Adrienne Bankert - How Kindness Can Make You Unbeatable at Work...
00:00:00.000 | I didn't write the book to have some, you know, utopian idea of, Oh, let's just all
00:00:06.000 | just be really sweet to each other.
00:00:07.760 | I wrote it because I wanted people to start seeing themselves as kind as an identity,
00:00:14.560 | not as an act.
00:00:15.560 | Because whatever you believe you are is what you'll attract.
00:00:19.360 | But also whatever you believe you are, you will stay true to, even if you mess up, even
00:00:23.200 | if you stumble, you're going to return back to that baseline of who you see yourself as.
00:00:28.600 | So if you see yourself as kind, not just somebody who can be kind, but your full identity as
00:00:34.640 | a person is kind, then you can come back to center.
00:00:39.240 | That will be your, your star.
00:00:41.020 | If you think I'm kind when I'm in a good mood or I'm kind after I have coffee, then you
00:00:46.400 | are limiting yourself and stressful situations may put you over the edge and you may not
00:00:52.160 | even realize how little control you have over your emotions in those times.
00:01:01.480 | Hello and welcome to another episode of All The Hacks, a show about upgrading your life,
00:01:05.600 | money and travel.
00:01:07.160 | I'm Chris Hutchins and I want to tell a little bit of a story before I get into today's conversation.
00:01:11.920 | In the 1960s, six boys from Tonga were shipwrecked on a remote Pacific island for 15 months.
00:01:18.760 | And you might be thinking it turned into something like Lord of the Flies, a descent into violence,
00:01:22.880 | but that is not what happened.
00:01:24.360 | In fact, it was the polar opposite of that novel, which most of us had to read in school.
00:01:29.520 | And while in the fictitional book, boys descended into anarchy, murder, mayhem, in the real
00:01:33.960 | world, they actually got along well, they developed structure, they took care of those
00:01:37.900 | who were injured.
00:01:39.760 | And when they were found after 15 months, they were doing great.
00:01:44.320 | They were fit.
00:01:45.320 | They were healthy.
00:01:46.320 | Now, why is this book Lord of Rings or sorry, Lord of the Flies so much bleaker than reality?
00:01:52.820 | Why did kindness end up actually ruling in real life?
00:01:56.600 | Well, author Rucker Berman introduced this story and others in a recent book called Humankind,
00:02:02.160 | A Hopeful History.
00:02:03.160 | And he makes the case pretty convincingly that humans are basically kind and they do
00:02:07.320 | better and thrive when they are kind.
00:02:09.840 | And that kindness is more human of a trait than cruelty.
00:02:13.880 | So if we can do better when we're kind, how do you hone and improve that ability?
00:02:17.560 | Well, that thought had me so intrigued by the title of Adrienne Bankert's book, Your
00:02:21.680 | Hidden Superpower, the kindness that makes you unbeatable at work and connects you with
00:02:25.800 | anyone.
00:02:26.800 | And I'm so excited to be talking about it today.
00:02:29.080 | Adrienne is an Emmy Award winning journalist who's reported on stories from all over the
00:02:33.240 | world, interviewed hundreds of people and celebrities.
00:02:35.920 | She was a correspondent and weekend anchor on ABC's Good Morning America.
00:02:40.360 | And she's the first woman of color to solo host a morning show as host of Morning in
00:02:45.240 | America.
00:02:46.240 | But her hallmark is kindness.
00:02:47.240 | And it's been a huge factor in her success and ultimately led her to write her book.
00:02:53.080 | Adrienne, welcome to the show.
00:02:54.760 | And thank you so much for being here.
00:02:56.920 | Thank you, Chris.
00:02:58.240 | Great story.
00:02:59.480 | It's funny because it's not always true.
00:03:01.360 | I recently interviewed a guy named Brandon Presser, who's a travel journalist.
00:03:05.520 | And he wrote about the Pitcairn Islands, which is quite more of the Lord of the Rings truth,
00:03:10.820 | but also was much older people escaping tyranny and a little bit crazier.
00:03:17.180 | So I just want to start and read the first first kind of part of the first chapter of
00:03:22.020 | your book, because I think it sets the stone for a conversation, which is there is an unbeatable
00:03:26.660 | superpower inside every one of us that is far greater than talent or tenacity.
00:03:32.300 | And supersedes strength and intelligence.
00:03:34.220 | It crushes selfishness, negativity, and doubt.
00:03:38.900 | That's kindness you're speaking of.
00:03:41.020 | And that superpower is something I really want to understand.
00:03:44.260 | Could you just jump in and explain how it's a superpower that could do all of those things?
00:03:47.860 | Well, you know, I gave a keynote speech just recently here.
00:03:52.820 | And my title of the speech was "The Purpose of Your Power."
00:03:57.340 | You know, I think that people forget that kindness isn't just a pleasant thing to do.
00:04:03.300 | It's not just good etiquette.
00:04:05.120 | It's not just the way we should behave as if, you know, we're completely oblivious to
00:04:10.740 | the world going sideways around us.
00:04:13.240 | But it's a choice.
00:04:14.380 | It's a very intentional choice.
00:04:16.300 | And the purpose behind it is to provide stability to other people.
00:04:20.860 | Right now, we're in the midst of a very uncertain time in multiple areas.
00:04:26.100 | Just turn on the news.
00:04:27.820 | And a lot of people are going through personal battles that we don't even know about.
00:04:32.100 | And inside of them, they're just hoping that somebody will be kind to them, that somebody
00:04:37.080 | will remember them, that somebody will call them and tell them it's okay.
00:04:40.940 | And I think that a lot of times with kindness, we think, "Oh, I've got to try really hard
00:04:44.860 | to be a good person."
00:04:45.860 | Or, "Oh, you know, I've got to give these people a break and be nice to them."
00:04:50.740 | And it's funny because I don't know that I, now that I've, you know, kind of worked on
00:04:56.020 | kindness for a while, I don't know that I would say it's inherently who we want to be
00:05:01.120 | as people.
00:05:02.120 | You know, I think that a lot of times we want to just get the quick fix or we can be selfish.
00:05:07.300 | But I think it's the thing that we all crave to receive from other people.
00:05:12.100 | And so, when we give people the one thing that we universally want, somebody to be kind
00:05:17.620 | to us, somebody to treat us in a humane fashion, someone to think of us, to remember us, to
00:05:23.740 | be friendly to us, then the power behind that is that not only does that person get helped,
00:05:30.300 | but we become inspired, we become encouraged, we become more of the person that we really
00:05:34.820 | do desire to be, but don't always act in alignment with.
00:05:40.140 | And so, I think there's something very powerful about giving someone the consideration that
00:05:44.860 | has a mutual reciprocity that has that power to put us in a better mood and them in a better
00:05:49.780 | mood and do more than that.
00:05:51.900 | Really give oxygen to our lungs and keep us going and not quitting.
00:05:56.660 | And is it somewhat self-fulfilling?
00:05:58.420 | If it feels hard to start practicing this more and more regularly, is it something that
00:06:02.700 | as you do it, and you see the reaction becomes easier?
00:06:05.860 | I don't think it's hard.
00:06:06.860 | That's the thing.
00:06:08.140 | It's really not hard.
00:06:12.580 | Just the 15 times in the recent history that you were in a environment with somebody, maybe
00:06:17.740 | you were interviewing them on your podcast and they said something in error and you could
00:06:24.300 | have corrected them, whether it's their grammar or a fact, you know, they were just factually
00:06:29.420 | in error because they were talking very fast.
00:06:32.500 | And instead of correcting them, you just let them talk.
00:06:35.820 | And eventually over the process of listening, they actually were able to spit out the sentence
00:06:40.220 | in a way that you could edit around it without having to super critique them in that moment.
00:06:45.540 | That's an act of kindness.
00:06:47.100 | I don't think it's hard.
00:06:48.260 | I just think it's a choice.
00:06:50.860 | I work in a live studio environment.
00:06:53.160 | And so there are times when you want it to be a little quieter on the set, but you know,
00:06:58.060 | as the host of the show, that's not my job to make it quieter on the set.
00:07:01.460 | It's the stage director's job to make it quieter on the set.
00:07:04.220 | So my kindness is keeping myself in my lane and trusting that other person to do their
00:07:09.900 | job instead of thinking, "God, I wish somebody would do their job."
00:07:13.540 | That's a kindness, you know, deciding to trust somebody.
00:07:18.120 | So I think it's really more of, you know what, I'm going to stay calm in this moment.
00:07:23.060 | And right now that's at a premium.
00:07:26.460 | You know, there are a lot of people who blow up.
00:07:28.500 | There are a lot of people...
00:07:29.500 | I just looked up the word stability, and I think one of my favorite definitions from
00:07:33.860 | Merriam-Webster's dictionary is not radioactive, you know, not spontaneously radioactive.
00:07:39.660 | Like a lot of people can blow up easily, whether it's rush hour traffic or it's at their kids
00:07:45.700 | or their spouse or partner, and it's like, everybody's kind of asking for a chill pill
00:07:50.300 | right now.
00:07:51.300 | You know, like, can you please just keep it chill?
00:07:54.700 | And we want that for ourselves.
00:07:56.900 | So if we can put ourselves in somebody else's shoes and use that empathy that we use that
00:08:00.820 | word so often now, but it really is about putting ourselves in the position of somebody
00:08:04.580 | else.
00:08:05.580 | We can think, you know what, I can keep my mouth shut for five minutes.
00:08:07.860 | And then just in terms of like, you know, everyday life, going to the grocery store,
00:08:10.860 | going to pick up your kids from school, like there's always going to be some interruption.
00:08:16.300 | Can you just hold on for five minutes?
00:08:18.900 | Can you just hold on for one hour?
00:08:20.780 | Can you just hold on until you get off at 5pm?
00:08:23.860 | Yes, most of us can.
00:08:27.060 | And that's the kindness.
00:08:28.060 | It's the choice to hold on.
00:08:30.620 | Just take it day by day, take it hour by hour, take it every 15 minutes if you have to.
00:08:35.700 | That choice is something once we put it in bite-sized pieces becomes very easy.
00:08:39.340 | I think we all want to do this.
00:08:41.820 | I have a few times in my history where I'm sure I've been on that, the kind of giving
00:08:46.060 | side of an annoying kind of blow up in an argument.
00:08:49.060 | And after the fact, I'm like, "Gosh, I wish I just paused and took a break."
00:08:52.780 | But in the moment, it's much harder.
00:08:54.940 | Is there a practice or something to think about that makes it top of mind for you?
00:08:59.380 | I don't have my other cell phone near me, but it says hot mic on it.
00:09:03.020 | And this is my easy way to do this.
00:09:05.780 | Imagine that the person or persons next to you all have their cell phone out and they're
00:09:09.780 | going to roll on you in the next few minutes.
00:09:13.660 | And so, your reaction is potentially going to go viral.
