Episode 31: “Givers Gain Chapter 5”

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Synopsis

Dr. Misner talks about his decision to sell off his consulting practice and focus 100% on BNI, as described in Chapter 5 of Givers Gain.

• Networking is different from other forms of marketing
• You follow people, rather than focusing on geographic locations
• BNI started opening chapters outside of California because BNI members moved
• Every policy in BNI was created by members (the BNI board of advisors)
• Dr. Misner met his wife through BNI—the best referral he ever got

Brought to you by Networking Now. Podcast produced by Live Oak Studio in conjunction with the Podcast Asylum.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 031 -

Priscilla Rice:
Hello everybody and welcome back to the official BNI podcast, brought to you by networkingnow.com, the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rica coming from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley California and I’m joined on the phone today by Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello Ivan. How are you?

Ivan Misner:
Hello Priscilla. I am doing great.

Priscilla:
Where are you today, Ivan?

Ivan:
I am back at BNI headquarters. We just had our international conference last week. And this week, we are training directors from eight different countries of BNI. Six of them are new countries so members can be looking for new countries that will be opening up in the next six months to a year or so. We’re continuing to grow like crazy world wide and we are training these directors and BNI headquarters this week as we speak.

Priscilla:
So do you need translators for that?

Ivan:
Actually this time, we might have a translator, now that you mention it. We have somebody from Brazil coming up and we had some issues with English. However, in most cases we have somebody who speaks English as a partner in a new country, so that is helpful in training. You’re right- this time, it might be the first time that we have a translator.

Priscilla:
Well, so most people speak English then, I guess?

Ivan:
It really is very much a universal language. Now, if you speak two languages, what are you called in English?

Priscilla:
Bilingual

Ivan:
Yeah. If you speak three languages, do you know what you are called?

Priscilla:
Trilingual?

Ivan:
That’s right. If you speak only one language, do you know what it is?

Priscilla:
Unalingual. (laughing)

Ivan:
No, it’s American.

Priscilla:
It’s American, right.

Ivan:
English is a fairly universal language, and we’re lucky that it is because it makes it a lot easier for us to open BNI. As of this moment and this recording, we’re operating in 37 countries around the world.

Priscilla:
That is great. I look forward to going to some of those meetings. It looks like this week you have an interesting topic and it’s based on one of the chapters in your Givers Gain book that you wrote.

Ivan:
That’s right. What I’ve been trying to do with these podcasts is once a month or so to cover one of the chapters in Givers Gain so that members of BNI who have read the book can hear me talk about pieces of it. If you haven’t read the book, pick it up and take a look at it. Read the chapter as I go through it with you. I think it will add value to your position in the organization.

This recording that I’m doing is on chapter five. It’s called The Way East. It’s the road between 1988 and 1990. During this period of time, I was drowning in work. I was running a consulting business. Aim Consulting was the name of the company. I saw the handwriting on the wall that I had to do something because people would ask me what do you do in this BNI thing?

I would tell people that consulting was my vocation but BNI was my avocation. I love BNI. It was really getting to the point that I realized that you have to do what you love. I sold off my consulting practice during this period of time and focused on building BNI. It was the best thing I ever did and am very happy that I did it.

Priscilla:
That is a great organization. Tell us a little bit about – your topic is the way it was from 1988 to 1990.

Ivan:
That is what it’s called but it probably should be called The Way East and Back because when you’re talking about networking, it’s different than other forms of marketing. You say I want to market so I’m going to go here. Then you pick a place on the map and you market and advertise.

With networking, the best thing to do is follow people. That means you have to find the right person to do something or to work with. When you do that, it leads you in some pretty amazing directions.

In a previous chapter of the book, I talk about opening up in Arizona. It was 1986 and it was the first state outside of California. With the in just a few years, by the late eighties for 1990, one of our Phoenix members moved to Las Vegas, Nevada. Then one of the members from Las Vegas moved to Connecticut. Of course the person who moved to Nevada had asked me if I can help them open up a chapter in that state.

Then the guy who moved from Nevada to Connecticut asked if I would help him open up chapters there. I said OK, so we went from California to Arizona to Las Vegas to Connecticut, the Hartford area. Then the most amazing thing was that somebody from Connecticut moved to Lake Tahoe.

