Camille Rapacz: I'm excited about today's topic because when I think of this topic, I think: George. That's what I think.
Camille Rapacz: What comes to mind when I say human connections, George, cuz that's our topic today. What comes to mind when I say that to you?
George Drapeau: Oh my goodness. Yeah. Actually your old dog Cooper is what comes to me first. The Black
George Drapeau: lab.
George Drapeau: And I feel like the human embodiment of Cooper. Just, you know, wanting to meet everybody, hear their stories, connect with them, connect people I know with other people I know. I think, oh man, you guys would be the best people to get into that. And just understanding what drives people. All that stuff.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah. Cooper was a pretty big embodiment of this concept that I'm thinking about.
George Drapeau: Oh, he is great. He was great with people.
Camille Rapacz: So today I wanna talk about human connection. I think this is right up your alley cuz this is something that you do well.
Camille Rapacz: But I'm bringing this up because I think it's really important. I think we get really busy in our businesses being just heads down, running the business. We wanna get things done, we wanna get results, gotta drive, drive, drive, do, do, do.
Camille Rapacz: And it's really easy to forget that what's happening, like what's making it all go is humans. And we're not doing and responding in a way, or being intentional about how we approach this from a very human standpoint. And so we think about human connection as being really important for our overall wellbeing, right?
George Drapeau: Yes.
Camille Rapacz: Pretty safe to say we all know this.
Camille Rapacz: But it's not just that it's good for humans, it actually also good for business. And that's really what I wanna talk about today. Is there actually a thing that's good for both?
Camille Rapacz: And I am making the case that yes, there is.
Camille: Welcome to The Belief Shift. The show that explores. What you really need to know about building a successful small business.
Camille: I'm your host, Camille Rapacz: small business coach and consultant who spent too much of her career working in corporate business performance.
George: And I'm George Drapeau: your co-host and her brother. I'm a leader in the tech world bringing my corporate perspective, but mostly my curiosity.
Camille: Together, we're exploring beliefs about success and how to achieve it. But mostly we're bringing practical solutions so you and your business can thrive.
Camille Rapacz: So I'm putting this idea of creating human connections out there, and it kind of sits in this same category for me as the last topic, last episode, which was the learning organization when it comes to business.
Camille Rapacz: I think of both of these topics as things that are like inherently of course we're like those are really good ideas. Why wouldn't I want to do that? Like, it's sort of hard to argue against wanting more human connection, wanting to learn. And yet they're just also inherently missing in a lot of business.
Camille Rapacz: And I think it's because, I mean, it sounds nice, it's warm and fuzzy, but then that's also why it can be easily dismissed. Sometimes we talk about these things as like the soft skills in business, right?
Camille Rapacz: But we also know the soft skills are the most critical skills and they are the harder things to do.
Camille Rapacz: And so in a way, I think we kind of use this term soft skills to make it sound like they're not as important, but they're critically important. Critically like leadership, critically important, but it's also seen as a soft skill when it, you know, I would argue, no, it's actually a really hard skill.
Camille Rapacz: Not just hard, difficult, but hard as in the way we would define every other skill in your business that is essential to it being successful business like marketing.
George Drapeau: We gotta find a different term for that.
George Drapeau: Cause you're, you're right, it's not soft at all. It's like, qualitative versus quantitative skills or something. When I'm interviewing for people, what I, I tell my interview team is, don't worry about the tech screening so much. The tech stuff we'll get an idea of where they are. But you can teach the technical stuff , that's very easy.
George Drapeau: Everything else is much more important, whether they can get along with the team. Yeah, I totally agree. Soft skills is a bad term for it.
Camille Rapacz: Somebody's probably made a better term for it. We'll have to look around. But yeah, so that's really what we're talking about today is
Camille Rapacz: I wanna talk about this idea of human connection and not just talking about it from the perspective of it's just better for you as a human.
Camille Rapacz: I really wanna talk about how do you do this? How do you leverage this idea of human connection to create, well, it's business wellbeing, but also better business performance.
Camille Rapacz: Both of those things will happen. Are you ready?
George Drapeau: Awesome. I'm ready.
Camille Rapacz: Rolling right into it.
Camille Rapacz: So, let's just talk about this idea of getting better results, cuz I really wanna emphasize that again, this isn't just because it's feels good. It actually is good for business. That's a point I really wanna drive home here. So I wanna start with just some examples.
Camille Rapacz: The first example I have is about your team. And we've talked about the definition of team. You know, we usually, we typically think of this as employees, but could also be vendors, contractors . Anybody who's helping you as part of the team of getting things done in your business, right?
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: From this perspective, the example would be say assigning your team a set of tasks and a deadline, versus learning what actually drives your team to get the right work done at the right time.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
George Drapeau: At first, I think, look, I like independence. People like their own autonomy a lot. So, Assigning a team, a set of tasks and a deadline, as opposed to micromanaging them and saying, here's everything I need you to do and I'm gonna tell you exactly how to do it, and giving 'em no control.
George Drapeau: So at first,
George Drapeau: this assigning
George Drapeau: your team a set of tasks and deadline, it sounds pretty, you know, independence driven, which is good.
George Drapeau: But if you don't know how they like to go about the task, if you don't know how they'd like to receive information, if you don't know what context they need him to be fully enabled, which is the second thing you're saying then, right. Hands off is not respecting him. It's aloofness, it's mismanagement.
Camille Rapacz: Yes. The reason that I brought this example up is because I think we tend to believe, well, my job is to do that exactly. Set them a set of tasks and a deadline, and then let them go do it.
Camille Rapacz: At best I'm not micromanaging and I'm doing that and that seems great. But, and we'll talk about how to do this in a minute.
Camille Rapacz: So right now I just wanna talk about the actual things.
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: So this one is, I say the learning what drives them, because , you're starting to build some independence into them, approaching this work beyond just, Hey, go get these things done.
Camille Rapacz: And that requires another level of connection with them as humans to really understand what does drive them.
Camille Rapacz: And so how they can then leverage that into doing better work.
Camille Rapacz: It's a important distinction. So I'm glad you mentioned that micromanagement aspect because yeah, it's like we're already doing better than micromanaging, right. By just like, here's the task and here's the deadline, but there's another level beyond that makes it even better, which is really if you're more intentional about connecting with them.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
George Drapeau: Absolutely.
Camille Rapacz: So that's example one. Again,
Camille Rapacz: we're gonna come back
Camille Rapacz: to that example and we'll dig into, well how do you actually do this?
Camille Rapacz: So second example I have is in hiring. So both these first two are kind of the more obvious places, right? Cuz these are about people. So hiring, we of course we wanna hire the most qualified person.
