#123: Build Better Relationships: at Home, at Work, and at Play

Welcome to The Accelerated Investor Podcast with Josh Cantwell, if you love entrepreneurship and investing in real estate then you are in the right place. Josh is the CEO of Freeland Ventures Real Estate Private Equity and has personally invested in well over 500 properties all across the country. He’s also made hundreds of private lender loans and owns over 1,000 units of apartments. Josh is an expert at raising private money for deals and he prides himself on never having had a boss in his entire adult life. Josh and his team also mentor investors and entrepreneurs from all over the world. He doesn’t dream about doing deals, he actually does them and so do his listeners and students. Now sit back, listen, learn, and accelerate your business, your life, and your investing with The Accelerated Investor Podcast. 

Josh:  So, hey, everybody, welcome back to Accelerated Investor. Thanks again for joining me. Whether you’re at the gym, maybe in your car, you know, a lot of gyms are going to start to unpack. So when by the time you catch this, you might be back in the gym working out or maybe in your own home gym, going for a walk wherever you’re at. I just want to say I’m so grateful and excited to be able to share with you again. My guest for today is David Wood. David was on our podcast a few months ago. David is an expert coach, author and performance expert. If you didn’t catch the podcast, go back to Accelerated Investor and check out that episode that we released a few months ago. 

Josh:  David is a former consulting actuary with a Fortune 500 company. But he’s better known for becoming the number one life coach in Google. If you look up, Life Coaches owns one of the world’s largest coaching businesses. David is an amazing life coach, Neil with accelerated investor. There’s the tactics of real estate, the tactics of raising money. But you, as an entrepreneur and as a person, need to absolutely be performing at your best every single day to lead your family, your organization, your investing, and ultimately to have a great life. And so we’ve invited David to come back to talk about some new topics specifically related to COVID-19 and the Corona virus. So, David, thanks so much for making some time for us. Thanks for coming back on Accelerated Investor. 

David:  You’re welcome. Thanks, Josh. I’m happy to be here with you. And we’ve got Remy in the background. And I want to clarify something. Those claims to fame are historic. So I’m no longer number one on Google. I no longer have the world’s largest coaching business serving 150,000 coaches. But that is something I did. It was awesome. And now I’ve moved on and I’m working with CEOs, executives, business owners and sometimes prison inmates to up level both life and work when possible. 

Josh:  Perfect. And that’s exactly what we’re trying to do here as well. You know, we’ve got about a third of our topics and our guests are really around entrepreneurship. It’s around self-development, leadership. It’s around basically becoming a better version of yourself. And definitely this COVID-19 scare has changed the world. It’s changed the world and how we interact with each other, how we look at ourselves. It’s created a lot of just new habits, new things, some good, some bad. But one of the things we’re definitely not doing, David, as much is able to connect with people. We can’t shake hands and give people hugs and kisses and, you know, and just, you know, even share in the boardroom of a business around a close conference room table like we used to. 

Josh:  And so you’ve recognized this and you have some amazing training around really connecting with your team, your business, your family, sort of your bunker, your quarantine mates. And so that’s all we want to talk about today, is some specific ideas and strategies to not only on a personal level with family, but then also with your business mates, which could be your teammates at work, but also your investors, people that are investing with you. And how do you really share with them and connect with them in a virtual environment? So let’s just talk about this, David, from a high level perspective from a second. What are some of the challenges that you’ve seen in connecting when everyone’s kind of on lockdown? 

David:  Yeah, well, you know, I’m loading up a whole bunch of stuff as as I hear you speak. So it’s not just on lockdown. I want to make that point. I think most humans have an issue in deeply connecting with somebody else. I do. That’s how I was raised as an Australian guy in a country town. And, you know, the deepest connection I get is when we’ve both had eight beers and my mate, neither one I am standing in the park leaning against each other, a prop each other up when we talk about some real stuff. Right. Right now at work, what people will do in this day and age is they’ll get a Zoom call together and we’ll have a happy hour. 

David:  We’ll have some wine and beer because it’ll relax people. And that’s great. But it points to I think we generally have some issues being vulnerable and really connecting. If someone cries in front of you, you know, what most people do is try and get a tissue and try and stop it. Right. Right. There’s an opportunity for deep connection that we just we’re just not trained. So I just want to make the point. It’s not just here in. I’m sorry. During COVID-19. But it is true. We can’t have the handshake with our friends and extended family. We can’t have the hugs that we were having. So I do think it’s even more exacerbated. So those are some of the challenges that we’re facing generally. But let’s touch on it. You touched on why. Why would we bother? Why would we want to connect deeper? Right. One, I believe that as humans we need touch. They found that babies that aren’t touched at birth will die. 