So in a period of about four years, we literally did a complete circle around the United States. I tell the story to members because you have to understand that that’s the way the networking works. It goes into directions that you might not expect or did not foresee, but if you find the right people and you’re working with the right people, they lead you to success.

Priscialla:
It’s very organic.

Ivan:
It is very organic. That is the perfect phrase. If you are doing networking correctly, it really is an organic process, and I talk about that here.

Everything that I talk about in this chapter I think is really critical in the success of BNI, particularly the early success of BNI. It was during this period of time that the Board of Advisors really came into its own. I started it in 1986 but I talk about it at length here in this chapter because the Board of Advisors tackled a lot of important subjects.

Members need to know that every single policy created by BNI and used in BNI today was either created by the Board of Advisors or approved by it. Everything from attendance to every policy we have was created by members of the organization- not by me in my ivory tower, but by members of BNI from all around the world.

They really came into it in the late eighties and tackled some tough issues that I think have made BNI a much stronger organization today. If you have a chance, read that section of chapter five because our listeners would really gain a lot as to the things that we learned as we went along. You know, when you’re learning something for the first time it’s called the learning curve right, Priscilla?

Priscilla:
Right.

Ivan:
Do you know what it’s called when you’re learning it as you go? You’re basically discovering it and there’s no way to teach you how to do it?

Priscilla:
What is it called then?

Ivan:
Then it’s called learning steps. The reason that their called learning steps rather than learning curve is that is really not very smooth. It tends to be very, very bumpy. You go along on your own and you’re doing just fine and then boom- you hit this wall and this wall and this wall.

You finally figure out how to solve the problem. So what do you do? You go up to the next level then you’re going along just fine and everything is okay until boom- you hit this wall, you hit this wall, you hit this wall. If anyone has ever seen a picture of me you’ll see that I have a flat spot on the front of my head. It’s from all the walls that I hit in my early days of BNI.

What I love about this book and what we tried to do in this is show BNI members that we made mistakes. What you are seeing today is much different than the way that it started and we learned as a group and BNI absolutely created an industry. We created the networking industry, and we did it through trial and error. When you look at our program, if you ever think that this is really a good program, it’s because we’re screwed up so much along the way. We got it right after two decades.

Priscilla:
Can you give us just one little example of a mistake that you made?

Ivan:
Oh yes. A big example. One of the things that we did- and I know we talk about in the book somewhere. I’m not sure it’s as if it’s in this chapter, but we allowed chapters to meet every week. We didn’t know any better. Some chapter said you know what I really like this but I think that every week is too much. We said okay meet every other week.

What we discovered was that chapters that met every other week past 52% less referrals than groups that met every week. We went back to these chapters in we asked if we could show them one way to double the numbers of referrals that they passed, would they do it? You know all but one chapter said yes. They did double the number of referrals that they did.

The only chapter that didn’t do it within a year had closed down because they were not very successful. It’s these kinds of things that we learn over time – there are dozens and dozens of them throughout the book.

Priscilla:
That’s interesting. I’m glad you shared that with us. Ivan, I understand that you met somebody special in the process of creating BNI.

Ivan:
I certainly did. I talk about in the book of chiropractic assistant whom I met earlier. Her name was Elizabeth Privo. It was during this period of time that Elizabeth moved to Prescott, Arizona and invited me out to speak to her chapter. One thing led to another, and I ended up marrying Elizabeth Privo. She is now Elizabeth Misner.

As of the date of this recording, we’ve been married almost eighteen years. That referral from BNI was the best referral I ever got. Although I don’t pitch BNI as a dating service, I have to be honest. I met my lovely wife in BNI, and it definitely was the best referral but I ever got!

Priscilla:
That is a lovely story. Okay- well Ivan, I think that might be all we have time for today. I would like to thank you for talking to all the members and listeners and let you know that this podcast has been brought to you by networkingnow.com, the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. This is Priscilla Rice, and we will see you next week on the official BNI podcast. Thank you, Dr. Ivan Misner.

Ivan:
Thank you.