Camille Rapacz: Sometimes we're doing that, the most qualified person on paper.
George Drapeau: Mm.
Camille Rapacz: The skills look good, right? They got all the right stuff, got all the right experience. So it's that versus understanding if that person is actually like a cultural fit for your team.
Camille Rapacz: Not just do they have the skills.
Camille Rapacz: So kind of what you were just saying earlier, right? Like it's not just do they have the skills? Cuz I can teach skills, but do they have that cultural fit for the team? And in order to figure that out, you have to make more of a connection with that person.
George Drapeau: You absolutely do, because when you're working with people, they're not working on paper, you're working with them.
George Drapeau: You're interacting with them.
Camille Rapacz: Absolutely. Okay, so number three example of how this improves your business is in the offers. The products, and the services that you create. So when you're creating something that you want people to buy, that's what on my business is about. I make something that I want people to buy from me, that offer that I have for them, often we're out there just creating that based on our own experience and expertise and what we think everybody needs or wants. Right?
Camille Rapacz: And especially for people who are working as an expert in your field. You feel like you're confident, you know.
George Drapeau: Absolutely.
Camille Rapacz: What you don't know is what your exact audience, your potential clients, how they think about what they want and need. Their version of that.
Camille Rapacz: And that requires another level of connection beyond you just being an expert in a topic and deciding exactly how you're going to deliver this thing to them.
Camille Rapacz: And that is what's gonna give you then a better offer, a product or a service. It will be better when it's more in line with what they want because it's what they want, so they're gonna buy it. Instead of what you want.
Camille Rapacz: So that's my third example of making this other level of connection, to the actual humans that will buy your thing is going to improve your offers.
George Drapeau: I could totally see myself falling into that trap because I think of myself as a pretty empathetic person. But I'm also, when I get excited about something, I get very enthusiastic. I can of picture this wave of enthusiasm, liquid of washing over me and crowding out the empathy.
George Drapeau: So I just think, oh, that would be so cool if everybody, I could share this with everybody without asking, you know, would you actually like this peanut butter, mustard and pickle sandwich?
Camille Rapacz: Yes. We are all susceptible to this. This is a big one, I don't think I've met a business owner who hasn't had that aha moment of like, oh, I thought my clients were really gonna like that, but it's not going so well. An idea that we thought was brilliant, but then it kind of fell flat, you know?
Camille Rapacz: So this is important. And it's because they just didn't take the time to make that connection, to understand their clients in that moment. Right.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
George Drapeau: It's cool.
Camille Rapacz: So my last example is being a small business owner. So being a small business owner can be lonely. Many of us do not know other small business owners in our friends and family group. And so you can work alone either cuz you don't wanna bother anybody, right? Who might also be a busy small business owner, or because you have this, belief that you should just be able to do it all on your own.
Camille Rapacz: Which is also just our society makes us feel like we're supposed to, you know, pull ourselves up from our bootstraps and make this thing all happen on our own.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: Versus if you take the human connection approach, you find community, you find a community of business owners to connect with and who you can also learn from.
George Drapeau: Brings so many thoughts to me. First of all, I love that thought because it's talking about human connection. The idea of getting coaches or personal mentors for us is good.
George Drapeau: When I think about it as a support group, like my wife, she's the executive director of a nonprofit.
George Drapeau: She's got nobody to talk to about, I mean, she could talk to me about it, but I'm not running a nonprofit. She's part of a group of nonprofit exec directors and they meet and talk all the time, and she gets a lot of value out of it, which is great.
George Drapeau: I think part forming a community of interest I think is important, but also staying connected with people who've known you for a long time is probably more valuable than you might think.
Camille Rapacz: It's so important and it is so hard. I see so many business owners that they are just really struggling to find the right community to be part of.
Camille Rapacz: Because it also, as a small business owner, it's maybe not just any other small business owner, cuz there's just also like, I need to kind of relate and connect with this.
Camille Rapacz: That's a wide range of people. So, anyhow, I don't wanna get too far into the, how, cuz we're gonna talk about that next.
Camille Rapacz: Before we get to the how, we've talked a lot about why does it matter for the people.
Camille Rapacz: Like of course it's better for people, it's gonna make us happier, more connected, blah blah blah, blah. That's all good.
Camille Rapacz: But why is it better for the business? Like what do you think this shift in approach, how does it actually give better results?
George Drapeau: For one thing employee morale is hugely important. If you have a connection with your people, chances are the morale is gonna be better because they feel understood, not liked, understood. And if they feel understood, if they understand you and they feel like you understand them, they're feeling more secure in their job.
George Drapeau: The morale is higher and they're more likely to stay. So if you wanna reduce turnover and have a better foundation for a team, that kind of connection, like I said, you don't have to be friends, but just show them that you understand each other is important.
George Drapeau: I'm gonna just stop there. I think that's a huge one.
Camille Rapacz: I think that's huge too. I mean, turnover is really costly for any business. It's time consuming. It's financially costly. There's so many reasons to want to have a very, satisfied and high functioning team. And I think the second part of that, equation on the having a high performing team is if you are connecting to what drives 'em, as we talked about, they are gonna be just more effective in their jobs.
Camille Rapacz: They're gonna be more efficient, they're gonna need to come to you less also, right? They're gonna demand less of your time because the time you do spend with them, you are really empowering them or motivating them or giving them what they need in order to just do that work better when they're out there on their own.
George Drapeau: You're gonna know how to delegate to them, what to delegate to them, which is so powerful for management, cuz you'll know what they can and want to do and what to take off your plate.
Camille Rapacz: Yes. Yeah. Now I have teed up for us to do a whole episode just on delegation. It's not obvious out of the gate necessarily how to do it well.
Camille Rapacz: So we will talk about that in the future. But yeah, that delegation piece is so important to getting right and doing delegation right, starts with this human connection idea.
George Drapeau: That's cool.
Camille Rapacz: This idea connects to hiring, going beyond just technical skills, right?
Camille Rapacz: If you have the right people on your team, like you were talking about pulling the team in, again, we'll get to the how in a minute, but just that idea that it actually connects with everyone else.
Camille Rapacz: That you are improving the overall human connections on your team as you think about bringing people in and not just like dropping any old person into the mix.
Camille Rapacz: That doesn't mean you want an echo chamber. You still want diversity. I'm not arguing against having diversity. I am arguing for creating a diversity culture that is aligned around your business mission, your business vision, all that kind of stuff .
George Drapeau: Yeah, for sure.
