The next question will be, what about your clients?
What's your vision for those that you serve?
And I'll ask you about the worst experience
in business you've ever had and the best experience.
So that way your brain can start thinking through
what those are.
And you'll have some fun stories.
So any questions for me?
No, I think this will be fun.
And looking forward to just chatting away with you.
You're not like, all right,
welcome in to Vision Pros Live.
With Jackson Calame, I'm your show host.
We'll be doing interviews for visionary entrepreneurs
and guest leaders who are building
fantastic visions out there.
Hey, what's up everybody?
And welcome in to Vision Pros Live.
I'm your host, Jackson Calame,
founder and CEO of First Class Business.
And I'm excited to have Henry Wong on the show today.
He is a brand strategist.
We're gonna get to his story in just a minute.
If you are interested in branding,
writing, design, creative,
what a creative director does.
I loved it on his LinkedIn, by the way.
He's got a blank image.
It's almost blank and it says, insert logo here.
I thought that was a really brilliant move
to help people understand you need to be branding
what you do.
I don't think that was on accident anyway.
I'll ask him about that later.
But without further ado, our sponsors,
I wanna give a shout out to CapShow.
CapShow.com, C-A-P-S-H-O right here.
That is the secret solution that we use
to produce our content for Vision Pros Live.
What we do is we upload our episode to that system
and it produces through AI.
It's the number one ranked AI technology
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And it produces LinkedIn articles, blog posts,
the show descriptions, the show notes,
what you need to put on YouTube,
what you need to put on LinkedIn,
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram.
It also does these cool little sound bites
where it will actually pull sound bites from the show
and organize them based on the type of sound bite
that you want.
So like if I wanna promotional sound bite,
I can just click the button for that
and it will give me options for promotional sound bites.
If I wanna sound bite for educational purposes,
the AI will look through our content and say,
oh wow, okay, here's a segment where Jackson is teaching
and where Henry's teaching and we should pull this out.
I don't know how it works.
I just know these AIs are getting better
and better at what they do.
And it saves my team so much time
with creating a professional page for all of our episodes.
So CapShow is one of our secret weapons.
My biggest favorite thing about it
is actually not the technology itself.
Technology is kinda cool, but what's really cool
is when a technology company has an amazing culture.
And so what really set me off
was when they hit their one year anniversary,
they actually sent to me a package with a decal
that I put on my guitar and a memo
about how happy they were that we were a customer, right?
You'd think it's kinda generic,
but they went and reviewed my show.
They went and gave me a five-star review on my show
and for all of their clients, I thought that was amazing.
And then we started getting involved in their community
and they got a great community culture.
You're welcome to showcase that Jaime, by the way,
to help people understand why I'm just so amped up
about this.
And it was Chris Crown, and I think his last name is.
Chris is this genius podcaster that ran this 12-hour event.
And in the 12-hour event,
honestly, I only had five minutes to sneak in.
I snuck in for five minutes.
It happened to be Deidre,
the founder of CapShow Talking at the time.
And I just sent a little memo,
hey, I'd love to catch up with you guys sometimes.
They didn't have the time for it.
She's got a busy, big company to run.
We ended up meeting at Kajabi's conference by chance,
sitting next to each other two days
before we had a virtual appointment.
I was like, whoa, this is crazy.
And my team at that point started to dive into the system,
look at it, and we've seen the support they give to people.
We've seen how much the CapShowians, as they call themselves,
love the system.
And by the way, we love the system too.
They did launch their affiliate program,
and full disclaimer,
and we will of course provide our link for that.
They launched it yesterday.
So if you have never seen CapShow and used it,
they do have a free trial.
You can upload a couple of episodes on there.
What I recommend is just upload the episodes,
and then click, click, click, click, click, click, click,
trust the system to create your content.
And just like anybody who writes for you for the first time,
you're gonna go back and see that there's little edits
and tweaks that you need to make,
but the creation process, the development process,
it is wiped out.
And so I highly recommend checking out CapShow.
Now the other sponsor to mention is iconmakerlive.com.
We don't have our affiliate link, and that's okay.
We're just excited to be supporting their events.
We're actually working on their new pages right now with them.
And I'm gonna be going to the conference in Charleston,
South Carolina as well.
They have a super VIP program
where 20 people are gonna come out to that event.
