Latest / Networking Unleashed: Building Profitable Connections / Networking Unleashed: S1E19 An Interview with Chris Abdey and Michael A Forman

Transcript

Networking Unleashed: S1E19 An Interview with Chris Abdey and Michael A Forman · Networking Unleashed: Building Profitable Connections

• 0:00
  Hello, and welcome to Networking Unleashed, Building Profitable Connections.
• 0:23
  Welcome to the show.
• 0:24
  I'm Michael Forman, and you're listening to the podcast where networking is more than
• 0:30
  just awkward handshakes and bad coffee.
• 0:33
  It's an art and a talent.
• 0:35
  But here's the twist.
• 0:37
  It's an art and talent you can actually learn.
• 0:40
  Yes, even if you're the person hiding in the corner at every event pretending to check
• 0:46
  emails.
• 0:48
  Nowworking isn't just a nice skill to have.
• 0:52
  It's a game changer.
• 0:53
  When you get good at it, you'll wonder why you didn't start sooner.
• 0:57
  More connections, more opportunities, more profits.
• 1:02
  It's like unlocking a cheat code for life.
• 1:05
  So whether you're the life of the party or the let me just stay in the corner and text
• 1:09
  type, we've got something for you.
• 1:12
  So stick around.
• 1:14
  Let's turn those awkward small talk moments into big wins.
• 1:19
  Now I have a guest today.
• 1:22
  His name is Chris Abdi, and I have a short intro for him, but I'm going to let him introduce
• 1:28
  himself and you'll get a better feeling of what he's about.
• 1:32
  His bio, well, what he asked me to tell you about him.
• 1:36
  He wanted to know if you're caught in an endless loop of I'll start tomorrow.
• 1:43
  Say hello to Chris Abdi, a seasoned procrastination coach with a lack of transforming hesitation
• 1:50
  into action.
• 1:51
  And I'm going to bring up as a simple poem.
• 1:54
  I told you this last time that my mother told me.
• 2:00
  Procrastination is my sin.
• 2:03
  It brings me endless sorrow.
• 2:05
  I really must stop doing it.
• 2:07
  In fact, I'll stop tomorrow.
• 2:08
  Okay, Chris, take her away.
• 2:11
  Oh, thank you.
• 2:12
  Thank you, Michael.
• 2:13
  And thank you for having me on the show.
• 2:15
  Yeah, as a procrastination coach, I do feel that sometimes we don't pay enough attention
• 2:20
  to it as such, but the house and the why has really brought me back to, you know, I've always
• 2:26
  wanted to help people in some way.
• 2:29
  My mother was a psychiatric nurse for many years.
• 2:31
  My father had many different professions always, you know, and in that capacity of helping others,
• 2:36
  whether it was, you know, the military or he was a paramedic for a while and very, very
• 2:41
  brilliant man.
• 2:43
  And so I, you know, wanted to, I've always wanted to help people like that.
• 2:48
  So we fast forward to my high school days and I'm sure everybody can relate to this
• 2:54
  one.
• 2:55
  And then my last two years of high school, I had, you know, to do 12 art projects.
• 3:01
  And what happened was, well, I obviously I left into the last minute because I didn't
• 3:06
  think art was really that important.
• 3:08
  So I was scrambling around in my garage, you know, it was probably about seven or eight
• 3:12
  p.m. on the Sunday before the Monday morning, which was going to be a full on art exam,
• 3:18
  like exhibit.
• 3:19
  You can actually look this up.
• 3:20
  We were in the paper, small paper, but still.
• 3:22
  So there was a lot of pressure on this, right?
• 3:25
  But you know, I did it and I walked in there and let me ask you, Michael, what do you think
• 3:29
  the result was of that?
• 3:32
  Maybe you saw that putting things off wasn't the best idea.
• 3:38
  That's what you would think.
• 3:39
  But a series of fortunate events led me to actually the proctor was from another school,
• 3:47
  so they didn't know me, didn't know that I just completely slacked off for the entire
• 3:50
  two years.