00:09:16.860 | Now, I'm not trying to use a scare tactic, but it's that thought of there's going to
00:09:21.420 | be video proof of how I behave.
00:09:24.340 | Now, I have to live with that reality every single day.
00:09:28.660 | But if we all acted like we were on national television, that to me is just enough of a
00:09:33.220 | trigger for me to think, "Wait, just wait a second.
00:09:37.060 | Would I want this on video and would I want this on TikTok all around the world?
00:09:41.660 | No, not so much.
00:09:42.660 | So, let me just chill."
00:09:44.700 | That helps me.
00:09:45.700 | I hope that helps somebody else out there.
00:09:47.540 | No, I think the kind of subtle reminders, whether they're post-its you put on your computer
00:09:52.260 | screen or whether they're changing your background on your phone, those kinds of like little
00:09:56.820 | tricks I think sometimes help people.
00:09:59.380 | And what I meant earlier was once you start doing it more regularly, maybe it actually
00:10:04.580 | becomes easier.
00:10:05.580 | Oh, yeah.
00:10:06.580 | I think Nir Eyal, who wrote a book called Indistractable, kind of says, "Hey, whenever
00:10:11.660 | you're feeling that urge to go pick up your phone and check Instagram or Twitter or TikTok,
00:10:17.420 | pause for a second and just feel what it feels like to want to go do that."
00:10:22.060 | And maybe at the beginning, you just still go do it.
00:10:24.440 | But the more you understand, "Oh, that's the internal feeling of I'm having this desire
00:10:30.340 | to do something that I know is bad for me, that I know I don't want to do."
00:10:34.660 | Step one is feel what it feels like so you can work on recognizing it.
00:10:37.940 | Yeah, I think we do need to get more in touch with the feeling, whether it's positive or
00:10:41.980 | negative.
00:10:42.980 | I mean, it's just like, "Okay, what am I processing right now?
00:10:45.260 | What's going on in my head that's making me want to either blow up or run away?"
00:10:49.860 | Because a lot of us have a fight or flight tendency just in our DNA.
00:10:54.980 | And it's like, rather than have conflict, even if we don't mind a conflict, we would
00:10:59.580 | rather just walk out.
00:11:01.220 | And we can't always do that.
00:11:02.900 | And so having a word that calms you down, having a song that you sing...
00:11:07.820 | And I think if you can come up with some little mini mantras so that when things do get tense,
00:11:12.980 | innocuous mantras.
00:11:14.660 | There was a gentleman that I worked with and I got a little bit heated with at one
00:11:19.540 | point.
00:11:20.540 | And I said, "Listen," I said, "I apologize because I could have come off a lot kinder
00:11:23.460 | there."
00:11:24.460 | I said, "If you ever notice me getting that way, and maybe you think I haven't noticed,
00:11:29.780 | I want you to signal me, and this is how you're going to signal me.
00:11:33.500 | I want you to say, 'Jalapeno.'"
00:11:35.300 | And I said, "Jalapeno is the code word between you and me that things are getting a little
00:11:40.620 | too hot in here and we need to turn it down a notch."
00:11:43.420 | And he laughed out loud.
00:11:44.420 | I mean, it was just like a fun, innocuous way to remind ourselves not to get too irritated
00:11:51.040 | or not to get too spicy with one another.
00:11:53.680 | So it worked.
00:11:55.500 | I just did a run with Robin Arzon from Peloton and they have these outdoor runs.
00:12:01.340 | And she has a similar thing where she's like, "Pick a word when you're running.
00:12:05.020 | And anytime it's hard, just repeat the word."
00:12:07.060 | And for her, it was "Outlast".
00:12:09.420 | And I found that -- I'm not training for a marathon or anything -- but I am trying to
00:12:14.740 | beat my records every time I run.
00:12:17.060 | And that idea of having a word that you just kind of, whether you repeat it to someone
00:12:20.420 | or to yourself, I found personally to be really helpful.
00:12:23.500 | I probably stole her word.
00:12:24.620 | I probably should come up with my own.
00:12:25.820 | But "Outlast" seemed like a good word to remind yourself when trying to compete or complete
00:12:30.880 | a physical challenge.
00:12:31.880 | Yeah.
00:12:32.880 | Well, and really, deciding to be kind in a world that can be very unkind is as physical
00:12:37.460 | as it gets.
00:12:38.460 | You know, I mean, you will have a visceral response sometimes to pressure and stress.
00:12:43.620 | And being kind is the last thing you want to do.
00:12:45.860 | You either want to tell somebody what you really think or you want to get the heck out.
00:12:51.060 | And I mean, I think that I didn't write the book to have some utopian idea of, "Oh, let's
00:12:57.480 | just all just be really sweet to each other."
00:13:00.020 | I wrote it because I wanted people to start seeing themselves as kind as an identity,
00:13:06.820 | not as an act.
00:13:07.820 | Because whatever you believe you are is what you'll attract.
00:13:11.620 | But also, whatever you believe you are, you will stay true to even if you mess up.
00:13:15.460 | Even if you stumble, you're going to return back to that baseline of who you see yourself
00:13:20.620 | as.
00:13:21.620 | So, if you see yourself as kind, not just somebody who can be kind, but your full identity
00:13:26.820 | as a person is kind, then you can come back to send her.
00:13:31.540 | That will be your North Star.
00:13:33.300 | If you think, "I'm kind when I'm in a good mood" or "I'm kind after I have coffee", then
00:13:38.700 | you are limiting yourself and stressful situations may put you over the edge and you may not
00:13:44.460 | even realize how little control you have over your emotions in those times.
00:13:49.340 | Sometimes the things that you might say don't necessarily come off as kind.
00:13:53.680 | And I'll give a fun example, which was I interviewed a guy named Mike Hayes, who was a former Navy
00:13:59.600 | SEAL commander, and he was giving a lecture and a student asked a question that was one
00:14:04.760 | of those questions that was kind of annoying, where they are trying to tell the whole room
00:14:09.780 | how great they are before they ask the question.
00:14:12.760 | And his response was, "Hey, I'm going to pause you and tell you you're a bad question asker.
00:14:17.260 | And in the moment, you're probably feeling really small, but otherwise I'm going to let
00:14:21.640 | you go on through life asking questions terribly and have all these people..."
00:14:24.980 | So he meant it in the nicest way, but it certainly is sometimes hard for those things to come
00:14:29.760 | across kind.
00:14:31.040 | How do you balance that?
00:14:32.640 | I think that a lot of times kindness does get this like wrap of, "Oh, it has to be said
00:14:38.480 | in the most sugary sweet way, otherwise it's not kind."
00:14:42.720 | When the truth of the matter is, is sometimes tough love really is truly love.
00:14:47.440 | You know, sometimes being kind looks like criticism, but it's the best thing you could
00:14:52.400 | do.
00:14:53.400 | It's the best thing you could do in your life over the course of your career or over the
00:14:56.200 | course of your relationships, because that'll be the reality check.
00:14:59.460 | I mean, I can't tell you how many times when somebody gets got...
00:15:02.280 | Not got in my face like in a confrontational way, because there's a difference between
00:15:05.840 | confronting and offering constructive feedback, but just told me like, "Listen, A, I got to
00:15:12.060 | tell you the truth because I don't know that anybody else will."
00:15:15.440 | And it was just like a lifesaver of information.
00:15:19.440 | But there aren't a lot of people who are that honest.
00:15:22.480 | And if they don't love you or care about you, if they don't have that desire to make you
00:15:28.880 | better, then they'll just let you keep doing what you're doing.
00:15:32.180 | But if they are kind enough to be super upfront with you and to tell you something that will
00:15:36.400 | actually help you be better and be who you really want to be, then that's absolutely
00:15:40.480 | kind even if the delivery stings a little bit.
00:15:43.480 | There's a book that I read when I was running a company called Radical Candor.
00:15:47.160 | And it kind of highlights that if you don't build the relationship for someone to know
00:15:52.120 | that that feedback comes from a good place, then even if your intentions are good, it's
00:15:57.060 | probably not going to land on the delivery.
00:15:59.360 | So you have to spend time cultivating the relationship for someone to say, "Oh, they're
00:16:04.240 | probably trying to help me improve when they tell me that the work I just delivered was
00:16:08.520 | terrible."
00:16:09.520 | And I think that too, there's two kinds of people in this world.
00:16:12.320 | For the majority of people that you are going to have to nurture that relationship before
00:16:15.960 | you can be that honest with them.
00:16:17.880 | But there is a small, I would say a radically small group of people who can handle that
00:16:23.880 | kind of honesty and frankness like you're talking about, no matter how it's delivered,
00:16:29.360 | because they're so hungry.
00:16:31.080 | Like the hungriest hunters, the people who are so teachable, the ones who are willing
00:16:35.600 | to pay the highest price, and there's more than one person on the planet who thinks like
00:16:39.240 | that, they will take it however they can get it because their ultimate goals are higher
00:16:43.680 | than their feelings.
00:16:45.680 | And they're not going to let sensitivity stop them from growing.
00:16:49.080 | Does it sometimes hurt still?
00:16:51.160 | Absolutely.
00:16:52.160 | But I would think that the top 1% of people had to put their feelings aside in order to
00:16:57.620 | grow through those painful experiences that looked like an insult, but really was like
00:17:03.360 | the billion-dollar idea to their success.
00:17:06.360 | I don't know if I necessarily want to put myself into that when you called it the top
00:17:09.960 | percent, but I do love feedback.
00:17:12.560 | And I find that people in general don't like giving it because they know they are kind
00:17:17.680 | and they want people to feel good.
00:17:20.480 | But for me, sometimes it most comes around when I'm cooking, and I'll make something
00:17:24.880 | for dinner, and I serve it to everyone.
00:17:27.040 | They're like, "This was so good."
00:17:28.040 | I'm like, "Great.
00:17:29.040 | Thank you.
00:17:30.040 | I appreciate that you enjoy it.
00:17:31.600 | But what could I do so that when I make this dish next time, it's even better?"
00:17:36.120 | And I find it so difficult to pull out the criticism from people.
00:17:41.000 | So if we reverse this, any tips for someone trying to seek criticism in a world where
00:17:47.120 | sometimes people don't like giving it?
00:17:48.960 | Well, I think number one is I would use a more real-life situation than you're cooking.
00:17:52.920 | Because I think cooking...
00:17:54.840 | As much as you probably love the idea of just cooking, I want to ask you, have you ever
00:17:59.800 | been in a situation where you knew that this person was wiser than you, more experienced
00:18:05.520 | than you, wealthier than you, and you knew that you could learn and glean from them,
00:18:10.440 | but you didn't know what to ask to get them to be really upfront?
00:18:14.160 | Have you ever been in that situation?
00:18:17.440 | I mean, I'm sure I have.
00:18:18.760 | Because an example doesn't come to mind, but sometimes I've interviewed people who have
00:18:25.920 | their own successful podcasts or TV shows with the goal at the end.
