Synergy IQ: 0:01

Welcome to Creating synergy where we explore what it takes to transform. We are powered by Synergy IQ. Our mission is to help leaders create world class businesses where people are safe, valued, inspired and fulfilled. We can only do this with our amazing community. So thank you for listening.

Daniel Franco: 0:20

synergizes and welcome back to another episode of The creating synergy podcast. My name is Daniel Franco and today we have a very special episode with an amazingly talented individual. Mr. Vinh Giang, who was a highly regarded international keynote speaker and entrepreneur and magician and i Master in teaching communication skills, wins passion for magic and self taught business skills lifted his family out of poverty and into a top tier income bracket and award winning entertainer and international keynote speaker and entrepreneur and a co founder and director of Encyclopedia of magic and unlike magic school that instructs over 41,000 students per year. Additionally, is the CEO of luminary productions, where he coaches a select few businesses and latest teaching them how to compete on an emotional level. The son of Vietnamese refugees Vinh learned from a very young age to take adversity head on, his father worked double shifts at a factory while his mother and sisters would dedicated every available inch of their backyard to farming so that they could earn extra money selling produce to the local supermarkets. When quickly embarked on his own adventures, from buying things on eBay to selling them to classmates for twice as much and then contracting school bullies to collect payments for any customers that owed him money. Just six months short of completing his degree in accounting, when decided to take a leap of faith and do the scariest thing that he could imagine. He told his parents that he was giving up school to pursue a career as a magician and entrepreneur. Needless to say his father was not happy that his son wanted to be the next Harry Potter. But after three years of hard work wins magic Tutorial website began to take off, winning him the prestigious South Australian Young Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2013. The business has since joined forces with 52 cards, a leading US based online Magic School. Together the two organizations will instruct an estimated half a million students per year. In recent years, Vince speaking careers exploded due to his unique ability to seamlessly interweave the principles of magic, business and success. Pre pandemic, Vinh spent 80% of his time traveling from continent to continent, performing and presenting one of a con business keynotes about building confidence, boosting presentation skills, facing fears, problem solving, and pushing limits during the pandemic Vinh turn his skill sets to creating online programs for many of his clients, specifically for the company's learning management systems, which one of his key clients being Microsoft, where he's created an internal communication program for them. Other key clients of Note have been Facebook, LinkedIn, zoom, Merck, and many many more. In this episode, Vinh and I touch on his journey from being a magician to becoming an international keynote speaker and his strong belief that life is a miracle and we should not take it for granted. We also deep dive into the story of his family, his thoughts on entrepreneurship and building a successful brand, how to overcome imposter syndrome. His definition of what great communication is some tips and tricks on becoming a better communicator, self awareness and reflection and how to manage fear. I know you're absolutely going to love this chat. And if you would like to learn more about some of the other great and amazing speakers and leaders that we've had on the creating synergy podcast, then be sure to jump on our website as synergyiq.com.au Or check us out on the creating synergy podcast on all the podcast outlets. Cheers. So welcome back to the creating synergy podcast. My name is Daniel Franco. And today we have Vinh Giang on the show. Welcome to the show, man.

Vinh Giang: 4:19

Thank you for having me. I see this wall of pictures of incredible people you've had and now there's this guy from Salisbury North. It's brilliant. If you've lowered the bar, so I could get.

Daniel Franco: 4:30

Yeah, I think your modesty is coming through there a little bit. Thank you very much. I've been following you for for many years now probably about five or six years, which I can't believe you've been following me for that long, which is strange to have you in this room and be chatting to you for me. Yeah. Okay. You know, I've actually watched a couple of your YouTube videos where you've gone and targeted people and I've gone I've gone and taken the same approach with us. Thank you very much for being here.

Vinh Giang: 4:56

Take it on board my stalking skills. Do you use things against me? It's brilliant.

Daniel Franco: 5:04

Now we got to be friends. That way you say. So

Vinh Giang: 5:09

when you when you get to when you're over my house for dinner, we respect you.

Daniel Franco: 5:15

I'll be there next week. So I just want to kick off this show, there is something there is a story that I really love that you've told previously. And it's it's the story of your of your old man of your dad, where he talks about the simple concept of life is a miracle. Yeah, can we jump into that story because that sets a really good foundation of who is Veen and where where you come from,

Vinh Giang: 5:41

my dad's story starts in Vietnam. And just the number of times my dad nearly died. So my whole my grandmother, on my father's side, she has seven children. And she only had enough money at the start of the war, to try to send one child away. That was my dad. So my dad, first of all, and I've never told this before, but my dad had the opportunity to leave. So my grandma gathered all the money, and at the time, it was gold. And then she gave my dad the gold to give to this person in the neighborhood that was escaping Vietnam on a boat. So my dad gets on that boat, they don't get two hours out, the boat falls apart. And people die. My dad kind of drifts back to shore doesn't make it all the gold's gone. Done. So he comes home, and he almost died. And that was my dad's first kind of encounter with death. And then he has another encounter. And again, during while they're escaping the war, and there was a trap that the Vietcong would lay. And that's, you know, the traps you see in the war movies now, where it's the bamboo or sharp, my dad falls into one of those with his younger brother, he's holding in his arms, and he falls into it, but I just haven't laid the trap yet. Her survived again. And so my dad has, could just go on this forever, because my dad told me 1000 times, but he always have has these encounters with death. And the craziest part is he survives them all. So to him, not only is that a miracle that he's alive right now, because again, if you talk about conception, yeah, and the whole fact that to even be conceived is one in a billion, or whatever it is, yeah, he then dodged death all these times. That's amazing. More than this, they finally got on the boat, get to Australia survive getting through Thailand, pirates and everything. So to him life is a miracle. Yeah. And then I am born here in 86. So I dodged all of that. And then now I'm here. So in a way, if my dad passed away or died at any of those points, I would have been would not have existed. So His luck is my luck. Yeah. And that's why I take on this approach in life is a miracle. I had a anniversary dinner with my wife. Congratulate, I think, yeah, thank you. I don't know, six years, six years, I've been together. 12 years. Yeah. And I asked just a question. At the end of the night, I said, How was the last 12 years, six years married? 12 years together? Yeah, how's the last 12 years. And she goes, none of it was boring. And I love that she said that, because part of life being a miracle to me is that you were not here for very long. You've got to make it fun. You've got to make it an adventure. Doesn't mean the adventures are always great. But you've just got to make it worthwhile, not only for your own sake, but for the sacrifices that everybody else before yours.

Daniel Franco: 8:42

I mean, do Yeah. Do you feel like that? Grit determination and resilience that you got from your old man has been passed through? And, and that's just sort of seeping through your blood? Right now? Is that kind of where that zest for life come from is knowing that you've come from refugee parents who are refugees to living a life where, you know, I mean, Australia is one of the luckiest countries in the world. Heaven on Earth, man. Yeah, it really is. Absolutely.

Vinh Giang: 9:15

Yes. And it comes through the stories that he's told me that has made up who I am. I've thought a lot about this. Because I think, you know, I didn't go through those experiences. So why does it impact me so much? You know, I didn't live through the war, I didn't nearly die because of the war. And so I've always thought, I mean, it's not genetic memory. But what the hell is it? And the more I think about it, the more I start to understand what makes us up as people. What is your identity? My identity is made up of stories that I told myself, it's that from those stories, I form values, and from those values, I'm able to extract certain beliefs about what's possible, what's not possible, but it all starts with stories. Yeah. And when Young my dad filled my head with stories, stories of adversity story of overcoming hardships, stories of poverty. So I'm made up of those stories as the foundation is set, isn't it? Yes. So my dad telling me the story since I was young that you can go from nothing. It's just starting again in your late 20s. Starting again, with nothing, you know, country don't not even speaking the language, then to be able to build a life that was great. I mean, we weren't abundant when I was young, but it was still amazing. Yeah. But to do that, that was a story I was fit. So you can do that. You can escape a boss. And so that whole idea of anything as possible, so the door was open? Yeah, my mind was fully Yeah. Because my dad would always tell me see what we've been able to do. Nothing that is halfway across the world to this. So that all of a sudden, for me, that was a part of my DNA, because it was stories that I've been fed already. Yeah. See, that's the importance I think of, you know, what, what stories are we feeding ourselves? What story? Do you feed yourself? What stories are you keeping and replaying in your head? Because in my head, I replay that story a lot. So then a lot of gratitude comes from that. Yeah. And a lot of grit comes from that. Because I kind of know that that's a part of me. But it's also very easy for me to play a different story, one of hate. And this still happens a lot in my community. When they think back to Vietnam, they think, ah, you know, Damn these people that there's so much hate still. So I could play that story, and then I'd be very different.

Daniel Franco: 11:33

Yeah, absolutely. It's interesting. Do you Yeah. Do you pass on those same sort of stories to your son now?

Vinh Giang: 11:41

I do. But lightly, yeah. And I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. But it's

Daniel Franco: 11:47

because I'm just thinking as a father, yeah. I really believe in the idea of stories and telling and educating through stories.

Vinh Giang: 11:54

Yeah, absolutely.

Daniel Franco: 11:57

But picking and choosing which are the right ones, and really understanding how much you can go all in and what to hold back. And

Vinh Giang: 12:03

yeah, my dad didn't hold a lot. He's pretty savage. Yeah. The stories were

Daniel Franco: 12:07

very, and is that is that the answer then or do we need to but I mean, you turned out okay, yeah. What

Vinh Giang: 12:14

seems a bit strange for me to be telling my dad's stories through meetings are you know, how hard your grandpa, you know, get through the war. It doesn't feel as authentic right? Because it's my it was my dad's story. My stories are different. My story is the ones that I do talk to my kids and even my nieces and nephew about when I struggled starting my business, and how I had to battle with being demonized by my own Vietnamese community because I took a path that was less common. Yeah. So So my story is different. The struggles are different. And because I connect with those stories more, I told them those stories, you know, I don't tell them the stories of dodging bullets running through the jungle at 2am in the morning with a three month old, but I I've heard him they make up who I am. But I think again, if I'd say it one more time and I it's kind of like Chinese whispers he loses its

Daniel Franco: 13:03

Yeah, but I think that's the the power of storytelling. Yeah, well, that's

Vinh Giang: 13:07

yeah, my dad's from, but again, it's not really PG when my dad told him. It was a few years. Yeah, yeah.

Daniel Franco: 13:13

It's how old Xander now

Vinh Giang: 13:14

for four years Oh, wait, another [inaudible audio]

Daniel Franco: 13:19

really isn't. So talking about your career path. And you mentioned you have you often joke about it and a lot of your keynotes about how you've not taken the traditional Asian path of accountancy.

Vinh Giang: 13:35

It's real. Many Asian kids suffer still today. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 13:40

So what are the three? What are the three ways?

Vinh Giang: 13:45

There's there's a doctor, a lawyer, accountant, there's a pharmacist. Yeah, very popular in the early 2000s. I've been now since the now it's hard to get a job as a pharmacist. Oh, oh, not pharmacy anymore. It's, you know, back to the original three near the go for that. But there's there's a deeper reason behind that. It's because refugees, they've done a lot of adversity. So what they starve is security. So they push their children into these different areas because of security. Yeah, yeah. And we're blinded by security. Yeah, that's, that's what happens.

Daniel Franco: 14:18

Absolutely. Yeah. And our parents often pass on those insecurities than i

Vinh Giang: 14:23

It's isn't that true? Also for the Italian community? Absolutely. Yeah. I'm living. Yeah. Right.

Daniel Franco: 14:31

So you decided to go completely the other direction and become a magician? Yeah. What, what where did the love of magic come from?

Vinh Giang: 14:42

It came from wanting attention. Okay. Yeah. I think at a deeper level, you know, it's kind of having time to think about it now being in my mid 30s. It came from girl growing up and having just no attention as a kid. Not getting a lot of attention, always being invisible. Always be ignored. Are you the only child? No, I've got a younger brother. And I, I just wanted attention. And I didn't know how to get it and magic. In a way it's the most fraudulent way to get attention is the cheapest way to get attention. Because you're not actually magic. You can't actually do magic. And you're tricking people into thinking you're amazing. You get the attention. So to me, I was like, what, what a brilliant shortcut. This is amazing. So that I just went all into it. And it came from kind of a, you know, kind of sad, tragic truth. But I just, I lacked confidence. I wanted attention. And it was the fastest way to get attention.

Daniel Franco: 15:40

Yeah. But one, I think where you would have learned so many great truths.

Vinh Giang: 15:47

Yeah. Well, the craft itself taught me so much

Daniel Franco: 15:51

that I think the time that dedication, yes, the application, all the above

Vinh Giang: 15:58

won't to be astonishing. takes work, correct? Yeah. It taught me that if you want something really magical, it's gonna take a shitload of work. Yeah. Yeah. And it also taught me that there's a lot of average in this world. There's a lot of average, but to truly, because, again, in the world of magic alone, right, there's, you know, if you do a trick, and someone goes, Oh, yeah, that's what a trickster. That means you haven't evolved to become a magician, right? To become a magician to create something truly astonishing. You have to practice for so 100 1000s of hours, so that when you're doing your sleight of hand, they can't see what you're doing, huh?

