be curious and be urgent w/sales leader, chris richardson

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Chris, it's good to people what they want, man. Who are you and I guess what do you do and what potentially are you going to do? Let's just start from there. Good morning, everyone. I'm Chris Richardson. I am former Googler. I'm in the process. My wife and I both work in tech. She leads a team of business value engineers at Snowflake. We're in the process of moving Singapore. So I'm exploring my next opportunity, but what I did at Google for the past few years is I was on, I'm what you call a cloud special forces operating, right? So we're on the large deal pursuits team.

So this means that the job has two different roles, right? And any given time Google has the top 2025 customers they're trying to close a deal with. My team is the team you call in. We understand the technical, we understand the art of how we get the grand vision. We go in front of CIO, CTOs, director of engineers, we paint the art of what's possible. Then we roll our sleeves up and we get shit done. Right. And that's been a fun job. It's been like building a plane and flying at the same time. But I've made a specialist of myself over the past maybe 15 years where I began my career working in IT with Boeing.

I've been an SC for Cisco Systems. I've been a go-to marketing strategy leader for Cisco, a lot for Cisco. I've spoken at Cisco Live, right? And so what you're going to hear me talk about on this particular episode is the importance of your narrative, right? Building out a skill set and taking roles that make you uncomfortable, right? And then looking at what's next and figuring out, okay, look, I am the accumulation of my life experiences, right? And so I tell Taylor all the time, I've done certifications out the Wazoo. I've done Stanford University of South Carolina. I utilize most of my skill set from working in the restaurant industry, right?

So I'm here to help people do things faster than I did. There's lots of lessons I've learned over my career that, man, I wish I'd talked to someone like me. And so when I reach out to folks and when folks reach out to me, I'm an open book. I'm very, very authentic. I'm very, very transparent. I'm very irreverent. I've worked with a lot of people at these top companies that probably don't deserve the roles they're in, right? And so I tell people, don't put me up on a pedestal and don't put people up on a pedestal. If you have a desire to get into these playing companies or whatever it is, right, you can do it, right?

You just have to be very intentional about it. So if I can help people on that path and that mission and help them cut some corners and get there fast and then I did I'm more than welcome to just be an open book. So thanks for having a love it. Hey, my mom's tuning in My mom Sarah, how are you? I love it. I love it. Uh, mark from mini and apple s. It's good. So you hate me and apple s is dangerous Uh, also didn't know Anthony Edwards went to Georgia. Did you know Anthony Edwards went to Georgia? Yeah, yeah Yeah, I remember the knock on him was that all doesn't have the wheel to win He's a good player, but you know Kenny doesn't have that driving I think we're seeing that now so big shout out.

I'm rooting for these guys man. Yeah Same I waited tails my 20s. He's just goes so let's talk about it, right? I mean listen I think the two things honestly I've learned the most with when my career is is being a touring musician and Serving tables and so so talk talk I guess some things that you've learned and really how to apply a business and also how others I mean how what others can pick up from kind of what you're about to say and apply as well Yeah, it's humility right the downside about coming from the service industry is that my wife and I still have nightmares from time At the time about getting sat at a table and then 20 minutes ago.

I'm by you have agreed at that table No, let's get set three tables at one time on a Friday night and all the morning I don't I Chris listen, I'm gonna interrupt you. I'm sorry. I know I asked you a question I'm asking no worries. I don't have you work has never been a stressful since serving tables on a Friday night, I backstake I was back back in 2005 when everybody wants to bloom in the night. That's the front lines man. That was the front lines. I've been in high pressure situation in the Q4 trying to close the deal, right? Nothing beats trying to get those tables and get everyone taken care of it.

So anyways, what are some things that you have learned that you apply to professional life? I'd say humility, right? I think that everyone should be required to work in service industry. Number one, you have a whole lot less assholes in the world, right? Number two is just learning how to, when you wait tables of your bar 10, you're kind of a steward of your own business, right? If you don't anticipate customer needs, you don't read that customer properly, it probably affects your tip, right? Your pops did a really, really good job helping us to understand the impact of customer experience. Every customer is important, right?

