [Mm hmm] Like it’s time for us to have little teeny Bluetooth headphones because Apple came out with little teeny ones [yup]. PF Right. [6:19] RZ So go do those, right? And that’s not driven by fundamentally a problem. Of course, everyone would like smaller headphones but really [yeah] the catalyst prove to be competition and [trails off as Paul comes in] — PF Well and, “I’m gonna— I’m gonna put my mark on it.” RZ You know and, “I’m gonna put my— we gotta—” AC [Crosstalk] Oh for sure. RZ “— have ‘em.” PF Yeah. “Ours will be purple.” RZ Yeah. Exactly which is— and— [stammers] that sits in such stark contrast to what you just described, right? Which is— AC It does. I mean, you know, one of common denominators, which I actually don’t talk and think much about but for this moment I will, is beauty. I mean this thing— this thing’s beautiful uh and so there’s a whole spectrum of we could say “purposefulness” um in design, everything from, you know, what industrial designers would call like “skin jobs” like, you know, very styling, take a thing and just, you know, shroud it in something beautiful or really rethinking the problem. Some of the stuff that you do in reframing, let’s say you have a client comes to you and they think that they want something and, you know, that’s good enough to start but likely that’s not what you’re gonna end up doing and the problem finding uh the scoping, the reframing of the whole engagement is gonna be the most important part up front. That’s no less true for any kind of design in my opinion including uh product design, just product design’s really [chuckles] hard. PF Right. AC You know: materials; technology; labor practices; supply chain. It’s just endless. PF We find this all the time. Like nothing that— people walk in the door and are ready to get that contract moving [yeah] and it’s we don’t want them to. RZ Well, actually, it’s— it’s counterintuitive, right? We actually get ‘em— we wanna slow down for a sec. AC Yeah, you wanna add some friction which they don’t wanna— [7:49] PF No! Cuz especially if they’re ready to go, it feels terrible— RZ And also we wanna— we also wanna close the business. [Yeah] So it’s a little weird for us too but you also don’t wanna end up— end up down a path where it’s like you’re doing a thing that a) is untenable; or isn’t gonna make a lot of sense down the road. PF You know what I’ve learned though is that everybody knows, like you just— you don’t wanna blow up that— that moment of fantasy is really important where your idea is absolutely transformational. Because the process whereby you actually start to go, “I’ve had a few of these ideas,” and then you start to sort of see them get poked at by reality as you walk around with them and then you figure out what you’re really in the business for, why are you doing this? You know? What change could you affect? Because kind of any— especially with technology, any technology idea you come up with: a smarter watch; a better hat. It’s doesn’t matter. Is going to be utterly world transformational and worth a trillion dollars. AC It’s everything is— and everything is a platform. PF That’s right. AC Even if it’s not like unless you look at it at the platform level, you’re not looking at it. The systems mapping, I think, is the most valuable thing that the students do. Infinity mapping; system mapping [how do they— what’s]; user journey mapping— PF What do those look like? Just— AC The most basic one, and probably the funnest one is a mindmap where you’ll put let’s say the topic in the middle of a piece of paper and you’ll draw a circle around it; and then you’ll have these lines that radiate out like spokes on a wheel; and they’ll radiate out to other circles, the things that are related. So maybe— like my background is in medical design, so it might radiate out to— well, what we’re talking about, industrial design, let’s say ergonomics. And then it could radiate out to regulatory, and then it could radiate out to money. Uh and very close to that is gonna be insurance and then payers and payees will be around insurance bubble and then you start making smaller bicycle spoke wheels around each of the wheels, and all of a sudden you have this map on the wall. And then it’s a pretty quick trip to do what we would call a systems map after that which is— RZ [Crosstalk] Well, ok— AC— where you would start to organize this a little bit, it’s not just a big like blah on the wall. And when you show that to a client or to really anybody, it is likely the first time they’ve ever seen what they do, and it is often just, you know, they’re jaw drops. Because nobody ever showed them a picture— [10:00] RZ [Crosstalk] They finally zoomed out [yeah] and took a bird’s eye view. PF Well, your own— your own process is a mystery, right? Like who knows your own process? AC Absolutely. Same with students like they’re the worst— they’re the worst at seeing what they do or just a little edit that will turn something from good to like, you know, great [sure]. I mean you find with— with your clients, right? That you have to do that in the beginning or you’re— you know, you’re digging a hole that you’re gonna be in, sometimes when I say to my student’s, you know, when they’re like, “How should we write our thesis books?” I’m like, “Well, you know, imagine reading them.” [Laughs] [Right, right] Write them— write them as if you would actually have to read them and they’re like, “Oh. Ok.” PF So students come in, they wanna make things, they wanna do things, design things, what are they— what are they like when they come out after two years? AC You know there’s certainly converse— I wanna say that they’re multilingual [ok]. That’s— that’s ambitious but there’s certainly converse and they understand how, you know, VCs talk and what they worry about; they’re gonna understand how to pitch to foundations; they’re gonna understand UX, UI, lots of principles around graphic design and typography hierarchy. Just like all of it. It’s— it’s ambitious. The thing that we do is we have a lot of short courses instead of [huh] — we almost— we have almost no 15 week courses left. I believe that people can learn things faster than most people think that they can [mm hmm]. Also, graduate students worry, like they’re old enough to know, I— I’ve written about this, they’re old enough to know that they’re uh decisions have consequences so they don’t wanna negative consequences so they don’t wanna decide anything. So they read another book. And so when you have a project that is, you know, 15 weeks long, you know, they’ll start and then by week three or four like it’ll get hard. [Sure] You know, cuz like anything worth working on gets hard. And then they’re like, “Well, maybe I should try this other idea?” So then they go to their other idea and then three or four weeks later, that gets hard too cuz anything [snickers] worth on gets hard. And they’re like, “Well, you know, now I’m getting worried. Lemme go back to my first idea,” and then it’s just like this desperate rush to the finish [right]. I’m sure it’s the same— same in business, right? With a seven week course, you begin and then you middle and then you end, you’re ending after like class two or three um and you have to commit to idea— to an idea and just never, never give up. Like [mm hmm] no changing your idea. Of course it will change and evolve but no like starting like, “Oh well now I’m gonna do something around optics.” So we design out those weeks of anxiety where students will typically have like an [snickers] existential crisis but the best part is if we make a course from 15 weeks to seven weeks, we have a new seven weeks now that we can create a new course around [mm hmm] um and because we’re in New York and because a lot of the classes are in the evening, you know, I can get people to say yes to teaching who could normally never say yes to teaching like 15, you know, afternoons. But you know like Paola Antonelli can give us, you know, five evenings a year, right? Um— [12:45] PF That’s right. She’s the Exec Director of MoMA, right? AC She’s at MoMA, yeah. PF Yeah. AC Uh she’s actually on sabbatical this year but and also like she can kill it in five weeks, you know? PF Sure! Where do they go when they graduate? AC I thought that it was gonna be just entrepreneurship city [mm hmm]. You know? It was so in the air, like I always conceived of it as a leadership program but I did have an idea that there would be more businesses launched out of it [mm hmm] and I think that I was a little naive— I’m Canadian. Still Canadian. I’ve been here for 30— 32 years. PF [Laughs] It’s never gonna leave you. AC Ugh. I wanted to vote. I mean, you know, it was the— PF Yeah. RZ Oh you’re still a Canadian citizen. AC Yeah, I am. RZ But residing here, in the US. AC Yeah, so I underestimated just the— the financial burden of this thing. I mean— RZ I was about to make a joke— AC— you know, grad school is so expensive. RZ— you just left ‘em with a debt [laughs]. PF Yeah. AC Yeah, I know and they worry about that. [13:31] PF “You owe me 80,000 dollars and start a company— go start a company.” Yeah. RZ “Good luck with your startup.” AC And, you know, add— add to that the cost of living and eating and they’re not earning money, right? Like they don’t have jobs [sure] while they’re in school. So it’s a— the opportunity cost is immense, in any event— So they get the jobs at IDEO and Frog and SYP and Johnson & Johnson, like lots of really great companies. And then medium and small sized consultancies as well, and it’s really only in the last couple of years that the students are— are leaving those, you know, probably their second jobs— PF Right. AC— and starting out on their own. The other thing that I knew but I— I hadn’t internalized is that like nobody stays anywhere more than 18 months. So I can— I can calm some students when they’re so worried about like, you know, picking the right first job kind of thing and I’m like, “You know, don’t worry about it so much.” PF “You’re gonna leave.” AC “You’re— you’re gonna leave anyway.” PF “In a year and six months.” AC And this used to be more of like an advertising agency model [mm hmm], you know, you’d raise your salary by leaving every 16 or 18 months or whatever the convention but, you know, creative people are really restless. Um [yeah] and they want new challenges and, you know, school in a way makes that worse because it spoils them with all these fascinating things to do like every day of the week, every week of the two years, and then they get somewhere and, you know [well and also you’ve just given them—] it’s not inventions time every day. PF You’ve given them the leaders of thinking in New York City around the field as their teachers, advisors, and friends. AC Yeah. RZ WHo— whose doing great work right now? [14:56] AC Well, actually, I mean back to one of my students, Souvik Paul, he’s actually turning his thesis into a commercial product, it’s called Cathbuddy. It was called Clean Cath. Two weeks before he came to the grad program, a friend of his was in a car accident and became paralyzed, so sort of back on paralysis. And he knew that for his thesis he wanted to— to do work around, you know, life in a wheelchair, but one of the things that he discovered is that there is a budget for how many disposable catheters you get a month if you are, you know, cathing and that it’s usually not enough, what insurance will pay for, and that people are sterilizing their own disposable catheters and reusing them. This is just like pretty specific design challenge. And they’re using like, you know, Clorox and microwaves and I mean it’s just [Paul sighs] — it’s a disaster out there [yeah], right? And so the risk for infection— RZ Wow. AC Yeah. It’s like — it’s a— it’s a big deal. So he came up with this device that would use a UV sterilization and you would put your used catheters into this device and it would sterilize them and then you could use them again. And he had really kept this dream alive since he’s graduated and worked so it’s gonna— PF That’s great. AC— it’s gonna be a real product. So like— RZ It’s not out yet. AC It’s not out but it’s like you think like that’s really like almost arcane. Right? It’s like a really, really specific but the numbers of people who use, you know, these products is extraordinary, so the scale of something like that could have really great impact. RZ Also there’s no segmentation here. This isn’t a urban problem or an American problem— AC Yeah, I know. PF Yeah, you’re— AC I think it’s a not talked about problem which makes it actually extra fascinating. PF Your persona work is pretty simple on this one. RZ Straightforward and it’s global in scale, I mean. [16:39] PF The other thing uh that I love is you and I love to talk about how we like really, you know, difficult, disgusting, horrible problems. And that’s a— RZ Are you looking at me right now, Paul? [Laughter] PF You and me. Yes. RZ Yes, yes. PF Yeah, we love to— we love to brag about it and that’s an actual like— RZ That’s an actual horrible problem. PF Cath— catheters that have to be clean where you can’t get the insurance money. So you had an agency. AC Yeah. It’s— it was that but it was, you know, sister to uh a design like publication platform. So this is ‘95. I had graduated in ‘86 and ‘87 from Pratt with an industrial design degree and I was— I did my thesis on stick proof hypodermic needles. So hypodermic needles where you couldn’t get an accidental needle stick. PF Gotcha. AC Uh HIV/AIDS was like new and everyone, you know, all the healthcare industry was like freaking out. The world needed a device like this. I mean now it’s like mandated by law but in those days it didn’t exist and no one could spend anymore money on any kind of— RZ State the problem, again. AC Um, you’re taking blood or [huh] you’re giving a shot [yeah] um and you remove the needle from the arm and you turn and accidentally um, you know, stick somebody [mm hmm] or you’re sheathing um the needle with the needle cap, the plastic cap, and you miss it and you jab your thumb. RZ Yourself. AC Um I worked for a year and a half in that area, ultimately it expanded to um a phlebotomy which is a fancy word for laboratory blood collection. So looking at the whole, well, user journey of blood from when it leaves the arm to when you’re gonna get, you know, a result. So things like, you know, when you put blood in a test tube— we’re getting very detailed now, right? Um that blood builds up pressure and so when you open up the rubber test tube top it can aspirate into your face, um and you can contract HIV/AIDS through your eyes that way. Um this is getting lovelier and lovelier, right? Um so I graduated and I knew I wanted to go into medical design. I always had like a big problem with solid waste. I knew I wanted to design things but I couldn’t stand the idea of mass production in just garbage. So I went into medical design. The joke’s on me, of course, cuz, you know, medical design creates more plastic than anything [crosstalk and laughter] and it’s like incinerated so it’s like extra bad, right? [18:51] PF It’s not like a styrofoam wrapper for a hamburger. That’s like [Rich laughs]. AC Oh I mean the mechanics in some of these devices like surgical staplers, I mean and it’s all just thrown out after a single use. I got to continue my interest in HIV/AIDS, I worked in secret on a project for Johnson & Johnson, it was the first home— uh home HIV test kit. PF Sure. AC But they weren’t ready to put their name on it and so like we couldn’t tell anybody we were working on it. Mackenzie was involved; the FDA; [wow] C. Everett Koop, if you remember this very beloved [yeah] Surgeon General [yeah]. Uh you know so I’m like behind the one way mirror like testing the design of this— of this kit that you would essentially prick your finger and then it provided a dry blood sample and then it— it sent in the mail but we knew that we were, you know, we— even in those days, we didn’t call it like, you know, user segmentation but we knew that we were really looking at sexually active teenagers; we knew that we were looking at, you know, in all candor, like cheating spouses [sure]; we knew that we were looking at groups that are high risk for HIV; and that this thing was gonna be done secretly and in some like with a lot of anxiety [mm hmm]. And so pricking your finger— RZ Lock the bathroom. AC So lock the bathroom. So thank you. That’s the first place is where is this is gonna happen? It’s gonna happen in the bathroom. So in the bathroom, not a lot of horizontal surfaces. Right? So we actually had to create— PF Ahhh. AC— a surface, this kit actually unfolded into a surface because we knew that it was gonna be in some sense laying in the sink. PF It’s not a desk. RZ You’re on toilet. [20:15] PF You’re not in a lab. Yeah. AC Well it’s before phones, so— you’re not in the toilet that long. Yeah. Um well and then it gets— so you have to get rid of the evidence, so the kit has to somehow go away. PF Yeah. RZ Alright. So wait, I’m trying to visualize it, so you’re in the bathroom, maybe you got on the floor, maybe you sat on the toilet. You open this kit up, it kinda creates almost like a— I guess a tray. AC Kind of a flat surface. Yeah. RZ A flat surface. Ok. Next. AC The big battle was the pre-test counselling. PF Ok. AC Because there had never been— there’s no precedent for a home diagnostic kit, like a pregnancy kit for instance, of a fatal disease [right]. Right? Um also the false-positive and false-negative was really, really important here because— RZ Stakes are high. AC— even if you were negative, you had to be re-tested in three more months [right]. Right? And it had to be private. So the idea— we came up with this like barcoding system where you would pull out this ticket and we shaped it in the size of a credit card so it was a very familiar shape. And you could put it in your wallet and hide it. PF Right. AC But if you were in a situation where you weren’t hiding this kit, where you were with a partner, and you were both doing it, let’s say, then that number would be on there. Ultimately there was a 1-800 number and the way that it shaked out was that if it was negative, you would get a kind of recording and if it was positive, you would get a live person [mm hmm]. So this was really hard to do and there were two different land sets in the package cuz sometimes you miss on the first one cuz it really hurts [sure]. So even if you miss and you don’t get enough blood, you have to do it again. And you’re really scared to do it again. Like I’d come home with these like sore fingertips for weeks [right] um— [21:48] PF Oh cuz you have to test this thing, constantly. AC The full user journey, right? So now what happens? You haven’t— it hasn’t worked. You take it back to the drugstore and you want a refund? This is supposed to be anonymous. Right? There’s no name attached to this. You’re not registering to do this. So— so thinking through these just unbelievably complex— RZ Sure. AC— thorny user experience design issues. RZ Also, there’s— there’s blood on stuff. AC The whole thing is just— [yeah]. You know back to the pre-test counselling— or the no pre-test counselling because C. Everett Koop was so beloved in those days, I think a deal was made probably bar— uh you know, brokered by Mackenzie and FDA that if C. Everett Koop wrote the— the manual then that, in some sense, would count as pre-test counselling. I mean it really came down— RZ That’s ridiculous. PF Woah! AC — It really came down to, like, “Listen: people should go to a clinic. They should go their doctor.” [Right] And then on the other side it’s just like, “People don’t go to the clinic, they don’t have a doctor, people are dying. Do you want this kit with a booklet? And no pre-test counselling in person? Or we’re gon— or nothing?” And so it became this really— it was an extraordinary— RZ It was a lot at play. AC— moment in time. Yeah. RZ Yeah. AC So as— and every one of these was just such an unbelievable design decision. It comes on the market, it’s ripped off in one day. [Someone whistles in disbelief/amazement] Right? The knockoff like same forward factor; similar graphic identity; basically the same layout. I think it was on the market— J&J was on the market for I think a year or two only, you know they really need a homerun with J&J like just the scale— PF It’s a giant company. Yeah. AC Yeah, so they, you know, have to sell a lot of anything and they’ll— they’ll sink, you know, huge sums of money into R&D for a product and if it doesn’t go, it doesn’t go. Um— [23:26] PF This is not something you can market like Q-Tips. AC No and all of— I mean imagine those meetings. PF Yeah. AC Right? PF Well that’s just giant company, too [yeah]. Like what are you gonna do? You got Mackenzie and the FDA in there. It’s a tornado. [Yeah, yeah]. And little Allan just trying to do his job [laughs]. AC Yeah, you know, I was just— anyways, so um I started teaching in 1995 and that’s where I met Eric Ludlum and Stu Constantine who were the founders of Core77 and Pratt was smart enough— for their thesis they wanted to make a website. So this was like two years into the World Wide Web and um and that was the year that I started teaching and Pratt was smart enough to hire them to design their first pratt.edu website and gave them um a room and a T1 line which you will appreciate. RZ Woo! PF Yeah. AC Yeah, right? PF Wooooo! AC Um and essentially like incubated them when that word wasn’t a word yet [sure] and so in those days I would teach like a full day which was amazing. Like three hours in the morning; three hours in the afternoon; like sophomore id studio. You could show a film; you could have a discussion; do critiques. It was amazing. PF Oh so it was a good thing? AC It was a good thing. PF That much teaching? AC Yeah but I had a lunch hour and I— PF I’m tired just— [24:26] AC — well yeah, now it’s like unimaginable [laughter] but I’d go there— I’d go there at lunch time and uh to the Core77 office and I would like learn HTML. PF Sure. RZ For those that don’t know what is Core77? Let’s— AC Uh so Core77 was actually the first design website online. It specialized in industrial design. So it had a very tight like per-view. And Stu and Eric talk about it that they created the site that they wish they had when they were looking for grad schools. PF Sure. AC Um and it had all of these sections, it had a resource section. Um like you remember what things were like in 1995, right? It was like web 1.0. Um— PF There wasn’t that much web! AC No, no, I mean and it was— you know these were static pages. I actually had a column called Contraptions. Stu and Eric tease that I— they say that I was first design blogger which actually might be true cuz I— I would pick like a funny object and write like some pithy paragraph about it and do like five of them a month kind of thing. PF I’m just worried Jeffrey Zeldman will burst through this door. AC I know. Yeah [laughs]. RZ He’s coming for us from three blocks away. AC Yeah I don’t know [Paul laughs] if there were web standards either. So I— I got to know these guys and um— and then there was a project that uh I was consulting with Ayse Birsel for Herman Miller. It was this brand new— you might remember a system called Resolve, it was based on 120 degree angles instead of 90 degree angles. PF Oh that’s right! It was the future of the cubicle! [25:40] AC Yeah it was— it was phenomenal. RZ Oh! PF Yeah. AC And then the first Dot Com bust happened, you know, eight months later. Like Herman Miller couldn’t build enough factories to make enough of this stuff and just— it was just unbelievable [Paul crosstalks]. No, in the contract furniture industry, that’s the first to go. PF Oh ok. Oh, that’s interesting. AC That was heartbreaking. Anyways, so I started doing some consulting with Stu and Eric at Core77 and uh we did this project for this Resolve system and it actually won a lot of awards like, you know, The Gold Pencil and the Silver Cube, I actually like have those engraved [mm hmm] and all of a sudden, Herman Miller starts calling and said, “Well, can you do that for our system?” [Sure!] And then we started to do all like the physical computing in our— PF Ah that’s for young designers, what’s a better than a call from Herman Miller? AC Well, yeah and [26:19?] was around and, you know, we worked with a lot of amazing artists. From ITP and— PF That’s really close to like the core, right? AC And they’re design-driven, right? PF Yeah. AC So, yeah we couldn’t ask for much. Anyway so I ended up like running a lot of this stuff in between like, you know, managing editing, um— PF I see you’re always teaching. AC Yeah, it’s a long time.  