Welcome to Networking Unleashed, Building Profitable
Connections, the show where relationships become
results and connections turn into opportunities.
I'm your host, Michael Foreman, and today we're
exploring the future of networking through the
lens of education, entrepreneurship, and technology.
My guest is at the forefront of Anabasis Academy's
innovative approach to learning. blending leadership
development with AI -driven tools to prepare
the next generation of entrepreneurs. We'll dive
into how emerging leaders can build meaningful
networks, leverage technology without losing
the human touch, and use relationships as the
key driver for professional and personal growth.
Whether a student, entrepreneur, or seasoned
professional, this conversation will give you
strategies to connect smarter, lead better, and
grow faster. I'd like to welcome to the podcast,
Sid. We had a little problem connecting, but
we're all here now. And I'm welcoming you to
the podcast. And would you please just give us
a little bit about your background? Of course,
it's great to be with you and your audience,
Michael. And sometimes a little bit of a connection
problem gives us more anticipation. So I'm happy
to be here. In terms of background, I'll be pretty
short because what I always believe is not me
that counts, it's the audience and it's you.
I'm an immigrant by background. I came to the
States when I was 16, educated here in college,
started my first company when I was in college.
And then at some period of time, I was a partner
of a consulting firm. I worked with very large
organizations. Then I started my own firm and
did turnarounds. We bought companies and sold
them. Then started the other companies, mostly
in technology. Bought four or five of them. A
few worked and we sold the companies and a couple
didn't work. And we learned a lot. And in the
past 20 years, and you can see that I'm an old
guy, I've been teaching at universities, both
in engineering and business schools, and have
been making investments in early stage companies.
I was the president of Tech Coast Angels, which
is the largest angel investment entity, had a
venture fund, then sold the company and full
circle to consulting as the strategic innovation
leader for a very large advisory at 26. billion
dollar advisory company. And now I do three or
four things. One is I'm still teaching. Another
is that I have a few books and I write a lot.
If you search me, hundreds of articles. I'm old,
so I'm very opinionated. I still serve on boards,
corporate boards and make investments. And our
latest venture is Anabasis Academy that you referred
to, which is a fusing, a combination of mindfulness,
awareness. and entrepreneurship because everything
begins in your mind and we're all unique so we
have to find that authentic way of of making
progress so that's me outstanding outstanding
and i'm sure you could have gone on for another
half an hour just tell me about your background
because it is so vast but okay so let's jump
right into the questions how does the new approach
at Anabasis? Am I saying that correctly? Yeah,
Anabasis. Anabasis, by the way, Ana is a Latin
word meaning moving up, move up. And basis is
obviously the base. So Anabasis is moving the
base up. Okay. See, I learn something new every
day. How does the new approach at Anabasis Academy
prepare students to build meaningful professional
networks from an early stage? First, I've got
to explain how the world works now because it's
important. Before I can say, hey, this is how
it's different. In terms of education, whether
it's students at colleges or folks that are going
through management training, leadership training,
or even motivational stuff, everything that you
could see out there. based on a lot of how -tos.
That's, I'm going to give you a skill, and I'm
going to give you four things, and then you're
going to follow these four things, and you're
going to get to nirvana, okay? So if you go at
school, when we go to school, they give us a
lot of stuff to memorize, and then repeat those
in circular formats whenever we face those situations.
Do these five things, and it's going to work.
What that does, it's very good at increasing
productivity. Because I'm getting you to do the
same thing over and over. But it's not necessarily
relevant or conducive to innovation and creativity.
Now, we are in a world, if you look at the AI
stuff that's happening, look at everything around
us, that we're at a transition point. We're at
a transition point. And our evolution as human
beings is moving towards... creativity and innovation,
as opposed to tasks. The tasks, even the programming
stuff AI is doing. So the tasks can be done by
somebody else. You don't need a how to follow
these seven steps and do this. And by the way,
they say practical advice to do A, B, or C, or
become a trillionaire. Those practical advice
are practical for who? Because you and I are
different. I'm an introvert, you're an extrovert.
I grew up in this place, you grew up in that
place. You went to the military, I never did.
There's so many different, there are 8 billion
people on our planet, no two people are the same.
