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Join Derek Hudson as he explores Essential Dynamics, a framework for approaching the challenges facing people and organizations. Consider your Quest!
Welcome to Essential Dynamics. I'm Derek Hudson, host of the Essential Dynamics podcast. Really excited to continue the conversation with Laurence Roberts, who we had on last time. Laurence, welcome back. Yeah.
Lawrence:Thank you for having me back. I feel like I went from nervous to like calm but confident in twenty five minutes of conversations about networking. And I'm gonna have to remember this conversation next time I'm I have an opportunity to go someplace where I would convince myself I don't wanna go. I tell you my experience with those things is I don't wanna go and then I have a really good time. And it sounds like, I don't know, youth camp or something like that.
Derek:But I always have a great time and the conversations and being with really interesting people is really helpful. So maybe I'll set this one up a little bit. In Essential Dynamics, one of the things that we found is that whether we like it or not, when we're in an organization, there's a system going on. There's a way of doing things. And typically we don't design that system.
Derek:We just solve problems and it builds around us. And when you're in the system, you can't see the system. So it's really valuable to step back and to look at how your organization creates value and it's especially useful to have a way to think about systems to be able to do that. So that's the work of Essential Dynamics if I want to put it that way. You in our last conversation introduced this, a very genuine and useful tool to get a lot of things done in a business.
Derek:And a couple of things that you emphasized were you have to be in it for the long term and you have to be actually genuinely interested in the success of others for it to work. And I thought that those were those are the kinds of things that help me not feel like I'm a pushy salesperson when I go off to talk about my business or to talk with people about anything. So if we think about networking as a tool to add to the system that you're designing to run your business, it's a system of its own that can plug into a system if we want to put it that way. You've spent many years bringing people together and teaching them how to do that. So I suspect you're taking a bit of a system approach that you're trying to put in people's hands so they can use it.
Derek:Can you just walk through some of your thoughts on that?
Lawrence:Absolutely. And on the last podcast, I talked more about building those relationships. But the bigger challenge is how do you get in front of those people? How do you find those people? Or how do you even get to the point where you can have a conversation with somebody?
Lawrence:And I think that's actually that's the first step of the system. Or or or maybe we even back it up and say the first step is is having that desire and that motivation. That's that's probably the hardest thing is is getting out of your head, getting over the fear of talking to people, maybe possibly the fear of rejection. But as I've been working with other people in coaching, there definitely is a system. So, part of that system is a numbers game.
Lawrence:You know, you do need to, approach a certain amount of people before you're going to be able to initiate good meaningful conversations and start building those relationships. And so I would say the first step in that system is is getting out in the community anywhere where there's a group of people gathered. K? So I say it like that because oftentimes when we think networking, the first thing we think of is large groups with a bunch of people standing around and chatting and socializing and things like that. That is part of it for sure.
Lawrence:But but maybe we also need to wrap our heads around the fact that sitting with a group of parents at our daughter's basketball networking. Or if we are going to a trade show, that is also networking. Right? Or a church event or a a mindset group or coaching or those are all any type of group collaboration is an opportunity to network. And so one of my favorite things to really start opening up conversations is going to things where people are standing still and they have to talk to you.
Lawrence:So like a trade show. A trade show is a great place to meet people. They all want to talk to you. You want to talk to people. Right?
Lawrence:So so starting those conversations, maybe gathering a little bit of information from who those people are, not taking too much of their time. Obviously, they're they're there for a purpose. And, and then following up, which we'll talk about later. Or when you are at those maybe soccer game or, maybe you're on a PTA, opening up those conversations with people that are already sitting beside you, already in the room, have a lot of the same beliefs or values as you starting to invite those people for something outside of the meeting. Would you go for a lunch?
