adhd & anxiety to public speaking w/ will klein

full transcript

auto-generated from the audio, so expect a few typos. the audio is the source of truth.

All righty. Good morning. Good morning. Happy hump day. Hump day. I never know why they went away from the camel. I thought the camel was a great, great thing. Should have done. Should have kept. Sweet. All right, man. Well, so where are you tuning in from again? Remind me. Connecticut? I'm in Connecticut now. I was in Colorado for the longest time. Okay. How did – why Connecticut? Family? Yeah, family and friends, right? Like people that I hung out with when I was in high school and college age and all that. I've been coming back to visit, and when I sit down with them, I just feel so comfortable.

I feel so at home with them. And we have some great friends in Colorado, but – It just feels like home back here to hang out with those folks. And we've been at altitude in Colorado for a while, and we're really curious to get back to sea level and be around other people back here. So we're giving it a shot. So we're in the process of moving right now. I'm actually in a short-term rental. So here is... And for those of you, welcome. Say hey. We'd love to hear from you. We're just yapping here. Sean, I appreciate you. Sean was dialed in. We weren't even live yet.

And Sean's out here saying he's excited for this. So that means a lot. That's the first three comment I've ever gotten. So Sean... Congratulations. You get a gold star. Here's a heavy hitting question, Will. Have we found a sheet of ice yet? Have we talked about Beer League? Have we gotten plugged into a team? Talk to me about that. I play ice hockey. I have since I was a kid. And I have a couple different friends asking me to come play. One wants me to play in some A-League in Simsbury where I'm probably going to be out of my depth a little bit and try to catch up.

I don't know, but you can move, dude. You can move. You sent me some videos. You can move, man. We need you down here. I appreciate that. Real quick aside, I just brought my kids last Saturday to South Windsor Arena. And if you've heard of South Windsor Arena or been there, you'll know what I'm talking about. This is a rink built in the seventies, really old school, including their pro shop. And the pro shop is like two levels wide. I'll get you in trouble. They have everything. Like usually I go to a pro shop and I can't find stuff my size or I have to like make trade-offs what brand I'm getting.

They have everything there. And I brought my kids to get fitted for the first time. I saw that post. I saw that post. Will is now broke. I'm now broke, yeah. So pretty excited that my kids will get to grow up playing in the same rink I did and build similar memories. I feel like ice hockey was pretty big out in Denver, right? I feel like you guys have a pretty good community out there. yeah yeah that's awesome as soon as I moved somebody on my my software development team was playing hockey I joined his team like are you serious yeah that was a really good way to connect with people there's so much there's so many tech people play ice hockey like guys on my team like I found out my defensive partner which it's sad you win back to back championships.

And I think the guys just feel like there's nothing to play for. So we don't have a team this upcoming year, which is incredibly unfortunate. But like one of my guys was like, Hey, what do you do? He goes, I'm a workday Salesforce consultant. And I was like, he was my line partner for like years. So, It's so funny, the tech hockey crossover. For those of you tuning in, good morning. It looks like we're finally live, which is great. Sean, Ricardo, Michael, Jeff, JC, Chris, Mark, Christopher, David, Amelia. It's great to see you all this morning again. We got the live comments up here. It's a fun little new feature that StreamYard is doing so people can see themselves comment real time.

Please say, hey, we'd love to hear from you. My little spiel before we get yapping here, I've been doing this show for five years now. I was pretty aggressive, which is my personality. I'm not an aggressive personality, but I'm very do things to the limit. So I did this thing every day for about four years, and it's been amazing. And what I realized over the course of the last year is this is really a meetup. Will's the speaker. I'm the moderator. And then the people who tune in on the comments are the viewers that like the, the, the people who show up at meetups. Right.

So that's why I tell people to say, Hey, because my strategy is, and this is what we're doing at torque with Jason, with his streams and Angelo and his streams is like, we kind of want to develop a place where we have a meetup. There you go. There you go. Uh, uh, we, we, we have a meetup. You comment. If you DM'd every single speaker I've had over five years, your network would be vast. So please connect with Will. Tell him you saw him here. But then connect with everybody in the comments, right? I did a one-on-one yesterday with a kid at Vanderbilt. And it's so funny.

His dad is a developer in Nashville, and he has sent both his kids to me. And I actually helped his oldest daughter get an internship at Capital One. And now I'm mentoring his son who's graduating from a mechanical engineering degree in Vanderbilt. And we were talking, I was like, he goes, what should I do to network? And I said, I would message everybody on LinkedIn that graduated from Vanderbilt and say, how did you get to where you're at and have a conversation with them? And that's kind of what we do here, right? Like if you mess with everybody in the comments, you mess with the speaker, You're going to – I mean, your network is going to be vast.

So please continue to say hey so people can see that you're tuning in. We're not in the metaverse yet with goggles. That would be pretty sick. A few other housekeeping things. First and foremost, I'm an upright hero. I always joke I'm the only non-technical person on a hero's program. Me and Jason Torres, both upright heroes. Go check them out. Great crew. Tell them the Torque Boy sends you. Listen, we just got – Drum roll. Brand new Torque community site. Brand new. It just dropped yesterday. It's really pretty. Go check it out. Torque.community. It's very fancy. Yeah. It's Schmancy. Check it out. Shout out Jason Torres for helping with that, with our Framer consultant.