So what does that mean to be practical? It just
doesn't make any sense. So the idea is, yes,
it's good to learn from others. There's a thousand
books out there, a hundred thousand maybe on
leadership. No two leaders are the same. No two
situations to apply your leadership is the same.
So it's how do you look at these skills and become
skillful, which is different. It's how do I use
my entirety to be able to do that. Now, so Animations
Academy is about provoking you. It's not about,
it doesn't think that your mind is like a vase
or another container. We don't want to put more
water in your mind, if you would. We want to
be able to ignite a fire because the belief is
you have all capabilities in terms of building.
We're all built to create better, Michael. We're
all built. It's in our DNA. We're not just here
to survive. We're here to be better. We all want
to do that. The trick is to provoke folks and
engage folks. To be able to activate the part,
which is about being aware of your decisions,
being aware of the surroundings, being aware.
Because if you're aware, you make better decisions.
Absolutely correct. That goes hand in hand, of
course, with the networking, which I'm all about.
You have to be aware of your opportunities, have
to be aware of the people. As long as you're
aware, you can talk with anybody, speak with
anybody. Correct. So this is a very good segment
or way to connect it to what your focus is, which
is the networking. A lot of people want to network
to sell something. I have this. I want to give
it to you. But let's think this for a minute.
Let's think about this for a minute. Do you really
sell or do people buy? People love to buy, but
they hate to be sold to. Yeah, they love to buy
based on their own decisions. So who makes the
decision at the end? Not you as a salesman, not
you as a founder, not you as... They make the
decision. They, for their own reasons. In a networking
environment, I'm not there to sell. I'm there
to understand the reasons why they would buy,
why they would engage. Why is it that how can
I satisfy... What they're looking for. How can
I provide the value? Because I don't have that
decision. They have that decision. Now, it's
the same thing about your employees. You know,
we think networking is about outside. Networking
is creating a network that produces a better
result than an individual. A network is an ecosystem
that creates collectively a better outcome. So
if you apply the same idea, Hey, my employees,
they decide if they give me productivity or not.
I don't decide how much productivity they give
me. I don't decide at 8 o 'clock at night or
10 o 'clock at night or 4 o 'clock in the afternoon.
They're really thinking about doing something
innovative or doing something better. They decide.
So if I realize that, then I have created a network
that is based on reasons. That drive decisions.
The same applies to your investors. The same
applies to your partners in business and actually
to the community that you thrive in. Does that
make sense? It makes perfect sense. It makes
perfect sense. Depending on who you are, it depends
on what angle you're looking at it from. It's
all the same problem. It's all the same outcome.
You're just looking at it from a different way.
Absolutely. And that's fantastic. I never thought
about it that way. Let me go on. People, people,
usually this is the thing. If you really listen
to what I've been talking about and writing stuff,
this is really not rocket science. No, it's not.
Life is not rocket science. We make it all this
rigmarole in order to have these 17 layers and
then charge people to do this. We make it this
complicated thing. It's actually pretty simple.
No, I coach. I coach many people. And I go and
I speak on different stages in different companies.
And I tell them all, it's not rocket science.
It's all common sense. And really, the 20 -somethings,
the 30 -somethings, they've never heard this
before. They haven't been taught this. But the
older people, the older, the 40s, 50s, or even
60s, they say, oh, yeah, I've heard of that.
I don't do it, but I've heard of it. But it's
all common sense. Okay. So. What role does networking
play in entrepreneurship and how can aspiring
founders leverage it effectively? So I talk about
a few things. An entrepreneur, first of all,
we have to build our own entrepreneurial philosophy,
each one of us. And by the way, entrepreneurship
by actual definition, I'm not making this up.
This word was defined in the 1700s. That is over
300 years ago. An entrepreneur is someone who
has something, who wishes to exchange it with
something of higher value, knowing that there
is risk. That means you have something. This
could be your idea. It could be your talents.
It could be you're a basketball player or you're
a good musician or you have a product that you
build. You have something. And you want to exchange
it with something of higher value. you have this
you want to give it to somebody else knowing
that there is risk you may have this you may
not necessarily get what you want to get okay
so we with that definition we all have this entrepreneurial
ability regardless of where you are the seven
seven year old child that you have who wants
to get an ice cream they're experiencing their
entrepreneurship okay The mother who goes out
and works all day and makes $12 an hour and brings
that to their kid to go to Disneyland on vacation.