Lawrence:Or, we'll stop by a coffee shop and have a drink or something. Or if, you know, it's young entrepreneurs, young business professionals, young trades, I I love to invite them to our office because in the construction world, we typically have a bigger setup than most people do. And, it's it's a great way to introduce them to what maybe could be or what might happen in the future. So that system of getting out of your head and looking around you to see what's out there, when you are in those situations,
Derek:connect
Lawrence:small conversations with the goal in mind to book later time with that individual. I honestly struggle myself personally in those large networking groups. And so what I try to do is I I set a goal. You know? I I I don't wanna just go around and mingle and whatever.
Lawrence:I wanna I wanna get into three meaningful conversations or five meaningful conversations, and I wanna come away with five business cards that I can follow-up after. Right? That also gives me the excuse when I have those five business cards that I can leave. They're a bit overwhelming for me. However, that's that's kind of the next step is is being out in the community, meeting people with the intent of setting up one to one meetings with them after.
Lawrence:So after you have in maybe a personal business card or they gave you their contact information on your phone, the next step in that process is actually following up with them. You know, continuing with that intent, booking those meetings. Now you have a personal connection. Hey. It was a wonderful time meeting with you.
Lawrence:You can do this through call, email, even more so now is text. Had a great time talking about this, reminding them of your conversation. Once you've related to them again, invite them to something or maybe invite yourself. Hey. I would love to stop by your office, continue our conversation that we had on this, and wanted to know what's your what's your favorite drink of choice or whatever I can bring by as I come.
Lawrence:Right? So initiating that next step. And then once you get the opportunity to meet with them, one of my favorite things is to to let them talk. Find out as much about them. Listen.
Lawrence:Let them share as much as they want about themselves. And and you know what often happens when you do that? When you when you ask really good questions and you've you've now started building those relationships is is they realize what's going on and they they turn turn the tie back on you and they will ask you questions. You know, if if if you're if you're clever and and you work it, well to the point where you've you've done a lot of listening, and they start asking questions, it would be a great thing to say something like, know what? I actually came here to learn more about you.
Lawrence:You know, I would love to tell you more about me at some other time. Maybe maybe I can invite you over to my office or or or maybe we can we can book another time, but I'd actually dedicated this time to you. Right? What's yeah. You may even consider that a power move.
Lawrence:But what it is is if, again, you've booked your time and you've set your mindset to learn about how you can help them, then genuinely do it. Right? And if they would like to meet again, great. That's awesome. We've now start building some good rapport.
Lawrence:But once you've had that initial meeting with them
Derek:Lawrence, can I just stop you there? Because I'm going to get personal on this. I like talking to people about the situations that they're in because I think I have ways of helping all kinds of situations in organizations. That's what I think about. That's what I do.
Derek:I can learn from situations that people tell me about without giving them any advice. Okay. Just because there's a data all over the place about, you know, your boss or your customer, your board or whatever. There's all kinds of stuff going on. And so that's a valuable time if I don't do anything other than say I'll call you again.
Derek:And so I realized you just sort of gave me permission to say I can go in sort of detective mode or or therapist mode and say, you know, tell me all your stuff. And people usually get better at thinking about it as they explain it. Yeah. So that's helpful to them. And so they're they're especially, like you say, if you ask good questions.
Derek:So that's a good meet. Well, Lawrence came by and man, I really like that guy. What does he do? Well, I'm not really sure because we didn't get to that. But I feel better about my situation now because I told them about it or something.
Derek:Yeah. So there's a
Lawrence:lot to that. And and I agree. And I I do say that, but but sometimes people are not conversationalists per se. And and so you you you do maybe need to not just maybe listen the entire time, but also contribute to the conversation and allow it to go forward. And, again, probably with some of those those good thought provoking questions.
Lawrence:But in the end, if you do have a a great conversation with somebody, you you can't just leave it there. You know, you've you've begun something. So continuing along with that process for that system is the continued follow-up. Well, let's you know, I've I've enjoyed this. I hope you have as well.