He did a great job with making sure everything's over. So if you go to Torque.community, you see all of our shows, our Sign Up for Ambassador program, which Will is a part of. Will is a fellow ambassador. And then also our mentor, mentee, mentee program. Mentee, mentor. I'm talking too fast. Coffee's kicking in. Also, if you want to be when I go live with great guests like Will, Will joined up last night. Appreciate you, Will. Shoot live. Shoot me a text is actually my number. Would love to have you. And hey, ambassadors get this first. But if you want new if you want to buy new torque swag, we just dropped two new designs.

on the swag store today. It's new, a lot of new updates. Uh, ambassadors are going to get this here soon, but if you do want to purchase, we don't take anything. We don't make any money. Everything's at cost. Um, and so, uh, go check that out. Wow. There you go. See, it looks good, doesn't it? No, it looks good. All right. Well, let's give the people what they want, man. Who are you? What do you do? We'll go from there. yeah sure um I'm will klein I'm in near hartford connecticut I work at north uh we help developers implement payment experiences I'm on the developer experience team there now and I've been in tech full-time since awesome I love it I love it all right so a fellow ice hockey guy fellow dad's in tech guy um uh so let's let's talk about let's talk about the topic right?

Anxiety speaking, right? It's, it's, it's, it's a lot. A lot of folks deal with this, right? We, we have a lot of folks, like one of the things that we're trying to roll out in the discord with Angelo is like a show and tell thing. There's a lot of people who like want to present who are too scared to present it, but we want to give them the opportunity to present virtually. So shout out Angelo. We just chimed in for, for doing that. We have our first, I think it's today. It's today. Show and tell at one PM Eastern. Man, talk about high level about, you know, how did you overcome it?

And obviously that's a very loaded question, but I'll continue to ask you questions as we talk. Yeah, I have to go back a bit. This is I'm thinking back to the twenty ten. I'd been in the field for three years at this point. I'd only worked at small companies and didn't have like a big network or know many people. And I remember being on the small team and it was like maybe eight of us around a table having a meeting about a big project that was coming up. And I had a lot of things to say. I had questions to ask, concerns to raise, things to figure out in that meeting that I needed to contribute, you know, those questions, those issues or those whatever it was.

And I realized that I was pretty much quiet the whole time. And I was choked up. I was struggling to say anything. And this is just where it really hit me that something I'd struggled with for years at this point, for over a decade at this point, I'd call it social anxiety, talking to people, let alone public speaking, like even just going to a grocery store and going to the checkout and I would get tensed up that they would make small talk with me at the cashier and I'd have to figure out what to say or ordering at a restaurant was really difficult. I like to share that my wife, when I met her, I didn't get her number or anything.

She had to track me down afterwards. Are you serious? I was so shy and it was so hard for me to say certain things and ask certain things. And then it hit me in the professional setting. And at that point, I'd actually been working on it for years. I had taken a speech class. I was president of the computer club. I kept putting myself in situations to overcome this. But here I was, and life was hitting me in the professional setting where I felt broken. I felt like I wasn't capable of doing my job the way I believed I should be able to do it.

And I knew that if I didn't do something at that point, this was going to be the rest of my life. And I had to go kind of take a step further than I ever had before. So in this case, I kind of did a two for one because I was also not accustomed to speaking technically. And I decided to the most challenging thing I could do that that was attainable within my reach would be to just start speaking at tech meetups. And so then I would practice speaking technically and presenting technical ideas and communicating those things. And I'd be getting up in front of people, which was always really, really frightening to me.

And at this point, I just really felt like I had nothing to lose. I needed to go for it. And I just started slow. And I spoke at like a local Google users meetup and then a local Linux users meetup. And I only did like three talks in a couple years. But by year three, I was realizing I wanted to do more in the JavaScript space. And so I started my own meetup. And being an emcee of a meetup and getting people to speak and introducing other people is like even another level of challenge. Yeah. kind of setting that social tone of what type of vibe do we have here when people get here?

And all this stuff was totally outside my comfort zone. And I'm so glad I did it because initially I was like counting them. And at some point I got to something like thirty or forty meetups. Wow. And this is now like four or five years in. I just stopped counting at that point. I just kept doing them. And then I started doing conferences in twenty fifteen. Nashville was actually November. Nashville was actually my second conference. Wait, you came to Nodevember back in the day? Yeah. That's awesome. That's awesome. Yeah. So yeah, it was public speaking and being able to talk to people and communicating technically was my weakness.

And I just knew how that would impact my career and how that would impact me personally in my life. And I decided to go all in. And I found that I think meetups are phenomenal to go and present at. I know some people who have also struggled with this. But for me, it was one of the best things I could have ever done in my life. love that man so there's so much to unpack here I think the first question um let me ask you this do you think you'd be where you're at in your career if you hadn't doubled down on public speaking that's a great question I absolutely would not be um I actually was I was thinking about this um the past month knowing this was coming up I was like all six of my opportunities that I got since I started doing this in uh all have a foundation or a direct result of public speaking or organizing a meetup or even just attending, even just attending conferences and meetups.

I'll say that's how it started. My early opportunities transpired because of showing up. And just talking to people and that in itself helped me stand out back in the day. And I think even now with attendance being lower than ever has been in the last, whatever. Yeah. I think it's easy to stand out and to go and just be there and to talk to a few people raises. I like to say it, it doesn't, I think it can create more opportunities, but I don't think of it that way. To me, it's raised the quality of my opportunities. Oh, I love that. The quality of the places that I end up talking to, that I end up interviewing at, or I even get invited to just go work at, has gone way up.

I remember Sunil said something yesterday about he's able to get a job with one tweet. My last job, I got because of one tweet. Are you serious? And by the way, I think of myself as a fun example for this or an interesting example because I'm not well-known like Sunil. I've heard of Sunil for years and known of his work and all that. I'm not that well-known. I have maybe two thousand followers on X as my biggest platform and I'm on Blue Sky and all that. I don't have many people. But the people I do know and the quality of the relationships I have are really high.

