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Project Management Mastery, AI Innovations, and the Art of People Skills with Andy Kaufman
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- Connect with Andy on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/buildleaders/
- Check out some great episodes from Andy's podcast: https://peopleandprojectspodcast.com/index.php/en/
- Check out Andy's AI course: https://ai.i-leadonline.com/?ver=9aaa9e
- Subscribe to Andy's Weekly "Lead 52" email list: https://getlead52.com/
- Meet PMela: https://peopleandprojectspodcast.com/index.php/en/podcast-episodes/655-ppp-384-andy-interviews-an-ai-introducing-pmela.html
- PMela interviews another AI: https://peopleandprojectspodcast.com/index.php/en/podcast-episodes/659-ppp-388-pmela-interviews-abraham-lincoln-a-lesson-on-ai-automation.html
- For a full PM-Mastery podcast episode list, visit here: PM-Mastery Podcast Episodes.
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- For a full list of blog posts, go here: PM-Mastery Blog Posts
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Project Management Mastery With Andy Kaufman
Intro/OutroWelcome to the PM Mastery podcast . This podcast is all about helping you master your project management skills by sharing tips , tricks , tools and training to get you to the next level , while sharing the stories of other project managers on their journey in project management . Now here's your host , Walt Sparling .
Walt SparlingWelcome everybody to the current edition of PM Mastery . I am honored to have with me today Mr Andy Kaufman from the People's and Projects podcast . Welcome , Andy .
Andy KaufmanHey , walt , I've been looking forward to this . I'm so glad you reached out .
Walt SparlingWell , it is great . I was trying to think what could I do for the audience ? That would just be a wow for the 50th episode , which now people will know . This is the 50th episode . So I took a chance and reached out to you and you said , yes , I will do it . So it's great to have you here .
Andy KaufmanYou know , I don't think most people appreciate how hard it is to get to episode 50 . There are so many people that start with good intentions and they get started , which is hard enough , but then to get to 50 , that's congratulations maybe .
Walt SparlingWell , I appreciate it as someone who's on what, 400 ?
Andy Kaufman396 , I think 398 , maybe 400 will go out this weekend . Yeah .
Walt SparlingOkay , yeah , I was just listening to the one that was so fitting on stress and burnout , so that's been very high on the list lately with PMs .
Andy KaufmanWell , especially I mean for you as well . I mean , you've got this going on . You got so many different thins going on . Anybody listening to us is at risk of , whether we realize it or not , falling into unhealthy state .
Walt SparlingSo yeah sure , there's always some time to do one more thing , right ? So ?
Andy Kaufmantrue , so true .
Walt SparlingSo , for those that may not know you which I would find hard to believe , and especially in the PM community but tell us a little bit about what you do . What's your day job , what's you ? All the different things you do , because you do a lot .
Andy KaufmanYou know , most days from a work perspective , I'm in front of a group teaching project management or teaching leadership , and so that could be a workshop of 20 or 25 people or it could be a keynote where it's got many more people in it , but the topics are typically related to how do you deliver or how do you lead teams to deliver , and so that's the vast majority of it , and the podcast is part of that . I'd say , walt , to be perfectly honest and you know this , not that you're into episode 50 , that you can learn so much from other people that you can kind of funnel that into other areas as well . So a lot of our workshops have been significantly impacted by hosting the podcast , and so that's definitely a labor of love . And we've been building e-learning courses and do a little bit of coaching . I've had over 300 executive coaching clients , but I find that my all those have the benefits Like .
Andy KaufmanThe benefits of a keynote is you can try to reach a lot of people , but you can only go so deep . The benefit of a workshop is it's kind of hard to run , because if someone asks a question , you know yeah , so it keeps things practical and humbling and one on one , you know , it really keeps me close to what's going on . So that combination of things helps me try to stay out of the realm of theory and in the realm of what are real people struggling with , on real problems , with real , you know , companies and clients and things like that . So I am convinced I have the best job in the world .
Walt SparlingWalt for sure that is . That's great and you're so accurate on the learning . So in the 50 , I think probably 40 , some of those were interviews and the other were some book reviews and things like that . Even in the book reviews talking the authors learning so much ideas that I've taken away from these interviews and tools that I've heard about and go . You know that's about the fourth time I've heard that . One or fifth time I'm going to go check it out .
