All right, two recordings in under one week.
dude.
What, what the hell happened? All right. Welcome to another CJ in the Duke, and actually this is going to be part two of the last episode. Link is gonna be in the description below, we, got so much feedback that we decided to just continue it. we also have a very, very special guest. Tim Woodruff is with us. This is what, third time on the podcast, Tim
That sounds about right.
and, Tim has volunteered to, be the person asking us questions about networking today. So we understand this comes very naturally to some people and to others. It's not so natural. And so we hope that with this one we can give you more tactical, nitty-gritty and actually doing the networking.
Yeah, I wanna ask some specifics, to what is largely, a conversation about feel, but, feel doesn't really work if you don't have a filling for it, if you can't intuit it, right? Like you need a little help, to build up that intuition.
and someday I hope as a return for this, I hope somebody can teach me how to dance. 'cause everybody's just feel the music man. And I'd be like, what?
Hmm. That, you know what, that's exactly how I feel about, social interactions as I think a lot of people feel about dancing. Also, fun fact, I feel the same way about dancing. I'm also a terrible dancer. I'm aware that I'm able to move my limbs. That's the extent of my knowledge about them. I think a good place to start being as I'm so unbelievably terrible at networking is with the most remedial stuff right at the beginning, what exactly do we mean by networking?
For me, it comes down to what differentiates networking from just being friendly. I've always thought of networking as if somebody sends me a connection request on LinkedIn and they said, I just wanna network with you, I'm immediately sus, you know what I mean? Networking is like being nice to someone.
With, ulterior motive and it just feels somehow slimy when you call it networking, instead of just being friendly, it has that name, it starts to feel slimy, especially when you start trying to evaluate, who it is that I want to keep in touch with and have as part of my network. So how do you get over that mental hurdle, or is that just a me thing that makes me feel weird and other people don't? Feel the same way about it.
I think you're close. I just think you've put a, negative slant on something that doesn't have to be negative, humans are a collaborative species, right? It's the reason why somebody can be a baker all day long, Because not everybody wants to bake bread all day. And so when you want bread, you go to the baker, or at least you used to, well anyway, collaborative, right? What's the first thing you do if you need something fixed at your house? You ask your network.
Do you know a person that's trustworthy and reliable?
Yeah.
that's not, oh, you have ulterior motives. You want to get your drywall fixed. That's it. That's all you wanna do. You just wanna get your drywall fixed, you monster. It's, it's, I, I would say that net networking is more the, purposeful growing of connections that can be valuable to you in exchange for providing value to them back.
Duke, that last part, right, we know we touched on this too in the last episode. You know, for me, when I think about networking, Tim, your point, right, of being friendly, that's the default for me as well. But then it's also what can I do for someone else, So I always, think about networking from the perspective of I'm giving, and anything I get in return is just a bonus, And that takes the icky feeling away from me.
And I would just say the distinction between friend and network is the amount of times it's been utilized. There was a time where Corey and I were just in each other's network and that was it, But we utilized that network connection, so many times that that breached a a friendship barrier at some point.
That's a good point.
And I, I love that perspective on it, especially when you referred to humanity as a collaborative species. That put that notion in my head of well, wait a minute. This isn't just for me. And maybe that's why it's always felt so slimy is because most of the time I don't go outside. There's like people out there. So, so for the most part, people trying to network with me, big air quotes.
There, has been people sending me random connection requests on LinkedIn and being like, I just wanna network with you. And then they, I, I, feel like they set a timer for 24 hours. And then 24 hours they come back and be like, anyway, can I sell you some stuff? Can you buy some stuff for me? Right.
Yeah, that,
is that networking? That doesn't feel good. I don't like that.
it's bad
that. That sounds like prospecting.
Yeah. Yeah, that's for sure. there's a lot of people who are bad at it, and that's what we hope these two episodes help people with. Like in the last episode, we talked about being clear with what you want and being clear with what you can return. So unfortunately there's so many sales channels that pretend to be networking. But it is just, like Corey said, it's prospecting. It's prospecting and, and not really good prospecting either.
one thing I considered doing, but I haven't recently had both the free time and the will at the same time to really follow through on it, is to go out looking for people who might have interesting problems and then solve those problems in like a blog post and send them the link. So, I run, SN Pro Tips, so I write a bunch of tech articles about. Nerd stuff relating to ServiceNow.