And if a customer leaves unsatisfied, right? And they tell someone else about that experience, right, that starts to multiply and affects your business both fiscally and just the experience that customers get, right? So bringing that attitude to the table working in tech, I think has been huge for me. Reading people is important, right? I've been there. I think my first year at Cisco's in SC, I got like seven certifications in eight months. And so I was literally just like hands down on the keyboard, I got to learn, learn, learn. And then I had an epiphany, right? I'm just like, well, it's about how I make people feel, right?

It's about leaning into my talents, being able to read people, right? I've been in rooms. I think I was in Brazil trying to chase down this big deal about a year ago, right? And I think what helped But when that deal was just understanding how to separate that room, right? Understanding, you know, okay, is this customer really feeling kind of what we're putting down, right? Just being able to read people and understand how to anticipate people's needs and make sure people are satisfied. That's a skill that will always be useful. You can be the smartest person in the room, you can be the most technical person.

You can understand technology be a genius, right? But if people, if you don't have that empathy factor or people don't resonate with what you were saying in your narrative, then you kind of did in the water, right? And I've seen that happen in so many sales situations. So I still draw from that to this day. I tell people, I'm like, yeah, I've done all this fancy education. I don't know these certifications, right? But my foundation, the corporal who I am, that time I spent working in bars and working in restaurants, that is huge. Everyone should be required to do it, right? So that's my spiel on that.

I love it. I love it. A few comments coming here. Dave said hi. So there you go. What's up man? What's up man? Jordan goes one more multitasking, work care at Chick-fil-A. Yeah, again, I worked at restaurant and retail. So Christina comes in, I love the fast pace. So Chris, I wanna pivot, because again, so Chris, so I catch up by everybody backstage. I have no notes, I have no questions. Chris and I have one, two, three, four, five, six, seven topics we have to get through in about 30-ish minutes. So we're gonna fly through this again. If you have any questions, please throw them up.

But I wanna talk about elevator pitch for a second, right? You were saying backstage, you have a really solid kind of formula for elevator pitches. I feel like this is the one thing people really, really are terrible at. So can you kind of break down kind of what you're saying some tips and tricks and folks. Yeah, the number one thing I think that I get on some of the calls that I participate in every week where we're doing mentorship sessions and things of that nature, right, is the purpose of an elevated pitch, right? So I'm going to pig it back off. First, it goes back to one thing.

You should always have a solid understanding of what it's like to have a mentor, a coach, and a sponsor. They are three very different things, right? You know, my interpretation of it is a mentor someone that can provide you guidance, right? It's right maybe catch up with that person from time to time a coach is someone that you know It's a shitty days of shitty week you're working on deal your way out of your death You can tell the coach the good the bad and the ugly sponsor Maybe you don't share everything right that sponsors someone that can open doors right that sponsors So in those that you can call up and say that hey If this person endorses me and says two good things about me man I am in there right because in this market you need to stand out We're gone from the days of looking on LinkedIn and just applying that well You can certainly do that right?

But it's often about who you know, right? And so therefore, I get people that reach out all the time and I say, okay, well tell me about yourself. And I sit, right? And the amount of people that just aren't very clear and concise on the elevator pitch, sometimes it's alarming, right? And there's different versions of the pitch, right? So there's a version why, okay, like, I only got 30 seconds, you know, what I want this person to know about me, then there's maybe we're actually sharing it. Everybody together or we're going to a conference and you know, I just met this person. And then there's the like more refined version, like we're at a networking event, we're eating appetizers, We're just having a drink, right?

And I tell people practice that. What do you want people to know about you, right? Sit down, put your camera up there, and just go into it, right? And I think I see a lot of folks that are coming out of college, a lot of folks that are early in career. And sometimes you're not clearing who you are, right? So if you're not clearing who you are, you can't say it and speak in the language of bullet points. Maybe get a bit clear on that and practice that, right? And be able to just pivot at the drop of a dime, right? If you're talking to someone like me, I've probably interviewed over two, 300 people at Google, right?

