17. Life is One Big Adventure: Business, Belonging, and Finding Your People

In this episode of The Imperfect Podcast, Wendy Lloyd Curley speaks with Andrea Hernandez from Adventures Web Digital about business, belonging, bravery, and the very human side of networking.

Andrea shares her story of moving from Colombia to Spain, then to the UK, and eventually to Australia, where she and her partner began building their own digital agency. With a background in creativity, web development, public service, and a deep desire to help people, Andrea’s journey into business is thoughtful, honest, and refreshingly real.

Together, Wendy and Andrea explore what it feels like to start a business in a new country, how isolating entrepreneurship can be, and why finding the right business community can make such a profound difference. Andrea speaks openly about her early experiences of networking, from awkward rooms and superficial connections to discovering BNI and finding not just referrals, but confidence, accountability, friendships, and a renewed sense of identity.

The conversation also touches on generational differences in networking, especially the way younger business owners often begin relationships online, while still deeply craving genuine face-to-face connection. At the heart of the episode is a simple but powerful idea: no matter our age, background, or business experience, networking works best when it begins with human connection.

This is a warm, reflective conversation about building a business, finding your people, and remembering that life really is one big adventure.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:18

Hello, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Imperfect Podcast. I am Wendy Lloyd Curley, and uh I'm so glad that you're here with me. And I have a special guest this time. Andrea Hernandez is a member of my BI region. And uh she and I were talking, and my dog has decided to make noise. That's why it's called the Imperfect Podcast, too. You know what I might do, Andrew? I'm gonna close the door. Oh, look at that. Oh my goodness me. And it's called the Imperfect Podcast because I don't need to re-record. Right, right, folks? Everybody listening, they're fine with that. Um Andrew and I were talking about generational differences between the way that people might network. And um, Andrea has shared with me that she's almost 30, and I am almost uh, well, I am 57. Let's just go with 57. And and and so um Andrew, what does that make you? Are you Gen Y or Gen Z? Or or or what do you call yourself in that kind of term?

SPEAKER_00 1:27

Yeah, well, first of all, thanks so much for having me on your podcast, Wendy. It's great to be here. And I think I still technically qualify as a millennial.

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Nice. All right, and is that that's Gen Y, isn't it? That's like or do they just call it a millennial?

SPEAKER_00 1:41

I just say millennial, yes. Then when it comes to all the letters, I started to get confused. I'm like, I'm just a millennial. I'm good with I love it.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Well, I'm proudly Gen X. We didn't have special names back then. Well, listen, um, first of all, can we find out a little bit more about you? We now know how old you are, but um uh you you probably have a little bit of a story. Where are you from and how did you get involved in what you do now?

SPEAKER_00 2:08

Oh my goodness. So answering the question where I'm from is probably the hardest one for me because what does that mean? I think where do I call home? Where is my family? Where was I born? So um basically I was born in Colombia in South America. When I was about two, my parents moved to Spain. So I grew up, um, my childhood was in Spain, and then when I was about 14, we moved again to the UK, and that's where I learned English. And I learned English by watching lots of American TV shows, and that's how I developed this weird international kind of American accent. A lot of people think I'm Canadian. Um, and then yeah, so I did all my formal education in the UK, and about five years ago, I met my partner then. He's now my fiancee, and he's from Australia, and he said, I'd love to move back there one day. And I said, you know what, why not? I am from warmer climates, so it sounded like a good idea. And so about 18 months ago, we made the move, and here we are.

SPEAKER_01 3:15

Just love that. Now, one of the things, um, let's talk a little bit about your business. First of all, let's start with your career. Like, talk about uh your first business, the first working that you did. What was that? And how did you get to where you are and take us on that journey?