Andy KaufmanYeah right , isn't that the truth ? Actually , that's how I often pursue authors for the People and Projects podcast to be like what am I hearing people say , man , this really helped me , and go well , it's probably an author we ought to reach out to , because , you know , there's no shortage of books , right , there's no shortage of ideas , but which ones seem to be really helping people ? And so , like you say , if somebody's like , yeah , this tool has really been helpful , it's like oh , we probably ought to investigate that tool .
Andy KaufmanYeah , yeah , so it's . I wouldn't say that it's totally taken any pressure off to come up with new ideas , but in some ways it has . Well , it's because there's so many good ideas out there . It's how can we find ways to package it so that people can use it ? I mean I . It cracks me up sometimes when people in my line of work have a quote and then put their name under it or they want a trademark or phrase and like there is something to Solomon's idea . There's nothing new under the sun . I mean there's . There's a lot of these ideas that it doesn't need my name under it to be powerful . You know it's just how can we package it in such a way that people can can say now I know how to use that , because too much of what you and I do comes off as theory and people are like well , I just I've never worked here , so that's the fun thing , I think .
Walt SparlingYet tools is a great example of that . One of my favorite things is to customize and optimize tools . So someone will write an Excel spreadsheet and then I'll spend years fine-tuning that thing to make it the best ever . But I've tried out a lot of project management software and some people swear by the one they use , but others will get in , and there's two things about that package I cannot stand . And it doesn't do this for me . You think , well , if they had that and added it , it'd be perfect . Well , then someone else said , well , it doesn't do this for me . So there are so many .
Andy KaufmanI always feel like if you don't hit your project management software at least a little bit , you don't know it well enough , and the reason is you're trying to model reality in a tool . And how do you truly model reality ? It's really difficult to do so . You swear by it , I think you said , or you swear at it .
Walt SparlingThat's kind of how people say it , say a little about it , yeah .
Andy KaufmanBut my dad has a bricklayer as that's growing up , and one of the phrases would be a fool the tool is still a fool . The tool is not going to be the answer for project management . You could roll out a multi-million dollar enterprise-wide project management system and if people don't know how to use it , or if people don't use it , it's only going to be of so much value .
Walt SparlingThat's probably the worst not using it .
Andy KaufmanThe tool is rarely the answer .
Walt SparlingThe good PM will figure out a way to make it work for them , if that's all they have .
Andy KaufmanThat's right . That's a great way of saying it . Well , that's exactly it .
Walt SparlingSo you do a lot of teaching , you do the podcast , you do coaching and you do a weekly lead 52 email , which I get and love , especially the Friday follow-up . A lot of times I'll wait and read the follow-up Friday follow-up for the original .
Andy KaufmanThat's interesting . This started a couple of years ago , but the thought was people are just their inboxes are out of control , and so what's a way to , in a short message , get a leadership idea across , get people thinking about it over the week and I enjoy hearing back from people of what they're . Usually it's a question or two or three in the Monday , one and then Friday tries to include some comments from people , and it's another example of I learn from people that when they're responding to them or I think of the problem in a way that I hadn't thought about it before . So it's the idea of the lead 52 . It's about leadership and there's 52 of them a year . Technically there's 104 , like you said at the follow-up , but there's the 52 leadership lessons for free , so that's not a bad deal .
Walt SparlingNo , it's not . I appreciate every penny I spend on it .
Andy KaufmanYeah , exactly , in fact I could double your price there in your studio , exactly .
Walt SparlingSo obviously you've got some great podcast .
AI Made Simple
Walt SparlingI haven't listened to all 300 or 400 coming up now , but I've listened to quite a few and the one that stands out was a few months back and it was the AI , where you created an actual interview with an AI and I'm going to put a link to that specific episode in the show notes for people to listen to . But it's incredible , and I did notice that you have a course for PMs about AI . Can you tell us a little bit about what that is ?
Andy KaufmanYeah , let me give you a little bit of the backstory first , and that is that , generally speaking and this isn't just other people , it's me too it's easy to be about . It's easier to be afraid about things we don't know as well , right , and so I think AI is one of those disruptive things that it's very easy for people to feel like is this going to replace me , is this going to make me less relevant ? And everyone listening to us knows that the hardest part of project management is not the gantt chart , it's the people interaction , the stakeholder management and our two D2s not going to be doing that anytime soon . So we've got a runway here , but I personally wanted to go all in , and so in 2023 , I just went all in . It's like I want to learn this , so to the point where I'm using it on a daily basis and not just in a generic way .