And I, I, sometimes I'll find someone who's asked a, a question, in the developer's Discord server, and I'll send them just a link to an article that I wrote a while back. But for me personally, I think approaching every networking opportunity, specifically looking for not, how can you help me, maybe targeting.
Who I I I look for based on, people that could potentially be useful to me one day, but approaching it specifically with the mindset of looking for things I can do for them as the basis for that networking opportunity.
you're a really strange case on this, Tim, because. You have already done so much for the ServiceNow ecosystem, right? So you're already got a gravity towards you based off of the content and value you've already provided. The community at large.
It's not the first time I've heard that. I'm a very strange case. You and my doctor have both been saying that to me for a while. but thank you. I, try. It's just. I started so long ago that the ground was a lot more fertile for me to get a foothold and become a little bit of, a name in the developer community just by putting out stuff back when there wasn't a lot of stuff. Um, and getting therefore high ranked on Google, I guess. but for me, there's a purity to that.
I believe genuinely that the highest calling of mankind is to learn a thing and then to teach it to someone else. literally, it's definitional to our species. and that's just what you were talking about, about collaboration. We learn a thing, we wanna teach it to somebody else. That's. how we learn best. That's how you reinforce it in yourself, is to teach it to someone else. So I was just doing that. I was doing the nerd stuff, and it just worked out really well for me.
But maybe that's part of the reason why networking has always felt like a separate thing to me. it's always felt like I'm doing this one thing where I. Have an idea and I write the code and I think, Hmm, I'm, I might could use this in this way, but someone else might, could use it in that way. So I'll build it for that use case as well.
And I'll write my code in this like functionally separate modular, API forward kind of way in case anybody ever needs to use it in that way or in case I like in the far future need to use it in that way, which happens so often. but there's like a purity to that in my mind and, I think I just need to get over that mental hurdle of, it's not separate. These are the same thing. when I start to frame it in my mind as networking is at least in part helping other people, that feels a lot less slimy.
I think John Lennon, wrote this, but it's, life is what happens when you're making plans for it, right? Like networking's, right? Like networking is the same thing, Networking is what happens while you're making friends, and I think you nailed it, Tim, you do things for the community. And so you've got folks they have a problem on the Discord channel, right? You know that you've already solved that. You find it, you shoot 'em a link.
Boom. You have now started networking, that wasn't the intention of your action, The intention of your action was to help this person solve a problem, But in doing so, you made a connection with this person, And now. this person connects back, Which they undoubtedly will because they'll be grateful that you actually helped solve their problem. Boom, network established.
Network is, a umbrella verb. For a bunch of other verbs that we actually like to do,
Yes.
we do like to help people how, when is the last time you felt bad for helping somebody whose problem you could solve? And on the other side of that, when somebody, maybe even a stranger gives you some of their time and says, I can help you solve that. Or Oh, I know a person who can help you with that and just connects you with somebody like that feels great. think about all the collection of things that you do with people that you enjoy doing or that can provide you value.
And that's, networking and it's like takes the, icky slant off of it by concentrating on the lower level tasks within it.
it really feels like networking can give you the opportunity to provide value to other people who you otherwise wouldn't. We're builders. We're creators. We wanna make new stuff and we don't just wanna make it for us, we want to make it for other people. We feel good when other people are using our stuff. And networking is an opportunity for me to.
not just be helped by, but to help out other people, to build that goodwill and to, get that feeling of knowing that the stuff that I do, is having an impact, to someone enough that they want to stick around in my network, and see that value. And there's nothing wrong with. I was gonna say, there's nothing wrong with getting something in return, but you're not even thinking of it in terms of tit for tat. this is not, I'm helping you in this way so that you'll do something for me, you
we talked about this in the last episode being like the Karma Bank, right?
Yeah.
we should probably state some of these things. in case you're not Tim, here's, because you've got such an incredible Karma Bank with, the books that you've authored and, and, the SM pro tips and, all that stuff. I wonder if we could sidestep into another question you asked on the, Discord thread, because there's the getting of people into your network. But also believe one of your questions was how to keep in touch.
Yeah. And there's, I do feel like there's a version of networking that I do, where I just put myself out there. But that I think Is insufficient for actually accomplishing the goal of actually networking. You can't just be like, hi, and then disappear for five years. You haven't networked, you're just weird. Um, by which I mean, I'm just weird.
