Speaker 1: 0:02

What's up? Denver Event Professionals, welcome to another episode of the Denver NACE Podcast brought to you by the Denver Chapter of the National Association for Catering and Events. My name is Jared Judge, I am your host and resident electric violinist and I'm so excited today that we have one of our very own Colorado native coaches, leaders, authors and owners of one of our very large event rental businesses here. Dawn Abbott is the leader and champion of Abbott Coaching. She is the author of your Life is Not a To-Do List and she's also the owner of fun productions where you can get all your super fun event rentals, such as I was just browsing it earlier today. You can get everything from a human powered snow cone machine to like blow up bounce castles and so much more, so much fun. Dawn just has so much experience in our industry a natural leader and has so much to share. So welcome to the Denver NACE Podcast, dawn. It's great to have you.

Speaker 2: 1:06

Thank you, thanks for having me. I'm honored to be here.

Speaker 1: 1:09

Fantastic. Well, I know that our members of our Denver NACE Chapter had an amazing time hearing you at our most recent NACE event, where you were the featured speaker. Would you mind sharing with our podcast guests what you talked about during that program?

Speaker 2: 1:28

Sure, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 1:29

So it was definitely geared towards that kickoff of the first of the year, sort of visioning and thinking about, you know, living your life in a more intentional way, which is something we kind of do at the beginning of the year, right, but it was really around my book your Life is Not a To-Do List, which is kind of the story of my life and the roller coaster that life is and sort of the biggest lessons that I've kind of taken away from some of the experiences of both being an entrepreneur and just living life.

Speaker 2: 2:08

And so we really went through some of those tools and had some exercises involved in, you know, sort of self-awareness and really looking at you know, like one of the tools is your expectations, right, how many expectations do you have for yourself? And so that was one of the things that we did is just sort of start looking at all the things and creating this list of expectations that you have for yourself and then going through a process of filtering that allows you to really get that down, whittled down to where only the most important things in your life are what you expect for yourself. And so, yeah, that was that's just an example, but that's what the talk was about. Awesome.

Speaker 1: 2:57

That sounds fantastic and the new year is definitely a great time to do that self-reflection, to understand it. What do you feel about the new year really makes this extremely relevant? Like, what are people thinking about right now, where, you know, maybe they get a little lost on the way and your solutions come in and help with.

Speaker 2: 3:20

Well, I think you know we always. We get into this brand new year and we think first of all, I think we overestimate what we can accomplish in a year, and so we create a vision board or we create this big, huge list of all of the things that we want to happen in a year, and sort of part of the book of you know, your life is not a to-do list is really focusing on what's truly most important. Because if everything is important and you're a to-do list or you're what I want to accomplish or my goals for this year is 25 things long, you know, when everything's important, nothing's important and we get to the end of the year sort of defeated with this like, well, I got half of these two things done and oh, I did get one thing done right. And so I think one of my biggest lessons in life and in what I teach through EOS and through coaching is really getting crystal clear on what is truly the most important things, so that you can focus all of your energy. I've shared that.

Speaker 2: 4:31

You know there's a book called called Focus by Al Reis in which he talks about you know, the sun has billions of kilowatts of energy and the worst thing that happens is you might get sunburned because it's dispersed all over the planet, right? But now a laser beam has a couple of kilowatts of energy and can cut through steel or diamond, so we're more like a laser than we are like the sun. We only have a couple of kilowatts of energy, and so we must focus on those things that are truly most important, and so part of that is you know, first, getting in touch with who you are and what the filters for your life are, meaning you know your core values, who you are, and you know your mission and purpose, and then really making sure that everything that you're doing, or that your goals, are really aligned around who you are and how you can be your best self and utilize your strengths.

Speaker 1: 5:29

Yeah, I love that. It's human first, rather than just like you didn't say. The first thing you must decide is how many bookings do you want for 2024? Right, yeah, the business activity stems from discovering and understanding who you are and what's most important in your life, correct, right? Do you see that that flipped around often? Is that a problem that's relevant, like in our events industry?

Speaker 2: 5:58

Absolutely.

Speaker 2: 5:58

I think we forget to look at that piece right, because, just like you said, especially from an entrepreneurial standpoint, we get caught up in this.