If you're talking to someone like me, right? I think I'm an easy interview, right? Because again, I don't really look at resming like that, right? Look at you. Who are you, right? You know, what's your passion? You know, what are you about, right? What are the things that make you tick, right? But not every person is like that, right? So you need to be able to kind of be able to switch and pivot with that format at the drop of a dime, right? The best people I've seen that work in sales and technical sales are the people that are very clear and concise about who they are.

And they can vary that pitch depending on the audience, depending on the vibe of the whole room. If you can read a room and read a person, maybe phenomenal at sales, right? So, elevated pitches, the number one thing I tell people, practice it. Sit down, it's so awkward, sometimes it kinda sees so, cause people don't like to watch themselves on video. You gotta do it, you gotta get those reps in, right? So. Yeah, I love that. And that's, I mean, so I'm out of public speaking at South Carolina and we had to record ourselves. And it was, I wish I had those videos still. I mean, I'm sure I was just an absolute disaster.

But it was so awkward. Oh, I mean, and to be honest, my voice over is my vlogs. Like, it is so difficult to do. And I hear myself every single day, like Fridays, I said, please watch this, it took me 22 tries. I think today it took me 20 tries. Like it is so difficult to perfect speaking. And the more comfortable you can get out of the better. Let me ask you this, like, what are some just key things? Cause I literally had somebody messes me this morning, text me this morning before we went live about like, Hey, I'm going to a meetup event. What should I prepare for?

And I said, hold on, I'm going to pull up this text real quick. I want to know your thoughts. I said, let's get it. I said, I said, yo, yes, I said I need to know exactly what you do, how you can help me, and what you are looking for in 30 seconds. What are your thoughts on that? I think that's phenomenal. I think most leaders, I think, bullet pointed out. Again, don't confuse being prepared and being methodical with being scripted. There's a very big difference there. So I tell folks, I'm a big fan of, there's a professor I met at Stanford, Jennifer Acre, I think it's a name.

She wrote a book called Humor Seriously, right? I'm a big fan of using your sense of humor. So is my wife, right? I remember I was right before the pandemic broke. I was still living in Seattle. I was a speaker at Cisco Live in Barcelona. Taylor, when I tell you, I practice this speech and practice this session. I mean, I knew it in and out. And I was just, I was almost robotic. I did all the things that you're supposed to do. If you took class on public speaking, you know, it's like you dress the audience, you make eye contact, you do your hands, whatever that is, right?

And my boss at the time was a distinguished speaker. He just killed it, you're out the year after the year. and the best feedback he gave me, right? And I use this even in my network. He's like, it's too much, you're too rehearsed. You're coming across as too polished, right? People need to see some imperfection, right? BU, you know this stuff in and out, right? So throw that script out the window, right? And just get up there and BU, tell some jokes, use humor, be loose. I mean, because he was very, I mean, he'd get on stage, sometimes he put his hands in his pocket, sometimes he leaned forward, but he was engaging.

Man, that guy knew how to tell a story. So my first outing wasn't that great because I was just trying to do all the things, right? So once I let that go and I just embrace my natural stuff, I love to tell a lot of dad jokes, right? I also sometimes use profanity, right? Now again, I'm not walking around like a potty mouth, but I'm very direct, right? You know, when customers bring me in when I was back when I was doing technical roles, they need to know that, okay, look, this guy's not selling me, right? This guy's going to tell it how it is no matter what, right?

So I tell people be your authentic self, right? Whether it's networking or whether it's getting up to speaker, you're preparing to go for a company like, well, how do I, how do I make most of this? Just be authentic, be funny, right? You know, use humor, right? Tell a story to humanize yourself, right? Tell people like, never underestimate the value of making someone laugh and making them smile. I use that to this day. I love that. I love that so much. Such good information, man. So I want to go over, we kind of talked about, and the title of this is Be Urgent. Be Urgent, be curious.

What, you know, you said that backstage, I thought that was greatest. Why the title of the show is that, what does that mean to you? Why is that something that you really hold a lot of value to? Yeah, we live in a time where when COVID happened, I think it forced a lot of people to think about their careers and think about their different paths, right? And a lot of the questions I get asked are, look, I'm trying to break into the cloud. I'm trying to break into cyber security. How do I get my shot? And one of the calls I help lead every week, right?