Andy KaufmanHow does it relate to project managers ? Because you know what I see ? Well , I see see this on LinkedIn 35 prompts for project managers , and if you actually tried those prompts as is in a tool like chat , gpt or barred , or Microsoft co-pilot or Claude , if you actually tried those prompts you'd get , it would be meaningless because it doesn't have the context of the organization , it doesn't have the context of the project , and so I wanted to go into a lot more detail , and my friend , karen Bondale , just recently went through this . Ai made simple that's the name of the course , and he goes . I took PMI's free class in general AI , which , by the way , I recommend people do it . I am in the process of taking that .
Andy KaufmanYeah , and he goes , he goes . It was good because that's just an appetizer . Ai , made simple , is the meal for project managers . So that that that made me feel very happy because I , I think it's one thing to know about AI , but the whole goal of this course is hands-on experimentation . Uh , here , you know , there's , there's exercises and there's discussions , like you know , somebody will do an exercise and they'll leave a discussion point . I respond back . So it's , it's almost like we go through it together and you know , I , I , it's , to me it's ridiculously cheap because of of the teaching you get out of it . But I didn't want price to be the issue . I didn't want price to be the you know why they , somebody doesn't do it and it's a rare student that goes through it who doesn't say something like Now I get it , now I see , now I've got a vision , now I feel more confident .
Andy KaufmanOne guy said I Was the team skeptic about AI goes . Now it would be the go-to person AI , which made me very happy . So to me , it's not the brilliance of the course , it is when we're willing to actually open our mind to try something and experiment with it . And then you know , then , all of a sudden you know you're not following my instruction . You're like , oh , here's how it would work . At my god , here's how , like , you use it for some for your social media . So right , so now I see how I can use it for that . So it's it can . It can be applied regardless what someone's title is , but there is A lot of focus on people who are leading teams and projects around the class and that's where I want to kind of really focus on it , because that's kind of what that's my job , that's mine , my passion .
Walt SparlingAnd I have a friend of mine who's a software developer and he has a couple apps on his phone and he was showing me some of the stuff that he does with his and I'm just like , wow , that is incredible . So Sunday this actually Sunday I sat down cup of coffee on the couch , yeah , and I'm taking an AI course for blog writing , yeah , yeah , and I'm watching . I watched a few videos on YouTube and then I installed an app and started playing with the app and in the course of I don't know two hours and the final result took me about 20 minutes to create ideas for social media posts , a Course outline , that are for something I've been thinking about doing . I mean just amazing stuff , and I'm like I've been beating my head against the wall for so long in here and it just motivated me . So now 2024 is gonna be a whole new year , so I'm definitely gonna get this class .
Andy KaufmanI'm so happy for you because it it lit . What you just said . There is literally it . You got to sit down at the cup of coffee and you just got to say I'm just gonna just experiment . And you know , stay open minded to it . And you know , in the course we actually we don't take a stand on you know is , you know predicting what the future is gonna look like . You know , because anybody who says they know what's gonna happen in the future with this , they're just making up stories . No one really knows . Things have moved so fast but you don't really know what something's good at and what it's not good at if you don't experiment . So you've done enough experiment .
Andy KaufmanYou know there's some stuff that comes back from you like well , that's not my voice , so that's not how we would do it . But then you know how to tailor it and so it's , you know it's . I know a guy who , when you're not recording this , it would have been the equivalent of yesterday . He had to put together a proposal of a major international Standing up , a new international sales organization for a company , and he goes what do you think I should do ? I'm like , I gave him some background on it and he's he's able to present a proposal tomorrow that looks like he spent weeks on it and he doesn't take it exactly out of system . It's just a way to generate ideas and to give them , you know , to keep refining , refining .
Andy KaufmanSo the the , the model that this particular course it's called AI made simple . The model that it uses , or the metaphor , is this is your assistant . It's not your replacements , not a project manager , it's your . It's your assistant . You just got a free assistant . Or if you pay the $20 a month for some premium version , but you know you want to hire an assistant for $20 a month , good luck , right , but but man , you know it's . It's , truly is an assistant to help you get more done in less time .