• 3:52
  They started talking about the art as soon as he came in.
• 3:54
  I just shut my yeah.
• 3:55
  He's like, oh, I really love how you use these, you know, unconventional materials, but you
• 3:59
  didn't go too far overboard.
• 4:01
  I love how this one rep seems to represent this.
• 4:03
  And you know, you're absolutely right.
• 4:05
  And my saving grace, I think was where he asked, you know, he said, oh, this is very
• 4:11
  reminiscent of pathetic art.
• 4:12
  I think I can work with this.
• 4:16
  And so I said, you're right, because in today's society, you know, is not the striving for
• 4:23
  perfection and mediocrity because everybody's doing it.
• 4:28
  And you know, bing bang boom, I pass with almost the same grade or maybe slightly better
• 4:33
  than the guy that busted his hump for two years and had extra art lessons and all this
• 4:37
  extra help put on him.
• 4:40
  And so it actually kind of gave me a minor God complex at that age, you know, going
• 4:46
  out into the world, oh, I'll just, you know, I'll leave to the last second.
• 4:49
  I'll pull a rabbit out of my hat.
• 4:50
  It'll be fine.
• 4:51
  Right.
• 4:52
  And it works like that until it doesn't.
• 4:55
  And then, you know, fast forward into my adult life.
• 4:59
  And you know, I was always striving along the way I lost that dream when I was younger.
• 5:07
  So I got caught up in the rat race, almighty dollar sort of thing, you know, customer service.
• 5:14
  Then I went to, you know, management, then I went to project management, business development.
• 5:19
  Then I went to, well, even at the end, you know, financial risk analysis.
• 5:24
  But the commonality between all the students is I was always working with people, right?
• 5:29
  You know, guiding them through burnout, you know, stress, overwhelm, signs of procrastination,
• 5:34
  right?
• 5:35
  But procrastination really holds that, that part for me because of what happened to me
• 5:39
  in high school.
• 5:41
  And also, I know how detrimental it can be as well because it robbed me of my last conversation
• 5:46
  with my mother, too.
• 5:48
  You know, we knew she was dying and because it was uncomfortable for me, you know, I just
• 5:52
  put it off, always had better things to do.
• 5:55
  And put it on the calendar and for the Monday.
• 5:59
  And depending on who you want to believe, it's still kind of a blur to me, honestly.
• 6:02
  I don't know the exact time anymore.
• 6:05
  But sometime between that Sunday night and the wee hours on Monday morning, she passed.
• 6:11
  So I know that it can have that detrimental effect as well.
• 6:15
  So that's really why I honed in on procrastination.
• 6:20
  Sometimes you need that kick in the pants to get you straightened out.
• 6:24
  And it sounds like that was your kick in the pants.
• 6:28
  So listen, whatever the reason is, it got you moving in the right direction.
• 6:34
  And I think you're a lot better for it.
• 6:37
  But judging by what you said by procrastinating or by not procrastinating, how would you
• 6:45
  network with other people?
• 6:47
  How do you keep networking and what's your commonality of networking?
• 6:54
  Right.
• 6:55
  So for networking, I never really procrastinate.
• 6:57
  Actually, that's not true.
• 6:59
  That's not true.
• 7:00
  I want it to be true, but it's not true.
• 7:02
  I'm sorry.
• 7:03
  I told a lie.
• 7:04
  A little white lie.
• 7:05
  I told them myself, I don't procrastinate on that.
• 7:06
  I'm like, well, maybe I do.
• 7:09
  So in one sense, I procrastinate.
• 7:13
  In another sense, I don't.
• 7:15
  So in terms of my networking, my online networking, which I've always been more comfortable with,
• 7:21
  I don't procrastinate that at all.
• 7:23
  But I do find myself procrastinating a little bit on my networking in person because any
• 7:30
  number of reasons, the main one being convenience normally.
• 7:35
  So getting better at that one, but normally I don't procrastinate when it comes to that.
