“Before we worked to be human through technology, now we must use technology to be more human” – Chris Brogan.
This episode of Disrupt Everything podcast series explores how to create a more human business, how to care for and love customers, and how to use digital assets to build your empire. It’s a conversation about what has been, is and will be the most relevant figure in social media in the world. One of the most demanded speakers in the world. And one of the people with the most charisma and humanity that I have had the opportunity to meet is Chris Brogan. Author of nine best-sellers, such as Trust Agents, The Impact Equation, and The Freaks Shall Inherit the Earth.
Chris Brogan is a born entrepreneur, a human marketer at heart, an excellent service to the walking client. When you connect with Chris, something changes you, you notice something different, you feel that he is here to serve you, to help you, and you touch him. Chris Brogan makes you feel it.
A lot of my work and the professional person that I am today (and therefore human being), is thanks to the inspiration that Chris, Seth, and Sir. Branson has given to me.
“Routine is the enemy” – Chris Brogan.
Disrupt Everything presents, Chris Brogan
“I’ve had to fight a strong depression, a divorce, 106 conferences in a single year around the world, all while you are having a family” – Chris Brogan.
In this new podcast, I have the privilege of interviewing Chris Brogan, in a conversation, in parts, intimate between two people who have known each other since 2010, the moment when I discovered chrisbrogan.com. Chris devotes himself to providing strategies, tactics, and skills for businesses and professionals today. He is the director of Owner Media Group, he has launched his new podcast, and he has a newsletter that for years provided considerable value, and without cost.
>> Listen here <<<
Interview with Chris Brogan
Index of contents
- The most significant moments in Chris’s life.
- A new book that changes to another new book.
- His story in marketing.
- The profound intersection between humanity, business, and marketing. The secret sauce.
- Practical advice on entrepreneurship.
- Recommendations for self-employed and small businesses.
- Essential learnings about podcasts and current projects.
- High performance for ordinary people.
- The most important book he has written.
- A normal day in the life of Chris Brogan.
- How to redesign our lives for the better.
- Habits that have helped the most
- The most effective workshop he has given.
- What makes his projects and jobs unique?
- The key to his workouts.
- Humanity, vulnerability, and detachment.
- The hardest and most important lessons learned.
- Change and evolution.
- Recommended podcasts.
- Favourite books.
- Stories beyond the professional ones.
Listen, download and subscribe here
You can also listen via iTunes, subscribe via RSS o view the web series.
You can also listen directly from the Disrupt Everything podcast series homepage.
Chris Brogan Disrupt Everything interview (transcription)
Chris Brogan on Disrupt Everything podcast series by Isra Garcia | Convert audio-to-text with the best AI technology by Sonix.ai
Welcome to Disrupt Everything Podcast Series by Isra Garcia.
Reinvent yourself and change what’s most important to you
Hello. Yeah. This is in English. Not in Spanish as you saw. This is Disrupt Everything podcast series. I’m your host, Isra Garcia and you know that every time it’s in English it’s because something is special right? This is for me one of the special ones, if I can say the special one because my guest is somebody that has inspired me over the years and when I started in social media it was the first person I followed over the years and he’d be the best and first person I followed together with Seth Godin, to be honest
And so you can imagine what a pleasure it is to introduce and interview,
the special one, my special guest Chris Brogan. Chris, thank you for being here. It is very much my honor and thank you for allowing this to be in English, ‘my Spanish isn’t very good!’
Thank you.
Thank you Chris for being on my podcast, on Disrupt Everything podcast series it’s a podcast for reinvention, for lifestyle redesign, for changing the things that matters for, you know, for just going deeper and changing first ourselves and then thinks that are around us.
For those that don’t know who Chris Brogan is, let me tell you a bit of background about Chris Brogan. Chris Brogan is CEO of Owner media, where he provides skills to the modern and entrepreneurs. He’s also a really well-known speaker, professional speaker and he’s a New York Times bestselling author of nine books and counting. As I said Chris Brogan provides strategy and the skills for the modern business all over the world. And he’s CEO he’s been CEO for other businesses and now for Owner Media as I said. Chris Brogan has a podcast, has two podcasts, has a current blog, has a newsletter which I’m subscribed to since probably 2010 when I started, no 2009 when I started getting the post from his blog and he’s working on his tenth book, book number 10 which is a Make Your Own Game right?
