YBIOTL Episode 18 Publish
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Shubh: [00:00:00] Welcome to episode 18 of Your Businesses On the Line, the podcast where entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, uh, operators, people we know, friends of ours, random people come on and pitch, uh, some, uh, crazy business ideas. On today's episode, we have Kelly Schmidt, CEO of head verity here in Calgary, three time, three time unicorn executive here in Calgary.
Maybe the one of the most, uh, accomplished tech executives in the history, in the history of this country, uh, has decided to lum it and come on this podcast and, uh, pitched us, uh, three killer ideas. Now, you might be wondering, uh, those of you who listen often, hey, Chubb, you're, uh, usually doing this intro and it's all witty, and you got some banter going with Philip or Chaz today.
You're all alone. That's right. I am alone. I'm alone. For the [00:01:00] introduction of this podcast, let's talk about being alone for a second. Let's talk about loneliness. It is an epidemic, and our friend Kelly Schmidt came on the pod and pitched an idea that we think, and she thinks can help solve that problem.
She workshoped it with Phil and came up with the name only friends. It's a subscription service to help people make more friends moving to a new city help you make friends Growing up while your, uh, childhood friends turned, uh, you know, a little weird. Um, this will help you make friends. You gotta a big group of friends, but, uh, you know, everybody's in a relationship.
Doesn't have time for you anymore. You need some new friends. This is gonna help you make friends. Very, very excited about this idea. People are lonelier than they ever have been. People need friends, not me, not me. I got a ton of friends. I'm a great friend, even though I'm doing this, uh, intro, uh, all alone and could use a friend, uh, just specifically at this moment.
Not generally, like I said, a lot of friends, [00:02:00] but, uh, loneliness is a real problem. Only friends. I think. Uh, it could help solve the loneliness epidemic. It's an incredible idea. Who doesn't need more friends? Even if you got a lot of friends like I do, you can always use a couple more, right? And if you got no friends, you could definitely use one more or two, or three or four.
Kelly's gonna solve that for you. She also pitched an incredible idea called. The name whisperer. You know, you go to party, can't remember who the person you're talking to is. It's just gonna whisper that in your ear. Super helpful, super helpful if you're a high powered tech, CEO, the LeBron James of Canadian Tech.
Or if, uh, you know, you're, uh, just at a place trying to meet some new friends. You forgot somebody's name. Nothing. Submarines and early friendship faster than forgetting someone's name. Alright, please enjoy episode 18 of your businesses on the line and just between, uh, you and I, because there's no one else on this intro, because I am by myself alone for this introduction.
This might just be our [00:03:00] best one. Enjoy. Like, share, subscribe, go to Y btl.ca. You can find us on all the platforms. Subscribe. Go to Instagram, find us there. Your business is on the line. LinkedIn. Find us there. Your business is on the line. And, uh, you know, if you're a little lonely, just pretend you're, uh, hanging out in the room with us while you listen to this episode.
Then, uh, get only friends. Thank you for humoring me with my solo intro. Enjoy episode 18. Hi everybody. It's Chubb here. Are you a startup founder or a scale up exec that's trying to take your company to the next level? Are you looking for the right people to help you do it? Are you looking for people who will help you set culture, who have deep domain expertise, who can figure anything out?
Who are Swiss Army knives and unicorns? How are you finding those people? Are you juggling multiple job boards? Are you screening hundreds of resumes, doing dozens of interviews? Is it working? I bet it's not. Are you frustrated? [00:04:00] I bet you are. Do you know how I know that? Because once upon a time I was you, then I discovered the new network.
Jennifer Weens and her team at the New Network helped Canadian tech companies build and scale high performance teams through a proven unique approach to recruitment and executive search. Also they're awesome. I use them to help build most of my team at ZayZoon and I would use them again. And I've recommended them to everyone that I know.
Check out new network.ca for more details. The new network, I couldn't have done it without them.
Philippe: Kelly, do you get to meet Chaz? Chaz is not on
Kelly: what?
Shubh: He's hung up at work.
Kelly: Come on
Shubh: work. I know he got a job.
Kelly: No.
Shubh: Yeah, we better text him and
Kelly: say jump on for private. So this this life of just living above his wife's shop and taking her lunches
over.
Shubh: That's
Kelly: what,
Shubh: no, that's, that's still true. Uh, welcome back Philip.
We are here in the room with Kelly Schmidt.
Philippe: Your business [00:05:00] is on the line's number one fan,
Shubh: not only number one fan. Maybe. And Kelly's gonna get so mad when I say this. I mean, if they were making a list of the top tech executives in Canada, Uhhuh. There's no list that can be made without Kelly's name on it.
Philippe: Wow.
Shubh: Can I just, I know Kelly, again, you're gonna get super mad. I'm just going to fill it for your benefit.
Philippe: Okay.
Shubh: I'm
Kelly: already embarrassed.
Shubh: I'm just gonna read you a tiny bit.
Philippe: I, I know this as well.
Shubh: Well, just for the, for the, for the people out there's benefit. CFO, smart Technologies. Hey, friends out there, smart Technologies.
You ever walked through a school before?
Philippe: Uhhuh
Shubh: every school classroom. Smart board,
Philippe: smart boards.
Shubh: Pretty, pretty, pretty decent. Company. CFO at Soum Capital. Oh. Got acquired by, uh, Morgan Stanley. Just over a billion dollars.
Philippe: Was that a billion dollar acquisition?
Kelly: A billion Canadian.
Philippe: Okay.
Shubh: That's still a billion guys.
Still
Kelly: is a bill.
Shubh: Chief Executive Officer, Benevity for six years. Benevity [00:06:00] another unicorn. Unicorn, unicorn here in Calgary
Philippe: and you helped it become a unicorn, right?
Kelly: I did indeed.
Philippe: Babu.
Shubh: That's three unicorns a geez. This is unbelievable. Either the CFO or the CEO at three unicorns in the city,
Philippe: soon to be a fourth.
Shubh: We haven't even had five, eight unicorns. I don't even know what the number is. Kelly Schmidt, I realized on the way Kelly is the LeBron James of. Canadian tech. Wow. She's gone to three different places and one titles at all different places.
Philippe: How do you feel about that comparison?
Kelly: Wow. I feel incredible pressure.
You've put the bar pretty high for me now on this podcast. Like I have nowhere to go but down. Yeah, you
Philippe: should do that chalk thing before we start where you'd like rub the chalk and throat in the air.
Shubh: Kelly, if you turn everything into a unicorn, could you turn this podcast into a unicorn for us too?
That would really help. That really, that'd really help us out.
Philippe: Yeah. We've already lost a producer.
Shubh: Yeah. Chaz is not on the call today. You got, um, Kelly, thank you so [00:07:00] much for coming in here. You have, uh, an incredible, I will say before we met, and you can talk about how we met in a second, but, uh, we all knew about your reputation, but in person, you're as capable.
Um, a person as I've ever met. I don't know what you're doing here, honestly, like you've, you've built this incredible reputation and career. We're probably about to I'm
Kelly: here to destroy
Shubh: it. We're probably about to give it all back. Yeah. Yeah. And 18 years, three unicorns undone in 22 minutes, basically. Yeah.
Kelly, thanks very much for coming. A pleasure to have you here.
Philippe: Yeah. Kelly, you said you like, you wanted to talk about how you know Chubb. How do you know Shep?
Kelly: So, I actually tried to hire Chubb to work for me at, at my new company, at at, at adversity. I, I tried like three times, and so I just want all the listeners to know, like if he hadn't said no, this podcast may not actually exist.
So I feel like I played a role in this. My hiring ratio is like, is stellar like
Shubh: Right.
Kelly: People [00:08:00] don't say no. So like, I was like really taken aback that like. He would pass this up off this opportunity to start a podcast. Like, I was like, what the hell is this guy doing? Like, he's gonna tinker around with this podcast for a couple months, it's gonna go nowhere.
And then he is gonna be like, Kelly, you were right. I should come and work with you. So the
Shubh: po you were, you were right. Just for the record, regardless of how anything works out. Yeah. Keep going, sir.
Kelly: So episode one of the podcast comes out, I'm like, okay, I got, I gotta see what's going on. And I, I got like partway through and I texted, shove, I'm like.
I actually feel like I'm getting less intelligent as I'm listening to this podcast, but like, I just can't stop myself. Like, it's hilarious. Yeah. And now, like, I don't know, I'm probably the only guest who actually has showed up listening. You know, I mean, listened to all 16 episodes of the podcast have been, I think that's,
Shubh: that's probably true,
Kelly: at least today.
So,
Philippe: yeah. You
Kelly: know, I know all the pitches, I know the 75 Southa scoring system. I totally get it now. This is like one of the highlights of my week, so I'm thrilled to be here.
Philippe: Okay. That's awesome. Well, we're glad to have it. Did, did, did we miss a score that you thought [00:09:00] was brilliant? Like, is there, uh, like do you, or maybe what's your favorite pitch so far?
Kelly: Oh, good question. So I, I gotta tell you, like, as, as episodes have been rolling on. I've been more nervous to come on the podcast because I don't know if I have an idea that can compete with like the aqua desks or Jesus Plus, which just like, I, I cried laughing. But then, you know, I heard Joe Farley's pitch for the precipitation detection system that Phil rated a zero, and I was like, okay, I'll, I'll, I'll take the pledge
Philippe: after there was this year score, you're like, okay, yeah,
Kelly: I can do it.
That can, I can't do, like, there's been a perfect score and there's been a zero, so I gotta be somewhere in the middle. Like, I'm good.
Philippe: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. That's great. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, thanks, uh, Joe Friley for having such a bad idea that
Shubh: when, when, uh, Kelly was, uh, trying to pitch me on coming to work at adversity, I will tell you 'cause, so the other side of that is I was a hundred percent convinced I wasn't gonna go take a job or work anywhere at that point in time.[00:10:00]
And to Kelly's credit, I went from like 0% that I was gonna do that to like pretty close to like, maybe I should go do this largely because of her. So she is very, very good at, uh, I always tell people that I'm really good at persuading people to join things. Again,
Philippe: yeah.
Shubh: I'm not in this category. Like I'm, uh,
Philippe: there, there was like three podcast recordings in a row.
We, uh, like sort of week over week where Chubb, we, we sat in this room. Yeah. After the podcast had finished,
Shubh: I'd be like, I think I, I don't know. Like this,
Philippe: like Yeah.