Daniel Franco: 16:35

Yeah, that's,

Vinh Giang: 16:36

I have to find a moment. I gotta show you some slides.

Daniel Franco: 16:40

I've watched some videos. Okay. That's but it's, um, you teach me something that I could amaze my kids with?

Vinh Giang: 16:49

Yeah, I checked my back.

Daniel Franco: 16:52

The, the grappling of working with your parents or helping your parents understand that you're going to take this route. How did you? How did you go down that path?

Vinh Giang: 17:03

The thing that convinced them the most was money. Yeah, yeah. It was. Because again, fear scarcity, right. So to me, I remember the first time I got my first gig, doing a local networking function here in South Australia. And it was for two hours to our networking function. And I quoted the client, two and a half $1,000. And they were like, one and a half 1000. I was like, done. I'll take it. I didn't realize I could charge that. And then I did the networking function. Two hours made 1500 bucks. Yeah. And I brought it home. And I thought, You know what, this isn't enough to show my parents yet. So I kept going. I did this for about a month, and I got $10,000. So I showed them I made $10,000. Working about six nights. Blew my parents away. Yeah. And from that point, I saw their mind open. Yeah. Because I knew that I sure I could sit down and talk to them. Hey, let me do what I love. But one of the things I learned from a classic book, How to Win Friends and Influence. Oh, it's really right. So if you're going to go fishing,

Daniel Franco: 18:05

I'm looking at gas because it's the number one book I recommend.

Vinh Giang: 18:10

Not the number one argument but I think it's so amazing. Yeah, but the thing is, one of the things I remember for that book so vividly is if you go fishing, are you going to put beef brisket on the hook to try to catch fish? That's my favorite. Yeah. No, no, you'd put on worms, right. And I remember this lesson so vividly. So when you go fishing, use the bait for the very thing that you want to catch her and I wanted to catch my parents approval. Yeah. So I wasn't going to use doing what I love. And because to them, they can't understand that. No, because I didn't do what I love in my life. worked my ass off to put you through school. What he told me do what you love. No, do what makes money. Yeah. Right. So to me, I had to speak their language. Their language was money, right? Yeah. So then I thought, okay, how can I do this? I proved it. And then that's when they mind something open. They go, well, instead of doing this six times a month, can you do it? Can you do it? 20 times? Yeah, I need to do all these things.

Daniel Franco: 19:06

The manager.

Vinh Giang: 19:09

Oh, they've taken a big cut. But it's just, it's just so it just took time. Yeah, to not get so wrapped up in my own world and go, why my parents are supporting me. Why don't they love me what, but to sit down and go really think about this and put myself in their shoes and go, ma'am, my parents don't speak this language. They don't understand this new world that we live in. They barely know how to use the internet. I need more empathy. I need more understanding in my heart to try to reach out to these two people who love me with everything. But because of this inability to communicate because we live in different worlds. I need to take the time to build a bridge from my world to their world. And it starts with speaking their language. Absolutely. Right. And I don't mean that my parents are not money hungry monsters, but but that's the language that they knew. Yeah, you Yeah, and that was the beginning of everything I use. It's yeah,

Daniel Franco: 20:03

I use a common thought process of you know, the old saying treat others the way that you want to be treated. Yeah. And I actually believe that that's a fallacy. I believe it's treat others the way they want to be treated.

Vinh Giang: 20:16

I believe that to that point. Oh, yeah. It's good.

Daniel Franco: 20:20

To find out who's better. Yeah. How old were you? When when you went through this process? And early 20s? Yeah. So who introduced you to the world of reading books on personal development,

Vinh Giang: 20:30

my uncle car, so I've got an uncle who's not an actual vehicle, but he's he's like, I think this guy's crazy. My uncle cars, one of the youngest uncle's, right. He's a Toyota Hilux. My uncle, he asked my dad, his brothers, they all worked really hard together to help support car three, you know. Uncle Toyota, and they put him through university to study pharmacy. Yeah. And the crazy thing is, it took him eight years to complete a four year degree. And all the products are like, Why are you every year wants it's very expensive. So

Daniel Franco: 21:20

we didn't do it part time it was because

Vinh Giang: 21:24

this is so enduring, because, you know, I look at it, I'm like, What's going on here? Right. And he goes, Why didn't even know the language. Yeah. And that was the crazy thing, I would have failed at 10 times every year. But he goes, because I didn't know the language, I had to learn the language while I was learning everything else. So it's incredibly inspiring. So the brothers worked hard, so that at the end of his degree, when he came out, you know, they would support him and, and then he put together pharmacy due to pharmacy. So he was an incredibly inspiring uncle of mine, because he was the only one that made it through the tertiary education system that was very westernized. And he was the one that always read. When he owned his pharmacy, he worked hard to ensure that every morning, he doesn't have to come into work to 11. And that's because from seven to 11, he would read, you know, well read about, you know, strategies on how to build a property portfolio, commercial property. And, and when I was about 14, the first book he gave me was how to win friends and influence people and the magic of thinking big. I didn't read those books at 14, I wasn't there yet. But he worked so hard that he would come over to our my house my cousin's places, because he didn't have children at the time, he saw all his nephew and nieces as his kids, because he felt so indebted to his brothers. And he goes the best way to give back to my brothers, two children. She'd come over Thursday nights all the time, and goes to Tommy, what did you learn from chapter one? I was like, ah, and I didn't do it. I didn't read it. But he kept coming. Yeah, he kept coming. So then it It forced me on what I have to because my dad was getting upset, because I'm reading the books. And I started, you know, the age of 15. Yeah, assuming these books didn't I didn't understand them, though. Yeah. But they were in my brain. Yeah. Yeah. They're just in my brain. And I mean, the simple lesson I remember that book, you know, don't criticize other people. You know, appreciate people. I started doing that at school. I remember starting until my teachers, I appreciated them. And so that was like, what? Yeah, it's

Daniel Franco: 23:25

amazing. I feel like I was introduced to me later in my life. I reckon I was about 24. When I when I got introduced to the world of self development. Yeah. And I always have thought to this day, imagine if I had learned this stuff through school,

Vinh Giang: 23:41

right? Because you could have become a magician. Magician. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 23:47

Seems like a great part. I feel that in the sense that it opens your mind to how to that book particularly changed my life, because it all of a sudden became I was a very, very, I'm a very people person. I love conversations. I love being around people, extroverted by nature, all that sort of stuff. But that book showed me how to treat people. It helped me understand how other people might be thinking, Yeah, and it helped me understand how best to work within a situation. If there's conflict or whatever it might be. And it just, you know, sharpen the edges, I guess. And yeah, I wonder Yeah, I've always wondered that. What would it be like? So you're, you're you're obviously a testament to that that you started reading? And did you just continue reading personal development books from that?

Vinh Giang: 24:40

No. All right. If my uncle didn't come on a Thursday, I wouldn't read the chapter that was assigned. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I was a normal kid once you started, did you then just consume? No, I didn't know it was it was a discipline that my uncle enforce. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn't something that I was in because I didn't see the benefits from it. Yeah, I didn't know how to recognize the benefit. Yeah, you probably Right. I again, I think as a young male, I mean, all I was thinking was I want a Toyota Supra. Yeah, I mean, that's the only thing I was thinking about. Man that's gonna get a body kit at age CRO rooms. Yeah, that's

Daniel Franco: 25:13

all like the chameleon, buddy.

Vinh Giang: 25:17

That must be the Italian. I didn't care about any of them. Yeah. But always being fed medicine I was being developed, I was being improved without even knowing now, there was a split off point. So I hung out with a group of guys, when I was young, that probably wasn't very good for me. Because these guys were into some pretty bad stuff. What saved me was this one point where obviously the self development had been working its way through my mind where it gave me enough awareness to go, wait, I actually don't think I should be spending time with these guys. Now, this wasn't my parents say, this wasn't my uncle saying it. But the books have made me realize the importance of the people you spend time with. Yeah. And I went, What am I doing? And I remember this when I was about 18. And these were these, you know, these are my boys when I was 18. You know, all you care about when you're teens is your friends, you know, and I left my tribe. That would have been no way that she wasn't. Because I'd realize where they were headed. And it actually wasn't hard leaving the tribe because I'd become a very different person, by the time I left, thought my distance grad, it's like, you know how they say, you leave a relationship emotionally six months before you've left generally. So a lot of the times when guys leave a relationship, but you know, don't feel anything more, because I left emotionally six months ago, I left that friendship group six months before us before. And it was crazy, because I only left because I'd become a different person through consuming all of these different lessons and stories. If my uncle didn't give me those books, I wouldn't have become a different person, I would have stayed a certain person and stayed on with that group. So it's, it helped me make better decisions. That being one of them. Yeah. Yeah, it's my mentor. Think back is scary. If I didn't. I'd be a very different person sliding door moment. Yeah. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 27:21

Do you

Vinh Giang: 27:21

have the chameleon? Did I make maybe I could have been could have lived a better life. I could have been more successful.

Daniel Franco: 27:30

Yeah, I think that, you know, actually multiple universe theory they will Hmm, that might be happening somewhere else.

Vinh Giang: 27:36

Oh, I could be happier and more fulfilled?

Daniel Franco: 27:39

Well, I would highly doubt that. Yeah. Well, you're obviously doing the right thing. It sounds like some, I mean, curious about the importance that magic played in your growth towards your keynote speaking your entrepreneurship. And, and, you know, because you talk about things like showmanship, you talked about things like Sight Sound sync. Talk to me about that. Talk to us about?

Vinh Giang: 28:09

Well, the question is, right. What is magic done for me? How what lessons has taught me Yeah, and I can definitely talk about the showmanship area as well. And but magic has just opened my mind to the possibilities. I remember seeing a magician named Raymond Crowe. I don't know if you use pretty famous Adelaide magician that made it on the global stage yet. But he used the Bosque in the animal. And I remember seeing him for the first time. And he did this trick where he made this card float, you know, just like floating around him flying around, and you'd catch it. And also what? Because I had certain rules for reality. And my rules for reality is that, well, you can't make something float. You can't make something disappear from one hand and reappear in another hand. It can't make cards come out of your mouth. These define the realness of reality. Yeah. So that magic opened my mind in a sense. So wait, so you can bend rules in where you can bend the rules of reality. So at a very foundational, almost philosophical level, magic opened my mind to the possibilities of what this life could give you. And then I later found Tim Ferriss, and he sums my whole experience with magic in a short sentence. Reality is negotiable. Love so magic taught me that reality was negotiable. So I couldn't negotiate whatever reality that I wanted. And once you open that can of worms you can't put them back down your you can't. So when you show me cards can float and you can make things vanish. You can't tell me that that world does not exist now. So to me at a really deep kind of cognitive level, it opened up my brain to the possibilities of what this life could be. Because all that that like this life could be for me at the time was okay, well, I'm going to become a pharmacist because my uncle has a pharmacy and he has aspirations to have a chain of pharmacies and my dad's in on that. And so that was the path for me. I didn't dare to stray from that would have been a relatively successful path. Oh, absolutely, absolutely. But But to me, is it a fun path form for me? No, not really. It's not a fun path. So that, at a foundational level opened my mind to the possibilities of hope your listeners are not lactose intolerant. But this is very cheesy. It's just opened my mind up to the magical life that we could live. Yeah, right. We could genuinely live a very magical life, if only we would open our minds and see it. Another great quote from a psychologist don't remember his name. But it's rather a mind opened by Wonder than one that is closed by belief. negative belief? Yeah. So I've always wanted to keep an open mind. And magic just opened my mind and made me see that this life if this reality is negotiable. And some people never negotiate anything, because they feel so trapped by the rules of reality that they've created themselves.

Daniel Franco: 30:56

Yeah. And the people's perception? Yes. on them.

Vinh Giang: 31:00

So that's at a very deep level. Yeah. Touch changed my life. No, that's

Daniel Franco: 31:03

perfect. Yeah. Did you? At what point did you think about turning your magic into Keynote? Korea? Like, where did that come in? Because your communication skills are amazing. And you obviously speak and are an expert in all things communication. Talk to us about that journey from from your getting up on stage as a magician into I'm actually now teaching and educating Okay,

Vinh Giang: 31:33

which starts at the fringe at the Adelaide fringe, right. So I started doing the Adelaide fringe since 2013. And performing magic and just magic. It was exciting at the start. But after a while, the applause started to feel empty for me. Or this beautiful Doris Day song about, you know, empty applause. And it just felt empty. And I feel empty, because you're clapping for something that I am not really able to do. Okay, so you think you think I'm reading your mind and you think I'm able to read your body language cues? And I'm able to do it? No, I just have a really expensive device that I've purchased. And this is just technology you don't yet understand.