And they have a VIP program and a general mission program
for the four day event where you get to go online
to this virtual event in Zoom
and learn about how to launch a successful podcast
and how to make sure that you launch a seven figure podcast.
Bold claim.
I'm excited to see what your assessments are of that.
But if you've ever been interested in the world of podcasting
and you wanna learn from some great executives,
I can say that Tom Madsen,
I put him through a ring of fire the other morning
when we were talking about this
because I have come across him in the past
and I've seen him work with great people
and I never had the chance to sit down with him.
And I knew that there's, you know,
I'm either dealing with a super pretender
or a super contender.
And that's how I look at all situations in life
when I'm meeting executives.
And Tom passed with flying colors.
It was an awesome opportunity.
I can see why he's run more than 80 businesses
in his tenured life.
And the wisdom that comes from that
is something that I do not take for granted.
And then of course, Cheryl, who we hosted on the show.
She's the one who is a founder, core founder.
There's four of them and the CEO of Icon Maker Live.
They have great plans for that.
So definitely see what's going on with that event.
See if it's an event that makes sense for you.
They've got the bullet points laid out
and I'm pretty excited about the page.
If you notice any mistakes, let me know
because I actually finished a copy on it
and I wanted to make sure
that all my mistakes are worked out.
So with that said, I can't wait to bring Henry on now
and talk to him about all that he's doing
in the world of brand strategy.
So Henry, thank you so much for being here today.
We're excited to have you on the show
and can't wait to hear about your vision.
Welcome.
Amazing.
Yeah, thank you so much for having me, Jackson.
Yeah, man, absolutely.
So from brand strategy, talker director,
there's something really interesting
about your background that struck me.
And you said that you grew up
in the back of Chinese restaurants
or a Chinese restaurant
and you'd entertain your customers
in the front of house with stories,
little jokes and big fish tales.
And I can understand how a brand strategist
and creative mind developed out of that process
at such a young age.
Tell us about that experience.
Do you have a big tell you wanted to tell
or a big fish tale?
No.
Something?
Maybe a big chop suey dish of some sort.
Oh, yum.
Yeah, like many immigrants who come to the country,
you have a very, maybe smaller community, closed community.
I grew up in the back of a Chinese restaurant, as you said,
and I had no idea there was another language
other than Chinese until I hit kindergarten.
But once I began going to school,
I began communicating with everybody.
It became my principal language.
And I'm far more North American than I am Chinese.
I grew up with backyard hockey, driveway, basketball,
and all of that.
But through the process, I was,
as I became proficient in English,
my parents put me at front of house.
So I became that little kid behind the counter,
no more than 11, serving customers coffee,
grabbing cigarettes from the back shelf,
counting change backwards.
But I learned to connect with them.
I learned to talk and to story tell,
because I figured out that if I could story tell,
they would actually leave me a decent tip on the counter.
And that became my thing as I grew older.
And I never realized how this all connected
till later on, as I got into advertising and branding,
that storytelling is a key part of, as you know,
building a brand.
And that all related back to the skills I picked up
just by standing there and performing.
I was very much like that short round character
out of Indiana Jones, who just sort of fast talked
and got people into all sorts of laughter.
And the more I made them laugh,
the more there used to be coins
that would be left on the counter.
I thought, oh, I could actually make money doing this.
So really-
There is so much wisdom in that.
I mean, you've been practicing for years
how to assess your audience,
how to perceive what will make those individuals laugh
in order to drive a return on investment.
Like you gotta be a gold mine.
But I will tell you, I mean, by the time I hit grade six,
I was pretty much the class clown,
always commenting on the teacher's lessons and that.
And I think that's what probably threw me
for a little bit of a loop because he called me out.
He pulled me to the front of the classroom and goes,
okay, wise guy, you like talking,
go ahead and teach the rest of the class.
And that's when I began fumbling
and I had no words that would come out of my mouth.
And I suddenly became very conscious
of what I was saying.
And that probably set me back probably two or three years
where I became very, very shy and withdrawn.
And you don't realize how a setback
can really throw you off.
But I'm glad it didn't progress into my adult years
because then I was able to get my swagger back
and I was able to talk and storytell.
But it's really about communication.
And that's really, and if anything,
that shyness forced me to communicate by writing.
So I became a decently proficient writer.
And that really led to my career in advertising.