And Elon Musk is experiencing the entrepreneur.
So let's take that as a no. The question is,
how can you experience that entrepreneur? How
can you practice it? You can define what you
have. You can define what is of higher value
to you. But from here to there, there's risk.
From here to there. So how do you accomplish
this? You cannot accomplish this without an ecosystem.
Period. Because people buy stuff from you. People
work for you. People give you money and investment.
People partner with you. And you live within
a society. These are the five pillars of the
way. Without these five, you're not practicing
entrepreneurship as it's defined in any way possible.
Whether it's at home. Or in a business. So an
ecosystem, a network is a must -have. Okay? A
network is an ecosystem. That's good. I'm going
to steal that from you, if you don't mind. No
problem. Okay. Let's switch it to AI a little
bit. AI is reshaping industries. How can professionals
use AI to enhance, not replace, genuine relationship
building? This is a very, it's a very obviously
topical question of the day because everywhere,
yes, there are numerous studies that says that
by 2030, we're going to lose in the world somewhere
around 800 ,000 or 500 ,000 jobs that are completely
going to be gone. And if you think about it,
that's about one, about a few percentage point
of the total jobs available. So it is a challenge.
Now, most of the things that are out there, there's
a lot of noise out there. Everybody there tries
to, oh, let's do an LLM and a JTPT or whatever.
And mostly are focused on productivity. Mostly
are focused on productivity. Meaning, here's
what I'm doing. Let me do this faster. But remember,
if you do things faster, let's say. Just as an
example, let's say we have a production system.
We make these cups and we make 10 of them an
hour. But out of 10, one is faulty. It's broken.
Now, if I just do this faster, I would do 100
an hour, but I will have more errors. Productivity
in terms of replicating what you're doing doesn't
necessarily mean that you got better. Now, there's
multiple tools now if you want to look at. capturing
people to come into your network if you call
it emailing stuff or but if the content if the
way you communicate you don't meet the reasons
it doesn't matter how fast you do it it really
doesn't matter how fast you do it so it depends
on how well you do it correct how so if you're
doing it well you could use tools to do it well
If you're not doing it well, just getting somebody
else's practical one, two, three doesn't make
you. Like goes back to the old saying of garbage
in, garbage out. Yeah. So you put garbage in
and you want to make it go faster. That's great.
But garbage out. Correct. But here's the thing.
Here's the thing, Michael. This is the interesting
part. We have so much noise and people trying
to sell things to people out there. So much noise
of how to do... You get my point about I'm against
this how -to business. Everybody's trying to
how -to this, how -to that and charge people
for doing the how -to this or how -to that. If
somebody else is doing it and you just copy it,
it's not authentic. It's not you. And people
will see through that. Yes, they will. Because
you're not being authentic. You're not being...
You're somebody else trying to be doing this.
Hey, a copy of a copy is just not as good as
the genuine thing. No, it's not. Okay, let me
go on. From your perspective, what leadership
qualities make someone naturally magnetic in
networking situations? Listening. Very good.
Very important. Active listening. Go ahead. Listening.
Listening to learn. Not listening to empathize.
I want to emphasize that. Because there is a
lot of hoopla. Oh, you listen to empathize with
people. No, I listen to learn. So I improve my
own decisions. This is a very selfish act. I'm
not listening to respect others. It does do that.
But it's a side effect of things. I am listening
because they have their own reasons. And if I
know their reason, I can be a better sales guy.
I can deliver better value. I'm listening because
they are giving me information that makes my
life better. I can make decisions better. I'm
not listening to reply. I'm not listening to
empathize. I'm listening to learn. You're a problem
solver. OK, so if someone has a problem, you
have the solution. You're getting to that. But
you can't get to that unless you first find out
what the problem is. So by active listening,
you're listening to them. And of course, when
you respond, sort of what they said to you so
that they know that you were listening to them.