Daniel Franco: 32:15

Is that simple? Yeah. Well,

Vinh Giang: 32:17

it often is right. Magic is the simplest solution. Yeah. It's just that the simplicity fools you because you're naturally complex. Yeah. Yeah, we tend to think things are more complex. Yeah. Because then we can use complexity as the reason for not doing something at a deeper surface. Well, it is because when we look at someone who's successful is too hard. I can't do it, they can. So human beings love to assume complexity, because if I assume complexity, that's a great reason for not doing it.

Daniel Franco: 32:44

Yeah. I can do this. Because there's a million reasons, but because if but

Vinh Giang: 32:48

but in reality, if it's super simple, you're in trouble now. Yeah. Because then you have to do it. Yeah. No, we don't want to right. So okay, so back to that. So then I started doing all these pieces of magic on stage. And then I went, Ah, man, you know, thank you for the applause. I'm not actually that amazing. You're giving me this false Applause So then it started to feel empty for me. Don't get me wrong. magicians who perform look are very respectable craft, making people smile and make people laugh, very noble. But for me, it wasn't enough. And I did it for three years at their like fringe, we started getting bigger and bigger. But the more successful we became, the bigger the theaters we got, the more tickets we sold, the more dissatisfied I became. And I remember at the peak of this brand that myself and Matt Tarrant, a local magician here brilliant magician that we created. I said to him, Hey, man, I'm going to part ways. I don't want to do this anymore. And I remember he was gutted. Because we built this amazing brand. I came back year after year with a better show. But I had, I had to walk away because I just didn't feel it anymore. And that's when I knew I needed more. I didn't want just applause. I want an impact. More than just entertaining you for an hour, I wanted longer lasting impact. So that's when I went, Oh, this speaking thing is amazing. Because I can entertain you. But I can also educate and I can inspire you. So there's so many things I can do here as opposed to just entertain. And that's when I went down the path of can I combine magic? And can I combine it with speaking while you're on the stage already? Yeah. While it's comfortable on the stage, raise

Daniel Franco: 34:19

my hand. That's exactly right. And you can now just add to your show by educating

Vinh Giang: 34:23

Yeah, but it wasn't that simple. The first time I combined magic with a keynote. It was shit. Yeah, it was really, really?

Daniel Franco: 34:32

Yeah, the story where you came off say, Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 34:36

Guys, have you done this before? No, I haven't. Yeah, actually. I refunded that guy's money. And so the story was, I got paid two and a half grand for this gig. Flew to Sydney for a building Association gig. Got off stage. I think everyone was like, What the hell did we just watch? Because it was me going. Here's a magic trick. Here's a lesson that has been Nothing to do with a magic trick that I don't fully believe I just read somewhere that I thought was brilliant on social media and Karolina didn't correlate it. There's no authenticity to it. It was just kind of me vomiting what somebody else said, regurgitating that gone around. Oh, yeah, there is there is. Sometimes I still fall victim to this. I'm not immune to this. I still regurgitate a lot of stuff. In a way we all like bees. They vomit. Yeah. I just learned that recently. I was quite disgusted by white eating beef.

Daniel Franco: 35:30

Go Yeah, man. I still look at that. Yeah,

Vinh Giang: 35:33

I still like it, too. So I I was doing that. Yeah. Put no thought into it. And I refunded the money that I got paid because I felt sick in my stomach. I just couldn't stomach it.

Daniel Franco: 35:45

Were you not concerned for your brand? At that point? refunded

Vinh Giang: 35:50

I didn't have a brand at that point.

Daniel Franco: 35:53

Okay, yeah, we did from more than magic.

Vinh Giang: 35:57

Yeah. And the magic brand hurt me when I was trying to move into the corporate world. Okay, because Oh, then we we've already got a comedian coming for that dinner after dinner slot. So we don't need a magician. And I was like, no, no, but I want to be this. I want to be the speaker. Yes. Oh, yeah. No, it's actually work against the hurdle to jump. Yeah. But deep at another kind of deeper level. From a business standpoint, magic taught me the importance of being unique. So I didn't know that the importance of you know, your unique value proposition, right in the world of entrepreneurship. Magic taught that to me. Yeah. So I thought, ah, by adding magic, I can become extremely unique, but unique at the start when you don't understand how to be unique in your own unique way, was damaging, because I was seen as just the magician. So I actually had to completely forego a career in the world of magic. I had to go online and clean up my online blueprint. You couldn't find me or you can book me as a magician anymore. Yeah, I had to sacrifice that path to open this new door. Because when people Googled me, they are magician now. So that's scary from a security point of view. Because I spent seven, eight years building this brand is being a magician. Absolutely. So I had to clean it up within 12 months. And that was that was frightening, but also aligned. Yeah. Because I was no longer getting a lot of fulfillment from it. And there's this Tarzan thing, right? For Tarzan to get from one branch to the next. He has to let go of the existing branch. Yeah. Otherwise, you will never get the other branches true. So there's a point where you're going to have to let go of the branch and to me, the time was, I needed to let go. Otherwise, I just keep swinging on this branch in it's gradually going to snap. And as long waterfall. Yeah,

Daniel Franco: 37:41

I remember the day I stepped out the girl walked down. Tell me about it when I walked out of the office for the last day. Into pursue this business is in 2018. And I just I remember literally pushing the door open and breathing the air in and going I'm on my own now. And it was scary.

Vinh Giang: 38:05

Did you tell the boss

Daniel Franco: 38:08

internally I had I had resigned and I just remember the day I actually you know when you talk about being aware in the moment walking out of the doors this you know the revolving it was literally the virtually revolving door God movie. Yeah, for the last time out into the world where I was gonna you know for sure. My own business. Yeah. Was was enlightening. And the scariest moment of my life in the same in the same moment. It was why? Because, you know, put on your big boy pants now. Right?

Vinh Giang: 38:42

You're responsible for you know, I'm

Daniel Franco: 38:43

responsible for me and your family. Yeah, absolutely. Two young kids in the middle of building a new home. Like all the above, I just literally walked out at a at a time and took a punt. But

Vinh Giang: 38:55

why did you do it? If the risks were so high,

Daniel Franco: 38:58

I just couldn't work for anyone anymore. I needed to be a mastermind domain I had to be able to create. And I was being stifled where I was. So that was I just had this. I have this obsession of creating a community of like minded people. So similar to what you you're doing right. I think that's why we connect is that it really is about giving and offering and working together. And I where I was before, didn't give me that fulfillment.

Vinh Giang: 39:29

So but I love that. You weren't getting it where you were. So you went out and created it. Yeah. As opposed to accept that I'm never going to be able to

Daniel Franco: 39:38

correct Yeah,

Vinh Giang: 39:39

I that will that accepting wasn't an option, because you could feel it. But for some people accepting is an option. Why isn't an option?

Daniel Franco: 39:46

I think it goes back to your comment of not seeing the possibilities of being having a closed door or being scared with failure. I mean, yeah, the growth mindset. So to start Yeah. Failure is not an option for Some people but for me, I had a family like if I was to go out and start a business and and fail, and I was the worst thing happened I moved back in my mom and dad's house. You live in Grange, right? Like you should actually do. I did that while I was doing I'll never do.

Vinh Giang: 40:20

But I think like that, for me was the the worst case scenario, fall flat on my face, and I walked back into a home that's gonna have a beautiful home cooked meal every single night. So Bloody hell, brilliant. It would be a massive hit to the ego. Yeah, but not so bad. In retrospect, not really. Compare correct one others go through. Exactly. So you you you had good perspective. Absolutely. Yeah. You know, you didn't paint this false picture that created fear. I love this quote, where they say fear is just terrible use of your imagination. Yeah. Right. So you didn't use your imagination to paint a terrible pitch? Yeah,

Daniel Franco: 40:54

yeah. Well, fear is is thinking about something that hasn't happened yet. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, I've I never. I didn't look that. And that's not to say that I wasn't absolutely shitting. Myself. Yeah, I was. I was worried and concerned. And it's one of those things where I honestly believe if your backs up against the wall, the only way is for like, yeah, so just keep moving forward.

Vinh Giang: 41:21

I think also, when your backs against the wall, sometimes people fail to I don't think it's always I mean, it's just because I've seen it. Yeah, I It's funny at the start of my entrepreneurial journey. I was that typical entrepreneur, you know, screaming entrepreneurship from the rooftops? Why isn't everyone leaving their job? Yeah. Come on, guys. That's all quit. That was me. It was terrible. My friends hated it. And it was because it was nauseated. And I just because I was like, why is why isn't everyone not doing this? Being in it now for you know, being on my own now and running my own business and everything. Oh, gosh, you know, since 2011 to 10 years now. I'm not as quick to scream that from the rooftops now, because I've seen the horrors. Yeah. I have seen down well, not only for myself, but I've seen the people around me. Yeah, I've seen people up with their backs against the wall. I've seen people who have then mortgaged their home. I've seen people who've then sold that home, and now are still doing terribly. And it's one of those interesting things in the world of entrepreneurship, where we, we sing the we sing the praise for the successes and people who have made it, you know, but we we don't, we don't talk to those who have lost it all. And that's the more common story. Yeah. Which is kind of frightening, man. It really, absolutely. And when I was in America, so a lot of that. I mean, it's the land of hopes and dreams, right? Where everyone aspires to be more, but there are a lot of Broken Dreams and broken people. And that's the reality, right, because it's easy to make this path. Glorify this path. But it's a bloody path, man. Yeah, it really is. It is. Yeah. And we're both here sitting here. And we've somewhat did okay. But man, there are a lot of people who didn't?

Daniel Franco: 43:11

Well, yeah. I mean, you like my posts recently on LinkedIn where I said, I'm having one of those. Yeah, yeah. Right. And yeah, it was one of those days where I was possibly having, everything went wrong. Like the moment I woke up in the morning, my phone decided just to go widescreen. And I said, you know, just that's not. And that's a first world problem. But it just snowballed from there. Yeah. And then I often say this on the podcast is entrepreneurship is one of those things where you can have the best day and the worst day in the same day, and hour in the same hour, right. And it was funny, I had this this day of events where things just and Kevin Gibbs was witness to it over things just kept turning for me and going in the wrong direction. And I was just trying to the day will pass you know, this day will pass this day will pass. And then at the end of the day, I've got a phone calls for 30 and was for this tender big project that we'd put in and then my phone rang. And I could see it was the company that was calling me. And I went on not today, like don't call me today, please don't call me today. But I answered it and said Hi, Daniel speaking. Daniel, this is such and such just want to inform you that you've been successful. Yeah, and so you can just imagine the elation that went through. Yeah, yeah. And that's the thing about you know, this entrepreneurship world Yeah, it's gut wrenching at times but some some other times is you know, he's the best feeling in the world.

Vinh Giang: 44:47

Yeah, and look it's it's it's a debate I had with one of my best mates on one of my best mates and I Ollie, we do a podcast as well. We're just talking about books. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 44:56

And yeah, no watch.

Vinh Giang: 44:58

And you just said to me, we Do you rather fives in terms of experiences? Would you rather just fives in life? Or would you trade the fives for nine out of 10s? But if you trade it for the nine out of 10, you're going to suffer one out of 10s. So do you want this kind of nice, middle ground through all of life? Or do you want the ups and the downs? And for my mate, Ollie, he goes, I'd take the fights. I take consistent fights through life. Oh, wow, that's ridiculous. I definitely accept the nines and example ones. But for him, he's different. Yeah. And there are many people out there that are different. And to connect this back to what I was saying before, I remember my friends saying to me, they said, Hey, Vin, stop telling me to quit my job, man. Yeah, I'm not you. And then that's when I egotistical Wangka, part of me, but I started to realize that everyone's not me. Yeah, everyone's different. And it's okay, it is. And I learned a very big lesson that day to let other people be themselves. Stop trying to force your ideologies and your beliefs and values on other people. You know, it drives me insane when I see people, you know, who are well intentioned in the religious realm, but they force their religion on others. I don't like that. Yeah. But I didn't realize I was forcing the religion of entrepreneurship. On to the people around Yeah. And it just taught me such a valuable lesson that you're you. And Daniel Daniel, yeah. And that's okay.

Daniel Franco: 46:23

I do that I did that with books. And you know, like, yeah, and learning. And, you know, the more and more books you picked up, the more and more you learn, the more and more things you realize shit, what I learned on my mother's knee is completely not correct. Right? And and I now have this whole new vision on the world and the way it works and a way I can apply myself and a new way of thinking, and I was just like, Guys, you need to get the hands on this information. It's amazing. Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 46:53

It's like when people first get on keto, yeah. Tell everybody about keto. 100%

Daniel Franco: 47:00

Because you're learning something new. And it was over the years that I realized the more and more I read that, and the more and more I learn, and the more and more I experience was that the the moment needs to find the person. Yeah. And not the person find the moment they need to be ready for it. And I believe that even just with the books that I read today, it is yes, I've got a book, but I don't need that whole chapter because I'm not Oh, that whole book. Sorry. Because I'm not ready for it. Yeah, I'm not ready for it. I'm ready for that one chapter. Let's see, that's the only bit of learning I can take out of this. So everyone's gonna, everyone's like you said, everyone's on their own path.