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: So, so I might have some responsibility to convincing him not to do it. No. Two opposing forces where like, everything
Kelly: happens for a reason.
And I, this podcast is to bring people joy every week.
Shubh: That's right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it's, let's just say it was the financially smart decision. Um, um, yeah. So, uh, I don't even know how to segue away from that, but first of all, I was very flattered that you [00:11:00] actually considered me. And then secondly, yeah, Kelly is.
Incredible at convincing people to do things. And also the fastest decision maker I've ever met in my entire life. I've never, ever, ever once in my career been in a situation where like, this person needs to slow down.
Philippe: Right.
Shubh: Until I met Kelly.
Philippe: Wow.
Shubh: But it wasn't like slow down because they're making like, they're not operating properly.
It was like, slow down 'cause I can't keep up.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: So that was the first time for me.
Philippe: Uh, my friend, uh, I've told you this before, but my friend Quinn Park, uh, told me that you, you were, I meant to put a little more sugar on your, on your donuts, uh, if you will, or rhubarb or, I'm not sure the, but, uh, told me you're the smartest person he's ever worked with.
I think you guys worked together at Benevity, right?
Kelly: Solely and Benevity.
Philippe: Oh, really? Okay.
Kelly: Yeah.
Philippe: But you would like be reviewing a 120 page slide deck that he had put together and you go to like slide 10 and you go, or slide 110 and go, why'd you change this number? Like, [00:12:00] I had that kind of memory. And he, he was, uh, very impressed.
And, uh. Um, said he would work with you any day.
Kelly: Wow. Thank you. Okay. Okay. I'm blushing. I'm blushing. You. You might be less impressed when you hear my business ideas. Okay.
Philippe: Too much sugar.
Kelly: Yeah, I,
Shubh: yeah. So Kelly, uh, do you have an idea you would like to pitch it?
Kelly: I have, for
Shubh: us today,
Kelly: I have a, a number of ideas to pitch today.
Shubh: Okay. Okay.
Kelly: One of them might even be good. I don't know.
Shubh: Okay.
Kelly: They're certainly not all good. Okay.
Philippe: Um, okay.
Kelly: Yeah, so
Shubh: we, we had some people stand up at our live show last week and pitch some ideas and, um, some of 'em were good.
Yeah.
Kelly: Got it.
Shubh: So I know where the bars, the live show, I guess is what I'm saying. Okay. Yeah. Go.
Kelly: Okay. So here's my first idea. I wear this aura ring.
Shubh: Okay. E
Kelly: every day, which gives me insights, like on my sleep, which is mostly why I bought it, but activity levels like general health, right. But here's something that'd be way more [00:13:00] valuable if this ring could do for me.
Okay. Okay. So I often find myself in situations where I'm at an event
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: Like Tech Thursday or a gala. Yeah. Or, or whatever.
Shubh: I don't get as, might do as many galas as Kelly does. I don't think.
Kelly: And, uh, you're not missing much. And, and someone comes up to me and says, Hey. And they know me
Shubh: right. Oh my
Kelly: gosh.
And I have no idea who they are.
Yes.
Kelly: No idea.
Philippe: Oh my God.
Kelly: So clearly I've met them before,
Philippe: right? Yeah.
Kelly: I've met them at an event. They were one of 800 people that worked at Benevity or Soum or whatever. And now I feel like an ass because they know who I am. They're allegedly excited to see me.
Yep.
Kelly: I have no f clue who they are.
Philippe: Yeah.
Kelly: Right. Yeah. Does this happen to you? And
Philippe: you have no idea? I'm now at a point where I'm scared to go in public. Like I've, I've, we've obviously been hosting Tech Thursday for the last three years every Thursday. Right.
Kelly: So everyone knows you.
Shubh: Yep.
Philippe: Right. Exactly. And, [00:14:00] and I also used to run a, a run club that went viral on TikTok 300 people every week.
So I feel like my brain is like a, a, a, a sponge that's fully sort of at capacity. And, uh, I'm like now scared to go in public. 'cause I always run into someone and I have no idea who they're, uh, so I've thought about this. I'm so excited for this pitch. Yeah.
Shubh: Uh, I mean, that doesn't happen to me as much as it happens to you two.
Uh, but I will say you're slightly less famous at the live show. So Darcy, our CEO at ZayZoon Yeah. Who I've worked for for a long time. One of my jobs, and we went to events was I'd be like, Hey, uh, especially like when it was BD events or like, I'd be like, Hey Darcy, you know, I'd kind of be like. He's, he's great with people bad with names.
Philippe: Oh, so you'd whisper to him.
Shubh: So when he walked into Tech Thursday, I was, I saw him in just old habits. I was like, Hey, just a heads up, there's a guy here. You met with him a year ago. He told me, you probably don't remember names. This guy, this is the, this is the startup. See?
Philippe: Boom.
Shubh: A little ai. I was like, his little AI sis.
So [00:15:00] I think for you guys, especially given your profiles, yes. 1000000%.
Philippe: Yeah. A uh, in Veep as well. I don't know if you watch the show, Veep. Uh, yeah. But they have, uh, her assistant, oh, it's like, whispers. This is this so and so, and so, so, yeah.
Kelly: Yeah. It's, it's like, you know what's coming because you keep talking about Whisper.
Shubh: What is it like, integrates with LinkedIn? How does
Kelly: it, well, let, let tell you. Okay. Okay. I'm ready. So this problem, it's a real problem. Okay? A real idea. We all, this is a problem for many people, right?
Shubh: A hundred percent.
Kelly: Now. For all of the fans out there who have similar age to me and are like perimenopausal, it's gotten way worse.
Okay. So, you know, ask Rita about this. Yes. The brain fog thing, like it's real. So a few weeks ago I'm walking into the winter club, some guys walking out. We immediately recognized each other and obviously we knew each other so well in the past. We both, we hugged. It wasn't like one of us awkwardly did it like
Philippe: Right.
Kelly: We saw each other. We hugged.
Philippe: Yep.
Kelly: I have no idea [00:16:00] still who it was. No idea. I don't know his name. I don't know how I know him. Yep. I don't know what the context is. So if like mystery guys, like a podcast listener, you know, please reach out on LinkedIn and set up that coffee we talked about. So here's the fix.
Shubh: Yep. I'm all in on this idea. Just for the record.
Kelly: A subtle, you know, attractive looking ring. It doesn't have to look like an ora ring. It could be, it could be stylish. That like just saves your ass the exact moment.
Shubh: Yep. Right.
Kelly: That you need it. Right. So someone recognizes you, you have no idea who they are.
You tap the ring and it quietly feeds you. That's Philip you met at Tech Thursday. He's 29 and keeps fake food in his fridge to impress the ladies. And you look like a hero.
Shubh: My god. Kelly is, she might her, her, her fourth CEO role is going to be CEO of our, of the, your businesses on the line. Fan club. That is unbelievable.
Kelly: Or, or, or maybe this rate, I, I don't know, right?
Shubh: We're
Kelly: talking, I've never been an entrepreneur. This could be my chance.
Shubh: This [00:17:00] is, you've never started something from scratch. This a big's the, uh, I was just thinking about all the practical applications. So yes, workwise, business wise, a hundred percent. School, you know, Kelly, you and I both have kids, kids at the school you run.
One of the parents, the parents, I don't know if you're like me, but I used to have notes that like, like, um, I keep
Kelly: them in my phone.
Shubh: Like,
Kelly: parents of this kid in class four A are named X. It's ridiculous.
Shubh: Rita's got like, the parents' names will be like, uh, uh, you know, Melissa. Chuck's mom or whatever, right?
So I'm always doing that and I'm always like, Hey, how you doing? How's it going? Hey, how you doing?
Kelly: Exactly
Shubh: right. Uh, so I love this idea. I think there's so many applications for it.
Kelly: So like how I think it works.
Yeah.
Kelly: Like the good thing about not having a product or engineering background is I'm not burdened by technical knowledge.
Hey. So I just assume this is all possible. The
Shubh: AI in the AI
Kelly: era,
Shubh: everything
Kelly: is, uh,
Philippe: there
Kelly: is no
Philippe: need. So, and, and trust me. Former pitches. Yeah. They also weren't burdened by capabilities.
Kelly: So I, I was trying to think [00:18:00] last night, like, how, how could this work? And I like, yeah, there could be like a tiny speaker you subtly have behind your ear or something.
Or maybe it's just like a small quiet speaker on the ring itself that you just sort of go like this and no one notices you're brushing your hand up. But it basically, the ring, it syncs with your contacts, your LinkedIn connections, your calendar, and it actually tracks and remembers all your past interactions.
Okay.
Philippe: Yeah. Yeah.
Kelly: And so, um, you just, you know, someone's in your proximity, they're coming up, you sort of tap and it's like, here you go. Boom.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: Okay. Can I, can I, um, uh, take your idea one iteration further
Kelly: please.
Philippe: So the, the, the one for the iteration was anytime someone, um. Or I see like a, um, ar or vi goggles.
Yes. VR goggles. I think the only practical application would be exactly who's in front
Kelly: of
Philippe: you. Who's in front of you. Yes. Like where did we meet when the last time it was? Yep. And those ray bands, the, the meta ray bands speak to you via, uh, vibrations on your jawbone or whatever and Perfect. So, [00:19:00] so like, it could go, Hey, you met this person, you connected on LinkedIn, March, 2024 at this event.
Yeah. And you talked about this thing last
Kelly: time. But like, you can't wear VR goggles or ray bands at a gala. Like, so that's why.
Philippe: Oh yeah.
Kelly: You know, you need
Philippe: Yeah,
Kelly: yeah.
Philippe: You need the
ring.
Kelly: I've got a name for it.
Philippe: Oh, with the name?
Kelly: Yeah. You, you kind of like gave it away earlier.
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: It's the name Whisper.
Shubh: Oh.
Kelly: And the marketing line, the pitch is like.
Because, hey, you is not a strategy. Hey, you, you're, Hey, you to the parents. Hey, how's it going?
Oh
Shubh: my God.
Kelly: Hey, so good to see you. How many times have we done that?
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: Oh, oh, hey, no fing idea where we
Shubh: are. Wow. How are you? How are things?
Kelly: Yeah.
Shubh: How's business,
Kelly: right?
Shubh: How's the, the family?
Kelly: Right? Right.
Shubh: This is a really, really good idea.
