My guest today is Mindaugas Petrutis who is the CEO at Coho which is The Direct To Experience ™️ Learning Network for professional growth. Interview Video: https://youtu.be/wgIaGMa-Dw8 In this episode, we discuss the following: - Mindaugas bio - How does it feel to launch a company out of stealth? - Importance of building authentic relationships - Should you have an agenda when building a relationship? - Why you should not focus on titles when building relationships? - Why you should provide context when doing outreach? - How to build a genuine relationship with a venture capitalist? - Why is it important to wait for the right time to ask for favors? - What not to do when you get intros? - Horror story about not following up - How to recover from a mistake when building relationships? - How to stand out as a design recruiter? For show notes, guest bio, and more, please visit: www.designmba.show
Mindaugas Petrutis builds relationships, connects the dots between humans, systems, problems and simplifies complex ideas. Often mistaken for a designer. He is currently the CEO at Coho which is The Direct To Experience ™️ Learning Network for professional growth.
INTERVIEW VIDEO:
https://youtu.be/wgIaGMa-Dw8
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Namaste and welcome. I am Jayneil Dalal and you are listening to the design MBA which is a real-life MBA program for designers. You will learn how to launch a side hustle and level up your design careers from the interviews rock star designers.
Jayneil Dalal: Welcome, folks! For those of you who are watching this episode or listening to this, today's amazing guest is Mindaugas. Let me tell you why I got so excited about Mindaugas. So, with Mindaugas, what happened is he … think about it this way. He landed in Dublin 10 years ago today with not enough money in his pocket, barely about 1000 dollars and he had a dream of opening his own restaurant. And then fast forward today, he's now the CEO in this new company that he started that spun out from On Deck called COHO but more than that, when we were talking behind the scenes in the prep call what should we talk about, what should the interview be, one thing I realized is that Mindaugas has always been involved in planning events, just anything that involves a lot of people, community building. And he has learned so many things about the right way to build relationships, nurture them and also mistakes that one should not make that he is so grateful to share today with us. So, today's whole interview is going to be about how do you build and nurture relationships. and there's no one better I think about than Mindaugas because he's worked with thousands and thousands of designers through his time at Envision, his involvement at Design Leadership Forum, so many other avenues.
So, without further ado, Mindaugas, welcome to the show, my friend.
Mindaugas Petrutis: Thank you, man. Really appreciate you giving me the space and especially today after the day yesterday. Appreciate it.
Jayneil: How did the launch go? I mean, you must be super excited on cloud nine right now.
Mindaugas: Yeah, it was an exhausting week for sure those things are just never easy. There are a million little details that you're editing right before going live but honestly, doing this with an incredible team, we knew we were confident in what we were putting out there. What I see today in terms of the feedback and the response, zero negativity which is just so amazing to see waking up this morning, I'm struggling with all the notifications, I'm not even going to lie. It's wild.
Jayneil: So, I'm curious to know. you make the announcement, right? It goes live that “Hey, I'm Mindaugas. This is the new company we're starting and I'm the CEO of COHO. What happens after this? Is it people just DMing you, congratulating you or is it people like “Can I invest in this?”, is it people like “How can I help?” What is that inflow or flooding of messages, what is the nature of that?
Mindaugas: It's a mixture of those and it's kind of … how we ended up recording this is, is talking about the relationships you build along the way. And without necessarily strategy behind it, you just invest time in people. There always will be a moment where you're … like this like yesterday where you're doing something huge and then you see that response, right? And so, even lead it up to this, right? Folks that I talked to was incredible. I'll give you an example. The Chief Revenue Officer at Airtable, Seth, he and I worked together at Envision but Envision was a big company at the time when I was there. And so, he was the leader of the sales organization. I was in the customer success organization, right? And so, technically, he was not even my boss but I reached out to him a few weeks ago and I was like “Hey, Seth, doing this thing, launching a company.” His first response after saying congratulations is like “How can I help?” And so, those kinds of things are incredible when you have a special moment like yesterday, a big, big moment, right? And yeah, building those relationships, then all you would want to hear or all you should hear is “How can I help?” And so, yeah, those responses rolling in. There's hundreds of them at this point, “How can I help? Congrats. What do you need? You're going to be … this is a big, big step. This is amazing. What do you need? What can I do to contribute?” It's just … it's wild.