Vinh Giang: 47:38

And you have to let people walk that path. Yeah, I used to try to think I could, you know, the whole, I'll save you, you know, but it's not about that. I think what you're doing is perfect. The stoic say it right, there's only two things you can control your thoughts and your actions. That's all you have control over. So if you want to move others and influence others, these are the only two things you can control. So you read more, you learn more, you do more. And in doing that, you inspire those around you to do more, read more. And that's all you can do. Yeah. Anything outside of your thoughts and your actions if you think you can control? Yeah, that's an illusion. Yeah, that's not real. No. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 48:22

You're not magical. No,

Vinh Giang: 48:23

absolutely not. I would say the that's the

Daniel Franco: 48:27

Viktor Frankl quote. stimulus in response between stimulus and response, there's a gap and in that gap is choice. Oh, yeah. That's good. Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 48:37

I love the I love that.

Daniel Franco: 48:38

So your entrepreneurship world so can can we pace back? Let's we've digressed and gone down the rabbit hole. You started this online magic company was that before you decided to go off and start this world of community speaking? Oh, that

Vinh Giang: 48:57

was painful. That was before? Yeah. Yes. Before that was in 2000. And like, 2010 Yeah, well, I started out with a group of friends. Yeah. And that was my first attempt at trying to do something that I enjoyed. That gave me money and also brought fulfillment. But before that, there were a few more attempts.

Daniel Franco: 49:14

Yeah. Okay, so a few failures. Oh, yeah.

Vinh Giang: 49:17

I thought I was going to be the next Cogan. I thought I was gonna be the next What's that brand quarter coming with the quarter I think it was was called Charlie Chandler's remember that electronic store? Yeah. So I was super inspired by that when I was really young, because I sold you know, the Backstreet Boys. Britney Spears albums that were awarded to this electric electronic store. And when I bought it, I want to own electronic stuff, because then I could buy all the CDs and get all the latest computers. And so I asked my dad when I was about 18. I asked him for 50 grand to send me to the console fair in China. Yeah, so I could see all the electronics there. Currently, my dad gave me $40,000 Or those 50 Yeah, why and I went So I went with one of my cousins and one of my uncles, and I bought half a container 40 grand worth of electronics back to South Australia. And you know, Newton shopping center. Yeah. They I couldn't afford to lease an actual shop. So I said, Give me that corner. That nothing is there right now I'll build a stall in that corner. You can monetize a corner that you don't monetize. And that corner is freaking huge. Yeah. So they gave me that corner for really cheap really started selling mobile phones, game accessories, we accessories and selling stuff that will make it 11 grand a day. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And then Akbar knocked on our door. And we're selling electronics without the the electronic approval. Oh, no. I $40,000 of stock. We've only been in business for two weeks. Yeah, unbelievable money. Finally had money to buy my Supra which was amazing. And then I was just like, What the hell's going on the stand? You can't you can't do this. Yeah. So they did

Daniel Franco: 50:57

and black market

Vinh Giang: 51:00

chips crossed. Sunday market started right. All these electronics in the market? I love Italians. I love Greeks. I love the community. Why? Because they dress really poor. Yeah. And then they come across and they pull it once a year. How much? They pay you $400 cash for Sunday markets. This is our first Sunday market. I remember getting there like 3am to get the best spot at the jumps cross. And first there were like 17 $18,000 Yeah. And I went out to all my dear friends, we went from big faced and went for a big meal.

Daniel Franco: 51:32

That's hilarious. How much cash? Oh,

Vinh Giang: 51:35

yeah, how much a better deal. What is the warranty? i The gym? Market? Right. So that was great.

Daniel Franco: 51:43

Once you bought it, no receipt?

Vinh Giang: 51:44

Oh, that's what I learned to the edge of it. Because the week after this farmer came along and he goes, Oh, you know, this TV phone you sold me. All I can get is SBS. And I was like, that's what I learned my first lesson. Entrepreneurship of having to go, I'm sorry, there's this there's no refund.

Daniel Franco: 52:00

I'll speak English.

Vinh Giang: 52:05

Yeah, so that that was you know, I and I did these different ventures to try to find what I wanted. Yeah. And that wasn't what I wanted. I didn't want to do that. And so I stopped that. And then I, you know, tried the magic business online. And I kind of enjoyed that. But then the team composition wasn't right. So then I learned another lesson there that you've got to do it with the right people. Like you synergy, right, you got to have good synergy with people, you've got to have good chemistry with people. So that to me is a huge indicator now. With the things that I do. It's one of the seven habits Morpho fantastic. Yeah, fantastic. And and that's, I always ensure that if I before I bring someone on my team, how strong is the synergy? How strong is the chemistry, if it's strong chemistry, technical stuff will work out later on? You can upskill you can learn other stuff. Yeah, but if the chemistry is strong, we're gonna make it yeah, this is gonna work. So the other magic business was one of those early journeys where you learn a lot of valuable lessons. Yeah, Google AdWords cost us over 100 grand because I just left it running. Oh, no. Oh, yeah.

Daniel Franco: 53:06

Did it help with revenue? No, no. No, with

Vinh Giang: 53:09

crappy ads. I had to write good ad copy.

Daniel Franco: 53:13

Yeah, no to self

Vinh Giang: 53:16

edit. Google ads, right. And during that time, they had no competition. They weren't. They weren't gonna get oh, that's fine. No, we had to pay it. Yeah, we had to pay it. And I did move into my mom and dad's garage. Yeah. And I had my wife now. She was my girlfriend at the time. We lived in my mom and dad's garage. Right? We had to buy this portable air conditioner. During summer. It was so hot. Right. And I just I just I love my wife so much. Right? Because we suffered through that. And she never complained. Never complained superstar. Pay when pay when should be paid now. Yeah, but it's pay when? When do you pay? Never. So.

Daniel Franco: 53:57

So let's talk about that transition to the world of keynote. So you've gone from the entrepreneur world. Did you ever in those early years and possibly still now? Did you ever suffer from imposter? Oh, yeah.

Vinh Giang: 54:16

Yeah, I felt it last night. Yeah. Well, last night, I was preparing for a session. I was working with Microsoft Middle East. Right. So Microsoft is a massive company. And I've kind of I'm in now and as I've done work with Microsoft, America, Singapore, Middle East, and first I'm doing for Middle East and some pretty high profile. People are on that virtual class I was running. And I sat there and they sent me the list. And I went now, I shouldn't have looked at the list. I looked at it. I felt like this was the literal thought that ran through my mind. I'm about to do a session. That's magic tricks, and Asian jokes. And I psyched myself out. Yeah, I psyched myself out. And the content that I'm teaching is like a cat sat on a mat. What am I doing? I don't deserve to be here. And then I had to go inside and needed a pep talk for my wife before I could go in and run it. So I suffer from it all the time. I suffer all the time. I think I'm like everybody else, you know, and yeah, and I'm trying to be better I'm trying to grow. But because I suffer from imposter syndrome, it's, it's why I'm, I fall victim to the material world. Right? So I'm aware of, I'm aware of myself in that and I still do it because I'm like, Shit, I suffer from this. I'm trying to be better, but I still fall victim to I want the one nice watch. I want the nice shoes. I want the nice belt. But when I think at a deeper level, why do I do that? It's because I feel insignificant is because I don't feel like I'm worth it. I don't feel like I am worthy. So I have to wear this armor to show people that I'm worthy. So that's my battle that I fight with. Because I suffer so deeply from imposter syndrome.

Daniel Franco: 56:05

Right? I feel we're on the same path. Really? Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 56:08

You know that the wearing Gucci shoes point so you're still fine. Yeah, but

Daniel Franco: 56:14

the thing was me with clothes, nothing makes me look good. So I don't waste my money on that stuff. I buy houses, but because my wife

Vinh Giang: 56:27

telling you Well, my mom would be proud. Um, but yes, I

Daniel Franco: 56:33

do. I suffer from it a lot. Well, how do you I mean, and especially early in your career, you know, there's this common saying that you know, it takes 10 years to become overnight success, right. And you push through the barriers and the the imposter syndrome and the no one clicking on my videos, and no one listening to my podcasts and all the above. Right? You had what? What helped you push through while getting up on stage and really not believing in yourself? Yeah, okay.

Vinh Giang: 57:01

Well, two things. First thing is, I'm not just me. I'm my dad. I'm my wife. I'm my son, I'm my father in law. I'm is a part of you. That's with me. Now after this session. I'm not just me. So I get a lot of comfort in knowing that. What makes me valuable as a human being. It's not just been Jane. It's all those have come before me. It's the wisdom that my grandparents have instilled. In me. It's the wisdom that my mentors have instilled. In me, it's the wisdom that all the books that I've consumed have instilled in me. So what gives me confidence on stage is I'm not standing there alone. I'm standing there with 100 or more people behind me, you just can't see them. So that makes me feel less imposter syndrome, your support group? Yeah, well, because I'm not just me. I'm not self made. I think if I believed that I was self made, then yeah, I'd feel a lot of anxiety. But what keeps the imposter syndrome at bay is hang on now. This is not just me speaking. Some of the lessons I've shared with you today, I've learned from my mum and my dad. I've learned from the wonderful books that I've read. We've mentioned the titles, right. So that gives me a lot of that comes my mind and my wife has to always remind me of that. The second thing that gives me a lot of comfort is imposter syndrome is not my enemy. It's it is my friend. Because if I don't feel imposter syndrome, right? So imagine, imagine, I think I am the shit. And I'm sitting here you'd feel the vibes of I'm the shit, right? Imposter Syndrome stops me from becoming that because imposter syndrome reminds me that I'm human. It reminds me that hey, man, you got to get better. So I stopped seeing it as this crippling FOMO that is there to crush me. But I see it now as a reminder to how are you being better? How are you improving? So I use it as a friend now it to me it's a friend. gentle reminder as opposed to a crippling, but sometimes it's still crippling, but it's a lot less crippling now. Yeah, it's more become that kind of slightly mean friend. Right? So slightly mainframe that reminds you Hey, get better.

Daniel Franco: 59:17

Yeah. Is it is self this imposter syndrome come from the continuous comparison to others. Like if

Vinh Giang: 59:25

so many facets to imposter syndrome, I think.

Daniel Franco: 59:29

But if you get up on stage Yeah. And you're talking about communication. Do you compare yourself to the Malcolm Gladwell of the world to the Simon cynics of the world?

Vinh Giang: 59:43

I don't because of the way I think about it. Okay. Think of a gym. Simon Sinek is the treadmill. Malcolm Gladwell is the benchpress Yeah, I'm the row. Yeah. Okay. It's not about I'm not in competition with them. If you get Simon Sinek, great, you should get me too. Because you should work on rope. It's good for your posture. It's good for your back. But you should do the treadmill is good for cardio. Yeah, we all teach in different ways. And what I realized what teachers do, is we just find unique ways to basically teach the same thing. But the way that I teach it opens up this group of people, the way that Simon Sinek teaches opens up this group of people. So I've had students come to my class and say, literally said me, just go in I, I think this is stupid. And that's okay. That means I'm not for you. That's totally fine. It still hurts what you're saying to me. Yeah, that's totally fine. But yeah, but find your tribe. Yeah. And find the people because you're not meant to serve everyone. This podcast is not meant to be for everyone. I'm not for everyone. Yeah. And I've just learned, I've just, I've learned to be okay with that. Yeah. You know, I've walked away from working with clients. And I've had clients who said to me even more, you can't say that. And I just go, well, that's okay, then maybe we should need to work together. Let's just not let's just keep this and make it easy. Let's just not work together. And I, it's while I talk about my favorite book. My number one book is the almanac of navall. Rava Khan, I love that I have so good, right. So

Daniel Franco: 1:01:12

you know, not many Nevada should be at the pinnacle

Vinh Giang: 1:01:16

of everything. It's not a religion, you start a religion and join it. Yeah. I mean, I, what do you want me to sacrifice?

Daniel Franco: 1:01:24

Yeah, that is a book that I jam down people's throats for now. And this is me

Vinh Giang: 1:01:28

too. I will. But I will continually jam it down everyone's podcast series is, is amazing. One lesson from that book is I mean, one of his core values is I want to help people get wealthy so that they can be themselves more. And I've never been able to in my life, been able to turn away things with comfort, because I used to have a scarce mindset on I need every client I can get. But it felt so good man being able to say to some of my clients, he's go, Hey, look, and I know this is a luxury. And if my business turns into crap, then trust me, I'll take everything on. And yeah, you know, again, I'm human, right? But I'm just fortunate to be in a place where I can turn work away and say, Hey, what, let's not do let's just not work together. Because I don't think I'm for you. And I don't think you're for me, because you're trying to bend me and make me into something that I'm not. And I'd rather just not do that. Let's just Let's just not Yeah. And it just felt so good doing that man. Because I feel like now I can finally just focus on the people that like me for me, and want me for me. Right? And classic example of that is when you're young, and you're trying to find love. And you get into relationships where your partner is forever trying to change you. When you find a relationship where the person loves you for you, man, it blew my mind, then you'll because my whole life growing up, my partners kept trying to change me. KPMG so yeah, I mean, I remember ex girlfriend, you bring it up where they say, Hey, my dad's my dad's not gonna let us be together if you don't become a partner of KPMG. Or if you don't get into this accounting firm, or, you know, and, and that's sad, man. I mean, why not? Let me be me. And the reality is now being in mid 30s. I just No, no, you can't change people. Yeah, absolutely. You can't say yeah. Sorry. That's another rabbit hole.