And the added part was just a way of being able
to sell the creative that I worked on
through the different agents.
That's awesome.
Oh, Henry cut out a little bit,
but I think you ended that segment
of what you were talking about.
And that process of going through the trauma
of somebody kind of shutting you down,
putting you on the spot,
and then having to recover from it
is something I love to key in on
because everybody, it doesn't matter.
If you're a super expert, you got baggage, brother.
Sister, you got stuff in your mind
that's holding you back from different opportunities.
It's important to learn how to address
and extract those things,
whether it's something that is from your super past
or something recent.
So I'm curious, do you know what you did
or what changed in your mind to recover quickly
at a young age?
Because that would be powerful to hear the example.
You got shut down.
What did you do to open back up?
You know, I think it often comes from reinforcement
from other people.
And we as human beings often look for that affirmation
from our fellow colleagues or, you know,
family love you no matter what,
but there's something about a third party, as you know,
someone who can reaffirm what you can do.
And you realize part of it is self-delusion
and part of it is that affirmation from people.
So when you start getting accolades,
when people start commenting on the way you do things
in a positive way, you really have to accept it
and accept it with a certain amount of grace
and understanding because many of us
who tend to be maybe introverted
or a little bit shyer, they go,
oh, no, no, I'm not that way.
As an Asian, a Canadian, an American,
I grew up with that very sort of humble outlook
that my parents instilled in me.
And that can be not a dangerous thing,
but it can quite affect you if you think about it
because if you're complimented
or you achieve a certain amount,
and if it's not good enough, it often can set you back.
What you're looking for is really,
these are just part of the steps of my growth
and as I achieve the next sort of run,
as I get published in a local literary magazine,
that's a win.
As I get my first job, that's a win.
And as we go through business, as you can imagine,
those little wins mount up and it gives you that confidence.
And I think that's what it was.
I didn't look at it eventually as a negative,
but I looked at each as a progressive step towards,
hopefully, the person I have perhaps become today.
Henry, you've already inspired two fantastic truths for me
that magnify my life and I appreciate that.
I'll share both of them right now
because it wouldn't have come without you.
So one, you talked about that individual,
somebody else being the catalyst, right?
Through an affirmation, an expression or compliment to you
to help you get back out of that shell.
I had the same exact experience.
When I was in kindergarten,
my kindergarten music teacher told me
I wasn't allowed to sing in class
because my voice was too low.
And I don't remember that.
My mom says I came home devastated.
She went to the, she's an angel
and she went and tore this teacher apart apparently.
The only thing I do remember about the situation
was the next day I came into class for music,
probably a week later,
there was this giant, huge black man with a low voice
who stood next to me and like was singing with me.
And I didn't know why I didn't have any content.
Well, at least I don't remember why,
but I'm pretty sure like that experience occurred
because of what my mom said to that lady now.
But for years, I had no confidence whatsoever in singing.
I was terrified to sing or to do things in front of people
or I was noticed and I was in church singing to him,
like under my breath sort of.
And my friend's dad, we had just moved into the area.
He turns to me and he goes,
man, you've got a really good voice.
And I was like, thanks, like awkward, preteen,
like thanks, I didn't say anything else.
But my mind was fireworks.
Like it was like, oh my gosh, maybe I have a good voice.
Maybe I could sing, maybe I could do this, maybe do that.
Like my brain was going nuts.
My heart was, I was like, what?
Like I was, I didn't know I had that capacity.
So my challenge to you, Vision Pros,
you'd be the person, right?
If I am, if I am my life,
be that person to compliment others and lift them up,
then I'm going to likely receive that in my life too.
The more you give, the more you get.
So look for people in your life who you can compliment
because odds are they're not as aware
of their strengths as they could be.
That's the first thing that you instilled in me.
Henry, you have any further thoughts on that?
You want to keep going on that subject?
Yeah, no, I love that touch.
And I think you're absolutely right
because we can lift each other up so much
and it really doesn't take much.
And it's not falsehoods or anything,
but you do, it's easy enough to focus on the negative,
maybe a little bit harder to focus on some of the positives,
but that most positives,
particularly within our peer groups and our,
the businesses that we run can be so discouraging.
It really helps to have that cheerleader on the side.
And you touched on your mother actually going to bat for you.
And I, now that I think about it,
my dad actually went to bat for me a number of times.
Even at times I was bullied in the schoolyard.