And yeah, when you said the, I was like, 'cause I was kind of thinking, oh, the RayBan idea or concept was awesome, but then I'm like, oh no, but you can't wear those all the time.
Kelly: Right. [00:20:00] I mean, if you take it a step further, like it could actually be a whole product line. Like women could have name whisper earrings, or men who wear my 10-year-old son has his ears pierced.
Like it could be in an earring. It doesn't have to be a ring. Like it just has to be somewhere
Shubh: like James
Kelly: Subtle, that's
Shubh: James Bond has all this shit, right? Like yeah,
Kelly: for sure, for sure. I, Daniel Craig probably already has this.
Philippe: Yeah,
Shubh: I, I know you said that the women of a certain age and perimenopausal. Yes.
And also I'm just getting old and I forget stuff totally as well. So like, that's legit. Um, uh, my brain is not, I never, I shouldn't say never, but I was always pretty good names with names, faces, names, and Yeah. There are times I've straight up, like,
Kelly: I'm actually really bad with names, so I always have been Oh, really?
Yeah. Bad with names.
Shubh: Straight up blanked, like completely blank to a person I've met, you know, multiple times.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: And also sometimes you meet people remotely. Sure. And then when you see them in person, it's different. It's, yeah. You can't associate their Nope.
Kelly: I agree.
Shubh: I love this idea. I [00:21:00]
Philippe: can, I can, can I, I love name whisperer.
I'm curious if, um. I can pitch an alternative name.
Kelly: Let's do it.
Philippe: I, I really love Es especially with wearables, Warby Parker, Frank and Oak.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Philippe: Uh, uh, uh, sort of name based things.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Philippe: Um, so, so what about the Veeps assistant? Uh, her name is Gary, or his name is Gary. Mm. What if this thing was called Gary?
Just Gary, like, Hey, Gary, who is this? And then Gary will be like, you. This, this. Okay.
Kelly: Or maybe you can name it, like, sort of like, you can customize what Siri sounds. Dar like Darcy or Alexa. Dar.
Philippe: Yeah. Yeah.
Kelly: Hey, sh, who's this?
Shubh: Wait. Would it always tell you like every time you walked up to some person
Kelly: you could, I mean, you could have different settings.
Like you could, it could be someone's in your proximity. It could be you just ask, you know?
Philippe: Yeah. Or, or maybe it could automatically recognize, like if you don't say their name within the first sentence, then it'll, right.
Kelly: Then it triggers
Philippe: if they're like, Hey. If, if they say, [00:22:00] Hey, uh, uh, Callie, great to see you.
And you say, Hey, great to see you too. And then that's kind of, you go for the hug, it's pss, it's this person. Yeah.
Shubh: So we go to Rita's Christmas party every year. She's worked at the same place for like 20 years, but I only see these people once a year. So of course, every time I go to the Christmas party I'm like, I don't, I don't know.
And I'm waiting for Rita to do the old, oh, Jill, you remember Shoub? Or vice versa. But then sometimes, 'cause she's, you know, she's, she's chit-chatting. She, she doesn't always get to it. So I'm like, so maybe there was like a couple's version too, where Sure. She could just tap her. Sure. I'd just be like, I'd be tapping my leg.
Kelly: Come on. Come on.
Shubh: That's right. What's this person's name? Yeah, I, I think, again, we said this before, these are like, this is a doable idea with the technology.
Kelly: Like I said, never been an entrepreneur. This podcast is my shot.
Philippe: Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.
Shubh: It's a doable idea. And it would be eminently useful.
It's almost like a AI recording assistant, but for. Real life interaction a [00:23:00] little bit and then gives me some feedback to just like, just so you don't, you know, one of the things I used to pride myself on is I would remember things about people or when we last talked Sure. And I would immediately hit that in the next conversation.
Philippe: Yeah.
Kelly: Yeah.
Shubh: And it's, it's starting to go a little.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Shubh: Probably 'cause I'm rusty
Philippe: been gone. For me,
Kelly: it's going a lot for me. Yeah. So Phil probably still can remember names. I mean, I'm the oldest person in this room, so
Philippe: Yeah. I'll meet, I'll meet people and they'll go, yeah, we've met six times. That's actually happened to me.
I'll be, uh, I'll just leave the conversation. I'll, and post
Shubh: you
Kelly: later
Shubh: both of your defenses. Like you're, you're at an event where there's 150 people there. They all see you up on stage. They know who you are. You're up like running a company where there's hundreds of employees. They all know who you are.
Uh, but some
Philippe: people still get offended.
Shubh: Well, wait. Also, like my wife is a dentist, doctors, dentists, they see hundreds and hundreds of people. Right? Everybody remembers the name of their doctor. Dentist, of course. Just guys, I don't want to ruin the surprise. The dentist or doctor does not remember all of [00:24:00] their patients.
Kelly: What?
Shubh: But, but then you about it. That's another target bucket. You bump into 'em at the, at the grocery store and they're like, Hey. And you're like, where do I know this person from?
Kelly: Right.
Shubh: I really am genuinely getting excited about this idea because I need now someone to make it.
Philippe: Yeah. Before we rate this idea, I'm, I'm always in the market for, um, greetings, uh, to, that doesn't indicate that I don't remember the person.
Okay. I like this. Yeah. So I've obviously done, uh, you know, I, I started transitioning to, Hey, great to see you. Yeah. Instead of guessing like, Hey, nice to meet you, or Great to see. I just default to Great to see you.
Kelly: Yeah.
Philippe: At Tech Thursdays, I've started doing, thanks for coming. Just broadly, because, you know, I can always thank everyone for coming.
Of course. They don't have to know. I don't remember their name.
Kelly: Yep.
Philippe: Um, so thanks for coming, but I'm curious if you have, if you, if there's one that you hit on,
Kelly: uh, your first one is kind of the strategy that I use. Okay. People say, Hey, blah, blah, blah, and I go, [00:25:00] good to see you.
Philippe: Good to see you. Yeah.
Kelly: Yeah.
That's mine. That's my go-to.
Philippe: Yeah. So
Shubh: the worst one is when you're like, nice to meet you, like what Craig did to you. Yeah. Remember Craig did that. You can really step in it. Hey, Philip, Philip, nice to meet you. And you were like, oh, we met.
Philippe: Yeah, we met. Yeah. Yeah. We've met, um, my, my, then I follow, if I say, Hey, great to see you, and I still don't remember who they are.
I say, remind me what you're working on again. And that's kind of my lead into mm-hmm. That hopefully remembering who the hell this person is.
Kelly: Right,
Shubh: right. Yeah. These are all good. I have straight up started to say, I'm sorry, I've forgotten your name.
Philippe: I like that.
Kelly: Hmm. Just admit it. Just own it.
Shubh: Yeah. Maybe that's the name, the product.
I, I'm okay. I'm sorry. I forgot
Kelly: your name. I'm okay with owning it, but wouldn't you rather just look brilliant?
Shubh: Well, yeah, I also, it does really depend on. I don't wanna, how to put this nicely, how much I care about this interaction afterwards. Mm, yeah. Right. Mm-hmm.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Shubh: Like if it's very transactional, I'm probably not gonna see them at any point again.
Yeah. The, the, Hey, how are you? It sounds [00:26:00] too generic,
Philippe: right?
Shubh: Welcome. You should start saying, how many, uh, tech Thursdays have you been to now?
Philippe: You'll be
Kelly: like, well, I said hi to you at the last six in a
Shubh: row. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because then if they say it's your first one, you go, wow. So happy to have you. But if they say it's your sixth one, and you'd be like, I know, I, you, you're one of our frequent guests.
Philippe: That's
Kelly: pretty good. Thanks for being such a supporter.
Philippe: Yeah. Thanks for being to support it. Yeah. That's awesome. The, the, here's, I'll let you in another trick, and I'm a bit scared to, to let it out that I do this. Yeah.
Shubh: Let's hear it.
Philippe: But if it is my first time meeting someone, I'll, I'll catch their name, obviously at the beginning of the conversation, I'll introduce myself and at the end of the conversation, sort of regardless, I'll say, um, remind me of your name again.
And then they'll say their name and they'll say, okay, great. It's Philip. And then I'll sort of walk away. You did
Shubh: that at the end of the conversation?
Philippe: At the end of the conversation. So, so I've heard their name twice.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Philippe: I'm still gonna forget it immediately. I
Kelly: mean, that happens to me too,
Philippe: but I'm
like,
Kelly: but you just told me five minutes ago.
Philippe: Right. But then I, I'm at [00:27:00] least they're leaving thinking, this guy's really trying to remember my name. Um,
Shubh: yeah. My buddy Jeff Rebel taught me the trick where you, when you meet somebody, you shake their hand and repeat their name back to them.
Kelly: Mm.
Shubh: And that's like, look them
Kelly: in the eye,
Shubh: say their name. That's like a pretty good trick.
Philippe: Yeah. Who's Carnegie?
Shubh: Oh, is it? Is that a Dale
Kelly: Carnegie
Philippe: thing? I think that's a Dale Carnegie thing. Yeah. Say someone's name as many times. Yeah. How to win friends.
Shubh: How do you, uh, just on the other end of the spectrum, how do you guys get out of a conversation? Because I've got, oh, that's
Kelly: way harder.
Shubh: I've got a
little,
Kelly: I feel like there needs to be a product idea for that.
Shubh: I've got a little trick. Is I teach You want me to teach you the trick? Yeah, let's hear it. It's gonna be bad. 'cause now I have a
great
Philippe: track too.
Shubh: Now everybody knows that, uh, I'll be doing this trick on them. So when I'm done talking to somebody, whether they're done or not, and it's almost invariably professionally, right?
Very rarely personally.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Shubh: Um, I'll just, uh, I'll sort of turn my body a little so I'm already kind of half turned away from them, and I'll put my hand on their shoulder and say, Hey Phil, it was really great seeing you, [00:28:00] and then because I'm already turned, I'm out. Right. I'm already departing the conversation, but because I've, I've placed my hand on your shoulder because I've said your name and placed eye contact, you don't feel like I'm just bailing on the conversation.
At least I don't think you do.
Kelly: Even if you're, it was just one-on-one and the person's left standing there alone.
Shubh: That's right.
Kelly: Hmm.
Shubh: Wow. Kelly. As I've gotten older, I have no tolerance for. Uninteresting conversations.
Kelly: That's fair.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: Yeah. To the, yeah. Yeah. So that's a little trick to get out. What's your trick, Phil, to get out?