David:  We need that touch.  We’re animals and we need that connection. So I think that’s important. And also, if you want to influence people, if you want your staff to like you and stick with you, if you want your teammates to respect you. If you want your customers to hire you, then this is one way that we actually have some positive influence over people. Is connection. Maybe, you know, and listeners, you’ll notice that if whenever you take the time to check in with a staff member about  their kid and how they’re doing, you know, it pays off when you take the time to ask a prospect about. Like how their day really went and what’s good and, you know, are there any challenges right now? And just really care about them. It feels good. And at the end of the day, it’s just good business. 

David:  And a friend of mine, Steve Farber, has written a book called Love is Just Good Business. Yeah. And I like that. Because we often don’t we won’t acknowledge that in the business world. No, we can’t use the word love. Hey, when someone respects you. That’s love. Right there. When a customer raves about you and says this guy or this woman, she is just awesome. That’s a form of love. So I just wanted to make the business case for why we would care about deep connection as well as the personal case. 

Josh:  Yeah. David, you know, it’s interesting, when I’m meeting with a new investor, I spent a lot of time raising capital and we manage, you know, almost 40 million dollars of private equity, private money. Actually have a relatively new investor from Australia, which is interesting considering your background. And when I met with him for the first time, probably the first 20 minutes of our call. I always position my calls when I’m raising capital, say, look, you know, I’m interested in building long-term relationships. And I’ll just say that because I’m looking to recruit money from you. I say that because whether you invest in my offering or not, whether you invest in my apartment, deal or not. Whether you invest in my private equity fund or not, is really immaterial to if I can make a new connection with somebody and if I can build a long term relationship with somebody, I can point you in the direction of maybe investing in something different. If this is not a fit for you, but if we’re a fit, if I care about you, I’m going to point you in a different direction. 

Josh: And also, the Securities Exchange Commission requires that we have a prior existing relationship with our investors before they invest with us. So I say, if it’s okay with you, I’m really going to just spend the next 15 or 20 minutes asking you a bunch of personal questions to get to know you better. So I ask him I start to ask about their family and their kids and their extended family and their work history. And then we get a little bit into their, you know, their investment tolerance. But I love to go off on tangents about personal stuff. And what I found is that the more I talk about that, the deeper I build the relationship, the more money they invest with us and the faster and sooner they invest with us. Other people did just want to go for the throat, right? They just want to like I want to pitch this guy my offer. I want to pitch this guy what I have to sell. I want to recruit money. 

Josh:  And that’s actually the route to recruit less money and have the guy be less interested is to go quickly. And so we’ve been using Zoom and go-to meeting in these online platforms to run our businesses since I had pancreatic cancer back in 2011. So we’re very used to the process of connecting virtually. So it’s very much something I believe in. And that’s why I was so interested to have you back on. And here some of your tips for how you think you can connect even better with family, friends, business contacts, you know, using virtual platforms, because we’ve done it for a long time. And I’m always interested in learning more about what other people think works for them. 

David:  Yeah. Well, I have three simple steps that anyone can practice and this will work on Zoom. And it’ll work outside of Zoom so you can use this face to face, you can use this one to one. And then we can talk about how you can actually do it on Zoom. So. And as you were talking about building that relationship, it had me think about a conversation I had this week with one of the top coaches in the world. And we got a phone call and he said to me, Do we know each other? Have we met before? I said, no. He said, well, then let’s introduce ourselves. And he did great. And he spoke for about two, three minutes about his life and what matters to him. And gave a really great introduction, was very colorful. And he said, so, you know, tell me your story. Tell me about you. Not many people will ask you that unless it’s on a podcast interview. Yeah. And I just was beaming, as he said, let’s introduce each other. And we had these ten minutes. And I got to tell my story. And he was interested in some questions. And I thought, man, this guy is bonding with me. This guy is building a connection. And I walked away from that call liking him. And, you know, I’m gonna say, who would be really happy that I mentioned his name. Marshall Goldsmith is his name. So here I am promoting Marshall Goldsmith now on a podcast because he had me like him. 

David:  I love the guy. So here are three simple steps you can use to connect with anyone. You can practice this with your wife, your husband, your kid. Right. You’ve got a 15 year old who doesn’t tend to talk to you because I’ve got other things that are more important. Yeah, try it out. I hear the three steps. One is curiosity. Two reflection. And then three, this is four bonus points. You don’t have to remember this, but if you if you like to get extra points, impact, share, impact. So here’s how it would look. The curiosity is ask, like navigate as if you a five year old and you just want to know about them. 