Jayneil: Here's the thing. Whenever you're on a rocket ship or you've got something of value, meaning like you are now the CEO of this cool awesome growth company in an exciting space, it's everybody wants to be involved with you now. I don't know how much this is true but if let's say five years ago when you're not doing this, would it have been difficult to get FaceTime with these people?
Mindaugas: That's the thing. If you build the relationships in an authentic way, becoming someone, let's say, because if we think about placing value on people because of the title that they have, if you build a relationship the right way over the course of time, that should not be the moment. It could be that you got promoted or you need a favor and you build that trust and relationship over time, you should be able to reach out to those folks at any point and ask them for something. So, we're a small company, right? I didn't just raise a billion dollars. We haven't raised any money, right? It's none of that. It's genuine like those relationships manifest today and yesterday in folks not wanting anything but wanting to give you their time. And so, there's that group of people but of course, you always have folks that want to sell you something that now see “Oh cool. You know, he's doing something. Maybe there's something in it for me.” There's always that regardless but the crazy thing is, honestly, I have not received one sales pitch in the last 24 hours since we launched. All I've received is “Congratulations” and “How can I help?” and the “How can I help?” does not have an agenda behind it.
Jayneil: So, let me ask you this. You talked about right there building authentic relationships. So, now, what is authentic, what should one’s goals be when trying to build a relationship?
Mindaugas: This is a … how long do we have? This is a rabbit hole in itself, at least, how I kind of think about it or what I've done, let's say, over the course of my life.
Jayneil: Like what is your agenda? Let's simplify it. Let's say you're trying to build a relationship with someone. I'm going to set the parameters to make it easier. Do you have an agenda when you're trying to connect with someone or build a relationship?
Mindaugas: I don't. And I practiced this thing over the course of the last 10 years, as you kind of talked about in the introduction, which I know was a major contribution in me landing into this situation because when you think about the Journey of like “Hey, 10 years ago I was a waiter working in like a crappy hotel in Dublin, pulling like nights till 4 a.m., being paid next to zero, struggling to pay rent, so on and so forth. And wait a minute. Now, he's the CEO of this company and in a very public eye also? So, what happened in between?” And so, I attribute … many things happened and I attribute a lot of it to one thing which I did is anytime somebody reached out to me wanting my time, unless it was very obvious there was going to be zero kind of … it would be a waste of my time. Let's say somebody is clearly trying to sell me something and I don't want to buy it, right? I'm not going to take it but let's say somebody introduces me to somebody I will always say yes and I will take that 15-minute call, I won't even look at who that person is or what benefit having a conversation with that person may have to me today. I would just take the call, get on the Zoom or grab a coffee and I would just talk to them and I would go in with the expectation that nothing will come from that call but I also know that if you do enough of those, have enough of those conversations, a percentage of those will manifest in something maybe next week, maybe six months later, maybe five years later because those 15 minutes or 20 minutes that you spend with somebody and if you do connect as humans but there's nothing for you to do today, the way at least my brain works is five years later I could be in a situation where something happens and I need something specific and I'll think of that person I met five years ago and they said something to me like that now makes sense, now it makes sense. And so, I'll reach back out to them and be like “Hey, remember that thing we talked about five years ago? Now's the time to do it.” And so, they start manifesting. If you have enough of those conversations, a percentage … majority of them will go nowhere, but I guarantee you that a percentage of those will end up going somewhere. I've been doing that consistently. I give my time freely to anyone. And I've been in situations where, let's say, I've mentored folks over the years and I often talk about my kind of approach to building relationships which this is a big part of it. And I would then offer, let's say, introduce them to somebody that I know. And a portion of people, the response that I would get back is like essentially saying “This person does not have any value for me right now. Thank you but no thank you.” And I always look at that as a mistake because okay, today this person might not have value but guess what?
Jayneil: The waiter from 10 years ago now is the CEO, right?
Mindaugas: Don't talk about me. I would be the one making … offering to make the introduction, right? So, again, it's … we tend to often think short term and look at a situation or our needs today and look at the person that we were being offered the introduction to and say “This person has no value to me today.”