Walt SparlingYeah , the brainstorming aspect of it . It's like I can feed it some information , give it some context and then , boom , it throws back all this data at me . You know , wow now I have all these ideas , I can start building on .
Andy KaufmanYeah , refine it , and sometimes I'll use it for like podcast episode titles . You know that . You know you don't want to make it sound clickbaity , but you also want it to sound like , oh , that might be an interesting episode to listen to , but it has to be honest to what the episode is , you know . And and so it's For grammar checking , although there's maybe tools that are better for that , but there's . There's all kinds of ways .
Andy KaufmanOn the focus of a I made simple is everyday use cases . So not not like a lot of stuff you read about in project management I'm like , oh , it's gonna do all this and maybe someday , but it's not doing that today . It's not doing that today , but what it can help us do are these things . So one of my favorite from project managers use cases is risk identification . So I mean , with all kinds of techniques we can use for risk identification , but what if you gave it the context on your project and said , by the way , identify based on this information ?
Andy KaufmanIn fact , typically the way I write the prompt , without going into all the details of it , is I'll give it as much background about the project as I think is possible , reasonable , and then just say I want you to identify 20 risks and , for each risk , identify what the risk is and what a potential consequence is , and take your best guess at what the probability is and the impact . Go one to 10 , where 10 is the highest , and then multiply those two together to give me a score , sort of descending in a table , and ask before you do this , ask me any questions about the project , wait for me to respond and then do the analysis . Right , so that is clearly not something you type into Google , right ?
Intro/OutroNo .
Andy KaufmanI mean that is like paragraphs and paragraphs , but I never take it as is . But usually what people tell me when they do that exercise is it came up with some risks that they're like huh , I don't know if I would have thought of that , or at least we hadn't thought of that yet . And also , by the way , I'll say in that one , include a column in the table for potential mitigation strategies . Yes , and there's only so much that it knows . So you don't just take it as is , but , like you were saying , it's a sounding board , it's a first draft , you know .
Walt SparlingSo that's a super practical
AI's Influence in Project Management
Walt Sparling. That is a fantastic example , because if there's one thing I see PM struggle with is risk creating a risk register , and there's the five or six that are common to every project and it's like , okay , well , what other things are going on in here ? This is a renovation or this is a ground up ? You're gonna have different risks associated with that , and that , right there , I think , would really expand someone's thoughts . Wow , I didn't even think about that . Like you said , that's a great one to add on there . Yeah , yeah , minimize the surprises that you get .
Andy KaufmanYeah , and there's gonna be a day when databases of our past projects and other planning information or the current project can all be included in that . It's not there . There's only one tool I know that is trying to do that and I'm interviewing them in about two weeks and they're pretty far down the path . But it's gonna be more and more where it's that . But for now these tools only know what you give them , right , and so you gotta give them a lot , and if they do , the more you give it , it is literally the garbage in , garbage out . The more generic you give it , the more generic the answer you're gonna get out of it . So it's been fun .
Walt SparlingThere's so many videos out there now . That is on prompting , the perfect prompt . Like you said , they give you these 30 prompts , but there's a whole process to it . You give them the , you tell them about what you're looking for , you give them some details of it , some background and , like you said , when I was doing stuff the other day , I looked for SEO keywords and then I went down and I started . I had like five other questions and then I said , oh , and based on , I said it create a game for project managers . So it did that , and then , like five or six questions later , I go and go back to the game that I asked about earlier and give me some , and I forgot what it was . Another oh , give me a series of blog posts based on that game .
Walt SparlingAnd it did it just went right back up and boom . This is fantastic .
Andy KaufmanYeah , it's like an assistant that is never lazy , never has a bad morning and always in a good mood for the most part , although this is early in . On Bing chat , before his more rebranded Microsoft co-pilot , I asked it to summarize an article and include some key quotes from it . And I double checked it and the quotes weren't in the article . I mean , the quotes were related to the article but they weren't in the article . So I confronted Bing chat and I said those quotes aren't in the article and they're like oh , I'm so sorry , I hear the actual quotes . I double check those . Those weren't in the article so I'm like those aren't either . They go , yes , they are , and I'm like no , they're not . It wasn't willing to back down and so I just thought that was kind of funny . I first argument with AI , so , but I don't know .