David:  We used to be so curious as kids and then we’ve lost it. I lost it. But if you really just you say to them, can I just spend a few minutes asking you questions about you? I don’t even know what they are yet. I’m just going to see what comes to mind. And most people are gonna be like. Yeah, yeah, let’s do it. And then ask him some questions like like Josh and then ask you something right now, I don’t know what it’s gonna be. You’re ready. Yeah. All right. Let’s see. What’s put the biggest smile on your face in the last couple of weeks? 

Josh:  Well, in the last couple days, the haircut that I just got, it was actually great, David, to be in the barbershop. Just today is Thursday. I think we’re recording. I was in the barbershop on Tuesday night and the barbershop, just a bunch of dudes, this older Italian guy that owns it and they’re all just talking shop. And I brought my son in there, Dominique, who’s eight years old. He loves to get his haircut. And his grandfather used to cut his hair. So we go to the barbershop. It’s sort of a bonding, used to be a bonding family connection time because it was my father in law, me and my son. So three generations hanging out together. And he doesn’t come here anymore. 

Josh:  But Dominic has he’s very fond of the barbershop. And so to go in there and look Dom was able to have his haircut super short. So I get to see the big smile on his face. The owner of the shop, you could tell even the business had been closed for eight or 10 weeks. And he’s reopened and he’s happy. He’s got customers lined up out the door. And everybody was just really fun. Everybody was really excited to be in the shop, just kind of talking shop. And so just this week, that’s probably what put the biggest smile on my face that was new. You know, my wife makes me smile often my kids, but something totally different that I hadn’t done for almost two or three months was go to the barbershop. So, yeah, it’s interesting. Thanks for asking me. I just I’m smiling just because you asked. Right. This is full of fun to talk about. 

David:  Yes. See that you seem really lit up and it sounds like you had like a really amazing father son experience and not just father and son, but you’ve got the guy who’s opened up the shop. It’s got the new customers in? It sounds like a really uplifting, connecting experience. 

Josh:  Yeah. Yeah, it was. And I gave the give the barber a huge tip. Probably the biggest tip I’ve ever given to a barber in my life, because, guys, I don’t know if he’s made any money in the last eight or 10 weeks. So I just felt good. It felt good to talk to him again and see what was going on with his life and leave him a big tip. And I hope, you know, hope that was made him feel good, you know, made him feel like he was, you know, needed and loved, you know, to some degree, because it was just it was it just felt good. It felt good to be out of the, you know, out of the house, in the car. You know, I had a call ahead because they had a line out the door and kind of take a number and wait. And then they text me back and, you know, they all had their masks on. And, you know, we’re just navigating the thing as best we can. But yeah, man. It felt good to get a haircut. How about that? It looks like you got a haircut, too, huh? 

David:  Yeah. Yeah, I do. So hearing you speak, I noticed that I’m beaming, you know, as I see you lit up. You seem so passionate. It’s made a difference to my day because I’m just feeling like I’m feeling good about that. And also, as you paint the picture of the community coming together, that feels uplifting to me during this pandemic. So let’s break it down. What just happened between us? Yeah. And we can call this the curiosity game with three steps. First thing I did is I asked you a question and I just tapped in. I just waited, checked in. And I’m like, oh, you know, I notice a smile on your face and wondering what’s had, you know, lit up recently. So I just ask that. It’s not the right question. It’s just the right question for me at that time. All that matters is that you actually want to know the answer. Right. So that’s curiosity. And we can also call that the listening portion because you spoke. I didn’t cut you off. I just listened. I’m like, this is a win. This is great. If we had more time on what have said, tell me more about it. You don’t end up with a couple of questions. So that’s stage one. And then the second thing I did, did you notice what I did? And you remember step two, I’m testing now I’m put you on the spot. 

Josh: So the first part was curiosity. The last part was impact. Yes, the middle part was, oh man remind me. I missed it. 

David:  Reflection. So I said to you. So it sounds like you had a father and son bonding experience. I said, you seem lit up by it. Right. I’m naming I’m naming that mouse, which might get into delight. I’m naming the thing in the room. You seem like this. And also, it sounds like the community was coming together. You’ve also got this guy who’s opened up the store for the first time and people coming back. So I’m reflecting to check that I got it right. So, you know, I was actually hearing you. And then third. And then the third step was impact. And most humans, I think we tend to skip this. This was a new step for me in the last couple of years to learn how was I impacted by listening to you. And it’s like seeing that you’re all lit up and then you’re smiling. I notice I’m smiling, right? That’s the impact I’m noticing. 