Jayneil: But let me interject you right here. So, I'm just going to put myself on the … the scapegoat right here and just tell you how I approach things. So, I have a limited amount of time and you've got a limited amount of time. And I want to build relationships. And I understand that you're saying that don't focus too much on the titles but oftentimes, let's say there's 2000 potential candidates I could build relationships with. There's got to be some filter I got to narrow it down like “Hey, this got us some common interest, maybe design, intersection of technology and design.” Now, within that, maybe someone has the title of a design partner at a VC firm. I get it. It's a very prestigious title but it also means that they've worked very hard to get there and they have a lot of experience to share as well. So, I'm not saying the titles are always the case but it also helps filter down who to connect with and who not to connect with because oftentimes these people know a lot of other people too.
Mindaugas: I fully agree. And so, let's say you are in a position where … you're in a situation where you are raising investment for a company. There are avenues for you to go and do that, right? But what I'm kind of saying is that is one portion of what we do. There's always something that we need from someone because of the role that we do, the life that we live. There are people and services and places where you can go and get that but in order for you to kind of, again, build those relationships that then further advance you as a person, as a human or make impossible possible one day is building those authentic relationships. And so, think about it this way. Sure, if you are in a situation today where you're raising money, you want to go … you want the relationships with those VCs but guess what? What if you had met that VC 20 years before when they were an executive assistant and you said somebody was offering to introduce you to this person and you said “Yeah, this person is just an EA. I don't have time for that” but if you had said yes, guess what? 20 years later you're raising money and this person now is the VC that you aspire to raise money from. It becomes … instead of sifting through a mountain of incoming applications or requests for funding that they have is a text “Hey, I'm raising money.” And guess what? You just skipped the line.
Jayneil: Let me share with you an analogy that I face in my life. So, for example, being a practicing designer, I mean you get a lot of DMs from people. And one of the things I try to do with the podcast is, for example, if a designer or someone reaches out to me that “Hey, just want to chat,” so there's some messages, just random chats like “Hey, let's just get on a call. I would love to chat with you.” Now, I have limited time and some other things that I'm doing. So, if, let's say, I just start giving up my time freely but nothing wrong with that but then it's just not sustainable long term. It just leads to burnout. Also, maybe this is not the right mindset but I'm more of like … the reason I've done that interview about becoming a manager … as a design manager for the first time is because those are the questions I was getting a lot of times from folks, those are the questions that I had. So, then my first approach is if someone messaged me to talk about that, I would rather point them to the podcast interview first and say “Why don't you watch this first? It might answer most of your questions.” And it's like a small hoop to jump. And if they do jump that, it shows to me that they're really interested in that because sometimes I think people just want to chat with you and then they get excited by that but then it’s really not helping either move their needle or, nor for you. So, then if they watch that video or the episode, then I know that they really want to know and then I'll get on a call with them. So, I don't know if that's right or wrong or push but that's the way I kind of approach it. In your case, because someone's making you an intro, that first hoop is already crossed because it's coming from someone that you trust.