Chris? Well I changed the book a little. I wanted to write a book about how business people could learn about business from videogames. But I read a very big survey by some very important company with about one hundred and forty CEOs from big companies and one percent said they were gamers. Nine percent said sometimes they play video games. And so I thought what a terrible idea to try to write a book that 90 percent of people either said no or hell no they didn’t like video games. So I am now writing a book about a very different approach. But the same ideas would relate meaning what I want to cover. I just use different analogies and it will be OK.
Can we ask you what is changing and what the final title is and what it’s about?
Yes you might be only the second people I’ve told this to. In 2009 when you and I started to become friends I wrote a book with Julian Smith called Trust Agents and now for either 2018 or maybe 2019 if I’m too lazy I don’t know yet, I’m writing a book called Building Agents of Trust. No Julian this time because he’s a grown up and he’s very busy now but it’s called Building Agents of Trust and in the first book we talked about how people could use the Web to connect and be more human with other people.
In this book it is how do we use some of these new technologies like artificial intelligence and chatbots and I O T. How do we use this to make and extend relationships.
So the first one was how humans maybe can’t be like robots. The second is how robots maybe can help us be more human.
Wow wow. There you have it listeners. You have a premiere from Chris Brogan. I got excited, you were talking about the book and I was thinking can I buy right now.?
No not yet but my new podcast I guess is kind of sketch notes for the book.
Yeah, Making The Brand right?
Yes. Making The Brand is where I’ve been secretly asking all the questions I need to ask to write a book like this.
Wow. Chris Brogan, I can say we’ve grown, I’ve seen you grow.
What are the most significant life-changing moments in your life? What have they been? In my whole life you know learning somewhere in my late thirties that maybe I didn’t have to be just one employee at one desk if I didn’t want and finding that there were other paths.
That was pretty significant, finding that even though I sometimes deal with a very mild depression that it doesn’t have to impact my life and that I can make my life work around a depression that’s significant. Having children is significant because I really felt like I could live my life my way. But children tell you know there’s that saying that says Man Plans and God laughs. I think children are the best example of that. And so I very significantly changed my life. In 2010 I did one hundred and six speeches all over the world one every three days almost. And I was not seeing my kids very much. And it led to a divorce that was rather unfortunate but it also made me change my life and decide that I wanted to be home with my kids more. So I see them now maybe one third of every month almost every weekend and then some extra time.
And so that’s significant. And then professionally because this all ties together for me I’ve worked with very big companies and then very small companies. And now I’m talking more to big companies again but trying really hard to show small companies their part in this relationship and how they can participate. So I’m trying to thread it all together if that makes sense.
Yeah, you created as you said, you created a great intersection between humanity, business and marketing.
What’s the secret sauce.
The secret really. I always love to joke about secrets because to me they’re they’re all fake. You know we all know them. We just don’t believe them yet. The secret sauce is the opposite of Santa Claus right. When you get to a certain age someone tells you about Santa Claus and then you feel sad. The secret is that everything you thought might be better. But it sounds kind of weird. That’s the right thing to do. So the secret sauce is treat people more like humans. The source is that maybe there’s not a mathematical equation to reach the person you’re hoping to sell. Maybe the best way that you can treat your customers is the way you treat your mom and that there’s a lot of real business opportunity in actually being nice to the people who give you money. And so that’s what I’ve taught for I don’t know almost 20 years now in different ways that if we can use this tech to drive better human interactions instead of easier human interactions then we have a chance at success. That would be one of the topics you covered on Making The Brand podcast right?
Yes and I cover that as often as I can really, if you look at a distance and you don’t pay much attention because who would? I’m just one person but if you look from afar you say oh Chris, he loves social media! Oh no now he doesn’t. Oh Chris he loves this. Oh no now he doesn’t.
I don’t care what tool we use the same thing is how do we reach people? As long as we remain human right?
Yeah yeah.
And just I got it with Escape Velocity, with the Human Business Works, all the businesses you launched where in the middle, in the center were people
That’s what your saying
And I think you know I think that there’s that saying that if you have a hammer everything looks like a nail.