Lawrence:I would love to stop by again. Or, you know, is there is there a a favorite place that you like to go for lunch? Or I just had a great lunch a couple weeks ago at this place, and I loved it. Or or a cute little shop or, you know, invite them to your office or or whatever the situation is, to leave with an invitation and then and then an invitation to follow-up. So hopefully during that conversation, you've learned a little bit about that, and you can maybe potentially follow them on a social media or a LinkedIn or something.
Lawrence:And, as they are posting things, you can you can comment, you can support them, you can show that you're interested in what they're interested in, maybe share articles or maybe send a follow-up email with, hey. You know, I was reading this and it made me think of you. Is this something that you found interested? Or, like, going back to what I said with motorcycles, oof, I look at so many of those posts all day. You know, I could I could share one one a week or two two a week.
Lawrence:I don't know. But but but that's key. And and then as you're going about your daily life and you're meeting other people, you're gonna find people that would probably be a good connection for this other person. So as part of the process, you you have to learn about them in order to do what you should and provide value for the relationship or maybe them as a professional or what they might need in their life. And so the the last step is that that continuation of the check ins and the follow ups and and providing value.
Lawrence:So, you know, the initial contact, where to find those people getting out in the community, how to initiate or set goals to follow-up and to actually meet those people in person and have a sit down conversation with them once the conversation is done to follow-up, maybe to have another one and then to add value to the relationship and those steady contacts going forward. So that's something that if you are constantly networking, you will have people in different levels or different phases in that process that you will be continuing to strengthen and build that relationship all along the way. I
Derek:like it. I like it. That's not very many steps. And there's a lot like if you come up with that, there's a lot of work there.
Lawrence:Especially if you're doing it with hundreds or potentially thousands of people at the same time.
Derek:Yeah. There's a lot of work there. So I think what would be really helpful now is if you could this has put you on the spot, but think of some stories or examples of where the pieces connected maybe after quite some time. And the little value the value that you added turned into something really big for, you know, maybe both sides.
Lawrence:Yes. So I can as a business owner, when I bought my first franchise, it was in Saskatchewan. And so my family and I, we moved out there to Saskatoon, and we ran that franchise for about two years. And I I felt like I could do more. I had more capacity.
Lawrence:And so I reached out to my the the national office of BNI, and I said I would I I have capacity to do more. Is there is there additional work or something I could do? And they they so they introduced me to a franchise owner who was looking to retire and said, well, maybe you could look at buying this region. When I bought Saskatchewan, it was it was pretty much a brand new franchise, so it was, like, entry level prices. This next franchise was, it was almost 400 members and, was valued, close to half $1,000,000, which I did not have to be able to buy that.
Lawrence:But I felt like I was practicing what I am preaching, and and I had built a lot of friendships and relationships with business professionals over the years, friends in the Saskatoon community. And so for the first time that I really genuinely felt that I was, calling in favors or leveraging that network for something that I needed, it did not disappoint. And through the connections and the friends and the relationships that I had, I'd I'd able to I was able to raise find investment investors and raise the capital that I needed in order to to buy, this region and then leveraged that same network again to buy the third region. And so I think to myself, if I if I would've just kinda, you know, kept my head down and done my job and, you know, not practiced what I was teaching and training other people to do, I would have never been able to do that. And, you know, anytime you're asking somebody for money that takes a large amount of trust between individuals in order to do that.
Lawrence:So to be able to raise a few $100,000 in order to do that, I think is a perfect example of being able to build a network of value and that network actually work for you when you need it. That's a
Derek:great story because I have to think for those first two years, nowhere in the back of your mind are you thinking, I I think I'm gonna hit this guy up to invest in my business someday.
Lawrence:Never I would have. No. I was investing in people because I believe in people and I love networking. So,
Derek:yeah. Any any, that that was such a good one. I'm going to ask for one more.