Yeah. PF Yeah. AC It’s probably 23 or 24— 24 years. And then um so that design publishing went on a long time and Core grew, the web grew, like everything exploded. [26:49] PF Are you connected day to day? Are you kind of advisory now? AC You know I’m on— I’m on partner meetings [ok] um you know most of my life is at SVA right now. PF Right. AC But yeah, no, it’s um— PF It’s still very much part of your life. AC It’s, you know, there’s not a lot of things that have lasted that long. PF No. AC Uh that are really about, you know, making design connections and helping people find either fascinating things to care about or fascinating opportunities, you know, job opportunities or finding talent. RZ So, Allan, design— it feels like somebody made two or three billion stickers that say “design” on them [yeah] and gave them out to everybody [yup], designers and non-designers, [yeah] and now there’s— there are design stickers on everything. PF Well there’s design stickers on giant consulting firms around technology, around— just everybody’s a designer. RZ The way a term’s like, you know, “customer journey” get tossed around. I mean it’s a strange— I’ve watched this not as a designer but more as a spectator— AC Mm hmm. RZ— and seen I think it’s the last ten years, more like five I feel like it really started to heat up. PF Well, do we— let’s— let’s actually— you’re saying, let’s ask Allan: do you feel that design has been commoditized in the last ten years? In a way that it wasn’t before? RZ Or describe this, like I— it’s just exploded and one I— I mean you can put on one hat and say, “Isn’t this great? Finally we’ve arrived.” And then there’s the other hat which is, “God we’re being— I mean it’s just— it’s been diluted into shit.” Uh give me your perspective on where we’re at today. [28:28] AC I think the first thing to notice— like so I’m not cynical about this, like the first thing to notice is that design has moved from something that is seen as aesthetic and coming at the end to something that is truly strategic, you know? And coming at the beginning. Adn like you understand that better than anybody. Right? You know? Again, you’ll make something beautiful but in a— in a Bucky Fuller kind of way if it’s the right solution, it will be beautiful. You don’t have to make it beautiful. So I think that there’s a new appreciation that— PF If you like domes. AC If you like domes. PF If you love a dome. AC Yeah. PF Yeah, ok. AC And then the other thing that, you know, people love to make fun of is design thinking which, you know, um even Tim Brown would like argue is just it’s pretty common sense. Right? Like work with your user; uh listen; prototype early; and then do it again. You know and iterate. And like don’t be an idiot. Basically. Like those [Rich laughs] are it. That’s design theory. PF That’s the man who runs IDEO. AC Yeah. PF Yeah, that’s Tim Brown. Ok. RZ Um design thinking is a wonderful thing. PF Well [sighs] — AC Well but people— but people make fun of it. And I think that a lot of people who make fun it— I mean first of all: the word, I talked about this in that no meeting article [https://productsofdesign.sva.edu/blog/nomeeting], the word thinking is in design thinking and everybody knows that design isn’t about thinking, it’s about making stuff. It’s about doing. PF Right. AC Um so right away it’s tricky um and then the idea is that if you thought about something hard enough then you— you would solve it, and that’s like ridiculous. I also think that people who criticize design thinking have actually never been in a design thinking workshop. Like I’ve run one uh with a bunch of um doctors and some managers and med students at Jefferson University just a couple months ago, and it’s like they see God. Like they can’t believe, they come up to you after and they’re like, “I can’t believe . . . I didn’t know about any of this. I can’t believe the notion of iteration. I didn’t even know that word, for instance. I didn’t know that we could make a low resolution like, you know, prototype of a webpage on a three— you know on a mobile app on three Post It notes and actually see something that we’ve been sitting in meetings just talking about and doing nothing about.” It’s like a revelation to them. RZ Mm. [30:24] AC So I think that people would be less willing to criticize— PF Well that’s the conversation where design thinking is brutal in the marketing message. AC Well and that’s the thing is journalists like to talk about the over promise of design thinking [right] and of course that’s bad. And again the over promising is— is part of the problem, the— the— the journalism of the over promising part is— that’s a fun article to write. You know? So. PF Well there was also a moment where everything kind of caught fire and went too far. It’s like TED was a good example like [mm hmm] 90 percent of the TED content is typical magazine style content. It’s pretty packaged up and then 10 percent is a little woo woo [mm hmm]. And fine, ok. Like that’s— that’s how America works and how we consume content but there was so much of it at one point that everybody was like, “I’m gonna make fun of this now.” AC Yeah, yeah, no, and I mean I think everything comes up for parody at a certain point [that’s right]. You know I liked it before it was cool kind of thing. PF Yeah. Yeah, yeah. AC Um so I see the more people talking or thinking about design as an actual process and not as a thing, as an artifact, like the better. That is— RZ It’s really value. AC Especially in a world where, you know, cynically, you know, it’s all about extracting value. Like the design process adds value. PF Right. AC Um and the earlier the better. Um I know Postlight’s like super design driven and you have a place, you know, you understand that everything, you know, starts and ends with design. [31:45] PF Thank you, you’ve saved us 30 seconds of marketing [Rich laughs]. AC Yeah. Ah it’s really, really true. RZ If you don’t mind [Paul laughing, Allan crosstalks] we’re gonna use that clip— AC Yeah, for sure. PF “Allan Chochinov says,” [Rich laughs] um you know a tricky thing too is the process can be really goofy, and that it’s hard to like it’s hard to commoditize like goofy thinking— AC Uh and— and risky, I mean if you’re a designer, you have to be comfortable with ambiguity [yeah] and business is not comfortable with ambiguity. Like they— they’re in the risk reduction business, right? A lawyer is too. Regulatory too. Policy too. So— PF One of the ways that I think we’re able to get stuff— AC— it’s antithetical to a lot of people’s like you know— RZ Sure. It’s scary. AC— way of life. RZ It’s a scary process. AC It’s really scary, yeah. PF One of the ways we get things across the line is just it’s so hard to ship software that people accept— there’s a point about halfway through on a lot of projects where we’re like, “You know, I know when you walked in and you said this and this and we said we didn’t know, we weren’t a 100 percent sure. It actually turns out that instead of A and B, C’s gonna be the better path.” They’re so anxious about not shipping that they’re able to sort of like process and listen and react to that because they’ve had experiences where things haven’t gone out the door because people have tried to do everything for them. RZ Also transparency is key there [yeah] like you can’t show up and say, “Listen: um it’s gonna be path C.” They— they have to have seen how we got there and involved— PF Rich has a wonderful maxim which is nothing’s bad news uh 60 days ahead. [33:10] AC Oh I love that. Mine is everything’s shitty until it’s better. You know? PF Right. AC Everything’s worse until it’s better. PF And if you just keep telling the story and they know that like, you know, path C is probably gonna be our option but it’s two months before delivery date, everyone is gonna calm down. AC Well do you think that— that scale like that number 60 changes depending on how, in some sense, in love they are with their own idea before they managed to get to you, to find you? PF [Exhales] We— we— AC Like how dug in they are to like, “We know that this is—” PF We destroy the love at outset of engagement. RZ Well, it’s— it’s— we have very much— we don’t report back, we’re more like, “Come on in. Come sit. [Yeah] At the table.” And you know that virtual table is Slack today. We don’t do the weekly report. We’re like, “Here’s what’s going on. Come on in.” Sometimes they don’t do it. They don’t come in. And then they just show up and they say, “Hey, what’s going on?” And— PF Actually not— not of the current class. Like we’ve got most of that out of the business. RZ Yup. It’s— it’s very— PF It’s too risky. RZ— collaborative. And because we want them to, first off: we want to have them in the room as we talk through the problem because a lot of times they’re the domain experts, not us. We’re just— AC Oh yeah. RZ We’re still trying to learn their world. AC Well I think appreciation for local knowledge is a nice tenet of design thinking. RZ Absolutely. Absolutely. AC It’s like not everybody— the client isn’t an idiot all the time. RZ Exactly. AC Kind of thing. Um. Yeah. [34:27] PF We are done with that. Like that— when we started this firm, my instinct was the clients were gonna show up and they were gonna show up and they were gonna be smarter than they used to be. The consumer of a platform company services is often a— a product leader on the other side and they— or they are experienced or they— also the— the resources for learning for what apps and what platforms and APIs are are— are so much better than they used to be [mm hmm]. So they come in pretty educated. AC Well and they also have consumer experiences on their devices [that’s right] that are like, “How come our work doesn’t work like this?” [That’s right] Like, “How come I don’t have a dashboard for this for my business but I do for my jogging?” PF Yeah, that’s right. AC “You know my running.” So, maybe half the battle is done for you. Maybe not half but at least they understand power of design, they may not understand the actual, you know, plumbing of it. RZ I think it has to do with— and I think you’ll see this even right up to big consulting, I mean the message now is, “We’re gonna worry about these problems with you. We’re gonna work through this. Design is part of the whole story. Here. Rather than it’s a bolt on.” And— and we say that, and so when people come to us, they kind of have an idea of how it’s gonna go, that we’re not a just raw engineering shop that is gonna take a blueprint and just produce the thing. AC I just wonder— you know one of my favorite quotes is Petrula Vrontikis, she’s a— a designer and a teacher in California, she says, “I work with my ears.” And so I wonder sometimes like well what kind of clients come in here where you’re mostly listening and what kind of clients are coming in here where you have to just help them understand like who are; what you believe; the process; the kind of team that you have. RZ Usually when they come here, there is so much bottled up. We go into pure listening mode. We just— we don’t even wanna actually have a dialogue much. We just sort of let them go. AC Put it out like let us see the reality of what you’re worried about, basically. [36:20] RZ Exactly. PF Around about minute 50 of a meeting— AC Yeah. PF I— I think like, “Oh, you know, we should tell them what we do.” Seriously like that’s— RZ We gotta let ‘em go and do the thing and then little by little we start to get into the— the conversation. You’re gonna know pretty quickly um whether this person is going to relinquish a lot of that control to allow us to do our thing or if it’s— if it’s going to be too tight and it’s gonna not allow this to be a success. And we can see it. Usually in that first or second meeting you can tell. AC Yeah, I’m sure you have really good instincts as well. Well lemme ask you the magic wand question like if you had a magic wand, what would you want that person to ask you or to know about you in those initial meetings where they’re trying to understand like, “Do I need design?” Like, “What is design capacity gonna do for me?” And I mean sort of where we started about choosing, you know, whether to go to school at all or with school and if your organization is the right fit for them. What would they ask you? Or what would they tell you that you couldn’t sort of sort of interrupt them at minute ten, say, “Listen, can you—” PF No, I mean— AC This would be helpful. PF For me, and Rich you might have a different point of view, but for me it’s just it’s very much— it takes a long time to get to the user. People have their— they have their peers and their business— AC They have the wrong user usually. PF Yeah and they’ve got the CEO and they’ve got so many anxieties. They have either money they have to spend or money they have to go ask for and— RZ Promises they’ve walked around for bigger companies. PF And who are we? Who the hell are we? AC Oh right, of course, like you’re not necessarily the only people they’re talking to. PF No and so they’re— they’re trying to figure us out. And so it often takes I think really three or four conversations until you can finally relax everybody and they can say, “Yeah, no, I know exactly who the user is here.” Right? But they cannot relax into that on that first meeting. It’s actually very closely held information. [38:13] RZ It’s often ambiguous. We had a client, the message was: there’s a big event coming in 90 days. And we wanna do a thing so that there’s— we make a good impact at the event. AC Right. RZ Like ideas came out like you know you pop the confetti thing? [Laughs] AC Exhibition design; branding; the whole brand environment. RZ They didn’t know. They had ideas. They had sketched stuff out. And they had what was actually great was they had this timeframe which we were able to use as sort of a forcing function [yeah, that’s true] to say, “Alright, listen: some of these are great and 3D is awesome.” AC [Chuckling] “But 90 days is 90 days.” RZ [Laughing] “But we’re 90 days away.” Right? AC And you’re budget’s your budget. RZ Exactly. That steering process and then eventually you have to give us the keys, right? We’re like, “Ok, we gotta run fast here.” I mean that is the reality. PF You’re gonna set up the server, you’re gonna put it on Rails at that point. RZ Yeah, yeah. And— and— AC And you might not get to test it so much. PF No, that’s right. That’s right like— AC Cuz an event like doesn’t slip. That’s— that’s the scary part of that. RZ It doesn’t slip. AC It’s just like, “Well, if we wait three more, you know, weeks, it’ll be, it’ll be [exactly] —” [39:15] PF No, it won’t get better and we won’t fail. Like we won’t let you fail. And so we actually have to build that relationship. The good news is that the people who are right over your shoulder watching every little bit, they tend to be super cheap. Like they don’t wanna pay. They wanna watch you and they wanna tell you how to do it and they’re gonna— they’re gonna watch every minute and so by the time we get even— even to back of envelope, they’re gone. AC They’ll know. You know that chart? It’s like, you know, design fees? You know whatever it is like 500 dollars, you know, if I do it [yeah], 750 if you watch me do it. PF Yeah [laughs]. AC You know? 1100, you know, if you’re in the room, you know. PF That’s right. AC Um and it just gets more expensive the more um [laughter] — there’s a bunch of these things on Instagram. They’re pretty great. I’m gonna find one and send it to you. RZ It’s also— I mean we think about the designers, it’s pretty demoralizing if you’re just— if somebody took your hand while it’s on the pencil [yeah] and are just constantly in there. It’s very— PF It’s not good. RZ It’s not good. PF Alright, Allan, what do people do to get in touch with you? AC I’m not much on Twitter. I mean I’ll be on it cuz I feel like I have to be on it. I like Instagram for hobbies. So that’s a good place to find me. Um, you know, you go down to chochinov.com but uh probably SVA is gonna be the— you know where you’re gonna see the most exciting stuff. So. PF Where? What is the name of the program? AC It’s uh Products of Design, it’s plural. Productsofdesign.sva.edu. PF Alright. AC Oh and I have this whole essay on changing the word “meeting” to the word “review”. Uh the argument is that if you use the word— if you had a review at three o’clock this afternoon, you know, you’d look like an idiot showing up empty handed to something called a review. But if you had a meeting at three o’clock like whatever, no need to prepare. So um this idea came up um in a— in a staff meeting from Alisha Wessler, our Director of Operations, and, you know, it was like, “Can we— can we reimagine the word ‘meeting’? Can we actually just change it in the department?” And she said, “Well what about the word ‘review’?” I was like, “That’s it!” So I went back to my computer and I downloaded an autocorrect Chrome Extension and I made it correct one word, whenever I typed the word “meeting”, it would change it to the word “review”. And then I went into my iOS and did the same thing. Um and so I spent seven months not being able to type the word “meeting”. [41:22] RZ How’d that go? AC It was awesome. Because you type “meeting” and then it changes it into “review” and you’re like, “Oh no, actually, we should probably ask people to like do something before we take their time and get together.” RZ Huh. I’m applying this test right now, so it’s like— AC Yeah. PF No, it’s not— it’s not— don’t just bring your ideas. Bring a plan. AC Anything— any kind of prototype. PF Yeah. AC Um and so one of our faculty, Bill Cromie, actually built a custom extension called No Meeting. Uh so you don’t have to like type in anything— RZ [Crosstalk] God bless web extensions— AC No, and get this: he came up with this idea to make a Slack bot, which he did. Which you can find at this— at this article. So when you type it into Slack, if the No Meeting Slack bot is in there, then the Slack bot will pop up and it says, “Hey, I noticed you uh typed the word ‘meeting’, would you like me to change that to the word ‘review’ so that people always come prepared to future gatherings?” PF Allan! RZ This was great. PF Yeah. I could listen to stories about medical devices being designed for the rest of my life. AC Well, thanks for having me. RZ Allan, thanks— thanks so much. [Music fades in] This was great. AC Yeah, this has been a thrill. RZ A lot of fun. AC Thank you. PF Hey, if anybody needs us, hello@postlight.com, that’s the email that you could send to and it would go to me and Rich and we’ll forward it to Allan if you have any questions for him. AC Ah, totally. PF Alright, let’s get outta here. Let’s hang out and talk about medical devices [music ramps up, plays alone for four seconds, fades out to end].