David:  I’m feeling uplifted by this story. And I love seeing your passion. I’m just talking about a haircut. This was awesome. Yeah. Right. So these simple three steps. Asking someone from actual curiosity. It’s not something on a list. It’s not something to get to somewhere. It’s like I actually want to know this and then reflect it back. I want to check if I got this right. And then the third step for bonus points. And that’s a little bit more advanced, but it’s not that hard impact. How were you impacted? I used to hate this step because we do this game in workshops and I’d be like, I have no curiosity. I don’t want to know about this person. That was a challenge for me. I had to dig. 

Josh:  Why do you think, David, so you know, with all this pandemic talk over the last eight to 10 weeks that has just taken over the world from social media and Facebook and Instagram and Twitter and the news, the popular news, the fake news, whatever you want to call it, that’s all everybody wants to talk about. But that’s bled into our personal lives where if I if I went back and looked at, like, my phone, my text message thread and my wife’s phone and her thread, you know, mine with my friends and business contacts, my wife with her other mom friends, a lot of them at my kids’ school, you know, you’re going to see my buddies with a lot of stupid jokes and funny memes and weird stuff that they do. Like because we’re really immature, even though we’re 40 ish years old, really just a bunch of goofballs. 

Josh:  And then but what other discussion is just around all of the surface-y, stuff around what’s going on with school? And did you hear about what Trump said and did you hear about this and that? And people are very blue or red. It’s either you’re either right or left. There’s not really much of this deep conversation even to the level that you and I just got, because you asked me a very just curious question. And frankly, like, I don’t know if I’ve really seen much of that at all in the last eight to 10 weeks, even in my own life, because I don’t know that other people are not taking an interest in me or maybe I’m not taking as much of an interest in them or we don’t want to make the extra effort. Well, you know, why is it so many of these conversations are so surface, see, and nobody goes as deep as we just went over a haircut, right? 

David:  Yeah, well, we suck at it. If we look and I’m going to include myself in this, I’m the coach and I’ve been asking questions for 20 something years of people. I have the ability to go deep with somebody. But it’s not natural. So what I did is I wrote an app and I wrote an app because what happened is I went to a games night and we sat down. It’s called authentic relating games night. And they gave us a couple of questions to ask each other. And these questions were something like that were deeper questions than we’d normally use in society, deeper questions. And I would have come up with questions like, what don’t you want me to know about you? 

Josh:  Oh, man. 

David:  Right. I did not want to be there that night because I was very tired. I just wanted to get out of there. I was looking at my watch. Within five minutes of asking that question of this guy, I was in tears. I felt like this guy was my brother because he’d shared something that could have been me speaking. Yeah. And I was like, I was feeling love. I’m like, how did that happen in five minutes? And I realized I need a prompt like that if I’m gonna go deeper with people. So I wrote this app. It’s called Get Real. Anyone can download it and get real dot life. It’s a free download. And it comes out with questions that even I would not want to come up with if I’m sitting with you. Even so, let’s say you’re having a beer. It’s just weird for me to just bust out with. Josh, what would you say to your younger self if you could travel back in time 20 years? It’s just a bit weird, but if I say, do you want to play a game? It’s a simple connection. Game could get real. It’s got some. Everybody wants to play a game. 

David:  Yeah. Yeah. And we busted open. In fact, I’m going to open it up right now. And can I ask you a question, Josh? Now, why this is great for listeners is because if you aren’t naturally curious about someone and you don’t actually come up with deep questions like me, then this app can do it for you. You can say to a prospect or a client. I found this really unusual game. It’s got some pretty thought-provoking questions. You want to try it out? And then I’m opening up the game and I’m going to go to just mitt. So this is a little bit lighter. And the key is you scroll through until you find a question you actually want the answer to. Do not pick the first question. It sucks if you pick the first question, you’ve got to care about the answer. Otherwise, it’s not curiosity. So, all right. I’m going to go with the one of the first one I looked at because I like it and this question is, Josh, what should the warning label on you say? 

Josh:  That’s a great question. 

David:  Let’s say you and I are possibly going to become friends. Yeah. Well, what would a good warning label be? What would I need to know about you? 

Josh:  Yeah, that’s great. The warning label on me would say that I definitely judge people pretty quickly. That I’m often very wrong. I often will get into a conversation. I feel like I’ve got a lot to say and I’m always right and pretty educated and I’m successful in business. And so I tend to not give people enough time to really learn the true person and who they are and what’s important to them. And I make some snap judgments and I know that that is something I need to do a better job of. 

David:  All right. So I’m hearing you are quick to make judgments about people and you may be later proven wrong, but you’re just very fast to make a decision about them. 

Josh:  Yeah, absolutely. And usually it’s you know, it’s usually an opinion that’s not always great. Like, I don’t always be like snap judgment, like, oh, that guy is awesome. That girl is unbelievable. I tend to tend to find the negative in people. And so I’ve had to recondition myself to think like, man people are good people. And in general, everybody wants to just take care of themselves, take care of their families being prosperous. Be happy. Be positive. And so even if I didn’t find the good in them quickly, I need to give them more time. And I’m probably going to find a lot of good in them. But I make a lot of snap judgments for sure. 