I tell people, I'm like, reverse engineer your career. Go find someone that's doing what you want to do and then just go ask them a bunch of questions, right? And so when I see someone that comes to me, right, and they say to look, you know, I'm I'm curious about this. I'm curious about that. Or, you know, if you're taking a customer meeting, right, you know, if I'm having a coach or sales team and they're just like, okay, look, guys, our forecast is short. We're short of playing, you know, what do I do here? Right? The customer gives you the answers, right? People will give you their pain points, right?

Even me, if I'm hiring and I'm having a hard time feeling a wreck, I will tell you, like, okay, well, this person didn't have this experience. So I'm looking for this specific thing. Ask a lot of questions. The art of asking questions and being what I call urgently curious will take you far. If I have someone, you know, especially when you talk cyber security, I tell people, like, You can go out there, you can get all these certifications, because that's number one course I get at. So, should I get a master's? Or should I go get the certification? Just start building shit. Start building it, right?

Start, if you want, AI is a perfect example, right? Go understand the concept and just get your hands dirty, right? People that are willing to get their hands dirty are people that don't put something off. They say, okay, well next week I'll do this. So next week I'll go to that comster. Maybe next week I'll follow with that customer. Now do it now, right? So when I say be urgently curious, I mean both on the job and being that if you want to break into this industry, reach out network. We live in a beautiful time. Man, when I was coming up, I'm going to sound so old here.

It's not real old here. I didn't have access to a lot of C-suite individuals, right? And now you literally through the power of LinkedIn, you've got access to just the whole wealth of people, right? And the people that reach out to me and the ones that can show me that they're curious, but also show that they thought about the conversation. They show they bring value. And I tell people this is nothing that will cover. Don't be selfish, right? I always tell people, if you are talking to someone, what can I do for you? How can I be of service? Look, you spent 15 minutes doing this information call with me, how can I help you, right?

So those sorts of things, I think, will go a really long way in terms of developing your professional brand, helping you to network and just help you to kind of figure things out. Just be urgently curious about everything. Act as if tomorrow is not promised. I keep telling people, like, at no point do I wake up and I go, look, I nailed it. I'm the perfect leader. I'm the perfect father, perfect husband. Drop the mic and walk away. I am always trying to improve and I'm always living my life and assuming that next year is not going to be here, right? Because as far as I know, not to As far as I know, I don't think reincarnation is real.

I don't think I'm gonna get another shot of this. I would love to, right? And so that's my thought process. Whether we're talking about- I'm back as you right, Coon. I know, right? You know, so that's how we live life, man. I don't assume that tomorrow is promised. And you know, so I'm urging about everything that I do. What, you know, I tell people all the time, like LinkedIn is still slept on. You can message any manager of any company across the world and potentially strike up a conversation Today, today, that was not feasible. I mean, when I was in college, the internet would exist that there was no smartphones.

I think LinkedIn was around, but no one used it. Like being able to network now is huge. Let me ask you this, you know, because people get so weird with me. They're like, well, what do I ask people? Like when I DM somebody, what should I ask? Like if they're willing to talk to me, what should we talk about? And I tell people, it's based off where you're at your career, what you're trying to figure out. But in my perspective, it's just like you said, be curious. I've learned all my technical skills from just asking developers, hey, what is this? Hey, what is that? So what are your thoughts?

What would you encourage people to ask the DMs to network? Yeah, I'll take it one step further. Don't be lazy, right? We live at an age of chat GPT, right? And I think it's a beautiful thing, right? But sincerity and authenticity can be apparent to someone like me that's really, really good at reading people, right? Probably not a good idea to sense someone to DM, hey, I'm looking for a job in the cloud. Help me, right? Maybe take the time to look at that person's profile. Try and find a commonality. Try and find a common connection. Hey, I see you're a fellow gankot. Or hey, look, one smooth way that I've seen people do is like, look, I saw you give a TED talk on this topic so and so two years ago.