Why Dave Decided to talk to Andrew Warner: Andrew Warner is the founder of Mixergy. Mixergy was created to help motivated and ambitious people learn from experienced mentors on the best ways to grow by sharing their expertise and experiences. Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business: Incorporating Chatbots into your business? (2:55) Tips and Tricks for businesses to stay authentic using chat? (12:15) Other ways to utilize chatbots in an effective manner. (17:00) How chatbots work and how are they available? (21:00) What is the future for chatbots? (38:55) Quotable Moments: "Across the board, for every age group, people are spending more time using chat rather than email." "Every chat platform is going to have to have a chat bot in the future." Other Tidbits: Andrew discusses the significance of having influential people at your access to help you start your new company.  Andrew goes in depth on the benefits of using Chatbots and gives fantastic tips on how you can incorporate them into your personal funnel. Links: FunnelHackerRadio.com FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar ---Transcript--- Speaker 1:     00:00           Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast, where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets, and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Welcome to the show. We're so, so excited. Speaker 2:     00:19           Have you guys here? This is a. I can't date outside of am to have andrew with us. I've been trying to get him back on her podcast for awhile and last time I was with him actually was at euro. Your Scotch dinner? Yes. For Guy who does it was. No, there was no dinner. It was. It was a thing, but chat, chat bots and Scotch. You don't even drink scotch, but you still attended. It was great. It was a ton of fun and you're a great host again for them because you guys who aren't familiar with Andrew, Andrew's got the most amazing podcast in the world. Mixergy, if you haven't been listening to, you definitely need to. In addition to that, he's got the coolest technology and stuff he's been doing. Probably I would say you're probably one of the pioneers in this whole chat Bot thing. Speaker 2:     01:00           I mean, you've been around this for a long time. Oh, I've been so psyched about it. Yes. So we're going to dive facebook even allowed it before facebook allowed it. That's legit. Well, I, again, I can't tell you how excited I am to have you on this out. So for those of you in facebook land, we're going to be taking your questions and things, so please make sure you put your questions down below. And in addition to that, uh, will be stripping this as an audio. This is the first time we've ever done this where we're actually bringing celebrity specialists expert onto this and we're actually gonna be using this audio for a future podcast on funnel hacker radio. In addition to that, we've got some cool stuff we're doing with Andrew and Russell upcoming here real soon. So, uh, you'll have to stay tuned for that as well. Speaker 2:     01:42           But Age, Andrew, welcome to the show. So excited to have you on here. So the reason that we switched to zoom at the last minute, we were like four minutes late. I know there's somebody who does not like to be late. The reason we're doing this is because I'm going to show everyone how easy it is to put makeup on my face in real time and switch it because of a chat bot. So I want to show that I want to show how I ordered beer within a minute to a seat at a baseball stadium. Just using a chat bot. You know, you just go to the chat, you say, I feel like a bud light. It says here's your, here's your apple pay. I double tap the side of my phone. I ordered a beer, I'm going to show you that and I'm going to show you how it actually fits in with click funnels and everything else that we're doing with bundles. Speaker 2:     02:24           So I wanted to show the screen. You said Andrew, it's important you spend like 15 minutes making this first lesson from what you just got is. Those are some of the strongest three hooks I've ever heard any podcast. So thanks for setting the hooks, how good you know what and the reason I want to say that it's because some of it's going to be fun and really practical like for women to be able to see makeup on their faces, way better than looking on a on a phone screen and seeing a selection of it on models faces and I'll show you what that looks like and coming back to. And that's the future. Coming back to today, I'm going to show everyone how chat bots can help grow their funnels. How about we just start with that because I find that people don't. What a Chat Bot is, I want Speaker 3:     03:00           to do something super concrete so we're all on the same page. Even those of you who are listening and not watching, I promise I'm going to describe everything that's on my screen. Here is what is on my screen right now. You can see that, right dave? Yep. Left side landing page on my desktop. Everyone listening to me probably understands this is a click funnels page. On the right side is my phone and on the left you could see that if we had a, a company that offered a yoga studio, they might say in the past, enter your email address to get the guide. I want to show you what it looks like if it's not, enter your email address, not type in your name, but instead press one button and not after you press the submit button, it goes into an inbox full of thousands of unread messages and a lot of anxiety, but the user gets an alert on their screen and they get the immediate gratification. So here's what's going to happen. I guess. Again, I'm going to describe this for the people who I know are just listening in and not watching. Speaker 3:     04:01           So on the left, come on desktop, I'm shutting this off and I'm doing it again. Hang on the phone about doing stuff. The whole thing was supposed to hang on that one moment. That one moment that I set up. Okay, here we go. So on the left you could see landing page, user presses, just one button, no fields to fill in the button. Just says, send me a guide, and underneath it is the user's face and their name. As soon as they press it, look at what happens on the right side of this screen. Boom. You see that boom air. It is the user's promise to guide. As soon as they, they press the button there, phone alerts them and says, here's the guide. It says, welcome Andrew. Can I give you the pdf and teach you via this chat? These are presses a button that says yes, give it to me, and there it is. Speaker 3:     04:46           The guide comes right in. Obviously this is a guy that I use for demonstration purposes, so it's going to be full of stock photography, but you get the picture. The user will get the guide instantly in their chat bot instantly there for them to read, to share with their friends to save for later and it right, and every time I send a message, their phone, we'll get another alert. There'll be brought back into facebook messenger. There'll be able to read it, interact with it, and get things like pdfs, get things like videos, get things like graphics, get things like files. That's what a chat bot is. Does that make sense guys? Absolutely. Loving it. I know we're looking at some of the questions and stuff down here. Yeah. If you see a question, just read it to me, but I want to make sure that James and miles and wendy and everyone else who's listening to us live is actually following through. If this doesn't make sense, if you guys disagree with this, don't just say, yeah, nice to. Nice to hear it, Andrew, but shoot at me. Disagree with me. Speaker 3:     05:41           I think we're good. Good and date it. I'll tell you one of the big issues that people have when they see this, they say, well, Andrew, if you're saying that someone can easily subscribe to get my messages inside of Facebook Messenger, what happens if my doesn't have facebook messenger? My answer to that number one is one point 3 billion people use facebook messenger every month, every month, number one. Number two, you can collect an email address within this process. You could do it on the click funnels page or in the chat. It doesn't have to be an either or. You could say, you know what, I want to reach people in chat when there's something urgent and short message that I want to send them and collect their email address too so that when I have a longer form message I could reach them via email or maybe at some point facebook decides that they don't like chatbots anymore or they make my life hard. Speaker 3:     06:33           I have their email address and I could still reach users. That way you don't have a question all the time. Real quick, Andrew, and that is how do I actually get the email from them? Is there any great that or do I have to actually ask for it? So we do two things. One is in some cases we just keep our standard click funnels landing page, the one that has a big button. When people press it, they enter their email address. It works for us. I don't want to mess with it. We leave it as is, but as soon as somebody hits submit and gives us their email address, the next page says, press this one button and I could also reach you via chat. So that's one way we combine it. The other way is what you see on your screen right here where we eliminate the request for an email address from the landing page. Speaker 3:     07:14           The click funnels landing page just says, press this button and I'll send you the message via chat and one of the first messages that come via chat is, do you like this pdf? Would you like it sent to you via email? All they have to do is hit one button and their email address is passed into my crm and my software can start adding them to the list and sending the messages and the email address comes not from them having to sit and fat finger, type it in with typos and everything. But as soon as they press a button, facebook passes the authentic facebook email address into my email system. That's what we're talking about here through a little bit that we've, uh, we've done some testing on that and that, uh, the social email we find basically it's anywhere from 10 to 12 times greater response than some of the other stuff we get know people typing in different things. Speaker 3:     08:01           So I think that's awesome. Oh, you mean the email address you get from social? Yeah. You know why that is. I had an email address that was male@mixergy.com because I thought anyone who wants to send emails, you just send it to mel at mixergy. Facebook came back to me and said, that is not an okay email address. I said, yes it is. It works. So no, that is not, it's a functional email address. So what's that? I went and I googled it. It turns out for many businesses, mail at is like a business wide email address, not a personal email address. Facebook super duper wants to make sure they reach me directly, my personal email address, the main one. And so they wouldn't let me get away with using anything other than the best email address I have. And so I now gave him a different email address, so facebook's putting all that effort to get email addresses. We might a little piggy back off of it. I love it. Speaker 3:     08:50           Very cool. All right, so now we've been talking about what chat bots are. So from here this kind of go, how, how are people using these? You showed an example here as far as clickfunnels and and going into yoga and all that kind of stuff. What are some. Who are some of the big players who are using this stuff right now? So here's the good news and the bad news. The good news is the big players in marketing are not doing anything huge in it, which means that we have an incredible runway to jump in and lock in as many users as possible. Get my lock and get them to subscribe. There's, they have free to opt out anytime they want, but we have an opportunity to be the big players in this. You know, years ago I had an email marketing company and I remember this guy who was a superstar in the paper mail direct mail business with someone I admired forever. Speaker 3:     09:38           I invited him into my office. The guy comes around to the twelfth floor of a of my business, five slash 75 Lexington avenue goes, this whole floor is yours, and he looks at me. I'm like 22 years old. And I go, yeah, this is how we run our business. He goes, what kind of business do you guys run? I know you wanted to hear about me, but what does this say? It's an email marketing business because email marketing built all this, how much revenue you guys do? I said, $35 million. He goes, we totally, totally missed the boat on email. Says, we've been doing so well with paper mail. We never thought to get into email and I knew it was big. I didn't know it was this big. So the same thing's happening here. The big guys and email marketing are going to miss this and new people, new, big players are going to come in and I think that's the power of this. Speaker 3:     10:25           I love it. I think, uh, for me some of the main things, we're super excited. We were adding a Bot technology to our actually next empty. If it's going to be rolling out here next couple months. It's really one of the main reasons I wanted to have you on the show is to help people understand it's, this isn't. First of all, I kind of addressed the issue as far as is it just a fad or is this something that's here to stay? So it's addressed that one first. Okay. So that's a really good question. The thing that I try to ask myself is when I talked to my friends, do I use chat or email? If I'm using chat more and more, that's an indication of something. If I think about what do I like using more chat apps like I messaged which I use with my wife, like facebook messenger, which I use with some of my customers like slack, which we use with our developers. Speaker 3:     11:13           If those are the fun ways that I enjoy engaging with people and email is the place I feel like I have to go back, that feeling I have to respect that this is what's in my bones and that this is an indication of the future, but I also want data so I went back to APP Annie App. Annie looks at all the apps that people keep on their phones and what they're most engaged in and I saw that across the board for every age group. People are spending more time in messaging than they are in an email except for people 45 and older. In which case email has a slight advantage but you can see it starting to wear out. So my feeling, my experiences were using chat more. The data's showing people are using chat more, especially younger people are using chat more than email and so we have to, as business people say, are we going to be stuck and say email's the only way to reach people or think you know what? Speaker 3:     12:06           Email is a good way. It's working, let's not get rid of it, but maybe the future is chat and let's jump on board now. Let's learn it. Let's develop our audience there. That's the future. And so that's what I believe. I think chats the future. I think that's the part I liked the most is the personal aspect and people are always asking, well, as I don't want to get into a situation where people are angry because I'm sending them messages and as a business, how many messages are too many? How do I make it personal style so they still want to receive my messages so they don't unsubscribe for me. What are. What are the some of the tips and tricks that you've found that a business can use to actually still stay relevant and be very authentic and in Messenger orange out? You know, before I answer that, I'm going to ask you about the earphones. Speaker 3:     12:48           What are you wearing? What is this? Uh, these are my favorites. These are, uh, are click funnels. Earbuds. Actually this is a, this was a gift from Russell to our executive team. And it's authentic. It's authentic. Yeah. It's the actual apple earbuds somehow in red and blue, the click funnels colors. That's correct. And we're going to be a most likely having a special affiliate price going up towards the end of the year where people can win these things were top affiliates. Get to have those ear buds. You get it. You know what? I didn't like my white here, but I love the airpods. I have them right here. They're never more than six feet away from me. I thought I could have them died in different colors afterwards because I don't love how bright they are and they're now becoming like everyone else. You're in San Francisco, but you can't get them died afterwards. There's no price you can pay. You got to do it before and it comes in a nice black box like this. Speaker 3:     13:43           So here's how to not be annoying. Um, first of all, the truth is a lot of this is still new and we're and we're learning and I have to accept it. If I'm learning at times I'm going to make mistakes and I'm not going to be the best, the best communicator out there. One of the things that held me back in high school was I was afraid to go and ask girls out because what if they, what did they think that asking them out is a little annoying. What if they think, what if I get embarrassed by asking them out and they say no, and so I didn't ask them out and I was really reluctant to do it. So what I'm trying to do as an adult is learned from that and say, I'll take a little bit of a risk and say the wrong things and learn from it because my intentions are good and I'll get better. Speaker 3:     14:24           So with that in mind, here's what I found. Number one, it used to be that going daily with your messages was the best way to engage people. Because if you skipped a few days, they thought you didn't care, it felt like you disappeared if you sent a message on Monday and Tuesday, but not again until Friday or Saturday, people would think it was spam because they forgot that this is part of the interaction and so we did that. We did daily, daily, daily, daily, and we saw that our response rates are going low. We started checking in with the BOT makers I've invested in. I wish I'd invested in clickfunnels. I invested in a few companies, two of the top companies in the chat space, and I started to learn from what they were doing for big brands for smaller marketers, and what they showed me was the world was shifting to every few days and so now I would say the first day, obviously you send a message right away. Speaker 3:     15:13           They sign up, they should see a message from you and chat. I'd recommend the next day sending another message to so that there's a little bit of a memory. They just signed up. The next day. They see that you're still reaching them. They know this is a relationship where they expect to get from you, maybe again the day after that, and then ease off, then switched to three days or so between messages. Maybe even as far as a week. Now is this hard and fast rule? No Way. I was sitting in my chat, I'm sitting in my chat bot the other day responding to every single person who engaged with my chaplain. There was this guy from Jordan and saying, how big is your list? He says, a million people. I said, how'd you grow up? He goes, and I can't talk. I don't speak English that well. I can't write English. Speaker 3:     16:01           So I call him up on facebook messenger because you can actually use books. And I say, how did, how did you do it? What's going on? He chats. He says, I've, I've listened to mixergy forever. I like that you're engaging this way. He goes, I created this quiz. People answer seven questions and then they. And then they get to send the response to the, um, the result of the quiz to their friends to show their friends how smart they are. And in that situation, sending more messages more than more than once a week obviously makes more sense. People are looking for more quizzes, they're looking for more things to share. I've seen the same thing happened with Bible quotes. People Create Bible of the day messages. People create joke of the day and those cases daily, even more than daily. Makes Sense. But for the most part you want to ease off. Speaker 3:     16:44           And that's one way to not be annoying. I love it. Well, I'm dying to find out some of you started off with some really super crazy hooks on. You're dealing with chats. I've got to find out. You have to tell us what are the stuff you're doing that's totally off the wall chat wise. So I want to show you something that it's not what I'm doing. But um, so the reason I know about this is I invested in a company called assist. And let me see if I can show you what we did there. These guys were one of the first companies to do chatbots. Let me share my screen. Here is my phone. Can you see my phone over here? You of let you know what I'm going to actually put, put it on do not disturb so that I don't accidentally get my wife's messages communicated to everyone who knows why she's going to send out. Um, so I want you to see what's Sephora, what they did for Sephora, because I think the floor is doing something really interesting. So let me bring up the flora. Speaker 3:     17:46           Now. This goes beyond marketing. This is an insight where the future is going and you can see on Sephora when I started out, they address me real quick for those people who aren't the notes before. Just if there are guiding me and I know it's a forest. Oh, so far as a makeup and beauty brand. So do makeovers, they'll sell you makeup and so on. And so you can see that I can shop different looks, I can book a makeover with them. I could share feedback, I could chat with a live person all within the Chat Bot, right? I just hit the start over button by accident, but here we're going to try on different looks. Speaker 3:     18:21           So let's suppose that I like this winged liner and red lip. Let's try it on now. My camera comes up immediately. That's a great color on you, Andrew. And notice how I'm going to keep on moving and it will stay there. That's impressive, right? Let's try a different look. See My, my eyes. Your lips aren't on, but your eye. There you go. Oh No. That was a more natural look. You see my lips are. There you go. You're right. That's the natural. Subtle. Okay. Now let's suppose that this is something that I like. I might want to share this with a friend so I could take pictures of this. I can do all kinds of stuff with this. Let's try it. Let's go for this. Speaker 3:     19:12           Look. Stays there. I can choose who I send this to and now I could pick from all of my friends in here or I could add a few others or I could send it to my story for the day and share it with the world. This is really powerful. This is the future. And now watch when I come back I can actually start buying this. They showed me what I tried on so that I can buy it. Okay. For most businesses, this is a little intense. We don't have to do things to that degree. We just need to say the world is switching to chat. We need to anticipate it and be there and I know you guys are there and so we have to think about not replacing email yet, but if we're communicating with people via email, how do we also add chat? How do we also incorporate chat the apps that they love and we need to think that in the future it's going to be more than email. Speaker 3:     20:05           It's not going to be a reproduction of email. It's going to allow us to do cool things like this, so imagine if you have someone in your audience who sells a couch to be able to bring up the camera right there in facebook messenger, see their room and add the couch in augmented reality in the room. That's not the future. It's here. I'm just saying for most people it doesn't make sense. For most businesses, for most users, it's a little too advanced. Let's be aware that this is where the world is going though. I love it. That's fantastic. So how did you order the beer? Okay, so the reason that the beer comes into play is because whenever I talk about this, people say, this is just facebook. What happens if. What happens when facebook says no more chat bots? What I'm finding is every chat platform is going to have to have a chat bot and in fact, before I even show you the beer, let me show you why that is important. Speaker 3:     21:01           So real quick, andrew, if you don't mind explain to people. A lot of times people think of Messenger as the only chat Bot out there, right? Can you kind of explain how the chatbots really working? What's available? Sure. In in chat there, it's a very fragmented world with email, no matter what platform you're using. You could be on hotmail, you could be on Yahoo Mail, you can be on Gmail. If I sent, if I know your email address, I could send a message to it. Chat is little fragmented. I have to know that you, Dave, prefer facebook messenger as a way of communicating and you have to know that I might prefer I message and that's the way that we're communicating with our friends. So how do businesses reach us using the chat apps that we love? Well, the way they do it is with something called a chat Bot. Speaker 3:     21:45           A Chat Bot is the equivalent at this point of sending out message, sending out email via chat, sending out, just like you would have an email marketing solution for reaching people via email. If you want to reach them via chat, you need a chat Bot and you want to know what platform they're on. Awesome. Okay. So