Camille Rapacz: So that's gonna help because everybody's gonna be on the same page about what we're doing and how we work together. Things will just flow much more easily in the business.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: You know, I was thinking about this just from the business owner perspective and that overall well-being of being part of a community, it's great, right? Like your example of Savitha having that, core group of people who are doing similar work to what she's doing, that's just gotta be so, just relieving for her to have a place where she can talk about her work with people who really understand when she says, I have problem X, they get it in a way you and I can't get it.
Camille Rapacz: But beyond that, I think where it really starts to benefit the business itself is that you will learn from other people in your community faster than if you're out there by yourself.
George Drapeau: It's faster. Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: It's just faster. right? They're gonna share some bit of knowledge with you, like, Hey, I found this great tool that I've been using. It might help you with that problem you have.
Camille Rapacz: Wow. You just solved my problem. I could've spent weeks never coming across that tool.
George Drapeau: That's so true.
Camille Rapacz: There's little things like that, that we underestimate the value of just people sharing their experiences, giving us new knowledge much more quickly than if we're, we can't possibly try all the things on our own, right?
Camille Rapacz: So I think that's a really critical reason for just making those human connections so that you can actually learn things that help your business grow faster.
George Drapeau: Yeah. I think that's a great point. Absolutely.
Camille Rapacz: All right. Should we talk about how, cuz that's the fun part.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
George Drapeau: Let's talk about.
Camille Rapacz: Okay. So I wanna bring back this idea that we started in the last episode. Was it just the last episode We started this?
Camille Rapacz: Were you, we created your business. The marching Magicians.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: So, I want you to put on your small business persona as the founder of Marching Magicians, and we're gonna go through some scenarios of how we would do this.
Camille Rapacz: And so we're gonna do it for each of these four topics. The team, the hiring the offers that you build and then business ownership.
Camille Rapacz: So we'll talk about those four topics, and what we'll do is we'll start with the what not to do, and then we'll go to the how would George do it.
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: So again, we're gonna do this everybody listening, George's answers are literally just gonna be George's answers on the fly.
Camille Rapacz: I'm not feeding them to him. So these aren't gonna be perfect answers.
Camille Rapacz: They're gonna be George's answers, but I think that's important because it's also just like, how do we meet ourselves where we're at as we're thinking through doing this? And then I'll add in my color commentary to improve on his ideas.
Camille Rapacz: All right. So team performance.
Camille Rapacz: You're running your little marching magician business and your team is doing well. You have a little team, so that's the state that you're in.
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: Let's just talk in general.
Camille Rapacz: So you have a team, and you want to use human connection more with your team in order to have them be more motivated to do more fulfilling and rewarding work. You listened to this podcast and you were like, this is a really good idea. I wanna do this better.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: Out of the gate though, what do you think, and you might have actually seen people do this, so I'm sorry if this triggers you, George, but what are some examples of what are the wrong things to do?
Camille Rapacz: What is the, please do not do these things thinking that you're making human connections with your team.
George Drapeau: Team building outings are a really good example of where it can go really right and really wrong. I gotta think about how I would explain, like, what are my rules or rules of thumb for making a good team building event, but forcing people to go on a team building thing where you say, oh, this is gonna be great, it's gonna be fun, and some people just don't wanna do it, and then they're,
Camille Rapacz: Mm-hmm.
George Drapeau: closed off.
George Drapeau: That's a mistake people can make often.
Camille Rapacz: I call that the forced fun.
George Drapeau: Yeah, absolutely.
Camille Rapacz: That's a really important topic because, you want to create this sense of comradery with your team. But you need to do it in a way that recognizes the diversity on your team.
George Drapeau: For Example, everybody, hey we're going to the shooting range. Some people are gonna love going to the shooting range. It can be a very interesting experience. Some people are really, really not gonna wanna do that. That's something can really split a team on step one.
Camille Rapacz: And that shooting range could just be paintball by the way.
George Drapeau: Yeah, yeah.
Camille Rapacz: That could still really upset some people because it's too close to that idea. So you do have to be really careful about this stuff. And what's gonna work for people in terms of how you choose to have fun.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: I always think of this too as there's always that oversharing boss because they want everybody to like them.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
George Drapeau: Actually I have to watch this for myself. I try not to overshare, but I'm very personal. I want people to get to know me and I have to think about that boundary cuz I have seen oversharing bosses, ugh, creepy.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah. And then it's funny that you just said creepy cuz it's not always creepy, but sometimes it is. And it definitely for women have all been on the creepy side of it.
Camille Rapacz: But, just in general. I think as humans we just want to be liked. And so it can cause us to, as we're trying to make connections with our team, we think of that as, oh, connecting means being their friends.
Camille Rapacz: And I wanna be really clear know it doesn't.
George Drapeau: It's not.
Camille Rapacz: Connecting with your team at a human level does not mean being their besties, being their friend. And definitely we've talked about this before, but definitely this is not your family. You will hire and fire them based on whether they've got the skills to do the job, which is not how family works.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: I am not gonna fire my brother if he's a bad brother. I might spend less time with him. But I'm still gonna see him at Christmas. There's different rules here. So what you really wanna go for is you wanna go for respect as you're doing this, as you're approaching your team and making human connections.
Camille Rapacz: So let's talk about the right things to do.
Camille Rapacz: This is your scenario, George, for your team. So you have a team for your marching magicians business.
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: The team's doing really well, but you are kind of starting to worry that they're not prioritizing the work the way you want them to.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: How would you approach this through the lens of human connection?
George Drapeau: Yeah. Oh, wow. Cool question. So, look, I already have faith in my team. I believe that they've got good hearts. They're trying to do good work. They're trying to do their best.
George Drapeau: So whatever they're doing, they think is right, they think is the best way to go about doing it. And if I don't think it's the best, then there's a mismatch.
George Drapeau: Maybe I'm right and there wrong, but I don't know. Maybe they're seeing something that I don't, I just don't know.
George Drapeau: So I wanna start out by, there's a couple things. I can do some one-on-one conversations where we just talk about how things are going and I want to hear about how are you thinking about, how are you're doing your work?
George Drapeau: You're going about stuff. Teach me what you're seeing. And if I'll say, you know, Hey, I've got some questions for you. Maybe like, I wasn't, I wouldn't have thought about that way of doing things.
George Drapeau: Have you tried this way? Or have you thought about what's in my head?
George Drapeau: How does that play out for you? Maybe they haven't, they thought, oh yeah, I tried that. That was idiotic. Or, no, I hadn't thought of that. And maybe there's a conversation we had there.
George Drapeau: Take that to a next level and put us in a group and say, Hey, let's do a review. How's everybody doing? Let's share tips and tricks and observations about what we're seeing.