Speaker 2: 6:09

You know my goals need to be around the quantitative numbers of how many bookings or how much money, or how many events or how many calls, or you know what I want to see happen when I think the first step, like you said, is this you know what I have created and what I show in the book is an offer, a download is this map of me, which is that going through this process of getting complete clarity on who you are and what your strengths are and what your purpose is and all of those things, and being able to utilize that when you sit down, whether it be at the beginning of the year or any other time when you need to set goals or make decisions and go okay, well, this is the filter for my decision making.

Speaker 2: 7:03

And does this you know especially visionary kind of people, right? You see a thought of a new income source or new revenue, or we could do this or we could. You know creative people, right? And then you start going off in these directions when what's important is to go okay, does this decision allow me to be who I am and allow me to be aligned with my values, does it allow me to move my mission forward, does it let me use my strengths and all of those things, and then that decision making process becomes easier and more relevant to what you want and with more alignment. Amazing how much you can get done when it's things that are aligned with who you are, right when you're in flow.

Speaker 1: 7:49

Yeah, that's fantastic and very helpful for me too. I think one of my the perks of me being the host of this podcast is I get to learn directly from our esteemed guests, and so I'm going to ask you, and you can totally say no. But if you were to coach someone like me? You know I'm an entrepreneur too. I run my own business. I have so many fires that I put out every single day. I find it difficult to find the time to identify my own purpose in this. Oftentimes I'm just flying by the seat of my pants and putting out the next fire. How would you suggest I go about tackling this process? Because I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels like that in the events industry, especially when wedding season rolls around and you don't have your weekends, you know.

Speaker 2: 8:38

Right, right, exactly. Well, like I mentioned, so that you know, in my book and also I offered I think everyone there at the NACE meeting can certainly provide that QR code but it's for that download of the map of me and it's spending some intentional time, you know, going through some exercises with a lot of questions and a lot of detail, taking some personality assessments and things like that. I think I'm a huge proponent of, you know, disk and enneagram and strength finders and Colby, really sort of digging into that and using that as part of your map. I also gave all of the attendance at that last NACE meeting what I call the personal VTO, or what traction and EOS has the vision traction organizer and it's a great way to start your year because what it does ask you is your core values and your core focus and your 10-year target, and you know, and then it has you kind of break that down into.

Speaker 2: 9:45

If your 10-year target is this, let's get really crystal clear and have a picture in your mind of what three years looks like and let's create that three-year picture and then break that down even further to okay, what are the three to seven things that you have to accomplish this year, which is a third of the way there to get to your three-year picture. And now let's break that into 90-day. You know increments and what are the 90-day rocks that you're going to accomplish just in the next 90 days? And I think breaking that down is really a big part and a big key to it. Right is looking for the future. Who am I? What do I want ultimately? Because I subscribe in this sort of 10 year thinking right, like I said, we overestimate what we can accomplish in a year, but I think we underestimate what we can accomplish in 10.

Speaker 2: 10:43

But if we really start looking forward to 10,. You know it helps us. It helps us make the decisions right now. You know Like I want a new dining room table and I said, you know, what I want is a ranch in the mountains, more in 10 years. So you know those kinds of like simple decisions are, you know, sort of the way I live my life with this 10 year thinking. But you have to get clarity on that first, and then you know that's too big right For us to see, and so that's why you get it all the way down to where 90 days is the only thing that's important, because we fray, we get distracted and so it's really important to go. Okay, I'm going to do these three to five things this quarter. That's what's most important.

Speaker 1: 11:34

That's awesome. It kind of reminds me, like you know, if you're planning a giant cross country road trip which is your 10 years out, you need a plan, you need a map like how do I get from California to New York? And then the 90 day segments are more like okay, which exit, am I going to get off the highway here? It's not like, oh, I'm going to take a boat and go west from California to get to New York. No, you need to know in the next 90 days you're doing steps A, b and C to get you closer to that 10 year mark.

Speaker 2: 12:07

Right, yeah.