SPEAKER_00 3:32

So um, I think I've always had a very entrepreneurial mind, um, and I've always loved to help people. Those are the two things that I know for sure. I didn't want to have a traditional sort of career pathway um where I would be working on a night to five, um, but I also really like helping people. So I think I did the traditional thing, you know, I went to school, I went to university, I got a degree, um, I studied English and creative writing because I'm very creative. And on the side, as a hobby, I would build websites because it was just another creative outlet for me. And it was a great way to publish my thoughts and because I like to write a lot and a way to connect with people through the online media, but using a bit of everything that um that I enjoyed, but I never really took that any further, and so after graduating from university, I ended up working for um for a non-for-profit, which was designed to help students in the UK find pathways to study in the US, because I had done a year abroad in the US and I really enjoyed it. So I did that for about a year. Um, and then COVID hit, and so I changed. I was supposed to travel and uh work as an English teacher, but when COVID hit, I couldn't do that. So I ended up working for the government, um, the UK government as a work um coach specialist, helping people uh find work. And I loved doing that because I love helping people. Um, but it was very demanding and and I got I got burnt out very quickly. Um we were supporting people that had very high needs. I couldn't see myself doing that for the for the rest of my life, and I was desperate for a change. By that point, I had met my partner and I had told him I don't think I want to do this. And he was uh paramedic as well, so he totally understood where I was coming from in terms of we are public servants. We we love helping people, but we're getting burned out and it's not sustainable. So um I shared with him some of my entrepreneurial dreams, and I said, you know what, like maybe we should explore this further. And I used to love building websites. Why don't we find for a way to um you know reskill ourselves, retrain ourselves, um, upskill and all of these things, and then just start something of our own. And so when we decided to move to Australia, it just sort of felt like the right time to go on a bit of an adventure and try and do that ourselves because it was you, you know, we were already gonna leave our job. So it kind of made sense to use that time to uh find a new way to help people, and that's essentially what we've done. And we, I mean, our philosophy is live is one big adventure, so that's why we named our business Adventures Web Digital, and is basically finding ways to help people while still fulfilling our dream to build something off our own, and um, a little bit about the business. It's a digital agency. Predominantly we build websites, but we build them with the hope of and the the strategic um outcome to get people leads to the website. So there's a lot of SEO and optimization that goes in the background. Even before we start um building the website, we do a lot of strategic planning and research and thinking about how we can get the messaging right, how we can get the customers right, how we can get all of these things right to make sure that this website is going to work for the business owner and it's gonna help them generate leads because the more leads they have coming in passively, the more they can just focus on doing what they do best, and they can just focus on spending time with their family and their loved ones and have a great work-life balance because that's something we want for ourselves, and we want to um offer that to business owners as well. So that's in a nutshell how we ended up here and a little bit about what we do.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

I love that, and I love I love that you've uh evolved over time, like try different things, sing different ways, and and not let allow yourself to be uh unhappy and then figure out what the next step is. That I think that's a really healthy way to live.

SPEAKER_00 7:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:55

Sometimes you can uh again, like the imperfect podcast, life is imperfect as well. Sometimes we make decisions and decide to do things, and then we realize, oh, that wasn't the right thing for me. Um so I do like that. All right, and I really love the motto of life is one big adventure. I think that's a lot of fun. Thank you. So thinking about you said at the very beginning there that your entrepreneur, you think you had an entrepreneurial spirit, but this is your first business, right? This one. Where do you think that that that courage came from? Do you have uh in your family do people run their own businesses or do most people in your family collect paychecks? I I always wonder about that.

SPEAKER_00 8:40

Yeah, I mean, that's a good question. Um, I think a little bit of both. Um, when I was growing up, um we had a single-income household. So my dad was predominantly um uh working as an employee. Um and then when we moved to the UK, it was around the financial crisis of 2008, and things were just very, very difficult. And I think at that point it became clear that a job wasn't as stable as it used to be in the day. Um, and so after a few years of um watching him struggle to get different jobs, even though he could speak English and all of this, um, eventually he found success by setting up his own business um and through being self-employed and helping other people with translations and all of these things. And I watched him grow that business into just like a little bit of a consultancy, into you know having multiple uh clients. And uh I watched the freedom that that gave him as well to be with us, to take holidays. And I think it was something that I took away from that experience is that if you work for yourself, you get to control your own time, you get to control, you know, how much you charge and what customers you work with. And of course, there's things that you can't always control. But um, yeah, I think that's what I took away from that, and knowing that a job wasn't gonna provide me the security and the stability that I knew I wanted for myself and for my future, you know, family and and even my current loved ones and friends. So I think that's um a little bit where um where I started seriously thinking, yes, you know what, if if my dad can do this, then I think I I can give it a try for sure.

