Rules To Help You Collaborate With High Performers In 2024

You can't expect any kind of return from somebody who has a big audience or the ability to make an introduction for you or a connection or something like that. You can't expect that big return from someone if you didn't first invest into that person, whether they have an offering or a community or maybe their favorite charity or who knows what it is. But you have to have a keen eye and look for how can I first invest into the very same thing, AKA person that I later would like a return out of foreign.

And we're back with another episode of he said, she said.

Huge congratulations to you, babe. You sold out your girlfriends in business event in like what, 10 seconds? It's like 90 minutes. But it was like 70 or 80% sold out in the first like minutes.

I'm so freaking grateful. And so much goes into that, you guys. I mean, there's a lot of consistency and there's also a lot of making sure that you constantly are funneling attention into either an email list or a text list so that when launch time comes, you're not just trying to like spray all over the place on social media. And you have that attention that was really, really specific to the thing that you are offering.

Yeah, for sure. Anyhow, congrats. Really proud of you.

Thank you so much.

I'm so excited, so excited for all the people that are going there. What we wanted to talk about today were some social awareness tips in order to collaborate with high performers and be more successful. And really where this is coming from is, is this year, as you can tell, we are really leaning into helping you upgrade your network, like helping you collaborate better with higher performers. And we're like, well, if we want to meet new people and have new people collaborate with us and collaborate with some of our high performing friends, then one of the things that we have to do is also tell them how to collaborate, like how to show up.

There's rules of engagement, for sure.

There really are. And the reason why we're going to share some of these things is you might hear a few of them be like, oh, gosh, you know, it's kind of jerky or whatever. But the truth is you don't want people to resent you if you're a good person with something good to offer. But sometimes you accidentally put yourself in the resentment zone, kind of like the friend zone because you don't know quite how to operate or you don't have these social awareness tips yet. Now, one of the things that we've done really well, like when you look at us. You see our friends in our network and you're like, wow, how in the world do they have those relationships? Is because we have this common sense about us to know how to operate among really busy, really in demand, really high performers. It's like, well, if this comes naturally to us, why don't we share it with some other people so that they can upgrade their network as well?

Okay, so let's start with the first one.

All right, here's the first one. Don't text or email your needs to somebody else on a Monday. Don't text or email your needs to somebody else on a Monday. Now, if it has to go out on Monday, duh, send it. But what you don't realize is everybody is sending their urgent need on a Monday. And high performers have great big audiences. So guess how many urgent needs they get via text and how many quote, urgent needs they get via email on a Monday. It's completely overwhelming. And the result is your need doesn't get seen, number one. And your need actually sparks a little bit of like, oh, not another one. Oh, not another one. Even though you're somebody that they might actually like.

Yeah. If you think of how you feel on a Monday, now amplify that by a hundred because that is just how many different things they're getting and how much their attention is getting split. So Chris and I, whenever we have an ask of someone, we try to wait until like a Wednesday or a Thursday just to kind of let things clear up and not to add one more thing on a Monday morning.

Guys, there's things that are really important for me to get an answer on sometimes, like maybe with one of my investors. I know that they're also kind of a celebrity or something like that, and I really want that answer on a Monday. But I will purposely hold off and not send it till Tuesday afternoon, knowing that a Monday is just going to cause more headwinds for them or it's going to get lost anyways or they're not going to get around to it anyways. So here's kind of to how to sum up this first tip, stop thinking with the what's important to you and start thinking about what would be important and a great way for this to be received for the person that you want something back from. All right, Second one, don't ask people that you have not already built significant relationship capital with to advertise or share your stuff. People will advertise your stuff, number one, if it is advertisement worthy or share worthy, number two, if they know it's going to benefit their audience. Because all of us, we protect our audience. Like you, the listener, we care deeply about you. So we don't want to just share everybody's stuff if we don't know, it's great if we don't know, it works if we don't know that it's legit. And so you might have something really good, really important to share with people. But asking someone who you've not already tilted the scales of reciprocity in your favor to share your thing or to advance your cause is just silly.

