Episode 23| Jabri Harrison: Connections Took Him All The Way To The Governors Office. Guidance On Using Connection Systems And Techniques To Reach Any Goal.

Jabri Harrison is arguably one of the most well connected people in the Middle TN area. He focuses on showing love for others, no matter their background. Jabri now travels the country to be on podcasts, perform public speeches and for political races. Jabri lays out his system and how he achieves so much in his daily life while keeping his sanity. He also lays out how he got started in his networking journey, and some tips you can take and apply immediately. 

Transcript

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Welcome back to the art of connecting podcast. This is your host as always Haydynn Fike here with another guest for you guys. Today we have Jabri Harrison with us. I'll give you a little bit of the backstory on how me and debris got introduced to each other. And this is through a mutual friend, Becky English. And you met Becky at the Capitol. I was telling Becky about what I'm doing. And she was like, you need to meet to Bree. He's a person that you need to talk to. And I was like, all right, bring it on. I always love meeting new people and me and debris got on the phone for the first time for like an hour. And we had a great conversation, but anyways, that's the backstory on how we got here today. How are you doing man? I'm doing good. I'm doing good. It's. I'm so excited to be in Chattanooga. So one of my favorite places to be but yeah, I mean, most of the time that's what happens when I'm on the phone with people they're like, I've never talked to. You know, for the first time with somebody and it's like, we talked for like an hour. Three hours. Like, I don't know. I'm just personal. Personal person and I like to top, so I loved it. I I'm a talker. I was a joke with people. I could talk to the wall and it would talk back to me. And when we got on the phone, I was actually, it was here. I was out in the garden. And this little light party thing. And I was like, oh, hold on a step away from the party thing. I'd rather just talk to somebody and having have a good conversation. And so I love like one hour phone calls. Cause then you just, you kind of get off and you're like, wow. Like I just had. You know, unless it's a one hour phone call where you're just getting talked at the whole time, but that wasn't the case. This time. And shout out to Becky. I love. Becky Yes. I've known her for a few years and she's wonderful. So whenever she sends me people I'm like jumped right on it. I love it. Yeah. Yeah, that's amazing. So I want to kind of have you just introduce yourself a little bit to the guests and maybe tell the guests about who you are and what you do. And then we'll roll into the connecting part. Yeah, it's all, it's always really hard to tell people what I do. Years ago. I was known for my bow ties. And so everybody loved my bow ties, but I started wearing hats and now I'm the hat guy, but it fits because I have. A bunch of hats. I wear a bunch of hats. And it's, I'm always trying to fix things and, and really suck at saying no, sometimes. And I actually. It was raining one day and there's this lady with a tent and I came over there and I just saw that her tent wasn't like set up correctly. So I like grabbed it, fixed it. And like this guy was like, I could tell you're a fixer. And I was like, that's the problem? Because people could tell. And then they asked me to do more stuff. But yeah, I, I do this a lot. I go around the nation speaking. And I've been, I really enjoy that. I really enjoy that aspect of getting to speak to a large, a large audience. People because I love people and I love adding value to people. I've been an entrepreneur my whole life. So a lot of startups and nonprofit work started off nonprofit work at 19, doing homeless ministry. And then. It just went on from there. Now sit on a bunch of boards and middle Tennessee. And I'm just a people person. The title that I usually have a CCO. Chief connecting officer. Because I just love connecting people. And it's beautiful to see like the connections like this right here. As you connect somebody and then it becomes something like a value to other people. And so once, once you do that, As the reward is so big. And you just connect somebody. It may be small to you, but then it like turns out. So much bigger, so much bigger for the other person. Yeah, that's, that's been my experience as well. And I think about time, I introduced two of my friends to each other and they both were. On the same track, they booked the morning to do a similar thing. And I was like, You need to know this other person. And now they work together, like all the time. on different projects. And they are able to create things that they wouldn't be able to create by themselves. And there's no greater feeling than that. Yeah, for sure. So how. How did you kind of assume this personality? I, whenever I go to a networking event or a real estate meetup, I kind of introduced myself as a professional networker. So how did you assume the title of the. Chief connecting officer. And was that just natural to you? Or was it something that you had to develop? Yeah. This is great. I'm like over here, teasing. I haven't got to talk about this in forever. So my parents like my parents split up when I was young. And most people think that sad, but I mean, I think it was such a blessing. To me, I have two great parents and two different. My dad was in the Marines. And my mom