George Drapeau: And maybe there's some cross pollination. That people are hearing from each other, they can learn from each other, not from the boss, because maybe there is some less optimal stuff going on. Or maybe stuff is going better than I thought for things that I didn't see. And again, I will hear it out in the group.
George Drapeau: But just kind of get people talking from this kind of comes back to the previous episode of what this learning mindset.
George Drapeau: Start from there and connect with that. To put the, the connection angle on it, my attitude is like, Hey man, you're right out there doing the work. I don't have as much time as you to be right out there with our customers and with our people. Teach me what you're seeing.
George Drapeau: I want to , see what you're seeing. I'm interested in learning how you're doing that.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah, I love what you said, teach me. I think that's like the essence of what you're trying to get to in this conversation to connect with them is to have them teach you.
Camille Rapacz: And so the way that this is different from, say, a traditional approach would be traditionally we might be like, well, if I are not prioritizing work the way I want them to, then I just need to tell them what my priorities are.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: And you know what we call that in the belief shift? We call it a quick fix.
Camille Rapacz: You are not enabling them so that you don't ever have to do that again. So a genuine solution is one that you don't have to repeat. You wanna get rid of this idea that I keep having to tell them what my priorities are so that they're keeping up with me.
Camille Rapacz: Instead, you wanna do this conversation right? I always think it seek to understand. How do I first understand how they're prioritizing the work?
Camille Rapacz: And go into it with the mind of, I might be wrong. Like, I love that you said that too. Like maybe their ideas are better.
George Drapeau: Yeah. I don't know.
Camille Rapacz: Yes.
Camille Rapacz: And the way that you talked about it, when you use that language of Teach me, it brings in the language that's really important in order for the human connection to happen, which is to enter into it without judgment.
Camille Rapacz: You're not assessing. You're not saying, I need to know how you're prioritizing things, because it's not the way I prioritize things.
Camille Rapacz: That language immediately tells them, you're doing it wrong.
Camille Rapacz: Even though you didn't literally say those words,
Camille Rapacz: That's how it will get translated.
Camille Rapacz: So you have to be really thoughtful about what language you use in order to pull out of them. And that's what I love that teach me language, right?
Camille Rapacz: Like, just teach me, teach me how it's going for you. And then from there you can build into the what does that now mean I do, about these priorities and how to better align. Do I now need to teach them something back? Or do I need to change something about what I do because they're actually right?
Camille Rapacz: That's that other level of human connection that then in the future you won't have to keep coming back to this problem over and over again.
Camille Rapacz: And that's ultimately why it's better for business.
George Drapeau: Totally agree with all of that. Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: All right. Let's do the second example.
George Drapeau: Hiring, huh?
Camille Rapacz: Hiring. Also kind of a more obvious place, but there's still a nuance here. This one makes me think of that concept of higher, slow and fire fast?
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: And I definitely agree with higher slow, and it can be painful, but you do need to hire slow.
Camille Rapacz: So we'll talk about that in a second. But I wanna make a comment about this fire fast because I do hear this phrase a lot and people might have heard it. And I think you could misinterpret the fire fast.
Camille Rapacz: If you are not doing a good job inside your business of providing feedback, setting clear expectations, and setting people up with the right opportunities to learn and improve, Then you could get in a position where nobody is ever gonna be good enough, and you are firing fast all the time.
Camille Rapacz: And it's not because they aren't the right people, it's because you aren't setting them up to be successful. So you do have to be careful here that if you find that you're firing fast and you keep doing it, you might be in this cycle of, there's something inside my system of work for these people that isn't working for them.
Camille Rapacz: So I just wanna put that out there as I have seen people fire fast when they didn't even give a thought to how can I help that person do this job better? And I think that's a missed opportunity.
Camille Rapacz: You can't always coach somebody and teach somebody into doing the job the way you want them to, but it is a mistake to not try.
George Drapeau: Yes.
Camille Rapacz: That whole topic is also for another episode when we talk about hiring and how to do that well. But I just wanted to make that small point about this higher slow and fast and how we think about it.
Camille Rapacz: So if you are doing a good job with hiring and onboarding and good development practices in your business, then yeah, you should quickly dismiss people.
Camille Rapacz: Cuz we also tend to hang on to people longer than we should when we know inherently they're not the right fit for my team or my business because, we want people to like us and we don't wanna be mean.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: And I think that's where that phrase comes in.
George Drapeau: I think what I do agree with is identify problems early. It doesn't mean you have to fire it. You identify a problem. Okay, I saw a problem, you're gone. It's like, no.
George Drapeau: Identify a problem and address it very quickly. While it's still small. There's probably plenty of chance to, course correct before you have to fire.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah, I think that's the thing, finding the problems sooner rather than later. Which means you have to be looking.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: And we don't really like to do that.
Camille Rapacz: Okay. Let's talk about all the things, maybe not all the things, maybe just a few things cuz otherwise we'll be here all day.
Camille Rapacz: What are the wrong things to do when hiring and trying to make a human connection?
George Drapeau: Well, you know, not that it applies to this podcast, but nepotism, hiring friends and family.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah. That's taking the human connection too far.
George Drapeau: You know, going by referral.
George Drapeau: I have seen this a lot of time when you're in a team and somebody says, I got the perfect person for this role. When I hear that, I immediately get on protective modes, like, okay, maybe you do. Thanks for the referral, but we're still gonna vet this person fairly.
George Drapeau: The few bad hires I've had in the past 10 years have been because I've gotten a referral from somebody who really wants them on the team, and they say, I've got the right guy for you. I don't know why it was the right guy, but that's, that's no reason to stop vetting and look for culture fit and everything.
Camille Rapacz: Yes, I agree with this a hundred percent. My comment was around just that hiring of friends and family, but it relates to also just this referral concept, which is doing that, believing that that's gonna make it easier cuz you already have some kind of connection.
Camille Rapacz: They're my friend, they're my family. Of course it's gonna work out.
Camille Rapacz: But guess what? The business is not a family. Sometimes that can work really well if you make the right agreements, but I've seen it go badly for a lot of people because they made all these assumptions about how well this would work out with this friend or this family, and then it didn't because they ended up basically taking advantage of that relationship.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: So these are the ways where human connection can all go wrong also, in hiring, don't ask personal questions. Like there's rules here people. You cannot get personal about these people.
Camille Rapacz: So that leads us to how do we do this well?
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: Your company George, is doing really well and you're hiring.
Camille Rapacz: Woo-hoo.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: But your team is really small and it's really important to you that the cultural fit is right cuz it's really jiving right now.
Camille Rapacz: So what kinds of things do you do? What kinds of things would you ask in an interview in order to make this other level connection with them?