Lawrence:Okay. Yeah. So because I I actually have a few stories that I I used to share with people, but another really good story of mine of like, a situation I I don't know how I would have got myself out of if it wasn't for the connections that I had built, was actually there was a time where I was just in the middle of selling my my original roofing company and had a bunch of money and everything tied up in that. And then I was I was right in the process of buying the my first BNI franchise in Saskatchewan, and I had a bunch of money tied up in that. And so because I had money tied up in these two situations, I was very, very cash poor at the time and just needed a few months to kind of get things figured out and, you know, back on track.
Lawrence:But at that time, my vehicle died. It was I was down. I I had one one vehicle between my wife and I, and I had already started making I was living in Edmonton, I was driving out to Saskatchewan, and I had no vehicle. And so I I took my my wife's vehicle, which left her at home with five kids with no vehicle for the week while I was gone. And and we were we were struggling.
Lawrence:And interesting enough is I was I was friends with a gentleman who owned a Honda dealership, and he caught wind of my situation. And and he he reached out to me, actually. Wow. And and he said he's like, I hear you're in a tough spot. And he's like, why don't you come in?
Lawrence:And I was like, you are the nicest person, but I'm just not in a position to, like, buy or finance or do anything. I got a lot of things kind of in the fire. I just need a few months. And he's just like, just come in. I was like, okay.
Lawrence:I'll come in. And then he sits me down. He's like, can you afford $250 today? And I was like, yeah. I can afford $250 today.
Lawrence:He's like, good. Go talk to my finance person. I got a car for you, and they'll take care of you. He's like, yeah. I don't know what this means.
Lawrence:And so I could talk to the finance person. They they're sitting me down. They're like, I have no idea what this is, but I'm supposed to get $250 from you and give you the keys to this car. And I didn't even know this for a while after, and this person, unfortunately, has passed away since then. But he had bought the car from his own dealership with his personal money.
Lawrence:He was financing me the car on his own. And he was holding me over until I could finance it properly like I should. And and and then I found out he had actually sold his car dealership at just a few months after, financed it for me as a cosigner so that it didn't inconvenience me. When I found out that, then I just, like yeah. I just paid the whole thing, it was done.
Lawrence:But, anyway, at a time where I was in such a pinch, because he was he was really nice to me and we had a great relationship, he bought me a car and floated me until I was able to pay for it, which was amazing.
Derek:I'm really glad I asked for the second story, Laurence. So
Lawrence:yeah. Which I mean, it does take me back. And thank you for reminding me. Hadn't shared those stories in a while. The power of your network, it can be something that you don't even understand until, you know, you need it.
Lawrence:And if you had actually genuinely built those relationships, invested in those people, there's no reason why they won't do the same for you when you need it. Absolutely.
Derek:Well, we got to end it there because we can't top that. That's fantastic. Thank you so much for sharing both your wisdom and your personal experiences. And I think we've got a different idea about networking than certainly I had and a bit of a system that we can apply. So thank you very much.
Derek:Lawrence, tell us again where people can find you and then tell them about the big event that's coming up right away if you're listening to this the day it comes out. Absolutely. So I am the business development manager at Jason Global Roofing, and you can always find me here by calling our office number and going on to our website, which
Lawrence:is jasonglobal.com. And then our company, Jason Global, is sponsoring a networking event that I am hosting for the Latter day Saint community for those that are business professionals and sales professionals that want to, get to know one each other, meet each other, support each other. We're hosting an event on February 28 at the Bison Lodge and you can get your tickets on Eventbrite or you can reach out to me and we can have those links put in here.
Derek:Thanks very much. Now we have an international audience. So the Bison Lodge is in Edmonton, Alberta in the beautiful River Valley, right? That's correct. Not everything is named after wild animals, but we are in the West here and it's called Bison Lodge for a good reason.
Derek:So Lawrence, thanks again. It's awesome to have you. Thank you for listening. I'm Derek with Unconstrained. And until next time, consider your quest.