You could have just left it at that, go back out there.
But he went down to the school and said,
this is the environment that's being created for my son.
You have to try to change it.
And that's particularly, he wasn't a forceful person
and he didn't have high expectations.
He just needed to communicate these are the concerns
and his sort of manner about him and a quiet confidence
really stuck with me.
And I, as we delve into this,
I realized so much of what the people around us
affect us in so many different ways.
And so you look for the positive,
I think, and then shed the negative.
It seems simple,
but maybe that's the way we need to look at things.
I love that.
And your dad showed what I would call the difference
between strength and force.
Right, when somebody is strong and they exercise strength,
they can do so with calm like a lion
that doesn't need to let his presence be known
in front of the antelope,
or the rest of the kingdom.
No hyena is gonna attack a lion by itself.
It knows it's strong.
Versus force where somebody comes in
and tries to make things happen,
much like a hyena tries to do and dives in.
There's not a lot of strength with most opportunities
where force is executed.
The strength is usually missing.
So well done by your dad to have that.
What's your vision, Henry, in 15 seconds?
What's your personal vision?
You know, it's quite simple.
It's just simply to have a positive impact on the world.
I love that.
I love it.
I think you're sticking to the 15 seconds.
I'd love for you to expand that too though now.
So now what has positive impact on the world
and how do you wanna accomplish that in your life?
We'll talk about those who serve after,
but what do you see for yourself five, 10, 15 years
down the road?
You know, just again, doing a lot of the same
that I'm doing now, impacting businesses,
sharing knowledge however I can.
Years ago, I remember interviewing someone
for my first book amongst entrepreneurs.
And he was really quite proud of himself
because he had moved from just being a doer
and a manager to now a manager of inspiration.
And I thought, what a wonderful job title to have.
And I'd love to be able to continue this on in my life.
You know, you learn a lot, you made a lot of mistakes.
If I can help people with some of that knowledge
or inspiration and be that manager of inspiration,
I think that's a perfect way to spend
the next five, 10 years.
I love that.
And so let's dive deeper into that.
So what's your vision for those that you're serving?
What is it you're hoping they achieve, accomplish
or redirect that to another outcome?
Yeah, I mean, it does tie back to my own personal vision.
So when I, I think seven years ago,
I was a partner in an ad agency.
And then unfortunately, my partner who was a bit older
had passed away.
And that allowed me to do a little bit of a reset
and re-examination of my life, you know,
what he had gone through.
So I started a new company, a new agency
and that's called Vue.
And my sole purpose and it's really the mandate that I use.
I only wanna work with companies and clients
who wanna have a positive impact on the world.
So that's informed the type of business I've brought in,
the type of clients I interact with.
And even the people that I bring on as team members itself,
it's been just a wonderful ride
and just that little bit of reset
and understanding how your personal vision
can affect your business vision can make things well.
Because when the two don't reconcile,
that's where the conflict happens
and that's where that unhappiness happens.
So I think I've been, you know, I'm super, super busy,
but I haven't been happier than I have been in years.
Wow, that's again, just another deep set of wisdom
of making sure that your personal decisions,
your business decisions, I know it sounds simple
that they correlate, but without it,
they're not gonna reconcile.
As you mentioned, there's gonna be a dissonance
that exists in life if you don't address that.
So go ahead, you have another thought?
Yeah, the biggest challenge often is, you know,
many of us who particularly who run businesses
or work with an environment, you know,
we're tied to obviously trying to make money
and that was always a concern.
Well, what if we don't get the business we want
or what if we don't, you know, sustain this
based on this sort of criteria?
I actually found, and I don't know if it was luck
or just the law of attraction,
but it actually did the opposite,
which is I have more business
than I can reasonably handle at this point,
just because of that, because I'm so selective
and I only focus on these types of companies.
It's when your mission aligns with other people
that they bring you on, not simply as a transaction,
as a way to engage your services,
but they truly see you as a partner in their business
because you believe in what they believe
because they're one in the same.
And from that, you're really growing together
and I think that's been a big learning for me
in terms of, I wish I, again, it goes back to,
I wish I knew then what I knew now
because it would have changed a lot of the way I did things.
Absolutely, so let's talk about that.
For the visionaries who are on the rise
and life's getting busier because they're becoming
more of an in-demand brand.