Camille Rapacz: To not just suss out their skillset, but you're really looking at, is this gonna work with my team?
Camille Rapacz: You've touched on this a little bit already, but expand on how you would do that.
George Drapeau: Well, I think first of all, I think let's understand what kind of business we're running. We're running a people-based business. A big part of our value proposition is that we are gonna energize our clients.
George Drapeau: So anybody I bring into this, they have to have the mechanical skills to understand the area, but we also want them to bring in enthusiasm and the ability to engage with people. So this is something we're testing for.
George Drapeau: So, I'll tell them, look, I don't need you to be a cheerleader. That's not what I'm looking for. But I wanna see how you engage others, how you observe, how people learning and you who adapts to that.
George Drapeau: I'm gonna ask questions along those lines. I'll ask them to give examples about when have you connected with other people?
George Drapeau: Tell me experience you had working with the team where together you're building on a goal and you ask questions like that.
George Drapeau: I'll prepare my team for interviewing this person, cuz I'll pick a couple of people on my team to ask them questions and I'll remind them, hey, you're not hiring a friend here. You're hiring somebody who can do what you do, which is to connect with clients and activate them. So think that way, not a friend, somebody who connect.
George Drapeau: And give them a chance to show their best, help them be comfortable in the interview, but can you help them show you what energy they can put into a job when they feel really good about it?
Camille Rapacz: I like that. You know, I often have seen people in interviewing scenarios where if somebody showed up and they seemed nervous that they made that a knock against them.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: And I always hated that. Cause I'm like, of course they're nervous. They're trying to get a job that's nerve-wracking. What about if your job was to help put them at ease and then see how they accept that?
Camille Rapacz: Like that is a great way to use a human connection in an interview. You know, as you're hiring is to acknowledge like, ah, this is kinda stressful, isn't it? It's been a long time since I've had to interview, but I remember what that feels like.
Camille Rapacz: And just acknowledging it and then moving them through it so that they can feel more comfortable, that's a human connection you can make with a person that then you can see how they respond to it, which will tell you every, because maybe they respond poorly to it.
Camille Rapacz: Like they just don't like it. They don't relax into it. Then you might know, like for me that would be a sign of, oh, you might not be right for my team. You might be too walled off.
Camille Rapacz: Right. If they relax into it, then I'm like, oh, this is good. I could, I could see, I could totally work with this person cuz I have was able to move them from this spot to this spot in this conversation.
George Drapeau: I've never thought of it quite this way before, but you gave me a thought, which is, a lot of people when they're interviewing, especially hiring managers, think that they want, one of the things they wanna find out is, how does this person do under pressure? Because my job is full of pressure and you're always gonna, you know. Everybody thinks they're gonna have to put their employees in a position of dealing under pressure.
George Drapeau: Okay? Sure. But that doesn't mean the whole interview environment needs to be about that, in my opinion.
George Drapeau: I'm getting data about the candidate and the best data is when you're most comfortable and relaxed. So for most of the interviews, I'm gonna tell you, look, I want data from you, and I want you at your best.
George Drapeau: Your best is your most comfortable. If you're not feeling comfortable, tell the interviewer. We're gonna ask you questions, but we're not gonna put you on the spot, necessarily. If there's a section where you, we really wanna see how you perform under pressure, then make that one of the interview spots and tell them, okay, this one is designed to see how you handle pressure, not the whole process.
Camille Rapacz: I totally agree with that. That whole approach to hiring of creating just this stressful environment, let's just see how they do. Like I'm just, you know, throwing 'em to the wolves and it's like, that's not really how work is.
Camille Rapacz: Or if your company is like that, you probably should fix that.
Camille Rapacz: Like, that's not how work should be, right?
Camille Rapacz: It shouldn't be, everybody's just thrown to the wolves and like, you know, survival of the fittest.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: I think that's spot on. So this is where that importance of making a human connection so you can really see what somebody's like. What are they like at their best? That will tell you a lot about what they can do when they're in a stress environment.
Camille Rapacz: If you do have stress environments, I do agree with you. Set up a very specific interview scenario for that.
Camille Rapacz: But don't have that be the only thing that you're checking because it's not realistic that that's all they're gonna do.
George Drapeau: No. No, not at all.
Camille Rapacz: So that's hiring. This does warrant a whole episode, so we'll do that in the future. There's so much we can talk about here, but hopefully that gives people some sense of a little bit of the difference in how you would do it.
Camille Rapacz: All right, number three, how do you create your best product or service?
Camille Rapacz: Plenty of us have either bought a program or a product or something and then we were like, ah, this isn't what I needed.
Camille Rapacz: I thought it was what I needed, but it's actually not. And then meh. You're disappointed, right?
Camille Rapacz: So in order to not be that business owner who's creating a fabulous stuff on putting all this energy into things, but we're really doing it for us and not for our clients, we have to think about more human connection.
Camille Rapacz: So some of the wrong things to do. Do you have any thoughts about this, George? Wrong things to do?
George Drapeau: Yeah, I think so. If you get in the mode where you think you're gonna talk to your clients, like, you're getting an input session. But really the input session is really to validate what you already think you know is the answer. So everything is a closed ended question.
George Drapeau: Everything is like, if I did this, would you like that?
George Drapeau: No open-ended discovery, all closed-end just don't even bother.
Camille Rapacz: 100% agree. When you're just boxing in it, would you like option A or option B? Is that it?
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: That's all I get to choose from?
Camille Rapacz: Like you're not really discovering anything new.
George Drapeau: No, not really.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah. And while that can be useful in some aspects of your business, we talked about like on online business, there's AB testing, like I'm gonna test this landing page against that landing page.
Camille Rapacz: Sure. And that's a thoughtful scientific approach.
Camille Rapacz: I'm talking about the creative aspect of, I'm gonna have this whole program or this whole, product or service or something that I'm creating for people, for humans to consume.
Camille Rapacz: Even a b2b that other business I'm selling to, it's humans that are using the thing I'm giving them.
Camille Rapacz: And so some of the other things I would say not to do is, you don't also wanna go too far down this path and just do everything your client asks for.
George Drapeau: Oh really?
Camille Rapacz: I mean, that's just gonna be a ticket to Crazy Town. That's what that's gonna do. Like, you're just gonna be made crazy trying to satisfy every customer's, every demand.
George Drapeau: Okay. So. Why not? It sounds great, give the customer everything they want.
Camille Rapacz: Just imagine the myriad of ideas and demands and craziness that people can have.
Camille Rapacz: Haven't ever seen, those people that they're going up to, place an order and they just keep asking for more and for more.