was pretty restricted herself, but she, they were really hard on me growing up, but I spent two days on two days off. And they moved around a lot. So I never really spent a lot of times. A lot of time at one school. So every single school I had to be like the new kid and I always dressed pretty nice. And. I'm a decent looking guy. And I played sports. So like, you have to be instantly like the cool kid, like, you know, so I've learned to always fit into different crowds and every school was completely different. I went to schools in Antioch. That's cool. And you know what that means. Went to school at black man. So, I mean, all of them were completely different and I just learned to adapt. And then it just went into the networking scene of going in a different crowds and people are like, how do you do that? And I don't even ask questions. Like if somebody says, Hey, look, you need to go to this event. This thing. And I don't really do research on it. I just like show up and like, I'm just like, whatever comes comes. And I just try to fit in and yeah, I think it's just natural. It was a natural thing that was developed through my life is. Reaching people where they're at. And then not judging people. And you never know, like, All my friends now, I would've never chose out of a group, you know? So you never really You never really judge a book by its cover because your biggest. Connection could be something that you could overlook. And never overlook anybody. Always try to shake every hand. There's a story that I, that I heard that this big Senator came into town. And they walked through the whole restaurant and shook everybody's hand except one person. And that one person remembered that forever and said, this is why I'm running against you. And they, won and so it matters that one person matters, you know Jesus said that. He we'll leave the 99 for the one. So the one matters. As so profound to really think about how every single person that you come in contact with and how you treat that one person. Can change their whole outlook on life. That person that didn't her hand shook. I mean, that's crazy. It did. I mean, like to think about how. In my own personal life. And that kind of stuff has happened too, where it's like, you just never forget things like that. Yeah. And for the other person, it's like, I shook a hundred hands, like. And, and you think. You know, it's on the big scope of things like that. If I went through a place and I shook a hundred hands and I only missed like a few, I would call that a win. But it does matter. And that's my thing is like, even in the grocery line, Every single person you come in contact with could be a divine connection. And then that divine connection. It's your job to figure out if it's for a reason for a season or for a lifetime. So that's why I'm not to go like really deep, super fast, but that's why I like to follow up with people is when I meet somebody connecting. And I think a lot of people could be good at connecting, but I don't think a lot of people are good at following up. And I think before you, before we started recording, you asked me. Like. We meet so many people, like how do we continue to follow up with, you know, all these people, you go to a networking event and you come home with like a hundred business cards. And I know you're, you're busy. I'm pretty busy. I don't have time to like text every single one and put their information in. So I've kind of gotten away from the business card Dell. I'm a big paper guy. I love paper. And I love getting something physical, but always sell them like, Hey, put your, put my name in your phone right now and let's text. And so I already have that. I already went past that step of. Putting your information and later. And I know that it may be a little bit more time consuming upfront. But I like to do that. Yeah. I have a tool that I use that I actually have a sponsorship. I just don't plug it. It's called popple, P O P L. And it's like literally on the back of my phone here. And I can put this up to the back of your phone. Yeah. And it will instantly give him my contact. And I've recently really started leaning into that, like this weekend, when I was in Orlando at a real estate conference. Every person I met, I was like, here you go. Here's my contact. And I'm like walking them through, scroll down to the bottom and click save, contact you and send me a text with your name. So you won't plug it in, but I I'll plug it in. I'm a Poplar ambassador. Yeah, me too. And if you use the code Jabri Harrison, you'll get 20% off. There you go. Used to breeze. I'm actually going to edit that out. No, I'm joking. But I am kind of retroactively going all my episodes and plug that because it's so important. It's not just like a, I actually use it. It's not like you know, promoting. The newest gym sock or something like that. I really want to start promoting that because it's been really impactful in my networking to be able to have. That just right there on my phone, right there in my wallet it sets you into a different mindset, walking people through. And it's a psychological thing too, of people kind of like following the instructions that you're giving them and things like that. So it's really interesting to me. I wanted to talk about something that stuck out when you were chatting. I think about how important childhood is to develop us into who we are. I was homeschooled. And because I was homeschooled, I went to all of these different what's called co-ops. So I had five different co-ops I went