A Family Affair: What Your Brand Says About You

[00:00:19] Hello everyone and welcome to another edition of the Can You Hear Me podcast. I'm Eileen Rochford, CEO of the marketing and strategy firm The Harbinger Group. Rob Johnson And I'm Rob Johnson, president of Rob Johnson Communications. As you know, we like to talk about building a brand that is authentic to you and resonates with the marketplace. And while we will be discussing that topic today, we will take it in a slightly different direction. Our guest today runs his marketing and branding firm, Modern SBC with his sister and has for many years.

[00:00:49] Rob Johnson That's right. Let's welcome to Can You Hear Me, Kevin Connor, principal at Modern SBC, where I believe you have run and owned the firm for more than 25 years. Is that right, Kevin? Kevin Conner We have. So I've been with the same company since May of 1988, Eileen, and I've been the owner since June of 99. So 27 years this year. Rob Johnson That was fantastic. Rob Johnson Yeah. Well, welcome to the show. We're very grateful to have your expertise and you on our show today. But just to kick things off,

[00:01:19] Rob Johnson We always like to start by hearing our guests' origin stories so that our listeners can get a sense of the expertise you're bringing to our conversation and kind of how you got where you are in your professional journey. How's that sound? Kevin Conner That sounds fun. Great. So I'll give it to you. You're looking at probably one of the worst finance majors at Temple University ever graduated. Rob Johnson Right.

[00:01:41] Rob Johnson Because I took my first marketing class second half my senior year and found out that I was probably in finance for the wrong reason and always had a liking for marketing. Believe it or not, I just, as I shared before, so I used to watch Bewitched a lot as a kid. And if you remember, her husband, Darren, was in advertising. So I'm this eight-year-old fat kid stuffed my face with Fritos and soda just watching TV and I'm paying more attention to him.

[00:02:03] Rob Johnson I didn't know why though. So it was kind of like parked up in my head. I've just always been interested in consumers and what urges, what influences people to buy certain things. So I love going to grocery stores where you've got basically about 45,000 items on there and just watching people. Like how do they choose? Because that's me. I'm doing the same thing. Right. You just want detergent or food or candy or vegetables. You're just watching. It's kind of fascinating. I think everybody's got this lab right around them for just learning about marketing and branding and how it all works.

[00:02:30] So that was a very long answer, a very short question. My apologies, but that's what we were looking for. We're looking for the backstory there. So let me ask you the question that I think we all want to hear a little bit about. And that is how you decided to go into business with your sister. First of all, what's her name and how that sibling collaboration has worked out for you? How did you decide, yes, we should do this together?

[00:02:54] Great question that. Diane is her sister, as my sister's name, my apologies. And we came together. We were in similar businesses and she had a business of her own. And when I called myself a desperatepreneur, I did not set out to be an entrepreneur, but the business was going to be for sale and the previous owner wanted to sell. And I had a wife and three kids at home with a brand new mortgage, a brand new house. And six weeks later, he said, I'm going to sell the company.

[00:03:16] So I said, okay. And I wonder what it might be like to own the company myself because he already had a buyer. He said, go meet the buyer. I came back. I'm like, man, I'm not the smartest day, but maybe I can do what he's going to do. And put it together, put a team together, myself and another guy. And we bought the other partner out about 15 years ago. So it's me and my sister. So Diane and I are two of seven kids. We are numbers four and five right in the middle. Sometimes it's like we like to think that we're the diplomatic ones in the middle.

[00:03:43] So maybe, maybe not. But so it became to be together. She said, you know what, you're going to buy a company. Why don't I just fold my business in and we'll just have one company together. So that's what we've done since then. What was her business that she was doing? I'm curious. We did a lot of, we were print distributors. So she dealt with a lot of banks and nursery and resale. So we did a lot of print. We sold print.