And what was I going to say here? Yeah, I posted, though. I posted on X that I was looking. I posted on LinkedIn, too. Somebody saw my tweet, though, that I knew from the community, other people that had spoken in the community, and they knew somebody else, and they put us in touch, and that got me my current role. That's so cool. I love stuff like that. And I have, like, five other stories that go along with that. We're just showing up. or even being involved in some way um created the opportunity that would be like where I would be really excited and be a great role absolutely so I want to get to so Amelia brings out a good and and and I I can talk about this too I'm sure you can but the burnout after being out and speaking with people is worse sometimes what are your thoughts on this Yeah, so I'm an introvert.

And the funny thing is I lose energy around other people. Same. If I'm being really honest, I lose and I gain energy. In the long run, I lose energy naturally. But when I talk tech with people, that gives me energy. It's interesting to me, right? But over the course of, say, a conference, say a three-day conference, I'll be completely spent. And getting in front of people is like another – another way I lose energy and I love it and I enjoy it, but it's also very like expensive energy wise. Ooh, I like that expensive. I like that. Yeah. Um, so I, I always need to recharge afterwards.

I try to, my, my, I actually have a rhythm now for, for conferences where, especially if I travel the one I'll go there two or three days early and I'll just be by myself. I'll be like, just walk around the city or just spend time by myself, really kind of charge up. Um, And then during the conference, it'll be like full on social mode. I do take breaks. I've learned to really lean into the breaks. Sometimes I'll go back to my hotel room and I'll even miss a talk I really want to see, but I'll prioritize when I need to recharge so I can be present for when I am there.

And then afterwards, I definitely need to take time off, be with my family, do things for myself, be by myself. And the other way, besides the burnout of the social part, the flip side is I get a lot of energy. I get a lot of inspiration from other people's talks, from a lot of the hallway conversations. So for me, it's weird. I lose a lot of physical energy, but my mental energy goes up over the course of that experience. Yeah. Yeah, I love that. Yeah. I mean, same with me, right? I think it's, I think, I think there is, I think folks need to know what works for them.

Right. And I'm very aware of that. Right. I'm out here preaching post, post, post, post, post. Right. Like, obviously, like, like, you know, I kind of say, like, I'm basically I basically have taken what Gary Vee has said, Gary Vaynerchuk has said for businesses, and I've applied it to like your your career and your brand and your job search. Right. I understand that's not for everybody. I get it, right? But for me, you have to know who you are and how you operate. And I think that has taken me some time. I'm sure it's probably taken you some time because for me, I have realized – And again, I'm not technical.

So I'm sitting in a talk with like micro front ends. I'm like, oh, no, sounds great. Right. Like even what I've noticed is even going to talks wears me out, not even talking, just sitting there and trying to absorb this information is exhausting. And so, yeah, like like it has taken me a few years to balance the, you know, balance the balance. the conference and speaking circuit right I mean even for me like I am an introvert I say all the time um I think the the the career path I've set for myself is a very interesting thing because I'm so people first and so people oriented and so online but yet it does exhaust me right and and and so you have to find what works for you uh but amelia absolutely um yeah I mean even AJ right like I saw AJ uh Josh Siri posted about AJ being his editor and I just sent AJ's DMS and he and I are chatting about editing this week it's crazy yeah like like the like yesterday um when I was talking with that Vanderbilt grad he was like should I do career fairs or should I just stay on LinkedIn I said you need to do both But I was like – and then I saw a tweet thread the other day.

I wish I saved it about this guy sending three hundred cold emails just to people he wanted to talk to and how the art of a cold email worked. And like he said his response rates were through the roof. Like you don't understand, like you don't have to sit here and wait for things to come to you. You can go and get those things. What are your thoughts on that? I just, yeah, for a second. Sorry about that. No, yeah. I mean, you mentioned, you know, from a reply on a tweet or on LinkedIn, right? I mean, that's how I know you. That's how I know of your work.

And that's how I know Jason Torres, right? And the fun thing I've experienced is there's a lot of people I've known online. I've just interacted with them online. And then one day I get to meet them in person. And we pick up at like, we've already fast forwarded past the who are you point. And we always sort of know each other to a degree where we know what we're into. We know what we want to talk about. We have questions for each other. And I mean, when I hung out with Jason, great example in Denver, he came out and did a meetup for Torque and Warp.

And I helped out a little bit. And we hung out, like, for a day. Yeah. And we went and just recorded some stuff together and talked, and it was awesome, right? And I have a lot of those experiences now at meetups and conferences where I've known somebody online, and then I get to add to that the in-person, you know, rapport. And it goes the other way, too, right? I meet people at conferences, and then we keep up online, right? And I always have this assumption now that anybody I meet or I haven't met, I'm going to, I'm going to see them soon. I'm going to see them next year at a conference or in a meetup or something.

And we'll cross paths again, which is pretty cool. For me, the, the, And for me, it really is the meetups and the conferences where I make that effort. And I've invested in that. I think of it this way. I think every single person in the world has something unique to offer the rest of the world. And I'm curious what that is. So I have this natural curiosity about people. So when I talk to people, I'm sort of wondering what that is and looking for that. And it's partly a little bit selfish, right? Because I want to know what I can learn from them. But I'm also thinking like, hey, what do they have to offer everybody else?

And then from there, with that goal in mind of going to meetups, going to conferences, or interacting with people online, and not just liking something, but actually replying with something positive or something that adds to the conversation, it always takes effort. It feels like a hustle every single time I do it, whether it's in person or online. But I look back and all the little bits of effort I've invested are like seeds planted. And so many of them have grown into like actual relationships. Those conversations not only gave me something in the moment, but now there's lots of people that I care about, that I'm interested in, that I'm learning about.

And I think about it that way. And it's... it's like a spider web I call it the spider web effect I like that like yeah like like my spider web is this show yeah will's in my I mean will's been in my spider web I get it yeah but like like I got sunil yesterday I got him oh man he's amazing he's great dude that was a great conversation that was such a great episode but like I got him in my I got him in my web And then what I do is one of the things we're doing at Torque is creating really meaningful short-form content then for folks to share with their networks.