to in my school career and then also went to public school for two years. So. It wasn't like I was bouncing in between school and it wasn't like a steady thing. But I had to constantly be meeting different people in a completely different environment. And kind of looking back on that I've never really thought about this. That might be part of the reason why I'm able to do what I do now. Is just like you said, I had to make new friends and new environments constantly. And I feel like there's two ways you can go from that. You've either shut down and become the quiet kid in the corner or you have to stick out and start talking to everybody and meet people. And, and that's kind of the route that I ended up taking. Yeah. People don't know this about me. And nobody will believe this. But I'm actually mostly introvert. And I am the shy kid that was staying in the back. But for some reason, I feel like God has always pushed me to the Frank. And I've always been like in the spotlight or the center of attention. And I really like. If it was my choice, I wouldn't be. But I, I just love people so much that I care. And and I really think that's just a part of my upbringing too, is that. I always cared about the. The person in the back playing yu-Gi-Oh. Just as much as the jock you know, Quarterback or whatever. I made friends with whoever and whoever was nice to me and whoever. Really cared about me. I cared about them and loyalty is a big value of mine. So that's awesome. I, I have seen some studies to where Introverts often. Are the best connectors because they're able to create more of an interpersonal relationship and Even though, oftentimes they get drained quicker. I've talked about some other episodes. It's more important to get to know three people in a room and really get to know them than to get a hundred business cards. And introduce yourself to a hundred people. He has, if you can get. Deep with three people. That relationship that you're going to get out of it. Each person is connected to probably, I don't know this isn't, I'm making this up, but you know, each person's probably connected to 302. Thousands of people potentially that can lead you in the direction that you're looking to go. With your life, your business, whatever it may be. Yeah. So I agree with that. And then also I have a difference per. Perspective. Because people go to different networking things or events for different reasons. And I, when I was networking, I would love to go deep with three people. When I got more into politics and when you're a politician or you're a speaker somewhere, Whenever you get off stage, there's a lot of people that want to take a picture and want to talk to you. Right? So. You don't want to get a quarter way through the line. You want to make as much ground on that line as possible. And so for me, that changed everything for me being like the super deep person upfront. To Tom awareness. And everybody wants that 15 minutes with you that 30 minutes with you. And I'm like looking at the back of the line light. That's it? And I started to stay. I'll be like the last one and I'll be there for hours. And I remember event where the whole thing, the whole time, I literally just shook hands and talked to people. And I was like, I don't know if this is. The best way for me to manage my time. So Tom awareness for me. Whenever I go to something now is to hit that good, like five minute that quick, like. As deepest possible. And then say, Hey. I would love to go deeper with you and I would love to talk to you more. Can we get coffee? Can we go grab lunch? Do you like a cocktail? And that that's helped me out so much because. I, when I worked. Actually worked for the governor last year and I was his field rep. So I went to all the events with, for him. And when he couldn't make it, I met with county leaders, mayors, and. Just went to all the events and most of the time everybody wanted to talk to you because you were representing the governor, right? But then I started to notice that people would just talk, talk, talk, and then I give them my card and nobody followed up. Really, they just wanted to be heard in that moment. Like somebody heard them, but they didn't want to go deeper. And so a person that wants to go deeper with spend that time, but it's like, is that the best time, you know, management that you could have? And so for me, that coffee, like, Hey, let's get coffee, let's get this. That kind of waited out people that were just kind of, I'm not saying people waste your time. Our people are a waste of your time. Bye. You know, That you only have 24 hours in a day. So that's one thing that I do is a new tip of mine is. Is. To break that barrier because I do want to have that three hour conversation. I do want to go really deep. But it may not be the setting. So I always say, Hey, let's, let's get coffee another time. You know, let's get, let's get lunch. And another tip that I always have that most people don't know. I'm gonna ask you a few now, cause you're the master networker. What Han. Don't know about baster. What hand do you hold your drink in? When you're at a networking event. Your left hand. And why is that? Because he always shake with the right. Yeah. And you don't want to have a sweaty hand. You don't want to have a cold hand or hot hand. So you always hold it and. And your left hand. And a lot of people don't know that. I see that. I mean, it's habit to. You know if you're right-handed and have a drink in your right hand, but just a quick, you know, tip in there. I love that. You don't think about that. How awkward is it when you shake someone's hand and it's like a cold icy way. Yeah. Maybe it's memorable. I don't know, but that's a great little tip there that I've never, I mean, I do it obvious. I like just cause it's kind of subconscious. Right-handed but. If you shake enough, people's hands, you get tired of having to like switch your hand over and. That's why we're here is to kind of think about these things that maybe you don't think about a lot. That's such a great tip. Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. And I think. A big development and my networking and my people relations. Is COVID I don't know how COVID affected you, but so before COVID, I didn't even know what networking meant. Like I, I had no idea what networking was. I'd never been to a networking event. My first event I ever went to within 2021. Right after COVID. I think we were still wearing masks at that point. When I went to my first networking event. But yeah, so I never knew anything before. COVID. And why do you think that was, was that just. So I that was freshman year of college. Like the end of freshman year is when COVID happened. And so I was so busy being focused on working in the restaurant job I was working in. I didn't really even know. To look for networking. I always kind of network a little bit with some of the regular customers and like talk to them. But I was 18 night. I was very young, I guess. And not as business. Focus. As I am now. Yeah. I love that. So for me, I was hitting my stride on speaking. And, and networking. I had two business networking groups in middle Tennessee at the time, and I was just here. They're speaking here doing that and like meeting so many people. And then I went to west Palm beach. And I think February. Of 2020. Yeah, 2020. And I met John Maxwell. When I distant mentors of mine, I love John Maxwell. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. He's amazing. And I was just so jacked up because John Maxwell was going to like, you're going to be great. You know, I'm going to be back. I'm going to go back and I'm going to kill it. I have all these plans. I have all these ideas, all these networking things, and I'm doing. I'm going to do this, do that. COVID hit, like right when I got back. And it was kind of like, okay, like I'm a person that's always out, always going, always doing and then like sitting at home and it's like, okay, like, What do I do now? And so it really trial and error. I did so many things. I did like zoom call group zoom, like networking things never really panned out. And then I started trying to do like webinars Wasn't really my thing. I'm in person. And so one thing that I found that really helped me out was. I was saying. So many people text messages. So I started sending like 500 text messages a day. Wow. And I would try to make them as like unique for each person as possible. Some of it was copy and paste, but so I just wanted people to know they were going through so much and you never know what everybody was going through that like, Hey, I'm here for you. Like, Hey, I could pray for you. Or like, Hey, I'm just thinking about you. And my idea was that it was like, okay, 9 1, 1, like, who do you call when it's an emergency? If, if. constantly hit me up, like, you know, and he's consistent about it. Whenever we do get out of this pandemic. The first person to think about is debris. And so that really gave me like a leg up. Well, I done that. And I had this opportunity to help in the Senate runoff election and north Georgia. And did an excellent job with that. Got invited to work up at the Capitol. So that was like the weirdest thing. And my life is like, okay, I get this opportunity that I've never even thought about. Having is working at the Capitol. I did the Tennessee legislative report card. And so I had to know all three. 1300 bills. I had to know every legislator and I had to re watch every committee and session. And then I had to. And I had to know every single sentence that every A representative or Senator said. I had to know, like, whether it was good, bad, yellow, green, and and whether or not they were like encouraging their how do they work leadership wise? Like I'll, I'll different types of stuff. So through that, I got to be up there at the Capitol when nobody was up there, like almost nobody was out there. So I got to like, Hands-on get to learn and get to talk to all the representatives. During that time period, then I went to their homes and went through their farms. And then I went, you know, I met their families and that was a thing that, that I picked up during COVID two is like, number one about the deep connection is on like, just texting people like, Hey like I'm here and I like here, like what's up, how's your life. And then also going deeper on the back end of like, You know, what is the most important thing to somebody? Is there their family and then like where they live, they live there for a reason. So really going deep on that is I, I went to Memphis Chattanooga. Knoxville, I would go to people's homes and kind of like I'm doing now. It's like group it all together. Like all the people that I need to meet in Chattanooga, I'm like, Hey, I'm in town for the day or I'm in town for the weekend. Like, Hey, let's meet, let's grab coffee. Let's let's do something let's catch up. And I just liked the group that end. But that was all inspired during COVID because before I was more like, self-centric like, what can you do for me? And and then after I'm