I think that is true about my ideas about business my ideas always have humans they always have communication. But what happens is the world gets excited about different technology. They run away. They try to come up with ways to automate and make it better but then they always come back to me to say it’s not really working people don’t feel connected to us. Now what do we do. And that’s my secret to my business is that repeatedly people make the mistake of thinking that they need to use that to the tools and not connect with the people.
Exactly. That’s was also my main point on writing my first book the one where you wrote the foreword, in Human Media and is it just because the Internet is the people, the tools have the people I mean not on the contrary. Right?
Exactly. Exactly. And that’s that’s I think why we’ve had a friendship for almost 10 years because you know I just see you doing that kind of work as well. And you know. You know ‘I don’t speak Spanish’ you get to have that market very well. So you know you can take the word to your friends there. Yes sure, I have done over the years.
I’m always saying that I’ve learnt the most significant way of human interactions thanks to you because can you imagine if the first person I’ve just met on their website will be some of the marketers that are talking just about the tools. I’m sure I will be missing a lot of things that now I have and I’m thankful so I’m thankful to you too. So how did you get into into these human interactions.
What was your passion to do this kind of human one to one work that you do?
I think that. Well and funny I’ll make one small correction. I very much like human one to many. But no. But because I like one to many that feels like one to one.
You know?
Yeah. The reason I make that distinction is because we can’t really afford to do one to one. That’s the old days with salesman and his suitcase you know full of supplies. But now we can do one to many. But what got me there originally was customer service.
So I worked for the telephone company back when there was only one telephone company in the US and I spoke to people all day on phones at call centers.
And I believed that companies did not really value their customer service department. They saw it as an expense. And I always thought there must be some really good revenue opportunity here inside a call center. And I think that that was probably my first template that and figuring out blogging that kind of pushed me into the space that I’m in. And for serving people through your company that can provide them.
I guess. So you know I think my early interactions were like anyone’s I guess just kind of testing to see if the microphone was on and trying to share all about me. And then when I learned how to write all about you know everyone to you, all business was better from then on.
That’s it. That’s it. Chris, you work a lot with the business owners so I’m a business owner and I need tools for a better time management or better productivity, as all of them say and at the same time I want to create vessels for my business, what would be your recommendation? This is very much like asking the man who sells encyclopedias. Do you think I need an encyclopedia?
The answer is yes. We have, this sounds like a plug but it’s my answer, we have a very simple course that we call the 20 minute plan jumpstart. That’s it. And the idea is that if you can find nine little spots for 20 minutes each day. So. So nine times 20 is, well sorry, 9 box of 20 is like three hours worth of time. If I can help you find three hours of time every day to improve your business even if the 20 minutes aren’t connected you know some in the morning, some while the child is sleeping or some when you have to go to your other job, whatever, those three hours done well can improve everything in your business. And that’s what I’ve been selling for years because that’s how I built my business except that in my case I just want as much free time as I possibly can have. And so my three hours of working on my business allows me just a few hours of having to do the parts no one wants to do.
Chris, you designed your life
You designed your life and you did really well because I’ve seen over the years how much time you put in to exercise or in disconnecting or working. Yeah.
I’m seeing this because I think you are a Master of lifestyle design. Where can we start or how can we can start designing our life for the better? I want to tell you again by the way you have such a great command of English.
It reminds me all the time how dumb all Americans are.
To be honest I always say that in my job I talk rusty English, kind of rusty. So thank you. Thank you.
No it’s great. So I hesitate to call myself a lifestyle designer because if you notice there’s almost no pictures of my feet at a beach and there’s almost no pictures of me with my new Lamborghini next to my old Lamborghini.
But I guess you and I talk about lifestyle in another way.
Yes. Yeah yeah. Very true. We talk about being the owner of your own time. So that’s what you do really well.
Yes. So in my seventh or eighth book which was called The Freaks Shall Inherit The Earth.
I love that book!
Thank you. It’s my favorite because I wrote it for my children. I have a definition,
I have a whole chapter about defining success and it’s different for everyone and that’s the important part of the chapter that you have to really define what you call success. And to me success is just one very simple thing. Being able to say no to the things I don’t want to do. That’s it. That’s success for me. Meaning I don’t have to say yes to this project because I have enough money that if I say no I can keep doing my job. The one I want to do. So that to me is the ultimate way to design your life is if you can work the projects you want to work and work with the people you want to serve and deliver the product that you think will best serve them with the kind of hours you most wish. That’s the formula.