00:18:31.680 | And I plan to do this with you, but we're a little bit of the ways in.
00:18:34.840 | And ask for feedback on my ability to interview, on my running an interview.
00:18:41.480 | And I haven't gotten a lot of feedback.
00:18:43.520 | People are kind of like, "Oh, you did a great job.
00:18:45.200 | Good job."
00:18:46.200 | And I'm like, "No, thank you.
00:18:47.400 | But I know that you've done this more than me.
00:18:49.920 | I know there's something I can learn from you."
00:18:52.460 | And I find it difficult to pull that out sometimes.
00:18:55.040 | I think that number one thing I would do is I'd take myself out of it and I'd say, "What
00:18:59.440 | would you tell?"
00:19:01.120 | And then I would give a category.
00:19:03.280 | Young entrepreneurs or whatever definition of the category of people that you place yourself
00:19:10.160 | in and say, "What would you tell?"
00:19:12.960 | Or "What would you tell your 20-something or 30-something self?"
00:19:17.080 | Start there.
00:19:18.800 | And then the next question is, "I'm giving you permission to be really direct with me.
00:19:26.320 | What would you say that I should take away from this conversation?"
00:19:30.540 | And see what they say.
00:19:31.540 | Now, again, a lot of the smartest people in the room can be very blunt, but they might
00:19:37.440 | want to know that they nurtured a relationship.
00:19:40.520 | They don't want to hurt anybody's feelings.
00:19:42.040 | They've learned, like you said, a long time ago, that it doesn't pay to make somebody
00:19:47.040 | feel lousy right after they just met you.
00:19:50.480 | First impression, right?
00:19:52.240 | But when they are able to kind of make a broader stroke and it's not so personal, like what
00:19:56.860 | can you do, then it actually lands better because you can apply it not only for your
00:20:03.160 | life, but you can talk to anybody in your peer group and give them the same piece of
00:20:06.480 | wisdom.
00:20:07.480 | I just learned that a lot of people don't really want the truth.
00:20:12.240 | You can't handle the truth.
00:20:15.280 | And so it's like, "I want to be kind to you.
00:20:17.600 | I want to help you."
00:20:18.600 | But it requires that you almost kind of have it coming out of your eyeballs and your pores.
00:20:25.680 | That I am so hungry to learn and be a student of this moment and be a student of life and
00:20:31.000 | be a student of those who are more advanced than me, that I can hear anything.
00:20:35.240 | And you can say that to your blue in the face, but unless you're really admitting it, unless
00:20:39.040 | you're really sending it out into the universe, they can smell that.
00:20:43.240 | It's like they can smell fear.
00:20:44.640 | Well, I can promise you that I am in that camp.
00:20:47.280 | But before we wrap this conversation, be thinking about anything I could be doing because you
00:20:52.200 | have 10 times the experience or maybe 100 than I do.
00:20:57.000 | But before I ask you that, I want to know, can people ever be too kind?
00:21:01.620 | Can there be a circumstance where there's just too much kindness in a room in a conversation?
00:21:06.840 | No, because kindness and niceness are different.
00:21:09.560 | I think you can be too nice.
00:21:11.120 | I think you can be, again, afraid to hurt somebody's feelings, afraid to make a bad
00:21:15.040 | impression, fearful of anything will cause you to compromise your standards and compromise
00:21:20.920 | who you really are.
00:21:21.920 | But I think that being kind means kind of being self-aware and at the same time being
00:21:26.080 | very, very aware of other people and knowing what maybe they could handle, what the room
00:21:30.400 | could bear.
00:21:31.400 | Again, reading the room is so key.
00:21:34.440 | In speaking to a group recently, there were two big meetings and I could have given the
00:21:39.000 | same speech twice, like nobody would have complained.
00:21:42.160 | The first speech was great.
00:21:43.520 | I could have just hit replay on my memory and busted out this extemporaneous speech
00:21:48.000 | and probably had a better delivery because I've already done it once before in front
00:21:51.400 | of a live audience, right?
00:21:53.080 | But there was the gentleman who was kind of escorting me through my different stops and
00:21:56.360 | he said, "Wow."
00:21:57.360 | He was like, "You didn't give a cookie cutter message.
00:21:58.760 | I said different room, different need."
00:22:00.320 | I was like, "You have to know what the room will bear."
00:22:04.480 | And until you learn to read a room, until you can kind of get a feel, there's one way
00:22:09.320 | to read the room by actually going around and kind of surveying people like before the
00:22:14.320 | event starts and shaking hands and kind of networking and breezing through and kind of
00:22:21.080 | getting a little focus group going of the experiences of the different people that you've
00:22:25.160 | met.
00:22:26.160 | You can make a judgment based on the age of the average attendee, but eventually you get
00:22:31.280 | practiced in discerning what it is that a room actually is looking for.
00:22:37.800 | Why am I really there?
00:22:39.880 | You know, some of that is research and development, but otherwise that's actually like time and
00:22:44.760 | experience and tenure of going and speaking to crowds and learning about people and human
00:22:50.560 | engagement and just being fully present.
00:22:53.560 | And that comes through kindness because when I'm kind, I'm so aware of the other people
00:22:58.240 | around me that I almost have what I call in the book a sixth sense, you know, an intuition
00:23:04.960 | that helps me to understand people better.
00:23:08.360 | Is there an example of a time where you read the room and it kind of altered what you were
00:23:12.640 | going to say or how you're going to say it that you could share?
00:23:15.240 | Yeah.
00:23:16.240 | I gave a speech and I thought I was going to talk about just kindness as your superpower.
00:23:20.480 | You know, let me just give the delivery of my book and you know, I'll give a couple examples
00:23:26.560 | and I'll have fun.
00:23:29.120 | But I just got really quiet.
00:23:31.160 | And when you're quiet to me and you hear this from all the top minds and thought leaders
00:23:35.780 | in the world, is that that quiet time can be so creative and so able to tap you kind
00:23:42.360 | of in to the space that you need to be in.
00:23:44.640 | I think that so that you can discern, but I ended up getting a word, just one single
00:23:49.840 | word of what this group needed.
00:23:53.560 | And I went into the room and I'm listening to the beginning parts of the awards program.
00:24:00.800 | And at one point they're honoring somebody who died and at one point they're honoring
00:24:06.400 | somebody who was in the ICU and there's tears and they're crying on the stage right before
00:24:12.760 | I'm about to give my big speech.
00:24:15.400 | And I was like, I'm so glad I got quiet because the word that I'd gotten and the situation
00:24:22.040 | that I was in caused me to connect the dots in a different way when I delivered that speech.
00:24:28.040 | Because there's one, you know, you can go into a room and you can be really fun and
00:24:31.720 | engaging and exciting, but they were all very emotional and a bit raw.
00:24:38.400 | And so they needed encouragement, but they didn't need it in a rah rah sis boom bah kind
00:24:42.860 | of way.
00:24:44.240 | And so reading the room for me meant being quiet enough to kind of tap in where I was
00:24:48.000 | paying attention.
00:24:49.160 | It's not like I'm a psychic, but because I was calm in myself, again, what was the first
00:24:55.000 | thing I said at the top of the interview, everybody's asking us to just take a big chill
00:24:59.400 | pill.
00:25:00.400 | But if I'm super high on like my wavelength of, I got to deliver a really good speech,
00:25:06.400 | I'm not going to be cool and chill and calm enough in myself to be actually paying attention
00:25:11.280 | to the room when they're crying on stage, I'm going to go practice my speech, go over
00:25:15.360 | my notes, order another drink if I do that before I speak.
00:25:20.000 | Just being present enough to listen to the program versus thinking, I'm too busy to listen
00:25:25.400 | to the program.
00:25:26.400 | I'm good.
00:25:27.400 | I know how to jump on a stage and give a talk.
00:25:29.840 | That would have been a big mistake on my part, but because I listened to them, because I
00:25:34.320 | had been quiet in my own private time, I could now tailor my delivery in a way that landed
00:25:40.520 | and people came up to me afterwards, thanking me for what I shared because it hit home for
00:25:45.480 | them.
00:25:46.480 | But I was in tune with the room and I was listening to them.
00:25:48.800 | I mean, obviously, reading the room is the big hack in that conversation.
00:25:52.600 | But 2 other things I took away, which I'm curious to hear your reaction.
00:25:55.680 | So one, be prepared.
00:25:58.740 | So I want to talk in a second about the kinds of preparation you do before you're delivering
00:26:03.680 | a...
00:26:04.680 | Whether for you, it might be a keynote presentation, but for many people, it might just be a presentation
00:26:08.600 | at work or an important conversation with friends or family.
00:26:11.960 | And the other, which I'm interpreting as a hack might be, if you're giving a presentation
00:26:17.380 | in a work meeting, volunteer to not go first, so that you have a chance to read the room,
00:26:22.960 | how they might react to another presentation so you can tailor that delivery.
00:26:26.960 | Well, I mean, I was the only speaker.
00:26:29.560 | I was the keynote.
00:26:30.560 | So it was me.
00:26:31.560 | You didn't have a choice.
00:26:32.560 | I didn't have a choice.
00:26:33.560 | And when I spoke, but I think that one key would be...
00:26:37.280 | When I arrive at a destination, one way to prepare is to go early.
00:26:43.040 | And reading the room can be reading the tense moments that happen while they're putting
00:26:47.880 | the dishes on the table or while they're setting up the PowerPoint slide.
00:26:52.640 | You can capture a little bit of reading the room by seeing how stressed out or calm or
00:26:58.920 | fun the staff is prior to the audience even arriving.
00:27:03.520 | Because I think all of that plays into it.
00:27:06.120 | And one of my favorite interviews of all time was Lady Gaga, Sam Elliot.
00:27:13.440 | Why can't I think of the other names?
00:27:16.600 | The Star is Born cast.
00:27:18.360 | Bradley Cooper.
00:27:19.360 | Bradley Cooper.
00:27:20.360 | I was like, "Of course, Bradley Cooper.
00:27:21.760 | How do I forget Bradley Cooper?"
00:27:26.120 | But I was setting up for that Star is Born interview.
00:27:28.440 | And I remember getting in the room very early.
00:27:32.280 | And the first person to enter the room and the second person and how they entered the
00:27:35.920 | room was very significant because they didn't all come together.
00:27:40.480 | But just being present and knowing what my crew was going through and knowing what the
00:27:44.280 | publicity team was feeling like, because there was a little bit of tension because it's always
00:27:48.720 | tense because they're dealing with these people who have to go through all these different
00:27:52.940 | interviews in succession.
00:27:55.200 | But I remember sitting in the room and thinking our chairs were too far apart.
00:28:01.480 | So I asked the crew, I said, "Can you move the chairs a little closer?"
00:28:04.840 | Well, we did.
00:28:07.520 | Then after the whole thing was done, everybody loved the interview, big success.