[00:04:06] So what made you think, let's, let's go into this. Let's do this together. Why not? What gave you that notion? Opportunity was there because it was, we needed to, we needed to come up with some cash and we were taking on investors. So, and she had an idea and I always got along with my sister. It's interesting. So I'll tell people that story. And invariably, I see them look up into the right in their eyes. And I say, I know what you're thinking. They're like, what do you mean? I said, you're thinking, could I go into business with my brother or sister?

[00:04:33] And they're like, how did you know that? Like, well, I've seen that look a thousand times, right? You just got everybody's interested in that. I never really thought about it that much. And call me ignorant. I don't know. We're naive, but I just kind of said, no, what could go wrong here? When you're 20, you know, I was 30, what could go wrong here? Well, lots of things. Now there's, there's, we've come across family business organizations and the stories we hear are just like, wow, a lot of stuff. Money and power can do interesting things to people, right? And when you have to sit down for people at Thanksgiving or Christmas, it can do a little bit more. So we've been very fortunate so far.

[00:05:02] Yeah. What were the family dynamics like when you were growing up and have any, has any of that kind of followed you into your business management together? A great question. So my father sold Cadillacs and Cadillacs on Lincoln's basically what we did. So we were seven kids and it was probably much like you. We're having dinner. There's two parents and seven kids and we're just discussing. A lot of what we talked about was this kind of sales philosophy. I didn't know it at the time, but he was just in customer service. He shared lessons about customer service, how to take care of people and what might just seem, what to listen for.

[00:05:32] So Diane and I kind of handle the sales part. Oddly enough, we really don't do what we, what we sell. Like we go get the business and give it to the people that can do it. Then we represent it. So our job is to kind of be the hunters. Diane's more operational than I am. Actually, she's kind of taken on that role a little bit more so than me. But those are great skill sets. The complimentary ones, right? You're the, you're hunting and she's operating. Yes, we've been very fortunate. Exactly.

[00:05:55] And it sounds like your sales training started very early in life for both of you, which is big boon. Not that I knew it was always there. It's kind of that present and background, like that sales mindset, right? Yeah. Being around other people. And sometimes I still look at it like, oh my God, I missed that years ago. Sure. It's funny, Kevin, I share something with you just in one respect. My father was also in sales. It was financial services.

[00:06:22] Essentially, he's in sales and client service, right? That's like core to keep your, to retain those whose portfolios you manage. And I would listen to him just in the background. I would hear him talking to clients on the phone at night when he could reach these people. Many of them were teachers and union members and things. And so he could only talk to them at night and he would do it from our house. And I would hear how he walked them through things and the kind of probing questions he would ask.

[00:06:49] So it's interesting how things like that as early as, you know, your grade school years can have an impression. You're setting the tone, right? You're listening. Yeah. And coming from big families too. That's the other thing, right, Eileen? Right. Yeah. We're going to have to save that chat for another day. Right. Oh boy. Yeah. That's probably not, you know, good for air.

[00:07:14] You and your sister for just a sec on our show, we love to talk about leadership communications and how leadership teams, you know, function really well together. And stand as kind of the, you know, symbols, examples of the best way to communicate, you know, setting the tone, like you said. So what would you say is the biggest plus of the two of you working together? And, and don't shy away from this one, what is the greatest challenge? No, I'm going to call her later and ask her for an important question.

[00:07:43] Fact check. We're fact checking. Absolutely. And add that to the show notes. Yes. Don't you worry, Eileen, you will have your say. But let's hear it from your perspective, Kevin. That's a great question. Believe it or not, as many years we've been doing this, I'm not sure I've ever heard it put quite that way. So I think there's both, as I said before, look, you're always different kids, right? No matter what the family, but we grew up in that mindset where I think we both have a sales first mindset because we've been there as sales people, right? Nothing happens until somebody sells something, bring it in. And then they can try to manage the day to day.

[00:08:13] So that would say probably one of the biggest pluses, one of the biggest minuses. I think sometimes we're too much alike. And we can, we've both been told that we can be impatient sometimes by brothers and sisters. They move to a little bit different where Diane and I are just like, all right, let's go. It's next, right? So that's something we're working on being more patiently impatient.