Philippe: Yeah. Again, I don't know if I should be disclosing it, but
Shubh: Yeah. No, I know him,
Philippe: but it's, it's,
Shubh: Kelly's the only one that listens this podcast, and she, and she's safe and she's here.
Philippe: It's, it's foolproof.
Shubh: Okay.
Philippe: Um, it's, uh, okay. This only applies to you.
Shubh: Just say, I have diarrhea and runaway. Yeah.
Philippe: That, I'm so sorry.
I'm about to cut my pants. No, uh, I [00:29:00] go, um, this only applies to networking events. Um, but when I'm done with the conversation, I'll go, are we connected on LinkedIn? And they'll go either yes or no. I'll go, okay, we should definitely connect and send me a note. It's only like 10% of them actually send me a note.
And then oftentimes they don't follow up after that. So pretty good. Or, or I'll say, Hey, yeah, thanks for coming. And then there's no ask, so I'll just go, oh, we should connect on LinkedIn. We connect. I walk away and, and that's it. So that's how I've decided to end conversations.
Shubh: Kelly, how do you do it? 'cause so many of your interactions must be with people who work at the place that you
Kelly: Yeah, I feel like I'm less, no, I mean I feel like this is mostly applicable, like at networking events, like you said.
Yeah, that's, and I, I think I need to, you know, I think my strategy is actually less good than the two of you. I actually did this at an event last night. Yeah. My out is like, Hey, great to see you. I'm gonna go grab a drink. Like I'm, there's nothing in my hands, like the bars over there.
Shubh: But you know what, the problem with that is.
Philippe: Then they offer to buy you a drink
Shubh: or they go, oh yeah, me too. I'll come with you. That's why. Yeah. I used to have reasons that I departed the conversation and then I straight up [00:30:00] just 'cause like,
Kelly: yeah. I think on last night I also used like, oh hey, I'm just gonna go say hi to X.
Shubh: Yeah. That one's XA good one.
That
Kelly: one's a
Shubh: good one. That one's a good one.
Kelly: Yeah. But it's difficult.
Philippe: I do. I sometimes I'll go, Hey, I just gotta go work the room.
Shubh: That's also a good
Philippe: one. I'll catch you later. Well, hey, I'm just gonna go smoke a cigarette.
Kelly: Yeah. I've never used that one. Never. That would really turn them off. They'd be happy to exit the conversation.
Probably.
Philippe: I
Shubh: gotta go and get a drink alone.
Philippe: That would be
Shubh: another good one.
Philippe: That's right. Hey, I need to go, uh uh, look at TikTok in the bathroom for 30 minutes.
Shubh: I'm gonna go to the corner, pretend to be on my phone for work, but I'm just gonna be scrolling Instagram. That's good. Yeah. What if, actually that would be a neat thing is like what if, uh.
Uh, YY Gary or uh, uh, the name whisperer.
Philippe: Name whisperer.
Shubh: What if it also just translated when someone was, was getting outta the conversation, what they were actually [00:31:00] based on? Their tone of voice. Ooh, Chubb's just straight up bored.
Kelly: Right.
Shubh: But that's actually, Bri tells me it's score. Rita tells me it's very obvious when I'm bored in a conversation.
Oh, really? So maybe I don't need that. Okay. Kelly, that's a We gotta score this one.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: Philip,
Philippe: I'm super excited about this idea. This is, this is actively one of the best pitches we, we've heard. Wow.
Shubh: Yep.
Philippe: Um, it, it is so applicable to my life. In fact, I've been like, anytime someone pitches me. Uh, that they wanna do something on ar in ar I go, well, you should build, I, I, I say the glasses idea, like that's the only, uh, real world application I can think of for ar.
Um, and so, no, no wonder Meta has pulled outta that space. They should have just been building this. Yeah. Um, but I I, this is to me, uh, a 75.
Kelly: Whoa. Yeah.
Philippe: Whoa. She's a perfect score. A perfect score.
Shubh: I also really love this idea, uh, to the point where, uh, uh, it's just coming back to me now, but there was a similar idea years before technology would [00:32:00] allow for it.
That I, that I thought of. I was like, oh, what if you could the glasses, you know, it was like a, again, a James Bond thing. The glasses would tell, tell me who I was talking to. And I think we, we like banded out a name. It was like called What's his face? Hey, that's
Kelly: not bad.
Shubh: It's pretty good too. Yeah. Um, what's
Kelly: his face?
Shubh: But I love this idea. Uh, I will hedge slightly. 'cause you said you had more than one idea, so I don't like Are you're gonna do that? I don't, I don't like to give out my. I'm gonna go like,
Kelly: I think this was my best idea.
Shubh: I'm gonna, I'm gonna go
Kelly: Don't hold back.
Shubh: Don't hold back. I, I really like it. I really like it.
I'm gonna go 70. Two.
Kelly: Woo.
Shubh: Wow. Awesome. 72, 75. Pretty, pretty. How does he feel? How weight off
Philippe: your shoulder?
Shubh: Wow. Now
Kelly: this is the highlight of my date for
Shubh: sure. This is how LeBron, right after LeBron won his, which is all basketball reference, uh, after LeBron won his first title, he just became free. Right. He could just do whatever he wanted.
Philippe: Yeah. This is your Miami and oh eight
Shubh: moment. Yeah. Yep.
Kelly: Amazing. By the way, I have a suggestion on your, on your scoring system. [00:33:00]
Shubh: I would
Kelly: love to hear it. So in, in a number of episodes, Chubb, you give two scores. Yeah. Like one for the idea, one for like the go to market. Yeah.
Shubh: Yep.
Kelly: Um, and I, after hearing Joe Fair's pitch, yeah.
I actually think you need a third category for humor.
Shubh: Right.
Kelly: And you know, like, don't score it out of a hundred. 'cause that would be too logical. Like 75 sauces is totally logical scoring system. It could be like 25 for the idea. 25 for the GGM opportunity. 25 for how funny, it's,
Shubh: I love this idea when someone,
Kelly: and then Joe wouldn't have been a zero, you couldn't have rated him as zero.
Shubh: When someone comes in and pitches a really, a serious, boring idea. Hard. Zero on that one.
Kelly: Zero on this category.
Shubh: Yeah, I like that.
Kelly: Could be a real business, but
Shubh: yeah.
Hold on. I'm just gonna pause so we can take that part out. Yeah. Nope. Everybody stop saying I'm gonna bleep. It's gonna be like, bleep bleep.
Philippe: I knew
Shubh: you
Philippe: take that one out. I knew you that.[00:34:00]
I have a feeling it's still gonna end up in the episode.
Shubh: It's definitely not. That's a relationship. I don't want a submarine. Plenty other ones, I wouldn't.
Oh, man.
Philippe: Uh, okay. Uh, hit us with your next one.
Kelly: All right. Yeah. Let's, okay, so here's my other idea. Um, I fear though, after that one, I, I didn't say I didn't save the best for last. The best, the best went first, but here's my other idea. Okay.
Philippe: Podcast listeners drop off significantly,
Kelly: so, so it's good to know.
It's good to know they only last the first half hour.
Shubh: Yeah. Once we come back and say, I just cut that part out, they'll be like,
Kelly: what? So, so, so all of these ideas, weirdly, in some way tie back to to Tech Thursday. So just, you know, shout out again. Okay. Right. So. As you both know, I, I joined a Tech Thursday panel, um, a couple of months ago.
Yep. And I went on a bit of a rant about how the SaaS business model is dead. Yep. And no one wants per user, per month pricing. Yep. They wanna pay for what they use or for the outcomes they get. [00:35:00] And I've actually come around on that a bit.
Philippe: Oh, okay.
Kelly: I think for the right business, subscription based services are very much alive.
So that's kind of the tee up to this. Okay. Now think about this global. Problem. Like an epidemic. It's loneliness.
Philippe: Yes. Yeah.
Kelly: Okay, Philip. So, not that I've done, you know, admittedly, I didn't do deep research on this. No, no. I'm, but I'm guessing this is a multi hundred billion, this is maybe a trillion dollar problem globally when you think about the mental health implications.
Lost productivity.
Shubh: I literally just read an article that like had some data in it that was like, this generation is the loneliest generation.
Kelly: See, there you go. I didn't even read that article. But like, if you just look at social media and device, how devices is taken over life, and now AI people just talk to their ai, like AI is your, but, so I think the loneliness thing, it's, it's actually continuing to, to grow, right?[00:36:00]
Yeah. Mm-hmm. So what helps with loneliness?
Philippe: Friends.
Kelly: Sure. Friends. Real human interaction. Yep. Like we're having in this room, right? Yes. So when we were kids, making friends was super easy. Here's what my 10-year-old son does. Every time we're on vacation, we hit up whatever swimming pool. Yep. And he goes up to a kid and says, do you wanna play?
Shubh: Totally. Yeah.
Kelly: And as a parent, you go, oh my God, please say yes, please say yes. Please say yes. Yeah,
Shubh: yeah, yeah.
Kelly: They always do.
Shubh: Yep.
Kelly: And we've actually met people from around the world that we keep in touch with because of our son.
Shubh: Yeah. The kids
Kelly: do.
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: And so, and like we go on vacation with people that we've met because my son did this in publication.
Shubh: Holy cow.
Kelly: So when your kids, it's like super easy.
Shubh: Yeah. It's also helpful for you 'cause your kids actually remember their names.
Kelly: Yes. Thank, thank God for that. They don't need the
Shubh: Yeah, yeah.
Kelly: Name whisper or Gary
Shubh: Mom.
Kelly: But like as an adult, once you're through university and you, you know, like you, you have that built in friends in your dorm or, or whatever.
Actually making friends is kind of hard. Oh my God. [00:37:00] Because. People are busy.
Shubh: Yeah,
Kelly: everyone's tired. We have jobs. Try to schedule the three of us at a time that works for everyone. You've got kids activities that take over your life, like whatever it is, it's hard. Um, so I was thinking we've successfully, as a society turned everything else into a subscription.
Entertainment, like groceries, meditation, like whatever.
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: But friendship is still running on the same old manual system. It's actually your example. Awkwardly say hi to another parent at the kids' school concert
Shubh: and then you hope they're cool.
Kelly: Yeah. Maybe you'll see them again in a few months. Maybe you'll like them.
Yeah. Maybe they'll invite you for coffee. Like, yeah. What the, like this is too, this is too much work. Yeah. Like, I'm not it,
Philippe: uh, so wait, wait. What's the pitch though? So, so how would you pay for your friends?