let me show you why chatbots are going to come everywhere. Guys, if this, if you disagree or if you're not following because I'm showing too many different things, let me know. Um, let me know in the chat and I'll keep monitoring it. But here's the thing. This is a standard browser in safari. Let's suppose I wanted to stay at the Marriott. Notice how in the past at the Marriott, this is just me typing it into the search bar in the past, uh, apple used to say, here is a link to the Marriott's website. Speaker 3:     22:31           Then they got a little smarter than they said, here's the link to the Marriott's website, but you probably want to call them or you want directions. And so they put a little icon for a phone so you can just call them and a little icon for directions so you can get directions if that's what you're looking for. What apple's realized is people don't want to call, they don't want to talk, you know, we can laugh at the future and I do, but the truth is people prefer to chat. So look at what they did. They'd now replaced the phone button with the little chat icon. If you look at it on your screen, do you see that on your screen? That's killer, right? So now if I chat, look at what happened. I actually did chat with them and you could see I chatted and I said, hi, look at the response Mary had sent to me. Speaker 3:     23:12           Thank you for messaging. Marriott associates are available to respond Monday through Friday, 9:00 AM to 6:00 PM eastern time for immediate for immediate assistance. Call us and they gave me a phone number. So why am I showing you this? We know that an apple knows that consumers prefer to chat with businesses, but when they do, most businesses, even big ones like Mary, I don't have people standing by to chat in real time. Right? So what they need is a little automation in their chat Bot. They need to enable people to say, do you have a room at the Marriott in Los Angeles? And have them say yes, absolutely. And that's where the future is where chat bots will be able to do it. And I believed that the apple is going to enable everyone to carry it, a chat Bot for their platform. They're going to have to have Mary create a chat Bot. This kind of broken experience is not going to survive for long. They know people want to chat. They know that Marriott doesn't have enough people to do it all the time. So that's why I wanted to show you how I bought beer, so now I'm going to bring up beer and show you what that looked like. Speaker 3:     24:16           This is an actual exchange that I had and I'll read the message to you. Welcome to brew to you. This is a chat bot built on apple today. We, you and I, Dave, even you with all your power, even Russell with all his power, everyone who's listening to us cannot create a chat bot on apple's platform. You could only do it on Facebook Messenger and slack and a few others, but I want you to see that this is coming because assist built this chat Bot. It's already the infrastructure's there. Apple just needs to start giving more and more permission. So again, I'm giving you a glimpse into the future so you could see what the message says. Welcome to brew to you. That's the name of the delivery chat Bot that they created, your automated bread beverage assistant. We're serving until the seventh inning because that's the way the baseball stadiums work. And here's what's on tap. So I hit this little button and I saw what's on Tap Bud Light Miller light, right? I could select it, I don't have to type everything. I could just see it and select what I want including for you dave water. Speaker 3:     25:21           So what I did was I wanted to be a bit of a jerk instead of tapping and selecting one of those options. I typed in to buds. I wanted to see will they understand the two buds means bud light but a budweiser and they did say to bugs, they spoke right back to me and they said to buds, you got it now type in the section and row and see which I did. And then they said your order is going to be $18 and then you don't see it here because it disappeared. Apple pay comes up and says, here is the credit card you gave apple. Can we use this? I tapped, I paid. We're talking about a minute and this happened and suddenly whoever was sitting at that role, I happen not to be there. It was just a demo and I hope that they're. That they're not non drinkers like you and I didn't, it was introducing something that they didn't want their just sitting there and somebody came over with a real beer and handed it to them. This is the future. This is what we're all going to be able to create. That is crazy. Cool. Right? That is crazy. Cool. So can I have ordered Scotch and since scotch to you know, man, the SCAP, the Scotch Bot needs to be created. You got to get ahold of a cyst. Alright. So as a that's amazing and super, super cool. And we could spend hours just kind of go through other ideas on this. But I wanted to find out a lot of people got concerned that all of a sudden facebook lock things down Speaker 2:     26:44           a few months ago and we were right in the middle of doing some things with actionetics and d and it kind of impacted us. So why do they shut it down and what's that have to do with the future of what might happen on facebook with chatbots. Speaker 3:     26:55           See, I was actually really glad they shut it down. Here's why I sold in my chat Bot last week, I followed the rules, Dave. I said, I'm not selling to anyone who didn't interact with my Chat Bot within the last 24 hours because that's the rules. I might. I might talk a good game sometimes, but I'm one of these nerds who has to, if the rules are there, I've got to follow the rules. So I've been following the rules exactly right, and then I see the people create these chatbots that they do nothing but send out deals. They saw the groupon does great. They said, we're going to be the group on of chat and they're sending out just boom, firing off a great deal on a, on a USB hard drive, boom, great deal on a case for your iphone. Boom, great deal. It's just like pounding people with it. Speaker 3:     27:42           Even when they're not touching the chat bot and I saw that they were making good money and I said, I'm a nerd who follows the rules. Why are these people who don't follow the rules doing better than hand? And then there was something else that was really troubling me. Everything that people say to my chat bot, including the curses, not only do I see it, but I see the person who sends it out. I can see who they're married to. I could see everything. I don't hold it against people they don't know and frankly we all curse is fine. You curse. Not much. I try not don't, so I thought it's kind of interesting that I see all this stuff that's the way the world works in chat and then I see these things like a therapy bought that. The first message a therapy bots said was everything you say to this therapy bought is private and I'm pulling my hair out going, this is. Speaker 3:     28:38           This is absolutely wrong. Forget minor infractions. Trying to. This is definitely wrong and so all this stuff was going on in the facebook messenger platform. It was super effective so people got away with everything. I said, I'm so glad that facebook is stopping this, checking out to make sure things are legitimate and then bring it back. I mean, you talk about a little bit of regulation, a little bit of looking around and not ruin the platform for all of us, and so they stopped it. They stopped some of the bad actors. They enable this platform to be better for all of us and I think that that's a great way to operate. Even facebook says we're not going to happen. Anything goes platform. Then it shows that this is going to be a place that people can feel safe. I love it. Speaker 2:     29:21           I think that we felt the same way. I know I was a little frustrated at first for us, but just the idea that it cleaned up the game for everyone I think is again, there's whole bunch of privacy issues and everything else going on legally these days and I think facebook does a great job as far as stepping up to cleaning up the game. So I thought that was awesome. Speaker 3:     29:36           Can I tell you what I did at the time? I, uh, I called up, uh, one of your competitors. You guys compete, everyone by the way, you compete with ad just like you don't need Andrew Anymore. You don't need Andrew, it's like the next week you are going to have an ad going. You do not need apple. We've got a new phone coming out. So anyway, I compete. I invested in one of your, one of your now maybe competitors because you guys are taking on the world immediately when facebook shut it down, I called them up and I said, how do I put more money in your little startup? I want, I believe in this because I now think because they shut it down, it's going to be an even better platform. So that's how strongly I felt about it. So let me show you something else that they did. Speaker 3:     30:15           Let's, let's look at one of my box. This is one of the new things that they did that people don't realize. I'm gonna. Share my screen again. I'm glad that you let me do shoot screensharing. Otherwise I'd just be yapping all day. I'm watching it. I'm watching people like Mark Stern. Mark, I'm looking at the screen over here. Thanks for the affection. Uh, thank you. Also Matana. I hope I'm pronouncing your name right. I'm, I'm checking to make sure that I'm not going too far with you guys. So here, this is a standard chat bot. This is mine. I obviously I've been sending them the same message to myself over and over because I wanted to make sure it worked so you can see I sent out my blog post and I have a read button so people can read the blog post and I also have a share button so they could share it. Speaker 3:     30:55           So there's a little bit of a reality built into the messages that we send out in our chat Bot. Right? Um, so by the way, if you want to, you can see if I hit share, the latest people who I chatted with are all within reach and I could actually hit send to. Let's send it to Rachel now. Rachel's gonna. Get it. Makes Sense. Got It. Okay. So that's how easy virality is within there. But I want to show you something that most marketers are gonna hate, but we should be happy. This exists. You see this little checkbox right here. Let me do that again. Little checkbox right there. I can now turn off messages, I don't like this company so right, because before that wasn't there and it was so frustrating. You get just inundated with some stuff, like how do I get off this list or off this bought and they've quoted it there, but they hit it. Speaker 3:     31:39           It was harder to spot and what they're doing now is making it easier and easier for people to see. Compare that with expedia. My Assistant Andrea, for some reason she must own shares and expedia. Every time I asked her to book a trip, you're going to see I'm going to come out to see you guys. Where are you in Utah? Uh, we're in Idaho, but we're going to meet you in. You're in Utah, right? So I tell her, can you help me get a trip to Utah? I bet you five minutes after she books, I'm going to get three different expediate information emails and five different subscriptions from them. And I do the same thing. Every time I go in, I hit unsubscribe from each one. It takes me to a landing page that says, give us 10 business days down. Subscribing. I go crazy. So that's the problem with email. Speaker 3:     32:24           The solution is that anyone can within chat unsubscribing, cancel. Super Cool. I love that. Okay. I've got more data to show, but I want to give you a chance to talk here. I don't want to just keep pounding, you know, I just want to make sure I want to be valued. I want to make sure we're sensitive to your time as well and I've seen the comments are loving this and good back when facebook. And I think that's, that's the whole reason we're doing this. I'm one of the things. So I had you on our podcast, I don't know, probably six months, eight months ago we talking about this whole Bot Academy and I had a couple of guys that actually some of our, even our, our support staff are buying it and people were excited about it. What the heck is Bot Academy? Because at first people thought they're gonna be able to create bots or do things. Speaker 3:     33:04           So explain kind of what bought academy is why it's important and all that crazy stuff. So as effective as this is, and you and I get it right, because we're in the email space, we're in the subscription space, we understand landing pages, somebody comes to Atlantic page, hits a button, subscribes, we understand that we need to welcome them in a certain way, send a certain sequence of messages. We know that if we bring that into chat world, we're ahead of the game because in the chat world, people don't know this stuff. The problem is when I started investing in this, in these companies, as an angel investor here in San Francisco, I thought everybody got it, and so I would show it to people and they say, this is great, and I go, are you building it? They say, no. I go, why not? They say, wow, I don't know what to say. Speaker 3:     33:45           I don't know how to create a sequence. I don't know what you mean by sequence. Exactly. So I thought, you know what? Somebody needs to train people, train consultants to build these kinds of experiences for businesses because businesses don't know this stuff. They don't have time for it. They don't want to learn it. They want to run their businesses, they want to sell makeup, they want to sell beer, they don't want to learn drip campaign and landing pages and opt in, and so if autocad. So first I started teaching it to them one on one and introducing them to the software that I was backing and they were building on that software. And then I said, you know, what, we need to place where we can teach it and that's what Bot Academy is. We teach people how to create these sequences, these landing pages, how to get convergence, how to do copywriting, and how to get clients to pay them for it. Speaker 3:     34:28           And we intentionally are focused on that. How to get people who want to do this for clients, how to get them up and running. I love that. I know that. Uh, it's fun. We rolled out our, what we refer to as our mother funnel and basically changed the whole page to click funnels page now. And on the right hand side, you can select from one of the 10 different industries or niches or verticals that you're in and one of those agencies or freelancers and we're seeing right now, it's probably one of one of our top two or three of those as far as fastest growing segments where people are trying to become an agency, but then all of a sudden they find they're competing with everybody else. I don't know how to, how, how can they really separate themselves from everyone? And it's one of the main reasons I wanted to have you want to talk about, you actually could specialize in bots. Speaker 3:     35:09           And I'd like to kind of expand on that. Yeah. Um, that's exactly what we're seeing. That there are people who are agencies or have tried the agency thing because they know that it's. If you could get a client to pay, it doesn't cost much to set up an agency. You just have to do good work. And then you can start expanding by hiring a team. The problem is you can be the millionth person selling facebook ad services or websites, services or email services, or you can be one of the handful of people, very small group who say, you know, this whole new chat Bot thing, do you want one? I could set you up with that, and so that's helping people who are already running agencies get more clients or be more valuable to their existing clients and we've seen a lot of good results from people who are already running agencies. Speaker 3:     35:54           I love it. I know it's for us, again, one of the main reason I wanted to have you on honest, it's actually an opportunity for people to use that as as kind of your lead Gen and officers. They have a chat Bot. The next thing they're going to need is going to be a funnel. They gotta take them someplace and so right up, right, and then we don't separate from email. We don't say no landing page, no nothing. Just say this is what's working. We're going to add chatbots to this, and by the way here, I actually, just for our internal group, I did an interview with this Guy Nick Julia. He's fantastic. He had an agency where he was doing basic copy services, web design, and he said, I'm going to try chatbots. And he started growing. You can see all my typos in here because it's my own person, my own personal notes. Speaker 3:     36:30           Part one of his clients is a company called completely Keto. He, uh, started working with him. Here's how many subscribers he got for him. 9,000 subscribers. It costs him nine cents to thirty cents per chat Bot subscribers. So that's pretty good. Right? And here's what he sold it. He sold 'em, 211 people are paying for a $165 product around Quito. This is a diet, a, a hundred and 20,000 for a one time thing. $60,000 for recurring. So I'm doing the math as I continue here in my notes to 215. And then book sales is $100,000 in book sales. So a grand total of $315,000 in sales from 9,000 subscribers and it's broken up into the smaller packages that cost 160. Uh, sorry, this is a bigger product, $167. Um, and something as small as book sales. And by the way I'm mentioning the exact name. I don't want to say Nick J or whatever. Speaker 3:     37:33           You guys should see nick, Julia, if you don't want to build your own chat bot goods, go called Nick Julia. If he can't do it because he's too busy, he'll refer you to one of the other Bot Academy graduates. If, uh, I'm not saying he had some random client, it's completely quito. You guys can actually see them online and see how well they're doing. So the reason I'm saying this is because people like nick who used to do other services are now creating chatbots and getting customers and their customers are getting results because this is so effective. The answer. That's awesome. I love that kind of stuff. So what exactly is bought academy? How do people get involved? All that fun stuff about academy is where we teach people like nick had a great chat bots and how to get clients to pay them to create a chat bot for them. If anyone's interested, they can see it@BardAcademy.com or we created a chatbot just for you guys so you can experience the click funnels chat Bot. All you have to do is go to academy.com/clickfunnels and you will see a book, a Chat Bot we created just for click funnels where you'll see a lot of what we talked about and get to experience. It's one thing for me to say, you can get an email address out. It's super easy. It's another thing for you to go, oh my goodness, Speaker 2:     38:36           I just press a button. This is the future is amazing. I should copy Andrew. Awesome. So I'm going to a miles if you're walking, listening to put that into the comments so people see that. So it's Bot academy.com forward slash click funnels. Make sure that's there for people who are interested in and taking advantage of that kind of stuff. Um, the other thing I wanted to kind of talk about it here is what's kind of, what's next, where do you see this thing going, how is it evolving and you know, kind of what's the next phase. Speaker 3:     39:02           The next phase is more chat platforms are going to allow this type of automation and they're all experimenting in their own way. So you're going to see it in what's APP, you're seeing it already in facebook messenger. You'll see it on apples I message but assist, which is a company that I, again, I backed and then they showed me how it's going to work in facebook messenger before it launched and facebook messenger and so on. Uh, they showed me, I messaged before it's on message. They're talking to me about how now they're working with big brands, big hotel brands to create this type of experience in Alexa to create this type of experience in Google home. And what they're doing is they create one product in one chat platform and then they say, now we can easily transfer to the next and the next to the next. And so as you walk around, do you have an Alexa device in your house? I do actually. Oh good. All right, good. So you know it, right? Once you have it in there, you start to use it. My Kid, he's four years old. He starting to demand that Alexa, play the theme from frozen. Speaker 2:     40:01           I love it. Or Andrew, I know a a question. I always get on this kind of stuff. When someone says, well how hard is this going to be? As I'm kind of seeing in some of the questions coming through on personal message of her saying a actually on personal messages. Say, Dave, is this something that I can actually do or is it going to be take a ton of experience and knowledge as do I have to learn a whole new technology? What? When you look at it Bot Academy, how much tech stuff too they need to be aware of and learn. Speaker 3:     40:29           I can get anybody and I would challenge you guys if you find in in this group, in the click funnels group, somebody who is completely clueless, I will bet a thousand dollars that within an hour I could get them to build a chat bot. So there's my challenge. If there's someone out there who says I'm the most coolest person, I totally get it. Pick whoever's the clue the person, the least cool person. I totally get it because you know what? When it comes to clothing, I'm the clue. Clue in person to hire a personal shopper to buy this shirt. This is not even that fancy, were all clueless and certain things, so if you find the most coolest person, I guarantee you within an hour they'll have a chat bot and probably what it'll be is 20 minutes to create the Chat Bot. Forty minutes for me to ask them about their earphones in their lives and just super easy to create it. So if you're listening to me, frankly, if you're all familiar with clickfunnels, you're ahead of most people. You can do this in 10, 20 minutes. It's not hard. It's not hard at all. Speaker 2:     41:24           I love it. So that's bought academy dot Com. Forward Slash clickfunnels. It's in there. Yes. And Click on that and go, go check out what the Andrews built. Andrew. Again, it Speaker 3:     41:34           is always a party having you on. I look forward to spending more time with you as we are kind of close to wrapping things up. Anything else that you want to share with the community here? Yeah, that don't be like that guy who's super smart, who understood one vehicle, which was paper mail, who was afraid to experiment with email. We know how easy email is, right? Be the person who was willing to experiment. Don't be. In fact, forget about him. Don't be like Andrew in highschool. The 16 year old Andrew was afraid to talk to girls because what if it didn't work out? I got to just gone over and sat next to them and talk to them. Just experiment with it. Sign up to. In fact, if you sign up to my chat Bot, I will start referring you to places where you can create a chat bot created. Speaker 3:     42:09           It will take you no time at all. You're going to get insight into the future and it'll give you a better life and opportunity to get more clients and more customers and more users. This is, this is the future, if you believe in it, just try it. Like I love going to. I can see that and mandarin at school. I see people already buying it. So this is a great tribute to you and what you created. So that's super cool. I know, uh, one of my buddies, uh, on our support team bought this from you the first time we did it and he loved it. And actually, you know, what's the best thing about having click funnels people in this is he is like doing support for our group. Somebody said, how do I add this to click funnels landing page? And I thought I made it easy and he's creating a separate video shown how to do it. Well. He's a great guy on our team. I'm glad he's working for you on yours. Hopefully. Thank you so much for having me back on. Thank you everyone at click funnels. Really, honestly, I want to help you guys create a chat Bot if you're having trouble. If you're getting stuck, let me know. Thanks again, but we'll talk real soon. Thanks. Bye. Speaker 4:     43:13           Hey everybody. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts. If you don't mind, could you please share this with others, rate and review this podcast on itunes. It means the world to me where I'm trying to get to as a million downloads here in the next few months and just crush through over $650,000 and I just want to get the next few $100,000 so we can get to a million downloads and see really what I can do to help improve and and get this out to more people. At the same time. If there's a topic, there's something you'd like me to share or someone you'd like me to interview, by all means, just reach out to me on facebook. You can pm me and I'll be more than happy to take any of your feedback as well as if people would like me to interview more than happy to reach out and have that conversation with you. So again, go to itunes rate and review this, share this podcast with others and let me know how else I can improve this or what I can do to make this better for you guys. Thanks.