And you know people say oh I’ve seen you speak all over the world I want to be a world speaker I say you do, until you do it and then you find that the quote-unquote…if I went to Spain to speak for you, you know you decide to put on a conference you give me a big bag of money I fly there. Do you know what the experience would be like. I would come to the hotel the next morning I might go to the event breakfast.
I would spend my day as much as I could with the attendees of your event. I would speak and then I would probably have to get on a plane either that night or the next day. I would never see any good parts of Spain. I would see nothing. I don’t like museums but I would not get to see like you know old places I wouldn’t get a nice tapas experience. Paella, tapas..
Exactly.
So that’s what people think I do when I travel. They think I’m at the beach I’ve got the drinks you know I’m in the same hotel room just with a different postal code but that’s it. And it’s me, the stage, the people. And sometimes a nice meal with a friend but that’s it. And I can tell you that it gets old fast. Hotels get old fast. You don’t really can’t wait to get to my hotel room that no one says that. And so I designed a life that doesn’t do that as much. And some days easier. I am definitely jealous. I’ll see some friend. I’ll see them you know hanging out in Tokyo and I’ll say I want to go there but that’s OK, I’ll make that happen one day. For sure.
So in this lifestyle design, what’s a day in Chris Brogan’s life?
As many video games as I can play. Is that a good answer. You know I have such a variety. Everyone says that especially on this show. But I do a lot of writing, no matter what. So my business is writing I’m working on a book. So 2000 to 3000 words every day on that book. I’m writing a sponsored blog post for a small business company that sponsored a post on my Web site. I’m making a video of a course that I launched a little while ago so I have to make the next module for the course. I had a client call a little bit earlier and I have a client discovery call a little bit later to see if I might have a new client and I’m going to send lots and lots of emails to people saying hey boy give me some money, money would be great, we should work together and there’s stuff that no one likes to talk about.
You know the hard work part where you ask for sales and when you try to get on phone calls and make people give you their credit card. And so that’s what’s in my day.
That’s the less sexy part but the needed one. I can tell every listener that’s listening to this podcast that Chris replies almost, well I can say all his e-mails. This is for me staying human. Sometimes the pace of life makes you like forget where you come from. But the thing is since I’ve met you and not just from me I know people that just told me the same comment.
I mean no no Chris Brogan just answer me, I say yes, he’s answering you know, it’s another thing about staying human. And Chris do you have any special routine every day.
No. I’ll tell you, I don’t like routine. I think what happens. It’s taken me a long time to realize this. Do you know sometimes you think maybe you’re developing something or you’re working on something or you’re trying to adopt something and then one day you say huh I’m 47 years old. I will be 48 years old. I don’t do that it turns out you know. So one of them is routine and one reason I don’t have a routine very much anymore is not it’s not because lazy because I do many things. It’s because I think that routines make my mind shut off and I want my mind on. So I need to not try to do repetitive things because repetition to me in routines can be an enemy. I think repetition is great in business meaning can I repeat a performance. If someone expects a certain thing from me can I give that to them every time. Yes but drive to work the same way eat the same breakfast wear the same clothes. I think that’s all a bad plan with clothes by the way. It’s not that I plan anything. I have a box full of shirts a box full of pants and socks and underwear you know and I reach into each box and I have it done you know that’s how I do it. But but that’s those little pieces are as close as I get to a routine. I put my keys in the same place you know. So I don’t lose my keys but other than that I’m free.
Yeah. That’s a completely different concept to what we’ve been taught. Because routines for me, you challenged my mind right now because, and it’s good, thank you I’m thankful for that because it just opened a new paradigm for me because I’m following routines to be more efficient and more effective. But what is the payoff. What was the cost of doing this you know?
Yes. So another way to think of that is what if we used routines for love. What if that person we love that man that woman we love. We come to them and we say we touch their cheek and we say I love you so much. Come with me to the bedroom. That’ll be sexy the very first night. All right. If I said it five hundred times I touch your cheek I look in your eyes I love you so much Come with me to the bedroom. We do everything in the same order you know first the left then the right whatever. You know that would be terrible. Yeah. And so I think that just like romance the excitement no matter how married you are of catching the attention of someone and flirting.
We should flirt with our life. And to me that means not seeing what’s going on this world trying a pickup line but being alive with our with our life.