Walt SparlingYeah , ai is just , oh , it's everywhere and I , just with Friday night I think , I watched a movie the Creator .
Andy KaufmanAnd it's based on I've not seen that , but I've heard about it , yeah .
Walt SparlingIt's based on AI .
Andy KaufmanYeah , I thought that looked like a interesting thing . So when I interviewed Pamela so Pamela , pm for project management , a small E , capital , l for leadership and an A I didn't have that movie in mind because I but what I wanted to do was say , could I have a conversation with an AI ? That would actually be reasonably interesting . So what kind of questions would I want to ask , or what I want to ask it and without me knowing what the answers were , could I follow up and have it respond and just see what it would be like and then take the text of the interview and put it into a voice generator and start to personify an AI called Pamela that specializes in project management , leadership . So it was definitely a fun experiment .
Andy KaufmanAnd then a couple of episodes later gave her we'll call it a her the reigns to interview another AI . That was there . I just thought who's a leader from the past that we won't insult or anything like that , and so I just said she's gonna interview Abraham Lincoln , and then the entire interview was automated AI . I did not intervene at all . She asked the question , he responded , she followed up on that , he responded and it was all . Ai , it was , it was .
Walt SparlingThat one I have not listened to yet . I remember the ads for it but I have not . I gotta go back and listen to that Because now what I know , what I've seen , and I love the voice part of it , it just being able to ask questions and have it talk back it just seems so much more real when it actually speaks to you .
Andy KaufmanYeah yeah , which maybe it's creepy to some people , you know , and I don't know , you know , but I just wanted to experiment with it . So we've got a lot of experimenting going on with some video stuff right now and I just audio for sure . I added a audio lesson to the class two days ago and it sounds like me , but it's not me . I modeled my voice in 11 labs and if somebody knows me really well , like if they just listened to this interview , they would know it's not me . But it's close enough that if they don't know better . So at the end of the short video it goes by the way , this audio is all AI generated , could you tell ? Yeah , something like that . So it's fun to experiment .
Walt SparlingYeah , I saw . I know the deep fakes and all that that's out there . I saw an ad today on it was a spoof but on YouTube With a famous TV actress doing a car ad for a Mercedes that was all powered by AA batteries and everything about it was fake , but you can tell it was fake but it looked so close to being real .
Andy KaufmanAnd it's just gonna get better . Here's why I think this is still not a terrible thing is , we should always be skeptical of what we see in here , and so it'll just be more important than ever to just be well . I know that sounds like that's what they said , but let's just , let's just have a good skeptical eye . I think that's probably a good , healthy thing .
Walt SparlingNow I don't remember any copyright notices on your Pamela podcast because , trust me , I'm interested in trying something like that . I think that would be cool to throw some questions . That kind of create a normal like a co-host .
Andy KaufmanWell , here's the deal . If you want to interview Pamela for an upcoming episode , you just let me know , and what we'll do is we will make that happen . Oh , I love that too , absolutely , yeah , yeah , that'd be fun , that would be a great thing , absolutely .
Walt SparlingAll right . So AI was definitely a big topic , which is good , because that's what's in the news and on LinkedIn and on YouTube like crazy right now . Yeah , let's see Trying to think of some other things . What if you have some advice for PMs for 2024 , maybe one nugget , two ? If you got it , what would be your advice ?
Andy KaufmanYou know , I mean certainly I'd be remiss if I didn't mention AI . As far as make it a year , if you didn't make 2023 of the year that you dove in , make 2024 of the year that you dive in , just because it's not simply to reduce any fear . Yeah , because I don't think people are .
Developing Project Managers' People Skills
Andy KaufmanI don't think most project managers are sitting around and losing sleep over it yet , but it's one of those things where there's just so much help that's available to you . But I think the thing that I see I mean I teach organizations as big as like we run project management courses for the United Nations , so as big as the UN and as small as 15 people companies so we get to see it all . We get to see cross industries and organizational cultures and the one common pattern that we see across all of them and it's not gonna be different in 2024 , I'll go on a limb and I think it's maybe always been that way is it's usually not the technical aspects of project management that is the struggle . It's the people side of project management that is the struggle . So I would say that increasingly it would be helpful for all of us , like here's , I think it's fair to say most people listening to us will understand that project management is not a title . Project manager is not a title . Everyone's a project manager . Now , everyone's a project manager . It doesn't matter your title is we have to hit due dates .