Daniel Franco: 1:03:16

i Yeah. Where are we? Where? Are we? Yeah. So communication is your is your niche? Yeah, you talk talk about communications, both from a personal point of view, to a, how to communicate within a corporate environment, business environment, within relationships, all the above. But communication is so much more as body language, it's self awareness. It's confidence. It's all the above? What is your definition of great communication?

Vinh Giang: 1:03:55

I use music as my metaphor. Great communication happens when you're able to move people with your music. And you can move people with your music. There's two areas that you've got to get good at. One is the music itself, you have to write great music. Second, you have to play the music really well. Okay, so I look at it like that. So great communication is when your music moves people to either take action, move people in a way that you influence you persuade, right? So that's great communication. And the message gets across, you get the point of the music, you know, I've learned something, I get this. So I use music as my metaphor. And what I find is, there's always this debate in the communication world. Is the content more important? Meaning? Is the music more important? Or is the delivery the way you play more important? And the real answer is both. And I feel people now I have to I mean, I remember last night I actually had to point it out and say to the group that look, I know I teach communication. From the point of playing the instrument, but that's not to say that the technical side is not important. Because if your information sucks, and you're really good at talking, that's not gonna work, you'll get found out, it's just not going to work. So the answer is both. To me great communication is when you're exceptional at what you do, technically, and you're amazing at being able to communicate that across. To put it concisely, communication is connection. Being able to connect very deeply. And you're very good at this. Because us sitting here, we don't really know each other that well, but look at the level at which we can connect right now. So I base communication on somebody's ability to connect, and you're connecting very well with me. And I think that's just goes to show how great you are at communication. Thank you. So a huge part of it is connections

Daniel Franco: 1:05:53

that over their head wobble over here. Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 1:05:56

Send me the check. Pay me later. That's fine. Just

Daniel Franco: 1:05:59

gaps cut that. Make that a video. And we'll just post that everywhere.

Vinh Giang: 1:06:07

You start running communication classes directly. Just found a competitor, my friend, my uncle.

Daniel Franco: 1:06:16

Yeah. So the importance of communication in in the workplace, then talk to us about that, and what work you're doing. Because you've, you've gone down, I've kind of skipped over a lot of the keynote stuff. But now we're sorry, yes, well, I'm really, I'm really passionate about number one, building trusting relationships. And you talked about that, it's about holding the room, hold it holding the space for someone to be able to feel comfortable to speak like I believe communication isn't just the person who's speaking, but it's the person who's receiving. And so I really interested in your, the work that you're doing with corporate world, and how you educate?

Vinh Giang: 1:07:02

Well, for example, I'm so grateful to be working like with a brand like Microsoft. So they bring me in to work with all of the new hires. Every year, I'm responsible for training the aspires, which is their new hires that they bring in 5000 people every year, 4000 to 5000. Every year. They're engineers. So they bring me in, to help these engineers communicate in a way that is more influential because A, they're young. But the reason Microsoft hire them is because they're young, and they're brilliant. But the problem is, when you're young, you're afraid to voice your opinions, you're afraid to voice your ideas. So you've got great music, but you don't know how to bring that music to life so that those who are more superior than you often older than you will listen. And one simple example is if a young person doesn't speak in a confident manner, and has lots of filler words and non words in their language, and don't use their body language, well don't storytel Then even if they have a great innovative idea, that innovative idea dies on the battlefield with them. So what I teach them to do is show you've got an idea, I empower them to be able to bring that idea to life, to play the shit out of that music, so that when others listen to it, it gives that idea a chance. It gives them a chance to be heard. Whereas so many ideas fall on deaf ears. Because either personally that lacks courage, be because the person plays the music poorly. Or see, I mean, they don't feel empowered or don't have the skill set required to be able to bring it to life. So that's what I do. I help them learn how to play their music more effectively in a way that's influential. So it's heard, because what Microsoft realized was that so many people, so many ideas were not being heard. Yeah. Does that make sense?

Daniel Franco: 1:08:49

It does. It's so great to hear a company do that right with them. Yeah. They're putting or they're empowering their people to speak and be heard. Yeah. So kudos to Microsoft. on that. Yeah. What

Vinh Giang: 1:09:03

any companies are doing this now, which is amazing. And they realize the importance of diversity, not only of culture, but of thought, which is really cool. Yes. So now imagine you've got 5000 engineers, who now feel empowered to share ideas. Think of the pool of ideas you get to access now. Oh, that's amazing. Yeah. 5000 beautiful songs being played. Now you've got an orchestra

Daniel Franco: 1:09:29

and you help unlock but that does that not make you just think to yourself? I like it, let's be if we break it down. I do feel proud if I do feel super proud because those ideas possibly could be the next piece of technology that changes the world.

Vinh Giang: 1:09:52

I feel happy. I think that's the way I was just looking for the right word, right? It's yeah, sure. I feel proud. I feel a lot of You know, I feel great about it. But what makes me feel is happy. Because I, because I have such scale now teaching virtually, I get messages all the time. And it's people who write me the three or four paragraph messages that I love sitting and reading, I've got a folder on my Dropbox called good vibes. And I screenshot all of the messages that come through. Because these are lives that I've been able to impact and have changed on where they say, oh, man, I just got this promotion. Or I just had a client of mine works for CBRE Glen, I'm sure he doesn't mind me calling him out. But he just got promoted from from Singapore now to a position in Seattle in the US. Because he was able to shine brighter. He had these ideas in his minds all along, but now he's brought them to life. And now he's been able to bring it's almost a movement behind his idea now. So I my vision statement for my me as a teacher is help make the invisible visible. That's my vision statement. It's so good. And it could be the person it could be their ideas. It could be their passion. It could be their product. It could be their service. In the words of Rihanna shine brightly. Right. I want to help people do this. Yeah, I want to help them shine bright. Yeah, yeah.

Daniel Franco: 1:11:19

What is one way without sort of diving into the paid work that you do too much? From low hanging fruit point of view, where every one of our listeners right now could take away? Yeah, to improve their communication.

Vinh Giang: 1:11:35

And that's it's okay to go into the paid content. It's I don't protect it with everything. We just make them pay Parsons was the reason why people were talking about this.

Daniel Franco: 1:11:43

That's the reason why the Chinese just have to pay.

Vinh Giang: 1:11:47

What are you, I like it, I guess, the others would be proud. The first thing I'd say to do is awareness. become very aware about how you currently come across to others. And the way you can do that is very simple. I've got a very simple process called recording review. Yeah, record a five minute video. And if you want to build even more awareness, record a 10 minute video of yourself speaking, just get your phone, and then a few little hacks that I've learned along the way, don't do it in selfie mode, because then you'll get too damn conscious of looking at yourself. Just use your front facing camera, hit record, turn around, so you can't see yourself. Place it in front of you. Stand preferably. Talk for 10 minutes, five minutes. If you're beginner, do it for five minutes. Just talk straight for five minutes, content is not critical. Talk about your day so far. If ever food where you want to travel when we can travel again, contents not important. But go for the full five minutes. Once you're done, reviewed in three different ways, play the audio and just listen to it and listen to how you come across. Take notes on how you sound and just start to listen. Because when you got five minutes, it's a long time to listen. Start taking notes on what you like and what you don't like, what are some of your limitations. Grab your phone again, after you've done that now press play, put it on mute and just look at yourself. Take notes on your how you're coming across visually what your body language is saying about you. Are you smiling? Are you moving your face so you you're moving your hands in a way that's distracting. Just take notice build surface level awareness. And then the final way, don't listen to it and don't watch it. Get a transcribed. Look at your communication from a completely different point of view. And when you get it transcribed as these brilliant things, you can check what you say leaving my non words and leaving my filler words. Your non words are the sounds we make to fill the silence. Filler words are the words we use to fill the silence. And so do you know what I mean? Like, print it out, get a red highlighter, and highlight all of your non words in your filler words. become super aware of the words you're using that add no value that declutter your message and decrease the clarity of your message every time you speak. It's like those notes if you if you hear a great song, and they're playing a beautiful song and you know, his Twinkle twinkle little star on the piano is like Da da da da. And then also that slight off note is a filler word. Yeah, it distracts people. It takes the beauty out of communication. It takes the influence out of it.

Daniel Franco: 1:14:13

Or the amount of times I've said I've counted someone who's up on stage speak, I've counted the arms, you've counted have counted That's sick. Yeah, it is disgust infuriates me and all I can hear is the um,

Vinh Giang: 1:14:23

well. And like you said, communication is 50% what the person receives right. It's not about eradicating it completely,

Daniel Franco: 1:14:32

because we're human looking there.

Vinh Giang: 1:14:34

It's okay, they're there. They need it, but decrease it by 95. We don't need it every second word, right. That's what I'll do. First of all, just know where you're at, and start that self awareness. This is the equivalent and often say this is like looking into the communication mirror. When's the last time you looked into the communication mirror? I mean, we look in the mirror every morning to dress ourselves. We need to look into the communication mirror because that's what people see every day. Yeah, so I start that

Daniel Franco: 1:15:01

I can vouch for this. The I listened to every single podcast back, once, if not twice, and really more from a critique point of view to really understand my questioning techniques. The way I speak. I've had I asked for brutal feedback from people as well. One piece of feedback that I got was Dan, you sugarcoat everything you say with the word I guess, which means it takes away what your power to say their power about of what you're about to say, by using the word, I guess. Yeah. And so I've tried to eradicate that. I still throw it in there every now and again, but but it was very prevalent in some of those earlier podcasts. If anyone goes back and listens to now I don't say it anywhere near as much. And I think you're right, it is just about power of repetition, really understanding every single day, what you're doing.

Vinh Giang: 1:15:53

When you play an instrument, the first time you play the saxophone, you're going to suck. The 100 time you play it sound better. It's practice. But it's about being aware of the practice. Because if you're playing the saxophone poorly, and you don't listen to yourself back, you can create an illusion for yourself. It's why some of the people who get on Australia's Got Talent back in the day or whatever, can sing terribly, but be shocked when they get terrible feedback. That's what happens when you don't have self awareness. That's what happens when everyone around you, tells you you're amazing, but you don't check to see if you actually are amazing, or if it's because mom really loves me. Right.

Daniel Franco: 1:16:28

So that's a key point is self awareness about picking the right people to give you feedback.

Vinh Giang: 1:16:32

Yeah, I mean, don't ask a random about how you can improve your communication skills, because they may not know how to communicate effectively themselves. Right. And that's just the reality of it is build self awareness, and you will improve from there. And of course, you're gonna get to a point where you plateau, because it's unknown unknowns is the Johari Window, right? Like you need to, if you want to know more unknowns, you have to seek out a teacher. Yeah, that's where I advise to find a teacher, find someone who can help you take it to the next level,

Daniel Franco: 1:16:59

would you say that lack of self awareness piece is the main contributor to poor communication? Yes. And because

Vinh Giang: 1:17:06

you're unaware of how you come across, you have no idea how you're using the instrument. Yeah, right. I mean, this is how I know. Because when people listen to an audio of themselves, they freak out. Our head the way I sound. Everyone says that, which means everyone doesn't review how they communicate. People don't even like how they look on camera, which again, shows me that well, it's because you don't review how you communicate. This is real time, what you and I are doing, I can't be aware of how I sound and everything all at the same time. While I'm doing it's too hard. Why do you think professional athletes watch their game back?

Daniel Franco: 1:17:46

Yeah, yeah, I love it. That's exactly what that's a piece of information that I give to everyone is that is the constant review. Yeah, I grew up playing sport. That's why I believe sport actually plays such a powerful part in society purely from after every game, you go back and you review what you did wrong, or where you could improve or what the opposite opposition did to, to beat you or, you know, and so you're constantly learning. And I apply that in everything that I do. Yeah. And then the review, I think, from going into the corporate world, the review system is we do a yearly personal development performance review. He mentioned playing a game of football once, yeah, and then review 12 months later, like, it just doesn't make sense to

Vinh Giang: 1:18:32

do that game you pay 365 days. But you know, I thought that I had that just came up was I've only just started journaling more in my life

Daniel Franco: 1:18:41

probably two, three years ago. Get yourself one of these, ya know,

Vinh Giang: 1:18:45

that when we had coffee, I was very jealous. I'm just writing in a notebook, right? There's a there's a pleasure to write as well. Yeah, right. I know you can run. And when you journal, that is a way for you to review how you're living. And I've never done that before. Prefer two to three years ago, I review the way I communicate. I've been able to get to, you know, onto global stages with this technique. But I didn't use it for life. So when I realized that gap in my thinking, I immediately started journaling. And that has changed my life because now you know, I had a really shitty month of a few months ago. And instead of going well, what made me feel good, I'm not really sure. Now I can see my thoughts, my way of thinking that has contributed to me seeing life in a shitty lens. And I can go I knew exactly actually what caused that. Yeah. And it was because of how I read a situation. But I read it wrong. Yeah. So allows me now to improve the way I see things that happen for the future.