[00:08:31] Would you think that maybe behind the impatience, there may also be just a, you have such a deep shared understanding and familiarity that you kind of read each other's minds or at least know what the other is probably thinking. You can finish each other's sentences. Is that kind of stuff? Yeah. Is that burning? That sounds so noble. Eileen, I wish I could say that while I was away there. I want to meet that person. Sometimes there is some of that. So my son had speech difficulties in grade school, right? So he has speech therapists.

[00:09:00] We're going to meet speech therapists and I'm just listening to her talk. And she's like, you know what? Like you think like the speech therapist, the most kind, hard person. She's like, sometimes I just want to reach out in that and just slide in the back of the head and push that word out. I'm like, my God, you think like I do. Like that's, and she's just like, if she can be patient. I was like, all right, I gotta do that. Ah, patience. Okay. And you know what? Not everybody thinks like, so we bought a company a couple of years ago. And I was led to the opportunity by a salesperson at the company.

[00:09:27] And she said, well, this, you know, she showed up on a Monday one day and they told her at 10 o'clock we're going to close the company. She's like, I've been here 30 years. What are you going to do with your hundreds of customers? She's like, no, we don't. You know, they had, they had made their money on a tech trajectory of something else. So this business was just kind of sitting here and they were like making this good money. It was easy money, but they're just, they're just going to close it down. So she's frantic. And she calls like a common supplier we have. And she said, this is going to happen. I don't even know what to do. She said, well, she said, well, what if I find a buyer? They're like, all right, I'll give you 48 hours. She said, 48 hours?

[00:09:55] Like she had never been the groundhog above them, above them, what do they call those things in offices? Like cubicles. She's like, sugar. I don't know anybody, you know? And I had just talked to this guy about a month ago. And I said, this is what we're looking for. He said, just call this guy, Kevin. She's like, who the frick is Kevin, right? And she said, just call him and talk to him and talk about what's happening. So I talked to her. I said, yeah, that was a perfect opportunity for us. So I got in touch with the owners, right? I had like a Zoom call like this with the owners. And she was like, do you want me to be on the call? The salesman, do you want me to be on the call? And they're like, no. Right.

[00:10:25] And I talked to her. I said, how come you don't offer it to her? He said, like, why are you talking to me? And then we paused. He said, you know what, Kevin? There's employers and there's employees. She's going to be employed. She's not going to be an employer. Want to take everything under that, right? They just manage everything. So I just kind of like, I had heard, I thought about it before, but a lot of things probably take for granted. You just used to being, you run the show, but not everybody wants to do that. Some people just want to clock out and say, I'm done. Sure. It's a lot of responsibility. Does that answer your question? I'm not sure if that kind of, you know, round that way. That was, that was. Yeah.

[00:10:55] Really cool example. But gosh, I bet you're pretty grateful to that woman for her ingenuity and figuring out to even ask the question and then leave the company to you. I bet you're pretty grateful. And I'll share kind of a backstory to that story. Like, so she was there and she's like, oh my God, I've been waiting for it. Like, I've been working at this company for 30 years and just selling this. I've been waiting for some of you to come along. Like everything that you folks do for marketing, I want to do is great. I can't wait to do this. So it was great for her too. That's wonderful.

[00:11:23] Five years later, still having the same conversation, no new business, just being a farmer, not really stretching. And that was the hard part. Like I wanted to send this duck to Eagle School, right? And like this ever go, but I just couldn't either. I wasn't the best manager. I just never, she just didn't really want to change. And it was difficult. We had to part ways. Interesting. That's, that is so reassuring because, you know, we all have been there and sometimes I, you know, we get stuck as entrepreneurs and owners being ourselves up. Like, why couldn't I do this?