Wow yeah.
It is a really challenging assumption because we’ve been told so that the contrary. Thank you for that take it’s really really really powerful.
Chris, how did you see this high performance because you kind of work on helping people in some ways and how you do see high performance for ordinary people.
What practices are working for you Chris, for being like you know physically, mentally, being on the right track. That’s a very good question.
I feel that I’m low performance. I mean I wonder if that’s a one. I think that what we’re struggling and striving to attain that, I think it’s because we have models for that right. We do it because I don’t know we see Gary and we say oh look at Gary. He’s very exciting. He’s doing these things and we say maybe that’s how we should be. But I think that when we, we only kind of understand the word I can only use is called construct you know meaning like a model we only understand the model that we see. And so if we’re never presented with a different model then we don’t really get a chance to try anything new. And so I feel that instead of maybe looking to be the fastest something instead of trying to be the first something what can we fix in incremental ways or what can we do different in some smaller way that someone else is not doing. You know the problems that I’m looking to solve now with things like artificial intelligence and with chatbots and with internet of things some of them are very small problems but they amount to revenue great amounts of revenue if I can solve it in a way that competitors are not.
So maybe you know instead of thinking how do I do something fast, where’s an improvement that either improves velocity you know for the customer they get something faster that removes friction you know makes it easier for the customer to do something or that maybe even just gives connectedness which makes the customer feel like they’re part of something bigger than just that moment. And that’s kind of where I put my focus in my life like if I want to get better at a sport I used to try to follow very specific routines. Now what I do instead is I try to mix everything and I say today I will do classic weightlifting you know the very basic three lifts and then tomorrow I might do kettlebell because that’s different you know. But I think that I don’t think we need to be novel for novels sake. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m not saying you know eat at a different restaurant every day. But I am saying routine is the enemy. And if that is true then what? That’s the question listeners have to answer for themselves right. If routine is a bad idea what should we do instead.
I love that one.
And so when you get into customer, I saw your two podcasts Owner’s Mindset podcast and then Making The Brand podcast. What are you learning in each of them?
Because as much as you gave as much as you shared knowledge and utility and value to others what are you learning from each of them?
So podcasts are the best opportunity in the world to become a bandit a robber a thief. A podcast allows me to steal knowledge and information and wisdom from other people and make connections. So I should tell you that I canceled The Owner’s Mind. We stopped making it because that show has run its course I did one hundred and twelve episodes or so. So in Making The Brand I interview people from IBM and Honeywell and Stanley Black and Decker and I’ll have someone from Microsoft very soon.
Some of the brightest people on the Owner’s Mindset too.
Yes. And so what I learn from these people is you know I’ll ask questions that I need to know anyway. I stole this idea because again we’re going to be thieves now. I stole this idea from Tony Robbins. Tony Robbins, in 2009 I guess it was flew me to his house just to pick my brain.
But Tony did it on video. An internet course, yeah.
Yeah. He wanted to make a course called Internet Money Masters. And I was like go OK. And so he made this course and I came and gave him everything I knew for free. And he made you know hundreds of thousands of dollars. So I thought that was so smart. So I took his idea and now I ask people on my podcast for ideas, advice and I also ask them. I steal for my readers and listeners as best I can as well. And so I say pretend I’m a medium size company you know maybe I’m a moving company with five trucks. How do I learn about this block chain stuff so that I can compete with DHL or someone. How do I do that. And so that’s what I like to bring because I feel like if I can deliver a really quality idea to someone who’s participating in my show it makes the company person seem smart. Because of course they’ve just shared a good idea. But it makes the person I’m serving seem smart because they can use that idea and make their business better.
And then you take this knowledge and providing this knowledge in chunks. Yeah. In your blog and also in your workshops because you do powerful workshops. What is the most powerful workshop you have and why?
You know I have. Well maybe I want to answer everything the 20 minute plan one that I mentioned at the beginning. That’s one of my favorites. Very specifically because it’s teaching how to use your time in a better way and how to remove excuses. How do you stop making excuses for your business you know. And so I think that if there’s one thing I can do to help other people it’s I can help them not make so many excuses.
And Chris what do you think. What do you think that makes the projects you work on yours and unique.
What is your signature?
Oh I love your question the answer for me is just very very humanistic.