Or you just haven't sustained it, right? Like you might make contact with somebody, solve a problem, or. Have a conversation about something important. You wanna revisit it like three years later. But you don't have that rapport anymore. So we do want to take a couple minutes and talk about how do you solidify in your head that keeping in touch is super important? Maybe like keep in touch with everybody.
You got like 10,000 connections on LinkedIn, like good luck with that, but how do you develop a protocol for. Sustaining your network because I, I, I always think of a network as a garden, if you don't weed you don't water the garden, if you don't like prune it and all this kinda stuff, it just, becomes a wild bush that you can't eat
And it really is for me so hard to prioritize networking as a thing because, that slimy feeling again, because there's not immediate value. To it. I don't just mean for me, if I'm reaching out and saying, Hey, how's things? Or whatever, just like maintaining that garden, there's not immediate value to that, to anyone directly at least. It's so hard for me to devote the time to do that when I know I could be doing other things like writing code that will help someone someday.
And I do have friends who are, amazing at maintaining their network. 'cause I'll drop off the face of the earth for weeks or months and not do anything but work. And then I'll pull my head above water again and be like, oh, right, you guys exist. Are we playing DD?
Yeah. So Tim, I a hundred percent agree with you and I know exactly that feeling, right. and as, somebody who's diagnosed a DHD, right? that seems to be one of the traits is that I. Relationships pause for you when they're outta sight,
and it feels bad too 'cause, then I feel when I come above water again, I feel like, crap, I can't reach out to 'em now. 'cause I've just accidentally ignored that they exist and like, yeah, they didn't reach out, to me either. I wouldn't literally ignore them, but it feels like I've done something wrong at the end of that, you know what I mean? Do you ever feel that way
No.
yeah.
wrong is, that's a strong word, to some people it's super, super natural, right? Not supernatural, but extra natural. You know what I mean?
Yeah. Yeah.
Supernatural.
yeah. To some people they just work that way. They're like, oh, my gut says I should talk to John and I'll call John. So to force myself to do it. I just recognized that my network has stuff that I want. Nothing made that more clear than when I started doing a little bit of recruiting. You have to recognize that there's value to it in the first place. And I think we spent the first 20 minutes going over that. Yes, it is valuable.
so the next thing you have to realize is that there's entropy in the universe and nothing self sustains without energy.
Yeah.
your life, your decisions, what you do, that's just a function of your decisions about energy. And so let's pour that energy into the network a bit. And I think where this doesn't happen naturally, just need to embrace the other ways of thinking that they're good at and create a system for it. So if you guys don't mind, I'd like to just run through the system,
Yeah.
Just imagine like, put my network maintenance? What would that look like in Flow Designer in ServiceNow? Okay, so step one of the network maintenance, flow is to. Generate the list of people that you are going to maintain this interval. Weekly or monthly, okay? every week or month, generate a list of people that you want to sustain, by asking who are you thankful for?
you know, I had a conversation with Jace the other day about an idea that I was kicking around and, you know, Jace audited showed me where my blind spots were. So I like, oh, I really appreciate Jace. I'm thankful for that.
Man, I haven't that brings, I mean, I haven't talked to Jason in a minute. I need to reconnect with him.
every, everybody should talk to Jace. LinkedIn is gonna be, we'll put his LinkedIn in, we'll put his LinkedIn in the description below. Everybody say hi to Jace. The second thing this might be a little bit more specific, but who did you have the most impactful discussions with in the last 60 to 90 days? And then lastly, who pops into your head by instinct? With those three, you should have a list of at least four or five people. It doesn't have to be dozens.
It doesn't, it certainly doesn't have to be hundreds. It's just something, Put some water in that garden. Any questions about that so far?
No. I will say that this is starting to sound like a custom app, but, uh,
It could be. I mean, if it helps anything, it helps, right? Um,
I'll just say I totally agree that everyone should talk to Jace. I talk to him almost every day since I hired him and can confirm it is thoroughly worth it.
Now we know where Chase is working.
nice.
so now you have your array of people in your network that you need to sustain, So for each of the items in the array, you have a list of options. Just think of it as like a, a la carte menu of actions to take. So, number one, ask them how they've been, and if you think this is too simple to matter. there's this saying, I don't know who coined it, but every human dies twice. There's the time that they die, and then there's the last time anyone says their name out loud.