[00:11:53] And why can't you do it? And what the heck, you know? So you're right to make the decision in a part ways. You're patiently impatient, as you mentioned. How does that, how does that manifest itself? Because you mentioned that as a challenge that you have with Diane, as you run your business, how does that manifest itself? How do you check yourself and say, okay, I'm learning a few things here. I need to be more patient. How does that, how does that play in your world? I have, I've been very fortunate with people, a couple of people you have here, the long-term

[00:12:23] people and look at me and Kevin, this, they knew when to tell me to say, guess what? You're being, you're being that person again, right? You don't want to be, you know, I've given them a latitude and to say, look, you got to smack me. Because if you're saying it, chances are excellent. I'm carrying that out into the field and working with clients and just trying to be a little bit more, not as goal oriented, so to speak, or just go work on the relationship. So it's very humbling for me. It's not, I don't think it comes easy to me. Maybe some people it does, but so I got to work at it. Thank you both. Yeah.

[00:12:51] I'm curious about, has, has anything of a time when like you realize, oh my God, my impatience just really, I just got burned bad. Um, yes, mostly, um, not necessarily with employees. Um, I think mostly with clients where you're just, I'm trying to give you an example, right? Where you're pushing things along too fast and they didn't digest what we do. So not that there's, uh, we're not doing rocket science, right? But, but brand development and content creation, it's not something that everybody else buys every day.

[00:13:18] So in my head, I'm used to doing, they're just like a little bit slower and steadier, just kind of work and meet them where they are and just slow down. Like, you know, I can, I can beat the foot at the bottom. Like I'm beating my foot at the bottom, you know what I mean? Just waiting for you, but trying to be the smoother, um, easier one and, and try to help them get, climb the steps. Right. Cause that, and I think sometimes that I'm able to help. We're all able to best help people, that person, what we have been before. That makes sense. Like, I know what they're going through because I've gone through that.

[00:13:46] And like, I'm probably certainly capable of helping Adeline or Rob kind of come up here because I was blessed with it where you're questioning, you're like, you know, it's a big spend. Guess what? Are you going to sit around here for, you know, your, your biggest competitor? I would say is, um, um, what's the word? What's that phrase? I can't think of, um, the way things are and your, your inertia, right? Your status quo, like one of your biggest competitors is status quo, not doing anything. Yes. The risk of inertia. Absolutely. There you go. Thank you. Perfect. You're welcome. I'm going to write that down. Thank you very much. You know what I love about this conversation?

[00:14:15] And it happens in many of our episodes where you go down a road, you didn't think you're going to go down. The impatience conversation ended up being this, and I don't want to speak for Eileen, but I will speak for myself and say, the reason I'm so fascinated about it is because I've had to learn that a little bit better. And I have probably been called impatient on one or more occasion in my career and life. So it's really interesting to have you kind of look introspectively at how you're dealing with it.

[00:14:43] Because I think people that may be listening to who realize they have some impatience issues are fascinated to hear what you have to say. I don't believe that. You know what? And if I had just met you before, like you were describing something, I'd say, you know, Eileen Rob, just so you know, I've been called impatient for it. So if I am giving you right to just kind of slap me around and push me back. So it's almost like throwing out in the table kind of like takes that pink elephant away. You know what I mean? I think it does for me. So I just kind of put it out there. And I think there's a certain amount of humanizing. Like we're just, I'm not this perfect robot.

[00:15:12] You know, like I'm not working at the State Department because it's just like life and death either way. Right. I'm just, sometimes it's, sometimes it's better days than others, but I want to do well. I want to be that person. Right. You kind of want me to be better and just wish I was a better communicator that way. So, but you're working on it. So. We always are. Yeah. That's part of the fun. I don't know if I've ever really gotten myself and said to a customer one time, like it was as silly as it sounds like this is so pigheaded. Right. You just, I saw her in the lobby. It was like five o'clock. And I was like, Lisa, you really look tired. And I totally missed it.

[00:15:41] Like, and she was just like, thanks Kevin. That's great. And I'm like, how stupid. I never saw, I never put two and two together. And just like, but I've never made that mistake before again. Right. Again. Yeah. Another time I walked into an office one time, it was cold calling. And this guy, I went to the front desk and I said, I'm looking to speak to the person in charge of this. Oh, that's Mary. She's over there. So I walk about 20 yards away. She couldn't hear me. I walk up to her. I say, excuse me, Mary. She turns around. She was maybe 30, 40 years older than me.