It's a whole big thing, but it works. OK. How
can young professionals or students strategically
network to open doors in entrepreneurship and
innovation? Very good question. So this may vary
from most people's perspective. There's two ways
of looking at it. I have this product or I have
this mission. I want to be X, Y, Z. And then
I begin to find everybody in that environment
and then send them emails and do this and do
that and blast them with LinkedIn stuff and whatever
to create this thing. And I show up at every
meeting everywhere now. That is like taking a
shotgun and trying to hit a mosquito. Okay. For
multiple reasons, it doesn't work because A,
you can't do that at scale and be genuine. Okay.
So, yes, it's like having friends on Facebook.
I have, I don't know, 15 ,000 people on LinkedIn
or 10 ,000 people on Facebook. I do. But how
many of them are really my friends? If I have
a problem, who would come to my assistance? Nobody.
So there is this idea that if I have a broad
network of people, that would funnel down to
something. funneling down to something, says,
I'm going to go as many as possible. And then,
okay, I only need two people to make my business
work. So what happens is you waste a lot of time
over here. You're not genuine. They understand
that you're not genuine. And then you may get
to two people. Now, entrepreneurship is not luck.
People say entrepreneurship is about risk takers.
Risk takers are in Las Vegas. entrepreneurs are
risk navigators. How do you navigate risk? By
being attentive, network with people, not because
you want to get something out of them, because
you want to give something to them. And when
you do that, and you're genuine about it, those
build relationships that are rooted in trust.
And those trust -worthy relationships Or the
network that's going to prosper. When networking,
there's really a whole, there's a mantra. If
they know you, if they like you, if they trust
you, they'll do business with you. But when you
go into a networking event or networking with
a person, you're looking to give, not to receive.
That's exactly right. You're always looking to
give because the more you give, the more that
they will respect you. But also they will turn
around and want to give you something. But you're
not going to ask for it. You're going to sit
there and say, how can I help you? How can I
make you more successful? Because they make,
at the end, because they make every decision.
This is a fundamentally different way of looking
at business. I don't make decisions. They make
decisions. Absolutely. They make decisions. So
I have to understand why they're making that
decision. Yes, at some point, I have to make
a decision to get engaged or not to get engaged.
I do have to do that, right? But it is their
decision that gives me money, that gives me prosperity,
that gives me connections, that gives me help.
It's their decision. It's not my decision. Absolutely.
Okay, so... Are there common networking mistakes
among founders or leaders and how can they avoid
them? I'm going to go back almost 40 years. There
was a guy. And he had a beard. We used to call
him H -Beard. He used to study. I went to USC,
University of Southern California. And he was
4 .0 all the way. He was a very smart guy, a
genius, super genius, whatever you want to call
it. And he had a beard. That's why we called
him H -Beard. And I remember in those days there
were discotheques that people would go to. You
may remember those days, but a lot of your audience
may not. I remember discotheques. I'm 63. Yeah.
So I remember. We used to go there. We were college
kids, so we would go there. And then one night,
I noticed this guy came in the door. I was already
there having a drink, and he came in the door,
and he went and he started asking girls, would
you like to dance? And then move on. Would you
like to dance? And then move on. I said, hey,
what are you doing? He said, on the average,
I have done the analysis. I get 22 no's before
I get to a yes. I like to get the no's out of
the way. So one big mistake is people go to these
meetings and they think that I'm a good networker.
So they go to people, to people, to people. Hello,
how are you? Okay, thank you very much. Okay,
let me get a card. Okay, so what did you accomplish?
Nothing. You have a card and now you're trying
to email the guy somehow or another and have
a conversation with him. Okay, you have a conversation
now. So it's this idea that volume, quantity
is more important than the quality. I used to
be in the mortgage industry and I would go to
networking events. I'd come home with a shoebox
filled with business cards. I'd say, look how
good I did. Yeah. It's so completely wrong that
it's unbelievable. So now when I coach or when
I do a workshop or anything else, I tell you,
say, look, if you go to a three or four hour
event, come home with about 15, maybe 20 business
cards. And that's because you are creating that
relationship with them. And you actually have
something to speak about during your follow up.
Because your follow -up is so much more important
than meeting the person. Correct. Correct. So
here's the thing. And this is the other mistake.
They talk to people. I've seen this. And people
come to me. And they immediately, within the
first 30 seconds, they're trying to sell me something.
I'm in the business of this. Are you interested
in this? Not really. Okay. Thank you very much.