00:28:12.560 | One person who wasn't even on that team contacted me and said, "I want to give you some feedback.
00:28:18.100 | I think the chairs should have been closer."
00:28:21.640 | So I was reading the room correctly in terms of preparing.
00:28:25.800 | That's something that anybody, whether you're giving a keynote or you're doing something
00:28:28.360 | at work, you want to think about the furniture.
00:28:31.120 | You want to think about how close you're going to be to the table if it's in a conference
00:28:34.480 | room area.
00:28:35.560 | Are you going to move around the room?
00:28:38.320 | Are you going to have somebody else operate your presentation in the clicker or are you
00:28:41.680 | going to do that yourself?
00:28:43.040 | All of those things lead to you feeling more prepared with the choreography of the conversation.
00:28:49.960 | And it takes a lot of stress off of you.
00:28:51.840 | It's not controlling the whole situation, but it's again, you want to read the room,
00:28:57.360 | but you also want to have some sense of preparing it yourself and creating atmosphere in the
00:29:02.800 | room, because that will help you actually channel the right vibes when people do sit
00:29:07.640 | down to hear you speak.
00:29:10.040 | One counterintuitive thing that I've done is that I like to really prepare if I'm giving
00:29:14.500 | a talk to the point that I know exactly what I want to say on every slide and all that.
00:29:20.160 | And some people say, "Well, but then it's inscripted."
00:29:21.840 | And I say, "No."
00:29:23.360 | Actually going through knowing exactly what I would say in a perfect scenario makes it
00:29:27.480 | really easy for me to diverge in the moment to do anything.
00:29:32.440 | And so, it's less memorizing a script and repeating the script as much as like memorizing
00:29:36.920 | every point I want to get across so I'm free to move around.
00:29:41.000 | How do you think about preparing for a big meeting or a conversation or a talk?
00:29:46.440 | I really flow a lot.
00:29:49.440 | You know, I think about it.
00:29:50.560 | I was in high school when I started doing speech contests.
00:29:53.760 | And my coach would literally untie my tennis shoes while I was talking while he was timing
00:29:58.200 | me to be as close to 10 minutes as possible.
00:30:00.840 | Throw toilet paper across, you know, maybe even throw toilet paper rolls at me.
00:30:06.320 | It was all very gentle, nothing abusive, but it was all to distract me while I was giving
00:30:11.640 | this talk and sounding pitch perfect while getting as close to 10 minutes as possible.
00:30:17.920 | So over the years, I've gone from memorizing my entire script verbatim, which I can still
00:30:24.880 | do to this day.
00:30:26.440 | I've done it with breaking news when I worked for ABC.
00:30:29.400 | You know, somebody gives me a story and I have to go live in four minutes and I can
00:30:33.240 | literally memorize the entire 40 second script or minute 30 script that I'm going to do.
00:30:39.600 | But now extemporaneously, I can memorize.
00:30:43.880 | If I type it out and literally write out the speech, I can pretty much gather in my head
00:30:50.400 | what the main points are.
00:30:52.320 | It won't come off exactly verbatim, but it's so close to what I put on paper.
00:30:59.480 | You have to know your strengths.
00:31:01.720 | Not everybody can memorize like that.
00:31:04.660 | Not everybody will work well if they're just flowing between bullet points written on cue
00:31:09.960 | cards.
00:31:11.240 | So if what you're doing works for you, keep doing it.
00:31:14.240 | But if you want to step it up to another level, maybe try a different delivery style, record
00:31:18.560 | yourself on video at home where you don't have to worry about the pressure of actually
00:31:21.680 | doing it in real life and see how it comes off.
00:31:24.240 | And then have a mentor or somebody who's a more experienced speaker than you take a look
00:31:28.240 | at it and say, "Hey, I wanted you to give me your honest feedback about my delivery."
00:31:34.760 | I don't think there's a wrong or right way to do it.
00:31:37.560 | I just think that when you've been speaking for 20 years, you're going to come off differently
00:31:43.160 | than if you've been speaking for five.
00:31:45.080 | Even if you're an excellent speaker, if you try a different method, you know, the different
00:31:49.600 | methods actually will show you your strengths.
00:31:53.440 | What about...
00:31:54.440 | Oh, I just kicked a trash can.
00:31:58.560 | Just trying to throw you off your game.
00:32:03.060 | For the last few years, I know a lot of us have been working remotely.
00:32:06.400 | I know that's changing.
00:32:07.780 | But for some people, that's probably the new normal.
00:32:10.560 | And I'm curious what kinds of lessons you've either applied or people could take away for
00:32:15.860 | how to work on their delivery of important conversations, work on their interaction with
00:32:21.280 | teammates, colleagues, when they're looking at a computer screen and not able to walk
00:32:26.600 | around the room, or maybe not read the room as easily as you would be able to in person.
00:32:31.600 | Treat your Zoom calls like FaceTime.
00:32:35.000 | We have way more fun on Instagram Live and FaceTime sometimes.
00:32:39.080 | And then as soon as we get into Zoom mode or whatever it is, whatever platform your
00:32:43.340 | office uses, it's like, "Let me stay in this very tight little box and not move and
00:32:48.520 | have very little body language."
00:32:50.080 | And it's like, no, lean into the screen, get in there.
00:32:54.380 | Don't be afraid of you looking distorted or looking silly.
00:32:59.400 | Move your body around.
00:33:00.480 | Don't just be a head and shoulders.
00:33:02.640 | People don't even like seeing that on television anymore.
00:33:05.880 | They want to see you kind of jump it through the screen and just be personable.
00:33:09.920 | And selfie mode your Zoom meeting.
00:33:13.900 | Not the whole time, but use the different tools that we have at our disposal.
00:33:19.340 | If it's your laptop, be like, "Hey guys, I'm just getting back to my desk," and make it
00:33:25.060 | a funny moment, loosen up.
00:33:28.620 | And I think that people will stay more engaged because I frankly think it gets really stale
00:33:33.420 | when we're all just looking like we're in our perfect little box.
00:33:37.020 | That's my first big tip and one that I hope lasts and sticks with you.
00:33:40.400 | I remember early in the pandemic, for no particular reason, I bought a bunch of party glasses
00:33:46.880 | on Amazon just so that whenever we started a meeting, it was like, "Could we break the
00:33:51.480 | ice in a different way?"
00:33:53.260 | And so that was one thing I tried to do.
00:33:55.760 | I bought those mullet wigs at one point.
00:33:58.480 | I feel like some of that's phased away and I'm like, "Maybe I need to go dust off that
00:34:03.120 | box in the storage room and bring it back out."
00:34:05.760 | Well, and I always am a big believer in the fact is the digital world is not going away.
00:34:12.800 | The virtual meeting world is not going away.
00:34:15.720 | So how can we surprise people?
00:34:19.100 | Whether it's party glasses or you inbox the first five people to log on on time, because
00:34:25.160 | there's always inevitably the people who are late to these things and say, "Hey, guess
00:34:29.440 | what?"
00:34:30.440 | And then five minutes in, "We just wanted to let you know the first five people who got
00:34:33.640 | here got Starbucks gift cards.
00:34:36.400 | And everybody else, we hope you'll be on time next time."
00:34:38.880 | Whatever.
00:34:39.880 | I mean, don't make them feel bad, but just like, "Guess what?
00:34:42.000 | There's a reward."
00:34:44.440 | And then have themes.
00:34:47.440 | Have a derby hat day.
00:34:49.080 | We just had the Kentucky Derby.
00:34:51.080 | Have a derby hat Zoom call for your meeting.
00:34:53.560 | I mean, you don't have to keep the hat on the whole time.
00:34:56.000 | And then the fact is so many people stay on the photo, like they don't even go to the
00:35:00.120 | video anymore.
00:35:01.120 | I don't know if that's a rule that you have to, but we hide behind the photos a lot.
00:35:09.140 | And so it's like, how can I get people to not have the static image, but to actually
00:35:13.440 | let us into their home?
00:35:15.060 | If they're hiding behind the photo, chances are they're either really busy, their house
00:35:19.080 | is a mess, or they're stressed out and they just don't want to see anybody and they don't
00:35:22.960 | want anybody to see them.
00:35:24.800 | And so for me, it's like giving people fair warning, "Listen, no static images.
00:35:28.680 | We're going to do video and we're going to give a reward to the person with the best
00:35:34.720 | background."
00:35:36.320 | And then they can do their virtual fake background thing so that they don't feel the pressure
00:35:40.520 | that they have to have the most perfect house behind them.
00:35:43.600 | Like, "Oh my God, this is a contest of who has the best living room."
00:35:46.960 | No.
00:35:47.960 | Or the best kitchen.
00:35:48.960 | No.
00:35:49.960 | I think that there is a lot of social anxiety right now over looking like everything's okay
00:35:53.880 | when it's not.
00:35:55.880 | And I think that if you're hiding, it's because you need somebody to call you and be kind
00:36:00.520 | to you and say, "Hey, how are you doing?
00:36:03.680 | Are you okay?"
00:36:05.420 | Which probably isn't the best thing to do in a group setting, but if you notice someone's
00:36:09.440 | kind of stepping away, maybe there's a really good opportunity after the meeting to reach
00:36:14.160 | out to that person, "Hey, noticed your background was off.
00:36:17.280 | How are you doing?
00:36:18.280 | Is everything cool?"
00:36:20.300 | Those kinds of subtle moments I found can add a lot of value in relationship building
00:36:23.960 | and in many other places.
00:36:26.640 | I think mental health should be in the spotlight all the time, especially after the past couple
00:36:30.560 | of years.
00:36:31.560 | You know, there's a lot of people who are doing great and their businesses are doing
00:36:35.160 | wonderful and there's so much opportunity, but I think there's a lot of people who have
00:36:39.800 | struggled with the past couple of years and so struggled to find connection in a tribe.
00:36:44.800 | I think people are just longing for interpersonal communication and in a way that's real and
00:36:50.720 | like meeting kind people and it's like, how can we help them?
00:36:54.480 | Well, first of all, if you're at work and you notice somebody's never showing their
00:36:57.760 | video, to me, that's a big fat red flag that they might long for some connection that they
00:37:03.360 | just don't have and they're isolating because they feel alone and they've disconnected from
00:37:08.320 | their family over the time, maybe because somebody's in a health battle and they can't
00:37:12.000 | go visit them because they are high risk.
00:37:14.400 | It's like we need to pay more attention and there's ways to do that first privately and
00:37:19.840 | then publicly just encourage people to check in on each other.
00:37:22.880 | So just make those appeals.
00:37:24.960 | And if you're the manager, I would say, maybe try...
00:37:28.320 | If you're finding it hard to make every meeting exciting on video, maybe decide if there's
00:37:32.920 | some meetings that don't need to be.
00:37:34.680 | I find that we've gone overboard and now everything that could have been...