[00:16:10] And she looks up at me like kindest face, almost like grandma. Right. She says, I know you. And I said, and I said, no, we don't do that. What gives you the right to call me by my first name? Oops. And I knew the exact day that happened. It was Mason, March 17th, 1989. Like you just remember that day. I know exactly where it was. And I had never made that mistake. It's Mr. And Mrs. Until you tell me to. So some things you can't learn in the book, you know, like, dad, how come you never told me that? Yes. For some people that was St. Patrick's day that year. And for you, it was this moment. You'll never forget.

[00:16:40] Yeah. I probably drank that day too. Sure. But you know what I'm really. Lessons, right? Yeah. Absolutely. You know what I'm really interested in too? You said it very early on in the conversation about a desperate preneur. And then you were touching on the entrepreneurial journey a little bit. I would like to ask you to dive in a little bit more on desperate preneur, if I'm saying that the right way, and what you've learned in your years as an entrepreneur. Oh, great question there. I guess desperate.

[00:17:09] I guess there's some people just said, like, I'm going to be the ball. I want my own company and do this. And I've always been maybe a little bit more comfortable on the margins a little bit, like the chief of staff or something like that, you know, that doesn't necessarily need to be the numero uno. So I guess I just never really thought about that. But I, like, probably, like, you think back, you know, when I was a kid, you're running around, you're shoveling driveways. Like, I was doing it. Like, I just went out. I didn't know any skill. But I was out there. I just wanted money. You know what I mean? So maybe there was more entrepreneurial DNA in the blood that I thought. Don't know about that.

[00:17:39] I'm still working through that. And an entrepreneurial journey is something I've learned. Get her. What I've learned a lot is get around other entrepreneurs, because sometimes just that tide can rise, right? You start to see things in yourself as you may have questioned your own behavior. Like, maybe that's okay. You know, let's flip that around. And just what's the plus side of that? And take it and run it. Because not everybody is going to be that. Some people are just going to be that employee, right? I want to be. I want to say I've been to Ducks or, you know, Eagle School. I don't want to be sitting as a duck the whole time. Yeah.

[00:18:07] That's excellent advice to surround yourself with others running, you know, companies similar or kind of tangentially related. You don't want to be the smartest person in the room. I don't want to be the smartest person in the room. That's why I love hanging out with Eileen, because I know I never am. Oh, man. That was a softball pitch. I love that. That's great. I love it. Thank you. I will take that one. But there's so many stories around entrepreneurs. And I'm sure you do the same thing. You're around people. They just have stories. They got stuff going on. They're doing stuff.

[00:18:37] And it's exciting. It's inspiring. It is. Completely great. It's great, great advice. I personally have been a part of a group of agency owners. Have you read? Yeah. For quite a while. Yeah. And the group conversations are great. There's often a speaker. And that's related to running your business effectively. Or issues or trends related to communications agencies. Things like that.

[00:19:04] But honestly, it's the relationships with other agency owners who I met through the group or just reconnected with. Because I may have known them in past lives. And lo and behold, we ended up also, both of us or all five of us running our own businesses. But who knew that when we were interns when we were 22? That would be the case, right? I know. But reconnecting with them and then just having conversations about what do you struggle with? And how did you solve for that?

[00:19:28] And is it worth going to different programs for certificate programs from Chase and things that help with running our businesses? Sure. We're getting really honest, honest answers from people in similar seats in different places who there's no competition. It's just... You're just looking to push each other. Yeah. And most people who join groups like that are really selfless in that they want to help

[00:19:54] bring up other people and help them to learn from the mistakes that they may have made. That's what I have found. And so I second that. It's a very valuable resource. And also just it helps me to see how others explain their brands and how they differentiate themselves in the marketplace. Not for comparison purposes, but just like, oh, wow. That's so powerful. You know, let's look at my own company and think, could we take that higher? So it's great.