It also can make people feel, this is going to sound crazy to you, perhaps, but it can make people feel a little used. I've had a lot of people who I've never met, I've never seen share my stuff. I've never had in my groups who are like, hey, I just wrote a book. I follow your stuff. I love it. Can you share it? Can I send it to you? And I'm like, I have no idea who you are. I know that you said you follow my stuff and you've liked me for years, but I haven't ever felt that. And so I think it's really important for people to not, you know, the people that you're asking are people as well. And it can be really. It's like a fine line of making those people feel like you're just using them for their audience, Especially if you've never shown up on their feed or you've never shared their stuff or created any reciprocity before. So just thinking in terms of that person is a person and they want a relationship.

It makes me think of Christina Barthold. Huge shout out to her. She owns a really cool social media agency. She has shared our stuff for years. She's put people in our programs for years. She has shown up as an advocate for us for years, to the point where now she has tilted so much reciprocity in her favor, I would go to the ends of the earth for her because she showed up with adding value after value after value first before ever having an ask. That's a great way to operate. Tilt the scales of reciprocity in your favor. And by the way, if you're starting to hear a couple of these, be like, wow, these really kind of sound like jerky rules. We're just being direct with you because we know you have good stuff to share. We're just being direct with you because we know that you're a budding superstar. We're just sharing these things directly with you because we want you to succeed.

And this is truly how it works.

This is true.

In all honesty. These are the conversations when we're in higher level rooms is like, man, you want to help people, but here's the people we're willing to help and here's the people that we're not. So we want to give you the advantage. And I want to add one on here, Chris, that is really, really important is crafting your ask in a short way.

Oh, yes.

So that's the next bullet point is learning how to craft your ask and just ask one question at a time. I think one of the biggest flaws where people go in is they ask like five to 10 questions all at once. And number one, it takes way too much time. Number two, you don't need all of those answers right now. And number three, you will get an answer if you get one very specific question and it's asked in a short period. I know that even for voice notes, sometimes people have our phone number and I've even been guilty of this, but I'm getting much better at it. If you're gonna voice note anyone, make sure it's in less than one minute.

One minute.

It will not get listened to. And in all honesty, a text is so much better with a clear ask that is one paragraph long. When we see emails or texts that are super long, I'm like, oh my God, I don't even look at it. I actually don't have the time because our team comes first and our projects come first. So if you an answer from people who have your answers, you have to learn to craft that and be very short, very specific. And this also goes along the lines of just having your elevator pitch dialed in in that one to two minutes when people ask you what you do.

I remember there was this guy that left me a six minute voice note once he had my phone number. He's a very good guy. He's got great things to share. He's a really good dude. Like, I genuinely like this person. I have never to this day listened to his voice note and he probably thinks I'm a jerk for never responding to something. Don't send me a six minute voice note. I don't have time for that. Matter of fact, if you did the math, like, you know, everyone has their hourly value. If my hourly value is a few thousand dollars an hour divided by 60 minutes, what does that come out to? Like literally hundreds of dollars a minute to listen to a six minute voice note. So you've got to make sure that you're Making it easy for people to digest your ask. Because the people that you have asks of, they're very, very busy people. So those are the ones that you want to be collaborating with. So you have to make it as easy as possible for them to be able to listen to your ask and be able to digest your ask. Okay, here's another one. Know your audience's work hours or what time zone they're in. Like take a moment, pause, think, oh, wait, I'm on the east coast, but they're on the west coast. So if I send this text message right now, it might be 9:30 my time and I'm already working, but it's 6:30 in the morning in their time, and they're barely digesting their coffee right, or getting their workout in or something like that. I know this sounds little, but even this morning I was inundated, inundated with text messages from people I like, people I care about, but starting at 5:40 in the morning, because they live on the west coast or they live in a central time zone. So to them they're like, hey, I've already been up for a while, I'm going to send this. I'm in my zone. I'm in my thing. You need to stop and pause and think, wait a minute, am I making this person wake up to a huge list of text messages or emails? And is that gonna cause mine to not get addressed or addressed in a way where they have a tiny bit of resentment?