Mindaugas: Yes. To your specific example there, I do the same. Everybody … like no one has infinite time to be responding to all of that outreach but there's some that think about that outreach to others a little differently, which is majority is “Hey …” I get these all the time too, “Hey, would love to chat. Can we hop on a Zoom?” with zero context or nothing in mind. Of course, I cannot say yes to that. How I approached it, and this is where people assume because of the role that I do, I build communities, so it's a very public thing and you deal with a lot of people that I'm highly extroverted. It couldn't be further from the truth. I'm actually very introverted. So, what I do often in conversations in larger groups, if you're ever in the same spot and if you ever see what I do, is I tend to not say anything. I stay quiet. Groups more than four, I don't get involved in conversation but what I do in instead is I listen. And I listen to people talk about maybe a challenge that they have, a thing that they're interested in, those kinds of things. And at least the way my brain is wired, three months later, could be even a year later I could be in a situation reading something, seeing something and I'll think of that person that said the thing that I now have maybe a follow-up with or a solution for and I'll DM them and I'll say … they likely don't even know who I am … “Hey, here's the thing you might find interesting. That's it.” You just provide value to somebody. That's how you build relationships. So, guess what? If they respond and they go “Oh wow!”, then I have the opportunity and … I'm not going to say the agency because you're still asking for somebody's time but now it becomes easier to ask for this person's time. And so, to flip that back to what you were saying, if I get outreach that to first, guess what? If their second response is “Hey, by the way, I'd love to chat to you about this thing,” it becomes so much easier for me to say yes because they chose to first provide value to me, let's say, and now they're asking for something in exchange. And again, you could view it as a trick to get you on a call but hey, if the person thought of something six months later and they thought of you and that specific situation or a thing that you said, a problem that you're having with and then they remember that six months later and now they're sending you something, damn. That is really cool and impressive and, of course, I'm going to say yes. And so, that's what I tend to do 100%. And I think … to kind of give a specific example is, I think we talked before about Soleo, right? He's a well-known investor, designer so on and so forth. Soleo, if you're listening, hope you're good, we'll be mentioning this but seriously, this guy is busy, right? Everybody wants … he's one of those people that naturally everybody wants their time. And so, I had the opportunity to bring Soleo on for a fireside chat for our design program that I was building at On Deck. And so, I had never met the guy before. We did the fireside chat. I said thank you, followed up with an email thank you, we kind of went our separate ways, right? But I also know and got to hear him talk about things he cares about for an hour during the fireside chat. I was the one asking questions … I was the one asking questions. That's a unique position to be in. And so, I knew what he cared about, I also know the type of stuff he is passionate about investing in so on and so forth. And so, guess what? I'm going to say a year later I just happened to get two or three startups just reach out to me within a space of maybe a month, who were in his space saying “Hey, we're raising funding. We're looking to add some great design investor … designer investors onto our cap table. Soleo is someone we'd love to get in front of and you may know him. Would you be comfortable sending it to him? And I was like “Well, yes” because I know he cares about the space and we've met before. So, it's not I'm reaching out just out of the blue with some random deal. So, I did, right? And so, I sent him something of value which I don't know if he ended up investing or not but he responded and was interested to investigate. And so, again, it's like you're kind of building that relationship, right? And so, it came to us …
Jayneil: You're providing value up front.
Mindaugas: Right because … yeah. And so, as we were kind of gearing up to launch this company, I'd reached out to him for some feedback about the business so on and so forth. And so, he ended up giving me an hour of his time. Even though we were supposed to chat for 20 minutes, we ended up extending and talking for an hour, right? And so, that I don't think could have happened if you don't take kind of a bunch of steps and just care to build that relationship and just providing some value up front first and then asking for something in return. And I never want to look at relationships that way. That's like … my MO is just build relationships with folks but always knowing that there will be a day where you may need to ask for something and I’ve just always been very careful when that is. I mean, yesterday was that day or the last couple of months. So, it was really cool to kind of go to a bunch of folks and say “I did a thing and I may need your advice” so on and so forth, “your help.” And the response I have got in so far is “Great. Happy to help and I want nothing in return.”
Jayneil: Let me ask you this. So, one of the ways that I think that you look at this is basically you look at these things as magic bullets or maybe if there's a term that. So, why is it important to … I don't know the specific word how to phrase it but not just cash in on those or immediately ask for those intros or requests? Why is it important to wait, according to you?
Mindaugas: Because I think it's kind of going back to a specific point we were talking about earlier is like if you need a specific thing, there's likely places where you can go and get them. At the same time … I mean, I'm thinking of a couple of situations.
Jayneil: Like the Soleo one is a perfect example. You helped them out and … I mean, you could have easily just said “Hey, let's go on …” even after providing the value, you could have just gone on a chat with him just for the hell of it but you kind of didn't do that. You waited until it was something of meaningful like “Hey, I've started a company. I think now it makes time maybe for me to reach out to you and request for some kind of consultation or advice.”