That's another spider web. And so the stickier you can get with people, the more it's going to benefit you down the road. Yeah. It's funny. I really don't think about, I know the benefits there, but it's not even, if you think about the benefit, that's okay if you do, by the way, I don't even think about it anymore. And I had this moment when I got this last role and people saw what I was doing and they introduced me and like, I didn't make it easy, by the way, they sent me a link. I went to it. It didn't work. And I was like, I just brushed it off.

And then they sent me the whole job description. It sounds like folks got to wrangle you. Yeah, no. Your wife had to wrangle you. This opportunity had to wrangle you. A little bit. I mean, people went out of their way for me. And it really surprised me at first. But then I thought about it and it's like I've been trying to do that for other people for years now. And there's definitely a karmic element to this. And again, it's like I don't do things for karma or what goes around come around, but it really does. Yeah. And I've learned it's just a great way to go through life where I'm not just curious about people want to go to me.

It's like I'm wondering if I can help people, if I can help somebody in just the smallest way or answering a question or telling them about a company or sharing something I know with them. whether it's at a meetup or a conference, every single one of those exchanges is a chance to help somebody. And you keep doing that over the years. It doesn't take long. It happens very quickly that it comes back to you in a really good way. And I think if everybody's doing that, I think a lot of people, I think most people in tech, especially part of the Tor community, are like that.

And that just makes everything so much better. Agreed, agreed. Let me ask you, so let's get practical tactical here for a second, right? Yeah. Will, I am terrified to speak in public. I am terrified to put myself out there. I have no social media presence. I've never spoken at a meetup. I am new in my career, but I have aspirations to be like you. What are some key things that you would tell them to get started? Yeah. So I would volunteer. I would go talk to a meetup organizer. That would be the easiest thing, I think. Just in your city. Yep. Find the meetups in your city that you're interested in.

Go and talk to them. Because usually people don't know exactly what to talk about initially. But there's stuff. Everybody has something. Something you're learning right now, I think, is a great topic, by the way. Something that you're interested in or something you're learning right now is a great topic. But if you're not sure and you want to feel it out, go talk to the organizer. Because they'll have a sense of what topics they wish they had. And I'm almost certain they'll quickly validate something that you're learning right now or something you're interested in and say, yeah, let's have you talk on that. Because organizers, right now, it's always been hard.

Always. Even when meetups were in their heyday before the pandemic, it was so hard to find speakers. Yeah. or especially new speakers, right? I didn't want the same speakers more than maybe twice in a year if I could help it. And because the, by the way, like the more different people show up and speak, That reflects into the community. The more different people show up and attend. That was something I saw through experience where somebody who didn't look like the last few speakers would present and people that I'd never seen before would show up at the meetup. So if you're underrepresented, by the way, I hope you have that not added pressure, but added incentive that you have that potential to really build the community in that direction.

But yeah, start with talking to organizers. And I wouldn't be shy about looking at conference CFPs. So here's the thing. Both meetups and conferences are always looking for new speakers. And we're usually looking for a balance of people who are brand new to speaking, which, by the way, is a unique period where you have something to offer that experienced speakers don't. You have this rawness, this, this natural, like I'm learning something right now, level of thing that is like, I'm distant from now in a lot of ways. Um, so do you have an, you have an inborn advantage being new to things that Talk to organizers.

I love that a lot of conferences will have a Discord with a CFP channel. You can go in and you can ask questions. You can go in and say, hey, I'm a new speaker. I've never given a conference talk. Here's some things I'm interested in. And you can talk it through with people. Some conferences will have office hours. Some conferences will say they really want new speakers. Cascade AGS is a really good example. I'm doing that in a couple weeks. Let's go. Let's go. So... It really does take going for it. And the other thing I would add, the last thing I'll add is, because this can make a difference for some people, is find a mentor.

There's a lot of speakers out there that are always trying to help other people, if only you ask. You can always reach out to me about that. I used to be very involved with that. I used to put on workshops for it. And I've seen some awesome people turn into speakers that are way beyond what I do. And they get invited now to speak at things all the time. And I'm so proud of that. Somebody that didn't think they could speak could turn into an amazing speaker. And it's a skill that you develop, and you don't even need to be skilled at it, right? You being you and your own style and presence there's that's going to resonate with so many people.

So I hope that's encouraging to folks. All right. So, so, so we got the meetup. All right. I think that's a great tactical thing. What would you say if somebody, cause I've had this a lot, there's no meetups in my area. What would you tell them? I had that. I mean, I was in, so I was in Hartford until when we moved and I was in a JavaScript and for meetups, I had, there was a Ruby group in New Haven, which was good because they'd have lightning talks and I could give a talk on JavaScript. That was fine, but there wasn't enough. So I started a meetup and that was a lot.

That was definitely a lot. I actually have a blog post I need to get back online about how to start a meetup because it really is its own thing. So hit me up if you have questions about this. But for me, starting a meetup, it just started with my team at work knowing that they were interested in the same thing. And that gave us this core group of five people that would show up. And then that's all you need. You don't need a hundred people. You don't need thirty people. You just need to have something regular that you can get together with. And my early meetups were five to ten people, these little user groups for Google and Linux.

And those super small settings can be really awesome and really very comfortable to get started and you can see everybody in the room just in a few seconds looking around and, um, maybe that's scary, but it's, it's better when it's only a few people. Um, so yeah, it's, it's definitely daunting, but if you don't have a meetup in your area, um, besides just applying to conferences, uh, and, and going for it that way, start one. It's, um, It doesn't take sponsorship. You can find a library or even a coffee shop. You do code and coffee, right? Just start somewhere. And that in and of itself, by the way, will do a lot to help you get to know people, build connections, and improve your social skills.

Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, even for me, when I was heavily recruiting Nashville back in the day, I started a lunch meetup. Now, granted, I had the funds to be able to pay for everybody. Most people would have shown up if I didn't pay for them. But I capped it at ten people. because I wanted, ooh, a bowling alley meetup. Honestly, that would crush if we're being honest, no pun intended. So for me, I think, but even to Jason's comment, like I think, I do think I've had a lot of conversations with conference organizers, meetup organizers lately, kind of people picking my brain. I do think you need to do something for meetups.

I think sitting in a fluorescent light closed room in an office is becoming very tired. Honestly, I think a bowling alley would crush. I think a coffee shop would crush. That's why I did a lunch. And also I, I only wanted nine other people there is because I want to have intentional conversation. Right. I feel like a lot of people see like, you know, the renders or the, you know, uh, the, uh, you know, I'm thinking, I'm trying to think of like all things open or, you know, these, these massive conferences, like, listen, like they all started with like four people showing up. like it does not have to be a large thing into this over produced thing pick a date pick a location show up and be consistent I mean jason I talk all the time about building community the hardest part about building community is doing the same thing same time over and over and over again because I will tell you this most people cannot keep cannot keep consistent So start a meetup.

So first off, if you're trying to get into this, going back to my thing. Also, by the way, are you wearing your mic, by the way? Yeah, that's the mic. It sounds so good. Your voice sounds so good, not to be creepy. So if you want to get involved in public speaking, find meetups, hit up the organizers. I like Elliot here. Elliot said it best. He goes... A pretty good source of knowledge. The meetup organizer is pretty much wearing a sign that says, I have an open door for anyone to come talk to me about anything tech. A hundred percent facts. I help advise the national JavaScript meetup.

We're always looking for people like definitely a thing. If there's no meetups, start something right. Start small, two, three people at a coffee shop, two, three people at a bowling alley, whatever. All right, let's go to the next thing. When it comes to actually putting yourself in front of people. Thoughts? I mean, at some point, you just got to freaking do it. You just gotta freaking do it. It's worth saying that I realized it was, so last year I went to Malaga, Spain for a conference called Way, Way, Web. And I actually hadn't spoken in five years at that point and in person at a conference that is.

And I'd given six or seven conference talks before and every single one of them I was nervous at and anxious at and felt like I couldn't breathe at some of them. when I started once I got going things would get better because I would always be talking about something I was interested in but the first it's the those that first couple moments that are always the heart were always the hardest for me it still can be but I remember it was it was at this point fourteen years into my speaking journey that I finally gave a talk where I wasn't tense and nervous and anxious and actually relaxed and felt calm for the first time took me fourteen years and that's a long time and that's okay and for some people will be never and I'm sure there's going to be something I do in the future where I'm really nervous again or I'm really tense and I need to let that fall away To prepare for those first few moments, it's funny.

I've had people that see me in that state and tell me what's going on and what I can do to overcome it, which is really nice. One person, even before that one in Spain, my chest felt tight. I was like, I've been really excited. I don't feel nervous, but my chest feels tight. There was a speaking coach there, and she pointed out, oh, that's adrenaline. You're feeling the physical effect of adrenaline right there. Just knowing that, by the way, was a bit of a relief because I didn't want to feel nervous. I didn't want to feel tense. Now I understood, oh, that's adrenaline. Okay, that's a positive.

Yes, it feels a little bit uncomfortable. And then I did something that I actually learned at a previous conference. Another time I had trouble breathing. I was like really short of breath. And the MC there said, Oh, get down and do some pushups. And so I found that doing, I'd get down and do ten pushups. And actually in that moment when I had that adrenaline, I went and I did some pushups and I felt better. Then I came back and I did some more pushups. But yeah, doing something to get your body your body your blood flow pumping can be really good I mean that's actually going to help you cognitively as well yeah not even a lot just just some push-ups or or a walk or some stairs or whatever um so for me a little bit of physical activity can do a lot get my heart rate up in a good way my blood flowing Knowing the other thing is preparation, right?

When I give a talk, the funny thing is I've probably given it a hundred or so times in my head, like rehearsing it in the car or on the commute or in the shower or when I'm lying awake in bed at night. I've practiced it so many times. And looking back now, I realize I'm always overprepared for any given presentation I give. And that gives me a bit of confidence knowing that once I get going, I'll be okay. So what I do really rehearse in particular as like a very regimented in a very regimented way is really the first slide, the first couple slides to make sure I get off on a, on a, on a good step.

And that sets me up for a much better experience. I'm always fine after like five minutes in, but it's the first five minutes, dude. Same. Oh yeah. It's the first two minutes really is, is the one for me to, to get going. Roxy comes to you guys. How do you keep your voice from shaking? Inside, it feels like I'm shaking. Even now, a little bit, it happens. You sound great. Thanks. And it's OK if you do, by the way. Think about when you watch somebody giving their first talk. And you can tell they're nervous, right? you're cheering for them. You're hoping for them to do well.

Yes. So everybody, whether it's your first talk or your tenth or whatever talk, everybody's hoping for you to do well. And I think it's actually really OK. And one of my own icebreakers, if I still feel tense, is I'll joke about feeling nervous. Or I'll tell the emcee about my history of fear of public speaking. They'll say something about it in my intro. And I'll get up and I'll take a deep breath like, oh, I'm still a little nervous, right? And to a degree, I need to take that deep breath. When you show that rawness, that humility or how you feel and it's a little bit uncomfortable, people lean into that.