[00:20:23] It's very inspiring and encouraging. So sometimes it's difficult. I find it sometimes difficult in our business. Like if you're an engineer, you know, people get it. You're an accountant, you're a lawyer, you're a plumber. You're not going to do that one day. But basically what we're doing, you can't not communicate, right? You're always communicating in some way, shape or form what you do. People ask, what do you do exactly? Well, it depends. You try to relate it to something that they do because they don't always see it. It's not very visual sometimes. It is. We sell intangibles, right? So we do.

[00:20:52] And communication is like many things that requires self-awareness. So you could sit there and say, oh, we're great at it. We have a marketing department. We're terrific. And you're like, oh, okay. And then other people say, you know, we could be better at that. And then I'm like, oh, okay. Now we need to continue this conversation. But if you don't have that self-awareness, then you're never going to be able to be a supreme communicator, in my opinion. No doubt. A hundred percent. Wow. Hey, we're always getting better. We always get better. And you pay attention to people you've gone there before and you just listen to them. I just love how they said that. Yeah.

[00:21:21] I always think if I always wanted a government job, I would always be in the state department. It's never like being a president or vice president. I would always say department, like diplomatic and just have language and vocabular your skill. Like it's the perfect word. Like you just want to chop off your tongue because that was said so perfectly. I couldn't even write that. I know. So yeah, that was awesome. I love that. One of my measures of like kind of great examples of people who are CEOs in particular that I interact with of, you know,

[00:21:48] how I compartmentalize like or rate them in my head is the thank you note. And I have a wall of thank you notes that I have received handwritten from different leaders and CEOs over the years. And they're just, they're beautiful. The choice of their words, the crispness of their sentences, the meaning that they convey in these, you know, five, six sentence thank you notes. It's incredible.

[00:22:13] And it's, it's very interesting how, for me, they're the, like, if I had to rank the best communicators I've ever worked with who were CEOs and leaders of clients, we've had those, the best communicators also send thank you notes and they write great thank you notes. Yes. And it's a lost art. So it's a lost art. It's a funny example. Yeah. Funny example. Did you just, you ever hear them called bread and butter notes? Yeah. Yeah. I had never heard that term before. This came into two weeks ago. I was like, that's awesome. Right.

[00:22:41] But I agree with being able to put pen to paper. And so I volunteer at a high school leadership and business camp in the summer. So I'm dealing with about 20, 16, 17 year old kids every year. I just get them handed. And they're just like, well, like you put the pen to paper, like how long is it going to take them? Like, you know what? A monkey can write an email, but you're going to stand out more. You're right. With a pen and paper, put a stamp on it. I know you have to wait like two or three days. So trust me, don't remember. I'm going to the client's offices where they're, I see my thank you note sitting there. I'm just like, right. And they're just like, how many, how many people do it? You just don't do it.

[00:23:11] You stand up on the ground. That's what I think. If you can read my handwriting, you're even better. That's my problem. Because sometimes it gets a little messy and I'm like, I'm not sure they're going to figure out every word. I'm left-handed. I'm scooping right over my pen there. Oh, yeah. I have to rewrite mine every time. Like I will write it on regular paper before I get to the stationary at least twice. I was just you writing. Nobody else goes through that. You're the one. It's only you're right. Preserving her stationary though. Very smart. My hands have stopped knowing how to write.

[00:23:40] So it's like I have to retrain myself. You ever get to that second to last word and you screw it up? You're like, oh, I got to start all over again. I feel like I'm back in high school. It's still worth trying though. It is. One more meaty question for you, I think. And that is, so you've been doing this for quite some time, brand building. Let's look at or tell us about what did brand building mean when you first got in the business?

[00:24:07] And now today, 25-ish years later, what does it mean? What are the differences between them? And how does that kind of play into what you do for a living? Terrific question. And I'm thinking about that. It's interesting. Back in the 80s, a lot of people can say there's technology difference, right? We're all dealing with technology. It seems to me that it's a power issue in that back in, let's just say the mid-80s, right? So you had TV, radio, maybe print, and you had billboards, right?