David:  While hearing that, I notice that I feel impressed by a self-awareness. A lot of people don’t know that about themselves. And if they did not, they wouldn’t share it. Yeah, that people say, I feel impressed by your spiritual intelligence and has me like you more. 

Josh:  Yeah, that’s great. So within the app, this get real dot life app when I’m on the I’m on the Web page as I have it up on my computer here as we’re recording the podcasts. So there’s a there’s a section for just met flirting friends, couples, kids and team building. So great. So if you’re not like a conversationalist, you’re not sure what to ask to go a little bit deeper. I love the idea that you’ve built in a bunch of these kind of thought-provoking questions that give people a little a little bit of a nudge to help them. 

David:  Yes. So we talk about some ways people can use it. And particularly on Zoom, you can use it with your clients. You can use this with different kinds of connections. But first, I want to unpack a little bit what we just did with the game, because what I did is a simple version of the game is you just ask a question, ask you a question, you answer it. I say thank you. I pass the phone to you. You flip through and you find one. And it’s great to see people’s faces because they go Ooooh. and then and then they ask it. So I did that. But then I also did, I’m wondering if listeners caught it. I did the next two steps that I suggested, which are reflection and then impact. I said so. So you make snap judgments on people and you know, you might be proven wrong. I reflected back to chat and a check. I got it right and say, you know, I’m listening. And then I shared impact. And a great couple of words to segue into impact is hearing that. 

David:  Those are magic words, they’re relational connecting words. Hearing that. I find and then I say whatever comes and, you know, sometimes is no impact. And you got you’ve got nothing. But I found that I was like, if I checked in, I was like, oh, that guy knows himself. And he’s willing to tell me I feel closer to him and I trust you more. So it’s just such a wonderful thing because people want to impact the world and they want to know generally, particularly if it’s positive, they want to know how they’ve impacted you. If you tell me something and I don’t tell you how I’m impacted and then I say some stuff and you don’t tell me how you’re impacted, we’re just skipping being relational, that’s all. Yeah. We’re just two billiard balls bouncing off each other. And I think that’s the normal human experience. This is a powerful way that we can change that. So shall we talk about how we can use this on Zoom? 

Josh:  Yeah, absolutely. Because things are unfreezing and thawing, but we’re gonna be in a whole different world. We’re in a lot of companies are just permanently going to work from home. A lot of employees might be able to work from home 60, 80 percent of the time and report to the office a lot less. So zoom or go to meeting Skype. These are all going to be part of the fabric of how we run businesses and also how we communicate with our family and friends. You know, think about it this way, David. You know, my father has advanced Parkinson’s. My mom is very spry. She’s 73 years old. And thank God my dad is not in a nursing home because there’s all these outbreaks of COVID in nursing homes and those people are really almost, you know, locked in and they’re in trouble. 

Josh:  But here’s what it’s the problem. It’s created on a personal level is like, I can’t go hug my father. I can’t go sit in my father’s living room. And I can’t try to engage with him. And, you know, and he’s also got some dementia that’s starting to present itself. And so I want to spend as much time with him as I can now because I’m not going to have it forever. But I physically can’t do it because we’re still social distancing or trying to take care of his health. And so this what we’re talking about now is using Zoom to have that deeper conversation, because even on a personal level, we might not be able to just walk into each other’s living rooms like we used to. So this has a lot of usefulness in business and personal relationships on a go forward basis. So, yeah, let’s talk about it. 

David:  Yeah. OK. So let’s take the personal first. Look, if you’re right, you’re in a quaran-pod right now with family or friends, then you can just bust out this app. It’s again, it’s a free download. If you pay two dollars, you get like 400 more questions. But the free download gives you plenty of questions and just busted out, say, let’s play this game and we’re going to play it. You just say, let’s play it for 30 minutes and add a simple version is pick a question you love, ask it and then pass the phone right now with you. You want to connect more with your dad. This is a way you can love your dad and express love. Let’s play this game. I met people with their parents. I know are wondering how can I connect a little deeper? You know, my dad just talks about the weather. How do we go deeper? Well. Bust this out. Now, if you can’t physically see your dad, you’re gonna be on zoom. It would be best if he can download it, too. So you’ve both got the app and then you just say you ask a question and then it’s his turn. Perfect. 