• 7:41
  So what do you consider the key elements of networking?
• 7:46
  Well, the key elements of networking are, well, for me, they would be, know yourself
• 7:54
  first, know how you connect and how you interact with people, and then know how to know other
• 8:00
  people and then go out and actually start meeting people.
• 8:05
  Okay.
• 8:06
  Okay.
• 8:07
  Well, you, it sounds like you have a certain fear.
• 8:12
  You're slightly introverted and you prefer doing everything online instead of going in
• 8:18
  person.
• 8:19
  Right?
• 8:20
  Am I right so far?
• 8:21
  Yeah.
• 8:22
  Yeah, pretty right.
• 8:23
  Okay.
• 8:24
  So how would you or how do you overcome the fear of networking?
• 8:31
  Right.
• 8:32
  So that actual fear of the fear of networking is actually twofold for me and I know I'll
• 8:39
  do a little bit of a sidebar when it comes to that.
• 8:41
  The fear for me hasn't really been about, before it's what we call the which one, right?
• 8:47
  You know, that fear of being judged, you know, like, what are you doing?
• 8:50
  I mean, as a coach and being in the space now, you hear a lot of stuff, right?
• 8:55
  Like, the first thing is, oh, procrastination coach, well, you know, do you want me to
• 8:58
  get over it?
• 8:59
  Do you want me to do it better?
• 9:00
  Like, well, what are you doing?
• 9:01
  Right?
• 9:02
  And then you have those other little, you know, gremlins that get in there, those doubts
• 9:06
  right of people who are close to you, they're supposed to be your supporters and they might
• 9:10
  not always support you.
• 9:13
  So there's, there's multi-faces to that.
• 9:14
  But the way that I get over it is, I mean, I go out and do it and the fear of being
• 9:20
  like judged to the which one I actually work on actively by, you're going to laugh about
• 9:23
  this one, but it's true.
• 9:24
  I'm sure there's pictures of me out there on the internet doing it too.
• 9:28
  I have this little duck hat.
• 9:29
  So when I feel like I'm being judged, you know, I'll go out and wear this duck hat for the
• 9:33
  sole purpose and it's got these little feet, you squeeze it and waves.
• 9:37
  So I'll just go out and wave at people all day, right?
• 9:39
  And I'm like, well, if I can do that all day and still feel all right about it, I can probably
• 9:44
  go out and tell people what I actually do.
• 9:47
  All right, I can go with that.
• 9:50
  I can go with that.
• 9:52
  While you're, you're, you're going out and you're, you're doing this networking, whether
• 9:56
  you're doing it through your introverted ways or extrovert sometimes, I'm sure you've made
• 10:03
  mistakes.
• 10:04
  So what is your, what was your biggest mistake and how did you overcome it?
• 10:09
  Honestly, my biggest mistake and this is, this has been, this is a common recurring
• 10:14
  theme actually.
• 10:15
  My biggest mistake was just not being authentic.
• 10:18
  One of the things that I learned on really early was that I was a chameleon just because
• 10:24
  of the way that I was brought up.
• 10:26
  So I would, you know, I would mirror people quite a bit, which sometimes works and sometimes
• 10:33
  doesn't.
• 10:34
  Right?
• 10:35
  And then what, you know, I, yeah, I guess that's pretty much it.
• 10:40
  So that's, that's the biggest mistake is just not being yourself.
• 10:43
  So I mean, I remember going to Las Vegas on a, on a company trip once, right?
• 10:50
  And you know, I'd never been to Vegas.
• 10:51
  I'm not really, you know, I wasn't really a gambler, wasn't really, you know, into the
• 10:57
  other sort of nightlife stuff.
• 10:59
  But lo and behold, when I got sitting with a bunch of guys over there, right, you know,
• 11:02
  we were talking about things, oh yeah, yeah, I love that.
• 11:05
  Let's, let's, you know, let's go see that show or whatever.
• 11:08
  Right?
• 11:09
  Yeah.