Okay. So first of all, I don't know who the hell
you are. Secondly, you don't know who I am. So
why would I need? what you have and for what
purpose there is no trust there is no relationship
there's no this is not you're not selling toilet
papers that i'm going to ralphs and pick it up
because i've got to go to the restroom so the
idea of knowing each other is more important
than selling something there goes the relationship
part of the equation i've gone from transactional
to a relationship -based meeting. If you create
that relationship, then you'll go much further.
Okay, so how can someone balance tech -driven
efficiency like AI tools with the human touch
required for authentic networking? So what I
always say about AI is don't delegate your imagination
to AI. Okay? Don't delegate your imagination.
Meaning, you have a lot of people now. Everything
they want to do, they go to chat GPT. Some problems
are that people have committed suicide because
they go to chat GPT and use it as a psychologist.
Okay, that's it. Because, so they, some people,
want the machine to tell them what to do. Okay,
because we are trained in this. Remember that
go back to our original, the conversation that
we started with. It's this educational thing
that we're used to this, tell me what to do.
And if I'm good at following orders, I should
get something at the other end. So this is now
a machine telling us what to do. Okay, call,
I'll do this thing. Here's the email, send these
three emails. Guess what? They gave exactly the
same, this machine. is giving exactly the same
advice to about a thousand, if not 10 ,000 other
people who are asking it about networking. So
all those people out there are going to get emails
that looks exactly the same like everybody else.
So you just lost your edge. Absolutely. Don't
confuse efficiency with effectiveness. Effectiveness.
comes from you and who you are and what you bring
to the table, how trustworthy you are, how you
listen, how you address problems, how you build
relationships. That's effectiveness. Efficiency
is how quickly you do it. Absolutely. And it's
a choice that people have to make. It's a conscious
choice. It's a conscious choice, but you have
to train yourself or themselves. To do it the
right way, because when I said I went to the
school of hard knocks, I did everything the wrong
way because I have to train. I had to train myself
to do things the right way. And once I train
myself and doing things the right way, then I
was successful. I think the key word there that
I want to emphasize is I have to train myself
based on who you are. I am a horrible networker,
I'll be very honest. I'll go into, you put me
in a room with three people, four people, I'm
very effective. Because I can build relationships.
You put me in a room with 200 people, I'm very
ineffective. You got to know who you are. So
my objective is when I go there, is to find four
people. Not 25, not 15. My objective is to find...
a good conversation because i know i'm horrible
at getting this thing i'm going to fail at the
end so my success is can i find a friend i'm
here for two hours can i find somebody to have
a good conversation and learn with and trust
with and i'm looking for how can i help as opposed
to taking business cards but that's me my point
is you have to find your authentic approach Yeah,
that's you, but that is the correct way in order
to network in today's environment. So by you
going there and wanting to connect with somebody,
become friends with somebody, that's building
your relationship and you get far more ahead
than that transactional. So it goes a long way.
In the entrepreneurial world. How do you identify
the right people to connect with versus just
collecting contacts? We just went over it. I
think we just went over it. But the key is, if
you listen, and is there something I can do for
somebody? You are a problem solver. Always remember
that. You are a problem solver. Those are the
people you have to connect with, not the ones
that solve your problem. See, this is the thing.
We look for, hey, I need cash flow, so I need
somebody to solve it. Let's go find people who
can give me money. It doesn't work that way.
No, it doesn't. It doesn't. Okay. What lessons
from education and leadership training translate
directly into building a strong professional
network? So all of us, all of us are leaders.
We may be bad leaders. We may be ineffective
leaders. But we all lead something. We all lead
our own life in some way. We may lead a team.
We may lead in the right environments that we
create and we choose and we feel confident we
lead. It's part of life. Now, we may not have
the confidence to lead properly because we think,
I don't know enough as much as Michael, so he's
a better leader than I am. Maybe. In some situations,
he's a better leader than you are. Now, I use
the example of these, the Eskimo have used these
dogs, the slate dogs or whatever they call them.
Sure. Yeah. So there's usually 10 or 12 or 16
of them. Now, here's the thing. They each have
a role. And by the way, in different terrains,
they move the guy who's in the dog that's in
the end and that guy leaves. And they bring him
forward because he knows how to lead in a situation.