00:37:38.320 | Things that would have been phone calls 3 years ago are now all video meetings.
00:37:42.600 | And so, I schedule some phone calls a lot and then save video for a time where the face
00:37:48.060 | to face is more important because I don't know about you, you're on camera all day,
00:37:51.840 | but sometimes I'm exhausted just looking at a screen for hours on end.
00:37:56.320 | Yes.
00:37:57.320 | I'm with you.
00:37:58.320 | And it's like, I'm on video calls almost as long as I'm on TV every day.
00:38:05.120 | And you're just like, "Well, sometimes, frankly, I just want to wear this wrinkled t-shirt
00:38:10.520 | and have my hair in a bun and not care, but it wouldn't be the most professional expression
00:38:17.400 | of my highest and best self."
00:38:19.180 | So it's like, all the lines are so blurred that we just...
00:38:24.080 | Again, another expression of being kind and being professional and knowing how to treat
00:38:27.760 | each other.
00:38:28.760 | It's like, give each other a break.
00:38:32.320 | Just understand.
00:38:33.320 | Again, like you said, not every call deserves a video conference.
00:38:37.440 | Yes.
00:38:38.440 | I do think face to face is really helpful in building deeper relationships, building trust.
00:38:44.940 | There was a whole chapter in the book about building trust in seconds, which reminded
00:38:50.160 | me of the Dale Carnegie, how to win friends and influence people without the undertone
00:38:54.360 | of trying to influence other people to do something.
00:38:57.520 | But I'm curious how you would explain to someone hearing that and say, "Okay, wait, so I can
00:39:02.200 | build trust.
00:39:03.200 | I can be kind.
00:39:04.200 | What's the trick?
00:39:05.200 | How do I start doing that?"
00:39:06.480 | Maybe with an example or two.
00:39:07.960 | The key is to become practiced, right?
00:39:11.600 | How often do you go out, whether it's Target or the dry cleaner, or to pick up some food
00:39:17.240 | and you don't speak to a single soul?
00:39:22.680 | It's kind of crazy and foreign to me.
00:39:25.500 | It's foreign to me that people go out and they never acknowledge, smile, make eye contact,
00:39:31.000 | strike up conversation with anybody.
00:39:33.460 | They just walk, get their stuff, walk back.
00:39:36.300 | In a world where we're craving connection, we can be apprehensive about interpersonal
00:39:40.700 | communications with strangers, which is interesting, but that's how you meet new people.
00:39:46.360 | So the first thing is just start to become more open.
00:39:51.440 | Really easy example.
00:39:52.440 | I was at the airline lounge or one of my recent trips and this woman walks in and says, "I
00:39:58.900 | love your shoes.
00:40:00.540 | Those are so cute."
00:40:01.540 | And I said, "Oh, thank you so much."
00:40:02.540 | And I told her where I got them.
00:40:03.540 | I told her a little story about them.
00:40:05.620 | "Oh, what's your name?
00:40:06.700 | Where are you traveling to?"
00:40:07.700 | "Oh, I'm going to Florida."
00:40:08.700 | I mean, you get all this information.
00:40:10.540 | We didn't exchange business cards, but in that moment, she felt comfortable just having
00:40:17.220 | a conversation with me.
00:40:19.140 | Another situation I had, I was out at a restaurant.
00:40:21.820 | I happened to go by myself, I was getting some food and the couple next to me strikes
00:40:26.580 | up a conversation, but I do that all over the place.
00:40:30.300 | So I'm not surprised when people want to strike up conversations with me out of nowhere because
00:40:34.260 | I literally do it all the time.
00:40:36.580 | And so it's like, once you're practiced in doing that, then somebody is going to strike
00:40:40.800 | up a conversation with you where they're going to build more on what they're going through,
00:40:46.820 | or they're going to ask you for something in their realm of business.
00:40:50.980 | And they're going to feel like they can trust you because you are actually showing genuine
00:40:55.860 | interest.
00:40:56.860 | The thing is you do not have genuine interest when you're born.
00:41:00.340 | You have to actually experiment with genuine interest as you become a grownup.
00:41:05.820 | And then as you are a grownup.
00:41:07.560 | And so as I'm curious about other people, I actually build trust with them.
00:41:12.740 | But that authenticity, people can smell when you're not authentic.
00:41:16.260 | People can smell when you're just trying to network and get a business card.
00:41:18.780 | Oh, do you have a card?
00:41:20.140 | Oh yeah.
00:41:21.140 | Oh, oh, you're in television.
00:41:22.460 | Oh, you know, I know somebody you should interview.
00:41:25.820 | That's fine.
00:41:26.940 | But the fact of the matter is, is that when you actually show that you care about somebody,
00:41:31.220 | then they feel safer with you.
00:41:32.620 | Oh, thank you so much.
00:41:33.620 | And thank you for that genuine concern that you have about my loved one because you end
00:41:36.700 | up talking about that kind of stuff on planes and in restaurants and in airline lounges
00:41:42.100 | with perfect strangers, because now you're practiced in showing that genuine interest
00:41:47.140 | with people.
00:41:49.140 | Now I'm sure you've been in a situation where maybe you didn't have that genuine interest.
00:41:52.700 | Oh, yeah.
00:41:54.360 | So how does that play out?
00:41:55.620 | Because I've definitely been in conversations and sometimes I'm too blunt, which I think
00:41:59.460 | can maybe be off-putting, but I'm like, "You know what?
00:42:02.380 | I feel like breaking off a conversation when there's no genuine interest to me is better
00:42:07.100 | than just sitting there and faking it."
00:42:09.960 | But neither path forward seems like it's the kindest path forward.
00:42:14.540 | So what do you do in that circumstance?
00:42:17.260 | A lot of my building trust with strangers is very quickly.
00:42:21.320 | It happens on planes or it can happen on social media.
00:42:25.860 | And there was two times on planes, once years ago and once most recently, that I was so
00:42:29.980 | exhausted, like I'd had two hours of sleep where I was looking at getting two hours of
00:42:34.700 | sleep before I had to be at work the next morning.
00:42:38.100 | And in the first instance, I was exhausted.
00:42:41.020 | I did not want to be there.
00:42:42.460 | I had to put a blanket over my head and I wanted to just knock out.
00:42:47.700 | And the person next to me had their food on the island in between the two of us and on
00:42:53.780 | the floor and was eating kind of loud.
00:42:57.700 | And I'm like, "No."
00:42:59.780 | And then I thought, "Gosh, I feel like I'm supposed to strike up a conversation with
00:43:03.700 | this person and I don't want to, I'm tired."
00:43:07.500 | And it ended up that I thought, "Well, why am I on this plane?"
00:43:10.820 | And this is a conversation I'm having inside of myself.
00:43:14.140 | Why am I on this plane sitting next to this person?
00:43:17.260 | This is a captive audience for 45 minutes, it's a short flight I was on.
00:43:23.700 | I could allow myself to give into my sleepiness, my fatigue, or I could be selfless in this
00:43:29.420 | moment and be kind and see if there's any reason why there's a once in a lifetime opportunity
00:43:34.660 | for me to know this person.
00:43:36.540 | I can hang on for 45 minutes, I can stay awake for that long.
00:43:40.980 | Ended up exchanging phone numbers, they ended up helping me later on in life.
00:43:45.780 | It was just amazing.
00:43:46.780 | If I would have missed that opportunity, I never would know.
00:43:50.860 | And it kind of marked my life because it's those times when you want to quit.
00:43:55.500 | It's those times when you want to just, "Please, I don't want to hear anybody.
00:43:58.420 | I'm going to put my headphones on and I'm going to block out the world."
00:44:02.260 | That's the time when you want to pay more attention, take your headphones off.
00:44:06.460 | Because inevitably, practice kindness leads to more kindness and more open doors.
00:44:11.660 | Practice selfishness, practice blocking out the world, practice isolation.
00:44:16.140 | I know that doesn't sound like...
00:44:18.380 | It's like, "Give me a break, Adrienne, you're telling me you never block."
00:44:21.180 | Yes, I do.
00:44:22.180 | But I don't know what I missed out on in that selfish moment.
00:44:25.340 | I don't know what I missed out on when I said, "You know what?
00:44:27.740 | I don't care.
00:44:29.020 | It's just me and I'm going to go to sleep, leave me alone."
00:44:32.380 | I've stopped saying the words, "Leave me alone," especially in light of the past couple of
00:44:36.900 | years.
00:44:38.060 | Because I think that there are a lot of people who wish that those words were never uttered
00:44:41.140 | out of their mouth.
00:44:42.140 | I never want to be alone again in terms of not being connected to other people.
00:44:46.540 | So yes, I think there's a fine line.
00:44:48.300 | Yes, I think that we all have our moments.
00:44:50.840 | But I really try to spur myself on, just like somebody who's running in a race and they're
00:44:56.340 | tired and they don't want to finish that race.
00:44:59.260 | Every time I sit on that plane and I'm sleepy, I think, "No, force yourself.
00:45:04.140 | Think about, 'Am I supposed to know this person?'"
00:45:07.220 | And if you have peace that says, "No, absolutely not."
00:45:09.500 | Like if your peace is like, "No, I'm good, take a nap," then take a nap by all means.
00:45:13.140 | I hope this makes sense to somebody.
00:45:15.380 | But I really don't like to miss opportunities.
00:45:18.420 | And I just think you're there for a reason, for a person.
00:45:22.700 | I'm with you on the not wanting to miss opportunities.
00:45:25.340 | But I'll push you on what happens if you've got this 45-minute flight, you're 5-10 minutes
00:45:31.020 | into this conversation and you're like, "There's not an opportunity."
00:45:34.700 | I've done that.
00:45:35.700 | Okay.
00:45:36.700 | So, yes.
00:45:37.700 | I've done that.
00:45:38.700 | And here's what I'll say.
00:45:39.700 | What I'll say happens.
00:45:42.420 | I'll entertain the conversation, and kindly, and I'll show genuine interest.
00:45:47.980 | It's true.
00:45:48.980 | And then if I feel like this is not one of those opportunities, this is a time to just
00:45:54.980 | be friendly, I'll say, I might even, I'm a very physical touch person.
00:45:59.840 | When I'm meeting somebody for the first time, I'll touch their arm gently to reassure them
00:46:03.780 | this is not personal.
00:46:04.780 | And I'll say, "You know what?
00:46:06.500 | I have not had any sleep."
00:46:07.900 | And I mean it because most times I have it, I'll say, "I've got to take a little bit of
00:46:13.020 | a nap.
00:46:14.020 | I apologize."
00:46:15.020 | And if they want to share their information with me, that's totally fine.
00:46:17.500 | But I literally like sleep is such at a premium and conversation is such at a premium.
00:46:22.540 | You don't have to feel bad.
00:46:24.300 | You can receive their information.
00:46:25.820 | It doesn't mean, you know, maybe you'll need it down the road, but it's okay to say, "You
00:46:29.300 | know what?