Speaker 1: 12:10

You. Oh, I'm sorry I'll let you finish. Oh, go ahead. You've mentioned EOS and traction a couple of times here and I bet some of our listeners have heard of it and I bet some of them have not. Would you mind kind of sharing a little bit about that? What is the system? Why does it exist? And I noticed that you implemented it as you purchased fund production. So if you could share a little bit about how did that help you with that acquisition process and growing that business to where you wanted it to be.

Speaker 2: 12:40

Sure, yeah, so I started fund productions 32 years ago.

Speaker 1: 12:45

And so anyway, oh, your son bought it.

Speaker 2: 12:47

Yeah, got it sorry about that that's actually changed too.

Speaker 2: 12:50

He hasn't bought it, so I still own it. But so we ran the treadmill and made all the mistakes you can make as entrepreneurs and did things the hard way and grew slowly and sacrificed a lot of life to business, and so when I read traction, it was kind of an aha and eye-opening. This sounds right. This sounds like all the other 100 books and webinars and mastermind groups that I've been a part of. It sounds like all the right pieces of all of that that I've been doing on this entrepreneurial journey and it's kind of tied together in a nice little toolbox with a ribbon around it.

Speaker 2: 13:38

So EOS stands for entrepreneurial operating system, and so in 2007, or, excuse me, 2017, I'm behind a decade we started implementing using a professional implementer and just saw amazing results. It was we had the best two years in the history of fund productions after 30 years and we had a 30% gross increase with a 300% net profit increase, which is huge. And during that time we spent 65% more on the sort of payroll benefits line item for employees. So we really put people first over profit and made creating the culture and getting everyone on the same page with a disciplined, accountable organization, and just saw these fantastic results, and that's the three things that really make EOS stand apart.

Speaker 2: 14:43

Is vision traction healthy? So we start with using that vision traction organizer and, as an organization, getting very crystal clear on who we are, where we're going and how we're going to get there as an organization and make sure that everyone understands that and is aligned with that. That that's the mission they want to, and they can behave in the way these core values suggest and things like that. And so then traction is from the standpoint of having processes and systems where we have a scorecard and everyone has measurables and everyone has those rocks or those 90 day goals that align with the companies and holding people accountable. There's very set processes on how people are held accountable and so, rather than oh, nobody's doing what I want, right, we make sure that's very well-defined.

Speaker 2: 15:39

And then Healthy is creating a cohesive, healthy team, because, if we're honest, most teams are not. And so, yeah, we found just amazing results from doing those things and I was put into what we call the owner's box. I know Lanker had daily tasks or anything left to do in the company. It was just sort of this visionary that showed up at the meetings once every quarter, and so that's when I kind of did all the pieces of my life to sort of click together and I said, yeah, this is exactly what I want to do. I want to help other entrepreneurs walk through the same process and the same journey and get them out of chaos.

Speaker 1: 16:23

Oh, fantastic. So you help other entrepreneurs do this as well. Is that right?

Speaker 2: 16:27

Correct Yep. That's what I as an EOS implementer. Now, as a professional EOS implementer, I help companies implement the entire, all the tools of the toolbox and sort of facilitate their meetings and teach them how to use tools and then coach them through the process.

Speaker 1: 16:45

That's amazing. And what kind of results have you seen transformations before and after?

Speaker 2: 16:52

There's been a lot of really cool experiences. I was working with a marketing company who is now franchising. They were just one office and now they're looking at having 10 franchises within the next couple of years. I've worked with companies who have doubled their growth over two years, which is amazing. And then I've worked with companies who have really gotten clarity on you know what Growth isn't what we want right now, but what we want is something that runs so efficient and so effective and is more profitable. But we're not going to grow, so we put these systems in processes. But what's important and what's clear is everyone knows where we're going and is on board with growth or not growth, or whatever that looks like.

Speaker 1: 17:50

Yeah, that's fantastic. It sounds like, regardless of where they're at, this system helps them, just like with the other aspect that we touched on earlier is just get to know who you are as a person, get to know the culture of the company, and then everything stems out of that, which I think is amazing.

Speaker 2: 18:11

Yeah, exactly, exactly. It's so critically important because we don't do that step first. Who knows where we end up? If we're not going to design and understand who we are and where we're going, it will happen for us, and it just might not be what we want.

Speaker 1: 18:30

Right, and that's a key distinction here is like you get to decide. Everyone gets to decide who they are and what happens to them, but you have to make a decision to decide.