You mentioned having the clients that you want to work with,
you have this abundance about you.
So the question that I think a lot of people
who are struggling to get to that level would ask is,
so then why do interviews?
Why put, I have my answers, but why do interviews?
Why seek more attention?
And why go out to the world to speak
if you're at capacity as a business owner?
What are your thoughts on that?
Yeah, I mean, my goal at this point
isn't necessarily bring on more business.
It's really an opportunity to share wisdom.
So during pandemic, I had the opportunity
because we were shut down in my city.
So I spent every Saturday morning beginning to write a book
and that laid out a lot of the process I have
and a lot of my philosophy for branding,
particularly for people brands.
And at the end of the process,
I ended up with a book that a publisher picked up
and now it's out in the world, which is great,
but it's a wonderful way again to share knowledge
with people.
The one thing I found with many people coming to me
was that my, not that my fees are super expensive,
but for a lot of personal brands,
it's not something they can normally take on
as an expense.
So it's my way of sharing the knowledge
in sort of a do it yourself approach
that they might be able to take on.
So I think just going out in the world
and perhaps being, I don't necessarily wanna be a teacher
per se, but being able to be simply a share of knowledge
and hopefully helping people in that way
will be quite a wonderful benefit back to me.
Awesome, I have a strange question for you.
I've never asked anybody on this show
and just feel very inspired to ask you about it.
So two questions back to back.
What are the two to three top most important virtues to you
if you have them on hand
and what are the two to three most important feelings to you?
That's really interesting.
You know, obviously they're all important.
Yeah, no, no, no.
They're all important.
So first question, what are the two or three traits, I guess?
To me, I think number one is compassion.
It's so easy for many of us to be unforgiving
or be angry at a situation or at people.
Much more difficult to maybe put yourself
in the other person's shoes.
So that sense of compassion, I think is really
one of the things that I've been working on
and I'd like to think that's what has informed
the way I run a business.
So I think the other side is to live life by example
as best you can, which is really my way of set,
hopefully setting an example.
So the way I, the manner in which I manage,
the way I conduct my business,
hopefully will connect with people that I work with
that they may be in turn be able to do the same.
Amazing, okay.
And compassion, I don't think you can have compassion
without love and I love that, that you chose a word
that dives into a very unique characteristic of love.
And what about on the feeling side,
the things that you want to feel?
What are the two or three most important feelings for you?
You know, I think it's a daily enthusiasm
and excitement and just laughter along the way.
They say laughter is the best medicine.
So you can't laugh at yourself and you can't laugh
at things that happen along the way
or find the humor in things.
And you can get into a very, very dark place
and it's easy enough to default to that.
But when you look for those opportunities
to smile at yourself or bring a smile to somebody else,
it just creates these wonder.
And I don't know necessarily the science
and the neurology behind it,
but I do know there's a positive effect
that certainly comes from it.
But you start the day with just,
you know, every day is a reset if you think about it.
So the day before could have been quite crappy
and didn't go your way, but wow, it's like a game.
I get to start a game the next day
and maybe make things a little bit better.
And that's a way to look at it
because the opposite can be quite debilitating,
which is dread of looking forward to going to it.
Right, right, no, exactly.
You know, and I think it's a four dimensional paradigm
or beyond perhaps, but because that's one
of the angle opposites and I need more Henry Wong
in my life to be honest with you.
This is super awesome.
I love the answers you have because I love
that you chose the word enthusiasm
because there's a very distinct meaning
between enthusiasm and excitement.
And it's cool that you chose excitement a second
and laughter too as part of that process.
I'm by nature a healer.
Like that's what I gravitate and nurture.
And you know, my number one would be peace,
you know, peace followed by love.
But I definitely, I grew up kind of not
with a whole lot of laughter, I guess you could say.
And so I've learned to rewire that over the last decade.
I've been working on that process of understanding, wow,
okay, this is what happiness is.
And this is how it works.
So, you know, you're like a superstar
at something that I'm aspiring to accomplish.
So let's, yeah, I mean, I'm excited to stand.
I think in a lot of ways, I would say you're there,
you just have this wonderful manner about you
that just sets everybody at ease
and it comes both from your voice,
but you know, there's a certain energy projection
that you have, even though we're, you know,
separated by, you know, you're definitely someone,
you know, we're in the same city,
we'd be hanging out and grabbing beers and coffee
and just chatting about how to fix the world.