I try to make it so that it’s a real person obviously spoke with you like a real person would. It would be the same as you and I and some espresso or maybe a nice beer later, we would talk.
I would give you ideas you would have your notebook and when you’re done you would go home and make that into money for your business and and so that’s how I deliver. Mine are made to feel as close as I can. Like we’re just talking across the table even though there’s a screen between us and that’s I guess it.
Yeah. You’re feeling closer with the people you are working with. Yeah and my ideas, I mean if you I know this might be hard for your listeners especially because English is not their primary language but the phrases I use are the choices of words and how I build my sentences is different than my friends and it is unique as I can make it but also as familiar as I can make it to your thoughts. And so I try to deliver that way so that the information sticks in your head better. Because it’s different because it’s unique.
This is why your blog is kind of different to the other blogs. And it sticks to a lot of people as an audience. I try.
It used to be that they would love to steal and copy from me more but you know I’m not I’m an old man. So now they steal from other people I guess.
Chris Brogan, whats the habit that has helped you the most?
I love that question. Very rare do you hear me not answer quickly right.
Yeah.
I love that question. My best answer is a long time ago and learned and I can tell you I’m so sorry. I feel like I’m stuttering so much. I learned this better from my son. So my son who’s 12 now has autism and very highly functional though some people with autism they can’t communicate at all but communication and interface is the core set of problems that people with autism deal with. And so what I learned from my son is when he was much younger he had a bunch of speech impediments. You know his speech wasn’t very clear. He lisped a little bit and so he knew what he wanted to say but sometimes people didn’t comprehend what he was saying to them. And one thing he taught me and this is the heart of my habit my favorite habit is that my son learned how to ask for something in more than one way. So if he wanted a pencil but he couldn’t say pencil well enough that the person understood he would be smart even as a little little kid to say I want that thing you write with. And they would say oh like a pencil and he’d say yes. He said it the first time, they just didn’t understand his word and he learned to say it a different way until they understood not just heard. And to me that is what I do as much as I can is I try to be understood and I try to help others understand because there’s so many people just talking and I think that that makes me different.
And I think that’s a good habit is to practice helping people understand. And you need to listen, to really listen, and then you need to learn how to see the world differently.
And this requires a lot of awareness.
Yeah I would say I would say. Yes awareness and language and empathy too right because you know sometimes our words are the enemy.
Sometimes our words are what confused someone.
You know if I say well I said that I want us to be bandits and thieves. You know when we get information right someone may be very virtuous and they might say I’m no bandit I’m no thief I’m a very virtuous man I get people who come to my website or to my newsletter I have a lot of friends who are very religious and so they’ll send their religious friends to me saying oh Chris has this wisdom you might like. And then I will curse or say something that maybe upsets a religious person.
And of course I’ll have to get the letter that makes them very upset. And so in those moments I have opportunity because I can say either well that’s how I talk you know enjoy it or leave. And some days I do that because I’m mad or you know I feel too important. And then other days I say what if you could learn something whether or not the words were useful or the same words you would use. And sometimes that helps them realize something. And so it’s a very long answer to say that I think that when you help people understand and when you learn to understand them. So I curse less now for instance because I don’t want to spend my time apologizing for cursing. I want people to actually get the impact of my words.
And so if I don’t you know swear every three words then maybe I can just get more time to quit yeah you get it.
Yeah. You know I did an experiment that was 20 days is like doing a Vinyasa meditation but in the middle of civilization and I was 20 days without speaking, no words, nobody. And I learned so much about what you are saying right now. I mean you don’t need to talk so much that almost 90 percent of what you’re doing is rubbish for not saying shit.
Yeah. You get to know because you don’t talk until you listen. So you start developing empathy. I need at least one month every year for learning.
Isra do you not speak at all or you can only speak after you’ve listened. No speak at all during 20 days.
It was in 2016 in August. I did it for 20 days. Not talking with anyone even with my girlfriend back then. Well my ex-girlfriend, so we were having fights. I mean that you stand yes you understand that it doesn’t matter. Words are different than emotions are met with your gestures. You learn so much you love so much.
So yeah yeah I feel a kind of empathy with what you say. Chris one of the other things that I felt so resonant with you is your vulnerability and humanity, you’ve been always really close, open, transparent and mostly talking about your shit, that shit that usually people don’t take about even with their closest relatives, people don’t talk about this shit but why doing it in public? Can you elaborate on that.