Daniel Franco: 1:19:39

Yeah. Tim Ferriss, he records every single workout that he's done, since he started as in like when writing it down, yeah. writes down every single workout like I'm talking in the gym. Yeah. And then, so he could look back if he sees a photo of himself in 1996, because we'll actually look there right there. I'll go back to it. And I'll say what how was training for that point?

Vinh Giang: 1:20:03

And what do you what are your past guests? Matthew Mihailovich, one of my good friends. He does that too. Yeah, he's got this workbook in his garage. And he's just got like stacks of them. And I see him do weights. So he's like the buffers. Older dude. I know he's, it's ridiculous to us. He's not we and we had it. We had a picnic one time. And he was late to the picnic, and I was there with his wife and my wife. And I see this guy just running on the beach topless. I was like, man, that guy's a Hulk. It's Matthew. Yeah, there's Matthew is a human. Yeah, I just I never take my shirt off in front of him. But he's made me do it. I was like, I feel like such a small man. But it's and now he's got a pool in his backyard. Great. Comfort, swim. hate myself. He does that too. Yeah. So I think the process of reviewing and building self awareness critical for all areas of life.

Daniel Franco: 1:20:48

I want to just dive into the journaling. You said, and we'll get back on to Matt in a sec on the back. Right. And I yeah, he's been he's been on the podcast twice.

Vinh Giang: 1:20:58

I know. So he must be great. He is a superstar.

Daniel Franco: 1:21:02

It with the journaling aspect of it? How have you found talking to yourself through journaling? Like you really understand your mindset there in your own communication to yourself in that space, don't you?

Vinh Giang: 1:21:16

Well, when I first started journaling, I wasn't very vulnerable with myself. Because I, I didn't want to write negative thoughts, even though no one's gonna read this. I still found myself not being truthful in my writing. Yeah, absolutely. Like I had really dark things that were on my mind, there's a barrier that you need to break through. Yeah, I didn't write it. You know, like, I had all these concerns about and, you know, I'm happy to talk about now because it's been a distance but I, there's this period of went through where I was so afraid something negative or bad was gonna happen to my son. That was that school, something's gonna happen. He's gonna die. And I was like, What am I? What? What? Why am I thinking all these thoughts? And I was afraid to write them down. So I just write some negative thoughts about Xander don't know why worrying about him too much. But then the moment I was able to break through that and start to write down some of my deepest, darkest thoughts and worries and fears, that's when it became more therapeutic. Yeah. Because I was able to truly dump those and get rid of them. He acted like it was like a, it was like one of those. I started. I started playing Diablo. Again, classic Diablo three is such a good game. When I have this 30 minute window at night where suns gone to bed. Wife's taking a long bath. And there's like, there's a dark stone that absorbs evil. And that to me, a part of my journal is that I agree. It's a dark stone that I'm like, get out of me evil. It's like the demons are flying out of me and being trapped in this book. Yeah,

Daniel Franco: 1:22:47

I use it for that there. I

Vinh Giang: 1:22:48

use it for that too, because I need an outlet. Yeah. And these thoughts, they're not rational. So if I started talking to everyone about it, people might think I'm crazy. Right. So

Daniel Franco: 1:22:58

Janice jibberish when you're. When have you ever yelled at your journal? Like in words?

Vinh Giang: 1:23:04

I think I think I think yeah, thank you for being really vulnerable. But I think that's the next level is I never yelled at my job. Well, I yell on the inside. Yeah, but did you do it on the outside? No, no,

Daniel Franco: 1:23:15

no. Oh, okay. But you almost yell through the words that you're writing. And you're almost like, wow, this is what I really want to scream out. Yeah, but I can't because I need to keep my wits about me. And I need to you know, do all the above thing. Yeah. Keep above the line. So

Unknown: 1:23:30

you sit there yell.

Daniel Franco: 1:23:32

Never yell at like, from that point of view. But as in the words I'm writing come from a point that the frustration anger. Yeah, it's I feel like it's as good as punching a punching bag sometimes. Yeah, in a sense, it's just that energy release is out. Yeah. And I find

Vinh Giang: 1:23:47

that once I do that, it, it's out of my head for the day. And sometimes it comes back, I'll write it again. You know, and it's great for many other things. This isn't a negative book that I just not just like a soul destroying book that there's so many wonderful things in it, too. But I sometimes do wake up in the morning with some awful thoughts. And, and then it's gone. Yeah. And then it's gone.

Daniel Franco: 1:24:10

Yeah. Yeah. Put it in on on the shelf. And you

Vinh Giang: 1:24:13

would you just acknowledge it. Yeah. If this thing happens in horror movies, right. So when when the when the main character is running away, you get more scared, you always are gonna get away, run, run, run, so you feel scared for the character. But when the character turns around and faces the monster, you're less scared of the monster. And I think that's what happens with fear. Right? When you face fear, if you get smaller when you run away from fear, fear gets bigger. Same thing with my students, when they do public speaking classes with me. The more you fear it, the bigger it's going to get. So at my workshop, we faced the monster. I'm like, Look, I mean, you know not to spoil it for everyone. But the first thing we do in my class on day one, the first moment you arrive, is we all go on stage and we sing. And everyone is like what? No, but I'm like, Let's go The monster. And the funniest thing happens, right? And I love

Daniel Franco: 1:25:04

I literally just clenched up as you said, Yeah,

Vinh Giang: 1:25:06

well, I'm gonna tell I saw you literally clench a budget. Yeah. But the thing is, what happens is this. Everyone gets thrown. Yeah. And then I asked them afterwards, why did you why did you feel so much fear before we did this? And they go, I'm scared of what everyone else is gonna think. Yeah, judgment. Judgment is okay, cool. Okay, that's valid. That's absolutely valid. Okay, let's talk about this. All right. As I point to someone, I go, what was the what was the first song that was sung? Who sung it? I don't remember. Okay, well, fine. Okay. Well, second song. What was the second third? No one room, it's okay. If I make it easy for you what was the last song that was sung on stage? No one remembers. So I say to them, so you fear judgment from others, while others didn't even remember your performance, that fear is invalid. It's an illusion, it's not real. And that is the biggest magic trick you'll play on yourself. And then I bring in a quote from Mark Twain who says, you worry less about what others think of you when you realize how seldom they do. So the one thing that stops us from being bright like a diamond, the one thing that stops us from doing this is a fear that is invalid, and not even real. So yeah, right from the get go, I show them that when we face this monster, we realize it's not a monster, it's not even real. It's something that we create in our own minds. It's not real.

Daniel Franco: 1:26:27

When you think that poor habit comes from

Vinh Giang: 1:26:31

our fear of speaking, our fear of speaking up, our fear of public speaking comes from early hood, early childhood experiences, where we got shut down for voicing our ideas or opinions. Generally, I find that now, having taught so many students, it comes from, you know, in high school, you've got an oral presentation. And the teachers don't teach you how to publicly speak, they don't teach you the skills, the tools, they just teach you the structure of how to organize your content. So they teach you the music, but they don't teach you how to play the instrument. So then you get on stage in front of the class, inevitably, you do terribly. And only the kids who are naturally gifted do well, which are foreign few. So the majority of the kids who go through the education system get an initial experience of public speaking, and it's terrible. And it stays with them. And haunts them, because in your nine now when you're 14, all presentations, oh god, no. And then you're sick. And you don't even go to the one practice session you have all year round. And then the next year, now that now you're replaying that story over I'm terrible at this, I'm bad at this and you replayed over and over and over again. And every time you have an opportunity to do it, you do terribly. It further anchors that experience. But it generally comes from that. I find.

Daniel Franco: 1:27:45

Yeah, I haven't even thought of that.

Vinh Giang: 1:27:47

That's amazing. Yeah, it comes from that. Yeah. Because when we when we work through it with some of my students, because it's not just like I pushed them, I just go, Where do you think this comes from? It comes from that it comes from that initial experience.

Daniel Franco: 1:27:59

That's brilliant. Yeah. T? How do you break the mold of that fear? Is it just by repetition getting up over and over and over again? I mean, do you always get nervous when you get up on stage?

Vinh Giang: 1:28:12

Do you? Yeah, but the nervous energy is now more excitement. It still feels nervous, but it's excitement. asked you this? How did you break the mold of that corporate world into your own entrepreneurial world? How did you break that mold? In what respect? Well, you're asking how do people break out of their molds on stage? Right? So how did you break your mold? I'll give an example. So I tell my students this, how do I get them to break out of their comfort zones? And is that what you're asking me here? People are attached to ideas. And there's this idea that, especially when I do this with men, sometimes women as well, but I say to men, oh, you know, learn to access your head voice. You know, when you're speaking with more air, and there's a bit more caring empathy in this. And then a lot of men will come back to me and sometimes Oh, that is not authentic. To me. That's I don't do that feels unnatural. It's fake and phony if I do it, I say to them, no, it's not fake and phony. It's just that you're unfamiliar with it. That's all. So they have this idea of who they are, that I only do this in my life. But I open their minds up to say that, in general, it's not about just the metaphor. I know, you've probably heard me use this. But the metaphor I use is there are 88 keys on the piano. You've just become so comfortable playing with these 12. And when I ask you to play with these over here, you say it's fake and phony. No, no, it's just unfamiliar keys on the same piano. So it's not even about breaking your mold. It's about changing the way you view communication. It's about learning how to use the entire instrument. And that, to me is the most authentic thing you can do. Otherwise, if the only way I can speak is like this, and this is the only way I speak that's not all. Cintiq that's not me being able to play all the music that I have to be able to offer. So I, I get them to break out of their mold by changing the way they think about communication. Right, I'm getting them to change behavior. And I think that's what you did to, for you to break out of the mold in the corporate world, you had to change a pattern of behaviors. Oh, that doubt? Yeah. And so, to me, I help my students break out of behaviors, because that's all that communication is an

Daniel Franco: 1:30:28

element of walking into the fire every day. Right? I believe that is you're walking out into the world. And you're putting yourself it's living with the ambiguity. Yeah, it's living in comfortable with the uncomfortable. Yeah, let's step into the discomfort, that sort of stuff. Yeah. That in itself, I believe is just what holds people back. More so than they're afraid of being uncomfortable. Well, it's that sick feeling that you get before you go on stage?

Vinh Giang: 1:30:56

Yeah, it's kind of mimics diarrhea. Yeah, it really, really does. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 1:31:01

Are you gonna go to the toilet? 25 times? I mean, yeah, I used to get nervous before a football game or cricket game. And the same in the same way that I do when I get up on stage. Now. Yeah, I'm not unstaged anywhere near as much as what you do. And people don't pay to see me talk. But if I do host functions and do all the above, and I get real nervous. Okay, because of the idea of the people will judge. Yeah, I don't. I know. They don't. Yeah, they don't care about Yeah, I mean,

Vinh Giang: 1:31:31

they're thinking more about, you know, their investment portfolio and how that's not doing very well. I think about the groceries. And

Daniel Franco: 1:31:38

yeah, so that being said, then what's the point of keynote speaking, if they're not taking in?

Vinh Giang: 1:31:44

Well, they. They're not there to judge you negatively. Okay, they're not there to judge you negatively. They want you to succeed. Yeah. I mean, think about this, right? If you go to a magic show. You want to see the magician succeed? Correct. Who pays to go see someone fail? Yeah, the intention is good. But as the presenter you have this fear that they're there to get me? No, they're not as an audience at a conference, they want to see you succeed. But at the same time, you have to realize they're there for themselves. They want something from this. So use that gravitational force. Don't think about you. The reason you get nervous is because you think, Oh, how am I gonna look? How am I gonna come across? How am I gonna sound Uuuuu? Right? Well, it's not about you. You have to snap out of that. And think for the next hour. I'm here to serve. It's one of the coolest words I learned in America. And I really love that word. So I'm here to serve. I'm here to serve my audience. It's not about me. I got to get out of my own head. I mean, I remember I coached the CEO in the US and I almost had the bitch slap him backstage and tell him, it's not about you, man. It this hour is not about you. Get over yourself. This hour is about you empowering and educating the people in front of you to give them the vision. So they have something to follow, because they need something to follow. Right now, more than ever. And he had to get out of his own head. So the quote about Mark Twain that, you know, you worry less about what people think of you and you realize how seldom they do that is not used to to, to say to you that Oh, no one cares about what you have to say no, they do. That's used to let you know that they don't care as much as you think. They don't care as much as you think. So when you're on stage to worry less. Don't be US centric, be audience centric. Think about them. I'm here to serve you. Shit. I'm here to serve you. It's not about me. Who cares about how I look? Who cares about how I sound right now? It's all about you. And that gets you out of your own head. Or whatever. You'll get your own head man you deserve? Absolutely not yourself. The audience. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 1:33:45

Moving into the matt Malevich. He had a fairly big influence on your keynote speaking career, didn't he?