• 11:10
  And it was, it's just, I probably could have saved myself a couple of hours of really awkward
• 11:16
  things, but you know, I did it because I wanted to be liked by the guys, right?
• 11:24
  Okay.
• 11:25
  Okay.
• 11:26
  But okay.
• 11:27
  So, so give me your, your top three strategies for networking.
• 11:34
  So you give it, you've given me everything you've done so far, but give me your top three
• 11:39
  strategies that you use today for networking.
• 11:42
  Right.
• 11:43
  My top three strategies for today, I'm a big fan of non-marketing marketing.
• 11:48
  I, I like to say ABN, always be more, always be networking.
• 11:53
  So I'll even go out and, you know, I'll do, I'll go to, you know, I'll sign up the book
• 11:59
  clubs, I'll, you know, go out to the library and just see what other people are reading,
• 12:03
  try to strike up conversations that way.
• 12:06
  See anywhere there's people, I'll try to, and again, I don't do this from a perspective
• 12:13
  of trying to gain business.
• 12:14
  I just do this from a perspective of trying to get to know people.
• 12:17
  But a lot of people, you know, when you're standing in a grocery store and someone says,
• 12:21
  oh, these lines, they never open up, you know, the two checkouts.
• 12:23
  Yeah, you're right.
• 12:24
  They never do.
• 12:25
  Just, just silly things like that.
• 12:27
  Hey, we got five minutes.
• 12:28
  So, you know, I should tell me about something about that.
• 12:32
  Well, you know, when you, when you meet people, whether you're at a networking event or online
• 12:39
  and department store or grocery store, there's a, still a mantra, know you like you trust
• 12:45
  you, then they'll do business with you.
• 12:48
  Now you could do business or just get to know you, but still you have to go through those
• 12:54
  first stages before the trust factor comes in.
• 12:58
  And as we said before, know you, that's pretty simple because you're a nice guy.
• 13:04
  Everybody knows you like you.
• 13:06
  That narrows the field down just a little bit, but know you like you and then trust
• 13:12
  you.
• 13:13
  Trust is such a crucial part of networking, whether it's personal or business, but it's
• 13:19
  still a crucial part.
• 13:22
  How would you maintain those relationships?
• 13:26
  You told me how you get those relationships, whether they're superficial or not, but how
• 13:31
  do you maintain the relationships that you want to maintain?
• 13:37
  So the way that I maintain relationships that I want to maintain, normally what will happen
• 13:42
  is I have a few touch points and I always try to get, you know, either a virtual coffee
• 13:49
  or a real coffee out of it, right?
• 13:53
  Sometimes it always work out and sometimes it falls by the wayside, but normally what
• 13:57
  it looks like is, oh, hey, you know, do you use WhatsApp, do you use, you know, Telegram,
• 14:02
  whatever it is, you know, let's look into that.
• 14:05
  I usually find that, you know, some commonality, right?
• 14:08
  Like they have some sort of club.
• 14:09
  If they don't, well, then I just say, you know, go to the virtual, you know, coffee
• 14:13
  route or whatever, but it doesn't always work out because I'll have to admit my follow-ups
• 14:18
  aren't always as good as they should be from those interactions because they just happened
• 14:25
  out of the blue anyway.
• 14:26
  Well, you know, follow-up, I profess that follow-up is just as, if not more important,
• 14:34
  then the initial contact, okay?
• 14:37
  So it's the way that you follow up.
• 14:39
  I have a secret sauce, the way that I follow up with business contacts, keeping it professional.
• 14:46
  So within two weeks, I contact you in a certain way or two certain ways and it usually gains,
• 14:53
  gets me pretty favorable results.
• 14:58
  But the follow-up is key.
• 15:01
  Give me one tip that you would give somebody looking to improve their networking skills.
• 15:11
  Well, obviously my biggest one is I would just be authentic, just be you because eventually
• 15:18
  it's going to come out anyway that, you know, you're pushing something off and when it does,
• 15:24
  then you have to rebuild the sort of trust factor, right?