00:46:30.300 | Can I get your card?"
00:46:31.300 | And then say, "It was really nice to talk to you."
00:46:33.460 | And then I'm going to, or I've had times when I wasn't sleepy and I'm reading a book and
00:46:38.340 | they want to have a long conversation while I'm sitting there reading my book.
00:46:41.420 | And I'll say, "You know what?
00:46:43.900 | It was really nice talking with you."
00:46:45.580 | Like, cause I'll make small talk and I'll, it's more than small talk to me though.
00:46:49.180 | It's exploration.
00:46:50.180 | It's like, let me learn a little bit more about you.
00:46:52.860 | Okay.
00:46:53.860 | Well, this isn't in my head.
00:46:54.860 | This isn't an opportunity that's going to come to fruition in the way that I thought
00:46:58.060 | maybe it could, but I enjoy talking with you.
00:47:00.580 | I'm going to finish reading my book now, but it was really nice talking to you.
00:47:02.980 | I don't...
00:47:03.980 | There's nothing wrong with that.
00:47:04.980 | Like, don't fake the funk.
00:47:06.820 | Not every single person that you sit next to is going to be a goldmine.
00:47:10.460 | I'm sorry to keep probing, but this is like a place where I feel like kindness is either
00:47:14.860 | hard or in your mind, you either just, you don't love it, but you're able to do it.
00:47:20.820 | Is a room where there's maybe 50 people and you're done, you're at a conference.
00:47:24.620 | Maybe you're the one keynoting and you want to get around the room.
00:47:29.040 | You're stuck in a conversation.
00:47:31.180 | A lot of the typical excuses of "I need to go take a nap" or "I need to go eat" don't
00:47:35.340 | totally apply because the answer is really like, "We had a brief conversation and I want
00:47:39.820 | to go have a bunch of brief conversations."
00:47:42.260 | Oftentimes, I try to be honest and say, "Hey, I really enjoyed talking to you.
00:47:46.320 | There's a lot of people here.
00:47:47.360 | I want to make sure I get a chance to meet them.
00:47:49.140 | I'm going to go around."
00:47:50.660 | Sometimes I feel like people might take that as rude because we've only been talking five
00:47:55.180 | minutes and maybe they were still interested.
00:47:58.960 | Anything you would do in that circumstance differently?
00:48:01.340 | You know what?
00:48:02.340 | I can tell you're hungry for information on this.
00:48:03.820 | So I'm impressed that you're asking such in-depth conversational questions.
00:48:08.840 | I think for me, it's funny.
00:48:11.780 | There's an art to living and there's an art to conversations that are brief like that
00:48:15.740 | at those events.
00:48:16.740 | And you, again, this is something where you have to practice.
00:48:21.220 | Practice makes perfect.
00:48:22.820 | But I have no problem.
00:48:24.300 | See, I think that the biggest issue is that a lot of people in this generation are afraid
00:48:28.740 | to offend people.
00:48:30.700 | And I think that that fear leads to us being more obliged to be what we think is nice,
00:48:37.580 | kind, respectful, don't hurt anybody's feelings.
00:48:41.500 | It's like, it's too much fear.
00:48:43.620 | I think that getting rid of the fear is the key.
00:48:46.920 | It's not so much how do you do it, it's what do you eliminate in yourself so that you're
00:48:51.500 | more confident flowing from one conversation to the next?
00:48:55.060 | When I talk to people like, "Don't you...
00:48:57.140 | When you're with a group of your friends, don't you guys talk over each other all the
00:49:00.620 | time?"
00:49:01.620 | Yes.
00:49:02.620 | Does anybody get offended?
00:49:03.620 | No.
00:49:04.620 | You step on each other all the time.
00:49:05.620 | You're like, "No, no, no.
00:49:06.620 | Let me tell you.
00:49:07.620 | Oh, but..."
00:49:08.620 | And then somebody else...
00:49:09.620 | But nobody's feelings are getting hurt because you feel safe in that environment that you
00:49:12.380 | cut each other off all the time.
00:49:13.860 | But nobody's thinking, "I can't believe I didn't finish my thought."
00:49:18.540 | Nobody's thinking that because that's a normal organic conversation.
00:49:23.800 | So thinking of it, when you go into an event, I would want anybody to walk in and say, almost
00:49:30.780 | give themselves a pep talk.
00:49:32.460 | I'm going in to speak with this networking group or this gala or this cocktail, and I
00:49:38.420 | am among friends.
00:49:39.420 | And I'm going to have fun with this one, and I'm going to have fun with this one, and we're
00:49:43.580 | just going to keep it moving.
00:49:44.580 | And it's like, "Oh, I'm going to go get another drink."
00:49:46.500 | And, "Oh, I got to go say hi to this person."
00:49:50.100 | Oh, and it's like that jumping when you're with your boys, it's like jump in.
00:49:54.300 | And then they might be in the middle, "Oh, you know what?
00:49:58.340 | Forgive me.
00:49:59.340 | I need to go see somebody over here or see...
00:50:02.460 | Oh, I think I recognize him.
00:50:03.740 | Oh, you know what?
00:50:04.740 | I just remembered."
00:50:06.220 | It's just like organic, but you have to get rid of the fear.
00:50:11.280 | And I think one thing I took away from this was, if you're going in with the right intentions
00:50:15.680 | and you're kind in the first half of the conversation, then the kind of breakup of the conversation
00:50:21.780 | is pretty hard.
00:50:23.500 | Sure, someone might take offense to it because they really wanted to be there for longer.
00:50:27.700 | But if you accept that you can't control other people's feelings, but you did it with the
00:50:34.060 | right approach and the right intent, and you came in with genuine curiosity, I feel like
00:50:39.100 | you can live with the fact that someone could be offended and kind of get over that fear.
00:50:43.700 | I really don't think anybody's thinking that hard.
00:50:46.040 | I think that they're doing the same thing you are.
00:50:48.000 | They're wanting to talk to enough people.
00:50:50.460 | I think if you think of yourselves as having more in common than different with the people
00:50:54.860 | in the room, then it's a lot easier.
00:50:57.620 | Everybody else is trying to talk to as many people too.
00:51:01.060 | They're not thinking about, "Oh my God, they broke up with me in that conversation."
00:51:04.460 | No.
00:51:05.460 | Be kind to yourself and realize they're not thinking about you all that much.
00:51:09.500 | I can't remember who wrote this or said this recently, but people always assume that everyone's
00:51:13.660 | thinking about them.
00:51:15.580 | What they wore that day, how they misspoke.
00:51:17.500 | But the reality is that most people don't spend any of their time thinking about you
00:51:20.940 | or the other people.
00:51:22.420 | They're mostly thinking about themselves and just coming to terms with that makes it easier
00:51:26.700 | in so many situations in life to say, "Maybe someone didn't even hear me," or, "Think about
00:51:31.780 | it," or, "It didn't even last for longer than a moment in their mind."
00:51:34.820 | Yeah.
00:51:35.820 | And they have their own issues.
00:51:38.940 | We all have our own stuff that we're dealing with and I think that we have to remember
00:51:44.300 | that as much as we think or maybe even agonize over the things that we have to do or the
00:51:49.380 | dreams that we have to achieve, other people are taking the same amount of time working
00:51:53.740 | on their own stuff.
00:51:54.740 | And even if they had a moment with you where it's like, "Ugh, I thought that they were
00:51:59.980 | like this and they're like that," or, "Oh, I thought I knew them," it's like they get
00:52:05.640 | over it with the next thing that comes along.
00:52:08.020 | So yeah, don't sweat it.
00:52:10.060 | Just have fun.
00:52:11.380 | I want to get to a few tactical things before we wrap.
00:52:14.440 | You had a bunch of ideas in the book about scheduling kindness into your day, building
00:52:18.580 | it into a habit.
00:52:19.580 | I'm curious if you could just walk through a few examples of how people could practice
00:52:23.540 | this and just hone those skills, maybe today or tomorrow or over the next week.
00:52:30.220 | Until kindness, just as a muscle, becomes developed where it's this natural organic
00:52:35.460 | process of always thinking about like, "How can I express to other people that I'm with
00:52:41.620 | them, that I'm for them?"
00:52:43.380 | Think about who you can call on a regular basis.
00:52:46.400 | My mentor, Bill Krauss, he would give his business advice to those who he coached.
00:52:53.220 | Spend an hour on past, an hour on present, and an hour on future.
00:52:57.780 | So that means call your past clients, check in on them every single day, even if you're
00:53:02.060 | in sales and you don't have any leads right now.
00:53:04.780 | You reaching out to people who are your past clients is going to reconnect you and for
00:53:09.300 | nothing else other than to just say, "Hey, thank you for your business in the past.
00:53:13.100 | Thank you for the relationship that we've been able to build over the years."
00:53:18.060 | Present would be those that you're working on currently and then future, those who you're
00:53:21.620 | endeavoring to land.
00:53:24.100 | Just reaching out and giving those friendly phone calls, even if it's five, 10 minutes.
00:53:28.580 | I recently went to an event and I met all these people and I gathered these business
00:53:32.500 | cards that are actually sitting right here to my right of me.
00:53:34.940 | And I took some time a couple of weeks ago and I just reached out on text message to
00:53:40.820 | all those people.
00:53:41.900 | And then this was the week that I was going to reach out by phone to some of them.
00:53:44.780 | But it was just a matter of scheduling out time in my day and for nothing else other
00:53:50.740 | than to either check in, say hello, or ask for the answer to some questions.
00:53:57.180 | And schedule it for like five, 15 minutes for each person.
00:54:01.420 | But I think that's a really good way to not forget the people who have been kind to you
00:54:07.020 | and believed in you and have supported you and invested.
00:54:10.660 | And then with your friendships, friendships are such a big part of our lives.
00:54:16.360 | And a lot of times as we get busy, or even those who get married and start having kids,
00:54:21.260 | the friendships fade into the background, but those are the spine of how you can stand
00:54:26.420 | steady in crazy times and in hard times.
00:54:28.940 | So checking in, whether that's once a month or once a week, and just saying, "Hey, I didn't
00:54:34.100 | need anything.
00:54:35.100 | I'm just calling to say I appreciate you.
00:54:38.140 | I'm looking forward to the next time we can hang out."
00:54:41.140 | These are relational things, but they're really kind acts that people get too busy for in
00:54:47.420 | the midst of hustling, in the midst of trying to make it to the next step on the economic
00:54:52.580 | food chain.
00:54:54.640 | And so once you do that, I think it's sometimes easier to do kindness to strangers, whether
00:55:00.560 | it's opening a door, paying for somebody's coffee or lunch in line ahead of you.
00:55:05.380 | And just like scheduling, like once a month, I'm going to do a surprise kindness to a stranger.
00:55:10.620 | That makes you feel connected to the larger neighborhood or community that you're in.