Andy KaufmanWhat I think is less obvious to people sometimes is we're all salespeople , we're all consultants . And I grew up as a software developer , walt , so if you had told me I was a salesperson , I would have to go take a shower . You know , like I don't wanna be a salesperson . They're the people that make promises you can't keep . But consultants there was just the people that were charging too much , and you know , you know there's that . But if I think increasingly understanding that it's not just your technical project management skills , I keep getting better at that . But how do you develop your influencing skills ? How do you really get better at influencing and negotiating and dealing with conflict , and those are the things that automation and AI and robotics . It's gonna take a lot longer for them to be able to get convincingly good at .
Andy KaufmanAnd the truth is , even if this wasn't a subject area like what we just spent most of our time talking about , it's still something we need to focus on . I think too many people don't think of themselves as a salesperson , and what I mean mostly by that is because I think sometimes our mental model of what a salesperson is is slimy , slippery , trying to get people to buy stuff that , like a car dealer or Mercedes car dealer , it's that's the right . Salespeople are like what's the need and can we help meet the need ? And if not , then it doesn't make sense or it's . And if we can get better at trying to understand what are the elements of influence and what are the elements of a true ? The best consultants , the best consultants understand , try to get a good understanding of what is the problem and how can we put together a plan to address those problems and to work with you and collaborate . And so I don't think that's new in 2024 . And I don't think that was new maybe in 2014 .
Walt SparlingYou know , I don't know , I think that's just , and I think it's .
Andy KaufmanIf you look at a lot of textbooks on project management , they're getting into the subtleties of estimating techniques that no one's really using in the real world and no one's not a true statement . It's very few you know . They're talking about techniques that maybe if you're a defense contractor , you're doing those things . But for most of us , where we are spending most of our day to day , there's some basic project management stuff we need to get to know and then from there it's developing our people skills , our stakeholder management skills , the relationship building skills I suppose related to some of that might be like . You seem to be a lot more active on LinkedIn , for example , and I think project managers would benefit from that , from a relationship building . I'm amazed at how much learning is available you know through the discussions on LinkedIn .
Andy KaufmanYou know , I think crazy , and I'm not talking about LinkedIn learning , which is fine , that's a whole other thing , right there . Yeah , but just the interaction of like oh man , walt's comment was very insightful , or you know , just the give and take . It is free learning , although it's time , and so that's something we have to balance .
Walt SparlingYeah , but the networking aspect of that and the information that's shared is sometimes there's some fantastic nuggets out there and I follow a lot of .
Walt SparlingI think last year , probably towards the middle of the previous year is when I started really getting up and I've been on LinkedIn for 20 years and it was just recently that I started following more and getting connected and putting myself out there and amazing the number of the connections that I've made . I have a trainer I don't know if you may have heard of him , joseph Phillips . He's a phenomenal guy and I took one of his classes when I went for my PMP and then I joined one of his Facebook groups and we were chatting one day about something in messaging and found out we're both into bourbon and cigars . And last week I've been talking to him now for two years . Always we're gonna get together . Always we're gonna get together . Earlier this year he was playing golf with a guy who happens to be a super good friend of mine , didn't even know it , they were talking and he said oh yeah , I know a guy who's got a PMP up in Tampa , walt Sparling , and he goes , walt Sparling .
Walt SparlingAnd so the three of us got together last week for cigars and whiskey and dinner and it was fantastic . After two years , you never know the relationships that you're gonna build through , starting out with social media .
Andy KaufmanYeah , yeah it's . I mean , there's so many stories we could talk about . But it's one of those things where I think , if I was listening to us , an earlier version of me would just say it's neat idea , I totally get it , guys , but I don't have time to take lunch , or so it feels , and so you can come up with whatever your strategy is . But there's all that time people go , you go from stalker to follower to liker to commenter . So even if you just start just kind of checking people out and start liking some things and start adding some comments , you don't need it to be a poster yet , you just look to develop it .
Andy KaufmanI had longer ago stopped worrying about follower accounts and stuff like that or the typical social media metrics , because to me it just doesn't really matter . That's not my job . Most of what we do is just the workshops and the keynotes and that's . But I will say it certainly has led the business , but it's more like how do we start discussions ? Like how do we start discussions and join discussions and then you can start discussions . That's , that'd be a good focus .