Camille Rapacz: And you're just feeling so bad for the person behind the counter. Like this idea that the customer is always right, only goes so far.
Camille Rapacz: Cuz a business can only survive with so much, of that demand, especially a small business, like we have to have some parameters.
Camille Rapacz: So what you do there is you basically say, oh, the people that are demanding this other thing, my product or service, it's not for them.
Camille Rapacz: And that's really important to do in business.
Camille Rapacz: We remember when we talked about like the riches in the niches reaches in the niches.
Camille Rapacz: This is kind of that idea of there's gonna be so many ideas from customers. At some point you have to make this decision of, oh, but not that set of ideas. That's actually not for me because A, I can't have a successful business if I try to meet all those demands.
Camille Rapacz: It's too much for me to produce. If I had to meet all the many ways people wanted me to coach them and do all the different types of formats and programs, I couldn't maintain all of that. I'm just a small business owner. I have to say yeah, but I gotta keep it to just these distinct things.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: So I'm still using human connection to figure out what those are, but I still have to like not everything, because I will go crazy trying to meet all the demands.
George Drapeau: I'm convinced I get that.
Camille Rapacz: It's tricky. You have to have the balance.
Camille Rapacz: All right, so let's do a George scenario.
Camille Rapacz: So you are designing your first program. Actually this brings up a good question. Who are your customers? Are the parents paying for the kids to do your thing?
Camille Rapacz: Are school's paying for it? Do you know?
George Drapeau: I think it's mostly schools.
George Drapeau: Maybe the PTA or some other organization that's providing
Camille Rapacz: Got it. But the people who are gonna say, we want you to come and do this thing, it's gonna be the schools, regardless of how they get the funding for that. Okay.
Camille Rapacz: And then the people that you're going to teach, it's the kids?
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: Okay. So you've got your first program, it's for the kids, but the school is your actual customer.
Camille Rapacz: So keep that in mind cuz the kids didn't buy this.
George Drapeau: They didn't, no.
Camille Rapacz: We'll just say the school bought it. So that's who your customer is. They brought you in to help their kids. So you're gonna go do this stuff and you're gonna teach them how to know, teach 'em how to write music or design marching, I don't know, something like that, right?
Camille Rapacz: Design marching patterns, maybe.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: And so you have in your head, and you probably literally already have this, like I already have in my head exactly how I wanna do this.
Camille Rapacz: I have this really cool idea. I can't wait to get this program up and running and launch it for the kids. You're super excited. You start to tell your team about it and they're getting all excited too.
Camille Rapacz: What do you do to make that human connection with those customers, the school, to ensure that this program is exactly what they want, and that they start telling all their other friends at the other schools that they should hire you?
George Drapeau: Wow.
George Drapeau: Oh man. Okay.
George Drapeau: I want to build a germ of excitement. I want to get the kids excited about this new thing they're gonna learn.
George Drapeau: Maybe they don't know this new world so well. They've been doing things in an old way. They're not really understanding how the shows are designed or what they what. So I want to show them a show to take them to the experience.
George Drapeau: A live show ideally, because what I wanna do is I want to show them the end product where they can be the end goal.
Camille Rapacz: So everything you just described in my brain is a great marketing sales tactic. But does it tell you how to design your program?
George Drapeau: No.
Camille Rapacz: So you already have this program idea in your head.
Camille Rapacz: You're like, I know what these kids need in order to do better.
Camille Rapacz: Cuz you've been one of these kids literally doing this learning about marching and the professional aspect of it and like super cool.
Camille Rapacz: So you walking into it like, man, if I had had this when I was a kid, this would've been. Awesome.
Camille Rapacz: But how do you take that idea and connect with them to find out if they would be as excited about it as you are?
George Drapeau: I still go back to, I wanna show them real world examples.
Camille Rapacz: Mm-hmm.
George Drapeau: I'm gonna watch to see who's absorbing it. Actually, one way to do this is let's connect with the staff at the school and say, okay, look, we're gonna build some excitement and we're gonna have a couple of students be leaders for the other students and drag them in.
George Drapeau: Do you know who are your catalysts? Who are the students who, other students respect? Let's take that small group and show them this experience, and then we will actually teach them.
George Drapeau: Take them through the class, because we know they're already excited. We'll teach them a little bit of this stuff about the program.
George Drapeau: Once they see the program, then we hope they'll spread the word to their other students, and use them to help them understand, oh man, there's this great thing. We got this company that can teach us how to become a next generation program. We've actually done it. It's really cool.
George Drapeau: And maybe start with the small germ of people we take through the class. They've already excited.
George Drapeau: The rest of the students, we don't know their excitement level, but they trust their friends. They trust these peers, maybe they can help them do it. And then, I don't know after that.
Camille Rapacz: You are right there. This is still very much a sales tactic. And the way you can tell. So what you've got is you basically are talking about, I'm gonna find my early adopters.
Camille Rapacz: These are the people that are, like, of course I wanna do that thing with you, George. Yes, I'm in.
Camille Rapacz: So you find out who those people are and then the only thing missing in your plan is I need to put them through my program and then get feedback from them.
Camille Rapacz: I need to do interviews, I need to then study and you can do that in a very thoughtful, not the like, Hey, so you liked it, right?
Camille Rapacz: Like you were talking about. You're gonna ask all the open-ended questions about their experience so that you can really dial and be like, did I design this right?
Camille Rapacz: Is the format working? Is this the right amount of content for them to consume? Or did I give them too much? Cuz a lot of times when we're teaching, we overwhelm people with knowledge.
Camille Rapacz: You test all these different aspects of your program with your early adopters who already really get what you're trying to do. And then you improve the program that you start putting out into the world.
Camille Rapacz: And I think people miss this like, get a group that you can test it with first.
George Drapeau: Yeah, I'd been thinking, I've got the product and I've done it before, so of course it's just gonna work.
George Drapeau: But you're right, every cohort is different. Every customer in class is different. So look, I've got early adopters and I try it.
George Drapeau: The thing that has worked before for other customers isn't working the way I want it to for these guys.
George Drapeau: You're right, I've gotta ask them.
Camille Rapacz: The other aspect of this is you might say like, I know this works cuz it's worked in the past and I've seen other people do it. But this is also an opportunity for you to create a differentiator for why should I do it with your company?
Camille Rapacz: Because you might discover something, they're like, oh, if I just did this one other thing in my program, that differentiates me and people love it. And so I'm gonna incorporate that into my program.
Camille Rapacz: And it's now a sales pitch, right? It's part of the sales process of like, here's what I do that nobody else does.
George Drapeau: That's true.
Camille Rapacz: right?