SPEAKER_01 10:25

I do think that uh starting your own business it takes a lot of bravery, and I feel like people who have seen others do it are aware of it's tough to own your own business, but it is rewarding. And I just speaking about myself for a minute, my my dad uh was always collecting a paycheck, and when I went to unique, I never really thought anything about starting a business. I I was just trying to get a great job, and everything I did was about career development and getting in front of the right kind of hiring managers and working my way to the top. That was what I wanted to do. And uh once I got into it 10 years in, I thought this is not what I wanted to do. But I still didn't know that I wanted to start a business. So okay, so you're a year and a half into running your business. Congratulations. And what's it like? What stresses do you have? What what joys do you have?

SPEAKER_00 11:31

I think the same stresses that every new startup uh small business owner has. Um, and I think I'll talk about the rewards because I want to keep it positive, but I think the rewards is definitely the people that I've been able to meet um alongside this journey and just having the flexibility to decide who I work and where I work and with whom. So it's um those are definitely the pluses, just knowing that if we want to take a holiday, we don't have to ask permission from a boss for annual leave because we are the bosses, right? So it's um the the freedom that comes with it is definitely um some of the perks. Um, and then the challenges, I think it's just the the the ones that everybody faces is sometimes you have so much to do and you don't have enough time to do it all, um, you know, wondering when the next line is gonna come from. And these are just normal stresses that come with running a business, but I think for sure the benefits outweigh the costs.

SPEAKER_01 12:31

You're a year and a half in over that 18 months or so. How have you gotten clients?

SPEAKER_00 12:39

It's been predominantly word of mouth referrals and networking. That has been the primarily way. Yeah, the primary way.

SPEAKER_01 12:47

All right, so let's break those two up. Let's start with word of mouth referrals.

unknown 12:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 12:51

So, did you start by doing a website for someone and then asking them to tell others about how did it how did it really start?

SPEAKER_00 13:02

It started by putting ourselves out there and going to quite a few networking events and building trust with people. And then it wasn't really, it didn't really have much traction until I joined B and I. Um, and I just by simply saying I'm a web developer and here's what I can do, um, we got the first few referrals come through, and that gave us the case studies to really continue to show this is the work that we can do, this is the results that we've achieved, and start to get more referrals come through.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

You've told me some really good things over time about your B and I experience so far. And I know you're a fairly new member, and um I I think that uh I always say that we're looking for high-quality people, high-quality businesses in a BI. And I think we found one in you, even though you have uh a small amount of experience, you've got big visions for what your company is going to do. Tell me a little bit about the experience you've had and how did you find BI, and then why did you decide to become part of it?