Mindaugas: Yeah, yeah because it's kind of like if … that's how you think of a relationship is getting something in return at some point. And it can be. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. Relationships are an exchange of value, that's what they are, but it's just make sure it's the right time because if I will ask somebody to just randomly now that I feel I have the agency to ask them for their time, why should it be just a random time and get somebody on a call who's super busy and just talking about what? Ask them a bunch of questions about how they're doing, what their life is? You know what I mean? If that's how you want to think about it, then damn, just … I've waited with some relationships for 10 years … for the last 10 years building those relationships. And so, in the meantime, just enjoy the relationship. Some of those folks that I started off as maybe like clients when I was recruiting or whatever are now some of my best friends or people who I've worked with or worked for me like I hired at some point. It's like we over-index on doing something to get something in return. It's the way I kind of look at it is you help yourself by helping someone else. That's how I look at it.
Jayneil: And the reason I asked you about the magic bullet is some of the folks that have interviewed, for example, on the show, an entrepreneur who had a successful exit, he knows Alexis Ohanian. So, I was like … in the moment, I was excited like “Hey, man, can you make an intro?” So, that entrepreneur was like “Yeah. I mean I can provide you an intro but do you have something of value to add?” If it's just to like “Hey …” get in front of Alexis and just say hi, he's like “You don't get that many of these magic bullets. So, I would advise that until you're starting a company or something meaningful for him to listen to, why waste this opportunity?” So, that's when it hit me like you got to wait for the right time.
Mindaugas: 100% And it won't always work. I definitely have made a couple of mistakes many years ago where I was given intros to a couple of folks, right? And I was raising money or thinking about raising money at the time. And getting an intro to somebody who literally has the keys to potentially you continuing as a business or an idea or not and I just did not take a moment to really think about how I respond to that introduction. I literally just went straight in going like “Thanks for the intro. Here's what I'm doing” and “Can I get this feedback, blah, blah, blah.” And honestly, it was two introductions … I'm just thinking about the response that I received. They ripped me to shreds in their response and they were rightly so. It's because when I look at it now, I did not respect this person's time in how I formulated what I wrote. I should have taken a moment and say “These are two amazing people I just was introduced to. Do I think that what I have right now is even interesting to them?” I could have saved those intros. You know what I mean? I just never did … just I know like … that moment is so etched into my brain that I really remember just being so excited about the intros and straight away just put together an email “Here's what I want, da, da, da, da, da.” And what came back was clearly a manifestation of me not taking the time to respect their time or just respect the opportunity because if I could roll that back … I wouldn't roll it back because you know what? I may not be doing what I'm doing today. So, that's a different conversation but if I was to roll it back, I think I would have actually not asked for anything at the time.
Jayneil: I love it so much because you're so … it's so hard to find people that are willing to just publicly share the mistakes and openly talk about the learnings because nobody wants to talk about it. So, what I love is you're so candidly sharing examples of like “This is what happened, what went wrong and what would have done different” because now anyone listening in get some perspective of what to do differently. I want to ask you if you could share maybe an example of where maybe you didn't nurture and manage the relationship right way and then if you go down that path and you make a mistake in a relationship, how do you recover from that. And I think in our prep call, there's one horror story or like a horror turned success story you were mentioning about from your early recruiting days. Maybe that makes sense.
Mindaugas: That was an interesting moment where … I have a couple of examples, older and one kind of maybe more recent. I mean, the more recent one maybe, they wouldn't view it as such but I've learned to communicate with folks and if I … especially if I get an introduction to somebody to make sure that I respect that and there's like a sequence of events and communication with this person and trying to … making sure you stay true to your promise and your word, right> And so, David Huang from Webflow, who works with us on the design program, he's introduced me to a ton of incredible folks over the past year, right? It's like … there was a point where there were so many names that I knew just sitting in my inbox, introductions from David and I was just like “What is actually happening right now?” That was crazy but there was a couple of people where I was introduced to them and I chatted with them and at the time when I talked to them … so, one is Randy Hunt. I think recently he was head of design at Grab. And then one Sana Rao, I hope I'm pronouncing her last name correctly, where … at the time of speaking to them, I thought I may be able to kind of bring them on as a similar role to David on our design program as a program partner or do maybe some coaching or something like that, right? And so, I went in and kind of talked about that. And then things kind of changed quickly after those conversations where I say … was no longer able to do so. And then just in personal life, I burnt out a little bit and then there was just changes happening work wise, personal wise and I just kind of lost … stopped communicating, I never followed up, right? And so, there was a long enough period of time like a few months where … and it was always on top of my mind like “I should really let them know but what do I let them know because I don't really have a clear answer or path right now?” And so, I didn't. And that is not the right way to nurture a relationship, 100%, but what I did and what was always in the back of my mind was that as soon as I have some clarity, I would just reach out to them, put my hands up, apologize and say “Hey, if you're open to it, would love to you know jump on a call and kind of share more.” And that's what I did. And so, to your question, what do you do in those cases? You just have to be honest. No excuses, anything like that. Just say what it is, “Sorry. I told you this on this conversation and then I disappeared.”