Camille Rapacz: That's that next level of how do I connect with people on not just getting them excited about what I'm excited about, but actually getting them to help me improve the thing I'm excited about from their perspective.
Camille Rapacz: How do I understand what they really care about in this thing to make sure I really do have this offer dialed in?
George Drapeau: Yes, absolutely.
Camille Rapacz: So, yeah, I'd loved walking through that with you because I think it also demonstrates like it's not necessarily an immediate quick solution that pops in our head to do. These human interactions that we think we need to have. It's sometimes hard to frame them in the way we need to, to really improve on certain aspects of our business.
Camille Rapacz: So you did an excellent job of proving my point, and again, audience, George really is just winging this as we go. So that was him painfully trying to think of the answer and you just bring up this really important point of this is a struggle. This is why we have to be intentional about it.
Camille Rapacz: You really have to dig deeper into the like, what else could I do? What else could I do? The answer is in there, but it might take a little bit to kind of dig into really that way of making a human connection that improves the specific thing you're trying to improve.
Camille Rapacz: Do you have time for one more?
George Drapeau: I think so.
Camille Rapacz: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: Let's just talk about how to be, I mean, I don't know that this would ever really be a problem for you, George to be a smarter, happier business owner, cuz you're kind of the like, happiest guy I know.
Camille Rapacz: I think as a small business owner, it feels like we're just supposed to figure this all on our own.
Camille Rapacz: And it, it is lonely. I hear this a lot from small business owners.
Camille Rapacz: It's lonely out there. So going it alone, while that might feel like that's what I'm supposed to do and I'm not supposed to need help, that's all a lie.
Camille Rapacz: So wherever you're being told that, just know that's a complete lie. Nobody's doing it on their own.
Camille Rapacz: Even if they make it look like they're doing it on their own, they are not.
Camille Rapacz: Nobody is doing this without help.
Camille Rapacz: There's just no way.
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: Also, even if you are trying to do it on your own, it's not just lonely, it's the slowest path.
Camille Rapacz: I can't learn as fast by myself as I can with others. Yeah, you're just one brain. Exactly. We want multiple brains.
Camille Rapacz: It's also just the most boring path. So back to what you and I have talked about before, like this is just more fun.
Camille Rapacz: It's okay to make choices to do things in your business also because they are more fun.
George Drapeau: I hope so.
Camille Rapacz: I know, right.
Camille Rapacz: All right, so what are the wrong things to do? Do you have any thoughts about this? The wrong ways to build a human connection as a business, small business owner.
George Drapeau: I'll take something from the company I work at, which is probably the, the biggest open source company in the world.
George Drapeau: You could literally download all our software if you wanted to.
George Drapeau: It's available for free, but people buy from us because of the connections we make, the support we provide.
George Drapeau: A phenomenon we see is other companies getting involved in open source communities just to suck out the intellectual property. They never put anything back in.
George Drapeau: They just go there and they try to join to see how it works, just for their benefit only.
George Drapeau: That's all they do. It's horrible.
George Drapeau: So just finding a group of like-minded people, and all you do is pepper them with questions and ask, and ask and ask.
George Drapeau: I mean, it's good to be curious, but people are gonna be onto you pretty soon realize you're just leeching. What are you giving back?
George Drapeau: And if you don't feel like you have anything to give back, that's okay. You'll find a way. You don't have to become an expert. There's other ways you can give.
George Drapeau: Look for that.
Camille Rapacz: My version of this is joining a community or going to a networking event purely to just try and find people to be clients.
Camille Rapacz: As opposed to, I just want to meet people.
George Drapeau: Yeah. Oh
Camille Rapacz: People, can sense
Camille Rapacz: that right away too, right?
Camille Rapacz: You can sense it in the crowd.
Camille Rapacz: Like if you were gone to a networking event, you can tell, I know why this person wants to talk to me.
Camille Rapacz: Even on social media, you get these cold dms and messages, people clearly wanting to do business with you, but not just outright saying it like, I'd rather you just outright said it.
Camille Rapacz: I have this business. I think it might be for you. Is it? That's fine. I can decide yes or no. But when they're sending you this weird message of, Hey, how are you doing today? I loved your post.
Camille Rapacz: And you're like, no, you're trying to sell me something. Don't pretend you're not. It's that weird like angle of, I'm gonna pretend I'm just trying to be friends with you. But at the end of the day, I really just want this to be a financial exchange in my favor.
George Drapeau: Absolutely.
Camille Rapacz: So don't do that. But yeah, that's a perfect example. What you just described, getting into communities where you aren't there just for the human connection aspect. Have we talked about this book Give and Take by Adam Grant.
George Drapeau: No.
Camille Rapacz: Oh, okay.
Camille Rapacz: We're gonna talk about this book later.
Camille Rapacz: It's a great book that's this concept of how the givers perform better in business than takers.
Camille Rapacz: And he, has all these beautiful examples of what that looks like. It kind of gets into the nuances of what you were talking about where, but what if I feel like I don't have anything to give?
Camille Rapacz: And he talks through all of that. So if anybody's really like getting, excited about this topic, that's a great book.
Camille Rapacz: All right, let's do the last scenario here.
George Drapeau: Okay.
Camille Rapacz: As the founder, owner of
George Drapeau: Marching
Camille Rapacz: Marching magicians. I keep wanting to put the magic part first.
Camille Rapacz: Magical marchers.
George Drapeau: I'll change the name
George Drapeau: if it's working better.
Camille Rapacz: As the founder of MM, incorporated, you have realized that the only other small business owner you know, is your sister.
Camille Rapacz: Wah, wah.
Camille Rapacz: She's lovely and she's brilliant. I mean, I don't know why you think you need more than me in your life from a small business owner. You You've realized, you do. You're like, she's not available enough to me.
Camille Rapacz: And her advice is always the same. George, you do you, you'll be fine.
Camille Rapacz: And I need more feedback than that. So what do you do? How do you meet some get to know other, like, what's your solution, Mr. Extrovert?
George Drapeau: For one thing, I'd like to find out who else is in my industry now if I'm doing a good job, I know who some of my competition is or people are in the general area, but addressing other niches.
George Drapeau: I wanna start there. Even cold calling saying, look, I'm another founder. Like you we're both in the same area, but seem on two different angles. Could I buy a coffee or something and ask you about how you started your business and stuff? I just started connections.
George Drapeau: As I'm telling you this line, I'm thinking, no, I'm not gonna start with my competition, but start finding other people in the general area, but at the top.
George Drapeau: That's one way.
Camille Rapacz: That's a great way. Because it's just really straightforward too, and not overly complicated.