Why Dave Decided to talk to Marcos Moura: Marcos Moura is one of the founders of Amada Senior Care. A franchise that specializes in providing home health care for seniors. An 8-figure click funnel award winner, Marcos has franchised over 120 locations and is anticipating putting another 200 locations on the map in the near future. Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business: Teaching entrepreneurs how to start a senior care business? (5:52) How to take your offer and put it in front of the right people? (11:00) Providing a business in a box to the entrepreneur: (17:00) Quotable Moments: "We provide a business in a box to the entrepreneur. They are never going to have to go find some other way to do it. All the marketing pieces, all the flyers, everything." "I hope marketers really see themselves as not just marketers, but as revolutionaries." "You don't have to start that low. I love that you start at $48,000. Totally extreme. It's like, no, we know what we are. And because of that, you're able to really get super, super dialed in on exactly who you're and you're marketing to." Other Tidbits: Marcos discusses his journey building Amada and how he helps entrepreneurs start businesses tailored specifically for the audience they are trying to attract. He discusses how to manage a high-ticket funnel, building a franchise and how to market effectively. Links: FunnelHackerRadio.com FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar ---Transcript--- Speaker 1:     00:00         Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast, where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets, and how you can get those same results. Here is your host, Dave Woodward. Everybody welcome back. You guys have Speaker 2:     00:19         of your life today. I am so excited. I've. I've known this guy for a long time and I want to make sure you guys understand. I bring on a lot of people onto the show here who've got everyone thinks, oh, I can use clickfunnels for information products or maybe for for lead Gen, for a retail shop or something like that. I want to introduce you guys to Marcus Mora, who is the founder of Amata senior care and it's the coolest thing ever because they actually are using click funnels for franchises, but as cool as that is, marcus is the guy. Nicest guy you'll ever meet in the entire world. The funnel hacking live. We were in San Diego, the botnet. It's kind of a joke now, but we appreciate it. The time is bringing the jot down the loudest. Take the team out on the yacht and everything else is the Harvard, but without any further ado, let's welcome to the show. Speaker 2:     01:05         Hey, thank you dave. I really appreciate you having me on. This is a huge honor. I've been waiting my whole life for this interview. Oof. Well now your life is over. So yeah, it's what a homer Simpson tells. Bart. Bart says this is the worst day of my life, Dad. And homer says your worst day so far, but this is like, this is the pinnacle man. It's so cool to be on this call with you. Thank you so much. Well, hopefully this is the best day of your life so far. So anyways, I wanted to kind of for those, you guys don't know what you do. Help people understand how in the world a franchise, especially in the senior care industry would be ended up using clickfunnels. Yeah. So this happened and I think so many people go through this, right? So, um, I think this is so click funnels launched. Speaker 2:     01:55         What are your Dave? Two thousand 14. So yeah. So, so let's go to 2014 and we're doing what everybody else does out there. You, you need a new landing page because you're trying to attract, uh, I don't know, whatever you're trying to attract, right? Uh, I wanna I want to attract a somebody who is male over the age of 30, who makes this much money that wants this product, right? Or I want to sell this. And what you had to do is whenever I want it to make that page or make a change to that page, I had to either go to an agency, right? The outsourced agency. And we'd say, here's what we want. It's okay. They'll take three weeks, right? Or four weeks or whatever it is. Or we have to go to our, our, uh, our it team, right? And it was the same thing. Speaker 2:     02:41         It was like, okay, that will take three weeks and you're like, are you kidding me? Three weeks for you to change a title here, do that. And so I remember I was googling, um, uh, I know the, I don't even know if I called it a landing page. I seriously guys, I have no tech skills, I'm a sales guy, right? All I needed as I, I needed content on a page, that's it, right. And I knew what I wanted to say and I knew my audience really well, which is something we can talk about if he is kind of an interesting topic, but I knew that but I, but I had no idea and I think I found one of your competitors first because I think it took me like two or three different page makers into click funnels and so we were testing out and I will set something like all three of them, right? Speaker 2:     03:25         I went to that stage where I think a lot of, a lot of people go through this where they have like four different landing page creators. Right? And, and, and you're testing all of them and click funnels. Is it it? It was. It's what we use to be able to be nimble. So what, here's what we know is, is a lot of times we start with a message and the message is not quite right. And so we have to tweak it. We have to change it and we have to make the message too that your click through rates improve and so that's how we started using clickfunnels back when you guys, man first launched and we have used it ever since, you know, that's, that's what we use to drive a tremendous amount of traffic to our company. I love it. Well, the cool thing is I know last year on stage or one of our first eight figure award winners. Speaker 2:     04:13         Ring isn't, I shouldn't say little. It was a decent ring. I hope so. Yeah, bring it back and all the amazing things. You guys are doing tens of millions of dollars a year and I want to make sure people understand. One thing that you just made mention that is of really knowing your audience and how could you guys use linkedin a ton, which is a topic we don't cover that much. So tell people as far as how. First of all, what is your audience? How did you find them and what do you do with them? Yeah. Okay. Now I'll go back. So the ring that I got from you guys on stage, so my partner top of Jefferson played for the Chicago bears. He was a Lineman for the Chicago bears. He played for, played for two years and he got injured. So I no longer have that ring, like softwares. Speaker 2:     05:01         That top of that is, that's a super bowl ring you never got. So I seriously don't tell Russell this, but I don't know where the ring is anymore because to my office, like what is this? Is that is the wing that we got to click on? It goes. I am taken as he put it on his finger. Actually I got it a little too big and he's a massive dude. He's six foot six, half black, half Samoan, just a massive guy, right? So he's got the ring. I hope that's okay. But that was, that was a cool, a cool achievement for us. So, um, so knowing your audience, uh, we, we, um, we started advertising this franchise opportunity, which, so if you guys think about a franchise, it's anything out there, right? It could be blaze pizza, a franchise that's really growing like crazy right now, right where you make your own pizza, right? Speaker 2:     05:52         That's a franchise. And a basically an entrepreneur was thinking, what the heck do I do with my life? And uh, they stumbled onto blaze pizza or onto subway or you stumbled onto any of these franchises and ours just happens to be a franchise where we. So instead of making sandwiches, you're caring for seniors in their homes, which is really cool, right? It's a service that, that seniors need a, it, it changes people's lives. So that's what our franchise is, right? So I know that, that Dave, that I don't know how many of your audiences in Franchisee, but, and it's probably pretty different from everybody listening to this, right? Absolutely. Now, uh, so that's, that's who we are. We, we help entrepreneurs start businesses in the senior care space. And if you think about it, and if you go to what you guys always talk about, really what we're selling is a high ticket funnel, right? Speaker 2:     06:46         Is it, it's a high ticket sale because our franchise fee is $48,000. So think about that. For those of you guys who are selling courses, you're selling a, you know, an information product. Here's what we do. We say, Hey, give me $48,000 and I will show you how to start a business that takes care of seniors. So you can say, well wait, is there like a recipe? No, there's no recipe. Is there like a build out of what the stores? No, nothing like that. Like we're going to coach you on how to become a senior care company, right? For $48,000. So, um, that's, I mean, so think about that. This is what we sell. That's, that's the product, right? So, um, what we knew is we knew something really important that we didn't want to sell the product to just anybody that had the money. Speaker 2:     07:36         Uh, and in the world of franchising and maybe in the world of, of courses, maybe in the world of selling informational products, you may want to just sell the product to whoever has the money. But for us as little bit different, you've got to think about, we're teaching somebody how to go and take care of seniors in their homes. This has to be somebody that is a good person who's going to be a good entrepreneur, who's going to do a good job and not only that, in our business, we make a royalty for the rest of their lives. So they pay us $48,000 and then we make five percent of all of their revenues forever. So we don't want just anybody to be our Franchisee, right? We don't want to go to war with just anybody. We want to have the marine, we want to have the green baret that's going to go and build this business, right? Speaker 2:     08:23         And become successful. So it became incredibly important to us that we needed to really know our audience. And I think that people say that they know their audience a lot of times and they really don't write. Like sometimes people say, well, I want to attract, uh, people, okay, that's not an audience. Well, I want to attract people who love energy drinks. Well, that's still not an audience, right? So you have to really drill down into an audience of one, and in fact, I wish I take credit for this, but so much of this is what Russell talks about. Uh, we, you know, all of us, we read his first book like crazy and so much of this we learned from you guys when you're talking, when you're, when you're attracting people, this idea that you're speaking to one person, right? And who is that person? Speaker 2:     09:14         Um, and so, so, uh, you know, that that's a lot of the work that we did when we first started the company is who is that one person we would want to sell the franchise to. Um, and that I think made us really, really successful. So who is that one for you? Could you, I know you guys got this dialed in really super tight. Yeah. So this is something we also stumbled onto. So, uh, so one of my partners played in the nfl and he's never had a job in his life. The other partner, his name is Chad, and he was a pfizer pharmaceutical rep, so he had been in healthcare for 10 years and then he quit his job and we started a modest senior care and shadow was this amazing salesperson, right? He, he had been trained by some of the best companies out there. Speaker 2:     10:00         He'd been trained by Pfizer. Uh, he worked for Baxter for a little bit. So these, like amazing sales organizations. So we're sitting down and uh, we start to get these, these leads, right? We start to get these leads of people that want to open a modest senior cares and they're all crap, right? They're just terrible leads. And uh, and by the way people with money, like we had people would have said, take my $48,000. And we're saying, no thank you. Can you imagine like, come, especially as your first that's like, whoa. Yeah, exactly. Right now we're just starting out. And so we're saying no to people and so we're sitting down, it was a late night dinner. We're thinking we've really got to find who it is we want to advertise to. And we said, well, what about Chad? Chad is a pfizer pharmaceutical rep. what if we could advertise this opportunity and say, Hey, those of you in America, if you sell pharmaceuticals, if you sell medical devices, if you're a basically in healthcare sales, this could be the franchise for you. Speaker 2:     11:00         And we and we all got really excited about. And then we, and then we thought, how the heck do we do that? How do we actually take our offer and put it in front of. And we started like drawing the person male over the age of 40. He is married, he has kids, he has worked for some of the best pharmaceutical companies in the world. Um, he makes about $150,000 a year and he is now to the point where he feels like all he'll ever be is a salesperson. All he'll ever be is somebody who goes and tells doctors to prescribe Viagra, right? Like they get to the point where they want more of life. And, and this is somebody though that makes $150,000 a year, which is not nothing that's a good salary. But they have this pain and so we, we, we, we did all that. Speaker 2:     11:52         We had a picture, we had a picture of, we got a mind, you're like, this is what it looks like. We pinned it to the wall and we wrote down all these things about this person and then it came, you know, how the heck do we find them? And uh, and then we, we, we were thinking about a different, different job boards and different places. And then linkedin came as maybe the opportunity because on Linkedin, what you can do is if you know exactly who you're looking for, you can then send in an advertisement or an inmail or an ad or something to that one person. So I have an ad for example, and you know, you guys can steal this if you want a funnel hacking, right? So, um, but we have an ad that goes on linkedin that says life after Pfizer and, and it has a picture of a person and that ad only shows up to males over the age of 40 who are salespeople for Pfizer. Speaker 2:     12:57         And, and so when that ad shows up to that person, you know, they're on their computer, they're on linkedin or they're on their phone right in there, they're looking at it and all of a sudden this ad comes across as life after Pfizer. I'm like, holy crap, I mean, I work at Pfizer. What isn't. So our clicksor rates started going through the roof, right? Because you're taking a message that is so incredibly targeted to one person. And once we started doing that and then came the magic of clickfunnels, because once they clicked on Linkedin to an ad that said life after Pfizer or a pharmaceutical layoffs, you know, we would, we would, we have this messaging that was really a punch in the face, right? I mean, you have to punch him in the face if they're going to listen. And then he'd go to a clickfunnels page and on the click funnels page I think is what a lot of people don't do. Speaker 2:     13:49         And Dave, if I'm talking too much, you gotta, you gotTa shut me up. Okay, I will. You keep going. You're doing awesome. So, um, so what happens is once you click on the linkedin ad and they go to, they go to the clickfunnels page, we, we kept the conversation going. So I think what a lot of people do is once you've grabbed them, you're throwing them on some website and all the website does is talk about how handsome you are, how nice you are, how amazing you are, and what your product is and how amazing your product is. And you've lost this communication. You've lost the opportunity to tell your audience why this is good for them, how we can change your life. And so our landing page would say, again, life after Pfizer, find out why you, the pharmaceutical rep are ideal to become an entrepreneur, to take care of seniors, what you know is so valuable. Speaker 2:     14:39         And we would talk about them, we wouldn't talk about us, we talk about them. And so then that conversion, that landing page and click funnels converted better than anything we had ever done. Um, and uh, and that's, and that's what we did. And so, uh, we are one of the only franchise in the world that we were trying to like get this, uh, to be, uh, like, I don't know Guinness Book of Records or something, but we're like the only franchise in the world where almost all of our franchisees are either medical device sales people who left medical devices or pharmaceutical people who left pharmaceuticals. And that's something we're super, super proud of that, that it really did work that if you go out there and you really can service one person and change your life, um, that I believe you, you can be successful. I love it. Speaker 2:     15:29         I think that's probably one of the main reason I wanted to have you on the show is you're so good at being able to identify exactly that Avatar. I mean literally down to the picture on your wall and exactly what he looks like. And I think that's the problem with so many people when they first get started is they think, oh, I'm going to start off on a $7 tripwire thing. I'm to send it out to the world. And whoever clicks on it, that's where my audience is going to be. I'm like, stop. You don't have to start that low. I love that you start at $48,000. Totally extreme. It's like, no, we know what we are. And because of that, you're able to really get super, super dialed in on exactly who you're, who you're who you're marketing to. And again, you guys are amazing the market. Speaker 2:     16:08         I know you. You're the brains behind all this marketing stuff there, Marcos. And so it's really cool to see how you've made, been able to build this in. And you guys built a huge, huge company out of this. So help me understand though. Now person spends $48,000 and they get this coaching. Where does it take them? What, what are you getting five percent of? How does it, I mean usually other franchise, they've got a physical building and the seats and everything else. So how you guys, are you guys doing that? Well, you know, I think the, the big part of this is uh, what we, what we really provide to them as the system that, uh, that they would need in order to go out and market their business to hospitals, skinner's facilities into the families, right? So you need to contracts, you need crm, you need a point of sales system to do billing and all that stuff, right? Speaker 2:     17:01         So we provide a business in a box to the entrepreneur. They're never going to have to go find some other way to do it. All the marketing pieces, all the flyers, a, everything. Seriously, everything they would need is his business in a box for them to go out there. Right? Um, I'm going to cut you off there real quick and I think a lot of people miss is people will pay for done for you. And I think you guys, what do you call it? Business box or whatever you want to name it. I mean, the reality is you've literally done absolutely everything for him. So it's plug and play. They don't have to think beyond just following your exact business model, which I think for, for a lot of people are listening to this realize there's a lot of people who are in that same situation. Speaker 2:     17:43         Maybe they are in their thirties, forties, fifties. As people continue to age, they're like, I'm not done working. I still want to be able to provide value to people and your service provides is massive, massive value. So I think that's killer. Yeah. You know, and in talking about that, what I think is interesting is people with whatever offer they have, you think about a $48,000 offer to somebody and there's lots of ways for you to, to show that offer, right? And you think about, if you think about what we're doing is just saying, give me $48,000 and I'll show you how to take care of seniors, which is not a glamorous thing, right? This is changed guys. It's changing diapers. It's, um, you know, moving people into the shower giving baths. Right now the entrepreneur is in doing that work. It's the caregivers who are doing it, but in no way are we selling something that is glamorous. Speaker 2:     18:36         I'm now and I think that sometimes people don't realize this, that the $48,000 franchise fee, the reason somebody who's really paying you that, the reason their pain is that is there's a pain point. There is something that they want in their lives that they cannot get and what they come to believe. And what your, what your. I think your job as a marketer, a with authenticity at least is to give that audience the idea that, hey, this vehicle that I have for you could be the solution to the pain that you're having and yeah, it's $48,000, but it will, it will get you to where you want to, where you want to be, right? It doesn't matter that it's home care. It doesn't matter that a senior care, it's the vehicle that's going to allow them to become somebody different that's going to allow them to achieve something, be be with their families, uh, have control, not have a boss anymore. Speaker 2:     19:32         Whatever that those things are right. And I do believe people would pay, I truly believe actually, that if we raise our franchise fee to $75,000 today, we would still have people join our franchise because of the, the amazing value we're providing to them, uh, even after they buy the franchise. And also the fact that we're solving such a, such incredible pain that people have in corporate America. Right? Which is our audience. I love it. Oh man marks. I can talk to you for hours on end about this kind of stuff as we get close to kind of wrap things up though. Any other parting words, things you want to make sure people know or learn from you. Um, Gosh, you know what, I, I think with this, for the topic of today that the, what I've learned so much from click funnels that I learned from you, Dave, alert from you, from, from Russell, is really, really understand your audience. Speaker 2:     20:23         None of us have unlimited dollars. So let me tell you guys, you know, if you, if you study the Egyptian revolution, this is kinda weird, but stick with me on this. What? Gibbins resolution. Yeah. So did jeff, were like, this sucks, we hate our dictator, the dictator is bad, what do we do about it? And it's all these college kids that are pissed off, right? And like, what do we do now? College kids, they have no money, right? Um, and if, if, if the authorities figure out what they're trying to do, there'll be killed. So think about that marketing. So if you're doing marketing, think about that's what you're trying to market is a revolution to topple the dictator and you're going to go take to facebook and you're going to do all that. So what's crazy about the Egyptian revolution is they were able to identify exactly who their audience was, why they were so upset about their dictator, and they were able to rally people in the millions to join the revolution and they actually toppled their dictator. Speaker 2:     21:26         If you, it's really cool, you see there's an image where, uh, in Egypt and they're in this town square and there's really millions of people on the street and it started with these college kids going, we've got to build a revolution. And, and again, all they did is they knew who the audience was, they knew the pain points were, and if you do that, it doesn't matter if you have a dollar in your pocket, if you have a million dollars, you can actually build a revolution. And I think you guys did that with click funnels as well, you know, we're aspiring to do. And that's what I had hoped that, that marketers really see themselves as not just marketers, but as revolutionaries. That's what you're really doing. I love it when Marcus, thanks so much. If people want to reach out to you, what's easiest way for me to reach out to you? I don't know, linkedin, anywhere. You guys feel free to reach out to me. I love this click funnels community. Uh, people reach out all the time. So just reach out to me on, on facebook or Linkedin or however you call me, whatever. Anyway, you guys can reach out. Happy to, uh, to get that reach. I love it. Marcus, thanks so much for your time, bud. We'll talk to you real soon. You got it. Speaker 3:     22:34         Hey everybody, thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts. If you don't mind, could you please share this with others, rate and review this podcast on itunes. It means the world to me where I'm trying to get to as a million downloads here in the next few months and just crush through over $650,000 and I just want to get the next few 100,000 so we can get to a million downloads and see really what I can do to help improve and and get this out to more people. At the same time. If there's a topic, there's something you'd like me to share or someone you'd like me to interview, by all means, just reach out to me on facebook. You can pm me and I'll be more than happy to take any of your feedback as well as if you'd like me to interview more than happy to reach out and have that conversation with you. So again, go to Itunes, rate and review this, share this podcast with others and let me know how else I can improve this or what I can do to make this better for you guys. Thanks.