And I think that's super dark, but, but I think all of us have some vague sense of this, right? And so anytime somebody just says, Hey, how you doing? Nothing else. Just how you doing? the universe is telling you, Hey man, you matter to somebody. Somebody took their time to come out and just say, how, like, how are you in a way that invites a response? it isn't a trivial thing. It does matter, especially if you are, Authentic about it.
definitely gotta be authentic about it, right? I know there are folks who aren't. And there are a lot of people who can fake it. And you probably know folks who are faking it and you don't know that they're faking it. But that's fine. Looking at this in a structured way allows us to break down the actions, That go into, creating these relationships, forming these bonds, and then maintaining them over time. Because, all relationships require care and feeding.
I. And it, it's funny duke, you talk about who provides value in your life or who you miss when you haven't talked to 'em, there have been occasions, right? Like, look up, it's like, man, I haven't talked to Duke in a couple days. What the hell's going on? Right. You know? And so then I'll ping you like, what's going on, man? You know, and, and so, That becomes second nature. Now, what, what I will say is like I have a couple of, good friends and it's really easy for me.
after 2, 3, 4 days, I haven't talked to them like, what the hell? Reach out and be like, Hey, what's going on? Where you go and that sort of thing. But that beat here, and I don't mean it as like a grade, but just like in kind of closeness to me, right? You know, the folks who I value, but probably don't talk to them every day. those relationships start to kind of get stale. And so remembering to keep them strong is a challenge.
would it help if we actually go through some like, what do you actually say to the person? Is that gonna be helpful like maybe I've met you three times. I don't just message you and say, how are you? Right.
I.
Uh,
Yeah, I. it is really difficult to reopen those lines of communication. I mean, I have a hard time remembering all the people I bump into and who I've talked to and all that. on a personal level, I just need to get better about that. I need to treat that as important in my life. that's just a thing I need to do, but.
it, it's just a subsystem, And especially if you're a programmer or you're data oriented, just build a structure in your head, like properties of people. So, I know Corey is married, I know he is got two kids. They're roughly the same age as my kids. You know what I mean? I know that, his wife had that terrible thing happen. she was in the hospital for a couple, a few years back.
You just start tagging these properties to the people that, you know, if you primarily chat with them over LinkedIn, that's fantastic. 'cause there's your message history right there. And so you kind of like, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're collecting facts about people and things that you've talked about, so you can use that as the excuse to go back.
I'm really bad at remembering stuff like that. I think I need to start by maybe writing it down or something. I remember Chuck Tomasi an episode of the ServiceNow developer podcast something like, after I, I take a selfie with somebody, I meet them, and then as soon as we part ways, I immediately write down everything I can remember and associated with our selfie together. and I was like, that's a pretty clever idea. And then I promptly did not do that. Um, and,
Yeah. Yeah.
but I think that having some mechanism for that, at least for me, for people like me, I think that's important. I would see ads for, smart glasses. One day you'll just look at a person and information about them will come up in your field of view, and they won't even know that you have no idea who the hell they are. And I'm like, these are made for me. I need the future to be here immediately.
man, be careful. Be careful. I look forward to that day too, but make sure you get your practice in so that you're authentic when the time comes. Like if you're the person that's gonna like read the information and then say it back to the person, like, congratulations on the new job, Jeff. they will see your eyes going back and forth under your glasses.
Yeah, I, I feel like I'm the sort of person, like, I just need a reminder. Tell you what, if you're listening to this and you bump into me and acknowledge 2025, if we've met before and you bump into me again and just be like, hi, here's my name, here's what we talked about. I'll remember you. I won't remember your face, but I'll remember our conversation.
That's a great strategy of just a cold opener too. If you know them but you're not sure, they know you reintroduce yourself. There's absolutely zero shame, no loss of face, and both parties feel even better if the, approached party does recognize you. If they don't, so what? Who cares? You're still establishing network connection, but maybe they do recognize you and how great would that feel?
Let me tell you why that's such a cool hack. You might recognize somebody's face, know that you had a conversation with them, but cannot remember their name. So when you walk up to them and you reintroduce yourself, they will reintroduce themselves, right? And now you've got their name and you don't feel awkward, and you can have a conversation, pick up where you left off, et cetera, et cetera.
one of the things that being a politician comes in handy for, is that I now have no shame just reintroducing myself to people I already know.
Oh, and names too. Say their name as many times as you can in the sentence. If you're asking them questions during your conversation, end the question with their name every single time. First of all, nobody gets tired of hearing their name,
This is true.