Jayneil: So, owning up to it. If I say to someone that “Hey, I'm going to do this” and whatever like life happens to me, you're saying that rather than just not ghosting them but just not responding, it's better to just own up and say that “Hey, I know I said I was going to create this module for you but I'm just super busy right now. I'm so sorry. I know I said I would do it for you but I but I cannot do it anymore. I'm so sorry but if something changes, I'll let you know.”
Mindaugas: That's what I should have done and I didn't. And so … that's again … it's one thing that you just got to own it and … but again, I did always … they were in the back of my mind and I was like … my strategy shifted from just ghosting people to then saying like “Okay, I think I'll have some clarity at this point.” And as soon as I do, priority should be to just send them a note, apologize and say “Hey, I can share more about where I'm at and what to think.” And so “Hey, turns out I'm in London next week on a panel for an event” and I'll be on a panel with Sana and we caught up a few weeks ago and I let her know about the ghosting and I apologized. So, it worked out well. It's cool. And we get to meet in real life. And imagine how awkward it would have been, if I had just ghosted her and now all of a sudden, I find myself on a panel with this person, because life works in mysterious ways.
Jayneil: By the way, thank you so much for introducing me to David Huang. I had a nice chat with him, super busy guy, but just really appreciate you connecting me with them. I'm really, really grateful for that. This is like a relationship coaching/therapy session that I feel I'm in and I'm just like “Please tell me more stories of what not to do, anyone that comes to your mind” because I think people openly talk about the best practices, what to do but rarely do people talk about what not to do and then how to do it differently. So, I'm just eager to hear if you have any other stories that come to mind for you, how you do it differently or …
Mindaugas: I mean, I can share what maybe was actually … I think there were many, many moments, many learning moments that kind of then shaped how I approached relationships, let's say. And that one you referenced earlier, the kind of the horror story, what could have been a horse horror story but … I mean, at the time … again, it's another one of those moments that is just so vividly etched in my brain. It was basically … I need to give some context on this. After working as a waiter, I kind of moved back … I had done some recruitment a couple years before that and so, I went back into recruitment. That's where I discovered design actually and decided that “Hey, I want to become a design recruiter in this agency” that I was working for. And so, it happened that my colleague who … she owned the kind of design desk at the time was leaving. And so, I asked to take that over. In her handover of her clients, candidates so on and so forth, she said “You know, I have this list of folks in the design industry who are well connected. You should definitely build relationships with these folks.” And so, picture this scenario. You could not write a script for this. She says to me “Let's go into this meeting room. I'm going to … we'll go through this list together, right? I'll give you some context on each person, the relationship that I have with them, so on and so forth,” right? Before we go in, I sent out a tweet of this really bad hiring ad which said “This was my basically first day of super green …” like “hiring this UI and UX rock stars, blah, blah, blah,” right? Sent that out with some graphic design that had a dude with a guitar on it. I mean, just cringe. Sent that out, going to a meeting with her. She's going through this list of people and one person she calls out, this guy called Owen Bara, an Irish designer … anyway, go back, check my phone. Turns out this guy Owen retweeted my thing and just ripped me to shreds. He was like … I don't remember what he said exactly. Him and I tried to look for that tweet a few years ago, we couldn't find it but it was bad. It was like “When will these, you know, stupid recruiters ever get it? Don't … basically, don't talk about designers this way.” And I immediately just had this sinking feeling of my career as a designer recruiter is over before it even started because I've just been told this guy is super connected in the design community and he just ripped me to shreds publicly. And there was like people replying, chiming in, so on and so forth, right? And I was just like “I'm done. This is bad.” And there was also this moment where I was like … I had two choices. One, I could sit in a corner and cry or what I did instead was I found his phone number in the database and I called him immediately and I called him. He answered the phone and I said “Hey, Mindaugas from …” Solace Consulting was the company that I worked for. There was this long pause, silence and then he just started … awkward silence and then he started laughing and he goes “Whoa! I can't believe you called me.” And I was like “Look, man, I don't know what else to do because if this is the wrong way to approach communicating with designers, I'd love to know what is the right approach? Tell me. I'm really interested.” And that one moment changed my whole approach in just building design community to start with because he then was very open. He was like “Oh, this guy is green but he's curious. He's actually interested.” And so, we spent some time talking. We are actually still friends to this day. I mean, he's going to be in Lisbon in a couple of weeks for the web summit and we're going to meet up and go for a beer. He was here last year for the web summit, we met up for a beer. I used to hang out in his design studio back in the day. And so … but aside from that, what that taught me is that being vulnerable and being curious genuinely curious will open any door in the world. And so, then I set about being like that in terms of how I built a design community around me to make sure that I was successful as a design recruiter but that was the moment, right? And so, a bunch of other things that kind of came from that vulnerability and just being open and saying … putting your hands up and saying like “I don't know what you guys do but I really want to know because it'll help me to be better at what I do and in turn, when you get outreach from me, you're not just thinking like “Oh, here's another idiot recruiter that cannot distinguish a designer between a developer.”” That was like a huge learning moment, for sure.”
Jayneil: I love this. I think the takeaway I got from just hearing these stories, the last one and especially this one, is owning up. I think it takes a lot of courage because it's awkward, it's accepting failures, it's being vulnerable but I really resonate with that, just owning up to it like “Hey, I don't have any excuse. I, you know, screwed up and I'm sorry. I would love if you give me a second chance.”
Mindaugas: And also, just putting yourself in those uncomfortable positions, right? It became a natural thing for me after those kinds of couple of learning moments, especially if we want to talk about building the design community and how that took me from being, let's say, a recruitment consultant to then building design communities at a huge scale around the world. That was definitely a massive, massive influence. I'm starting to remember all these other stories too, talking about it.
Jayneil: Any interesting one that comes to mind?
Mindaugas: Yeah. I mean, there's … I mean, shortly after the story I just talked about, that kind of pushed me right to then, I was like “Okay, if I'm just open and honest and vulnerable and curious, it'll help me kind of build trust with the design community.” And so, I actually ended up going to this UX sketching kind of session. And I knew the two people who'd organized it. And so, I reached out to them and kind of said like “Hey, can I come along. I just want to … just want to watch how … so to understand like what does a UX designer do on a daily basis. There's no other way for me to kind of see it, the process.” And so, I went to this. It was a small group. I went into … I remember I went into this like space where it was being hosted, a few tables set up and some chairs on the side and I just sat on the side and then the two organizers are like “No, no, no, you're going to sit and you're going to sketch with us.” And I went “What?” I mean, I'm not joking. I started … anxiety inside me just went through the roof. I was sweating. I was so worried. And what happened there was I sat at a table with a bunch of designers, I sketched very badly, I had to stand up and present, which just on its own, even if it's standing up presenting about something that I know and I care about, is like nerve wracking for me. This was like another level. I remember just nearly physically shaking, right? And nobody in the group aside from the organizers knew that I was not a designer, by the way. And so, what happened afterwards? We all went for drinks. And so, naturally people “Hey, what do you do?” – “I'm a design recruiter. I'm actually not a designer.” And the response that I got was “Whoa! So, you sat with us and you sketched with us? That's so cool.” And so, guess what? Building relationships with just … building that trust. It's like “Hey, I'm willing to be incredibly uncomfortable in order to show you that I'm really interested in what you do.” Those kinds of things work huge in kind of how it shapes just your understanding on how to approach building community or building relationships, so on and so forth.
Jayneil: Oh my God! That is so amazing, Mindaugas. I cannot thank you enough for just sharing all these insights and stuff. Thank you so much for just coming on the show and sharing these stories, sharing what to do and most importantly, sharing how to build and design authentic relationships.
Mindaugas: I appreciate you for having me along. Thank you, man.
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