It’s a beautiful question, for me it’s amazing.
Yeah. So I love the question for two reasons too. One is cultural. So in Spain of course machismo right like this is not okay. In Spain men are not supposed to say I have a weakness at all. You know at least classic machismo you know. Yes. So first off I challenge that but also the other part that I challenge is that I also think when I talk about things like mental health problems like I have depression basically that’s the part where skipping for someone who’s new.
I have very simple depression very mild depression but it’s depression.
When I talk about it I’m never talking about it because I want someone to feel bad I’m never talking because I want someone to do something different or why not for me ,it’s just to kind of indicate that that’s where I am right now in my my moment you know. And so I think that being too sensitive is bad. I think being too macho is bad. I think that communicating your status in a way that people understand what your capabilities are is the important goal. It goes right back to the last question about I think understanding is so important. And I’ll tell you the weird part about communicating one way that I learned about this more or one model or reason why I did this is because I pay attention to and I interview a lot of military special forces. And so with the military the Special Forces type units they have to operate at a very high level and they have to be very open about what they’re doing and how they’re doing in that sort of a thing. It’s not OK to to not communicate you know.
And not doing it in a vulnerable way.
Yeah. Yeah. And the reason that they have to communicate a lot of times is to say I don’t have, I’m incapable right now. You know they might say I don’t have the capacity to handle this right now or something. So it becomes important in that kind of business to say you know my legs broken I can’t defend this person right now you know. And so I think that that’s one of the ways that I learned how to do what I’m doing is because those special operators whether or not they want to admit a certain reality at a certain time it would be damaging to their mission if they didn’t. Does that make sense.
Yeah it does.
It does because it seems like let’s forget the fake or let’s take the fake or put it down and decide then let’s be real because this is not who we are.
Well yeah. And I don’t find any benefit to not explaining it. You know people say Aren’t you worried. People don’t want to work with you if you deal with depression. And I say no. If they don’t want to work with me after they hear that I deal with depression I think that’s good. That’s exactly right. No not even deserve. But you know I had a client meeting. It was a prospective client we did not have business yet for one hundred and eighty thousand dollars was was the ticket for this job. And my kids interrupted the call to ask me a question in the background. And I said Oh I’m so sorry. My daughter has a question and one person sighed and then another person said really in the background. And I heard this and I said oh you know what. I want to thank you for your time today on this call but I’m not gonna be able to work with you. I really love my children and I love people who love children. And if you have children I want you to be the kind of parent who would take a moment just to answer a question because it’s only a moment. So I don’t think we’ll be a good fit so let’s not work together. And I said no to almost two hundred thousand dollars and I feel so good because I know that I would have a very bad time working with that client.
It’s all about principles and values without them we have nothing as ?? already said we are only flesh and bones. Right. Chris Brogan here’s just a couple of rapid-fire questions. Yeah. What’s the person you admire the most and why.
My dad who is a very hard worker. He was very good at going to work whether or not you wanted to. He’s just a very hard working man.
He should be proud of you for sure. What is the most important lesson you have you ever learned.
Learn from your mistakes and don’t spend too much time worrying about them just try to figure out what to grow. If you are opportune to change something about yourself, What will it be? You know I would be just a little bit better with my fitness journey because I forget to care.
You are doing better than… When I started follow you and since now, well I just have to see the amount of hours you work in the gym because I was following so you were growing and increasing your journey. I was I slowed down a little though.
So you know my answer stands I wish I were a little bit better at that.
If you could switch jobs someone famous who would you pick? If I did what with someone famous sorry?
Sorry for my accent, my rusting English, told you.
If you could switch jobs someone famous who would you pick?
Just Wieden the guy directing the Marvel comic movies and the Star Trek and Star Wars.
I love that idea. Why.
You know because you get to play with so many big toys with imagination right. I mean multi-million dollar budget. Many actors. Convincing them to tell a story that you know where the story still matters and dialogue matters.
I think I would be so fun to have that many toys. What’s your favorite videogame?
Oh it’s a it’s a shooter game called Rainbow Six siege where various special operators from around the world get together to practice. What’s the podcast you love the most?