That happens to be a topic that I'm very passionate about. Would you have 10 minutes to talk to me about this, right? Do some digging, right? Look at a person's LinkedIn, look at their Twitter. People tweet their thoughts, right? look at that person's background, right? Try and find some sort of common factor and try and make it apparent, depending on how high the stack you're climbing, what's gonna be a compelling reason for this person to talk to me? People love to talk about themselves. So I tell people like, you know, flattery can be your best friend, right? Find something that person did that resonate with you and maybe lead with that, right?

You may still get a no, right? But oftentimes I've seen people reach out and sometimes it's younger folks, they don't put a lot of thought into their message, right? And they just kind of send that DM and maybe, you can fire up 100 DM's. But again, if I'm going to fire up 100 DMs, each one is going to be unique. Each one is going to be germane to that person that I'm reaching out to because I've taken the time to do my research. I didn't just type in an object chat GPT. How do I talk to a director at Google, right? People are going to sniff that shit out super, super fast.

Right. So I think being authentic and being curious by being curious in this instance is just researching that person. Who is that person about? You know, what are you coming back to then go from that standpoint? So the smoothest people I think have just kind of showed that they have a nice touch and they've made it personal. I don't think I've ever met somebody that talks as fast as I do, but you do. that's pretty fast. Talk about you said something so good. And I just I already forgot. Dad, come at what were you saying? You're saying about how messaging DMing people. Oh my gosh, I had a really good question.

Totally blanked. All right, let's keep moving on. And then we can come back to it. So talk about, talk about owning owning your narrative. What does that mean? I think that's so true in today's market, but can you expound on that for me? I mean, take my career, right? It's very non-linear in the sense that when I worked in IT at Boeing, I felt that, okay, look, this is a great job, right? You know, because there was a time where I was young and I was just like, I can just get a job on these big companies and I make six figures, I made it.

That's it, right? Then it became about once, you know, I tell people there's times where you motivated my money, then there's times where you're motivated by a title. Like I've got like a three or four year five year development time. I've got to be director of VP by a certain time. Now it's about the experience, right? Do I like who I'm working with? Do I like what I'm doing? Right? I think that's huge when I think about shaking my career. I oftentimes not had to look for roles. I've been tapped on the shoulder because I've taken roles that have been very, very challenging. Because when I look at the book of Chris, when it's all said and done, and I write this book, and I talk about my experiences, right?

It's about being in the Unconference Zone, right? Never being afraid to take an opportunity to write and being very intentional about the roles that I take. I specifically want to start out really, really technical. And then I want to work my way up to like the sales path, then I want to go to marketing strategy, right? So to do that, you have to be willing to take risk and you have to be willing to kind of think outside the box and take roles where you're uncomfortable. If you do what you've always known, and you do what always makes you comfortable, it's not a lot of growth there, right?

We grow our muscles by tearing down that fiber, right? And it had a recovery, right? It's the same thing with your career, right? And so when I look at my career and I look at the path, and some people like when I have like happy hours and people just like, well, how old are you, right? It feels like you live five different lives. I'm like, because I have, right? And I've been very intentional about that. I've always been willing to kind of take a risk and throw myself into a situation where okay, maybe I'm not the smartest person in the room. That's okay. I can get there, right?

So I tell people, right, don't go just following one particular career path. Take roles that are going to interest you. Take roles that are going to push you. They're going to challenge you and force you to grow. The result is that it's going to be that when you are approached by Google to take a job where they just like, look, we don't know how to write this job description. You just need to be able to talk to a CIO or CTO or Director of Engineering. There's no education for that, right? There's no degree for that, right? I am the culmination of all my experiences. And when I talk, because when I say, oh, that's interesting, I've seen how that works out.

Here's how this is gonna play out. That's through my own experiences. That's through trial and error. That's through being urgently curious, right? And so you get to, people will look at my career some time. They're just like, well, how do I get it all right? Then I'm just like, you piece it together, right? I've done these different experiences and I feel this perspective through authenticity, right? Through taking some challenges, taking some really big risk actually. So. No, and I love how you brought this up because for me, like I've spent 12 years in the traditional staffing world, right? Typically traditional and I've talked with many people at my last company as I was transitioning out.