00:55:14.860 | And you actually feel like a world changer every single time, rather than just somebody
00:55:19.660 | who's going through the motions, not smiling and not speaking to anybody, just going and
00:55:23.180 | getting your Uber Eats delivery downstairs or your Instacart order.
00:55:29.460 | Let's all remind each other that we are connected and that we need each other.
00:55:33.260 | It's as simple as a phone call or a text or sending a video to somebody and saying, "Hey,
00:55:36.860 | I was thinking about you.
00:55:37.860 | You're amazing.
00:55:38.860 | You're a rock star.
00:55:39.860 | Talk to you soon."
00:55:41.420 | There was an app a long time ago that I wish still existed that would sync across all of
00:55:46.500 | your texts and your emails and be like, "Hey, here's a person you haven't reached out to
00:55:49.580 | in a year."
00:55:50.580 | So if anyone's listening and knows of something new that does that, let me know, because it
00:55:56.300 | would be great.
00:55:57.300 | I don't want to know who I haven't emailed in six months because maybe I texted them.
00:56:00.980 | Maybe I called them.
00:56:01.980 | Maybe I saw them on my calendar.
00:56:03.540 | But if you could somehow bring all that together, it would be incredible.
00:56:07.660 | I assume there's a big privacy element there and hopefully, it's a company that you could
00:56:11.860 | trust.
00:56:12.860 | But I'll come back to one thing you said, which was, you have a mentor and you talk
00:56:18.300 | about mentors in the book being kind of invaluable tour guides.
00:56:21.740 | How has that worked in your career and in your life?
00:56:25.180 | And what advice would you give to someone who maybe doesn't have a mentor right now?
00:56:28.920 | Well, number one, I'd be really clear on what you expect out of a mentor relationship.
00:56:34.060 | I think that a lot of people think they know what mentoring is.
00:56:36.100 | And it's like, "Oh, I want somebody that has my back.
00:56:38.300 | I want somebody who will check in on me.
00:56:40.140 | I want somebody who will give me advice."
00:56:42.140 | But mentoring relationships are extremely intimate if you let them be.
00:56:46.740 | And they have a lot, like a mentor has a lot to give you, but they also have a lot at stake.
00:56:51.700 | I mean, their time could be better served by something that's not as emotionally invested
00:56:56.420 | as mentoring.
00:56:57.420 | They could be doing a business deal.
00:56:59.980 | And even if they're relational as people, and they love quality time, the fact is, is
00:57:05.340 | that when you mentor somebody, you're giving them some of that feedback or some of that
00:57:09.140 | constructive content that could be taken wrong.
00:57:13.380 | And people's feelings get hurt in mentoring relationships.
00:57:16.620 | And people feel betrayed, or people feel like they don't get me.
00:57:20.460 | When you're establishing a relationship with somebody who you almost are giving the power
00:57:24.300 | to say no, you're giving them the power to look into your life and be more vulnerable
00:57:29.700 | with them, which can be very scary to some people.
00:57:33.020 | And so I would just take stock of where you are in your life, how honest you want to live,
00:57:38.200 | and how teachable you are right now.
00:57:40.540 | Are you willing to be told that what you're doing is absolutely wrong?
00:57:44.100 | Are you willing to be told that you need to make course corrections in order to become
00:57:47.640 | the person that you say you want to become?
00:57:49.540 | If you are really honest with yourself and you can see that you want that, then you're
00:57:53.420 | eligible for a mentor.
00:57:56.300 | And then in terms of like connecting with the right mentor, it really is a matter of
00:58:00.260 | starting off almost like you would in a relationship, you know, obviously no romantic interest,
00:58:04.580 | but you know, you don't just jump to third base with somebody that you're interested
00:58:09.200 | in.
00:58:10.200 | You know, you start off with maybe a DM or you ask them for their phone number at the
00:58:14.000 | grocery store, or you ask them to coffee, you know, typically you don't just jump straight
00:58:19.360 | to dinner with people.
00:58:20.600 | I mean, sometimes you do, I guess, but it's just, it's a nurturing process.
00:58:24.800 | So rather than ask somebody, will you mentor me?
00:58:27.640 | I think the best thing to do is can I get five to 15 minutes with you?
00:58:31.520 | And once you give yourself and them that space to kind of get to know you and you get to
00:58:36.960 | know them, then, you know, check in again, Hey, I'd love another five, 15 minute check
00:58:41.600 | in.
00:58:42.600 | Like we haven't talked in four weeks.
00:58:43.600 | Like, how are you?
00:58:45.600 | And show genuine interest in that mentor.
00:58:48.560 | Don't just look for them to be genuinely interested in you and know, and, you know, answer all
00:58:53.440 | your questions.
00:58:54.440 | How can you be interested in them and what they bring to the table?
00:58:57.480 | I think that it's, it's gotta be mutually, I guess the word is again, that word reciprocity
00:59:05.080 | always comes to my mind.
00:59:06.800 | Like, how are you seeing their value while you're hoping that they see yours?
00:59:12.560 | Are you valuing their time?
00:59:13.900 | Are you valuing, valuing that experience that they bring to the table?
00:59:16.840 | Are you valuing the fact that they might be going through something in life?
00:59:19.760 | And are you willing to check in with them and say, not like, how are you as if you're
00:59:23.640 | their counselor, but like, Hey, you know what, I'm willing to do what I need to do to spend
00:59:28.960 | time with you.
00:59:29.960 | If, and you notice them, study them, don't say, is there anything I can do for you?
00:59:34.280 | Cause they're going to say no.
00:59:36.520 | Study them and find out, notice if it's at the office that they don't have an assistant
00:59:41.360 | on Fridays.
00:59:42.360 | You know, they only have an assistant four days a week, you know, Hey, I noticed that
00:59:45.680 | on Fridays, you know, you don't have, your staff isn't filled up or don't even mention
00:59:49.360 | that.
00:59:50.360 | Just say, I'd like to, you know, give you an hour of my time on Fridays.
00:59:53.120 | Is there anything I can do, um, in regards to, and then be super specific bookkeeping
00:59:58.440 | or, you know, can I help run some, uh, get some coffee?
01:00:02.440 | You might be such at a level of your experience that you would never be getting coffee.
01:00:06.600 | Like that's for an intern to do.
01:00:08.420 | But I remember there was one executive at one of my previous jobs and I knew how she
01:00:12.040 | took her coffee and I would just show up and bring it to her.
01:00:16.120 | There was never an expectation.
01:00:17.400 | And every time I did, I got a thank you email.
01:00:19.560 | I just left it on her.
01:00:21.560 | It bonded us.
01:00:22.560 | It created a relationship with us where I could go in and speak to her pretty much anytime
01:00:27.240 | I wanted to.
01:00:28.540 | But many people are looking at mentoring relationships and making demands of what they think a mentor
01:00:34.260 | should do for them.
01:00:35.260 | They're not knowingly doing this.
01:00:37.260 | It's not like people are coming there with an attitude or an air about them.
01:00:40.260 | It's just like, you have to understand what, there's a service element to somebody mentoring
01:00:46.140 | you and volunteering that time and for you being a serving, a kind person back to them.
01:00:52.780 | So just, if you're willing to do anything, I think you can have the right mentor and
01:00:56.380 | have a wonderful relationship.
01:00:58.020 | I think an important takeaway that I learned as an investor and as an entrepreneur with
01:01:02.340 | investors, while your investors aren't necessarily mentors, in some ways they are, but a big
01:01:07.100 | thing is to not make your offer to help more work.
01:01:10.640 | So oftentimes, people would say, "Hey, is there anybody you can introduce me to that
01:01:14.340 | would help?"
01:01:15.340 | And my answer would be like, "I don't know."
01:01:18.740 | But some people, and I took this from them and then applied it myself, would say, "Hey,
01:01:23.380 | I looked on your LinkedIn, you know these six people who I think could be valuable to
01:01:27.860 | what I'm doing.
01:01:29.380 | Would you be willing to make an introduction?
01:01:31.860 | Here is a copy and paste thing you could use if it's helpful."
01:01:35.260 | The more you can do the work to ask for help, the more people are willing to help.
01:01:40.940 | And then what you said that I really liked, which is a perfect segue to my next question,
01:01:45.260 | is show that you're willing to take their advice.
01:01:48.900 | Because I think people get a lot of personal satisfaction knowing that their advice is
01:01:53.540 | actually being put to use versus knowing that it's just being heard and sitting there.
01:01:58.740 | So I said I'd come back to asking you with all of your experience interviewing.
01:02:04.020 | I know it'll benefit the show if I can improve my skills.
01:02:07.220 | I know it'll make me more fulfilled if I do better.
01:02:11.220 | You can choose to give advice to a podcaster who's one year into interviewing or you can
01:02:16.300 | go direct and give it straight to me, whatever makes you more comfortable.
01:02:20.060 | I can take anything feedback-wise.
01:02:24.020 | What do you have for me?
01:02:25.020 | Well, I think that based on how you ask questions, I think you want to do such a good job.
01:02:31.180 | And when we're hungry to do a good job, sometimes we can not listen as attentively because we're
01:02:37.700 | so wanting to do the best.
01:02:40.300 | And I think if you take the pressure off of yourself a little bit.
01:02:44.260 | I think you're humble, but I think at the same time, you're sometimes not comparing
01:02:48.980 | yourself in a competitive way, but you're saying, "Oh, well, this person has done A,
01:02:52.740 | B, and C, and D, and I've done this."
01:02:54.580 | And it's like, but you have something else to bring to the table.
01:02:57.380 | You know what I mean?
01:02:58.740 | But like when people are doing something new, they try so hard to be so good that some of
01:03:05.300 | their sensory gifts, whether it's listening or whether it's eye contact or whether it's
01:03:13.420 | feeling can get tuned out.
01:03:16.780 | So just flow a little bit more.
01:03:21.300 | This is not a critique.
01:03:22.300 | It's more just taking you to the next level because you have a great voice and you do
01:03:27.460 | ask good questions like what you just gave.
01:03:30.660 | This is what advice you got from investors.
01:03:32.540 | I love that.
01:03:33.740 | That made me want to ask you another question about what you've learned from investors.
01:03:38.940 | So you've had, obviously, a lot of great experiences, no matter what your experience is in podcasting.
01:03:45.060 | You've had amazing experiences in entrepreneurial or the business community.
01:03:49.820 | I might start with that at the top of your podcast, rather than a story that could...
01:03:59.620 | The Lord of the Flies, I think is what you referenced in the beginning.
01:04:02.940 | Not bad.
01:04:03.940 | But you have...
01:04:06.180 | What would you think is your expertise?
01:04:09.260 | What's your strength in terms of what you bring?
01:04:14.940 | I feel like I've had the entrepreneur and the investor path.