Kelly: So instead of awkwardly, you know, being the one to like [00:38:00] text, do you wanna hang out?
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: You just subscribe to them.
So it's, it's just totally predictable.
Shubh: So you're taking like a social media friend request, but instead of connecting online, you're friending, actually friending.
Kelly: Yeah. So it's, it's friendship. It's friendship as a service. So a platform where you's such a genius
Shubh: idea.
Kelly: You subscribe to friendships the same way you subscribe to Netflix.
So you like choose the type of friend and the type of plan you want. Okay, so here's what some of the plans could be. Yeah. So if you start with like your basic plan, maybe this is like 9 99 a month, I don't know. That gets you like a brunch with this person every quarter.
Philippe: And do they get a cut?
Kelly: Um, yeah, let me get to that in a second.
This is a multi-sided marketplace. This is a, you know, you get a brunch, they'll send you a text on your birthday. By the way, some of my best friends didn't send me a text on my birthday two weeks ago. Like, ites me, if you all know who you are,
Shubh: you both,
Kelly: I'm mad.
Shubh: Give us some names. Philip literally told me it was his birthday the next day and I didn't [00:39:00] text him.
I forgot. So,
Kelly: exactly.
Yeah.
Kelly: Um,
Shubh: sorry Phil.
Kelly: So, so that could be like a base, like a base level plan. Okay. And then from there, to be honest, like the sky is the limit. Okay. So the next plan could be like, you get a monthly hangout. So it's like someone to go on that hike. You wanna do in Canas us, but you don't wanna have to find people and arrange it or someone, you know, to go to our lady piece at the coke stage during Stampede.
If, by the way, if anyone wants to go to that, I'm totally in.
Shubh: Phil says Phil ever told you he knows Rain Maita.
Philippe: Yeah, he's, he would connect with you. He's a tech guy. He's building a tech company out of LA Yeah, he's
Kelly: amazing.
Philippe: Let's
Shubh: amazing. So, uh, we
Philippe: should, we should get him on the pond when he's in town.
Shubh: Tech Thursday should do an event at Stampede for our Lady Peace.
Kelly: I'm in, I'm in
Shubh: panel. He's
Kelly: gonna be here.
Yeah.
Shubh: Yeah. She's gonna be here. Says he. She'll join a panel with Rain Ma from our lady piece. You heard it here first? It's booked. It's booked. We just booked it.
Kelly: Perfect. I love this.
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: Okay. Here's the next tier.
Shubh: Yep.
Kelly: They pick you up at the airport. [00:40:00]
Shubh: Oh yeah. That's a big tier
Kelly: or, okay, let me ask you this.
Philippe: Oh, that's an expensive tier.
Kelly: Let me ask you this. How do you know when someone is really a good friend?
Shubh: Oh yeah. The airport there. The airport pick.
Kelly: There's one other thing. The airport is one.
Shubh: It's like, can I can,
oh,
Philippe: I know exactly what it is.
Shubh: Text them to help you move.
Kelly: They help
Shubh: you
Kelly: move,
Shubh: help you move furniture.
They
Kelly: help you move
Shubh: anything that needs anything heavy.
Kelly: Okay.
Shubh: Yep.
Kelly: So that's like the premium plan, like Yep. Because like a real friend helps you move, right?
Philippe: Yeah,
Shubh: that's right.
Kelly: Um. But I think there's a package above that and he guesses what that is.
Shubh: Ooh. Uh,
Philippe: my brother, by the way, is, is currently going through a move and is losing friends.
He's like asking people to help and they're kinda like, well, I can't. And he's like, he, he's going. Now. I know where we stand. Yeah. I think it's a
Shubh: good litmus as now, what is the tier above
Kelly: helping you move
Shubh: airports and moves?
Kelly: This is where my whole reputation I've built over 20 years goes right out the window.
Philippe: Okay. [00:41:00] I'm scared to say it. What do you think it is? I think I might have one. Well, you go first. Well, it's like, like therapy friends. Like friends, you can,
Kelly: oh, I love this idea. But that wasn't it. But I love that that should be in a package. It's not
Philippe: friends with benefits, is it?
Kelly: It's friends with benefits,
Philippe: low key prostitution.
Shubh: I, no. Oh yeah. Wait, hold on a sec. Yeah, we're gonna have to maybe, maybe walk that back a little.
Philippe: It depends. I kind of like, I'm curious is, is there relationship asymmetry? Like, are, are both people paying each other? Yes. This is $9 an hour. This is
Shubh: gonna be
Philippe: my question too. If I'm texting you on, like, is it only one sided or do am I also paying for you to text me on my birthday?
And am I ever, do I walk away from a coffee being like, I want to decrease my subscriptions. Like, I wanna only pay $5 for this guy. Like, is that how that works?
Kelly: It's actually a great question. So I I, I would say, I think now that you've raised that, it could be both. I was originally thinking it was one way.
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah.
Kelly: And so I was thinking of it kind of like a multi-sided marketplace. Like people who [00:42:00] will need a side gig or make out extra cash can be the ones that offer themselves up as friends to go on hikes and do all these things. And like busy people like me that just want like predictability and just like to know what I'm getting with subscribe.
But I think you're right. It could, it could go both ways.
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah. So I'm just going to like, I like this idea a lot. Um, this is gonna come off maybe a little. Uh, arrogant, but I think I'm an excellent friend. Okay. Like, I call my friends. I think I'm pretty entertaining to hang out with. Uh, I volunteer to help with stuff.
I'm always like a, he, uh, with pretty good with advice or I always just do stuff for people, right? Um, I think I could make a lot of money. You should
Kelly: charge them.
Philippe: Yeah. Yeah. You should charge
Shubh: them. I think all my friends are gonna start getting an invoice.
Philippe: Yeah. I, uh, um, a
Shubh: monthly invoice.
Philippe: Yeah. I, I don't want to toot my own horn as well, but do you guys, do you guys ever play that game salad bowl?
It's,
Shubh: no.
Philippe: Usually like it's at the end of a night. It's
Shubh: like a swingers game. No,
Philippe: no.
Kelly: Throw your [00:43:00] keys. Everybody
Philippe: puts
Shubh: their
Philippe: keys in a
Shubh: solid
Philippe: bowl. That one. That's right. Hello? Uh, dude, it, it's like it takes place at the end of the night or at the end of like, usually on a Sunday if you're hanging out for the whole weekend.
But you, you know, get a bunch of like, scraps of paper. Everyone writes three or four sort of things. You know, people, places names, but often like contextual to what happened over the night or the weekend. And then you, then you throw it all into a salad bowl. You use those clues to do, like, first round is catchphrase, so anything but what's written on it.
Second one, you, everything goes back in the bowl and it's charades. And then last one is, uh, one word. Okay.
Shubh: No, I've never
Philippe: even heard of anything. It's, it's so much fun. You should play call, do the, but I kid you not, I was at a dinner party on Saturday and we played it and out of say 30 15 were directly related to stories or, or like things that I had done throughout the evening.
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: In a po I didn't know in a positive or negative sense, but certainly memorable. Memorable. So I think those friends [00:44:00] should definitely pay me. You know,
Kelly: all publicity is good publicity.
Shubh: That's right. I think, uh, yeah, I think this loneliness, lack of connection thing and like people needing friendship is a hundred percent real.
Yeah. I think that, um, you know, the other area where there's like a, a B2B application for this. Yeah.
Kelly: I was gonna, it
Shubh: is like, you know how all these people you're connected to on LinkedIn, but then when you actually like, do the calculus of like, how many of them, you know, well enough to, to sort of send a message to, to ask a question of or whatever.
I would like, uh, what if we could like, you know. Make those connections more real too.
Kelly: For sure. I mean, there's definitely applicability in the workplace, right? Corporate friendships, so
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah.
Kelly: You could, you know, you could have like a work best friend, you know? Yeah. Someone to have lunch with who agrees with your dumb ideas in meetings, like laughs at your jokes, whatever,
Philippe: decides to do a podcast,
Kelly: whatever the things are.
Yeah.
Philippe: Um, do you have a name for this? Yeah, I have a perfect name, I think.
Kelly: Okay. I, I, I've, I've struggled a little bit with the naming, so [00:45:00] I, I, I all, I've, all I've been able to come up with is Friender. Okay.
Philippe: She's the one that I have for you. I really like Friender. Actually. Friender get it like, reminds me Napster.
It's Tinder, but for friends.
Kelly: Yeah, exactly.
Shubh: Yeah. But somebody's paying. Yeah. Uh, we even worry about the payment model. Yeah. There might be a challenge.
Kelly: Put the commercial models.
Philippe: Yeah. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. My suggestion is that on only Friends,
Shubh: that's pretty good. That's, uh, that's very good.
Kelly: Yeah, because I mean, obviously like I was looking at, okay, so who else is already doing this? Right, right. Because like, is this really a dating app? Is this
Shubh: Yeah, there's like Bumble and other
Kelly: things like that. Yeah. And apparently like there is a Bumble friend version actually.
Yeah. I, I learned as I was researching this idea, but it's not this, right. Yeah. Like it's, it's literally meant to match you and then you go off and be friends. Yeah. It's not like I'm gonna subscribe and I know what I'm getting.
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah.
Kelly: For that. And it's predictable and I, you know, and like this is like, you know, but [00:46:00] it could very much work similar to a dating site in terms of a matching
Shubh: Yep.
Kelly: Algorithm. Like it could be based on hobbies, it could be like level of cynicism, preferred pizza topics, whatever you want it to. Like. It could be, it could be anything like,
Philippe: well, someone was just telling me that in Japan you can rent an old man.
Kelly: Ooh. Like rent a grandparent.
Philippe: Yeah. Rent a grandpa and he'll just like walk in the park with you.
Like,
Shubh: hey,
Kelly: wow. Wow. How old do you have to be? You're getting close.
Philippe: You're
Kelly: getting close.
Philippe: If that was available, I would just always have an old man with me. Who's that? That's my old man with, so yeah, there's a huge mic there. Yeah.
Shubh: It's like, I love the city of like, yeah, like the, the tuning your subscription.