Speaker 2: 18:40

Yeah, right, and that's definitely a part of my story is just sort of rolling with it for a long time. I mean, it wasn't necessarily my passion or goal to be part of the events industry, it was just. It was my late husband, he was all about it. He loved every aspect of events. It was totally his passion and I was like, all right, let's go. And it took 20 years or so for me to wake up and realize, wow, this is my journey too, and who am I and what do I want the rest of my life to look like?

Speaker 1: 19:20

So yeah, that's awesome and that helps me kind of transition to the next question I was going to ask, which is, like a lot of our NACE members tend to be solo entrepreneurs or entrepreneurs with a very small team In addition to, of course, we've got employees of companies, people that work at hotels, restaurants, etc. But how would this system apply to the little guy Like me? I'm a solo electric violinist. I love playing tons of weddings and corporate events or some of our photography friends. They have one, maybe two shooters on their team. How would they apply this to their businesses?

Speaker 2: 19:59

I think I love seeing clients and I've seen a couple very small. I had one company that was three employees and then they had some subcontract and fractional folks and stuff. But when you're in that place and it's just you, I think you set yourself up incredibly well. By starting with some of these tools and this framework, you're building a great foundation and you don't have to be like maybe I was, where there's this huge ball of duct tape and twine of all of the issues sitting in the corner of my office and all the stuff that I've swept under the rug over the years, that I had let get out of control and now we have to break that apart and deal with these issues. That was part of the process. It's like let's fix some stuff where you get to start building from that foundation and, whether it be your first employee or your fourth, you're hiring the right people in the right seats because you've defined all of that before even getting into that. So that vision traction organizer is amazing for starting that process. And then the other tools that we have that are totally free to download for anyone that wants to download those tools is like the accountability chart and a people analyzer. So once you start creating those tools. Your accountability chart is looking at six to 12 months forward.

Speaker 2: 21:36

What do I want this business to look like? And what we do in companies with a lot of employees is we say let's pretend that there's not anyone here that what is this business need? What are the seats and the functions and the roles within those functions? What is the business need? Because what we typically do is we take the people we've hired along the way and sort of try to make an org chart of some kind that fits. And this is about what do we need to grow or what do we need to do and have. And so then when you do that, when it's just you, you know the first place I'm going to hire is this seat and I already know exactly what that person needs to look like and what their strengths need to be. And then I also need to know that the businesses core values are going to be intentionally so that I can hire somebody based on those core values right To make them a right person for the company.

Speaker 1: 22:36

I love that. What does the business need? It takes all the emotion out of it, it takes the ego out of it, and you may discover that the business needs something that it doesn't have currently, and you have to make some changes.

Speaker 2: 22:51

Totally, including if it's just you right. It allows you this moment to say, okay, if I'm going to grow, this business has to have someone doing X, Y, Z, and that's not who I am. And so, again, when you're looking at it from both aspects of understanding yourself and understanding the business and where the business is going, you can see where the gap is.

Speaker 1: 23:16

Right.

Speaker 2: 23:17

What do I need to surround myself or who do I need to get to help me? You know.

Speaker 1: 23:23

For sure. An interesting thought popped into my head, because I can hear myself and the imaginary other NACE members listening to some of them who started these businesses and they're their babies and they're like I don't want to give up control of my baby. How do they mitigate those thoughts and feelings with this system, which may suggest that they're not the right person in the CEO role?

Speaker 2: 23:49

Yeah, that's a hard thing, and one of the most important leadership abilities that you can grow in yourself is that ability to delegate and elevate. And most service-based businesses especially, you cannot grow unless you sort of clone yourself, right, unless you sort of you get other people. There's no other way to grow in a service-based business is unless you're going to add people to do some of the work, and so we have. You know we go through a lot of tools. There's a for anyone out there. The delegate and elevate tool is amazing, especially.