It's not something to try to hide. So if your voice shakes... you know, it's okay. Yeah, absolutely. It's only going to make you a little bit more endearing, a little bit more, you know, people are going to only be cheering for you. I don't think it's something to try to hide. And I think when your voice shakes or you have any misstep, it can be anxiety inducing and it can make you tense up, but really it should be the opposite because that's where you're showing your humanness. And it's going to make, it's actually going to add to the talk in a way. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, listen, I think the general notion, I think people need to flip their minds from the general notion of like the audience is out to get me to the audience is here to cheer me on.

Like, here's the deal. There have been talks that have not been the best. That's okay. Literally, I've heard them and I'm like, that's fine. I still like the content. It's good. No one's going to hate you. You're not going to finish the talk about micro front ends so people will be like, I hate them. That just doesn't happen. It just doesn't happen. So try to give yourself that grace where it's like, dude, we're just up here to jam. We're just up here to jam. I mean, I haven't talked about this a ton. I was in speech therapy until like sixth or seventh grade. Um, I stuttered like crazy.

It sometimes comes out. My wife makes fun of me now. I love her to death. Uh, but like, like, uh, like when I get really excited, sometimes I get caught on a word, but like I, I had major stuttering issues. I couldn't pronounce it. I couldn't pronounce anything else. T H is R's S all of it. I was in speech therapy till sixth, seventh grade. I don't know if you're aware of this. If you're in speech therapy till sixth, seventh grade, you get made fun of just FYI. Okay. Kids are ruthless. Right. So then but then what my parents did and I'm so glad they did is they made me at the time in middle school enter into speech competitions.

Wow. And in sixth grade, I made the finals. Seventh grade, I didn't make the finals. And in eighth grade, I won it. And so it's one of these things where you have to just do it. You have to do it. And I will say this, in my opinion, I'm curious to hear yours. There's a lot of people who can write code, but it's if you can write code and be able to communicate and articulate in meetings, that is where you really start to elevate your career. Thoughts on that? Yeah, a hundred percent. I mean, that's how it really kicked me. It was in that setting where I wasn't able to do that.

Then looking back now, I think of not even just these team meetings, but these guild meetings across entire companies where we'd have developers from all the teams showing up. Presenting at those were some of the most challenging presentations actually, probably more stressful actually than any type of talk because talk you prepare. And then you're in these, say, a guild meeting or this cross-company technical discussion. And that's totally dynamic, right? You're going to get hit with really hard questions. People are going to push back on you and challenge you and disagree with you. And those experiences, speaking in those situations, not only was I able to start to do it and find out it's okay.

People can disagree with me. People can have different ideas. Sure. We're all trying to figure it out. I remember, I think it was just a few years in, I remember going to some of those, doing some of those, proposing things, and working through that and finding, wait, I'm not just presenting now or able to talk about things. I'm steering what we're doing technically. Yeah. That's crazy. That's crazy. And you can't do that if you're not getting up and presenting in any way. Yeah. It can happen to a degree, right? There's a way to influence through writing code and documentation examples. But if you really want to have an impact in a positive way on the other engineers that you work with, being able to communicate, being able to teach, being able to explain concepts.

It starts small with just like one other person, but at some point you realize, wait, a lot of people need to learn this. And then you're presenting in front of people, right? So all those different things are such a critical part of what we do. I think software engineering has this weird rap for being a very individualistic effort. You can sort of be by yourself in the dark, and you can, and there's nothing wrong with that. But to me, software development is a very collaborative field. It's highly collaborative. you're working with design, you're working with product, you're working with other engineers. There's so many facets of collaboration in this that it's, it's absolutely essential to, to know that.

And I, I keep, when I think about how I talk about this, I don't want to leave anyone out at all because some people don't feel comfortable in those situations. And I identify so much for that. Everybody has the potential to increase their comfort with that, increase their capability. And the more you do, the more, Not you will benefit, but I really do think first and foremost, the more your company, the more your team, the more people around you are going to benefit, the more you're going to help them in their career and what they're trying to do. Yeah, absolutely. So. Twenty minutes. I do want to get to the next kind of thing, which is putting yourself out online.

Right, so we kind of cover the speaking, find a meetup, ask to organize what you talk on, talk to them what you want to talk on. Then if there's no meetups, go create a meetup at a coffee shop, bowling alley, whatever. I'm going to use the bowling alley from here on out. Thanks, Jason. Then there's getting up, public speaking, the first two, three minutes stressful. comfortable with it repetition repetition repetition I talk about if you ask me to run right now I have not worked out in a bit that's my fault right being a dad's hard if you ask me to run a a mile right now I would tear something right I would have to work up to that right speaking is something like like mind you will said I mean will you said forty times forty forty times speaking at least at this point I mean forty minutes before I stopped counting Yeah, exactly.

Probably like eighty or ninety or a hundred or something like it's it's it's not something like I don't want to get across where it's like, all right, I'm going to do the steps that Taylor will talk about today. And then it's like they present the first time and they bomb like I didn't work. If you go run, if I try to run a mile right now, it's not going to work. I got two hundred meters, four hundred meters. All right. We're going to build up to it. Talk about putting yourself out online. You got a job because of a tweet. This is one of my conference talk, the power of putting yourself out there, the brand.

People talk about it a lot. But what can people start doing today to start putting themselves out online? I got to say this before I... It's stuck in my head right now. In the Torque Discord, which is a great Discord, I've said it online, there's a channel on personal branding. And you mentioned earlier, it's important to figure out who are you? What do you bring to the table? How do you want to represent yourself? That's a great... One, join the Torque Discord. You just join the Discord. It's so easy. There's a personal branding channel where people are talking about this and kicking around ideas like, what's my two or three liner of who I am?

So go and do that. It's a really good exercise and it's a really good community to do it with. And I'm glad Jason kicked that off a while ago. And as for the online thing, Don't create a profile wherever you want. It used to be really easy. It used to be LinkedIn, and then it used to be Twitter, and now it's everywhere. So don't worry about being everywhere. Choose where you want to be. Choose on one or two to focus on. I want to say LinkedIn is kind of the common denominator now. It's a really good safe one to go with, or you're going to reach everybody.