Walt SparlingLove it . So you're a busy guy and I know you're probably trying to enjoy your holiday week . So I have one more question for you , and I hope you're prepared for this , because you can't leave until you answer Every episode . We do it . Did you know some fact that you can throw out that someone may or may not know about , but is you find interesting and maybe some of the audience would so ? Do you have it ? Did you know ?
Andy KaufmanYou know , I suppose my everyone is a salesperson was the my did you know ? But you know , I would say that , when it comes to being effective from a project , major perspective , man , we've talked about LinkedIn , that's something . How about this ? Let's go with this one . I make a living where I'm in front of audiences 150 to 200 times a year . Now , okay , and that may sound like a lot , that may sound like a little , but here's what you don't know Is there was a point in my career that if I had to stand in front of a group of 10 people that I would have been so freaked out that I would have had trouble sleeping the night before .
Andy KaufmanAnd so how do I go from that guy who would melt and be freaked out and wanna puke before speaking to now thinking he has the best job in the world , like we talked about before , and it wasn't overnight for sure . But here's the did you know ? I'd like you to consider is I think a lot of times we tell ourselves I'm just not good at presentations , or I'm just not good at negotiating , or I'm bad at math , or I'm , you know , fill in the blank . And there are probably cases where those are genuinely true in certain circumstances , but so many of them end up being self-limiting beliefs and , at the risk of making it sound woo , woo , I'm not well . All I would say is , if somebody in the year had really wants to get better at something , most of it is skill-based . You know , most of it is skill-based , and if you're willing to do the work , it could be that the thing that you'd really like to be able to do .
Andy KaufmanYou know there's a lot of people that feel like they have the golden handcuffs at work , like I can't well , I could never , you know , start my own podcast , right ? You thought that for a while , probably . You know , there's probably all kinds of things you're toying with for the new year . Like , ah , I could do that , but you've learned that , well , wait a minute , I can spend the time sitting with a cup of coffee and learning this .
Andy KaufmanAnd what I think a lot of people don't realize is this is gonna sound way too much like a cheesy motivational speech , so forgive me that if you really want it , all you have to do is kind of figure out where can I learn about it ? And the opportunities to learn have never been greater now . And so I think , regardless of what it is . You know it's saying all right , who does this ? How can I follow ? How can I learn more from them ? You know it's , I'm telling you from the guy who couldn't sleep the night before a presentation to . I'm doing it almost every day now . It's totally possible . It is totally possible .
Walt SparlingOne of the things that's on my list . Speaking of that is , I feel pretty comfortable talking to audiences . Obviously , here I talk to a lot of people , but in front of so one of my goals this year I've already set it up with a friend is joining Toastmasters so that I can get even better at speaking to large groups of people . Ah yeah , it's a great program . You gotta put yourself out there .
Andy KaufmanIt's one of the best programs because it's a totally psychologically safe environment . Everyone else is in the same boat . For a while , I was in a Toastmasters group that everyone in the group was a professional speaker as well , and that really set the bar in pretty unique ways . But I took stuff away from that . That . I mean , that was more than 15 years ago and I'm still using those ideas now today , so it's a great program .
Walt SparlingWell , andy , I just wanna thank you again for coming on . This was an honor to have you on here and I'll put together some show notes , put some links to some of your podcasts , your services , your classes , definitely going to press that AI and get signed up for that one myself , the AI class . So I look forward to having more conversations with you down the road and I will reach out to you about that interview with Pamela . Absolutely , yeah , that sounds exciting .
Andy KaufmanI bet she's pretty darn excited about it too .
Walt SparlingOh , I'm sure You'll have to ask her about if she's heard of the PM Mastery podcast .
Andy KaufmanI'll have to , although with hallucinations you never know . Is she just flattery or does she really know ? Yeah , so that's funny , yeah .
Walt SparlingAll right well , and I wanna thank everyone else for listening to the current episode of PM Mastery . Thanks , andy .
Intro/OutroThank you all . Thanks for listening to the PM Mastery podcast at wwwpm-masterycom . Be sure to subscribe in your podcast there . Until next time , keep working on your products .