David:  That’s the simple version. If not, you can maybe send him a few questions ahead of time because, you know, my dad is not technologically literate. He’s not going to be able to use an app. But I could email him some questions ahead of time. And then we can just bounce off each other. And let me just give you another one here. What would you like people to say about you at your funeral? Oh, wow. That’s a good question. Yeah. You get to learn about people. So this is a way you can love him. Now, let’s talk about Zoom in general with groups. And by the way. What an opportunity, a nudge right now to go and connect with a bunch of people that you haven’t connected with. When I had a few connection calls over Zoom early on during the pandemic, I was like, oh, this is this is really good. And it started I started wondering, why hasn’t my high school done this? Mm hmm. 

David:  We couldn’t get a reunion together for the last 15 years. Why the hell hasn’t someone said, hey, I’m going to be on Zoom at this time? Who wants to come and do 60 Minutes together? So I went and set up a I call for my class of 84 and then I’m a member of something called the Transformational Leadership Council, which is a group of thought leaders. And we get together once or twice a year to come together as a family. But it cost a lot of money to fly around the world and go and take a week out and do all that right. Why do we have a Zoom call every couple of months? And so I pitch that and I held the call and it went really well. Here you go. So and then my family, I haven’t been to a family reunion for years and years, and I live in a different country. How is it? It never occurred to me or anybody. Let’s just have a Zoom call for 60 Minutes. So I did it. We all showed up. We all had a great time. And someone’s like, we should do this weekly. I said, well, slow down tiger. That might be a little bit too much, but this is an opportunity to bring together groups that you may not have brought together. 

David:  Now, let’s say you’ve done it. You’ve got a group that might be a group of prospects that might be bringing your clients together. It might be a team building talk. It might be a regular meeting that you have with your team. Here are some simple things you can do. And I’ll go back to the three steps. Curiosity, reflection and impact. So simple version. Firstly, the principle of focused attention is so beautiful in groups. And you need it in zoom in particular. If you’ve just got different people talking at a family reunion or the networking thing. That’s good and that’s valuable. But when you stop and slow it down and one person gets the limelight. That’s a beautiful thing. Someone did it at my birthday party. And just said, can I have everybody’s attention? I want to go around the room and just have everyone say, what brought you here tonight? Yeah. Oh my goodness. I’ve got goose bumps. Yeah. Wow. It was so connecting that we all got to have because it’s a common experience. 

David:  Now we’re all having the experience of listening to Jim. Right. And Jim gets to speak and Jim gets to be heard by everybody. So that’s the first simple thing you can do. Go around the room. If you’ve got, say, less than twelve people go around the room. Everybody gets a minute or two to answer a prompt. And look, you can do. You could go with a prompt from the get real up. What would you like people to say about your funeral? Or you can pick a lighter question. It could be something like. You know what am I most looking forward to even during the pandemic? Right, something uplifting. Yeah. Or just a general check-in. What are you arriving with is a great thing? So people get to just release. You know, I’ve just been stressed. Whatever. I’m looking forward to chilling now with you guys, whatever. So the principle of focused attention is one simple thing you can do. And then a second thing, which is such it is so easy. Breakout rooms. If you haven’t discovered them yet. On Zoom give people a chance to interact. And have them, you know, I’m going to break you all now into the rooms of two. And here’s a question for you to answer to. Ask each other. And, boom, just bust out something from the app. 

Josh:  Yeah. Love it. I love the idea, I’m thinking in my head, as you’re talking about, like my own team. In the last eight to 10 weeks at the office, we haven’t really had, like, a big team meeting or talked about anything personal, you know, rumor here at the office and everyone’s around and going to the coffee and this and that. And morning, afternoon. People start time out like real personal stuff, like somebody just got married or engaged and somebody else is pregnant and going to have their second kid. And that those things are coming up. And as we’ve had our business meetings on Zoom the last eight or 10 weeks and everyone’s working from home, those personal interactions and questions are just less and less and less. Because it’s like, OK, we’re on the line. We kind of have an agenda. We’ve got to get this meeting done. We’ve got 30 minutes or an hour to get it done. Let’s just jump in. And I haven’t really done a great job. Kind of reflecting while we’re recording here on this podcast. I haven’t really done a great job of, you know, asking new questions and having people have an opportunity to talk about personal things. And really like we talked about the beginning, you know, it’s those personal connections that want have people say, but I love this business. 