Yes, that's right.
Well, I appreciate that, you know,
and that's the goal, right?
It's that, I love how you framed it too,
the starting the game again the next day.
You know, it's those little concepts that can shift
how we perceive an opportunity.
So my fourth dimension, right,
or my other dimension of starting is,
I have the same type of concept,
but I've usually started my day with like,
I'm happy, I'm excited, and I have joy, I have peace,
I'm ready to go, and I can't wait for the day,
but I haven't looked at it from the perspective of a game,
right, and so adding that little chip to the equation
can make a world of a difference
in how you perceive the opportunities in the world.
It makes it a little bit more playful.
And so it's, yeah, just little golden nuggets, man.
I'm gonna dive into a dark subject now,
something that just completely changes the tone.
So what's your worst business experience ever, Henry?
You know, I have to say,
it was probably during my time
working for one of the big ad agencies,
and with global ad agencies,
you don't get to choose the clients that you have.
They're part of a worldwide alignment.
So we had this one, and I won't mention names, of course,
but we had this one large client
who was forced to work with us.
They preferred probably to work with another agency,
but because it was alignment across the globe,
they had to work with us.
So as a result of it, the client was just simply bullies.
You know, they could yell at us,
they could expect really unsavory things from us
and harass us.
And we had to essentially take it
because it was like a forced marriage.
So I think, you know,
when you think of the corporate grind, that was a grind,
but rather than look at it and be stuck,
it actually inspired me to realize
and to work towards creating my own entity,
because then I could control the type of clients.
And I think that was probably,
again, more of a learning experience
rather than a bad experience.
So even though it was probably a super bad work, you know,
business experience, it did inspire me to really,
I guess, go back to my original mantra that I talked about,
which is really only work with the clients that I want to,
only work with the ones that have a positive impact
on the world.
We can control our destiny as best we can.
I'm not making, you know, in those first few years,
I probably nowhere in the world did make the money
that I made back in the big agency days,
but that quickly corrected itself after some time.
And it was just because I was able to attract
the type of clients and still do the work that I wanted,
because it's, you know, in business,
when you reach a certain level, you can be quite lucrative,
but at the same time, you have to look at what you're getting
out of it as a result.
So as bad as it was, it was still a positive in that manner.
It is mind blowing to me that three out of three times
I've asked this question since I add to the list,
every single entrepreneur, their worst experience
led to them starting their business.
It is an interesting trend that just continues.
So let's talk about your best experience.
What is your best experience in business?
I would say a job that I wasn't paid for,
and it was the national newspaper at the time coming to me,
because I was getting fairly well known
as a creative director and a brand person.
So they said, you know,
we have this homeless situation in the city.
How would you advertise it or create awareness around it
so people pay attention to it?
So I said, give me a week.
And I began working with my creative partner at the time.
We came up with this quite an unusual idea,
and that was to photograph a homeless person
and a rich person side by side,
but we had them stripped naked.
And we ran this as a full page.
It was an editorial, but it was also an ad.
And really the thought behind it was,
the only difference between the rich man
and the homeless person is your attitude towards them.
It was stripped away, you had no perception of who they were.
And that got all sorts of accolades and positive response.
But the more important thing,
it made me realize that through the right messaging,
through the right way in which I could express my skills,
I could have a small impact
on the way people could perceive things
or the way we could alter the way people look at things.
So in that way, I think it really was
my best business experience
because it began leading me again
to all the things that I'm doing now
to ensure that I had impact on the things that we do.
Wow, what a bold move.
What a bold, okay.
So you took this move.
Did you have any trepidation about you
when you were thinking about the idea of presenting this?
Was there anything that made you be like,
oh my gosh, I don't know,
they might fire me if I suggest this?
Or did you already have the boldness
to know that you're good
and they were going to accept this process
with flying colors?
What were some of your thought processes like
when you realized you were going to ask them
or suggest to them that you were gonna make two individuals
strip down buck naked and get photographed?
Or did you do it before you asked?
Tell me about this.
I think particularly in the world of creativity
and business, sometimes those things
that make your palms sweat a little bit
or make you feel a little bit uncomfortable
or maybe the ideas you wanna begin pushing
because if you do everything the same,
then the goal often in branding and in advertising,
in addition to all the other sort of steps is that be noticed.