Vinh Giang: 1:33:53

Yeah, absolutely. When I first started my journey, he he released his book, The Life in Half a Second app, great book. Five doors for success. Right? changed a big part of me. Yeah, me too. And I couldn't believe this guy lived in Adelaide. Yeah. And what he said was, he goes, I'll help you with this big career. Come help me, do my book launches all around Australia. And he flew me paid for my hotel room. And I wrote this one joke. It was hilarious. So we got to the hotel in Sydney. And he obviously arranged this joke. And I was like, why is this man being so nice to me? I don't understand. So we get to the hotel and he goes, Oh, we're staying in the hotel room. And I was like, Ah, it's one of those relationships. I know it wasn't but we both are in separate hotel rooms, but he he flew me around Australia to open his book launches. And he had clients that booked me thereafter for keynotes. It's amazing. Amazing man. What a man What a man and now we've become best friends. Right? And, you know, I've gone to Poland with him and stayed in his home over there. We just went out to watch a series of Arnold Schwarzenegger movies in the cinema together. It was it was sick as a sick man. But he was fantastic. I mean, I've now I've now I now love Arnold Schwarzenegger. Yeah, by force. Right? I find it funny now. But three years ago, I didn't. But he, that kind gesture, changed the trajectory of my career. I remember sitting down with him, we were at boat deck. This is what we had coffee as well. And Matthew and I sat down and he goes, and this was when I just started keynote speaking, I was getting paid 1500 bucks, two and a half $1,000 a talk. Yeah. And he goes, You're a $50,000 speak of him. And again, I had the media thought, This guy's insane. He's one of those success fanatics, that's completely lost his mind, this is absolutely offensive. I'm almost offended by him saying that, because I've never reached that. And you're making me set false expectations for myself. And I'm just going to crush my mind. And also, this, you're crazy. I hit it. Yeah. And I believe that I somehow hit it because he unconsciously always planted to my mind that I am worthy. That I am great at what I do that I am amazing. And he is one of the very few people in my life that pushed me to dare to dream and to dream big.

Daniel Franco: 1:36:22

You open the door for you. And he continues

Vinh Giang: 1:36:25

to open my mind to the possibilities. Whereas tall poppy syndrome is real. In Australia, and I've lived in the US I know it is and now that I've come back, I can feel it. In scrappily it is and it's subtle. It's very subtle. And, you know, I've got Look, Listen, I love my country, I love Australia, I would fight for my own country, I love my country. But I don't want to ignore the things that are negative about it too. And one of it is we genuinely have a case of tall poppy syndrome here. Whereas I'll give you an example of this. Many of my close friends will look at me and go, Oh, he's made it. So I don't get encouragement from them. I don't get support. And they love me and I love them. We love each other. I brought this up at a recent kind of sitting with my friends go, Hey, I really want you guys to inspire me. I I want you to cheer me on, you know, and I had this conversation with this heartfelt conversation. And then you know, we all hugged and everything. But basically, we weren't even aware we're doing this. But I said no. But I want you to I still want you guys to cheer me on. I want you guys to say hey, then what's next? You're having? No. What are your next plans? What are you going to do? I want that from you. I mean, I give it to them. But I don't get it in return. Yeah. Whereas Matthew has always given me that. Our friendship has been one that has been continually inspiring. So lucky to have he's a brilliant

Daniel Franco: 1:37:51

man. That's how I met Matthew and manage the anyone if you haven't, do yourself a favor and listen to those podcasts or if the listeners in, go back and listen to one. One. The first one's about his book. And the second one is about his new book, The Rise of artificial intelligence, which they're both brilliant conversations. But I was sitting at the bottom of this a wall building in Victoria Square here in South Australia. And Matt was sitting at the edge just having a coffee, don't know what he was doing there didn't care. I saw him and I went on to speak to him. And I walked over into him introduce myself. I said, Matt, my name is Daniel, your books changed my life. Wow. He said sit down with coffee for half an hour together just in that very moment. And caught up with him a few times. After that. He taught me a lot in about sales. I was really interested in sales because he's obviously as you know, his face and picked his brain and he just offered his time. And I think now that was three years ago, I think now back to it. And you know, that in itself helped me because I do the same now and I often give my time and your approach. I reached out to you cold as they come and I think I mentioned your dog link, which is probably what Jags do. And which is a Legend of Zelda game.

Vinh Giang: 1:39:14

Oh, yeah. The fact that brownie points.

Daniel Franco: 1:39:17

Absolutely. But I felt you do the same thing. So you're repaying that now. You're repaying the goodness that Matt gave to you, and you're doing the same, and then it's just an ongoing effect. So it is amazing how influential people are and where I want to go with this point is and you talk about your friends. I think you mentioned it earlier with the friends where you were hanging around at school. You are some of the people that you hang around absolute. How important is that to you hanging around the right people and seeking the knowledge of those who are close?

Vinh Giang: 1:39:55

Well, you've seen the classic line that even Matthew referenced in his book Is your the direct reflection of the top five people you spend time with? Now, obviously, there's a professional version of that. And I think there's a personal version of that. Because I've got personal, you know, top 15. And I'm never going to remove any of them. Yeah, they're my, that's my tribe. That's my core as my family. I love them, right, my friends, my family, but then professionally, I'm fairly strategic with this. For example, if I'm, um, I teach communication skills, so when I was in the US, I wanted a very specific top five professionally, I wanted the best opera singer that Southern California had to offer. In my top five, because I wanted to understand vocal projection, how to really harness the power of this voice. Who would know opera singers, they sing without mics to a room of two 3000? People? Yeah, who better to have in my top five than an opera singer Melissa treatment. Amazing. Amazing. So I wanted to I wanted to,

Daniel Franco: 1:40:50

it's amazing. You think of that, though, as a thing. That in itself is amazing. Why

Vinh Giang: 1:40:54

not learn from the master of their craft? Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 1:40:59

The the idea that your brain worked in a way where I need to learn how to project my voice more,

Vinh Giang: 1:41:05

right? It's something that if I went to a communication teacher, I'd want them to know. Yeah, wow. Yeah. I was I've kind of I want to become well, you know, who I'm inspired by as a teacher? Who's, I'm inspired in the Dead Poets Society. Yeah. Yeah. Captain, My Captain. Yeah. That is who I I like it's not real. It's not real. But yeah, but I thought if I ever had a teacher like that, oh, man, I'd be so inspiring. So you know, be the change, you want to see the world, right. So then that's kind of what I'm trying to go after. So then I got Melissa treatment, who was my vocal coach who taught me all about the voice and how to force systems voice and how to project powerfully then also wanted to speech pathologist, because I knew that the way you communicate is a series of behaviors. So if you want to improve your communication skills, you need to learn behavioral change, who better than speech pathologists. So then to me, I, I align my professional top five, with where I want to go. Whereas what happens often is we keep the same personal five, of course, and that really changes but it does sometimes change. But then we also keep the same professional five. Matty was part of my top five for a long time. Yeah. But I had to part ways with him almost to grow. Yeah, I had to make room for new teachers, correct for new mentors. And the most beautiful thing about great mentors is they know when their time has come to an end. They know when they sit down, they say to you, and I had one of my mentors do this. He goes, Hey, Jim. you've outgrown this mentorship? And I have to set you free. This these coffees now I have nothing to teach you. You're teaching me way more. And it's, you need to find someone new. And to find people like that. Extremely rare.

Daniel Franco: 1:42:45

Yeah. Yeah. The Apprentice becomes the Yeah,

Vinh Giang: 1:42:49

somewhat, right. So what I would say to the listeners or listen to this is ensure that once you have clarity on where you want to go, reflect on your professional top five, do you have the right people in your professional top five right now? That is going to help you get to where you want to go? Yeah, and reading Oh, yeah. And be strategic with that. Right. It's like, even in my personal life, I think I told you this before and our coffee. I I took a battery. So to me, Well, who can you bring into your top five to help you become a great archer? Sure. And I went to a local coach here for two months, March, we didn't improve much. So I was like, Okay, let's, let's let's do what you know, I kind of would normally crazily do. So I reached out to the gold medalist of 2016 Olympics in reply, monster. And then I reached out, you know, silver medalist is pretty good. And they don't get a lot of rights. They don't get a lot of love them. And so I reached out to the silver medalist Jay Kaminski, he replied, yeah, brilliant started coaching me. Right two months of coaching with the local coach here. I improved 10 15% one session with Jake 80 plus percent improvement in accuracy. I could hold my groupings with one hand. Unbelievable. Yeah. And it shows you the importance of the quality of your top five. Yeah, absolutely. So that's yeah, sorry. I just got to get angry they don't know why.

Daniel Franco: 1:44:11

I'm with Yeah. What do you think I started this podcast for if it's a big part I'm a people collector. I absolutely love being in a room with people who are smarter than me or done more than me or have something to offer and, and knowledge is one of my you know, wisdom and knowledge, some of my key values. It's about getting all the information that you can now I am conscious of your time because we've we've all missed it.

Vinh Giang: 1:44:37

Yeah, so sorry for sitting through this like you're sitting through

Daniel Franco: 1:44:41

I have had so many questions that I'm not not going to do about to down the track but you're a busy man. So why we won there are a few minor questions and I want to quickly touch on Quick Fire ones right? Well, so the Quick Fire ones too long, the Quick Fire ones at the end, but there's a few things I just want to bring up quickly. It's interesting because we've talked about Xander your son few times throughout this. But what's one lesson that you've learned about communication as a father?

Vinh Giang: 1:45:10

I'd say energy. When, when kids are young, their languages energy, energy and focus and attention. And what I learned was, I could say all the right words to my son doesn't matter. It's how I said it. How I say it matters more. I could play with him, but how I play with him matters more. And being a little boy, he loves energy, right? So to me, I look at it as I'm giving you a lot of energy in this podcast. But this is nowhere near how much I give my son. Yeah, well. So when I go home, and I'm about to see my son and my wife for lunch, he's going to get a very big version of me, because he loves it. He loves it. When that does that. Of course, you know, I'm not always outrageous within, but that's important to him. And he eats, he eats that energy up, he loves it. So I bring the energy. And that's the part of communication that matters a lot. Because it's very easy for me to serve you, it's very easy for me to serve my clients, and then bring home the shittiest version of me to my wife and my son. It's why I love what Shakespeare says in his speech or poem. You know, all of the world is a stage. So I'm right now on the synergy IQ stage. And I have reasons why I'm bringing the best version of me maybe listeners out there, listen to this, and they come see me for communication skills, or whatever that may be right. So I want to bring the best version of me. But what about my stage with my son when I step onto that stage as a father? You know, am I bringing my A game? Yeah, and I want to, I want to I may be shit tired at the end of the day. But I'll find a way to bring the energy. Because that's that's probably the most important stage in my life. Not here. Not even for my client last night. Those are not the most important stages to me. Amazing. Yeah. And I fail at that. Let's not be illusioned and go. Oh, he's always an amazing guy. No, no, no, no, I, I am also a shit dad at times. Right? And we'll put Yeah, well, yeah, I think if we're all being honest, so to me, but I tried to have way more better days than shooting days. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 1:47:26

Yeah, I think for me, one of the key learnings is being present. So communication is spoken through your presence. Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 1:47:37

Are you really listening? Yeah. And you can I bet you can tell when someone in a podcast is listening to you. And when they're not. Oh, yeah,

Daniel Franco: 1:47:43

they're a few people. Yeah. Not only in the podcast, but in life that you speak to, and they just do not even reference the question that

Vinh Giang: 1:47:52

was Yeah, yeah. Yeah. See, that's something Matthew is very good at. When he's with you. He's with you. Yeah. That's one of his superpowers. Yeah. He makes you feel so amazing. It's piercing. Yeah, it is. Yeah. It's amazing.

Daniel Franco: 1:48:06

I this is just a random question. Gary Vee, sent you a message on your wedding day. Talk to me about that.

Vinh Giang: 1:48:14

Yeah, as I was courting his mentorship and his friendship for years, because I knew I was going to the US, I knew that I would cross paths with him. Because, you know, I've spoken on stage, you know, on the same stage, as he's spoken at, you know, multiple times now. And he sent me a message and I went crazy. On my wedding day, I have a video of me just like losing my mind, and I want to go, Oh, my God, this can't get any better. It's hilarious. But then the thing is, I no longer courted him as a mentor after what because he, it's very easy to want people like that in your top five. But I had a bit more clarity on who I wanted to become at that point. And he definitely wasn't a person I wanted to become. He had many facets of him that were very inspiring. But I knew that if I he was too close, in my top five, I would become the person that would hustle a lot. And forget about my friends forget about my family. And I'm sure he doesn't forget about his family. But his gravitational pull was so strong, that I knew that if I got too close to that and got into orbit of that planet, I'd be in trouble. Yeah. Yeah, because it's too inspiring. They bring out a different version of me. I agree. There's an element of Gary Vee stuff with this constant hustle thing. And he's toned it down a lot. He has to say to be fair to where he was at. And that's when I got into him at the start. Yeah, where was the work your face off? You know, it's all that kind of message and then I went, if I get close to this, I'm going to get back

Daniel Franco: 1:49:33

well, and I think that's the thing for me being a parent. I don't want work to get in the way of my life, but I also am Well, sorry, I don't want work to get in the way of my relationship with my children. But I also am super ambitious and I want to take this business to new heights and you know, Australia wide and all the above. But I'm trying to figure out a Matthew is also we keep going back to Matthew He was telling me then you can do both. Yeah, you can. You can do it. He's, uh, he is he is absolutely

Vinh Giang: 1:50:05

is. When I go to his house and have lunch and dinner, his kids are at the table the whole day. Not for the meal the whole day. Yeah. And that that says a lot. Yeah, it does. Because they have been the teenagers. So that says even more. Yeah, yeah.