Speaker 2: 24:30

It's a great thing to do at the beginning of the year where you spend a couple weeks just writing down everything that you do in your days weeks, right, and you're just writing down everything that you do and about how much time just generally speaking, you don't have to get crazy and how much time it takes, right. And if you say, okay, my working week is 40 hours a week, or my working, you know, or it's 60 hours a week, whatever that looks like for you, where's your best? How many working hours are you at your best? And if it's 50 and I have 100 hours worth of things on this list, I need to get rid of 50 hours, right? And so then you take each one of those things on your list and you put them into a quadrant system where the top left is the things you love and that you're great at. You need to be in that space. That's your unique ability space and try to be in that space as much as possible. And the upper right is the things you like and are good at. That's fine too, doesn't hurt, right.

Speaker 2: 25:43

The bottom left is what I call personal hell the things that you're good at but you hate doing right, and so you just keep doing it because you're good at it even though you hate it, and it drains your energy. And then the bottom right is obviously the things you hate and aren't good at. So that bottom row are the things you need to get rid of, and so just getting that clarity is you go, oh, wow, okay. So now I know what I need help with, because it's all these bottom things. So if I find somebody that loves and is great at these bottom things, where can we go? That's going to be amazing, right? How much growth will it take? And if you're, as a leader, doing $25 an hour work that you're not good at and you don't like, you're holding your business back, so you have to look at it rather than in a place of control. You're saying what you're doing is doing damage.

Speaker 1: 26:40

Right.

Speaker 2: 26:40

Your own business as well as to yourself, because of the way our energy works, is that we're in that place of our unique ability where we're doing stuff we love and are great at. We're at this 100% level energy level. As soon as we have to do something we don't like and aren't good at, we drop down and for the rest of that day it's sort of scientific brain will never get back over 50% of our energy.

Speaker 1: 27:06

So, like, how much are you costing yourself and your business by not delegating and elevating, by not letting go of control, so that makes sense and I'm connecting some pieces here because in the beginning of this interview you mentioned personality tests and I imagine the stuff at the top row of that quadrant mesh with your personality type, like in the disk assessment. It's like you know, dominant people versus I forget the C, but like basically, people who are good at sales and who are not.

Speaker 2: 27:39

Yeah, right, yeah. So, like the D dominant personality is results driven right, Prioritized results. So getting things done is very important to them the quickest way possible where Cs are very systematic and logical. That's the conscientious style and so it's. You know, if you love systems and processes and creating, you know kind of process maps, or you know, looking at more efficient ways of doing things, then that's what you should spend your time doing. Yeah. And have somebody help you with sales Exactly.

Speaker 1: 28:15

Because I imagine, if you're doing the things that are your personal hell, you're literally forcing yourself to be someone that you're not, which goes against your core values. Right, it's very hard to be someone that you're not.

Speaker 2: 28:28

Yeah, and you, like I said, you'll prevent that growth in yourself because you're just, you're just keeping yourself, you know, back from being at the highest place of your energy, that you can be Exactly.

Speaker 1: 28:42

Because that's where we all thrive. Yeah, exactly, if it's okay with you, I would love to ask a bit about growing Abbott coaching as its own entity. Your journey of transforming from simply somebody who was using these systems into somebody who's now teaching these systems, and how elevating yourself into that leadership position has I can absolutely see how this is also benefited. Fun productions, because you're getting your name out there more. Would you mind sharing what was kind of the turning point for you where you're like I need to share this with other people.

Speaker 2: 29:20

Sure, yeah. So the I guess the journey starts well before Abbott coaching in that during the recession 2008, 2010, we started a separate entity called Connections Team Building, which we also still own that company, and it was for the sole purpose of getting fund productions equipment out when people were not doing huge company picnics and holiday parties and things like that, but they were doing less with more. They were doing more with less staff and needed some you know team building events right, and so we started creating these team building events you know corporate recess and scavenger hunts and things like that utilizing our equipment. And so, as that business took off and grew kind of in its own merits, some of our clients were asking me to do something more in depth, like, do you have something? These are fun bonding experiences, but can you go into something that's a little more strategic team building? And that's when I got certified in disc and five behaviors of a cohesive team and I started doing a lot of facilitating and, at the same time, was also on this self awareness journey of discovering who I was and how I wanted this life to look and realize that that was really what I was passionate about and really loved it and was good at it and so knew that someday I wanted to be a business coach.