And then they switch him around and some lead
in a different way. So the lead dog, which is
a term people use a lot, the lead dog doesn't
have to be the lead dog all the time. You lead
based on situations. Now, that comes from your
confidence. That comes from your, it does come
from your education. It does come from skills,
but. Every situation requires a different kind
of a leadership. You're in a war. That's a different
kind of leadership. Then you're leading a five
-year -old, you're a coach or a leader in a five
-year -old soccer game. It's a different leadership.
You're a mom and you're leading the efforts at
home of who gets up at what time and who gets
the stuff and who goes to school at what time
or who does the homework. It's a different thing.
You lead Microsoft or you lead a donut shop.
You lead them at different levels, at different
areas. So connecting that to your networking
thing. In every situation, every conversation,
we're either leading or following or both. Being
able to realize how to lead or follow, like this
late doc, how to lead or follow in that conversation
makes you a better network. Okay. Okay, let's
bring this podcast full circle. If you could
give one actionable networking strategy to anyone
looking to accelerate their career or business
growth, what would it be? One tangible, actionable.
So I would avoid to go out there and obvious,
those are obvious things. What I would say would
be tangible. is the practicing before you network.
So let me explain what I mean. Think that you're
networking with your mom's friends or with your
uncle's friends or with your cousins or with
the person who's at the grocery store. Practice
listening. That's a safe place. You're not selling
anything. Learn how to listen. Learn how to appreciate
who people are and create a conversation. Do
it in a safe place. And when you get that ability
to connect with people in a genuine way, in your
own way, then you have the skills. And there
are thousands of books and capabilities and experts
like yourself in terms of how to get bigger networks
and whatever. Then you have the skill set or
the skillfulness. to be able to apply. That would
be my advice. That was great. That was absolutely
great. There's so much more that I want to ask
you or talk about, but time won't let us. So
if somebody wanted to get hold of you for whatever
the reason, what's the best way for them to get
hold of you? My email is Sid at Mahasib .com,
which is, you see it on the screens at Mahasib,
my first name at mylastname .com. I also want
Michael to mention the Anavases Academy, where
you started, where we started, which is where
we provoke and engage. We have a lot of stuff
and the membership could be, is $1 forever. And
then the next level is something that... people
have paid forward and sponsored folks. Because
I believe that if I'm provoked and if I can put
my own authentic self together, if I practice
my entrepreneurship in the way I defined it,
of realizing what I have and exchanging it for
something better, we will live in a much better
world. So I'd like to invite everybody and they
can go there, anabasesacademy .org. They can
listen to our wake -up calls. They could become
a member. They can apply to be sponsored by clicking
on sponsor me and somebody would pay for them.
So let's get engaged. Let's provoke each other.
And we say this is a learning platform. We learn
from each other. I don't know. I don't have all
the answers. I do not have. We at the Academy
do not have a one, two, three solution for you.
I'm not going to give you something that's going
to make you a trillionaire tomorrow. But we'll
together learn how to evolve and how to be better
in our own authentic way. So that's a sustainable
growth. It sounds fabulous. Sid, I can't begin
to tell you how much I appreciate everything
you've told me, taught me. And I hope to speak
with you again soon. God bless. It was a pleasure.
God bless you and all of your audience. Well,
hold on, folks. Don't go anywhere. Let's hear
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Up Kids. Revved Up Kids is on a mission to protect
children and teens from sexual abuse, exploitation,
and trafficking. They provide prevention training
programs for children, teens, and adults. To
learn more, go to revvedupkids .org. Henry Kaplan,
Century 21. When it comes to making the biggest
financial decision of your life, leave it in
the hands of a proven professional, Henry Kaplan.
Henry is a global real estate agent with Century
21, celebrating his 41st year in business. No
matter where you're moving, Henry has the right
connections for you. You can contact Henry at
561 -427 -4888. A huge thank you to our guests
for sharing such... insights today. And of course,
a big shout out to you, our amazing listeners,
for tuning in and spending your time with us.
If you're interested in my digital courses, being
coached or having me come and talk to your company,
just go to Michael and fill out the request form.
Remember, networking isn't about being perfect.
It's about being present. So take what you've
learned today, get out there and make some meaningful
connections. If you've enjoyed this episode,
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