Camille Rapacz: Yeah, I love this cuz then you're taking this concept of like, who do I want in my community, in my network of people I know beyond just, they do what I do,
Camille Rapacz: But they, they live in this world that I live in and are doing from different perspectives, which is an even greater, like, value long term to just, oh, now I have all of these people that resources that I can tap into and learn from and connect with.
Camille Rapacz: So I love that idea. I think of it as these rings, these circles, like there's the center circle of people who actually do what I do. And then there's these, rings that keep going out of, they're more adjacent to what you do and you just keep building out.
George Drapeau: Yes,
Camille Rapacz: Working all those angles is how you build a really nice, you know, network.
George Drapeau: It's just fascinating to me.
Camille Rapacz: I know. I love it too. So me being an introvert, this has been a struggle for. I have to really think about it. Now, I don't have any problem getting up in front of, I've, I've overcome my fear of like speaking in public and I've done enough of like presenting and do, I don't have any problem doing that.
Camille Rapacz: But there is something about going to a networking event in a room of people I do not know. And just that initial, how do I, I feel like a little kid, like I don't know how to approach a stranger and greet them.
Camille Rapacz: Even though that's literally what everybody else in the room is doing.
Camille Rapacz: We're all doing the same thing. So there's things that I've done to sort of help me overcome that stress.
Camille Rapacz: So if you're an introvert and you're like, ah, network events, no, the first thing is to go in with a better objective than I have to meet people to help my business. And just go in like, I might find one super interesting person.
Camille Rapacz: I just might find one person that I find really interesting. That's what I'm trying to do. I'm not trying to be the most interesting person. I'm going to find somebody that I find interesting.
Camille Rapacz: So just flipping that around kind of takes the pressure off. I don't have to be the best person in the room.
Camille Rapacz: I don't have to be the most flamboyant, interesting, whatever person in the room. I just wanna show up trying to find that interesting person and get to know them, right? Interesting to me.
Camille Rapacz: So that can really help just kind of take some of the stress out of what am I gonna do when I go to this networking event?
Camille Rapacz: Because from there, all the fabulous conversation will flow. And by the way, people will find you fascinating the more you find them fascinating.
Camille Rapacz: That's something you are very good at, George. I always tell people, when you meet my brother, he's gonna make you feel like the most interesting, fabulous person in the world and you, therefore you're going to love him cuz you're so good at asking questions about people.
Camille Rapacz: Cuz you're so curious and you genuinely are.
Camille Rapacz: You can also do this in online communities. I actually also started my own community for a while. That was like, I'm just gonna create my own group cuz I can't find it. So just having my own group of people that kind of got together here and there.
Camille Rapacz: You might have to do this sort of in a hit or miss way.
Camille Rapacz: So if you're struggling with this, like I can't, I don't know, I given up, I don't give up. Just keep looking for who are those people that I wanna connect with. And do ask other business owners if they wanna just have a, it could be virtual coffee.
Camille Rapacz: And I've done that so many times and sometimes they don't go anywhere. Most of the time they don't go anywhere. And every once in a while you're like, oh, this person I'm connected with them for life now. I will always be able to call that person, chat with them, throw an idea to them. You'll start to build this little list of who are your people.
Camille Rapacz: But it's not gonna always work out. So you kind of have to go into it with the, this might work, this might not, but I gotta try. Cuz when it does work, it's great.
George Drapeau: You know, I was thinking sometimes we have guests and we're gonna have more guests, and I think for the audience, if they're wondering how to make these connections, just listen to a couple of those interviews, because we don't come with a predefined script. We're just asking questions of them to learn more about them.
George Drapeau: But there tend to be questions we'll ask over and over again about how they get started, how they got in this industry, were there any real big aha moments or setbacks they had?
George Drapeau: We tend to ask a lot of those questions again and again. It's good tools for how you learn about somebody else and how you connect with them.
George Drapeau: Just listen to those, those will help you.
Camille Rapacz: You are spot on. And it's mostly cuz George is asking the questions.
Camille Rapacz: Cuz he is very good at this.
George Drapeau: Both doing okay.
Camille Rapacz: We've both gotten pretty good at it.
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: All right. That was all of our examples.
Camille Rapacz: Any last thoughts?
George Drapeau: You know, there's one thing that's, we talked about a couple times and they really nailing home the point that you don't have to make friends with people to connect with them.
George Drapeau: You're seeking understanding, not friendship. There's a difference.
George Drapeau: For me, I like making friends and it's pretty easy for me.
George Drapeau: So that's good for a lot of people in a don't want that.
George Drapeau: But if you have this mindset of I just want to gain understanding really takes a lot of pressure off I think.
Camille Rapacz: You could not have said it better. I think that's, yes. Making that distinction of this isn't about friendship, it is just about connection is really important. And I think if you do that, it maybe also will take a little bit of the weight off of what you're trying to do.
Camille Rapacz: And it's can be a really small level of connection.
Camille Rapacz: It doesn't have to be connecting in this, really a big emotional way or I don't know, however you might be thinking about it. Just we're talking about some small adjustments that you would make.
Camille Rapacz: But to do them, because they're small, you do have to be intentional about them or you will easily skip past them.
Camille Rapacz: Again, back to the work, just super busy and we're trying to get a lot done and taking a minute to make this connection or I'm too tired, or whatever it is, whatever we're dealing with in the moment. But if you just thought for one minute, what's one thing I could do to just connect with this person?
George Drapeau: Yeah.
Camille Rapacz: It can make a huge difference in the outcomes that you get from that interaction with that person, in so many different ways and definitely inside your business.
Camille Rapacz: In closing, I would say, everyone listening, choose one of these areas we talked about. Whether it's about your offer, about being a solo business owner or about your team in hiring. Pick one of those areas and just ask yourself, what's one intentional thing I can do around making more of a human connection that would improve both the experience and the results here? And try it out.
Camille Rapacz: And then definitely let us know what happens.
Camille Rapacz: So leave us a voicemail, go to thebeliefshift.com and leave us a voicemail if you try this. And I mean, if you try it and it doesn't work, I definitely wanna hear that.
Camille Rapacz: Cuz it's not a guarantee, there are no guarantees in life.
Camille Rapacz: It is not a guarantee that every time you do this it will work because that other person also has to be open to receiving it. 99.9999% of the time people will, but every once in a while people are not always gonna be wanting the Black Lab Cooper Pup to come and greet them.
Camille Rapacz: I don't know who those crazy people are, but they exist.
Camille Rapacz: All right. That's my guidance for everybody.
George Drapeau: That was fun. Thank you.
Camille Rapacz: All right. Thanks everybody.
Camille Rapacz: Back in your ears next week.