Speaker 2: 31:01

I'm incredibly passionate about entrepreneurs. I think that entrepreneurs can change the world in a way that not other, no other way. You know, I don't think it's schools, churches, corporate America unfortunately any of those are, you know, going could make the impact that entrepreneurs can make. So I knew that I wanted to help out in that realm and I also was in this amazing industry right that all of these incredibly creative people are at our end, and it was always frustrating to me to see all this amazing talent and this creative energy and this getting stuck in running a business. And I loved that part.

Speaker 2: 31:45

I loved the processes and systems and running a business and making culture and those kinds of things, and so I knew that was what I wanted my future to be. So then, rather than recreating the wheel, as soon as we put EOS into place at Fund Productions, I knew that that was absolutely just the right direction. And you know, I didn't really have a job anymore, so it was like you know it, just it was this aha moment where I was like all the puzzle pieces of my life. So this is why this happened and this is why I got this certification and this is why you know, because I could put it all together and just walk with an entrepreneurial leadership team through this and be able to help them, get them to know themselves individually and get them to know themselves as a team, and so utilize all of that experience in one place.

Speaker 1: 32:41

Absolutely. That's amazing and thank you for sharing that story. You're, you have such a great story and you're so good at telling it, and I know just from my experience within the Denver NACE membership and other groups that I'm a part of. All of these other amazing entrepreneurs and employees within the events industry have great stories. They're very well qualified at what they do, but they are absolutely afraid to share their story. They do not want to step up and be leaders and communicate what they're all about and their unique gifts. Was it always easy for you to tell your story or did you have to overcome any of that kind of imposter syndrome fear, anxiety, worry and if so, how did you do it so that we could empower other leaders in the events industry?

Speaker 2: 33:31

Oh, absolutely, yeah, absolutely. I mean, I have to say, even just a couple of weeks ago, when I was, you know, speaking at NACE, that whole imposter syndrome fear sort of pops in and I'm like, who am I to think that anybody cares about my story? Why do these people want to hear it, you know? And the bottom line is it's a couple of things. First of all, vulnerability is true strength, right, and being vulnerable is incredibly cathartic and it allows you to sort of understand yourself better.

Speaker 2: 34:14

But I think, scientifically, that's how we learn is by story and that's how we connect, right. So, like, the brain shuts off as soon as somebody tells you you should, right, as soon as somebody starts telling you or advising you on what you should do with your business, your brain is going to turn off. But if, instead, what they do is share their experiences of how they did it in their own business, your brain is going to light up and turn on and say give me more, tell me everything you did, tell me more of your story, because that's going to help others learn. The more you can just share your experiences, others will learn from it, be impacted by it, be inspired, as well as feel connected.

Speaker 2: 35:00

We're all. We're herd animals. So, at the end of the day, the only way we can connect is not through data or seeing you know like we have the same color eyes. It's through our story, and so I think it's incredibly important that people share and it's how we're going to know you. Right, it's how you know. Yeah, you can give me your business card at an ACE meeting and have you know commission breath or whatever that looks like, but until I know who you are, you haven't sold me anything, right?

Speaker 1: 35:35

Yeah, exactly, and I like that you added the part about sales at the end, because when you tell stories in such a way, sales are a natural byproduct of good storytelling.

Speaker 2: 35:47

Absolutely.

Speaker 1: 35:48

That was one of like.

Speaker 1: 35:49

I studied a lot of marketing and sales as well, and one of my mentors is huge on what he calls the epiphany bridge story, which is where you tell a story in such a way and preferably real stories like marketing is not about lying, but, of course, telling true stories that highlight the before and after, like if, for example, I don't know, say, a wedding is looking to have a beautifully memorable event I'll just use myself as an example, please, and I would tell a story about my own brother's wedding, where they didn't hire live entertainment.

Speaker 1: 36:27

They had a DJ that was subpar and, as a result, the dance floor was not very full. People were just not having a great time. And then I went to another wedding where they did have a live musician and it was just a crazy party. Everyone was having such a good time, and so I would tell the story to brides, because it's true that that right there would cause an epiphany that hey, live entertainment can really make a party go next level. And oh, by the way, I sell live music if you're looking for that kind of experience.

Speaker 2: 37:01

Totally.