Let's go on to the next one. Don't make an email or text intro without getting permission first. So what does this mean? This means no matter what, even when I have a really good friend, even when people are asking for intros to some of our best friends, I'm not like, oh, sure, they won't mind. I always ask them, hey, we have somebody who is interested in maybe having you on the podcast. I know you're really busy right now, so just let me. If you want the intro or not. If not, I'll tell them it's not a good time right now for anything. No worries, no stress. So we always, always ask if it is okay to make the intro first. This is like actually one of the biggest negative things that you can do.

Faux pause.

Faux pause. Yes. Is making an intro without asking first.

When you do have access to people that you want to be collaborating with, like super duper high performers, you want to actually protect their contact info, you want to protect their email, you want to protect their phone number with everything you've got. Because the minute you let it out to somebody else. And again, I know this might sound jerky, but we're just trying to help you operate in this world where you're excited and you got big things going on, right? And you want to do big things with big people. So we're trying to help you by sharing this. But the minute you're like, ooh, I'm going to make this intro, I know this person's going to want to maybe get value from collaborating with this person. The minute you do that without getting permission first, it makes the person who you made the intro to be like, oh, come on now, I've got to fit this into my responses today. I didn't ask for this intro. I don't have time for this intro. And it might have been a great intro. So the way to navigate that is texting that person first at an appropriate time saying, hey, Chris, I've got a great intro for you. I think they could be a Mastermind member. I think they could be a investor. I think they could be whatever. Here's why. Would you be okay if I made it via text, or would you prefer email?

Yeah, I'll have a lot of people who will do intros without asking, and they'll be like, hey, I think it'd be a really great fit for your podcast. And I'm like, oh, my gosh. Number one, I'm not looking for anyone like this right now. Number two, this doesn't actually feel like a good, energetic fit for me. So now it caused a big stress in my day of, like, I have to figure out how to tell this person I don't want them on my podcast. I feel like jerks doing that. And now there's an intro. So it's a really awkward situation that people. People put people in. So it's just important to understand the rules of engagement.

Here's one more. Just got a couple more here. Don't treat every interaction like this is your last chance ever. Laurie, you kind of talked about this one before. It's brief on this one, but when you get a chance to meet somebody or talk to somebody or email or text somebody or get on a call with somebody, play the long game. Know that if you do a good job moving the needle on just one thing in that interaction, like maybe you're passing by someone in a hallway at an event, then you're going to earn another chance to have another interaction in the future where you can move the needle again. Don't try and go from start to crossing the Finish line. In one chance interaction, in one meeting, in one phone call, in one whatever.

It just makes people feel really pigeonholed and they sense that desperate energy and they might say yes to to your face, but they're probably gonna try to figure out how to pawn you off after it doesn't feel good for that person. Again, it's kind of a desperate using energy and nobody wants that because the thing we want you to remember while talking about all this is the person that you're wanting something from is a human. And they just really want that. They want a relationship just like anybody else.

Yeah, spot on. I think you just said something really important to remember during this episode, and that is these are humans that you're interacting with. And so the more you treat them lovingly and caringly like a human and the, the more you try to not add something to their plate but still meet your agenda. And that's like a fine dance. You got to be able to walk there. The more you're going to have these amazing relationships for the long term. All right, couple left here. Invest in somebody else's community before asking for a return. So it's just like the stock market. Imagine if you're like, why aren't I making any returns on these stocks? They're all going up today. But you didn't put any money or investment or energy investment into the stock market. Well, it's the same thing. You can't expect any kind of return from somebody who has a big audience or the ability to make an introduction for you or a connection or something like that. You can't expect that big return from someone if you didn't first invest into that person. Whether they have an offering or a community or maybe their favorite charity or who knows what it is. But you have to have a keen eye and look for how can I first invest into the very same thing, AKA person that I later would like a return out of.

