For years, I've been connecting with interesting people and documenting insights that might help my clients and myself. What was once private is now (mostly) public.

People often ask: "How do you know all these people?" and "How do you connect these (re: random) ideas?" The answer is simple: consistent relationship cultivation and thoughtful note taking. My north star is trusting my instincts, my maps are the constellations in these reflections.

This approach to multidisciplinary networking has helped dozens of clients, colleagues, and friends strengthen their networks and unlock new opportunities. Feel free to steal these ideas directly - that's what they're for! I can't promise you'll learn FROM me, but I guarantee you can learn something WITH me. Let's go. Count it off: 1-2-3-4!

Do you know Shannon Staton? She's the founder of Collective, an experiences - based membership that brings together serious people - investors, business owners, thinkers - in carefully curated settings to have conversations that change how they see the world and each other.

If not, allow me to introduce you. Shannon doesn't design conferences or networking events in the traditional sense. She designs rooms - physical and metaphorical - where people who need to know each other actually meet, think together, and become resources for one another. She's the kind of creator who knows that the best conversations happen in saunas, on ski slopes, and when someone feels like they actually belong.

I wanted to connect with her because she's spent her career building what Joe Pine writes about - and I wanted them to recognize that they're designing the same future from opposite directions.

Our conversation is LIVE now on the Just Press Record YouTube channel. Listen and you'll hear two people discovering that they've been solving the same problem - how to keep experiences from becoming commodities, how to actually transform people - through frameworks and through practice.

In the meantime, I wanted to pull THREE KEY LESSONS from my time with Shannon to share with you (and drop into my Personal Archive).

Read on and you'll find a quote with a lesson and a reflection you can Take to work with you, Bring home with you, and Leave behind with your legacy.

Key Concept: Shannon names her own contradiction brilliantly - she's not winging it, she's intentionally designing the conditions for the unplanned. She builds in structure so rigorous that she can afford to abandon it the moment something better emerges. It's the opposite of chaos; it's disciplined freedom. She knows that magic happens in the margins, and you can't account for it if you're too busy following the plan.

Personal Archive Note-To-Self: The idea of an event planner who is also a serendipity sherpa is one of the best resume reveals I think I’ve ever come across. The reason is, even at most great events, the events alone aren’t the thing you remember or tell stories about. When a person like Shannon (or Joe) approaches the event planning with that in mind, it leaves space for memories to form.

I think about concerts my wife and I have been to. Especially when I think about the travel story Shannon told in the episode, where she had tickets reserved for a soccer match in a foreign country, and told all the attendees to find their own way there, and how - through looks of panic and amusement - it ended up being the exact right call because everyone ended up with incredible commute stories.

There was this one time in NYC when we were going to see a band, and between rush hour and the made-way-in-advance dinner reservations, we realized we were in the wrong part of the city to get to where we needed to be (which was Marta, RIP). Now, I can tell you all about the concert that night, and even how amazing our meal was, right down to the complimentary espressos and sambuca before they wished us well on our way to the show, but the funniest memory of that night is the least planned detail.

In order to get across town and break as many pedestrian and vehicle travel laws as possible, we hired a rickshaw, and paid the largest non-plane travel bill either of us had ever seen to make it to our reservation on time. The band was great, the pizza was perfect - but that rickshaw ride is something we will smile about having done for the rest of our lives, and no business or consultant or coordinator ever could have planned THAT aspect of its value.

Work question for you: Where in your work are you so wedded to the plan that you'd miss the magic if it showed up?

Key Concept: Shannon's filtering mechanism is ruthless - every new idea has to pass the test of differentiation and transformation. She won't chase growth for its own sake. She won't build a podcast just because she should. The question "is this different?" isn't about ego - this is a moral compass where integrity is true north. It's her way of saying: I won't commoditize what I've built. And the kicker - when something passes the test, when it actually transforms people, that feels like real payment.

Personal Archive Note-To-Self: I like to point out how every great idea has to be both discoverable and differentiated. If you can’t find it and explain why it’s different, you’ve got nothing. And discoverable is such a loose term, too. Sometimes it’s word of mouth only, or there’s a whole other layer to it, but the point is, it needs to exist in the world for at least one other person.

This is hard when it comes to stuff like podcasts, which everybody knows, that since everybody has a podcast or three (yes, I’m part of the problem, I know), and it only seems obvious why a community like Shannon’s should probably have one for discoverability or SEO or blah blah blah.

But since this is a higher-end offering of a community, why would she ever risk having just another podcast on the Walmart shelf that is the YouTube search page? I’m totally behind her here. Unless she knows what the differentiators are, and why they rhyme with the underlying brand promise - then anything NOT high-end would take away from the whole idea. That’s a major no-no in my book, too.

When we think about what kind of work we want to do, and what kind of life we want to lead - this idea of what we don’t want is as important as the sense of what we do want. The more we can simplify, the better. The faster we can see alignment or punt to other options the better. (And for the record, if or when she figures out that podcast, I’ll subscribe because I’ll know it met this standard).

Life question for you: What would you say no to if you applied Shannon's "is this different?" test to your own work?

Key Concept: The progression from handshakes to hugs is Shannon's measure of transformation - not measured in dollars or attendance, but in actual human connection that becomes durable. She's not just creating a moment; she's creating a network. The real legacy isn't what happens at the event; it's what happens after, when those people text each other about an opportunity, a crisis, a question. That's the whole point.

Personal Archive Note-To-Self: There’s a lesson I’ve learned from client work that I try to remind all of our new advisors about in my work-work at Sunpointe. It’s the idea that you haven’t really solidified the relationship until you’ve been through a tough decision together. It could be a bigger than expected expense, or a bear market/recession, or a job loss, or - you need some friction that gets you both into the mix of solving the problem together.

My favorite expression for this is “garden glove service.” It’s when you get your hands dirty together, in the name of growth. That’s not to say you need to be literally hugging all of your clients, it’s just the foundational observation that A. trust is a story, so B. stories requires tension, and C. tension that resolves positively between people creates trust.

When you do this repeatedly, and especially when you teach others that it’s part of the expectation of the journey you’re taking them on, I genuinely believe it makes the world a better place. At the end of the day, all we have are the stories we tell to our friends and loved ones, and really - the stories we tell ourselves inside of our own heads.

There is no higher purpose than to transform relationships from handshakes to hugs, care about other people and share positive stories into the future, and nurture that community to take just as much care of everyone else as it does of us. You can’t plan it all. Don’t forget to leave some cracks for the light (and the serendipity) to get in.

Legacy question for you: What relationships are you intentionally building that could become resources for others long after the moment ends?

You have a Personal Network and a Personal Archive just waiting for you to build them up stronger. Look at your work, look at your life, and look at your legacy - and then, start small in each category. Today it's one person and one reflection. Tomorrow? Who knows what connections you'll create.

Don't forget to click reply/click here and tell me who you're adding to your network and why! Plus, if you already have your own Personal Archive too, let me know, I'm creating a database.

Want more? Find my Personal Archive on CultishCreative.com, watch me build a better Personal Network on the Cultish Creative YouTube channel, and listen to Just Press Record on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, and follow me on social media (LinkedIn and X) - now distributed by Epsilon Theory.

You can also check out my work as Managing Director at Sunpointe, as a host on top investment YouTube channel Excess Returns, and as Senior Editor at Perscient.

ps. AI helped me pull and organize quotes from the transcript, structure the three lessons, and sharpen the Key Concepts. If you're curious about how I use AI while keeping editorial control and my own voice intact, I wrote about my personal rules here: Did AI Do That: Personal Rules