• 15:26
  So I'm just saying you like sushi when you don't.
• 15:29
  Been there, done that multiple times.
• 15:30
  Let's go for sushi.
• 15:31
  I hate sushi.
• 15:32
  Yeah, let's do it.
• 15:33
  I'll go and eat a California roll or something maybe.
• 15:36
  But it's right.
• 15:37
  Right.
• 15:38
  Yeah, it's true.
• 15:39
  Being authentic is really the key to be present, to be yourself.
• 15:45
  All of that is part of the confidence building that you normally try to have before you even
• 15:52
  meet somebody.
• 15:53
  So you have to first start with that confidence, confidence in yourself.
• 15:57
  If you're, excuse me, if you're not confident, then the people you're talking to usually
• 16:05
  can see that and they'll go right past you.
• 16:09
  So that's all very important.
• 16:11
  So you have the confidence building, you have the building of the trust.
• 16:15
  All of that really comes into how you network professionally, not just personally.
• 16:22
  But with everything that you've told me so far, what's your favorite marketing tactic?
• 16:29
  Actually, this one, this one's something I don't really share often and I'm wondering
• 16:34
  if I should because, you know, if I do, then people are going to understand it and they
• 16:38
  may not do it as much.
• 16:40
  But there's a psychological aspect of something and somebody taught me this a long time ago
• 16:45
  and it's kind of applied to dating, but I sort of, you know, mimicked it to the network
• 16:50
  when I'm talking to people.
• 16:52
  And it's, you know, you teach somebody something and they're going to, you know, they're going
• 16:56
  to trust you a little more when they use that thing.
• 16:58
  Well, I sort of dumbed it down a little bit.
• 17:00
  And so let's say I'm in that grocery line again, right?
• 17:03
  So if I know the line's big, and this always happens to me at the grocery store anyway.
• 17:07
  So when I know the line's long and we've had that interaction and I'm like, normally,
• 17:11
  you know, maybe I've got a cart, maybe I don't, man, you know what, I left the pickles in
• 17:16
  the aisle, can you watch my cart for me?
• 17:18
  So I get back.
• 17:21
  And you know, normally if I've, you know, done a good job of talking to them, they say
• 17:25
  yes.
• 17:26
  If they say yes, I've noticed that they are more likely to ask me for my contact information
• 17:31
  after without actually giving them anything.
• 17:36
  That's really a good way.
• 17:38
  Always have the person ask you instead of you offering it up.
• 17:43
  You know, it's the same way when you go to networking events, I'll use that as a whole.
• 17:49
  You're always looking to give rather than receive.
• 17:52
  So you're always looking to give them whatever information that they want.
• 17:57
  And if you're authentic enough, if you're real, if you're present enough, then they'll
• 18:03
  in turn ask you for your contact information.
• 18:07
  You know, when I was in the mortgages and I was online at a grocery store, I'd hear
• 18:12
  a conversation behind me about mortgages, the rates, the, the, they can't find the
• 18:17
  right property or this or that.
• 18:19
  There's some sort of a problem.
• 18:21
  And I turn around, I give them an answer to their problem and I turn back around.
• 18:28
  And if I presented that properly, they would say, wait a second, what about this?
• 18:35
  And that's all you're looking to do.
• 18:37
  And the same way is if you're meeting somebody and you're giving your, your 30 second elevator
• 18:42
  pitch, you don't give out the whole pitch.
• 18:46
  You give out just enough so they ask you for the information.
• 18:51
  But that's a very good, good thing.
• 18:53
  So let me bring this all the way around.
• 18:57
  Give me one takeaway that my listeners can use right now.
• 19:05
  In terms of networking.
• 19:06
  It's up to you.
• 19:08
  Give me what?
• 19:09
  Yes.
• 19:10
  Let's keep it to network.
• 19:11
  Okay.
• 19:12
  All right.
• 19:13
  So the one takeaway that you can start doing today, I'm going to go back and beat it with
• 19:17
  like a dead horse, you know, be authentic.