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And last but not least, this one's my all time favorite. This one is like ending on my favorite note. Bring the energy. Lift people up Fill them up. They should leave every interaction, even if it's just passing in a hallway, even if it's just a quick text message, whatever. They should leave every interaction. Be like, God, every time that person comes across me, I feel good. This is a feeling thing. This is a high energy thing. This is not a Could I have, could I have, could I have, could I have, could I have. Where you're draining energy. This is a Fill them up, fill them up, fill them up. Be perky, be bubbly, don't be fake. But I mean, be the best, highest version energy of yourself.

Yeah. I think this one for us, we work on this all of the time. And we work on this because we've been on both ends of the spectrum, we've had people treat us so freaking amazing that we're like, oh, my God, I will literally do anything for this person. And then we've had opportunities to meet our mentors, and we've left going, oh, my God. I feel like they couldn't have not wanted to be in that conversation more. So for both of us, I think bringing the energy, being the generator, this is something you and I are always working on because, well, we have so many great examples. I know Brendan Burchard is one of our favorite mentors in bringing the energy. But you guys, no matter what the interaction, even whether it's in an email, whether you're going on somebody's show or you're having whatever someone connected you to somebody, if you said yes to the interaction, bring the energy, make it seem like that's the most important thing you're doing that day. And I'm telling you, that is going to be the game changer that opens up all your relationships.

Well, but both ways. So whether you're speaking to someone who you mentor, bring the energy and leave them feeling better than you left them, or if you're speaking to a potential mentor, bring the energy and leave them better than you found them. It's literally my next tattoo that just says, leave them better than you found them. I'm not kidding. Like, this has been my model for so long. No matter who I'm talking to, I try to leave people filled up. So when they get in their car or they walk away or the next person they talk to, they say, God, I really like that person. I like how they make me feel. And so when you concentrate on leaving that interaction so that when they go get in their car and they turn to their wife, they're going to say, you know who I really like? So. And so I just talk to them and damn, they just, they make me feel good. That's how you want to leave every interaction from a text to a in person meeting. Anyhow, at this point some of you might be like screw these guys if this is what it takes to operate in this world. This sounds jerky but hopefully the majority of you are like, ah, I see we're playing a game with humans and the better we make the humans feel and the easier it is that we make for that human to succeed, the more they're going to want to interact and collaborate with us because it feels good and it bears fruit. And that's been our motto. And those are some of the things that we teach when we teach networking, when we teach community building, when those are the ways that when you look at our network, it's how we have the, the high performing friends that we do is because we've always been very conscious of these things. So instead of hoarding them to ourselves, we wanted to in a loving way bring them to you so that you can choose to operate by these rules or not.

You guys, we're so grateful for you and we have an offering for you guys that we are so excited about because we want to be in rooms with you and we want to be connecting you to the people who are going to move the needle for you that you are going to come up with. And that is at the dinner series this year.

Yes, the dinner series. There's only a few spots left at the dinner table, so to speak. And you can go to chrisharder me dinner. You can also go to loriharder.com dinner. They both work. Whichever your favorite one is, you gotta choose, is Lori your favorite or me? But all joking aside, we're literally teaching you how to network and this is direct networking. This is literally putting you in a room with high performing other individuals and having you say here's what I can offer, here's what I need and creating what I call these magical collisions over the course of a half a day that leads into a beautiful dinner that bonds everybody. So if you want to do that three times this year with us, go to Chrisharder Me Dinner or loriharder.com dinner. Grab one of those last few spots at the dinner table. Thanks for listening. Please know this, we love and appreciate you.

We'll see you next week.

Sam.