About our Guests:   Janeya Griffin At the age of 16 years, Janeya Griffin faced significant hardship when her parents were incarcerated and she raised herself and her 6 year old brother. Since that time, she has dedicated herself and her career towards entrepreneurship, advocating for technology and social justice, and examining generational wealth, specifically within underserved communities. Having gained experience serving as a contractor for federal labs and organizations across the country, including the National Aeronautic Space Agency (NASA), Janeya recently founded a consulting start-up called The Commercializer, a strategic firm that actualizes independent inventors, intellectual assets, and monetizes entrepreneurs’ ideas. In addition, she co-founded the creative agency ConCre8tes which focuses on helping men, women, and children behind bars and beyond by changing how society views people with criminal histories. Vincent Bragg Vincent Bragg, co-founder of ConCre8tes, spent 121 months in federal prison. During that time, he studied law, wrote books, and organized think-tanks. The difficulties he experienced working in prison, including the low pay and forced labor, highlighted the need for a fair method to help incarcerated people. Episode Summary   Janeya recounts her childhood and its impact on her personal development. She offers valuable insight, describing the importance of understanding one’s past and how it influences your life. Having taken an introspective look at herself, Janeya explains how she took advantage of opportunities that motivated her. Vincent, her co-founder of ConCre8tes, discusses the origins of ConCre8tes. He explains how the agency empowers incarcerated and formally incarcerated people return to work.   Insight from this episode:   Strategies for using your passion to find your purpose. How intentionality helped Janeya identify her career path. How to move forward and use the lessons encountered along the way. Why personal branding is important. Keys to turning adversity into an opportunity for growth and finding your direction. Vincent’s experience while incarcerated helped him discover a way to help others who were previously or are currently incarcerated. The importance of ownership of ideas and property rights.   Quotes from the show:   “Until I started, like, questioning, ‘Like, okay. Why am I the way that I am? Good and bad?’ Right? ‘Um, what makes me tick? What instances or situations have happened in my life that have, kind of transformed, like my journey and things like that, and brought me to this place that I’m at right now?’” – Janeya Griffin, Episode 124   “I decided that I wanted to go into my 30s with forgiveness and healing.” - Janeya Griffin, Episode 124   “So, to me, you know, you remind me of the ladies from ‘Hidden Figures.’ You know what I mean? Who were doing their thing? Just the importance and the representation, I think is just so dynamic.” – Kevin Y. Brown, Episode 124   “Being humble enough to ask for help. And then being wise enough to listen when people are talking to you and helping you find your way.” – Kevin Y. Brown, Episode 124   “I’ve learned to listen in the midst of chaos.” - Janeya Griffin, Episode 124   “When you allow this many people to be intentional about an outcome of something, we’re able to manifest that.” – Vincent Bragg, Episode 124   Resources Mentioned: Trello – Janeya Griffin G Suite – Janeya Griffin Favorite Book:     The Automatic Millionaire by David Bach – Janeya Griffin The Process of “I” by Emily Maroutian – Vincent Bragg   Favorite Quote: Janeya Griffin: “There are no problems, only solutions.” – John Lennon “Life is simple. Everything happens for you, not to you.“ – Byron Katie Vincent Bragg: "It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men." - Frederick Douglass 3 keys to Create Your Best Life:   Janeya Griffin: Invest in ourselves and our communities. Giving with the intent to grow. Collaboration over competition.   Vincent Bragg: Self-realization. Authenticity. To live your best life, find something that you can’t live without.   Stay Connected:   Create Your Life Series:   https://www.facebook.com/cylseries/ https://www.instagram.com/cylseries/   Kevin: www.kevinybrown.com www.instagram.com/kevinybrown www.twitter.com/kevinybrown www.facebook.com/kevbrown001   Janeya Griffin: www.instagram.com/janeyagriffin/?hl=en twitter.com/janeyagriffin www.facebook.com/JaneyaGriffin/   Vincent Bragg: www.instagram.com/iamvincentbragg/ twitter.com/IAmVincentBragg?lang=en www.facebook.com/gslicksta   ConCre8tes: concreates.com/ www.instagram.com/concre8tes/ twitter.com/CONCREATES_ www.facebook.com/concre8tes/   Subscribe to our podcast + download each episode on  itunes, google play, stitcher and www.createyourlifeseries.com/podcast      

On our 44th episode we go over New Japan Pro Wrestling's Wrestle Kingdom 12 that happened recently and our thoughts on it.  We then talk about the upcoming WWE Royal Rumble PPV (Big Joe's favorite PPV) and the historical first ever women's Royal Rumble match.  We the answer a couple listener questions to finish off.   Make sure and go to collarandelbowbrand.com and use our offer code JKPODCAST and get 10% off every purchase you make.  Like, share, and enjoy.

Ken Singer, managing director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology at UC Berkeley, discusses his role in Skydeck, the start-up accelerator, and his own background as an entrepreneur in part two of this two part series on entrpreneurshipTRANSCRIPTSpeaker 1:Method to the madness is next. You're listening to method to the madness of biweekly public affairs show on k a l x Berkeley celebrating bay area innovator. Good afternoon. This is your host, Vanessa ing. Two weeks ago we learned about skydeck and the Berkeley method of entrepreneurship from Equinox. Did you founding director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and technology at UC Berkeley, otherwise known as the CET. [00:00:30] Joining us today is Ken Singer, Managing Director of the CET. Today we'll learn more about how skydeck helps to develop Berkeley's entrepreneurial culture. Thank you for joining us, Ken. So just in case some of our listeners weren't able to tune in two weeks ago. What is skydeck? Speaker 2:Yes. A skydeck is a joint venture between three big groups on campus. The College of Engineering, which is the, the school that I work for and [00:01:00] the business school, Haas business school, and the vice chancellor of research and few years ago the deans and the vice chancellor got together and realized we had a missed opportunity in entrepreneurship, that we should have a a coordinated effort in facilitating and developing startups that are popping up all over campus. You know, we all have different skillsets and different kinds of strengths that we can contribute to the growth of [00:01:30] small companies. And, um, while we were seeing Stanford and several other universities make inroads by having, um, it seemed to be a more collective effort that it only made sense for us to do the same thing and pulled together a brand that was Berkeley wide, right. Berkeley campus wide rather than just in everyone's different colleges. Speaker 1:Could you tell us more about your relation to skydeck? Speaker 2:So I s I started, um, I started working [00:02:00] at, at Berkeley about eight years ago as an instructor for the mobile applications course. It was the first class that they did taught in that and I was running a startup at the time and two years ago the startup was sold and I got, was pretty exhausted. It was five years of just 24, seven working. And I thought, well, what if I go back to the university, maybe teach a little bit more and just kind of take a breather. And, uh, in talking to ECLAC, he said, hey, actually we're looking for someone [00:02:30] who might be people to head up the CET, uh, because I'm moving into developing more programs. And so he brought me in and we became co-directors of the CET two years ago and they had just started skydeck around that. And that was the first, I think, cohort of teams that had gone into skydeck. Speaker 2:And, um, and so I was there kind of at the beginning to help form some of the programmatic elements of how teams might be selected. We at CET were, were [00:03:00] we're, we're, we're partners with skydeck in many ways, one of which is we share resources, we share mentors. But what we also do is we feed teams up to skydeck. So a lot of our teams from CET, which were part of the engineering school. So most of our teams are our heavy engineering based. So some, uh, some devices, some, uh, research based, uh, algorithm stuff, you know, some applications. But [00:03:30] a lot of it is heavy, heavy research based and the teams that have come up with those concepts or those products need a little bit more help before they are ready for skydeck. Right. So a lot of the business school students, they already know how a terms sheet should look like. Speaker 2:They already know what negotiations should sound like. The, they've had some of that training. In fact, most business school students have had business experience. They're back at school, right? But most of our engineers that [00:04:00] their undergrads of course have oftentimes never worked before. And if they're graduate students, they've gone through the whole track where they've never really been an industry. So they, they, they themselves have not had much industry experience. So what we do is we put them through a, what we call an incubator, which is venture lab and venture lab is Kinda like Kinda like your, um, what does that first five kind of head start program for [00:04:30] engineering-based startups where we help you learn how to hire and fire people on your team. Cause many of these people haven't even been hired before, right? Because they've never been in an industry. We help them talk to investors, how to find them, how to talk to them. Speaker 2:We also help them find first customers or how to even talk to a customer, how to even look at a customer. Cause they'll, they'll use the name, hey we want to sell to apple. They don't realize there are multiple groups at apple, [00:05:00] different people who have different agendas that you need to find the right person who will be an advocate. So they don't even fundamentally understand the, the, the challenges ahead of them in some of the things that they absolutely have to master. So what we do is in venture lab and they stay for anywhere between three to six months. We help them through those elements, get used to those, those activities before the ones that are ready, we graduate them up to Skydeck and they perform much better [00:05:30] when they get get up to skydeck cause they're ready for what Skydeck, which we consider a skydeck and accelerator. Speaker 2:And what that means is that a team is pretty well formed. So they know who, what everyone is doing on the co in the company, there's no real hole in the company. It's a strong fundable team. They have a product, they know what their product market fit is, they know who the customers are. They have probably a dozen or so customers and [00:06:00] they know how their customers purchased product and they're there really to fundraise and, and grow. And so what you'll see with a lot of teams up there, they've got really strong presentations, really sharp pitches. They know how to sell their product. They also know their market extremely well and now they're trying to find the right mechanism of for growth. And that could be the right partner that can fund their growth or the right venture capital firm that can fund their [00:06:30] expansion. So it's really for more mature teams that have gone through, you know, they've gone through the ropes either through venture lab or through other means, but they, they tend to be well positioned to get funding and, and grow from there. Speaker 1:Could you tell us how skydeck is different from all the other um, hubs and accelerators in the bay area? If I am an entrepreneur, how would I know which tech space I should use? Speaker 2:Yeah, so there's been, there's [00:07:00] been this incredible explosion of incubators and accelerators and programs and, and, and whatnot. And, and I'm actually part of several international ones to bring companies from other countries here to be incubated or to get injected with some of the silicon valley culture as they say. And I think they have a list of several thousand of these programs around the world. And just in Berkeley I heard there's something like six or seven and sometimes they're topical, sometimes [00:07:30] they are just physical space and other times they're really programmatic. And um, I would say the difference between them and that will actually, let me tell you what I think they are. Incubators are really, they provide a few things. One is obviously space. Many of them provide space and either at a discount or free. They also by virtue of giving you space, they give you a community of other startups and entrepreneurs [00:08:00] who you, by virtue of being next to them, you'll find ways to collaborate and share information and be able to really fast track your, your path to success by learning from each other. Speaker 2:It's a pure driven educational model, right, where you're learning from each other and that actually I would say from being an entrepreneur myself as the way that I learned a lot is that you build a community of, [00:08:30] of likeminded folks who are dealing with same issues and frankly actually what you end up talking about is not much. It's not really the, the technical parts or the vcs. Even you don't. You do share some information about that, but the vast majority of stuff that you share is around, I am dealing with some serious stress right now. I've got a guy who's about to leave or have IP issues or I'm running out of money and it's not really, can you solve this problem for me? It's just can you listen [00:09:00] to me, have a freak out so that I don't freak out in front of my team? Speaker 2:Right? And maybe you can commiserate with me for a little bit and then I can sound totally with it when I'm talking to, to my team. Because being an entrepreneur, being a founder of a company is by far the loneliest experience you will ever have. Because you cannot share a lot of information with a lot of people, especially the people you're closest to your team. You can't tell them you're running out of money, you can't tell them. You might have some concerns about the IP, [00:09:30] you can't tell them you might be getting sued by apple or by Google or whomever, right? And these things happen, right? And so you end up having to hold back enormous amounts of information because that's the nature of the game. And you have to be careful about what you hold back. But there's certain things that will randomize your team or your effort. Speaker 2:And what drives a startup is momentum. It's this belief that you're, you're going to be doing something great. And so it becomes a very lonely road for, for that founder. So if you have a community [00:10:00] of people who, who get together because they share space, you have that valve, it's a safety valve that just blows steam, you know, and, and keeps you saying it's a really important element of all of that. And if you talk to people who have successfully exited out of these incubators, you'll hear a very common theme about, you know, it was really important that we are, we were in that environment with all these other entrepreneurs, right? And this is why the good incubator's and accelerators like skydeck are extremely careful about [00:10:30] who they select because you, you don't want to introduce a wrong element in there that can cause people to stop sharing with each other across the different companies. Speaker 2:The other thing that, that incubators and accelerators do is that they leveraged the extended network of the people involved in the incubator. So you see these independent incubators pop up in San Francisco and throughout the country. And the person who started it usually has a huge Rolodex of people that they know [00:11:00] from investors to partners, to vendors, to all these folks, lawyers, consultants, all these people who can help your business and they become the connector. Right. What's that? The, the huge advantage that skydeck has is its association with UC Berkeley and UC Berkeley has something like 475,000 alumni that who are currently alive and that can be resources for [00:11:30] companies that are starting up and that's where I think Stanford's done a great job. Where we can do a better job here is that they've engaged their alumni network of course are alumni network tends to be very, very technical as well as well because there's so many that stayed in the bay area. Speaker 2:Um, so that network is what drives the growth of these startups. The more people that you meet who might have relevant connection to your business is equivalent to maybe 15 connections because they can introduce [00:12:00] you to so many more people. So you know skydeck because of its connection with Berkeley is probably these potentially the strongest network that you can have. Because it's not just Jeff Burton who runs Skydeck, who's network you're going to be tapping. And by the way, he's a Stanford Grad, right? And he's such a huge advocate for this program at Berkeley. But you're also tapping the networks of all of the deans, all of the executives, the professors, [00:12:30] all the people who want to give back to Berkeley. And we have tons of people who come back who want to help smart, small companies. Those people become your resource that you can't buy. You just can't buy access like that. That's something that you have to be a part of in order to get access to. Speaker 1:It does seem like Berkeley has a very strong alumni network, but a lot of the national press seems to focus on Stanford and its ability to produce entrepreneurs [00:13:00] with great commercial innovations. Why do you think this is the case? Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know, I can take you back as I was, I was a history major. So I like looking at this in a chronological and historical way. And actually it's both historical and geographic. So if you look at Berkeley, Berkeley abuts a hill. And so growth potential for Berkeley for companies that might sprout up around the campus are fairly limited. And that happened [00:13:30] actually fairly early because after World War II, the East Bay exploded, you know, um, and during World War Two, so, uh, there wasn't much room for growth, you know, for, for cheap space. And if you look at Stanford, it, there is a reason why they call it the farm is that there's a lot of, there was a lot of space, not so much anymore, but back then it was a strawberry fields. So geography had something to be to play into it over the course of the last 50 years. Speaker 2:Right. Because companies could find inexpensive places to, to build their businesses. [00:14:00] But also there was a strategic decision that was made back during World War II. Right? Um, during World War II, the government enlisted several universities to help them develop a weaponry, right? So MIT did a lot of work, um, and so did so did Berkeley, you know, with our role in, in discoveries around nuclear technology. And so Berkeley saddled up with government and got a lot of research grants and a lot of research money. And when you start that, it [00:14:30] just becomes easier to get government money. And Stanford went the other direction. They partnered up with the private industry. And so if you look at who set up shop, literally on their campus, you had HP built literally on their campus, you have Xerox Park, you have now SAP. So you have some of the very largest companies literally on their location. Speaker 2:And that strategy has proven out to be probably the better one. Um, and when you are a [00:15:00] private university, you get to make a lot of decisions faster. And I think you're also allowed to make some more mistakes because you know, you're afforded that luxury of, of changing course and, and try new things. So, um, you know, with those two things, Stanford was able to grow very quickly with these, you know, other companies that were built around their campus with their professors, with their students, and it was [00:15:30] also in the company's best interest to promote themselves. And if you think about government research, it's really not in the government's research agenda to promote, you know, on the scale that small, large companies do. Um, what they've been successful at, especially if some things have military application, they don't really want to let people know. So that, that's kind of what I think has created that disconnect between what Stanford now represents and what Berkeley, the, the, [00:16:00] the lack of a PR engine that Berkeley has had. Speaker 2:And you know, with, with the way that these communities work, you can't just be the only one talking about how great you are. You need to have other people talk about you. And when you have thousands of companies down, you know, Google and Yahoo have that all and Cisco and, and sun that spun out of, of the Stanford campus. And of course Berkeley has a role in Sun as well, but you know, when it came out of, out of Stanford, they talk about [00:16:30] that and they end up promoting a, that campus by virtue of, of, of them promoting themselves. Speaker 1:You're listening to method to the madness, a biweekly public affairs show on KALX Berkeley. Joining us today is Ken Singer, Managing Director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and technology at UC Berkeley. You mentioned earlier that Stanford's strategy of partnering with Industry ultimately proved to be the better method. What do you mean by that? [00:17:00] Are The CET and skydeck part of an effort to emulate Stanford's entrepreneurial direction? Speaker 2:Yeah, so I, I would, I would correct my previous statement. I do, I wouldn't say that it's better. I think it was more effective