I have a few answers for this one I guess. So the one I listen to the most is how I built this by Guy Raz. I also love The Moth podcast which is a storytelling podcast. I love Jeff Brown’s read to lead podcast and my fiancee Jack just launched a podcast called Woman stuff and I love it just because I’m proud of her.
Thank you and I’m going to put all these recommendations in the show notes and also in the blog post. Chris what’s your favorite book.
Oh my favorite book for business probably would be Ender’s Game which is a science fiction book. And
What happened with the princess? With the princess you were present
Oh the question a hot Oh what a great day.
I don’t know why they invited me. I’ll be honest and I’m not being humble when I say that. So the three people went to this Alexis Ohanian who co-founded Reddit Dom Scola who is one of the early founders of Twitter and Chris Brogan a fat weird blogger. So you know one person helped found Reddit one person helped found Twitter and I type. So we went to the United Arab Emirates and it was Sheikh Zayed something foundation something-something. And the princess’ name is Sheikha Maryam and she is the granddaughter of Sheikh Zayed who founded the United Arab Emirates UAE like Dubai and Abu Dhabi and all that.
And her dad I think also called Sheikh said is worth like 7 Bill Gates’ or something he’s doing OK.
And and so I presented about technology and that sort of thing with these other two gentlemen. And the first meeting was with the princess and just women because that’s a thing in Muslim culture that sometimes it’s more appropriate to have a women-only part of an event and then to the greater assembly of people who are wanting to learn a little bit about maybe startup culture and that sort of thing.
And so it was a great time. I very much enjoyed the time I learned so much about the culture that I didn’t know.
And then this beautiful place. And Chris, if you had to give just one requested no I’m no sorry one not requested advice for anyone who is listening to this podcast.
What would it be this non-requested advice. You know I have the same answer all the time to this question. So you know if you were unfortunate enough to listen to one hundred podcast interviews with Chris Brogan which I would never ever do and I love me I see the same thing always which is be helpful. And the reason that is my advice is because when we start making mistakes in our life and our business it’s when we are by mistake we’re worrying too much about ourselves and we’re focused too much about ourselves.
And it’s not bad to take some time for you.
But I checked and if I pay myself as my own customer I don’t get as much money because it’s only the left pocket and the right pocket. So be helpful because that’s the only way that we make money in this world is if we help other people do something.
Here you go. Be helpful. This is a Chris Brogan on Disrupt Everything Podcast series. Chris Brogan, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the podcast. Thank you for your books.
Thank you for your career. Thank you for helping a lot of people around the world the way thank you for your blog and your podcast and all the things you you’ve been helpful with.
People like me and a lot of listeners for sure from those 40000 downloads a month. I’m sure a lot of people is following you and listening you and is writing your books, reading your book. So thank you Chris. Thank you for you.
Well danke and gracias and Obrigado. I’m very very very grateful to be of help. It’s so nice to connect in this way my friend after so many years of just talking you know at a distance it’s nice to sit down for a moment.
Thank you so much. Ladies and gentlemen you have Chris Brogan, routine is the enemy. Be helpful. Stay Human. Decide your life.
Say no. Create whatever you want to create. This is Disrupt Everything Podcast series. I’m your host Isra Garcia. This is the episode number 33. Can you believe it. 53? 33 33. Sorry. Oh 33. Yeah.
So. Here we go.
The journey continues because it always continues. Thank you Chris and thank you, to you too. This was Disrupt Everything.
By Isra Garcia. Find the risk, before the risk finds you.
Transcribe audio to text with Sonix, the best online audio transcription software
Sonix quickly and accurately transcribed the audio file, “#33 DEP – Chris Brogan.mp3”, using cutting-edge AI. Get a near-perfect transcript in minutes, not hours or days when you use Sonix, the industry’s fastest audio-to-text converter. Signing up for a free trial is easy.
Convert mp3 to text with Sonix
For audio files (such as “#33 DEP – Chris Brogan.mp3”), thousands of researchers and podcasters use Sonix as a simple software solution to transcribe, edit, and publish their audio files. Easily convert your mp3 file to text or docx to make your media content more accessible to listeners.
Best audio transcription software: Sonix
Researching what is “the best transcription software” can be a little overwhelming. There are a lot of different solutions. If you are looking for a great way to convert mp3 to text , we think that you should try Sonix. They use the latest AI technology to transcribe your audio and are one my