Monday Motivation: Being Reenergized By Interns.

Good morning everybody. It's Luke here. As you can see, I have a fresh shave. Well, actually day two, usually I come bearing gifts with the beard, but not today. Just teasing, but hope everybody's doing well. Happy Monday to you and yours. It's a beautiful morning. Look at just a gorgeous, gorgeous morning. Hope everybody had a phenomenal weekend. Looking forward to chatting with you about where I'm learning some, some of the most today. So just want a quick share. Got the beautiful sun popping up.

What a great day. Good morning everybody. Good morning, good morning, good morning. Hope everybody is doing well and had a phenomenal weekend. Rebounding, getting ready to rock and have a phenomenal week. I sure am and you will too. But say I just wanted to share with you all. So in the last, call it, 12 years of owning and operating businesses, helping to lead, leading at board levels, you name it, ChatGPT and AI has really leveled the playing field for learning and the capacity to learn. So in other words, I can today get just about any information that I possibly need as quick and as fast at my fingertips, right?

Like it's fast, it's really, really quick. Like I can get that information and I can run super, super fast. But here's the really cool thing is today what I find is and what re energizes me in life is having the opportunity to work with our summer interns. So want to give a shout out to Renee, of course, and some of the individuals that we've had the privilege to work with over the last three years. But I also want to share that over the last nine years before that, you know, with Northstar, et cetera, I've learned so much from individuals that come in and don't know our systems and ask questions and ask why we do things.

And usually this is the best part, usually these individuals are very ambitious as well. I'll give you an example of the last 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 of the last 5 interns. All of them have cold called me or cold emailed me and asked about opportunities. So they've reached out, they've been ambitious. They've wanted to participate in something that was bigger than themselves. They wanted to have the opportunity to learn and grow with fast paced, growing organization, et cetera. So by putting themselves out there, by putting themselves out there, it gives me a different dynamic of like bringing me back to that old 18, 20 year old Luke.

I was that guy. I was that guy that would email, cold, call, send emails, try to get my foot in the door. And when these individuals do this and send A cold email. Hi, my name is so and so from Harvard. Hi, my name is so and so from Michigan. Hi, my name is so and so from xyz. I heard about your organization. I'd like to learn more. Da da da da da. For me, this is just an immediate re energizing, like, holy cow, I was that person. And I can't wait to learn about what drives you and what motivates you and how you see the world and why you think some of the things maybe we're doing are a little off or vice versa, and ways in which I can hopefully add to their repertoire and learn and coach and support them.

But most importantly, how they see the world through their lens at 18 to 25 years old and how it ultimately affects our business. So the learning opportunity that we have today from those individuals is. It's incredible because like I said, what you have today, that's the great separator is like knowledge and resources are at your disposal and at your fingertips. Like you can find the information as quick and as fast as humanly possible. But the experiential learning that individuals have, the ambition, the drive, the want to curiosity, taking the knowledge and finding ways to do something very, very different is where it just motivates me, drives me and brings me insane amount of like energy.

So what's re energizing you at work? What's re energizing you at work? And I'm telling you right now, I'll give you one example. So there's this, there's an individual that I had the opportunity to work with that she's never cold called before. Okay, are you ready for this? She's never cold called before. And I gave her a list. 100 opportunities to cold call. Okay? And she made all these calls and she made the first 20, they hung up the phone on her cold emails, all these things, right? 100 cold calls and finally she sends me an email.

It's like it's not working. The individuals aren't even. Not even, not only that nice, but their time is very important. And my email, her back was like, keep going, see how the next 20 go. And she does it, she gets whatever. And she goes, one replied to me and I have an appointment on Friday. And she's like, I'm still a little frustrated. That's only one individual. And I replied back, I'm like, let's go. This is utterly amazing. Like that you cold called, found an opportunity, identified somebody with a need, and then they ultimately had the opportunity to share with you information and drive Home.

Like, she'll never forget that opportunity and nor will I. Like cold calling. If you can go knock on doors and you can go pick up the phone and cold call and you can go send emails that are cold emails to the world, not even warm leads, I'm telling you, you can do almost anything. Like, that is hard. That is really, really, really hard to do. So totally re energize me. Individuals that put themselves out there and know, like, I'm probably gonna fail at this, but I might find a little bit of gold in it.

Like, what an unbelievable opportunity. So what's re energizing you at work today and who? So a lot of the times when the interns come in, it's like, all right, hey, do this one little marketing thing. Hey, do this one little this thing. Do this one little this thing. My thought is, no, like, let's learn from them. Let's learn from the platform. Let's learn from this. Let's learn about how they see the platform through how they see. So I just, I'm just a complete sponge. I mean, I'm telling you, like, I've participated in very expensive coaching things, participating in all these different things that you have the opportunity to be a part of.

And you know, again, I would share that some of the best learnings I've ever had are from 18, 19, 20, 21 year olds that are interns at this organization that I'm learning so much from. So learning in unusual spaces or unusual spots is something that I encourage you to try to figure out. All right? So good morning from Smoky Lake Vermillion. Good morning. Lovely day. You got that right, Anila. Morning from the bayfront to Lake Erie. Anila, the major NFP in our space just canceled their conference.

I. I'm energized because my team is going to arrange. Yeah, I love that. I love that. Anila. That's absolutely amazing. So, you know, again, I just wanted to share and you know, I'm not saying this, I'm not saying this with ego or narcissism, but as being, you know, leader of an organization, a lot of leaders probably don't interact with the interns at the company. And what I find is it is the absolute Energizer Bunny for me. And not only the Energizer Bunny, I live for it. I live for the opportunity to figure out how they see the world.

The 18s and 19s, 20s, 25s, their access to technology, how quick and fast they can roll with things, their ability to use ChatGPT. I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm just learning so much. So I encourage you all at your companies, when you have those interns in and you have those folks that are first timers that have put themselves out there to even have the opportunity to work for the company, trust me when I tell you, go ask them for lunch, go ask them for lunch, go ask them for a coffee that you can learn and see how they see the world.

Because not only is it very, very different for Gen Z, but honestly, they're the game changers. They're the game changers that are going to see the world very, very differently. And not only see the world differently, but act on it differently. So that's my push to you is when you see those 18, 19, 20, 25, don't, don't give them the this is the, the way we've always done it mentality, but rather how could you see that we could do this? How could you see that maybe we do this differently? And ask those questions and I'm going to tell you the answers that you'll find are going to be phenomenal.

And you might just find some solutions that drive your company and your business and your life to a whole nother level. Have a phenomenal week, you guys. I hope you all become re energized by something at your work. Enjoy it, Take it in. Love you all. Thank you so much for the opportunity to be here. It's what I live for on Mondays. Peace. All right, bye bye.