like, I just want to add value. And John Maxwell says that, have you helped somebody else succeed? Then they'll help you succeed. Yeah, I love, love, love that. So before we were, before we started recording, I wanted to hit on this. So when you go to you travel around a lot to you you're. We're going to New York to different states to see people correct. When you get there, how do you keep track of all of these people you've met and. So, this is something that I struggle with. Like just to be Frank with the audience. It's like, as I meet people, you know, I'll put their first and last name and my phone. And there's some recent stuff I've started implementing, like taking a selfie with the person and sending it to them as soon as we connect. That helps me like jog my memory of like, oh, I remember I was here with this person talking about this. But sometimes I don't do that time. Doesn't allow me, or they don't want to. And, you know, I'll get to an area and I'm like, well, there's this the first and last name and that's it. Cause my brain's met, you know, I've met 500 people since I've last met that person. We last had a conversation. How do you keep up with all that? Yeah. That's really. Deep. Deep answer. Because we're always learning and evolving and I feel like I'm still learning and evolving. I'm a paper guy. So I always carry around like a bunch of legal pads. I'm very old school and I write down their name and the city, their number. And kind of their profession or area of profession. And then from there, I usually put it into either like Evernote. Something like that. And create a list. And so that's how I know like, okay, Chattanooga, these are the people in Chattanooga. This is what they do. Like I'm ahead on this. But I have this like in-depth system called the house. And I don't want to take up too much time talking about the house, but basically my system is from paper. To typing it to printing it out and putting it in color coordinated binders. And folders. And so I have a folder for each like area of my life that I have, like politics is an area of my life. Business is an area of my life speaking as an area of my life. And then I, I'm also an author. So when I write books and that's like an area, so I binders for each one and each day has a different area of my life that I want to focus on. So. Going from paper legal pad to typing it and putting it in like a digital folder and then pregnant printing it out and put it into like a physical. A folder. And that goes really deep. So, but that's kind of like the overview of that because I never could just do digital. I'll wait. And then also it's steps of, you know, I think you remember 70% of the stuff you write down. And then, so if you type it, that's another added on. So just from my memory, it helps me out of going through that process. I do want to go deep. That's what we're here for. So how, how do you decide. Each day. What you're going to focus on. Does that sound? I'm the same. Not the same, but like, I have a very similar thing to where. I have so many different things going on and I I'm a real estate person. I'm a podcaster. I'm a networker. Business person, entrepreneur, all of these things that, that I do. And I personally know that I struggle with this because for the longest time I didn't have a system. I finally have built a CRM. And monday.com and tracking stuff to be able to quantify, like, what is today need to be. How do you make that decision of what you're going to focus on? Yeah, so I hate CRM. I haven't found one that like matches my brain and I've paid for a lot of them. And I've tried, like, I've heard like, oh no, this one's like the best it's integrated with this. And so I've just done that. And the system that I, that I talked about was the house. And so. I had a mentor of mine said, Hey, on a. On a sheet of paper, tell me like, The main things that you do, what are the main things? So I put the main things down and for some reason I put them in a box. And then I was like, okay It says in the Bible it says something about, I'm sorry, I usually, I could quote this, but I haven't quoted this in forever, but basically a house established. The something. On the solid ground, right. No, it's, it's like, it's just a proverb and it's very simple. And it's basically like, okay, if you, you established your house and like, That's your establishment. That's your like, kind of solid ground, but it's a different scripture. But so I made a house and then each big thing that I did, I put it in a room. And then from each room, I made us different, a different sheet of paper and like, what is all in that room that I do? You know, as a speaker, you know, podcasts interviews And in person events, zoom calls. And put that all in there. Okay. And then I went, and so again, each day it was distinguished like Monday for me is, is politics. And that like all encompasses a bunch of stuff. And there's different folders in each one, but within that each day I have, what podcasts do I listen to that I need to that pertaining to that. Do I need to listen to today? What speakers, what articles do I need to listen to? What books do I have? And. In that area that I could look at. And so. I have like different political books. I have. Different speaking books. Leadership books. Thursdays is leadership from me. And so I listened to the podcast. I listened to a YouTube. Okay. What articles do I need to read on that area and what, and then also have area for like need to connect. Like, I need to connect to these people