How will you be noticed?
And what is the effect of being noticed?
So it's easy enough to just simply do things for attention,
but with the right attention,
with the right sort of messaging,
what's the residual benefit from it?
So while it seemed risky, in the end, it really wasn't
because the effect or the message that we're getting,
we were getting across is absolutely what we want to do.
So that was really the idea was a conduit
to getting that message to people.
So in that way, no risk.
And I mean, the publication ran it
with the right black bars in place, of course,
but it did have a strong effect
on people looking at it, of course.
Well, so visionaries, listen to this.
Henry's answer to my question shows his absolute conviction
over the situation at hand.
So many of us psych ourselves out
when we have an opportunity where we're so worried
about the perception of what others will say
in spite of our palms sweating
and wanting to move it forward,
we almost, we can plant the seed of doubt too often
with those that we're working with
and overshadow the value of what we do.
And so if you have a tendency to ask for permission,
for instance, and when you're supposed to be bold
and confident about a situation,
I'm not talking about being overbearing.
I'm talking about being certain about your knowledge
and expertise and moving forward boldly.
You didn't even, you either missed the question,
which because of your assurity, which I think is beautiful,
or you didn't see what could have been a negative,
I guess, contention in the process
because you were centered and sound and ready to move forward.
So was there people who pushed back or were there not?
No, I was in a position of a forwarding in power.
I was a senior vice president and creative director.
So it wasn't a difficult approval process.
But I will add to what you said,
and I think you framed it really quite well, Jackson,
and that's really just moving forward.
And I would add to it, go back to, for each of us,
go back to your own purpose and your mission,
because if it answers that, then you really can't be wrong
because you've set that out as part of your belief system.
Where I think there is an issue
is where it goes against that.
If it didn't answer what I was looking to do,
which was to have a positive impact
on the way people perceive things on this particular issue,
then I would have probably shied away from it.
But the mission was there.
And that itself, I think, is your guiding light
in many ways.
Interesting.
I'm gonna ask you a deeply personal question.
You can decline.
But what is your belief system, Henry?
From spiritual or religious?
I guess that's what you're looking for.
So, Henry, you're welcome to answer that how you'd like.
You know, just to, I guess, share with everybody.
I mean, I grew up very much in the suburbs.
So I went to a Bible college,
and my best friend down the street was Lutheran.
So a lot of very strong Christian-based thinking
that helped inform a lot of my morals and standards.
But it didn't really end up where,
or I didn't end up with that.
Along the way, as you become curious, as you look at,
you begin studying other religions and philosophies.
And so I began embracing a little bit more of that Buddhism
where, I guess, that compassion trait comes in
at the same time.
But these things, I think it's a little bit more,
I guess, universal.
I don't really tie to anything.
I think we can maybe move beyond the bounds of doctrines
and just try to help each other and embrace each other
and uplift each other.
And it doesn't need to tie to any one philosophy
or belief it.
Because if you look across the board,
that can be in itself very common.
We have that magic golden rule that we often say,
do unto others, do unto others as you would have them
do unto you.
It's so universal across any sort of belief system.
And you don't need to be tied to one to appreciate that.
I love that.
So again, your approach, I just wanted to dissect it
for those who are listening because there's so much
deeper wisdom in the way that you're portraying this
and that you can take it.
And you're actually making me sound smarter than I am.
So thank you for that.
That's not true.
I'm pulling this from you because you're putting it out there.
So Henry, you have a deep appreciation
for the religious cultures and systems
that you've experienced in life.
You talk about it with honor.
And it's guided you to have this in nature.
And one thing that I think is really valuable about that
is that the belief systems are ones that you honor.
You've chosen to find the virtue in those opportunities
as you've expanded.
And so you have a core set of belief systems
that are also flexible with your knowledge and learning.
Whereas I see a lot of people in the world who
are very scared to talk about belief systems
because they see such quick opportunities to clash
with others and to find conflict.
And if you ignore the belief systems out there,
you say, well, they're bad because I don't agree with them.
And then you end up isolating yourself
from having a belief system, which I think,
from what I've seen in my small experience in life,
is that it leaves people without a foundation and a base.
Whereas you have all these foundations
that you're constantly molding together.
And so entrepreneurs, the visionaries that I talk to
and they get to interview and meet with, to me,
it's not about cornering them into a belief system
as much as it is about recognizing that when we have
a base that we can draw from, we have principles and laws
that we trust, kind of like gravity.