[00:24:37] Now, so the brand is in control of the brand. Now I'd say the power shift has gone to the consumers where I can pretty much access you wherever I want. TV may be still over there. Radio is made still over there. There's streaming. There's podcasts, right? There's still some print. There's email, constantly relentless email and texting. Instagram, there's so many more channels that you'll have to manage where you're going to be and how you show up. And consumers can pretty much access it when they want, not necessarily waiting for you. Does that make sense? Oh, yeah. It's a great answer. Huge, huge difference.

[00:25:07] That's the biggest channel is that we went from here down to here. Which I think is good. Personally, I think it puts it on all of us. We're not necessarily just dictating what ABC, big consumer product company, wants us to believe. There's a lot of options, right? And there's a lot more outlets. There's a lot more value propositions. So. Individualization, tailoring. So, Kevin, you've given us plenty of nuggets of wisdom.

[00:25:31] But before we go, is there any thought, anything you'd like to share, leave our listeners with today as we say goodbye? Because it's really been an enlightening conversation. I'll say one of the key people often ask you, right? The key is your success, whatever success looks like. I'm just pretty curious. It sounds pretty simple. I don't consider myself the smartest guy. I just ask a lot of questions. I like talking to people because I'm curious as to what they're going to say and where they're going to take it. So, I would say, kids ask, how do you get where you are? I say, look, I just grip and grin.

[00:26:01] I'd say, just pretend you're running for office, right? You're running for an office and a campaign for the rest of your life. You're just gripping and grinning, saying hi. You're kissing babies, shaking hands, shaking babies, kissing hands, whatever you want to call it. You're just talking to people and finding out about them. Because they don't care about me. They want to talk about themselves. Or share their stories with you. And it's more fun that way. And if you're just genuinely curious, like, man, come up with really odd questions. And I told all my kids, I have three children. They're all in their 30s. They're all productive citizens, right? So, look, your mother and I, neither one of us were in the National Honor Society.

[00:26:28] Like, your DNA, questionable at best, you know, middle management at best. No, I don't say that. But you get the drill. I say, look, those have questions in your back pocket all the time. Just be able to walk up to somebody and just sit next to someone on a park bench and just ask them questions. Start talking. Like, what are you normally doing on Monday night at 5 o'clock? Or something like that. But it gets the pressure on them. The person asking the question will kind of dictate where they want the conversation to go. That may sound patient. It may sound kind of egotistical. But I find more often than not that, much like Rob said, you start here. And you're pretty soon.

[00:26:58] You're just talking about over here. And I've had opportunity come to me more often than I can count that way. And probably your clients are like, how did I get here? Right? Go back. You're like, oh, my God. I met this person. I said hi to them. I walked into the room and just like, hey, start talking. So I don't have easy answers for that. But I find more people are just going to leave with curiosity. Again, a very long answer to your very short question. That's terrific. That's exactly what we were looking for. Kevin Conner, principal at Modern SBC.

[00:27:26] Thank you so much for joining us today. And can you hear me? And then, Rob, thanks for both the opportunity. You hit some points that I hadn't thought about in a while. So it's good to talk to them. Super. Great to have you with us. Best to everybody. So that's going to do it for this episode of Can You Hear Me? I'm Eileen Rochford. If you would like to comment on the podcast or give us an idea for a future topic for our show, just contact us on our page on LinkedIn. And don't forget to subscribe to the Can You Hear Me newsletter on LinkedIn as well. Look us up there.

[00:27:56] Absolutely. I'm Rob Johnson. If you like what you heard, please consider giving Can You Hear Me a positive review wherever you get your podcasts, such as Apple or Spotify. It really helps other listeners find the podcast. And one more promotional effort here. Please check out our brand new website at canyouhearmepod.beam.ly. We'll leave that address in the show notes. And we do thank you for listening.