But it also just, builds that neural pathway too, right? You see in their face, you're shaking their hand, you're talking about stuff. You're accumulating all that info, and every time you're stamping it with their name, say their name, as many. Times you can't. So we still gotta get through the rest of the, flow here. do you mind if I return to that?
go for
Alright, cool. So we've already talked about generating a list of, who do we sustain our network with at each interval. And then for each of those people we've we're asking them how they've been, two other strategies, ask them an intelligent question about their domain, especially if it's germane is something you're doing right now. I wonder how many friends Nathan Firth has made because he just answered questions about service portal for all those years.
Yeah, and he was the guy for it too, like the only one for a long time.
It goes back to our, episode one where we were talking about when somebody answers a question for you, it's an investment, It's their investment in you. They want you to succeed, it's good to ask people questions as long as they're intelligent, as long as you've shown some. Groundwork beforehand. Don't just like pounce on a stranger and just, Hey, I haven't tried anything. What's the answer to this question?
I do.
I hate that. and maybe we should talk a little bit too, counter examples, we're talking a lot about things that are good to do, things to consider and things to make sure that you're, hitting the mark on. But maybe we should talk about some things like, Hey, just so you know, this is not networking. If you just slide into my BMS and demand answers of me, you have not networked with me. You have annoyed me. I will remember your name only because you have annoyed me. That's not the way to be.
going back to the flow. we have ask how they've been, ask an intelligent question about their domain. Okay. This is super important. Let them know how they've impacted you over time. if you do this networking thing that we said, go talk to Bob Ask him a question about his domain, but then like a week later, go back to Bob and say, I just wanted to let you know that thing worked out great. Plus I found this other thing out that you might want to know.
Absolutely.
sharing knowledge is, always great advice. if I have one skill when it comes to networking it is knowledge sharing. I don't know how to, hi, how are you? I don't know how to ask about your kid. Like, I, I literally know how, but I'm not, good at it. and remembering to do it at prioritizing it a lot of time I remember like, I'll get all the way to the end of a three hour long conversation. We've had drinks, we've had food, we've, tossed the ball around, I don't know, whatever normal people do.
And then all the way at the end when we're like, okay, bye, see ya. And I get 10 steps away and I go. Wait a minute, I never asked that person's name. I never even asked What the hell's the matter with me? You know? But if I do have one skill, it's sharing knowledge, which is, I will come at you with my nerd all the way out, every time. 'cause it's the only way I know how to be. And for some people, namely people who don't care, that's probably not the best approach.
But for my people, for the people who I. Am invested in, and who are likely to invest in me. That's seems to be the right approach.
I think the people who are worth, having in your network are people who will take you as you are, right? Whether, rather than, imposing some standard that they have upon you. And you know, if you and I talk for three hours and you don't ask me about my kids, it's cool. We'll talk again and you don't, you'll ask me then maybe, or who, who knows, right? We had a three hour conversation. It was a rich conversation if it went three hours, I think you care.
Yeah.
And just because you didn't ask that one question, doesn't mean that you care any less. And so I think, a little bit of, letting yourself off the hook. when you have those, moments and when you walk away and you think, oh, what, why didn't I, or didn't I, I should have said, and you feel that little bit of cringe, that you messed up. You forget the fact that you actually were successful for three hours, before you walked away and have five seconds of, damn, I, I messed up.
it's honestly really good to hear that because, I, Beat myself up over that kind of stuff quite a lot. When I'm imagining the perspective of other people, I spend so much time imagining the worst version of myself through their eyes. And when I had that realization, like, shit, I had asked that guy's name, it hits me in the form of I'm imagining that person walking away, getting a few steps away and going. That jerk didn't even ask my name. What a dingus. You know?
It's,
It
I, I, I think it takes a special kind of innate paranoia to attribute malice where real malice hasn't been shown. You understand what I mean? Like that? Yeah. That person didn't ask my name or he didn't remember my name. that's not malice. First of all, the beating yourself up about it doesn't gain you anything, right? It, doesn't reverse time and it sabotages your mental, state for the next interaction.
Like, that person walked away, you forgot their name, or you didn't, you didn't remember their name or you didn't ask their name. Great. Well, if you're beating yourself up when the next person comes to you, what do you think the odds are that you're gonna have a good interaction?