Um, I'm on everything by the way. And if you do want to find me and send me a message, which I would love and tell me, you know, something you gained out of this conversation or questions you have will client.co. Um, it's so, you can't just give one at, right. You have to like Twitter on this, on blue sky on this. Yeah. It's a little frustrating. Yeah. And then I will say some of the social media feeds can be pretty toxic. So I've spent a lot of time curating my feed, muting people that I like, but they're bringing up things I don't want to see in that context, that professional context.

So I'm very careful and gotten all my feeds, and this is on every platform, to be really clean, very technical, very encouraging. And so that took a little bit of effort. With that, what to post and how to post is definitely a challenge. What do I say? What do I put out there? How do I get followers? How do I make real connections? One thing I've definitely realized is worrying about followers or watching followers is like a fool's errand. It's really hard to even do that right now, the way the platforms are. And the better thing to do is just interact. Going in and replying to things that you find interesting is a great way to just get started.

Reply on things and be authentically yourself. Be kind. I think Sunil had some great words on this yesterday. And just be kind to other people and you figure it out over time. It's a learned skill of how to do that. I'm at the point now where I kind of enjoy it. I kind of enjoy going in and seeing what people are up to. I also sometimes, if I'm kind of feeling tired and I need some inspiration, I'll go, I'll go on Twitter or I'll go on blue sky and I'll look at things and I'll see what people are announcing or sharing or publishing for me.

That's, that's exciting. And that's that it gets me going. And don't be afraid to DM people. Right. That's actually such an underrated feature. One of the magical things about any of these social networks is that you can often direct message people, especially once you're mutually connected. But even me, my DMs, I try to have as open as possible. So the barrier to reaching out to me is really low. I definitely get some spam, but I'd rather people be able to ask a question without having me follow them back first. And don't be shy about that, right? if a little bit more encouraging encouragement on that if somebody goes on a podcast or gets a talk or whatever and you want to talk to them the greatest validation you can give them is to follow up with a question and send them a question because that's how I know that something I talked about resonated that's how I know something I did was worthwhile yeah is if people have questions and want to talk about it afterwards it's yeah it's not even ego thing.

Like it's really, I want to spend my time doing things that matter. And if you've got a question, well, that mattered and that's, that's going to matter to me that you have that question. And I'm always going to entertain that. A hundred percent. Yeah. I mean, even Sunil yesterday, right? Like he posts, I don't know what the tweet was, but it was a while ago and it really resonated with me. And I just slid into his DMS ago. Hey, Sunil, I know of you. I really resonate with this tweet. Do you want to come on and talk about this tweet? I don't think we even talked about the tweet.

But I was just like, hey, we'd love for you to come on immediately. Immediately. Because if you pay attention to people and you respond to them based off what they put out, huge unlock. Huge unlock. Also... For the record, my new networking tactic is signing up for email newsletters of people that I'm a big fan of that is way higher than I can shoot. So far, ten out of ten response rate. A hundred percent response rate. Like replying to their newsletter? Like replying to the email. Like there's this marketing branding guy. I'm a big fan. His name's Ashwin. He's in New York. And the dude consults for global brands and his massive following on Instagram.

He sends out an email yesterday. I go, hey, bro, I love this, this, this. He goes, thanks, man. I appreciate it. I mean... It's worth it. People just don't understand that you can pretty much get to whoever you want to as long as you do it tactfully. Yeah. Yeah. It's never tired to go and just say a nice thing either. Everybody, no matter what their level, is putting things out and has a little bit of imposter syndrome and has that self-doubting. They're wondering, is this even worthwhile? Is somebody going to even care about this? It's like... And anyone can go and say, hey, this was helpful.

I learned this. Or thank you for this. Or I have a question. What do I do next beyond what you said, right? It's not selfish to go and ask that. It's mutually beneficial to exchange, whether it's a compliment or a question. Those things are always positive. Yeah, absolutely. All right. I have some rapid fire I want to get to, which is always fun. Any last encouraging words of wisdom as we wrap up here again? I'm so glad I moved to these hour sessions because they do really fly by. Any just last words of wisdom? Get rejected. I was thinking about this. Interesting. It took me a long time to learn and overcome was I played it safe for a lot of things I applied for.

And I think we usually sell ourselves short and underestimate what we're capable of achieving or getting hired for. So if there's a dream role that you have, go for it, right? And if you get told no, great. I promise you, you will learn a lot from that interview. You will realize, oh, wait, I don't understand this. I interviewed at GitHub one time to work on Atom before VS Code really took over. I've always wanted to work on the editor, and I held off on applying to GitHub for years. When I interviewed for it, I didn't get it. And I didn't know certain things. Like, I didn't understand buffers very well.

But I found that out in the interview. And afterwards, I mean, it also erased a bit of, like, potential regret that I never tried. Yeah. So I want to encourage people and myself, I'm always trying to tell myself, right, don't be shy about applying to something that seems intimidating or scary if you want to do that, right? Yep. If it's something you're interested in, go for it. Who cares how big it is or how well-known they are or how cool they appear to be or how technically advanced they seem to be? You never know until you get told no or maybe yes, right? And if you're only getting yeses and you're only applying to say things, which I did for a while, you're probably leaving something on the table.

You're probably not getting as great a role as you possibly can. And this was a really hard lesson to learn and overcome because you're always thinking, I need to learn one more thing. I need to be that much more proficient in this. And it's this never-ending, like, someday, someday I'll try for that. And I... I do see some people go right for it. And I'm like, good. I don't want to take any. I think the people who are sort of naive are doing the right thing and just going for it. It's better. I'd err on the side of going for it and trying to get something that you're not sure about.