We know that every time I throw something in the air,
it's going to come down.
And so I have a confidence about my ability
to do things thanks to the belief systems
that were instilled in me.
And you've just expanded that to say how every culture
in the world has light and knowledge
that we can learn from if we're willing to.
That's beautifully put.
But you're absolutely right.
And I think we can learn so much from each other
rather than to maybe look at the differences,
look at the things that can help align
with your own belief system.
And it's amazing how you could bridge the gap
to many discussions that way.
Wow, absolutely.
So we've pretty much done this the entire time,
thanks to you, but I'm going to do it again.
What powerful lesson can other visionaries learn
from your experience, Henry?
Hopefully this thirst for knowledge and curiosity,
because if you come in with an open vessel,
you can learn so much from other people.
I've been complimented in the past
of being not an interesting person,
but an interested person.
And I found that at first,
I thought I might've been put off by it,
but then I realized, no,
that was actually a wonderful compliment.
And I think having that, being that openness
to just learning from others will help fulfill your life
and help you just keep advancing
and finding those incremental improvements,
whether it's business or in your personal side.
So be curious.
I love that.
If you're in sales long enough,
or you're in marketing long enough
to go to enough conferences,
you will eventually hear a leader reflect just that
and say, the moment you stop being interesting,
and you become interested in those you serve
is the moment you will level up and rise as a leader.
And so that's really cool that they said that to you
and that you caught the value of it
out of the circumstance.
It is definitely one of the best compliments
that one can receive as a leader.
So if you're out there listening right now,
we appreciate you,
because you're also expressing that interest
in what it is we're doing.
We honor your curiosity.
If you have comments that you'd like to share,
if you have to inspire others along this way,
people who are maybe looking from the fringes
of potentially listening to this,
but saying, I don't know if I wanna spend time on that.
It's your comments that are going to inspire
those individuals to also tune in
and gain insight from people like Henry.
On the flip side, if you have questions,
things that you'd like to know further about Henry or myself,
don't hesitate to comment and ask,
and reach out to us.
I'm sure Henry would be more than happy
to receive communication.
Where, if people wanna contact you Henry,
where should they be reaching out?
I have my own website that leads to both business
and my book, henrywong.co.
So contact is there and a little bit of information
about me is there as well.
So yeah.
Awesome, Jaime, go ahead and you can pull that up.
That way everybody can get a look
at what they're looking for when they,
and the spelling of course.
Very good, awesome.
Your story, building your brand.
Just, I just wanna thank you for the incredible depth
of wisdom knowledge that you shared with us.
I can see how valuable insights would be in your books
if people have the opportunity to go
and purchase those as well.
Vue as a company, would you like to share anything
about Vue before we wrap up?
Is there, who's the ideal, what scenario is somebody in
in their life or their business
where it would make sense to say, wow,
Vue really could be the great solution for me?
Yeah, so the ones that I seem to gravitate
and the ones I'm looking to attract
are typically mid growth companies
who are looking to get to the next level,
but definitely have that mission and purpose
of having a positive impact on the world.
And love to talk to you, even if not to do business,
I enjoy meeting so many people in this space
and the more of us that who are out there,
I think the more we can have a positive effect on the world.
I love it.
If you're looking for a dynamic speaker
who has capable of driving laughter, enthusiasm
and excitement to your conference, that also is endearing
and has a, what I've seen as a heart of gold
and who's going to bring an authentic series
of wisdom truths for your audience,
and by all means reach out to Henry Wong
and bring him on your stage.
You will bless lives.
Henry, thanks for your time.
That's really nice, thank you.
Of course, man.
Wonderful to be on your show.
Oh man, you're constantly honoring me, I appreciate it.
So you guys have a fantastic week.
In fact, we will see in the next episode.
We got one coming up here at 1 p.m. Central, I believe it is.
Am I right, Jaime?
Is that when the time is?
I appreciate you, brother.
All right, guys, have a great one.
We'll see you on the next show.
Thank you for being here today.
I'm really happy that you tuned in to Vision Pros Live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions
as these episodes continue to move forward.
This is gonna get more and more fun.
We'll have more and more engagement as well.
We'll invite people to participate in the show,
and thank you for giving us your time and attention.