And there's, there's a fine line, I think, especially for that sort of self-talk perspective. A fine line between, I meshed up, I did poorly. That sucked. Versus I could have done better. I'll try to remember that for next time. It feels like a fine line and it's really easy to get stuck in that negative self-talk. that, you're right. It, sabotages you for the future.
Tim, I'll double down on that, right? you said this is the right thing that I should have done, but I think what you're really saying to yourself is, this is the perfect thing that I should have done. This is right.
it's, it's like when you have a, somebody is talking smack about you and you come up with a perfect comeback on the drive home, right? It's like that.
Yes. Exactly. That, at the end of the day, I think good enough is often good enough.
Oh, yeah, progress. Not perfection too, right?
Absolutely.
So for everybody else out there who is not Tim, there's a very important lesson here. Tim being the tremendous content contributor as he is and has a natural gravity, well. Of network around him. Right. He doesn't even have to try. 'cause so many people love what Tim's done, That they want to be in his network. So he's got all that gravity in the world. And even Tim is worried sometimes that he might not come off perfectly.
Oh, quite often, yeah. If you're in the same boat as me, you're in good company or bad company, depending on how you like my company.
You're not gonna hit all of your interactions perfectly. It's not every interaction's gonna come away with, wow, that was thoroughly super awesome. it's okay. Now that you acknowledge it, you can just move on. Go to the next one.
Yeah.
Okay. We got just a couple more in the workflow. So now that we know how to generate our list the things that we can do for each of them, then Every interval refine your reconnection timeline, Tim gave me the answer to a question, what would be the best time to get back to him? Like, I'm gonna try out what he said and then I'm gonna tell him that it was valuable to me or not. Right? So am I thinking days, week, months.
And then you can put that in a little Excel sheet or your little private task on your VBS and ServiceNow, however you want to do it. But now you throw something into the future mentally for when you want to contact that person again. And then lastly, just recognize it's all a heuristic anyway, right? This is not a super concise, accurate system is just meant to roll with the punches a bit. And so if you have the opportunity to talk to somebody earlier than the next interval, take it.
I agree with you, if I help someone and it helps you, And you wanna let me know that it helps you, Any asynchronous, communications, connection that we have. Feel free to use it at whatever time of day. Like if you send me a LinkedIn message at two in the morning, I don't care. I'm sleep. But I will see it when I get up.
Right.
feel like, that you gotta wait we've already connected, I helped you out, like you asked me, you know, for a thing, or maybe you didn't, and I offered, and now we already have that connection and yeah, I wanna know how it turns out. Of course, I wanna know how it turns out. Never feel that if somebody's offering you help, that they don't wanna know how it turns out. They absolutely wanna know.
See the last episode. It's an investment. I have put ener, I've put energy into you, right? I want the warm fuzzies that that energy was used for something.
absolutely. Absolutely.
And, and that everybody, I assume loves that feeling like knowing that the stuff that you've done has been valuable to someone else, the notion that all of us are building on the shoulders of giants, the platform itself. is built on the shoulders of giants and we build on it. everyone likes being someone's giant. Right. I like being the person who made the thing that someone else used to do something even cooler.
cause that's how the species progresses, you build something new based on something old and the something old becomes foundational to the something new. Whoever built the, something old doesn't go, ah, it's been usurped. No. They say, oh great. You're doing something really cool. I didn't even think of using the thing that I built for that, but that's neat.
For me, I like being the hub on the network where it's like, Robert, do you know anybody that and insert the parameters. Oh yeah, I know this person, or I know somebody who knows somebody. And then getting those connections together. That's what I really love to do.
for me the motivation is kind of like, Hyman Roth and the Godfather, right? Like, I, I wanna make all my partners rich. And when you provide that level of value, you can only, see it, come back to you. and I don't provide it to ca it come back to me. It's just what I like to do. Right. I provide it because I'm paying it forward because a lot of people, provided that value for me when I needed it.
but, whatever I can do to help whoever I'm doing it and I'm actively seeking out those cases and trying to do that because. from the networking angle, right, it's gonna keep me top of mind. If there's ever anything that they can do for me that I might not even know that they can. That's the silent benefit of networking, And especially when you do it well is that you become, top of mind for a lot of folks in your network.
this is so common in, popular media as well. I'm thinking of, shows like my name is Earl and loads of other things where there's like the central person who I. Is going around doing all these little things for people, and it's all these different people and, every episode they interact with some person and they help them out in some way.