Like I went to, um. Two, uh, two years ago I went to, I've, I've done it twice, two years in a row. But like, I went to go see the Oilers in the Stanley Cup final. And, um, it was very expensive. All my friends who were Oilers fans were, uh, occupied or not willing to spend the money. [00:47:00] So what I needed was, uh, boom, someone who was very passionate about the orders and also had a little walking around money.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Shubh: It's a hard question to ask it just like your regular pet, do you wanna pay
Kelly: three grand for a ticket to
Shubh: join me with the game? Yeah. Be like, Hey, or hey, I don't, I know we don't talk about money, but, uh, you're, you have enough money to go to this hockey game, you know? Yeah, yeah. If I could just type that in and somebody was like, Hey man, I'm in.
I think that's pretty good.
Kelly: Totally. And I do like the name only friends.
Shubh: Only Friends is really good. Yeah. That would probably carve out the friends with benefits part.
Philippe: Yeah, we don't need to play in that space.
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah. I think we could just, no,
Kelly: I mean that's an option, that's just
Philippe: a
Kelly: premium.
Philippe: Right.
Shubh: Although I think, you know, that might just be an escort service. Yeah. I think that Phil's a really point. I really like this concept though. Like people moved in new cities, it's very hard to meet. It's funny when you were saying, you know how kids can just walk up to somebody and meet them. The only adult I know who can do that is Joe.
Philippe: Is there, is there, have you guys ever seen the movie? Uh. Pretty woman.
Kelly: Oh, yeah,
Philippe: yeah, yeah.
Shubh: I like that You hesitated.
Philippe: Great movie. [00:48:00] Yeah, right. Great. I just watched it a couple weeks ago for the first time. But you know how she, you know, she to, to insinuate that they're more than, uh, the relationship would, you know, she doesn't take the money that's left on the bedside table,
Kelly: right?
Philippe: Uh, she just walks out as if to say like, you're not paying me. Oh, I see where you're going with this. Is there a point in this relationship? Ooh. Where, where all of a sudden you, ooh,
Kelly: like, what's the exit? It's back to our, what's the exit?
Philippe: Right? What's the, there Like, aren't we such good friends that you're not gonna take my money to your friends?
Like, does it ever get to that point? Or Ooh. Or once you sign up, it's kind of like, I'm just,
Shubh: that's good. That's like a,
Kelly: oh, that's a great question.
Shubh: What's that? Paul Rudd movie where he doesn't have any friends? Is it? I Love You man. He doesn't have any friends. And then he becomes friends with Jason Siegel, who like then immediately becomes the best man at his wedding.
'cause his wife is like, you don't have any friends. They're getting married. She's like, here's, here's gonna be my whole, and he has no friends. I'm pretty sure it's, I love you man. And uh, then they. He finds he makes a friend as an adult. 'cause he has to, he, he has no one in his wedding party. [00:49:00] Uh, yeah. I think this is great.
And I love the idea. At some point the subscriber just says, Hey Phil, I'm no longer taking payment because this friendship is now real.
Philippe: It's real. It's real.
Shubh: And what better revenue model,
Kelly: but maybe you have to pay only friends like a lump sum fee for that at the end. Like, it's like,
Shubh: oh, right.
Kelly: You know, it's like, think about,
Shubh: oh, like it's almost like a search firm sort of,
Kelly: yeah,
Shubh: it's like a recruiting firm, but for friends.
Kelly: And then if you, you hire the person,
Shubh: oh, guys, wait,
Kelly: you decide This is a long-term friendship. There's like a,
Shubh: I like the commercial model where Yeah, need to break the subscription. Only friends takes all the money. So then the friendship is maybe real from the get go, but it only converts when it's a full-time friendship
Philippe: and they get a payout.
Shubh: No, the friends, I don't, and well, maybe the friends get a nice dinner on us.
Philippe: That's fun.
Shubh: Yeah. A couple champagne once a quarter. I really like this idea. This is like, um, I think people don't know how to make [00:50:00] friends anymore. I think it's harder to make friends.
Philippe: It is so hard to make friends, actually.
Genuinely.
Kelly: Yeah. I lived with my family last year in Spain and so we showed up really knowing no one.
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: And that was the first time in a very long time. Yeah. It was like, had to flex the muscle of making new friends.
Shubh: How did you make 'em,
Kelly: um, par parents at the kids' school
Shubh: threw your kids in a pool, right?
Yeah.
Kelly: Yeah, yeah.
Shubh: Yeah. Huh. Yeah. Well that is, there's these phases in life. We, I think we actually talked about this 'cause I talked about this idea that I sort of had, which was like a bit of bumble for families where you try to get matched with families in the neighborhood. Yep. The parents are cool and the kids are cool.
Mm-hmm. But like, um, you know, you make friends when you're a kid. Two of my best friends still from first grade. Uh, then you make friends maybe in college or university. Then you make friends at work maybe. Mm-hmm. But earlier in your career, later in your career, you, you, you're friendly with people at work, but you don't, like, you're not going out and hanging out out No.
You're going stuff,
Kelly: you're, you're rushing to your kids' soccer game, Notre going for bears,
Shubh: and then you like, and then [00:51:00] there's this phase where you make friends with parents. You've met via your kids. That's right. Some of our closest friends now, literally the intro was via the kids. But there's that interven like that, that period between university and when your kids are old enough to make friends, that's really hard to make friends.
Mm-hmm. I don't know how people do it.
Philippe: Yeah. And, and when you move, so I, I've also always thought moving to, to a new city, such a powerful, um, self-development. Uh, because you have to flex that muscle. That's right. You have to, but you also learn every time you move to a new city, like I'm from Winnipeg, went to school in Montreal, moved to Calgary, uh, every time.
I think I've sort of understood that it takes about four years to, to fully find a friend group, right? Mm-hmm. Where, um, you first year you meet a couple people, you're kind of, you're mostly lonely. I'll say like year two, you have a bit of a friend group. They're not really your people though. Mm-hmm. And then year three, you kind of meet your people.
You're like, Hey, these are the cool people that we, we are like friendly, [00:52:00] whatever. And then year four is just like, yeah, you know, you're self-actualized maybe, but, um, but consistently, uh, but, but then once you hit year four, like I'm kind, I'm now in year five of living in Calgary. It's what opportunities are there?
It is kind of awkward to make a new friend, like Yeah, I, the friend group, especially because you never
Shubh: remember who anyone's name is.
Kelly: Right. But if you had only friends and the name whisper,
Shubh: oh my
Philippe: God. If
Shubh: you put these two things together.
Philippe: Um, and just to add again, a little bit more, uh, sugar to your rhubarb, uh, trying to make that expression stick.
Yeah, I think it's, it's gonna catch on there. There are more, there's more, uh, to, to add to like how much of an epidemic this is during heat waves. Um, there are gr like in cities like Chicago, during a heat wave, uh, uh, death among elderly men in spikes in particular because of how lonely They're
Kelly: Right.
'cause they can't go out 'cause it's too hot.
Philippe: Yeah. It's too hot. They, if they don't have ac in their place and they don't know someone nowhere to go ac Right. They have no, I nowhere to go. And, [00:53:00] um, it spikes like, like so you would actually be saving lives.
Kelly: There you go. We went from low key prostitution to saving lives.
Philippe: I
Shubh: mean, that's a journey we like to go on. Almost every episode the film starts talking. I
Kelly: love how you help legitimize this idea.
Shubh: Yeah,
Philippe: yeah. There you go. That's what we're here for. You know?
Shubh: Yeah. I, 'cause I always judge like, you know, friendship. Like really, really good friends. Um, like good, good friends.
You have to make plans with really good friends. You can text them on a Thursday, even at this age, text 'em on Thursday and be like, Hey, what are you guys doing tomorrow, Saturday, tonight? Right. It is incredibly hard, uh, to create a new to Phil's point, a new group of people that you can have that type of relationship with, where you're like, 'cause you know, Kelly, with the kids and working and everything, you're planning months ahead sometimes mm-hmm.
To see people. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. When really you have these windows sometimes where you're like, hell, I, you know, come over and hang out. I'm free tonight.
Kelly: Yeah,
Philippe: yeah, yeah. So,
Shubh: [00:54:00] so those kinds of friends. Whew.
Philippe: I'm in, I'm in a new, so, so, like I said, I'm, I'm kind of year four, five. I have a pretty established friend group, but.
Literally all of my friends in the last 12 months are now in relationships. Ah. And that
Kelly: here's another problem.
Philippe: And so I'm kind of like the only single one right in my friend group. Um, which, which actually makes it so much harder to do what you're talking about. Right. Which is just like text them. 'cause almost all of them, I only get like one day on the weekend to hang out with them where it's like boys night we're doing something or whatever.
The other night is always reserved for a date. Right, right. And then everyone's so busy on the weekdays. So now I'm at a point where I'm like, fuck, I think I need to find a new friend group. But I don't know how to make, because like all my friends are in relationships.
Shubh: It feels friends. I'm speaking to you right now.
Philippe: They don't listen.
Shubh: You know, maybe, uh, maybe a little text on a Saturday. Hey, Philip, why don't you come by for a barbecue?
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: You know?
Philippe: Yeah, we do. We had a seafood boil at my place, you know, a couple weekends [00:55:00] ago. There's plenty of things like that, but it's like, yeah, I get one and I gotta go. I guess that's my social engagement.
That's it.
Kelly: Yeah. For the weekend.
Philippe: Yeah.
Kelly: Now I'm on my own
Shubh: lonely. When I was in my twenties with my buddies, we'd start hanging out Friday after work and we'd hang out until Sunday night. That was, that was our weekend, right? Yeah. We didn't even have plans. We would just, that would be our, Rita was away at school.
We would just, we'd meet up at a patio on a Friday. I pretty much hang out till Sunday. So yeah. Phil's friends.
Philippe: I think I just need a girlfriend.
Shubh: Yeah, that, I mean, that would probably do it, to be honest.
Kelly: There are other already apps for that.
Shubh: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You got it. Well, you never, yeah. Based on how Kelly talked about how these things could escalate, maybe this app,
Kelly: you never know.
You never know.
Philippe: It's kind of like more where I'm at. It's like, yeah, maybe. Maybe just a friend. That friend. I get you. Perfect. Um, no. Um, what do you rate this thing?
Shubh: I really like this idea. I like the first idea a little bit better. [00:56:00] Only because it's like, I could see that being a product tomorrow. Yesterday.
Like for real? Like in actuality? Yeah. Like
why
Kelly: hasn't someone already made it?