Josh:  And what you really want as a CEO is for the group to say, I love working for Josh. I love working for this company. Well, the reason why they love it is not because the work that they do, it’s typically because of the interaction with the other people as the reason why they love the company. So it’s the conglomerate of the mishmash of all the people that makes the company. And people love the company because they love the people. And in the last eight to 10 weeks, been very difficult for people to kind of connect on that personal level. So as we’re thinking here and talking like I’m reflecting that. Wow, like I wonder if people really love working here like they used to, because we haven’t had any of that personal conversation, so as I look at the get real that life app, I keep looking at the team building one. The little team building dot and thinking, God, we got to have a Zoom call with just our people, do it as a team building. It’ll be fun. There’ll be some weird questions or some things that are off the cuff thatpeople aren’t used to talking about for the last eight to 10 weeks. And that’s what provides and creates the connectivity. So we’re gonna have to do this and use it as soon as possible because I think I feel like we’re missing that. This gives us a real tactical way to bring everybody back together. 

David:  Yes. And if so, if you want to do a team building call, you can either have someone come in and facilitate it for you or take people through the three steps that I mentioned so you can. You can use the get real app as the initial question. And maybe that’s the first round. The people just get used to that. But then you can add on steps two and three have people when they hear the answer. Have them practice reflecting. And maybe that’s round two and then maybe for round three, they do reflect and then they share impact. Hearing that from you, this is how I feel. It’s a beautiful thing. And Josh, you said it so well. I’m going to use some different words. Companies tend to be too transactional. Someone said to me once, David, you can occur as very transactional. 

David:  And I was so confused because my question was. What else is there? What do you mean? What are you talking about? And what I got to realize is the masculine and I’m very left brain and masculine in my energy. I just. Let’s get shit done. Like here we are. Come on. Boom, boom, boom. We’ve got ten minutes for this. What’s the most efficient way to do it. What do you need? What do you need? Go. Let’s go. Right. I’m a very get it done kind of guy. And what was happening is I was missing the person. I wasn’t taking a little time out. Just purely for the sake of relating. And so I think companies might get a little hung up if they’re anything like me on just being transactional. And that’s valuable. We need that. 

David:  We need the transactional but let’s be aware of when we’re being transactional, when we’re being relational. And take a little time out. Hey, I want to take a couple of minutes just to get to know you before we start talking business. Is that alright? Hey, before we get into what needs doing, Can I ask you about how your kids doing? And your wife? I’ve got a client whose wife got COVID-19. Right. Take a little time to be relational. So now I’m choosing when to be relational. And then I might be like. I’d love to. I’d like to get into this more. And I know we’ve only got 20 minutes left. Is it OK if we start talking business? Yeah. Now, I’m asking I’m setting context and being relational about the fact that now I want to be transactional. 

Josh:  David, you know, it’s interesting. I want to make this comment and then we’ll get to wrap it up here. This has been great. These three steps have been great. The guys get, you know, check out the app. Get real life. Download that if you don’t, to kind of stir your mind. Create deeper questions, create deeper understanding. I want to make this observation. When I was twenty-four or twenty-five years old, I was a financial adviser. I was series six, License, Life and Health. I sold, you know, retirement plans and estate planning and insurance and mutual funds and IRAs and things like that. It’s been great for my real estate practice to have that background as a financial advisor. But what I’m observing now is I used to take a mentor of mine, a guy that another sales guy was you know, he was in his middle 50s. He was always the top producer in the office. His name was Dan. He had a red Corvette. 

Josh:  And Dan, when I went on appointment with Dan, like if I had a big whale client that I wanted to land, I would often bring Dan and I would sit with Dan at the office or at the dinner table with Dan and Dan would bullshit with these people for like an hour. And I’m like, God, he’s driving me nuts. When is he going to get to asking them questions about their portfolio? When is he gonna get to the questions by asking them about their retirement plans or their accounts and their IRAs and rollovers and insurance and long-term care? And Dan would just talk like all the stuff that you’re referring to. He was so good at just talking and asking questions and laughing. And I was always like, how the hell does Dan get all these amazing clients? And now I look back and think that was the way that he got all those amazing clients was Dan spent the time, you know, Dan would only have like two or three appointments a day. I was going to have like five or six appointments a day. 

Josh:  Well, Dan was investing in those people through getting to know them on a deeper level. And that’s why he had such a big business and had so many clients and had such a huge portfolio of money that he managed and had clients he was helping was because now that I think about it, the client felt like Dan cared. Because Dan went so deep with all these questions. Dan didn’t have to ask a bunch of questions about what did they want to get a rate of return or mutual funds or annuities, because when Dan was done with them, they were just like, I love Dan. Dan can have all of our money. Dan can manage all of our cash. He can handle our retirement accounts because people felt like Dan cared. I had it totally wrong 20 years ago. And now as we’re talking through this, you know, it just allows me to reflect on the fact that that was the secret sauce. 