Yeah Typically when you're in staffing you're stuck in staffing Like it's kind of like this role where it's like like like you know, so so my dad, right? I know they're watching my mother is literally texting me as we're live right now, but I'm a four-second multi-task. But like my dad always said, he goes, it's always good to serve tables. We're kind of going back to the original topic. It's always good to serve tables because you can at least fall back on it. He goes, if you're good serving tables and you anything and some go south, you go, Chris, you can go back to serve tables for me.

I've even talked about my retirement plan, moving to the beach and just serving tables at like a fish and shrimp place. That would obviously be the dream. But with recruiting, it's kind of like the same thing. And so I thought I was stuck in recruiting forever. I'm not, I'm not because I hone my craft and I change my narrative to where I was most recently looking for a job last year. I was like, hey, this is what I do now. I'm kind of this blend of marketing content. I'm a sales leader. I can talk with engineering leaders, VPC, TOC, IOs, and I can build a community.

I know how to build community. So I just, that was my pitch. Like every company I talk to, but when I realize, And I think you realize too, I wanted to go startup, right? I work for a billion dollar company. Like I'm probably never going to go big again unless like I know I can carve out a role for me. Yeah. And I will tell people this, it is not as scary on the other side as you think it is. No. No. Because I was terrified. I was terrified. And I was like, I was like, this is going to end. Listen, are there things you know, I miss?

Of course. But for me right now, I'm doing exactly what I want to be doing. And if I would have never taken the jump, I would have never been doing what I'm doing now. thoughts on that? No, I think you're your spot on, right? When you talk about IKE staff, there's all sorts of roles in this industry where people, I remember when I was an SE, I built this kick-ass brand as assistant engineer, and then I remember I told people, I think I want to give the sales thing a shot, right? Because again, I can be an account manager, right? I can do all the business these things, right?

I got told like, oh, you're going to mess up your brand, right? It's so hard to switch because, you know, you've been typecast as this. What I started to develop was like, okay, well, you're not going to develop my narrative, right? You know, and so what you did was, wasn't what's impressive about being stuck in staffing, is that okay, maybe there's all sorts of reasons why they're just, okay, well this is why you should stay in staffing, this is why maybe you can't go outside of that box, right? It's only you to create the new narrative, right? It's only you to tell folks that, no, this is why I can operate in this lane.

This is why I'm more than just staffing. And I tell you this is not just Flush talk, right? I'm leading by example, right? You know, I was about to start with a very wonderful company here leading another team, right? When my wife got the opportunity to take a role in Singapore, I'm just like, okay, I guess we're pivoting, And I've got two kids, two dogs, a cat. And so I lead with no fear. So we've both never been to Singapore. Every time we've had a plan of Singapore, I was supposed to be a speaker out there, COVID messed that up or certain things changed it.

But we're moving, we're a family of four, we're a family of seven, and we're moving to Singapore in a few months. So again, operating with no fear when people tell you or try and put you in a particular box or they say, well, this is why you're not a good leader. This is why you wouldn't make, you can maybe talk about the transition from waiting tables to being a bartender. I remember having a convention or dad like, okay, I'm ready for the bar, right? You know, having a bit tied to that, I was ready for the takeout. Yeah, you know, start, I know people start doing the role.

Look at the attributes of the role that you want to do and start exhibiting those qualities. And then if here's the thing that a lot of people won't go even further, if you are still running into a brick wall, leave, go step out, take ownership of your own, and you know, it may not work out, but what if it does? Right, so I tell people, right, I'm at this age now, I'm like if someone keeps telling you you can't do something have enough self awareness be like okay Well, is there a skill gap there because sometimes you can take a step back and maybe you aren't qualified right?

And then go address that right? But if you are then just leave I've been in that situation where I've had to step out on faith. I've had to make a difficult decision right from just okay Well, this is right for me. I'm confident in myself. I'm confident in my abilities right? I need to go change the paradigm right never be afraid to do that right and I think we saw a beautiful thing with code where people It was tough out here in the restaurant industry where people that worked in health and fitness right and the beautiful thing is just that now we're at an age where there's so much information in the line, there's so much free training, free learning and access with the beauty of LinkedIn, you can go and figure something out and reinvent yourself, right?