Shubh: I don't know why anyone has not made that. Um. And le sorry, not to leave the first one, like the price point that you could charge for the first one again. 'cause you're targeting like, you know, this reminds me of Blackberry, you know, when Blackberry was launching and they, they, they dropped, um, blackberries to all the CEOs of all Yep.
These Fortune, uh, 100 companies. And then everybody saw the CEO had a Blackberry and then that was their, basically their acquisition model. This is like with the, with the, um, the name Whisperer. You could just do that. Like you target the most important people.
Kelly: Absolutely. And the subscription price per month could be egregious because it's so valuable,
Shubh: so expensive.
Yeah. Because people at that, again, it's generally people who are, have a high profile and are successful who everybody knows them and they don't remember those people. That's right. So I think that one has incredible go to market. The [00:57:00] Friends one I think is just something that needs to happen. I'm not sure how we'll make money off it without going to jail.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: Uh, but I love the concept. I'm a big, like, community. Getting people physically together is like a, a, a massive thing for me. I think not only has this generation grown up a little bit isolated, but then you had COVID, which like further isolated people. Yep. That they haven't, I even don't think everybody's snapped all the way back.
Right. In terms of like, oh yeah, you can go out all the time instead of just sitting at home and watching tv.
Kelly: Mm-hmm.
Shubh: Um, and that's no disrespect on tv. I love sitting at home, watching tv. Um, but, uh, this one's a great idea. I'm gonna give it 63 sauces, uh, would've been 55, but I like Phil's name port so much that I bumped it up.
Kelly: Only friends.
Philippe: Only friends.
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: I, so, um. In its current form, I'm happy to rate it, but I, I actually just thought about what if this was, um, sort of subscription [00:58:00] based, uh, group chats. So if you came to us, ah, it was like $20 a month and you said like, I wanna, um, a group chat for folks my age who kind of like these things and then maybe like,
Shubh: like the Jets?
Philippe: Yeah,
Shubh: the Winnipeg Jets.
Philippe: Yeah. Who like the Winnipeg Jets or something. Or, or the Calgary Flames or, and then we would put you into like three different group chats of like different folks and, and in those different group chats. Like one would be for hiking, one would be for
actually
Philippe: like
Kelly: concerts. So this is, this is actually how people connected when we lived in Barcelona.
Really? Yeah. So, so everyone in Europe uses WhatsApp, right? Yeah. Like exclusively. And that was it. It was like, meet a parent at the school and they, they give you a list, like, here's the group chat for everything. So there's one for your kids' class, but there's one for hiking or there's one for people who wanna see live music.
So all of a sudden I was in all these group chats, like it kind of. Became overwhelming, but I think your idea is solid. Right? Right. Where it's like curating
Shubh: Oh my God. Yeah.
Kelly: People with similar interests. So it's like maybe I don't just wanna subscribe to one friend to do four different things.
Shubh: Yeah, yeah.
Kelly: [00:59:00] But I wanna be part of like, could this hiking group, this guys, and how do I do that? How do I know
Shubh: how to join guys? Be an hour lady piece, group chat. Yeah,
Kelly: totally. Right.
Philippe: And, and uh, and, and then it removes the awkwardness of, well, one of these people is getting paid to be here and the other one's not.
Right. Um,
Shubh: this is, can I revise, can if Kelly's amenable to this extension of this idea. I'm gonna up my,
Philippe: yeah.
Shubh: Up my score.
Philippe: Well, let, let me just, uh, uh, like,
Shubh: no, stop selling.
Philippe: Okay.
Shubh: No, no, keep going. He's making it better. He's making this better. Keep, keep going. I'm just kidding. Keep going. Keep going.
Philippe: Good. Um, uh, yeah, like, then you would go and be like, Hey, I, I wanna go for a hike this evening.
Who wants to go? Oh, sorry. More. So you would go and find Calgary only friends Sure. When you're moving to Calgary. That's right. First thing you would do, you join
Kelly: these groups? Like,
Philippe: and, and, okay, cool. I'm gonna pay $20 a month and, okay, great. You're this age, you like these things. Uh, uh, cool. These are the group chats.
There's like a hundred people in there. Make a plan and someone's gonna say yes. Yeah. And then like, start your own group chat and, and do your thing.
Shubh: And you just have to be like. [01:00:00] Super discerning about who gets in, right? Because like people have, like
Kelly: that's what you're paying for those, like someone to curate this, I
Shubh: think.
Yeah, that's totally. And maybe, maybe
Kelly: monitor it.
Totally.
Shubh: Because these things used to be like, oh, there's a Facebook moderator, but they would just let everybody in. Yeah. They're
Kelly: all crap. Yeah.
Shubh: I think, yeah. Paying someone who's like, job it is to go, is this person like a mini interview? Almost? Like, is this person really like, you
Kelly: get vetted.
Shubh: Yeah. Are they really into hiking?
Philippe: Mm, totally.
Shubh: Or are they just a salesperson looking for prospects
Kelly: to pitch to on the trail?
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah. Like, exactly. I bet you a bunch of good executives are part of this group. I'm gonna, you know,
Philippe: it's actually kind of a brilliant idea. Yeah. Okay. So what's your score on, on, uh, this
Shubh: iterative version?
I'm, I'm so, like Kelly's first idea better a tiny bit. So I'm gonna give this one a 70.
Kelly: Woo.
Philippe: Wow. I bumped you up to a 70.
Shubh: Yeah, that's, that's teamwork.
Kelly: Thanks Phil.
Philippe: You're
Shubh: welcome. Also, you went
Kelly: from a 55 to a
Shubh: 70. You guys should also build this curated group chat idea. Like this is a,
Philippe: that actually is kind of a shout
Shubh: out.
Shout out to, to multi-time guest Tate and house 8, 3 1. This was like at a. Conceptual level, what he was [01:01:00] physically trying to do with a three one. Right, right. Oh
Philippe: yeah. And this is so much better than house 8, 3, 1
Shubh: house, 8, 3, 1. The second best tech gathering community in Calgary. Just kidding, kidding. Um, I'm also a member.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: You should see the look on Phil's face. I'm just kidding. I'm kidding.
Philippe: You're kidding. You're not a member.
Shubh: No, I am a member.
Philippe: Uh, no, I think that's a great idea too. I, I, I might match you on 70, I think. Yeah.
Kelly: Wow. Wow.
Philippe: Two seventies.
Shubh: This is like the, I'm just trying to think if you could create like hyper-specific.
You're in this neighborhood and you like these things. 'cause that's part of the challenge sometimes too, is like, oh, you wanna go hang out? This person lives across town. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Wow. Come on. I'm not that, that was also
Kelly: a thing in Barcelona. The parents groups, you could get it curated by neighborhood.
It's like, so if you live in this part,
Shubh: so who would But okay. Of
Kelly: the city and the school
Philippe: would
do
Kelly: this. There was actually, I
Shubh: like, who do this? Who's the, who's the person behind it?
Kelly: Like some parent at some point started it, right? Yeah. Yeah. 'cause the school wasn't responsible. [01:02:00] Right? Right. But they would actually hand you, like your kids enroll, you're here.
They would be like, here's all the chats, join. But like at some point a group of parents started this. Right? And so you could, if you live in a certain part, it's like, okay, you could get together and do something in that part of the city.
Shubh: This is a really good idea.
Philippe: I like it. And it's just like a service model.
A SaaS, like a subscription, but it's a service. Yeah. Like essentially you're constantly curate. It wouldn't, you wouldn't have to build anything for it. Like you'd literally just build WhatsApp groups and have like one person
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: Run it.
Shubh: Maybe. Maybe you get access to three groups for your
Kelly: Sure. Right. At 20 k.
And if you want more, you pay more.
Shubh: Yeah,
Philippe: yeah.
Shubh: Or, or you join the WhatsApp group and uh, some of this stuff is gray out. It's like, Hey, who wants to go hiking today? And you're like me and like, meet at this place at this time. But that's all gray out. Oh, you
Kelly: gotta pay for that. You gotta pay for 2 99. We can fill this,
Philippe: we can let you know where to find these people.
Shubh: But I think it's such a good idea to do it in WhatsApp. I think so many companies would probably have this idea and say, build an app. Then [01:03:00] everybody's gotta subscribe to, it's like a, with kids sports, you have to subscribe to 14 different apps just to chat with their parents. Yeah.
Kelly: No, you wanna be where people already are.
Philippe: Yeah.
Kelly: Right.
Philippe: Yeah. The mvp, the MVP of this is like, you build a wait list, Google form, where are you willing to pay $20 a month for this? And then you like understand who they are and you're like, okay, cool. Let's like put you in a group chat and see if it actually works. And if you get engagement, then you just keep running it.
Shubh: Um, you go to the moving companies,
Philippe: are you, are you willing to put this out to the community? Like if there's a willing entrepreneur out there, can they steal this idea and build it and.
Shubh: On, you gotta, you gotta toss Kelly A. Little bit. Define
Kelly: steel. I mean,
Shubh: like, at the very least, Kelly needs a board seat.
Philippe: Yeah. Board seat.
Shubh: Board seat and a little equity.
Philippe: Yeah. I mean, I feel like
Kelly: maybe co-founder status.
Shubh: Let, let, let me change the question to, uh, Phil, uh, whoever is out there that might want pitch this idea, do you want that company to be a unicorn or not?
Philippe: Right?
Shubh: Because if you don't, then Kelly doesn't need to be involved.
But if you want it to be a unicorn,
Philippe: right? Yeah. Do you want to be a billionaire?
Shubh: Yeah. [01:04:00] Then you gotta, Kelly's gotta be on the, on the roster. Yeah.
Philippe: Yeah, exactly. I'd be, yeah. Who, what, what founder in the right mind would not want Kelly.
Shubh: Yeah. This is, yeah. Imagine somebody goes and steals this idea and, and they're like, uh, I don't want Kelly Schmidt involved.
Philippe: Yeah. That'd be so dumb. Do you have one rapid fire? One more rapid fire.
Kelly: Oh, like, like just a quick, like, just a quick one?
Philippe: Yeah.
Kelly: Okay. I, I, I have one. It's not fully fleshed out, so I don't, I don't know. Okay. That's, that's kind. I I think you're, you know, this one probably gets cut, although likelihood, although I've noticed on the podcast you say you're gonna cut a lot of things.
That's true, but they're not actually cut. I should be careful. Usually the stuff that I say I'm gonna cut
Shubh: ends up being really funny,
Kelly: but like, there's, there's, like, I can't go down further than friends with benefits, so I saying, um, I don't know if this is the right name for it, but, um, the accountability mirror.