SPEAKER_00 14:16

Yes. So I mean, as I've spoken, I came to Australia about 18 months ago. We didn't actually set up the business immediately because we spent the first few months um upskilling, retraining, and all of this. I had done web developing previously, but so much had changed. So I had to go back to basics almost and reel in a lot of what I had kind of forgotten. So we spent that time building that and at the same time trying to build our network. We were looking to connect with other business owners that were going through a similar journey that could understand the struggles and the challenges that comes with how do you start your business? What is the product that you're gonna offer? What makes you different? All of these things that not everybody's gonna understand. Like your friends and family might support you, but they don't understand what that feels like or what that looks like. So we were trying to connect with other business owners specifically that were also trying to, you know, going through this process. And we went to as many networking events as we could around Sydney. Some of them were a complete waste of time because the majority of them, they just want to sell you onto their products or their courses or whatever it is, whether it's property or their investing or whatever it is. Um some of them were just very impersonal, and you just go there and everybody exchanges LinkedIn with you, but you don't actually have a proper connection with anybody and you walk away feeling like that was just a complete waste of time. So yeah, we spent about nine months doing that. Um, and and we went to different um programs. We did a personal development um program and we were sort of networking with other people, but it just felt like there was nothing that would stick. And likewise, because I had come here and you know, Nick, who is my partner, his family is here, but I don't have any family or any friends. So I wanted to make some friends as well. But being in the entrepreneurial space meant that I wasn't relating as much to people that were in jobs, so I was kind of looking for friends in the business space as well, but I was just failing miserably. So I would try and make these connections work, and if we were online, I would sort of meet them online, but after a few weeks or a few months, it would just sort of fizzle out and nothing would come out of that. And so it was just like this feeling like we're an island in the middle of the no of the ocean with nobody around us, thinking, my God, like we're we're we're completely isolated and we must be the only ones going through these challenges at this moment. And every single person we meet, they either want to take our money or they're not, or they want to sell us something, they're just not interested in just having a genuine connection. Um, so we were lucky that um when we were sort of um upskilling and retraining, um, we went with um a mentorship program, a community program for all the digital agencies, and we spoke to a few of their um past alumni, I guess, or um people that had done it previously, and they said, you know what? B and I is a great way to start networking and start getting clients. And we were like, B and I, what is that? I have no idea what that means. Business Network International, whatever that means. I have I have no idea what that means. So anyway, fast for a few months, and it wasn't until I think it was September last year that we started looking on Eventbrite, and we, and this is the place that we used to go to to find all of these other business networking events, and we found one that said specifically B and I, and still not really knowing what that means, we're like, okay, let's check it out. So then we looked at the details, we were taken aback at how early it actually was. It was like super early, probably, okay, that's fine, no, not a problem. Um, it's just one day, let's just check it out. So we went to a B and I, I think it was in um the inner west. I'm I'm not really sure the regions, but um, it's in Moore Park, and we we we checked it out, and it was so different to any other networking event that we had been to. And I had been to quite a few both together separately. I had been to um Chamber of Commerce events, and it was just, I don't know, I was the vibe was so completely different because it was structured. Um, you would sit around a table in a specific way, and they ran through an agenda in a specific way, and then at the end, everybody would stand up and say, This is what I have this week. I've either generated this much business or I've given this much business or these referrals. And wow, I was just completely blown away. They were so, so specific, especially around the thank you for close business. It was so specific about this is how much I've generated, and everything was recorded, and I was like, I don't think I've ever seen this before. I I just couldn't imagine going to another, for example, Chamber of Commerce event and them saying, This is how much business I've generated because of another member in here. It was just wow, it completely blew my mind. And maybe I'm a little bit of a type A personality, and I it just really appealed to me. I was like, yes, this is what I need because sometimes you say you're a business owner, but you don't take yourself very seriously. And so you're like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I have a business, but I'm actually just at home watching TV doing nothing, right? But it felt like within B and I, within this group, in this meeting, people are like, no, we mean business, right? We are in business and we mean it. And it was just like, yeah, this is the accountability that I need because I need to take myself more seriously if I'm gonna make this business work. Um, so at that point, I immediately knew that it didn't matter if I didn't get any clients from BNI or any referrals, none of that mattered to me at that point. I just knew that I wanted the accountability that the system of BNI would give me. And at that point, I knew, yes, I need to join. I need to join. This is this is what I what I need. And I had no idea the impact that it would have in my life a few months later. Um, and no idea the relationships that I would build at the time. I was just interested in the in the accountability aspect of it. So I immediately started researching um chapters in my region that didn't have the web developer seat because that's the seat I wanted to take, and that were easy enough for me to get to because I don't drive, so it needed to be within um public transport distance and all of these things. And yeah, so eventually I visited a few um and I settled on on Bizmasters, and that's where I ended up. And I don't know if you want me to talk more about what it's been like since I joined.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

Well, you know, uh let's just take a breath for a moment and say what an amazing testimonial that was. Um, really, for and and and I resonated with everything you said. I was a pretty successful business owner, but I worked for myself and I didn't have that accountability and discipline. And I had been doing my business for seven years at the time. And then it was going well. But when I saw all those people in a chapter meeting, you know, they felt like adults. And I wanted to be an adult like them and and have that accountability. That is absolutely what drew me to be an um, you know, solopreneurs, which is really what I was uh at at the time, it just really called out to me. I'm so glad that you found a home. And I I do, I'm so grateful that I've gotten to meet you. I I'd love to hear a little bit about what you've experienced since becoming a member because I think it's pretty impressive what you've been able to experience for your business, but also for yourself.