within that area. So I'm not like one area of my life isn't lacking. I have a list of people. Like I need to. I'm sorry. And then I need to connect with. And then I have action items. A list of action items for each folder. So that's kind of how I keep up with it. I know it sounds like a lot, but once you go through that, for me, like, Every, I can't care around each binder each day. So I care on a legal pad. And if I'm like in a meeting, I'm writing that down, but then I track, like I said, I type it into, put into a digital folder. And then from there, I print it out and put it in that binder. So each day, I know like what I did. What did you do last week? What do I need to follow up on? Who do I need to follow up on? What do I need to grow and learn? Cause I think that's the biggest part that people miss out on is like the biggest portion of all of that is the growth. And the learning. Because we should always be growing and learning and evolving. And even if we don't complete all the tasks. As long as we're growing and we're learning, that's the key part. Hmm. And I think it also brings up You going through this brings up a good point of if you don't track it. It won't get done at least in my case. And I know a lot of other, like, if you. If you're just out there and you don't know. You said you, you have a list of people that, you know, you need to connect to. And you haven't connected to those people yet, and you're not going to do it right that second. Yeah. But, you know, you need to do it. And you put it there. So you're tracking that action, which is, I think that's one of the keys to being, it just sets you apart. You can tell when someone has their stuff together and when they track things, because you can see it in the results. Yeah. I don't want anybody to think that I have all my stuff together. Because, like, I don't think anyone ever. As it completely. Sometimes I'm like, I think even for this, sometimes I got just know, cause we've talked about it for so long. I'm just like, I know, okay. This day I have this. So it's in my mind, I didn't write it down anywhere. And and so sometimes I, you know, I'm a airhead. Man. And then, so my old texts me and like, An hour before we need to meet, like, Hey. We're stalling for the meeting and I'm like, oh yeah. Yeah. So it really is important to track it, especially in. And I think it's a great tool to expand. As long as you're tracking stuff, you could expand because you're hitting everything that you need to do. And like I said, that growth, but if you're not tracking it, you're kind of all over the place, which Distraction is the opposite of traction. And so. His face when I said that, but yeah, distraction is the opposite opposite of traction. So clarity really allows you to move forward and it gives you a mind map of like where you need to go and what you need to do. And vision is as the most important thing is like, if you don't have vision, it says in the Bible, a people without vision, Shout peers. Hmm. Wow. That's incredible. Okay. So I want to ask you this for someone who is listening to this podcast. And. I'm just going to use it a general example. I don't know my exact demographic, but I know a lot of people have regular nine to five jobs. And they're trying to grow themselves outside of that. So, how do you go from. Working all day. And then you go to a networking event and you don't have any of the systems in place. What would you say? The first few steps people should take. Just at least start systematizing the process and meeting people. Not just to track it, but to be able to create better relationships and connections with people. Yeah. I don't know if I'm gonna answer this the right way, but. For me. I always tell people. Actually a shadow to Nick Lauer has a marketing agency. He's he's the best, but for, for five years I looked for a video guy. And I was just like, I just need a video guy. Like, and all the people that I thought were really good and I would hit them up and they'd be like, yeah, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do that. But they would never show up. And Nick. He showed, he showed up. And so for me, the biggest step is the first step of showing up. Like that's the biggest step is the, do it. And I don't want to take people to a stream because my story is like, I was working a nine to five and I just knew that. I wasn't made for a nine to five. That's not like how my brain works. And so after each day, a 12 hour day, I would go home and write my book. And I will stay up until two, 3:00 AM. And then I had to be at work at two F. Five 30. So not getting. Sleep, but like kind of stretching yourself. I'm not saying go and do that. That may not be the healthiest thing for everybody, but stretching yourself in like, yes, you can make that event. Yes, you can make that network and yes, you can make that coffee. Yes, you can, you know, make time for somebody that, that you met, that you had a great connection with and to make it to dinner. And we always make excuses. You know, there's kids there's work, there's this but like stretch yourself and make it, make it work. And then that's like the first step. And then you. Then you never know, y'all start meeting, you know, regularly, and then you bring on long another friend, how you have like this group, you know, I know there's a bunch of parents out there. I know maybe the audience isn't parents, but you get so busy with everything else that you forget. Like you need a network of people. You need connection. And And then from