So who else do you man for not keeping yourself boxed into that lane and taking control of your own narrative, man? I appreciate that. Let's talk real quick as we wrap up here. Sure. COVID, you mentioned it backstage. It was kind of a, I mean, it's reinvented a lot of what I do now, especially with content and stuff. What have you seen on your end over the last four years with not only yourself but the industry. I think that we're company struggle, and I think whether it's opportunity just that job descriptions, it's like dating, right? Generative AI is cool. I hate that word, but it's cool.

It's everywhere, right? I see so many poorly written job descriptions. Most have 10 years experiencing a technology. I hadn't even been out 10 years, right? So I tell people like, stay up to speed on different things and different shifts and trends in the industry, right? I think we're seeing a down push and hiring and things of that nature, right? But again, if you're out there, you're searching for a job or you're trying to figure out, okay, well, it's the cloud for me. Don't pay that much attention to job description. They are simply like a dating profile. He must be over 6'5", and he must make $400,000 a year.

He must have this, right? You know, and so oftentimes I think companies are still trying to figure that out. Don't let that be a detractor. Seek human experiences. Talk to people like Taylor. Talk to people like myself that have done the hiring, that have done the interviews, and ask us what's gonna set me apart, right? Where do you think the industry is going in the next two years? how are companies going to shift their focus and their priority, right? So I think focusing on that thing is going to be huge for folks as they try to figure out, okay, well, what's next from you? Or how do I evolve my career?

Or maybe I've been doing the same role for three, four years and I'm ready for a change or a challenge, right? So. Yeah, I love that. I love that. I totally agree. All right. So as you wrap up here, I do kind of a rapid fire for questions. I didn't prep you on this. It's not super intense. That's good. You just fine. All right. First question. And don't don't say family. I always tell whenever I bring husbands and wives on it. I say don't we get it. We love your family. Just give me another answer. If you could, what do you do outside of work for fun?

I read, I do a lot of reading, but not self-help books. I got all the books that you're supposed to read about leadership and all that stuff. I read science fiction and fantasy. Really? What's been a good book you've read lately? The Stormlight Archives is one of my favorite books. There's a book called The Way of Kings. And the whole purpose of that book is journey over destination. Right. You can read a book on like how to progress your career and how to, but I've learned a lot by watching and reading fantasy, right? I don't take life that seriously. Right. There's lessons in everything that we do.

There's lessons in going out and spending time with family and friends. And there's lessons to read. I'm a big book nerd, right? And so, and I read really, really fast. So I'm looking for my next series, but Stormlight Archives, my best book series by far. I love that. I love that. What do you do outside of work for fun? Oh, these days, man, And spending time with my son in terms of training him for basketball, right? He's playing on the Nike Select Team here in Austin. Oh shit, what? And it is just being able to look at someone because he's very different from me, right?

I was a bruiser, like I was just like aggressive and like training six, seven days a week and he's just, his approach is very, very different, right? And so spending time with him and his friends and just getting the most out of them, I think that's like, that's not to be, I can do that for free, right? And so spending time with him, we have a gym here in the garage and just kind of watching and I'm gone for something, it's just been really, really fun. And then some of the kids on this team come to me for advice about different things. And so that's fun for me, right?

Because again, my whole thing, as I get to this page, right, I'm going to sound over here, is just making people better, passing on those lessons, right? So that for me is really, really fun. Love doing that. And I've been, I've been to watch some shows on Netflix too, right? So let's go. OK, can't give me one show you're watching, much recently. I just watched a show called, I can't think of the name of the show. It's a limited series, it's a six episode series called Man in Full, I think. It was a really weird show. Wasn't the best show in the world, but I enjoyed it.

So I'm not above a good trash and Netflix show, Hulu or something like that. I would tell people, I read all the time, or I wake up at four AM every day, and then I do this. Oh, bunch. No, I watch on TV, too, man. I really watch TV. I watch TV. I watch TV. I watch TV. I watch TV. I watch TV. And then the last question. So this, oh, no, two more questions. If you could do anything outside of tech for work, and money was not a question, What would you do outside of tech sales yada yada? Oh anything and money wasn't a question.