Absolutely. Absolutely. I love that. I love that. All right. Rapid fire. You ready? Yeah. What's one tech tool or app you can't live without right now? Oh, tech tour app, geez. Um, right now, if I'm being honest, it's probably chat GPT, or Gemini or any of those, being able to ask questions of things, which isn't even just technical stuff can be so it can be so helpful to just get quick answers and have a starting point. That's, that's really fast. Yeah, agreed. I've been using it to ask stupid questions. I don't ask my wife anymore. So she's really appreciative. What's the first job? you ever had paid?

Oh, I was an ice hockey referee at the age of go. I love it. That's awesome. That's awesome. Um, let me ask you this. If you had it your way, what would the, what would remote hybrid onsite look like for you? Like, like if you could set the tone on the, the, the, the state of North and meeting people onsite, what would it be? It's everybody's choice, which is the case at North. Sure. They have a great culture around that. Um, I think we're mostly remote now and we have a headquarters in Troy, Michigan. So the people who want to go in can, um, our team is actually like my team gets together around a conference or we fly in and do off sites to get together.

So that, that having a choice I think is, is the key thing. Let people choose the way they work best and then meet those needs as, as needed. Right. Create an office where you have people that need an office, um, let them be remote and make sure they have the best tools to do so. That was a very political answer. Would you want to go on site or not is what I was looking for. Oh, I do. That's a funny thing. I traded away with this role. Yeah. And I got the flexibility of I could move from Colorado to Connecticut and it didn't matter. I was a remote worker in both places.

But I actually prefer being in office. I do really well being around other people working on the same thing. And I don't have that right now. yeah yep um what uh when when you were young what did you want to be when you grew up grown up grew up a few things I think the thing that I really remember is I want to be an architect and design buildings oh okay then I realized how much math was involved in a lot of math physics and engineering and and I actually like math but I don't know it sort of took the the creativity out of it for me What else?

Is that it? Probably want to play, play in the NHL. I'm only five, seven. I played some college hockey, but I was the lightest guy in the league or maybe the second lightest guy. You probably felt it too. Oh, I felt it. I definitely felt it. I had to be the one initiating the hit. Cause if I didn't initiate the hit, I was in trouble. Yeah. I love it. It was fun. That's awesome. What is a career mistake you're oddly grateful for? Hmm, career mistake, I've definitely made money. And every single one like I've learned, hopefully learn from sure. But one I'm grateful for There's an email I got from Facebook in the summer of twenty thirteen and I actually met their engineers right before they announced React and we're talking about frameworks and I got recruited.

I don't know if it was for that team but there was a time when I wanted to work on React at Facebook And I was too shy to reply. I was not shy, but I was too intimidated to apply at the time. And I'm really glad I didn't, but I sort of wish I... It was definitely a mistake that I didn't at least consider it and explore it and then make the decision later if it was for me. That makes sense. That makes sense. Two more questions. Actually, three. If you weren't in tech, if I told you tomorrow... You could not do anything in tech and I'll pay you the same that you're making now, if not more, what hobby would you pursue?

I would make ice cream. I would open up an ice cream shop. That is a first. Really? Oh yeah. It'd be called cookies and cream. We'd specialize in cookie based flavors. Okay. Probably have cookies too. So yeah, I would, I would do an ice cream shop. Let me ask you this. What's your favorite cookie? Either you make or like a store. um I really do like cookies and cream as a flavor in oreos okay um that's definitely like I like a lot of different ones but I'll go with oreos I love it that's awesome um I always have to ask this are we a coffee or tea guy coffee I wish I was going to tea authorized Hot.

I know you think it's too much. So gross. It has to get down to like one forty. I'll do my own pour overs. And I'll add oat milk. Oat milk actually works for me and complements the coffee flavors for my palate. It does well. And I'll bring it down to that temperature where it's not so hot and I can taste the coffee. And it has to be a certain oat milk, too. Otherwise, it doesn't taste right. But, yeah, I really like I really love coffee. I love that. Last question to wrap up. And again, thank you all so much for tuning in. The comments, I mean, I kind of like this feature where I can see the comments real time.

The comments have been fantastic. So thank you all so much. Please, again, shoot Will a DM. Tell him you said you were grateful that he was here this morning because I'm grateful that Will is here this morning. So the show is called Guidance Counselor two point oh because we had guidance counselors in middle school, high school and college. But now as adults, we don't necessarily have them to go to get career advice from. You could go back in time until young will something. What would it be? I already said something about going for it and getting told no. The other thought I've had is everything you do compounds over time.

Every single person you meet, every single conversation you have, it compounds. It's like making an investment in your career. The sooner you do it, the more you do it, the more investment you make. it compounds over time and it builds into relationships that are surprisingly strong and surprisingly amazing. So the sooner you do that and the more people that you overcome that nervousness and just go and talk to, the more that not only are you going to get from it, but you're going to be able to give back. Yeah, I love that. I love that. All right, y'all. Well, thank you again for hanging out with us this morning.

Will, I appreciate you, my friend. Stay on, so I can say bye to you backstage. But y'all have a good one. If this episode resonated with you, please share it for others. If you know people who are struggling to speak and put themselves out there, we'd love, obviously, to share for this. Otherwise, we'll see y'all back next week. Oh, actually, a few housekeeping things. Show and tell this afternoon in the Torque Discord. Join. Two, I'm going live tomorrow, actually, and I'm bringing some guests. I'm going to talk about this trend of all these brands hiring social media people because I think there's something happening in the new wave of marketing.

So I'm going to go live with some guests tomorrow, surprise guests. I'll see you tomorrow morning. It's early, eight a.m. Central. It's the only time I can do it. So I'll see you all tomorrow morning, eight a.m. Central. Will, appreciate you, my friend. Y'all have a good one. Peace. Thanks.