And one day they need something and there's the score rises and there's this wonderful moment where everyone comes together to help out this person and they realize, oh, hey, I have friends, I have people at my back helping me out. Too, because I've been so generous with them, I now have that same in return that just popped into my head and I realized like that can be what networking is.
We went over this in the first episode as well, but there's no bigger reason to network than the employment opportunities that comes with it because I guarantee you, every time a company decides, okay, add one more person to the ServiceNow team, the very first thing they're doing is going to their network. If I'm the hiring manager, I'm going to my network. If I don't have a strong ServiceNow network, I'm going to my other people's networks.
I'm going to my partners and asking them that is the way the world works. You don't have to like it. It's how, but it's how it works.
Well, yeah, I mean, absolutely.
we're gonna take a little bit of a side step. We know knowledge is coming up in gosh, like what a week? It's crazy. for those of you, again, who this doesn't come naturally for, we wanted to have a quick rundown of non-verbal cues. Things that can signal you that it's okay to talk. Okay to go up and be bold and introduce yourself signals where it's not okay to talk. or maybe that you, not that you've out worn your welcome, but it's time to move on.
and then also how to give a signal to it's time to move on. So let's start talking about signal hacks.
You should start on this one, duke, because man, I don't, I don't know.
Okay, so the easiest one is people that you know that aren't doing anything, they're by themselves, they're not on their phone. maybe they're dipping into a snack or having a coffee or just walking somewhere. Okay? That is a perfect cold, open opportunity. Hey, I haven't seen you in X. Or, Hey, where are you off to? what do you got planned for the afternoon? knowledge content wise, or, Hey, what did you think about that keynote? that's the easiest another opportunity to open is, after sessions.
and this is the key here. So people you don't know, how, is it okay to talk to people you don't know if you make eye contact with them? It happens accidentally all the time. You're scanning the crowd, you make eye contact with somebody. You're within two or three arms. Reach of them as fast as you can. Hey, what did you think about that?
I especially like the, distance calculation of like, how long of a walk is it to get like you make,
Yes. Yeah, they gotta be within, they gotta be within conversational range, which I'll say, I'll even revise my estimate. I would say like two arm lengths.
Because if if I make eye contact with someone all the way across the conference hall and they start walking towards me, I'm like, oh my God, what do I do? I have too much time to think about it.
Just
You just, you just crank up the creed and just with arms, arms wide open. Just get that guitar like going on. That's what you do. No, that's not what you do. That's.
yeah. I mean, I don't know. You know, sometimes there's a little bit of novelty in being awkward. Right?
There is, especially if you're honest about it.
Yeah, absolutely. And so, to that end I say also, you should be yourself, right? Like you shouldn't, no. I mean, there's also a, a limit to being awkward where it goes beyond making, other people uncomfortable. And
Well, well, yeah. How do you know? How do you know? Right? Okay. So here, here's your signals, your nonverbal cues for it's time to move on. and not beat yourself up. It's just people are busy. People have other stuff they wanna do too. Okay? So I. it's hard to gauge that. So, number one, if they are looking around, you are talking to them and they're twisting their head, they're looking over their shoulders, they're craning their neck a bit, that's a signal that you gotta wrap up.
Yeah. Yep.
if they check their watch more than a couple times, they're trying to tell you without telling you that they have to move on. They have to go somewhere. if they're angling their body away from you.
Yeah.
if your, if their shoulder is facing your chest, they are signaling that they need to leave or go somewhere. so keep an eye out for those.
they say, well, all right, then.
Yeah. Oh, that's a good one. If they say, well,
just, even just the beginning. Well, yeah, you hear that well, and you, should be preparing. And by the way, don't take it as, I'm trying to end the conversation with you. Take it as I have to do something, or I would stick around and chat. personally, I've, learned to. Always assume everything in the best light. But I'll tell you what, there's a lot of value in that.
If somebody comes up to me and I'm just about to go do something, I gotta pee or whatever, and they start getting those signals they pick up on it. They give me that out. That's all you gotta do is give a person an out. You don't even have to necessarily end the conversation when you start getting those signals. You just gotta give that person an out that doesn't feel awkward for them to take you.
Give them a non awkward out and they'll, if they take, they'll, they'll take it if they want to, but then the next time you see them, you are in, you're not introducing yourself anymore. Not from scratch, at least. Right. You might be like, Hey, it's you, how you been? The second time I see someone, the third time I see someone, it's not. Necessarily just the length of the interaction. It's the number of interactions you have, especially you space 'em apart.