SPEAKER_00 22:19

Yeah, I think the the biggest gains that I've had from BI have been on a personal level for sure. When I first started going to all that networking events, um, some of which I've mentioned previously, I would I would be the person that would take a drink to have something in my hands. And then I would stand at the back of the room just there observing everybody else. And maybe I would sit at a table and if somebody came up and sat next to me, I would try and make conversation. But that's about as as far as it went. I did not feel any confident talking to people. I I felt like I was just trying to do a bit of a checklist of like I should network so I'm here, visibility and all of that. But it didn't feel like I like I believed in what I was doing, and it didn't feel like it was gonna lead anywhere. So every event I went to, it was the same feeling of oh, I'm just I'm just here. I don't really want to be here. I'm scared to talk to people, and I don't even know what I want to say. And with then I joined BNI um officially in December last year, so about seven months ago now, almost seven months ago. Um, and I was absolutely terrified at first having to stand up every week and talk about my business and do a pitch and you know talk about what we did and in a way that made sense to other people. I was shaking. I had to always look at my phone because I just couldn't possibly remember what I had to say. Um, my voice would always literally be shaking and my heart would be pounding all the time. I found it very, very difficult. But over time, the more I did it, the more confident I became. And I'm sure lots of people have this experience, but it's true because you are forced to confront that fear time and time again. So you you do it, and the more you do it, the more, the easier it gets, the better at it you get, the the more you can connect with people, and the more you also get to refine your message, which then makes it easier to go to other networking events outside of BI and know exactly what you need to say to connect to people and how to explain your business in a way that makes sense. And that's training that you don't get anywhere else, right? Even if you've had all the online training in the world, unless you're physically doing that, it's just not an experience that you're gonna get anywhere else. So, first of all, it really helped with my confidence and with my ability to refine my services, my pitch, you know, understanding what we offer and how to explain that to people so they would understand. So that, so first of all, that's been you know the one of the biggest wins that I've had. And then the second one is the relationships that has come with that. I, as I said previously, I really did try to form friendships, especially within the entrepreneurial space.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:26

And I was looking for people that would be as motivated as I was to build a business and to be successful. Um, but that we could also just hang, you know, we could just have coffee and just talk about life and share pictures of each other's cats or whatever it was. You know, this is just what you you just want to have a friend, but also like a business friend, but also a friend. And I had found that very difficult to do um previously. All of these other events that we had gone to, like I said, either people were trying to sell to us or they were just really in like a totally different space where they were extremely successful and they just couldn't relate to us. So they were either in a mentorship, um, uh in a mentor sort of position, or or they were even below, not below, but a step a few steps behind us where they were only just considering business, but they were still employees. So it was really difficult to find kind of like that right spot where you have someone that is already in business, or maybe they're starting out, but they're as equally motivated as you are, but they're also don't want to, you know, they're not sort of super stuck up and they don't want to only talk about business all the time, that they're happy to just have that personal relationship. And over time, from going to the chapter meetings, because we meet every single week, you talk to the same people again and again and again, and you start to form those relationships, and then it really helps that there's different categories in the the chapter, so it's not just a whole room full of other web developers, but you know, you have your you know, your removalist, you have your cleaner, you have all of these different people so that if anything breaks in your in your house, immediately you know who to pick up the phone and call and go for advice, right? Which is which is crazy, but that's that's what you get. But also you go into you can hang out with these people and you can talk to them outside of business and just talk to them about life and have a coffee with them and catch up. And that is has been absolutely invaluable for me, who I didn't have any sort of community here, I didn't have any friends, all my family are back um in the UK or in Colombia, and I had absolutely nobody here apart from my partner's family, which was great, but it didn't feel like my family, and this is sort of like what I've um what I've said to my partner many times. When I came to Australia, I stopped being Andrea and I became like Nick's girlfriend or Nick's fiance. But when I joined BI, I could just be me. I was just Andrea again. It felt like I got my identity back and I got a whole group of people that I could come to for advice and that I could just hang out with and just share a few laughs, and that to me has been invaluable.