01:04:18.620 | And then I'm also this crazy researcher where when I want to learn about a thing, whether
01:04:23.340 | it's a stroller that we're buying for a baby or a vacation, I will go so deep on the research
01:04:30.980 | to try to understand every nuance to it.
01:04:33.180 | I think those 2 elements of my life are the optimizer and then the entrepreneur investor.
01:04:39.260 | I think that you should start with those strengths at the top of your interviews.
01:04:43.240 | I thought it was cool that you used a story to introduce me.
01:04:46.100 | I thought that was neat.
01:04:47.880 | But just what you said at the very end piqued my interest.
01:04:51.340 | And I think piquing the interest of the interviewee makes for a more mutual conversation rather
01:04:57.420 | than you asking questions like, "They're the expert and I'm just here to ask them questions
01:05:02.820 | to get this great thing."
01:05:04.500 | It'll become much more of an interesting interview when you allow that part of you to shine more
01:05:10.340 | and not to minimize it.
01:05:11.340 | I don't know.
01:05:12.340 | I would think most people, when you ask them, "Do you have any questions?"
01:05:14.380 | They usually don't.
01:05:15.380 | Right?
01:05:16.380 | They never have one.
01:05:17.380 | Maybe.
01:05:18.380 | Yeah.
01:05:19.380 | Not really.
01:05:20.380 | Like, "Where do I look?"
01:05:21.620 | And so since they...
01:05:22.620 | It's kind of like what you said.
01:05:23.620 | What did you...
01:05:24.620 | Did you just say it?
01:05:25.620 | Or did I say it?
01:05:26.620 | You said, "Don't make them helping you more work."
01:05:29.660 | And I was saying how, "Don't ask them, 'Is there anything I can do for you?'"
01:05:34.540 | That question of, "Do you have any questions?" is kind of like, "Is there anything I can
01:05:37.620 | do for you?"
01:05:38.740 | Because they're not thinking about any questions.
01:05:40.180 | They're like, "I'm sitting here.
01:05:41.180 | You told me where to go."
01:05:42.760 | And so it's like, if you can start...
01:05:44.900 | I just think that...
01:05:46.420 | And I don't know how old you are or where you are in your journey, but I would say you
01:05:50.140 | have a lot more experience than I do in some areas of business.
01:05:53.820 | A lot more.
01:05:55.140 | And I could learn from you.
01:05:56.940 | And so rather than coming off like, "I'm such a great business mind," I would want you to
01:06:01.780 | at least show up with enough of, "This is what I bring to the table.
01:06:05.920 | But I know that I'm interviewing fill in the blank because they bring something else to
01:06:10.060 | the table that I know you who are listening needs."
01:06:13.420 | Does that make sense?
01:06:15.180 | Yeah, it totally does.
01:06:17.140 | And it's funny because I usually record the intros after.
01:06:20.260 | And so as I was giving it, I was like, "Yeah, if this doesn't work, I'll redo it."
01:06:23.020 | So if I end up redoing it, half of what you just said will be very confusing to people.
01:06:27.820 | But maybe I'll post the original intro somewhere else for anyone listening if I end up making
01:06:33.820 | that decision.
01:06:34.820 | So this has been really fantastic.
01:06:38.220 | There's one wrap-up question.
01:06:39.620 | So first off, I'm going to take a lot of that to heart, just to be clear.
01:06:43.780 | If you want to keep listening in the coming weeks, hopefully you'll see better introductions
01:06:48.780 | and more infusion of things that I know to a conversation that can make it more reciprocal,
01:06:55.020 | as you mentioned in the book.
01:06:56.020 | Yeah.
01:06:57.020 | No, you have a lot to offer.
01:06:59.180 | Thank you for giving feedback.
01:07:00.460 | I ask for it a lot.
01:07:01.540 | I don't always get it.
01:07:02.540 | So it's very, very welcomed.
01:07:04.460 | The one question I like to ask everyone at the end of every episode is, pick a place
01:07:10.760 | where you're most comfortable, city that you know well, and give a little bit of advice
01:07:15.980 | to people who might be heading there for whether it's a place to go have dinner, place to meet
01:07:20.580 | a friend for a drink, something unusual to do, or ideally, maybe all three.
01:07:26.020 | So I live in Chicago now, and I absolutely fell in love with Chicago, had no intention
01:07:31.560 | of moving here.
01:07:32.900 | Always thought I would live on the coasts, LA or New York, especially in my business.
01:07:38.300 | And when this opportunity came about, I came here first as a visiting correspondent when
01:07:42.860 | I worked for my previous job.
01:07:44.300 | What I just noticed, the architecture was so beautiful, and the downtown area, there's
01:07:48.700 | a beach with a magnificent skyline and a river all in the same area.
01:07:56.540 | You can do everything.
01:07:58.100 | So when it's sunny outside, like it is now, you'll see boats all in the river and on the
01:08:02.340 | lake, and it's just gorgeous, the light hitting off all these buildings.
01:08:05.980 | So the one thing that I would say is if you come to Chicago, you have to do the Chicago
01:08:10.180 | architectural tour.
01:08:12.540 | The city is seen in a way unlike any other way you can actually witness it.
01:08:17.300 | They tell you about the history of the city of Chicago, who founded the city, why the
01:08:22.220 | buildings are built the way they are, who built them.
01:08:25.280 | Some of the most world-renowned architects have their work on display here in the city
01:08:29.900 | of Chicago.
01:08:31.020 | For dinner, there's way too many options.
01:08:33.180 | I just had high tea at the Peninsula.
01:08:35.440 | So for anybody who loves that London experience, it was phenomenal with a live string duet.
01:08:42.500 | I mean, again, like there's just a little something for everybody and you will get some
01:08:49.300 | of the best pizza in the world, whether it's deep dish or it's thin crust, but just walking
01:08:55.340 | through the city and seeing all the different neighborhoods, because every single neighborhood
01:08:58.460 | in Chicago has its own personality and you have it all within a few miles.
01:09:04.980 | I definitely appeal to people to come to Chicago if they've never been and check it out.
01:09:09.840 | It is one of the most magnificent cities, I think, not just in the US, but in the world.
01:09:14.540 | I have been to Chicago a few times.
01:09:16.420 | I agree.
01:09:17.420 | In the summer, I didn't really realize there was a beach.
01:09:19.740 | So I would say if you're going to Chicago in the summer, like prepare for a beach day.
01:09:24.180 | Like this is the kind of beach day I didn't expect where people are like, you know, throwing
01:09:28.620 | frisbees, drinking beer, sitting on the sand.
01:09:30.820 | It kind of blew my mind because as a non-local, it just wasn't something I expected.
01:09:36.500 | But I have a question for you if you're done with my questions.
01:09:41.060 | Tell me one other thing that you've learned from investors that you think every person
01:09:46.240 | should know that sometimes they overlook or they're really in too much of a rush to pay
01:09:54.660 | attention to.
01:09:56.220 | I think something that I learned as an investor and an entrepreneur at the same time was that
01:10:03.260 | as much as people schedule a lot of time to have a conversation, they're making a decision
01:10:09.500 | in the first moments that is often unchanged.
01:10:13.660 | So if you're trying to tell a story about your company, don't have the story come 10
01:10:19.500 | minutes in because you need, you know, it's like a rule of social media and videos on
01:10:24.700 | YouTube.
01:10:25.700 | It's like you got to captivate someone in the first 10 seconds.
01:10:27.100 | Well, when you're meeting an investor, when you're trying to explain your company, it's
01:10:30.660 | like the first minute or two that matters.
01:10:33.940 | And so if you aren't good at doing that with writing, then I wouldn't try to send the description
01:10:40.660 | of your company with enough detail that someone could make that decision in an email.
01:10:45.580 | If you feel like whatever the medium that's best for you, if your data shows well, have
01:10:49.580 | that be the first few slides and email it.
01:10:51.820 | If it's the story about how connected you are to the mission of the company and the
01:10:55.900 | reason it was created, make sure that comes across first.
01:10:59.340 | And don't feel like you have to follow any guidelines around what the arc of an investor's
01:11:04.620 | conversation is.
01:11:06.100 | And this probably applies in many other sales tactics or professional environments.
01:11:10.620 | But so many times people said what they think you wanted to hear.
01:11:14.860 | But if you said...
01:11:15.860 | By the end, I would often give feedback and say, "Hey, you should lead with this story."
01:11:21.060 | I would give it away.
01:11:22.060 | It's like, "We're not investing.
01:11:23.060 | I'm really sorry.
01:11:24.060 | This is not a good fit for us right now."
01:11:25.820 | But if you're giving this pitch, again, this is the piece of the story that I would start
01:11:30.580 | with.
01:11:31.700 | And if anyone listening wants a little deeper dive, Sunil Gupta, who wrote a book called
01:11:36.460 | Backable, we had a conversation.
01:11:39.140 | I don't remember the episode number, but I'll link it in the show notes, where he talked
01:11:42.760 | about how he completely changed the narrative of his fundraising stories as an entrepreneur
01:11:49.140 | because the story of why he was there was actually the thing that got people excited.
01:11:55.240 | Even though he thought that company had good metrics or a good, well-designed product,
01:11:59.300 | that story was, it turns out, the most powerful thing and he had to rechange everything to
01:12:03.180 | focus on it and focus on it really early.
01:12:07.540 | That's very good advice.
01:12:08.620 | And that's like the elevator close.
01:12:10.020 | But again, stories sell and being able to tell that in the first 60 seconds, it's true.
01:12:15.140 | Because people are making an impression or they have an impression of you right away.
01:12:19.980 | And like one of the gentlemen in my life who works with me says, "Adrienne, the first answer
01:12:23.780 | is always the right answer and everything else is BS."
01:12:28.200 | Thank you so much for being here.
01:12:29.760 | Where can people stay on top of everything you're working on?
01:12:32.360 | Well, you definitely can watch me, you can tune in every single Monday through Friday
01:12:35.880 | on NewsNation.
01:12:36.880 | Go to newsnationnow.com.
01:12:37.880 | We're on cable, as well as YouTube TV and Hulu.
01:12:41.840 | But to find out more information about me personally or my book, you can go on "AB on
01:12:46.120 | TV" is my handle on Instagram.
01:12:47.640 | That's AB, my initials, on TV.
01:12:51.080 | Very easy to find on Instagram.
01:12:52.800 | You can go to my website, adriennebanker.com.
01:12:55.100 | And my book is sold everywhere, whether you use Amazon or Barnes and Noble, Audible, there's
01:12:59.500 | an audio version of the book, Your Hidden Superpower, The Kindness That Makes You Unbeatable
01:13:04.120 | at Work and Connects You With Anyone.
01:13:06.060 | And that is available right now.
01:13:08.380 | So go get it.
01:13:09.380 | The book's fantastic.
01:13:10.380 | Thank you so much for sharing all that.
01:13:13.260 | I'll link all of it in the show notes.
01:13:14.500 | Thank you for being here.
01:13:15.500 | Thank you.
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