there. Just stand in the loop. You know, staying connected. For me when people always ask me, like, how do you know about all these events? How do you know about all these things? And it's really hard when you're outside of the loop, but once you're in it, if you're out of it, you're around other people that go to events or like, Hey, there's another event on Friday. There's another event here. And like being in the loop, then you start knowing about everything, you know, that's going on. But once you're out of the loop is really hard. So the first thing, like I always tell people is for me, I'm. Probably not as good as everybody thinks I am. But I show up and people like to. Jabri you're everywhere. I see you here. I see you there. Like everywhere I go, like, and everybody's always talking about you. Like, could you just show up. And that's number one. Again, I may not be the best, you know? The best of what I do, but I show up. Hmm. So I would love to talk about that. Cause I get questions from people all the time. On how to find networking events. People are, I probably have three to five people a week that say, let me know when you're going out to this or let me know when you're going to an event, I'll come. And I always just tell people like, Hey, go follow the Facebook because I hear that. I don't say it this way, but I mean, like, I hear that a lot. Right. Just people see what I'm doing. And they're like, wow. Like I want to go to these networking events and meet the people that you're meeting. And it's like, okay. I just go and go to the Facebook page and follow the event and check it every week. You know, how do you keep track of. What a mentor when and what are some like some flow, some, I don't know how to say this when I think of lead flow, like, but as an event, how do you keep your inbox flowing with new events and things like that? Yeah. At simple pudding, I think there's a lot of events that are reoccurring. So putting those into your calendar, you may not make every single one because. Putting the reoccurring ones in your calendar. And then once you just make it to those, then you could expand a new ones. And also I'm going to plug this. This is something that I'm going to start doing. So I'm going to give you guys an opportunity to do something that I'm not doing yet. But Instagram has broadcast and, or you could do like a text message, you know, system. Of like, okay. Sign up, you know, for my, my go and join my broadcast on Instagram or go Yeah. I like Texas code beyond the Textless and I'm going to start sending like events. So people know like, cause there's so many events and I have to, at this point, I sit on a bunch of nonprofit boards. So. And there's always like balls. Gala's, you know, fundraisers where I have like three tables that I have to fill. Well, you know, this 30 people. And I'm like, it's really hard to like do that. And people like you didn't remind me or you didn't tell me, I'm like, there's a million people in my head. Yeah. And so that's one thing that I'm going to do to better systematize is, you know, finding a platform that you trust and, and learn and get a group group of people that the people that asked you. What's going on and get them in there and get them plugged in. And then it saves you time. So you don't have to think about it in texts, that person. Cause I know like. I've already forgot about the last person that told me. Like invited me with this event. And that just sparked a new idea that I am going to do. Well, I don't know the thing to the list. So at church, whenever you're there it's I go to clear Creek, church of Christ and it says texts CC, or a CC guy at 9 40 0, 0 0. They say every Sunday, yeah. Incident attacks. And it'll like, Cindy, the guide. Our mutual friend, Kiersten Murphy, she on her Instagram, she's always posting about like, what's going on in Chattanooga this weekend. So after this, I'm gonna talk with her about creating one of those texts, blast things. To where someone just texts. You know, chat events or something like that. And then it, each week sends out the networking events to a list. Yeah. There's this week alone three three groups have asked me what text message system they do use. And I'm like, I don't yet, but I need to, and there was so crazy. Somebody said that I need to do that. So it just been like a topic of conversation of like I think the open rate is 90% because like everybody's on their phone, but like on email it's like really low. So I know that a lot of influencers and a lot of I get a lot of polo. You know, text messages. I know a lot of companies are going to it to tags over email. So might be something cool. And, and for me connecting with people. A big thing that I want to talk about is OPA. And if you want to like, expand your network, other people's audience. You know, going and doing this, like now I'm connected to your audience and connecting to somebody, but always ask. And when you say down. With somebody who do, who do you know. That I need to know. Hmm. And that's a key question that I forgot. I think it's John Maxwell gave me that one too, but doing that just like. Blew my mind. They're like, oh, you would, because they're not automatically thinking that when you're at coffee or something, but once you ask that question, like, oh my gosh, You need to know this person. What does asking that question? And I know it seems kind of weird at first, but asking that question opens up to like, okay, we're, like-minded, we're having a great connection. Who do you think that