in achieving some of the goals that, that I'm sure Stanford had, which was to become the nexus of, of startups and innovation. And, and Berkeley, I would say is on par. If you were to look at just the kinds of innovation that comes off of the Berkeley, uh, Lawrence Berkeley [00:17:30] labs and within our own campus here, but we don't have the same kind of marketing machine or the, or the kind of, um, push towards promoting it. So it's, um, it's, it's different. And this is, if you look at the reputations, and in fact I just have recently talked to some students are trying to figure out whether they should go to Berkeley or to Stanford. And the pitch that they get from Stanford is very much around, hey, we have an entrepreneurial community here. Speaker 2:Everyone's [00:18:00] doing a startup. And you know, you'll, you'll love that cause this is what, uh, what real researchers do. And, and you know, Berkeley is great academically, it's great, but that they produce professors and researchers. And I heard, I've heard that a couple of times now from students who have gotten that, that pitch and to some degree they're, they're right, right? They're right. That Berkeley does produce professors and researchers, but they are world-class that turn around and create companies like Marvell and cadence and, and [00:18:30] companies that you might not be familiar with, but there are multibillion dollar businesses that power every, virtually every machine that you use, right. If you use up in the bay area. Okay. Yeah. Right. So if you use anything with a chip in it, um, other than a potato chip, you're, you're dealing with something that was designed by Kate on Caden software. Speaker 2:Right. We don't know that because many people don't know that because Berkeley oftentimes does the kind of research and the kind of of applications [00:19:00] that aren't necessarily sexy, but they're foundational and so everyone touches them. You just don't necessarily know. You do. So earlier you mentioned that you, uh, had been a history major. I was wondering if you could speak a little about that and then tell us more about your background and how you got here. Yeah. So I, uh, so I grew up in, in the Seattle area and um, had always wanted to be a, a microbiologist. I always wanted to do some research where I could some somehow have an impact. And [00:19:30] My mother was an English teacher, so I ended up coming to Berkeley as a dual major between English and microbiology. And I quickly lost the love of microbiology cause in my classes it was mostly premed students who didn't necessarily like the material, but they're there to, to get good grades. Speaker 2:And I wanted to be around people who I could have interesting conversations with. Right. And where I could find that was in my history courses that I took and I, I took a few too many actually, [00:20:00] and realized in order for me to graduate on time, I would end up having to be a history major. And um, yeah, that's, that's poor planning. But, uh, it was felicitous because I learned an enormous amount. Yeah. And every, it's funny because I always get the first day of class, I teach several classes every year in the engineering school and, and it's a multidisciplinary course. So I have students from, from Haas, I have students from the humanities, but half of them are engineers of some flavor. And I [00:20:30] always get that question from someone who has pulled up their iPad or their their computer and Google searched my bio and there's one hand that goes up and says, um, so I noticed that you were a history major at, at Berkeley. Speaker 2:Uh, can you tell us more about that? Or the braver ones will say, hey, can you tell us how that applies to entrepreneurship? Which would they really mean is how are you qualified to teach me today? Right? Which is a classic Berkeley, you know, it's a classic [00:21:00] Berkeley thing for students to do that. I, I'm used to it. And so what I tell my students is that history is not what you might think it is, which most students, because of AP tests and because of the way we teach thinks, think that it's a string of, of facts and string of dates and people to memorize and wars and all of these things that are just something that you have to, to memorize and get tested for. And what I tell them is if [00:21:30] you take a really good history course, you find out very quickly that history is not about these things. Speaker 2:History is about decisions. History doesn't exist in a vacuum. It actually can only exist when there's human beings involved. That is actually the definition of history. Every day as an entrepreneur, you do maybe 50 to 60 decisions of which three or four are so consequential. If you make the wrong one, your company might die. Right? And so if you've spent years [00:22:00] studying what goes into a decision, what are the consequences, what are the unintended consequences? What are the things that you might not even know might be exogenous things that affect a decision. If you spent years analyzing that stuff, you become very comfortable making calculated decisions that hopefully will be good ones and you're comfortable with that. And so I tell my students, if they haven't studied history, they haven't studied decision making and they're going to [00:22:30] be pretty far behind when they need to make a couple of really key ones in their startup that usually shuts them up. Speaker 2:Could you tell us a little bit about your background in entrepreneurship? So I came to Berkeley as, as I mentioned before, completely planning to do something different. And in 1999, the Internet bubble was still quite, quite huge. It Ha it was still expanding. And I sat down with a couple of friends [00:23:00] and we just started kicking around some ideas and it just kind of rolled down the hill and we started a company, raised a bunch of money. And before I knew it, I turned around and realized I was doing a startup and I'd quit school and, and, and headed down this career path that, that I look back now and go, that's insane. I was 1920. I couldn't even run a car in Germany as I was, as I found out, as I was trying to go to a meeting that was not possible. So, uh, [00:23:30] you know, it just kind of happened I think by the luck of the draw of being the right in the right place at the right time. Speaker 2:You know, you're in the bay area, you're around other people who are innovative and, and, and interested in starting something. And also my father was an entrepreneur. He had started his own company, his of consulting business for, for, for banks. But uh, so it wasn't really foreign in my, in my family to do something like this. And actually they are fairly supportive of me doing that. They were one of the investors in [00:24:00] that first company, which, uh, didn't make money. We ended up selling the remnants of that company to, to a company in Singapore, but learned an enormous amount during that process. And once you've gone through it, it's really difficult to do something else. You know, I'm one of those people who is curious about everything and if you're curious about everything, there's kind of two paths for you. Either you become a museum curator or a professor, which I didn't have the, uh, the patients for that path. Speaker 2:[00:24:30] But, uh, the other thing is to be a consummate tinker and be an entrepreneur because as an entrepreneur, you don't just do technology stuff. If you're tech entrepreneur, it's not just building product. But it's also working with customers. It's also working with finance, it's working with legal, it's working with patents and and conferences and marketing and all the elements that go into making a company fire up all the different [00:25:00] parts of your brain. And it's all interesting. It's all interesting to see how they're all connected. And if you're a systems thinker like I am I, it's just really fascinating how, you know, you pull a string over here and marketing and suddenly product changes, right? You change a little bit on the product and suddenly customers change the type of customers who come to you. And it's just kind of this game of, I was just trying to describe this to someone. Speaker 2:It's like a game of Kerplunk, right? You've got a bunch of marbles on top of this things and you pull different things and suddenly for whatever reason, that last thing that you pulled out and made [00:25:30] everything collapsed. But why was it just that last one? Right? So it's really fascinating to me to seal all those kinds of things. And so I was driven to entrepreneurship and startups. Part of it was because of time and place, but I think I'm well suited for it because of this natural curiosity that I had. Could you tell us about some notable startups that skydeck has helped accelerate? Yeah, so we've had a few that have recently got funded, uh, you know, small, small amounts that pre series a, [00:26:00] we have one company called Lilly and they were two guys who are in my mobile class a few years ago were actually my big data class. Speaker 2:They created a, an indicis outside of of the course. They created a drone company, so that's a bit scary. But what they did was they put a camera on it and a sensor so that it follows you while you're doing extreme sports. So you know you've got the, the GoPro, but it's your, it's very solid cystic, right? It's from your [00:26:30] standpoint, it's where you're jumping off of something. This thing is actually watching you as if you're having an out of body experience. So you can watch yourself do this stuff as if you're an observer. And a, they recently got some and they didn't know each other until my class. One was a business student and the other one was an engineer. And in our, in our class they, they met and now they're best friends and they've created a company together. And I would say that if there was ever a legacy that I would like to leave behind [00:27:00] is that I created an environment in which people who wouldn't have typically met or collaborated found a venue to do that and some really cool, amazing things happen there that, uh, had an impact. Speaker 2:Right. That that would be for me, what I would love to leave behind at Berkeley, we've got a couple others that are earlier stage that we're really proud of. If they're successful, it will be a huge deal. We have one in cancer research and [00:27:30] these guys are, one is a researcher, the other one is a business major. They're called XL bio. And what they discovered was that metastasizing cancer cells are very difficult to replicate out of the lab. Other cells you can replicate outside the outside of the body, right? And um, and metastasizing cancer cells, if you're familiar with it, spread very quickly. And you might have a few attempts at chemo before you know, it ravages your body. [00:28:00] So you gotta get that Chemo right? But you know, chemo is very individual, right? It's, it might work for one person and it might not work for another. Speaker 2:And so what doctors typically do is they find that the chemo that they think would work on you, and that's just based on the population, it works on the highest percentage of people, they'll try that on you. That's the logic they gave go through to figure out what chemo to use. So what these guys have found was they could get metastasizing cancer to replicate outside [00:28:30] the body. They discovered a way to do that and now you can test chemo, all the different types of chemo on the cells outside the body to figure out which one will work for you to tailor the chemo to your body, which is amazing because you know, this has an, this has the potential of saving lives. But it also has the potential of making life a little more pleasant for those who don't have a chemo that will work for them. Speaker 2:They don't have to spend their last year destroying their body and feeling [00:29:00] horrible. They just can have, you know, enjoy the last, last year. So if you think about the human impact of some of this research that's going on, it only happens if someone finds a way to commercialize it. And that's the role that we play is to take these amazing things that are happening up on the hill that's happening on campus and helping those researchers and those innovators turn that discovery into something that can impact all of us. That doesn't just [00:29:30] reside in a paper, but that can have a human impact on us. So that's how I think, you know, if I were to look at what we do as a center, I can't tell people that I'm, I'm curing cancer, but I can certainly say that I'm helping people who are trying to cure cancer. Right. And that that's, it's an [inaudible]. Speaker 2:It's good to say it's, it's a good thing to be able to look at your job and say, hey, we're, we're doing something that has that kind of impact. Thanks so much for joining us today. [00:30:00] If people want to get in touch with you, how can they do so? Yes, so there's a couple of ways you can email me. I have an open door policy. It's at 10 dot singer@berkeley.edu so k e n Dot s, I n g e r@berkeley.edu. You can also go to our website, [inaudible] dot berkeley.edu and you can get more information about our programs. Thanks again for joining us today, Ken. It's been a pleasure. Thanks for having me. It was great. Speaker 1:[00:30:30] If you have questions or comments about this show, go to the k a l x website and find method to the madness. Drop us an email. Tune in again, two weeks from now at this same time. Have a wonderful weekend. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Interview with Cal student Ben Einstein about his venture VapeSecret, which is an e-cig company that is focused on helping smokers quit smokingTRANSCRIPTSpeaker 1:Okay. Speaker 2:[inaudible] Speaker 3:you're listening to Kale expert, clear 90.7 FM. This is the method to the madness coming at you from the Public Affairs Department here at Calex, dedicated [00:00:30] to the innovative spirit of the bay area. I'm your host aliene Huizar. And today we have the founders of vape secret with us. We have Shawn Linehan. Hey Sean. How's it going? Good, how are you? Good. And Ben Einstein. Yeah. What's going on? What's up man? And then we got Dave, you lead. Thank you for having us. Hey, thanks for coming on the show. And this is really exciting cause we have three entrepreneurs with us who are actually cal students. That's right, right? Yeah. Okay. So two of your seniors and Davey, you are a junior. The Junior. Okay. [00:01:00] This is very exciting. And um, we reversed the first question we usually ask on this show is your, you've created something out of thin air. It's came from your brain, right? So give me, why don't we start with you, Ben. Give us the problem statement. Why did you, what is, what is the problem that you're trying to solve? Speaker 1:Hi Ma, I'm actually glad you asked me that because, uh, I think the problem that we had was mine. Um, Sean and I were actually working on a different project, [00:01:30] um, and we're working on the 11th floor of a building and every 20 minutes he would leave to go smoke. And it's really hard to develop any software if you're a coder is leaving every 20 minutes. Um, and so I said, why don't you try e-cigs and he said I did and they all suck. And I said, okay, let's make a good one. And 44 days later we did. What was the project you guys were working on? Yes, so we were [00:02:00] still working on, on that project as well. We're kind of doing two simultaneous things. It's crazy, but it actually is managing to work. Um, the other project is einstein.com which is an intelligent product recommendation Speaker 3:software. It's a mobile app that we're working on and is also making significant progress. Okay, great. So maybe we'll get to that later on in the day of the program. So, um, so you wanted to make an e cigarette cause you saw your friend Ben not be able to Sean not be able to [00:02:30] work for more than 30 minutes in a row, although a lot of coders have the same problem. Speaker 1:Yeah. Um, it was also the scent, um, the owner that, you know, smokers have, we're working in a small space and that was obviously, uh, not pleasant for everyone else. Um, but most of the Burton Lee's my friend, I didn't want him to die. So a good friend. Yeah. Smoking smoking's really bad. My grandfather died from smoking. I've always been pretty against it. And so I didn't really know much about the e-cig business. Sean [00:03:00] did a little bit of research and tried a couple, a couple of products and didn't like them. And so we figured out what the problems were with the existing product on the market. And what are those problems? Um, the most popular electronic cigarette is called blue. Uh, it's a little cigarette looking device, um, lights up blue at the end and it's very small and it doesn't produce a lot of vapor and smokers required a large amounts of smoke or in our case [00:03:30] vapor in order to be satisfied. Speaker 1:So it's not satisfactory. Um, it's also limited in that it's small in size, which means the battery's small, which means that you can't use it all day straight. Um, and we wanted to create a product that, first of all, it delivered the experience of smoking, uh, while simultaneously being able to do that all day while simultaneously being able to be affordable to people like us college students. Um, [00:04:00] and so we looked around and there were similar products that we wanted to create on the market, but there were being marketed for over 60 bucks. And that's out of the price range of most college students. And it's definitely out of the price range of putting entrepreneurs who are going broke. So, um, on here slash students, some students who are, who are on a student budget and spending all their extra money on trying to build, build the company. So, um, it came down to quality, um, [00:04:30] and affordability and, um, you know, we, we were hoping, we were luckily able to, uh, go through the entire product development, um, stage in, in just, uh, 40 days. And, uh, we were proud to have developed a pretty good product. Speaker 3:So what I want to get to your product development, we wanna tell that story. Um, but first tell me a little bit more about, it seems like from someone who's not really into this industry, that the e-cig market and in vape [00:05:00] market has exploded over the last few years or kind of they're everywhere, where you didn't used to see them very often. Tell us a little bit about the, the kind of macro backdrop again of the industry that you guys are trying to disrupt. Speaker 4:Yeah. So the industry has been around for a good number of years. Five to six years was actually invented by a dentist and in Asia, which is interesting, but you know, it, it, it's one of those products that sounds too good to be true. [00:05:30] You know, you get all of the benefits of smoking without any of the, the bad things. Right. And so for the past couple of years, um, you know, people were using them, they were being sold online, but there was so much pessimism about the product because nobody had ever really done any studies on them. Uh, so, you know, more, more and more research was done on the products. Uh, basically we find that although they're not perfectly safe, they are so Speaker 3:much safer [00:06:00] than traditional cigarettes, but they started to gain mass appeal. Um, and you couple that with companies like blue, who we, we don't really like, and they don't think they're that good of a product, but them having a lot of money in their bank accounts has, has really fueled the distribution of e-cigs. So you're 100% right in saying that they've totally exploded recently. Um, you know, it's interesting though because the products that have exploded are, are not the best products on the market. They're just the companies that have the most [00:06:30] money to have a blue, which is, you know, funded ridiculously. And then you have the other guys which are actually owned by big tobacco trying to keep people smoking. And I think they caught the realization that these products weren't going to go away and people were going to use them and people did want them and they joined the bandwagon. Speaker 3:So you're talking, you're listening to Shawn Linea and one of the founders of vape secret and all three founders are here helping us to learn more about the [00:07:00] product that they've come to market and they're also cal students to seniors and juniors. This is very exciting to have some cal local entrepreneurs on the program. So you guys are telling the story about, and this program by the way, as method to the madness on KALX Berkeley 90.7 FM. And so you were telling us about, you guys were building this software program, einstein.com and um, and Ben, you realize that Shawn was going [00:07:30] out and smoking every 30 minutes. Like, Hey, let's do another project to building a e-cig. And I would assume this is my belief. But you were not at e-cig expert when you came up with the idea. Is that right? I'm not at all. Speaker 1:I, uh, I, I was not an expert at then, but I can pretty confidently say that I'm an expert. Now. Tell me Speaker 3:about like when you, you had the idea, and I'm always interested in this kind of, this spark of innovation, like the thunderbolts hits, you're like, Whoa, [00:08:00] that's an idea. I know nothing about it, but it's an awesome idea as to take us from that moment to how you 44 days later, whatever it was, had a product. Speaker 1:So, uh, so first of all, Sean and I are not, uh, engineers in the sense that we don't, we're, we're primarily business guys. Um, we're primarily nerds and second, secondly, we're primarily business guys. And, um, the electronic cigarette idea kind of came about, um, for, for two reasons. First [00:08:30] of all, obviously it was practical because, you know, I didn't want John to smoke cigarettes anymore. But also, um, starting a company with no profitability in forecast is very difficult. Um, especially if you don't have much money. And so we saw this as an opportunity to solve a problem that we had and we assumed