SPEAKER_01 28:40

You've given me goosebumps. Uh I mean, and literal goosebumps. Uh that is such a fantastic story, and it's one that I know thousands of people have, thousands of people have experienced that. And the neat thing is what you are able to take from it now, you are able to then give to the next people. Um, so that's that's pretty incredible. Um, I would like to ask you a question, and and uh I I don't want to mislead you in any way. Is there a difference in the way that people relate to you depending on their age? Do you notice a generational difference in the way that people network or in the way that people successfully network? Or is there a common thread?

SPEAKER_00 29:34

I think at the end, we're all just looking for human connection. So I think when you find that human connection, one of the beautiful things about BNI is that it doesn't really matter how old you are because you can connect with people at a human level. But what I have found is that especially within my generation, we've sort of become overly reliant on the online first, more than the face-to-face. And even just outside of networking, just trying to make friends as an adult, it's so hard because everything's online now. So I was joining lots of sort of Facebook groups and online communities, and I was always trying to, you know, do the online meetups and and have you know transition that into WhatsApp and keep the relationship going over text. Maybe we'll meet up once or so, but it was really difficult. And I feel like in my generation now relies on connection through the online space first, and that is, you know, social media or local groups or online communities, and it can be really isolating because even though on paper it looks like you have all of these thousands of connections and I don't know how many friends, but the reality is, and I've lived this, is that you still don't have anybody because you're not really building that authentic connection that is built from face-to-face, you know, repeated face-to-face interactions. And I think that's why I've really enjoyed BI because you're forced to see these people face to face every single week. So you are forced to talk to each other in person, and through that, you get to understand people's energy better, you get to read their body language better, you get to see whether you vibe or not, and you build on that. And I think in my generation, a lot of it is just almost entirely on social media, and and there's a loneliness that nobody really talks about, or or or maybe they are, but a loneliness that because on paper you look like you have all these connections, but when it comes to who can you pick up the phone and call because something broke in your house or you just need some advice, that is not it's not quite the same. So those connections stay more as superficial. Um, so I I don't think I've noticed any difference in how people treat me because I'm younger versus how they would treat an older person. But I mean I I don't know because I'm not I am the age that I am and I don't have any other experience. So I I don't know. But I do feel like when it comes to making connections and networking, um, my generation is is very focused on the online, and it is, and I think that's part of what made it really difficult to have any genuine connections when I first arrived to Australia about 18 months ago.

SPEAKER_01 32:36

Your your insights are amazing, and I really am so grateful that I invited you to share your story here on the Imperfect Podcast. I I would love to know this. Uh, what are your plans for the future? What what what are your goals over the next uh let's say, first of all, the the rest of this year, so that's another six months, and then maybe for the next couple of years. What do you want to do with your business? And how do you see networking being part of that, knowing that networking and word of mouth have gotten you to where you are?

SPEAKER_00 33:10

I definitely want to keep expanding my visibility within BNI and just connecting with more people in the region here but beyond. And I think I will probably stay a BNI member for a long time just because of all of the benefits that it's giving me, both personally and professionally. So I definitely see myself staying and here, and whether it's that we stay in Sydney or we move somewhere else, it doesn't actually matter because BI is so global. And recently we were in the UK and we visited a couple of chapters there, and the energy is the same, it's just fantastic. And so I know I definitely want to stay part of BI. Um for the next six months, I want to keep growing my presence within our region, and I want to keep building genuinely good relationships with people, and I want them to understand the value that we offer within our business because there's so many um questionable agencies out there that do questionable results for people, and we're not like that because we come from a place of genuinely wanting to help people. And I think I just want to get my message across that everything that we do is with the intentions to genuinely help people have the work-life balance they deserve, and that's something that we want to achieve for ourselves as well. And I think in the next few years, we're hoping to grow this into a lifestyle business that we can feed around a family because you know we're still young, so no kids yet, but we definitely want to expand that into a business that will allow us to have the flexibility and freedom to be there with our kids when they need us, um, and and provide us with the um with the flexibility, but also the the peace of mind knowing that that's there. Um, and I think regardless of what happens, I definitely see me standing BNI for a long time.