You're reinforcing like I exist, behold my face. And I'm realizing this as I'm, listening to you guys, and as I'm saying this, I'm realizing the people I remember best are people. I had brief but frequent interactions with people I kept bumping into in the halls just for like, Hey, how you doing? Oh, what are you doing? What do you like? Write books or something you freaking nerd.
I don't know why they're all from Jersey, but they are, those types of interactions, I remember them so much better than, even like a 10 or 15 minute conversation just once I.
you may be the kind of person that nonverbal cues don't resonate really hard, like it is hard to pick up on. So if you're that kind of person, what I would suggest is, limit yourself to the number of questions. ask him a question. Let's have a little talk. Ask 'em another question. Let's have 'em a little talk. Maybe ask him a third question. Let's have, and then just say, well, I gotta get going to my next thing. If they wanna keep talking, they will let you know. They'll ask you questions.
Yeah, and, and, you can kind of do it from, both perspectives. You can both be giving. An out to another person and you can look for another person giving you an out, because that can also be a nonverbal cue that they want to end the conversation, right? If they start trying to give you an out. A lot of times people will frame it that way. We've all heard the phrase like, uh, I better let you go. Like if you're on a call with someone and they would really like for you to stop
them let you go for sure.
yeah. yeah. They'll give you a, well, I better let you go. It's like, that's not for you buddy. That's them giving you an out to lead gracefully. Right.
Yeah. that is absolutely that. I'm, I'm gonna holler at you later.
and so if it's new to you and maybe you're in a conversation that let's be frank, like you're bored of it, like you don't wanna look bored of it, or you have other things you gotta get to It's okay to tell those. Is it the little white lies? You're like, well, I better get going. or I have the next thing to get to.
Yeah, that one, especially at Knowledge, you can always, always, always say, you got a session you gotta get to or ask, Hey, you gotta get, you got a session you need to get to. Right? That's an opening.
Yep. Or I have to, I have a important phone call. I have to, take, or I have a four phone call. I've gotta, make, I. It was a pleasure meeting. You name,
Yeah,
Yeah,
offer your hand good charge, handshake, and then you're good.
yeah. And at, knowledge 25, if you're in the Venetian, for example, you've al always got the excuse. Well, my, my next session is all the way in the wind. it's a. 45 minute walk. I'm gonna, which if, if anybody listening to this didn't know when you're listening before knowledge, Hey, pack some good shoes. 'cause there's gonna be a lot of walking this year. More than usual. Even
Yeah,
We are at an hour of record.
dude, Tim, that's all you, man. That's all you.
I do get a bit verbose with my nerding out of things, you know.
No, man, we love it and we really appreciate you coming on to be vulnerable too. not everybody can do that.
Hey, anytime, I lack the gene, which fears vulnerability. do you guys mind if I, plug some stuff? I actually got the fourth edition of the handbook coming out pretty soon.
Absolutely. And we will put the links in the description below, so plug away.
Awesome. Thank you. if people wanna reach out to me, there's my LinkedIn You can put that in the description, if that's all right. It's probably the best way to reach me. And social media is not really my thing, but I'm on LinkedIn. I've got the ServiceNow Development Handbook. there's some other books as well, but that's the main one really. If you're learning ServiceNow, if you wanna level up, get the ServiceNow Development Handbook.
The fourth edition is just about to come out hopefully next month. it says July 4th, so it'll be no later than that, I hope. the fourth edition adds a bunch of stuff, some newer stuff that ServiceNow did, some stuff about Flow Designer fourth edition is up for pre-order right now. Handbook Do snc.guru. Last thing I wanna mention is if you see me at. Knowledge on the conference floor or at a bar or restaurant, and you have one of my books on you.
Whatever I'm doing, whoever I'm with, wherever I am, I will have something to give. It's a very small thing, not a big deal, but it's a fun little thing to give to anybody that shows up with one of my, books if you happen to see me around. feel free to come say hi. that's just an opportunity for anybody who wants to network and isn't sure how. If you got one of my books on you, you come up, I'll be like, Hey, you, you there? You a freaking nerd. Come over here and say hi.
Boom,
If that's your in.
All right. Hope this was helpful to everybody and I guess we'll see you on the next one.
Thanks everybody. Thank you Duke, cj. See you guys next time.
Absolutely, Tim. Thanks. I.
Bye.