Shubh: Wow.
Kelly: So what this product is, it's just a, it's a, it's a mirror on your desk at work, or it could be a mirror in your bathroom at home. [01:05:00] Okay.
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: And it has one line, like etched in it. You said you'd do it. That's it. That's the whole product.
Philippe: You said you'd do what?
Kelly: You said you'd do it?
Shubh: Yeah. Uh,
Kelly: whatever it is.
You promised your team you'd do something. You said you'd work out this morning, you said
Shubh: it's like accountability coach of yourself
Kelly: basically. So. In, in, in both my work life and my personal life, like the people I get on with best are people who have like a very high say, do ratio.
Shubh: Yeah. Right?
Kelly: Like, do you actually do what you say?
Shubh: Yeah.
Kelly: And if that isn't at least like 80%, like we're probably not gonna get get on. Yeah. Yeah. Like ideally it's 90 or, or a hundred, but like if it's 50, like Yeah. Like no tolerance for that. Yeah.
Shubh: That's a, that's a huge,
Kelly: right, so how do, like, trigger for me, how do like, and how do you also hold yourself accountable?
Right. It's like, hey, look, and, and, and, and also like part of where this idea came from is like if something goes wrong at work, right? [01:06:00] I, you know, often I've seen in my career, like people immediately point the finger. Yeah. Like, wasn't me, it was product, it was sales,
Shubh: it was, yeah, it was Phil,
Kelly: whatever.
Shubh: That episode wasn't funny.
It was Phil. Yeah, I got
Kelly: you. Precisely, precisely. And as I've kind of grown as a leader, like the first thing I always do when something goes completely off the rails. I look in the mirror,
Shubh: what did I do wrong?
Kelly: What did I do to contribute to this? Or what did I not do? Or, or like, that's the place that I start, right?
Yeah.
Shubh: So
Kelly: the accountability mirror,
Shubh: I love it. I like this idea a lot. I got, um, when, back in October when I had taken, after I'd taken a couple months off and I was like, okay, I better start doing something. I built an AI accountability coach, like every Sunday it would basically pop up and say, you go, Hey, you said you were gonna do this and this and this.
Did you do this and this and this? Not that I ne generally need, so this
Kelly: could be paired
Shubh: to that external accountability, but it was helpful. I also really like the idea of, yes, it's a mirror, but I think many people, uh, feel more accountable to someone [01:07:00] else than they do to themselves. Yeah. So like, you could be like the, the mirror could, you know, if you were sort of dropping the ball a little bit, like the mirror would just change to like
Kelly: Mm.
Shubh: Kelly Schmitt's face. Kelly said, be like, love this. Kelly would be like, Hey, you said I love this. You said you would do this. And I'd be like, fuck, I better get this done. Right. Like, ASAP dropping,
Kelly: like all of a sudden I appear on your
Shubh: mirror. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Philippe: And your mirror.
Shubh: Yeah. And tied into like your performance, me, your personal performance metrics and your ai.
And if you're dropping way behind it escalates from just like, oh, Philip, there's some nice, like, um, um, you know, you in the mirror to like, uh, it's, it's me saying, Hey Phil, you don't, you don't have enough revenue.
Philippe: Right?
Shubh: It doesn't matter what your business is. It's just me saying you don't have enough revenue.
Philippe: I mean, I've been,
Shubh: you're not growing fast enough.
Philippe: That's what
Shubh: it says.
Philippe: Yeah. I've been joking around about building a clo bott. That it would just exist on Slack. That is my old boss and Neo that I was afraid of. And it would just like, perfect, like almost every day I'd just come and be like, Hey, where is this?
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: Or, you know, how, what's this looking like? And it [01:08:00] would totally kick my ass. I, I,
Shubh: I told my accountability, my AI accountability coach. Hey, when you're speaking to me, I want you to speak to me like I speak to people at work, which is not disrespectful, but it's very impatient.
Kelly: Very direct.
Shubh: Yeah.
Respectfully impatient. And, uh, yeah. I like this idea at all. A lot. Yeah. Just building a little bot, but I like that Kelly's paired it with a physical medium.
Kelly: Right. There's two pieces to this. Yeah.
Shubh: And then the mirror could, if someone was behind you that you didn't know, the mirror could also interact with your, with the name whisperer and be like, that person behind you
Kelly: is X.
Shubh: You could, oh my God. You could have a little compact mirror. Oh. When you're at events. So like when the person was behind you, you could just be like, who's that behind me?
Philippe: Red? And it appears as a name. That's kinda funny. I like that.
Shubh: I like this idea too. Kelly. These are all good ideas. I like this accountability coach.
I like, you could also like, just completely [01:09:00] dumb it down sim simple wise, just to your point, have the mirror with the thing and just have a little slot where you could put someone's photo in.
Kelly: Ooh.
Philippe: Yeah. I like, yeah, I really like it also gives me Harry Potter vibes, which I'm a big fan of, you know, in like the first movie when, uh, what, what's that miracle called?
Oh, right. Where uh, you, yeah.
Shubh: What is the miracle?
Philippe: Um, you know, Dumbledore says, don't ever come looking forward to get.
Shubh: Does he say it like that?
Philippe: Yeah. Ron. Ron is the tri wizard cop.
Shubh: Yeah. Yeah. Harry sees his family. Yeah. So sad. Harry sees his family and Ron just sees himself winning a, a, a cup. Right?
Quidditch
Philippe: cup.
Shubh: Yeah. Fucking selfish.
Philippe: Yeah.
Shubh: Such a shallow view. Of
Kelly: course, the Canadian Quidditch champion would bring up
Shubh: that. Yeah, that's right.
Philippe: That's right. Yeah. Do you think Ron is jealous? Ron sees me. I That's
Shubh: awesome.
Kelly: He's your photo.
Shubh: It's only 'cause Phil's projecting. That's also what he sees when he looks in the mirror every day.
It doesn't, not even a magic mirror, just his regular mirror.
Philippe: Yeah. Before I, before I step in front the mirror, I put out my quidditch medal. [01:10:00] Yeah.
Shubh: It's actually, it's actually got a, a, a, a cut out of the trophy right at arm length. So you just have to kind of scoop your arm in the mirror and it looks like you're carrying around all the time.
Philippe: That's right. Do you wanna give this one a rapid fire score?
Shubh: Yeah. I'm gonna give this one a straight 60.
Philippe: 60.
Shubh: Yeah.
Philippe: I'm with you. 60.
Shubh: I love it. I like it. These are three very high scores. You know this, you've actually, actually listened to. I know
Kelly: this. I'm really, really flattered. Yeah,
Philippe: kudos. This is awesome.
Shubh: Unbelievable. Uh, I think name whisperer should be built yesterday. Get the team on, uh, adversity on it. Also, if you need mental health solutions for the workplace headers Right.
Kelly: You know where to go.
Shubh: I did that right too. Um, uh, name Whisperer needs to be done. Uh, only friends in the iteration that you guys arrived at, I think is actually legitimate.
You know, we talk about solo entrepreneurship right now mm-hmm.
Kelly: In this country a lot. Mm-hmm.
Shubh: Actually, yeah. You'll like this. You know how you're always like a hundred thousand less entrepreneurs? A friend of mine texted me a picture of her getting incorporated today. That's because the conversation her and I had, so I'm like, [01:11:00] Phil, we got one out of a hundred thousand.
Philippe: Whoa.
Shubh: Um, but solo entrepreneurship, people are like, well, how can I side hustle a little bit? Mm-hmm. Side, this is a, this is very side hustle, right? For sure
Kelly: it is.
Philippe: Yep. And we're opening it up right. We're, we're all busy. So if someone wants to run this and get us all on the
Shubh: board, I think it'd be hilarious if you and Kelly carved off your time from running these two organizations.
They like
Kelly: I built this,
Shubh: started a little chat group like
Philippe: Kelly Schmidt.
Shubh: Yeah. Phil's chat group is, uh, uh, Quidditch Lovers Calgary, Quidditch Lovers.
Philippe: Yeah, that's right. You can have a chat group that's like friends with benefits.
Shubh: I mean, our
Kelly: Lady Peace Club.
Shubh: Ours, lady Peace. Oh man. We're uh, everybody's going to Our Lady Peace this summer it sounds like.
Philippe: Yeah, let's do it. Yeah,
Shubh: I think it's a date. We're gonna do a panel with Rain Maita and with Kelly.
Philippe: Uh, we could actually try and set that up. I can text him or I'll email him.
Shubh: I would like that to happen. And, uh, Kelly, uh, thank you for being, uh, incredibly generous with your [01:12:00] time. Thank you for all the support.
It does actually, it's meaningful. Like the number of times I've showed, uh, Philip a text from you that are like, Hey. I laughed.
Kelly: I'm like,
Shubh: alright.
Philippe: In early days those texts were really helpful to
Shubh: Yeah, we were, I was, uh, I haven't, uh, publicly talked too much about this, but um, we almost had to toss Dan Chapman's episode because the audio was so messed up.
How did, I don't know. I probably spent 40 hours
Kelly: clean it up.
Shubh: Clean it up, and you sent, because we'd had a couple episodes out and you sent a text that was like, it was the text that was like, I listened to the first episode and I think I got dumber with every second. And then you sent the text around the second you were like, uh, that was Pip's lips.
Right. And you sent, I can't remember exactly what you said. And I was like, I was in the middle, like literally till 2:00 AM every night trying to recover this audio for someone who does not know how to do that. And they were very much like, okay, well if a real professional human being. Enjoyed one of these episodes.[01:13:00]
It's worth it. So,
Kelly: so I've enjoyed all of them from
Shubh: what I'm, so our accountability coach for putting out more episodes would just be that, right? Would just be Kelly. That's
Kelly: right. Yeah. I'll send you a mirror with my
Shubh: face up, Kelly. Be like, where's the new episode? Awesome.
Kelly: It's Sunday. I'm waiting. You said you'd do it?
Shubh: Yeah, actually I've also got that text. Yeah. Kelly. Um, thanks Kelly again. Uh, you're the best. Uh, somebody go build this thing. Uh, and it'll be unicorn, automatic boom.
Kelly: Thank you both.
Shubh: Thanks Kelly. Thank you.
Philippe: This is a presentation of Indian Dad media in association
Shubh: with,
Philippe: this is a Thursday media [01:14:00] production.