Man, I probably coach. I probably coach. I'll be honest with you. I don't know if I can handle parents, right? Because being on the Amy basketball team, every parent all of a sudden is an expert, even though they never played the game, right? Oh, I would have done it this way, right? But I would love to coach, right? I meant my best one I can just, I can see the good in people. I can see the best in people, right? So if the world were a perfect place, I'd be coaching. I just don't know if I can handle the 2024 type parents that come to every game and they know everything, right?

So even when I go to my son's games, I just put my headphones on. I don't talk to anyone because it's just so bad. All the yelling and stuff like that. But yeah, if I can remove the parents from it, some of the toxic parents, not all parents, right? I'd be coaching. I love that I love making a difference. And I love kind of passing on my knowledge and just kind of making people better. I love that. Last question. The show's called Guidance Council 2.0 because we had Guidance Councils in middle school high school and college. when I was an adult, we don't really have a guidance counselor turned to and asked for advice.

What would be your biggest piece of career advice to young Chris? Man, out back Chris, out back Chris. I would say it's going to be okay. When you find yourself in situations where you have been challenged, you've been don't or you feel like you're failing, you're failing fast, take this moment, send it yourself and just know that in 10 years, because I always knew that in 10 years I'm going to be successful. I don't know how I'm kind of struggling right now. Double click on that feeling. I've had moments in my career where I'm just like, man, I'm so scared. I've made the wrong decision that I make the right call here.

Center yourself and understand that it's going to be okay. And just treat it as if like, this is your future self, right? Visualization, right? Visualizing everything, right? I wish I'd done more of that, right? And take chances, right? I like to think that I've had a pretty good run and I think the journey isn't over yet. But I would say double click on that man. Visualize your success, believe in it. People are going to tell you like, hey, you can't do this, you can't do that. He's gonna be all right, right? Take that wrist, take that shot, take that chance, you know? So that's gonna love it.

That's awesome, that's awesome. My mom fishing out. Dave and I are proud of you, Chris. Thank you so much, thank you so much. Good to see you guys. Hope you guys have more. Again, thanks y'all for tuning in, Chris. It's stay on backstage so I can say bye to you. But tomorrow I have my dear friend, Anthony Mayes coming on, Anthony is a former Googler as well. It's just Google. I've seen his content, he's phenomenal. Yeah, do you know Anthony? We never met, but I've seen this content. I, he is phenomenal. Right. I think I sit on his way for some coaching, whatever. So he is, his mission is powerful.

I love what he does. I'll be tuning in for sure. I'll be tuning in for sure. Anthony's great. So not their ambience until tomorrow. And then we're off Wednesday, Thursday, because we got some of the team from around the country here in Nashville for gun IO. So we're in the office. I'm in the office Wednesday, Thursday. And then Friday, I got a little fun, little streaming episode that I'll update you all the way there in the week. So again, thank y'all. Go connect with Chris. He's a gem to follow. I'll say this, Taylor, if anyone out there is curious about getting to cloud or cybersecurity, I lead a totally free call.

I helped to lead that call every week. We're going to plug this. On Fridays, it's called CSOH.org, right? Come on, come on. It's a safe space. We've got industry CEOs, professionals, right? It's the only call that I've seen where people, there's no ego. We check that door. There's no such thing as bad questions. If you got questions, feel free to connect with me. I'll make their reach out. It's totally free. We're just trying to pass the goodness forward. I know. It's called again. It's cloud security office hour. So, CSOH.org. Yes. Yes, got it. Cool. Awesome. All right, y'all, good one. Peace. Hey, you did it.

You listened to an entire episode and I am very grateful because you know why? There's a lot of podcasts out there. There's a lot of episodes and I myself rarely finished an entire episode. So I appreciate you so, so much for listening. Quick reminder, please rate and review this podcast in the app store. I want this to be discoverable to others and the only way that happens is if you take the time right now and rate and review it, please. Like right now, unless you're driving, then don't do it. So thank you again. If you need to reach out to me at T.S. and on all social media handles.

And I hope you have a fantastic day.