• 19:20
  Barring that if you can get them to, and it depends on how much trust you're willing
• 19:26
  to put out here because the gentleman that actually, you know, put forth this idea, not
• 19:31
  mine, but he said you give them your wallet and you let them hold it for five seconds.
• 19:38
  And I'm like, okay, wow, that's a little bit more than I'm willing to go, but we push
• 19:42
  to get just a little bit too much.
• 19:44
  Yeah.
• 19:45
  So, but I mean, if you can get them to, you know, accept that tiny, tiny responsibility,
• 19:54
  it means that, that you're in and they will say generally they'll say yes to, you know,
• 19:59
  a second coffee meeting at least, right?
• 20:01
  Or something, maybe a book club meeting or whatever meeting you want to go to.
• 20:05
  So that actionable step is something they can do today is actually three actionable
• 20:10
  steps that are pretty easy to do.
• 20:11
  If you don't want to do that, there's still active listening.
• 20:15
  So listen to what other people are saying, you know, be a make it about them and not
• 20:19
  about you.
• 20:20
  And then that second one would be don't offer any information unless asked for it, which
• 20:27
  is pretty easy.
• 20:28
  You just have to shut up.
• 20:29
  Yeah.
• 20:30
  Yeah.
• 20:31
  That's pretty good.
• 20:32
  As far as the listening goes, and I've, I say this across stages and workshops and everything
• 20:37
  else, listening is so important that when you're 100% listening, you're taking away
• 20:43
  all your distractions, your cell phone, everything else, putting it all away and you're listening
• 20:48
  to that person.
• 20:50
  You're concentrating and by listening, by not saying anything by shutting up, you are
• 20:56
  giving that person 100% of your attention.
• 21:00
  And what's more important than listening, but the pause at the end, because the pause,
• 21:09
  that's the other person believe that you were listening to them and you're going to respond
• 21:14
  to what they said, not the next thing that you wanted to say, but responding to something
• 21:20
  that they said, and that goes such a long way.
• 21:23
  It really does.
• 21:24
  Again, building that trust and everything else.
• 21:27
  Okay, Chris.
• 21:29
  So if somebody wanted to get in touch with you about coaching, about just getting in
• 21:35
  touch with you about saying hi, whatever, how would they do it?
• 21:39
  Well, the best ways and the easiest ways are my LinkedIn.
• 21:42
  I'm the only Chris Abbey on LinkedIn, so you can always find me there pretty easily.
• 21:46
  Then you have my website, procrastinationstation.ca or you've got just my name, chrisabdy.com.
• 21:54
  None of them are very well-designed right now.
• 21:55
  They're just placeholders, but you can find me there.
• 21:59
  That's okay.
• 22:00
  But as long as they can get hold of you, that's great.
• 22:02
  Do you have anything, any last minute things you want to add?
• 22:06
  No, I think I just want to say thank you for having me on the show and really enjoyed it.
• 22:12
  It's great, Chris.
• 22:13
  Chris, I want to thank you again for coming out and this is great.
• 22:17
  I'll talk to you soon.
• 22:20
  Well, that's a wrap, folks.
• 22:23
  A huge thank you to our special guests for sharing such incredible insights today and,
• 22:29
  of course, a big shout out to you, our amazing listeners for tuning in and spending your
• 22:35
  time with us.
• 22:37
  Remember, networking isn't about being perfect.
• 22:40
  It's about being present.
• 22:42
  So take what you've learned today, get out there, and make some meaningful connections.
• 22:47
  If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave us a review, and share
• 22:52
  it with someone who could use a little networking inspiration.
• 22:57
  Let's keep the conversation going.
• 22:59
  You can find me on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or my website, MichaelA4man.com.
• 23:06
  Remember, until next time, keep practicing, keep connecting, and keep building those
• 23:11
  relationships.
• 23:13
  This is Michael A. Foreman signing off.
• 23:16
  Take care and happy networking.