that other people had, but also to make money, um, so that be able to find that through our lives so that we can actually work on einstein.com. Um, [00:09:00] electronic cigarette industry is huge. And what we noticed is that aside from there not being a good product for this specific type of, of, of use case that we envisioned, it was also very complicated. Speaker 1:Many people didn't know about this. Um, it's almost as if, you know, you take an alien and introduced an iPhone too. I mean, you wouldn't really understand how to use it or how to, how to get, how to, how to get the value out of it. And a lot of electronic cigarette e-tailers are websites, um, had many, many products and it's very, [00:09:30] very confusing and overwhelming for someone to go through that and figure out what to use. So we saw our space as being the simplest electronic cigarette you can buy in that it literally takes 30 seconds to go through our entire website and fully customize an electronic cigarette. You get to choose from 20 different flavors. It's all done in a very, um, user friendly and beginner focused, uh, way so that people [00:10:00] who know nothing about electronic cigarettes can successfully purchase from us quickly, easily, and with confidence because we explain everything in such simple terms. Speaker 1:And so we sell one product, we have one unit, it's available in six different color combinations. Um, we literally walk you through the process. We tell you exactly what you're getting wide good, what's good about it. Um, and we're really focusing on the people that have been thinking about it. I've [00:10:30] heard about it, but haven't really pulled the trigger on getting electronic cigarettes. And we kind of want to be that first step, that stepping stone, taking them away from smoking these dangerous cancer causing traditional cigarettes and moving them on to this new, this new type of, of electronics of electronic cigarette so that they can get all the benefits of smoking without dying young or through the business car talking. I get that you are a good business guy. He's just giving [00:11:00] me exactly the problem and what you're trying to do to make it easy to solve. Speaker 1:But it take us a little, a little detour here and talk about the engineering side of it. So you guys have, you wanted to build an actual product that like does some stuff right? That creates more of a vapor and is cheaper. And so how did you go about the manufacturing process of coming up with the actual product? Um, so from a, from an engineering perspective, the electronic cigarette [00:11:30] consists of three components. First of all, as a power source, which is a battery, uh, second of all is what's called an atomizer, which actually, uh, takes the vapor, takes the liquid and vaporizes it. And the third component is the liquid that you're actually uprising. What we did is we did a huge amount of research into various manufacturers of these components. Um, we did a huge amount of testing on these products. I would get prototypes, give them to Sean, he'd smoked [00:12:00] them for a couple of days, tell me what was wrong with them. Speaker 1:And we work with suppliers all around the world who made this stuff to put together the unit that we have today, which is basically a collection of components from a bunch of different places. And the way we selected each part was first of all, for again for quality, which is our core. And second of all, for affordability, we wanted a product that was sub $30. Um, and so the, for example, our [00:12:30] liquids, um, they're made with food grade, all food grade materials. Um, our flavorings come from Italy. They're, they're food based flavorings. Um, again, we're trying to move away from the general idea of electronic cigarettes as being dangerous and trying to attach some sort of, of tangible, um, healthfulness though as much as we can in this type of product. So that we can actually say that we've [00:13:00] done our, our, our, our, our, our best effort in terms of trying to make this product as good for you as possible. Speaker 1:So, um, you know, the, the battery we selected was, was selected with, with people like Shawn in mind, people that smoke all day, they need a product that lasts all day. A battery can't die because that's my biggest fear. That's our biggest fear is that someone's battery dies and then they go to seven 11 to buy another pack of cigarettes are real vision is helping people quit. And we've done that very successfully. [00:13:30] And the way we do that is by, by creating a product that lasts all day, it's got a USB charger in the bottom so you can literally plug it into your, your phone charger or your laptop and use it while it's charging, which is a very unique feature. Um, our atomizer is some, one of the simplest on the market. And most importantly in terms of, in terms of, of, of, of our, our consciousness towards the environment is [00:14:00] everything about our product is rechargeable and we fill up. So unlike most of the products on the market where you buy a product and then you have to keep on buying the refills and cartridges and all sorts of new components, which you then throw out. Our product is fully rechargeable and we fillable. So not only is it more affordable for the customer, but in our opinion it's also better for the environment. Um, so yeah, that's basically the, the, the focus that went into the engineering side of what we were doing. Speaker 3:Okay, thanks. [00:14:30] You were listening to Ben Einstein, one of the founders of vape secret, a new company formed here on the UC Berkeley campus dedicated to helping people soft smoking by creating a affordable high quality e cigarette. Um, and I have the founders with me here, Sean Linehan, Ben ice, the name Davey Lee. Um, so 44 days. That's a quick time. So how did you get, it sounded like you had to test some different components and stuff. So how, [00:15:00] how did you get the capital to, go ahead. I'm Shawn you and tell me about how, how did that process work? How were you, how many atomizers did you have to buy before you found the right way? Speaker 4:Yeah, so it's, it's, it's actually really interesting. So we didn't take sort of the bottom up approach to engineering our product. Like you might imagine some companies do. We didn't go into cad and, and mock up all of these individual components that we then have to tool ourselves. We recognize that we [00:15:30] only really had a couple thousand dollars of our personal savings left and we needed to make due on that limited bandwidth. So what we did is exactly what Ben was saying was like, we, we went to factories with premade components and figured out how can we put them all together. Right? Um, so the, the capital constraint was pretty significant. We, we took some of the money from our other company, which we also completely self-funded just from our savings accounts, um, and bought [00:16:00] dozens of dozens of these atomizer components and just kept testing them and when they wouldn't work, uh, and some, some of them just outright didn't work, which is ridiculous. Speaker 4:You know, you're getting samples from companies that were trying to become our main suppliers for these components and they chest were broken, um, and cross them off full list. Yeah, exactly. Those guys we don't even have to worry about, even if their first sample doesn't work, you know, it's just not worth that. Um, so, you know, Ben Ben took the efforts in terms of [00:16:30] getting all of the different sample products and the, the engineering components of it. Um, and he did all of these different pieces simultaneously. So it wasn't like, okay, now we've got to find the perfect this, finished that and then find the perfect that and finish that. No, he, he sourced batteries and clear misers and liquids and atomizers and all of these different pieces concurrently so that we could, you know, test all the different configurations. Um, and you're right, 44 days was, it was a sprint. Speaker 4:So, you know, we had [00:17:00] this other company that we didn't want to ignore for too long. So Ben, while he was doing that, I then went with Davey to work on the website. I don't, we're primarily an ecommerce driven product. We don't sell in stores, we sell exclusively through our website. And so Davie and I worked on trying to perfect a beautiful design for our site, making it sleek, making it intuitive, making it the type of experience that I would feel comfortable having my mom on. [00:17:30] Right. And funny story, she actually did, did quit using our product, which I'm really proud of for my mom, my stepbrother, my brother and my stepdad and my best friend all quit using my product [inaudible] and myself. Quit, quit using it. So you know, that that was the aesthetic that we set out to do. And you know, luckily between Davey and I and Ben's input as well on the design, we were able to make something that, that we're really proud of. Um, Speaker 3:that, that's amazing. Congratulations. I mean, your [00:18:00] return on investment right there is huge. If you have your whole family quit complete smoking cigarettes and you have to, I mean when you say quit, I mean you still smoke, you smoked a e-cigarette. Right? And I've, I've been interested in this. I've seen like people and I was in an airport last week and it's like guys smoking and E-cigarette in the airport. And I was wondering like, what's the, um, there's no actually no second hand smoke issues or bathe second hand vapor issues [00:18:30] with an e-cigarette. Speaker 4:No. So, uh, at least according to the most recent studies, and I'd cite the name if I can think of it off the top of my head, but, uh, basically the, the deal is the only detrimental piece of the second hand vapor is exposure to nicotine. Now to your average healthy adult, non infant adult, like, you know, anybody 10 and up, um, and 80 and down, this has absolutely no problem. Or like, if you're pregnant or you're an infant, [00:19:00] I still would not recommend, you know, having vapor blown directly in your face. It's just, there's no proof that it's very bad for you, but you know, nicotine is in a high enough quantity, not good for you. Um, but for your average person, I mean this, this really has very little health health side effects. The, the vapor itself is comprised of a, of a thing called propylene glycol. It sounds scary, but honestly it's one of the most heavily researched [00:19:30] just components, um, over the past eight years. And it's found to be completely safe. It's in inhalers, it's in food. I mean, it's literally in a significant portion of the products we use on a day to day basis. Um, and that's what makes it visible, the vapor visible, um, and it's safe. So, Speaker 3:so when, when smoking is bad for you, it's not necessarily the nicotine that Speaker 4:creates a lung cancer. It's the smoke, certainly not the, the, the deadliness [00:20:00] of, of cigarettes is significantly, significantly not associated with the nicotine. Nicotine is a chemical is bad for you in high doses, like very high doses, but in the dose, that level that you're using cigarettes, it's not the component that's hurting you. The component that hurting you is the smoke itself, right? Like you're literally burning plants. There's thousands of other chemicals added to cigarettes and that's what kills you. Yeah. Speaker 3:Okay. [00:20:30] Very interesting. So we're talking to Shawn Lenahan, then Einstein and Dave, you either the founders of vape secret. It is a e-cigarette company founded here on the UC Berkeley campus. They're all students here at cal and have launched this new enterprise. When did you guys launch? Speaker 1:We launched a late July, late July, July. We, uh, we, we actually launched a website and a, it's funny, we actually got, um, interviewing by cvs in [00:21:00] San Francisco, um, on television and that was kind of the jumpstart for our business. And um, the, the core for what we're doing is not you selling your product today. We put you on a regimen where we wean you off of nicotine completely, which is kind of backwards. Our business professor theta sort of this, Speaker 4:yeah. Basically we, we aim to lose our customers over time. And the way we do that is [00:21:30] we, Speaker 1:you start you off at at a certain nicotine content and we slow you month to month. We send you new liquids every month that lower at, at increasingly lower nicotine contents. Shaun started off at 18 milligrams, I think. Yup. Um, and he, and now he's, what are you smoking now? Speaker 4:Three. And it's funny because for the first two months I actually was at the 18, um, for a longer period of time than I should have been. Cause I didn't want to, we were running out of inventory. Right. We had a very little capital. So we kept having to [00:22:00] continue to buy small quantities, smaller quantities, bigger quantities at a time. Um, so I was using the 18 cause we had a lot of that and I didn't wanna use the inventory that we were going to sell to our customers to help them quit. So, you know, somebody, somebody that we would, that we would have as a customer starting today would quit much faster than the 10 months that it's taken me. They would quit over a period from lot of nicotine to no nicotine, three to four months, just for frame of reference, 18 milligrams. Speaker 4:So you said, yeah. [00:22:30] What does that equate to? Like how many packs a day is that? It's about, uh, between like three quarters of a pack to a pack a day. Um, it's depending on how often you actually use the device. It works for somebody who's up, even up to two packs a day. It's really the strongest, uh, levels that we recommend using. And how does the, so the, it's almost a years of a service. It's not just a product. Correct. Cause you're sending people the lick, the smokeable liquid, if that's the right term. So a Cho, what are the economics [00:23:00] on our liquid versus packs of cigarettes? Yeah. So one, one liquid, which we sell for $5 is equal to about three packs of cigarettes in terms of time spent using it. Um, so one, one liquid lasts an average person. I'm a little bit under two, a little bit more than a week, which is about the same that somebody would have about three packs of cigarettes. Um, unless they're very heavy smokers. But with the vape it's about a week with the one bottle. So we're [00:23:30] literally saving lots of money. Right. I mean I was a smoker for 15 years, but that was years ago when I quit cause I'm an old guy. So what was the, uh, what are the packs of cigarettes go forward today? The ones hours I was, were Speaker 1:about $7 on the average in Berkeley. Wow. So just right there just to save money, you should, you should buy vape secrets, right, man, we actually have a calculator on our homepage where we can tell you exactly how much you'll save this year. [00:24:00] Uh, if you switch, if you switched to electronic cigarettes. Nice. Um, okay, so you guys started in July, so you've been around for about three quarters now and you, you're showing your whole family as quit basically. It's not a like, yeah, you're on the road to quitting. Tell us some more, like how many have you sold? How many stories do you have of people quitting? Um, we, we try to keep in touch with all our customers. Some people it's easier. Some people it's harder. We actually have discovered [00:24:30] that we appeal more to older people because of the simplicity of the site. Speaker 1:Um, because of the simplicity of the product. And older people are generally not as, uh, into communication, especially the email and things like that. Um, so there's been a little bit difficult for us to, to keep track of those numbers. Exactly. Um, we've taught, we've helped dozens of people quit and we've sold hundreds of units. Um, so, um, the business is growing and our only constraint right now is [00:25:00] really, um, is just, you know, getting the word out there. Um, getting, getting people to learn about it and word of mouth has proven to be our strongest marketer. Uh, we hope maybe this, this presentation might help us also a little bit. Um, but the, the important thing for us is that we want to be able to maintain this experience, this personalized experience, um, without getting that diluted by, by getting [00:25:30] too many customers too quickly. Speaker 1:And so, you know, every package we s we ship out is hand packed by us. There's, you know, we, we hand write a note to every customer and we try to develop a really strong personal connection and relationship with them because smoking is an emotional thing. It's a very personal experience. And we're, you know, who are a bunch of kids that come into someone's life who's been smoking for 30 years and tell them, hey, we can help you quit. Um, it's, it's a very bold statement for us to make and it's something we don't take lightly [00:26:00] and we try as hard as we can to make that experience as pleasant and as professional as possible. So it's only, you guys have two businesses, but you're also seniors. A cow. What majors do you guys have? A, I'm a business major. We've mastered the art of, of being good students while simultaneously, uh, trying to be good entrepreneurs. So you are your business as well then? I know I'm not a business major, I'm just the business guy. Um, I [00:26:30] uh, I made development studies major. Um, I learned about developing economies and things like that. Um, but I read a lot about business and uh, Shawn teaches me everything that's important to know that he learns in Oz. You Speaker 3:guys are, uh, it's April. So graduation is staring you in the face and you have two businesses. Yeah. Is that the plan, you guys are going to go full force after May. Speaker 4:That's, that's the plan. Yeah. And we're not, not gonna [00:27:00] not gonna hesitate, you know, actually can't wait to graduate so we can really sit down and focus. Right? Like focused is the biggest issue. Um, with school you, you have varying schedules all the time. You have different wake up days every day, right? Sometimes you have class at eight, 10, 1112 and we're, we're ready to be able to, to truly dominate. Speaker 3:Yeah. So did tell me about the path to domination you felt like your, and we're speaking with the founders of vapes, secret hearing methods [00:27:30] of the Madison on KLX Berkeley 90.7 FM, Ben Einstein, Sean Lennon and David Lee. These guys who started this business while trying to graduate from cal, they're about to do that. So I want to know now you're going to graduate. The shackles are off. You can drink from the capitalist Downton as much as you want. So what, what's the difference? How are you going to get from where you are today to selling thousands of these helmets? How big a market did you save? This was Ben Speaker 4:big, is it? [00:28:00] So last year it was a one point $3 billion industry and it's projected to hit 15 billion over the next 10 years. Speaker 3:Okay. So if you can get half, half of a percent, you're doing well, how are you going to get there? Speaker 1:Um, we were really working on trying to get our, um, our supply chain in place so that we can actually, uh, produce these products in, in really high quantities. Um, right now we're kind of doing small dots [00:28:30] runs, which keeps our costs higher than they should be or merged. Immersions are still fairly healthy. Um, but we can always do better in that sense. Um, but again, it's in test. This is, um, this is something that we started out of necessity and we realized that this was an opportunity to really help people quit smoking. And so we're actually passionate about it. We really care about this. And you know, anyone we meet who smokes weed, you try and convince them to quit, not just so [00:29:00] we can get a customer, but also cause we, we think smoking's bad. Shawn is in better shape than he's ever been. Speaker 1:He, he doesn't get tired running up and down stairs anymore. Um, not that programmers do that much, but he actually goes to the gym more than any of us do. Um, but you know, for us the, the important thing was, um, you know, what did Winston Churchill said, don't let your school and getting in the way of your education. Um, we, we've learned more in the past year working together than we probably have [00:29:30] in all four years of college. And so at this point, um, where we're going to go, just in terms of the time commitment. Also for me, I'm putting myself through school. So, um, you know, the financial and the financial responsibilities of paying for college, um, have been, have been, uh, pretty serious on my family and you know, the opportunity to be finally be able to work full time, um, on what we're trying to do. Um, the ability to dedicate not only all [00:30:00] of our physical time, but our mental capabilities. I mean, if we're studying for a test until three in the morning and then we try to come into work the next morning, we're not 100%, whereas if we don't have tests anymore, we can actually dedicate our entire, you know, she be you in our brains to, um, to building new businesses Speaker 3:and thanks to you guys for coming on today and telling your story about how you sorted vape secret. We'll have to have you on another time to talk about Einstein. Um, but you've been listening to the band, Einstein, Sean Lenahan [00:30:30] and David lead of the founders of vapes secret. They're a seniors here on campus about to graduate and go full force into this, um, e-cigarette company that I've created. Um, and to learn more that you guys can go to vape secret.com right. That's the URL to check out. Speaker 1:That's correct. And actually there's a, a special cow promotion for Berkeley students. Uh, if you place an order, you put into words, go bears into the coupon code and you'll get 10, 10% off of your [00:31:00] sale. Speaker 3:Alright, we got a plug in at the aunt's, a nice word fan. And uh, thanks for coming on guys. You've been listening to KLX Berkeley's method to the madness. Have a great Friday. Everybody. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.