Speaker 2: 37:03

Yeah it's that? It's that helping people feel connected to you right, and understand that you have experience in this and that you know how to solve their problem because of your experience, not because of some dog and pony show that you show them all the things that you can do that others can't. But it's that like, here's why, here's why I can solve your problem, because it's meaningful to me because of this story and because what you said of being at your brother's wedding right, that was just heartening and, yeah, you don't want others to have that same experience. It's a very important day and those kinds of things and yeah, and it's but it.

Speaker 2: 37:44

But you're absolutely right, it must be very real and authentic and you know it's people, people smell in authenticity, right. You can just feel, feel it if somebody's just trying to sell you something and it's, it's. And I think that's why I've always been a part of industry. You know associations and things like that. It's been a huge part of my journey and my life is just these really getting to know people and know who you can trust and and and those you know. The associations are so incredibly important for understanding who your resources are in this city and being able to be a help to any of our clients. We can all do that so much better together than any of us can do independently. You know, be able to provide the best event experiences for any of our clients yeah, knowing each other.

Speaker 1: 38:38

That's awesome and and that reminds me what, before we started the podcast episode, I mentioned that I'd seen you at a venue hub event as well, and so you're clearly an active part of the Denver events community and you're absolutely right. The support that you get from these events is incredible, like just having a network of shoulders to cry on job opportunities in case you lose yours. And so I guess the question that I would ask them is like, if there are people here listening to this podcast who are not members of these events networking groups, what would your suggestion recommendation be for them?

Speaker 2: 39:18

Yeah, run, run. You have to, you have to get involved Like you just have to. There's no way fund productions would be anywhere near what it is had I not been involved in for so many years in industry associations. And not only that some of my very best friends in the whole world, like the people I call at the lowest moments, are people that I met, you know, at an industry association. We served on a committee together, then we joined the board together and now, 30 years later, we're still friends and that's incredibly meaningful.

Speaker 2: 39:54

Plus, there's just this, all of a sudden, this ah-ha, where you realize, oh, I'm not alone, right. That like, like you said, shoulders to cry on. All of a sudden, when you're real and you go, oh my gosh, you know what just happened, an event was a giant disaster, or X, y, z happened, or oh my God, and somebody else across the table can be real and say it's happened to me too. You're not alone, right. And entrepreneurship can be incredibly lonely, right. And if you were on some island where you don't want to share what's bothering you, what your obstacles are, what your challenges are, it's going to be a lot, lot harder to climb that mountain where, when you realize oh, these people get me, they get me Like other event. People totally get it. They get sacrificing life and working on the weekends and all of those things Right and it's so important, so important.

Speaker 1: 40:55

Yeah, that is beautifully said. We're getting ready to wrap up this episode, but was there anything that I didn't ask, that you wish that I did?

Speaker 2: 41:05

Oh, that's such a good question. I always ask clients too. That's the last question I ask them, so I should be prepared for it, but I don't think. So yeah, if anybody needs. I guess I would just say if anybody wants to talk, wants a tool, wants a download, please reach out. You can reach me at any of the places Don at Fund Productions I still have that email address or Don at Abbott Coach it's abottcoachcom and that's my website, abbott Coach. So please reach out and I'm happy to share free tools and help you in any way I can.

Speaker 1: 41:47

Fantastic. And where can they get a copy of your book called your Life is Not a To-Do List?

Speaker 2: 41:54

It is on Amazon, it's on in Kindle hardback paperback and, as of this fall in October, it's on Audible as well, and it's also on Goodreads and Target and Burns, noble and all of those places. But Amazon is easy.

Speaker 1: 42:12

Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for sharing that and congratulations on all your success. Thank you, but more importantly, congratulations on your ability to help others succeed. I get that. That's a genuine part of who you are. It comes across here through your writing and it's just so appreciated by me and the rest of the NACE community. All right, so that was it for Don. Thanks so much for being here, don, and to our listeners, thanks for tuning in to another episode of the Denver NACE podcast. If you are not a member of Denver NACE yet and you would love to come check out a meeting on the house, we would love to have you. Just go to nasedenvercom that's N-A-C-E Denvercom Check out our upcoming meetings. We've got a meeting roughly once a month and I would love to meet you personally. So thanks for tuning in and we'll see you at the next event. Bye, everybody.