I need to be connected to? And then that conversation goes like, Tremendous was in you start meeting great people, just like yourself. I love that. That is such a great question to ask that I'm going to start asking. I got a tip. I want to share this with everyone. Cause I haven't recorded an episode since this happened, but I was in Costa Rica at the retreat for the action academy. The mastermind that I'm in, which is another like huge asset for me is having a group of people around the country that are in. We're in a mastermind together. So we're all focused around entrepreneurship, real estate. And we had a retreat and Aaron and He's a, he's an investor in Austin and he was talking to us. And one of the pointers that he gave in his, in his talk was when you meet someone. That's from out of town and they say, Hey, when you're in Austin, let me know. We'll get together. When someone says that to you. Go and look at your calendar and book the trip. To Austin and ask, are you going to be an Austin? In December or October or whatever, whenever you're going. And that just shows that you are, you're not just a, like your follow up example you gave of seeing who will follow up. But it's like another level of like, oh crap, this person's traveling across the country to come and hang out. And, you know, that's so powerful too. And it takes resources to be able to do that. Like you've got to have your freedom and flexibility, and that might be a more advanced kind of thing, but it can be a weekend, right. It could be a weekend in six months that you get to go and do it, but go and do that. Yeah. And another cool thing that I do is we're not saved their contact. I play underneath their address. I put the city they're in. And so whenever I go to contacts on my phone, On my app. I could type in, you know, Chattanooga and everybody that lives in Chattanooga is on that, on that list. And I do try to like book something as much as I can. I'm so terrible at like, Saying, I'm going to go to S like I was supposed to be an LA. Three weeks ago. And I just got so swamped with this. With this campaign that I just couldn't go anywhere. I couldn't do anything. But you know, then you just continue to follow up with that person. But for me, like I said, biggest thing is the follow up. Cause that's, that's huge. Like. I want to go to, you know, Austin. Texas. And when I do now, I know people and I'm not just going there by myself. And then they could show me around. Yeah, absolutely. So we're coming up on our time already. Which is. AC. It feels like we just started talking. I wanted to see if there's any additional tips or tricks, anything that you wanted to outline or go over that we didn't get to. I th I think I hit, you know, some, some good high points. I'm going to leave everybody, you know, in anticipation for the next episode, that to bring me on. Sounds good. That sounds like a plan. Yeah. Awesome man. If I plug plugin. Plug it, man. Yeah. So My Instagram is Jabri Harrison, J a B R I. Harrison and everything is almost the same. I use my name for anything. Twitter. YouTube. You could check out some of the podcasts. That I've done. On apple podcast or any podcast screaming. You know, by just Googling or searching debris Harrison. So. I definitely would have an episode too, because there are so many questions that I have about several of the things that we talked about. And I want to dig into further. I really think that the the systems conversation that we had, especially because it's constantly evolving and improving the systems that we use. I think that we can have a whole episode just about that and time management and all of those wonderful things that we don't like to do, but are so, so important to being able to achieve what you want to do. And I would love to continue that conversation. So like, do you, Tom block? He knows that it doesn't, that I don't time block. I need to yeah. So yeah, we're always continuing to see what processes work and trying new things. Cause I time block for a little bit. It didn't work great for me when I was at a certain season. And but everyone has a different way of doing things, which I think you've been very graceful in the way that you've explained that to you is. Not everyone is going to do it the same way. There's no one silver bullet. You need to do it this way. We're just here to give some examples of how everyone does their thing, and you can take the pieces of that. And even if you take one little piece of what we talked about today, It can completely change your, your landscape of what your. What your life looks like? Yeah. Thank you so much for having me on. There's so much that we could talk about more, but I'm just grateful to be here. And hopefully I added value at some point. Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you so much for coming on. You've been listening to the RF connecting podcasts. Go ahead and follow us on all the social media. It's an art of connecting podcast on Instagram, LinkedIn, all of the places. I have not been active on their self-admittedly. We've had some issues with our social media, but we are working those kinks out. Go ahead and follow the Instagram. And then the last ask that I have of you guys. This podcast is completely free. My one ask is that you go up to that top and give us a five-star rating review on Spotify. Or if you're on apple, scroll down at the bottom and leave us that five star review. If you got some. Good nuggets out of this. I hope you have a great day and we'll see on the next episode.