SPEAKER_01 35:05

You know, uh my thesis uh about about this right now, and I'm I'm I'm exploring it, and I'm glad that you're here with me. And I uh we'll we'll start to wrap things up because I know we've talked for a while, but I I just want to share my my thesis is exactly what you said, that it I don't think it matters how old we are, or even what our upbringing was, uh you know the human connection is ever important. It's the human connection that that we need. And the the research says that you will live longer if you are still part of a community. I think we we inherently need connectivity. And so the the in-person, and as you said, the forced B and I experience becomes a habit and becomes something that that you can feed on. The the visitor flow, the growth and the contraction of a chapter, the the breadth of it, uh really does work well. And and as you also said earlier, you you said that those are skills that then you can now use away from a B and I environment. In another networking environment, you can actually evolve that and get value instead of wasting your time, uh, not wasting your time. So I do love that.

SPEAKER_00 36:29

And I have experienced that a little bit already. Um, every time I've gone to an event outside of BI, it's so much easier now to talk to people. Because now I'm looking at it through a different lens. Now I'm focused on building a relationship first, and I'm not as scared anymore. And that confidence has just come purely within from BNI.

SPEAKER_01 36:52

So I love it. I'm gonna ask one last question. Uh uh it's about the fact that you went to a national conference recently, and it was a B and I conference, but it was called Accelerate Business. Uh the whole point um it from I was one of the conveyor conveyers of the is that a word? Well, it's the imperfect podcast, so we'll make it up. Um conveners, that was it, yeah, of the of the event. So our purpose was to help the attendees to get to be able to accelerate their business, to, to, to, to grow it. It wasn't necessarily to sell B and I. We already had B and I in the room. So it was instead to help you. Uh so now that I've already answered it for you, I'd love to find out what you benefited from. Uh, just in a, you know, I don't want, I don't need a lot. Just I'd love to find out what your thoughts are after attending it.

SPEAKER_00 37:46

Yeah, I thought it was a fantastic conference. I've been told it was the best yet. So I'm really glad that I went. Um, I loved all of the networking that would happen in between the scenes and getting to connect with business owners all around Australia was really valuable. And I love the talks as well about how you can, you know, grow your business either through telling a story. So one of the speakers, Monique Bratley, she shared about you know, selling through storytelling. That was just very impactful. How you don't have to be salesy or pushy, you can just sell by telling stories. And so that's partly what I want to do within the next six months, is I want to tell my story because that's how I want people to understand I'm here to help you, you know, don't go to somebody who's just interested in your money. I'm generally interested in helping you. So that was one of the key takeaways uh from me. And also Phil Berg, who is absolutely a legend um within BNI, but he he said, you know, get in front of the people who are in front of your customers first. And I had never really thought about it in that way. And so um in web development, there's sometimes customers that would be in front of branding agencies or marketing agencies first. And so to me, that advice was invaluable. And from there I've gone and I've started scheduling one-to-ones with these branding agencies and marketing agencies because that's a strategic way that I can grow my business as well. And so yeah, this are I would, I would, I'm gonna keep it short. So this is the two insights, the major insights that I got, but overall, it was 100% worth attending, and it was just so much value, whether you were in B and I or not, it was just um invaluable, as I said.

SPEAKER_01 39:37

I love it, I love it. Well, listen, ladies and gentlemen, you've been listening to Andrea Hernandez, and um I I just want to remind you of a quote that she used earlier, which is life is one big adventure. And uh as another um person who's moved to a completely new country who doesn't know how to answer the same question that you don't know how to answer, where am I from? Um, I just want to say it's been wonderful to get to know you more. And uh I when we're talking about generations, I don't think it matters in networking. It's about human connection, and I'm really glad to have met you. Thanks everybody for listening. Um, this uh the music that you're about to hear was written by my very good friend Ben Little, and I happen to have been playing the guitar on the recording. So I hope you enjoy it. Have some fun, and I'll see you next time on the Imperfect Podcast.