Josh: That’s why Dan had such a big business. And that can apply to all of us. So if you want to be more connected as a husband, as a father, as a son, as an uncle, and be more connected on a don’t just show up and be transactional, don’t just show up at the picnic, ask the questions if you’re raising private money, if you’re a real estate deals, spend extra time asking all these questions. And don’t be transactional in your questions, but go deeper. And if you need some help again to get real life at, it’s going to give you some tactical ways and some good questions to ask. So, David, man, I’m just having a great question. I’m just I’m loving this interview because it’s giving me some real, real ways for me to go deeper with my friends and family and clients. 

David:  I love hearing that and that Dan’s story was perfect. And the fact that you sitting there. Why isn’t he asking them about their portfolio? All right, that’s the masculine energy saying we’ve got to get shit done. I love that. Let’s honor that. But then there’s that other side, which is who is this person? Right. Dan was loving them. That’s what he was doing. And love is just good business. Now, I wouldn’t suggest that everyone has to take that on. That was Dan’s style that worked for him. But if you’re anything like me, you can head in Dan’s direction and take a page out of Dan’s book. Yeah. And just enjoy them. And there’s still plenty of time to get stuff done. Hey, can we talk business now and or shall we talk business now? It’s a beautiful context. 

Josh:  That’s fantastic. Well, David, listen, this has been an amazing interview. Just a great time. Thanks so much for coming back on and sharing some new insights for all of our listeners and viewers. Go to get real dot life. Download the free app that will help you, you know, come up with new questions to go way deeper with your clients, family and friends. David, as we as we kind of wrap up here, is there any other way for people to connect with you? Reach out to if they want to get more information? Yeah. 

David:  I have a couple of invites. One is if you’re interested in one on one coaching, I don’t work on just business or just life. It needs to be both. And if you want both to be better, then request a session with me at play for real life. So the other the other link is for the app. But play for real life. There’s a big request, a session button. And if you’re seriously interested in coaching, I don’t charge to do an initial session with you. I’ll create a plan for your life and business with you. And maybe that’s all you need. If we both believe that coaching can have a big impact on your life and business, then we’ll talk about setting up coaching. And another invite I have is I do tough conversations, trainings for teams, because if you don’t learn the truth about what your people are thinking, your company is not going to make it in the coming recession or depression, whatever it’s going to be. We need to know what people are thinking. We need to make it safe enough for them to be able to speak up. So I do trainings in tough conversations and also we do spot coaching as part of the program because some people can’t afford a one on one coach for every team member. But as needed, when they’ve got an issue they don’t know how to resolve with someone on the team, boom, they book a session, maybe even the same day. And so reach out to me about that and you can do that or play for real life. 

Josh:  David, listen, thanks so much for coming back on Accelerated Investor. 

David: My pleasure. This is a blast. I’m having a good time.

You’ve been listening to Josh Cantwell and the Accelerated Investor Podcast. Leave a comment on our iTunes channel and let us know what you want to learn next, or who you’d like Josh to interview. While you’re there, give us some five-star rating and make sure to subscribe so you can be the first to hear new episodes. Follow Josh Cantwell and his companies, the Strategic Real Estate Coach and Freeland Ventures on all social media platforms now and stay up to date on new training and investment opportunities to start your journey toward the lifestyle you’ve always dreamed of. Apply for coaching at JoshCantwellCoaching.com.

If you want to influence people, have your staff like you, or your customers to hire you, then you need to connect with other people. Moving beyond the transactional relationships that many of us get stuck on will take some retraining of your brain, and David Wood is here to teach us three simple steps that will help us connect with other people.

Maybe it’s the pandemic, or maybe it’s just modern life, but a lot of us just aren’t connecting beyond the superficial surface anymore. Funny memes and political jokes shared between friends aren’t enough to help us truly connect with each other. It’s not just on lockdown, but most of the time people have an issue connecting with other people. It’s hard to get vulnerable.

As a life coach, author, and performance expert, David wanted to help people find a way to let their guard down and build stronger relationships everywhere in their lives. Whether you’re still social distancing, on Zoom conferences all day, or stuck at home with your family members, David’s new Get Real app can help you let your guard down with the people you care about.

When I share something, and then you share something, but we don’t talk about how we’re impacting each other, we’re just two billiard balls bouncing off each other. We’re skipping that connection that’s so necessary for two human beings. Curiosity, reflection, and impact are crucial steps in the conversation.

If you’re craving more connections, or if you’d like the chance to strengthen your team even during virtual work, David’s Get Real app can help you slow down and really see your teammates. Share some love in your life, and watch their faces light up.

What’s Inside:

  • The principle of focused attention in a group is a beautiful thing.
  • Three important steps to reconnect with your coworkers or friends.
  • David models what a meaningful conversation looks like.
  • The lesson my old coworker Dan taught me about conversation and making deals.

Mentioned in this episode​

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