Daniel Franco: 1:50:24

Good kids. I love them. Yeah. Right, quick fire questions. Okay, let's do we're gonna get into these never end up being quickfire. Okay, but I'll try to make as possible. What are you reading right now?

Vinh Giang: 1:50:37

Literally in the car today, listen to how to win friends and influence me. I literally listened to that. Yeah. And because we're about to talk about that on the podcast with my best. Yes, we're about to do that book next. So I'm revisiting it.

Daniel Franco: 1:50:48

If you ever do a guest speaker and want to speak, let me know.

Vinh Giang: 1:50:51

Okay. Do these virtually as well? I can.

Daniel Franco: 1:50:55

Okay. All right. I'm happy to do whatever. But give me some heads up. Yeah. All right. What's one, so other than how to win friends? What is one? The personal development book or self development book or book on communication? Or okay, that you? Yeah.

Vinh Giang: 1:51:16

I would say how to set your voice free by Roger love.

Daniel Franco: 1:51:20

And set your voice very Yes. Because it's a

Vinh Giang: 1:51:23

book about it's, he's a singing teacher, a vocal teacher, he is coached Rihanna, etc. So if you'd learn from Roger, you will learn wonderful vocal techniques that will open up your voice and unlock your voice. It's a very distilled book, lots of wisdom in there, how to set your voice free. And it comes with practical exercise lessons, audios, that you can practice every morning.

Daniel Franco: 1:51:45

Is it for singers or is it everyday speakers?

Vinh Giang: 1:51:49

I'll be taking indicators. Yeah, well, when you're speaking, we're actually singing right now. This is a form of singing. It is. It's just a form of singing.

Daniel Franco: 1:51:56

That's not what my wife thinks.

Vinh Giang: 1:52:00

Generally, because, again, the way we speak now can either pull people in or just make people bored? Yeah, we just spoke like this the entire time. Yeah, this is a form of singing, but it's bad.

Daniel Franco: 1:52:12

It's yeah, people get bored. Yeah, they do. What's one lesson? Actually, no, stop this question. First. Are there any podcasts that you're listening to other than or any podcast that you religiously listen to other than this one, obviously, on your own?

Vinh Giang: 1:52:30

I am a huge fan of Joe Rogan dog. Good man. Yeah, I love Joe Rogan. Because I love that he's willing to change his beliefs based on new evidence. I really respect that. Yeah. Okay, admit his wrong when he's wrong. And we will shift his beliefs is not married to be his beliefs. I love that. Because it's who are aspire to be to. So here's one. I love Tim Ferriss. Yeah. Joe Rogan, he gets such conviction from people. I love that because he's, he's my kind of guy. Yeah, you have a drink, and you just connect and have a good laugh. Yeah. Loved him first, because of pragmatics. He doesn't get a lot of connection with people. I don't find that, you know, he gets into rapport as much as Joe Rogan does. But here's the pragmatic takeaways. This is what you do. ABCDEFG Oh, great. Love him. And outside of those two. How we built this every now and then. You know, not always. I'd say those are the top three.

Daniel Franco: 1:53:23

Brilliant. The Brene Brown podcast is really Oh, I

Vinh Giang: 1:53:26

love her books. I haven't Yeah, podcasts that her podcast is I've reviewed two of her books on my podcast. She's changed my life. That lady she she changed my life.

Daniel Franco: 1:53:34

So I don't know if you know this, but Michelle, my business partner Michel Hollen went over and spent a

Vinh Giang: 1:53:39

week with brah you did tell me that that's amazing. Wow. accredited in

Daniel Franco: 1:53:43

the dead laid work. Yes, we offer here but yeah, we were all very big. Brene Brown Brene Brown, but the Joe Rogan Tim Ferriss, I am obsessed with him, but I am very picky and choosey about which podcast I like. I won't listen to any of Joe's UFC stuff. Yeah, actually. Yeah, it's just yeah, yeah. Excellent. What's one lesson that has taken you the longest to learn?

Vinh Giang: 1:54:11

I'd say Oh, this there's so many. I'm trying to pick one that will be somewhat potent. I'd say Don't. Don't climb all the way to the top of the mountain. Give your children mountain left to climb. Oh, can you okay, I'll explain because that's very metaphorical. My dad didn't give me any of the inheritance. Nor did he give my brother. Two kids no inheritance, right. That's all they got. And they gave their wealth away to an association they really cared about a Buddhist Association. We didn't get any of that. And the reason my dad didn't give it to me is he he left me some mountain to climb it is so hard not to give my son right now everything that he wants. So hard not to make his life as comfortable and as good as possible. It's so hard to hold back. I'm still not learning that lesson very well. But I have to learn this. Because I don't want to raise a child that is entitled, green. So I'm struggling with this one and my wife and I chat on a weekly basis. We need we can't, you know, and so this I'm struggling. Yeah. But my dad did it in the ultimate way. And initially when he didn't have

Daniel Franco: 1:55:37

10%.

Vinh Giang: 1:55:41

That's about right. But then I just I realized the gift. Yeah. Of mountain that he's left me to climb. Yeah. Because when you rob someone of that they feel a lack of purpose. And I've seen this. I've got I've got really wealthy Italian mates, parents own wineries. I want to save Ignatius when I was young. And I see how difficult it is for them to be inspired. When they've got $10 million. They're in the inheritance. Yeah, there's no mountain left to climb.

Daniel Franco: 1:56:12

It's so relevant, because I had this exact same conversation with my daughter. Awesome. Wow. How old is she? 10. Oh, wow, Isla, she beautiful name keeps bringing her lunch home. Every night, every day. Sorry, when she comes home from school. She's not eating lunch. And so. And her response last night was Why don't like it. Some are eating it. And so I picked up the lunch and I threw it in the bin. And I said to her not not that money is the issue here. But there's about $4 that we just threw down the drain. So I'm going to take you out of this $5 note, I'm gonna throw that in the bin as well. Oh. And she said, What do you throw that away for like, Well, you did it. So why can't I?

Vinh Giang: 1:57:03

Whoa. What an experience. Yeah, the moment

Daniel Franco: 1:57:06

and so. And the look on her face. I said so every morning, Your mother and I wake up in the morning and we make your lunch for school that day. Only for you to bring it home. So we sacrifice our morning or an element of our morning for you. For you to bring it home. So here's something that you can do is that you can wash all your lunch box in all the containers, everything for yourself now and prepare it for us in the morning. Better yet, you can make your own lunch tomorrow morning. What happened? She went to make her own lunch this morning.

Vinh Giang: 1:57:45

Question? Yeah. Did you take the $5 out of the bill? Yes. Okay. Thank God. You know what happened? Oh, my God. I was crazy.

Daniel Franco: 1:57:55

Okay, no, never

Vinh Giang: 1:57:57

goes against all the mothers out there. What is he doing?

Daniel Franco: 1:58:02

That's for money, right? No, no, but wow, what a lesson. Yeah. So the lesson was this this expectation in entitlement. Yeah. Yeah. I am struggling with it every day. I am too. And I'm actually putting my foot down more and more often now. Yeah. As they get older. My children got 10 to 10. And I I'm really it's letting go the rope almost. Yeah. You're on your own. Yeah. To an extent. Well,

Vinh Giang: 1:58:31

I have the best metaphor I've ever heard for parenting was your kids. They want to go on the roller coaster. But they want the security belt. Yeah. Right. They want that? Absolutely. They pretend that I want it. But they want it. So it's interesting. It's it's hard, man. It is. But yeah,

Daniel Franco: 1:58:49

sorry. I told you we these three security people that you can invite for dinner? Who would there be?

Vinh Giang: 1:58:57

Darren Brown. Darren Brown, a magician from the UK. Yes. Love him. He is the one that showed me that you can take a really boring, shitty piece of magic and turn it into the most amazing thing you've ever seen. So Darren brown ain't number one. Number two dead or alive just doesn't matter. I'd love to have chain canasta. Who's the magician that inspired Darren Brown. He's not dead. I'd love to have him too. So being able to have the master and the student in the same Ah, damn epic. And then the third person to mix it up not have all magicians. I'd have my grandfather that I've never met my mom's dad. Because in my family, he's like a hero. And I've had so many stories about him. So I'd love to have him at the table. Because I really believe I got passed down some of the things that he had. Yeah, not I like to thank him. Because I feel like a big part of me is him. Yeah.

Daniel Franco: 2:00:05

So powerful. What's some of the best advice that you've ever received?

Vinh Giang: 2:00:16

It would have to do with money management. I'm I feel free nowadays, because I don't worry about money. I didn't realize how much money burdened to me. And I didn't get taught how to invest when I was young. My mom dad didn't know how to invest. My mom and dad buried money in the backyard. Yeah, like to be no joke. They buried money. So if anyone had a shovel, we would Yeah. So I my parents didn't know how to invest. They work their ass off for money. And then the money took a holiday. The money was in Hawaii every day, sunbathing underground, right. And so I've learned how to make money work for me. So I learned how to invest in early 20s. i My uncle car, right, he taught me how to invest. He taught me how to take your hard earned money, put it aside, create buckets, in your account, put money aside for tax, don't be surprised by that monster. And so my whole life, I've learned how to invest, you know, ETFs, you know, invest, don't go high risk. You know, even though you know, crypto is really interesting. But it's just, I've done that for a long time now. So I've been able to see the compounding interest, the power of compounding interest in the last 15 years. Right, More more recently, but it's just so I'm not, I don't feel trapped. Novell says this. First of all people play the money game. And the money game is when Oh, this job makes $10,000 More I'll go to that job. Or that job pays 15. I'll get that job. So people play the money game, then they play the status game. Oh, I've got these issues. You don't Oh, that means I'm better than you. So you play the status quo. But he goes, ultimately, we just want to get out of playing games. And it feels refreshing. Not playing the money game so intensely. Being more free from it. I agree. So financial literacy. Yeah, get five books on investing. Charlie Munger read his book. The mental models. Unbelievable. Yeah, get the books. Read it. Keep it simple. If there's one area that should be boring in your life. It's investing. Yeah. I agree. Should be the non sexiest thing you've ever done in your life. Yeah, automate it, but it works. I did the same. Yeah. Yeah. What

Daniel Franco: 2:02:24

if you had access to a time machine? Where would you go?

Vinh Giang: 2:02:30

Oh, man. Well, Medieval Period. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. That would be amazing. Yeah, I'd be dead. So fast, man. Dead so far. Yeah. So fast. Probably the smartest. This is so cool. To be back in the halls of the great kings. Yeah. And just Ah, man, I love it. I'm just rewatching the Lord of the Rings. See if any models will real. Yeah. It's such a cool class race of people.

Daniel Franco: 2:03:04

If you had one superhero power, what would it be? We're sorry, if you couldn't have one superhero power. What would it be?

Vinh Giang: 2:03:11

Oh, wow. This is super hard. I would. I think it would have to be very cheesy, but I'd like to fly. Yeah. Just to feel free to typically respond. What an amazing feeling if you could just

Daniel Franco: 2:03:30

fly. Yeah, so you want to keep that answer. And

Vinh Giang: 2:03:33

yeah, I think I'm just gonna keep that you're lucky.

Daniel Franco: 2:03:39

Now flying would be great. Yeah. i Yes. Yeah. I always thought teleportation will be better if you want to get somewhere though. Is the flying shit. Yeah. Is if

Vinh Giang: 2:03:51

I didn't think that. That would that would just out be at a keynote anywhere in the world that's doing that right now in my garage. I'm doing that virtually right now. But that's yeah, I retract D and I'll go with a teleportation easily influenced. Yeah, that's actually pretty cool. I mean, cuz I immediately went to reading minds. Yeah, that's what I pretend to do once that Yeah, but then I don't want to read your mind. I don't want to read the minds of everyone around me. I don't want to know mine is enough. It's yeah, imagine how Worf Yeah, have an anxiety attack.

Daniel Franco: 2:04:22

Last one. And you might not have prepared this because I actually didn't text you it. What's your best dad joke? Okay,

Vinh Giang: 2:04:34

um, there was a zoo. There was only one animal. It was a dog. It was a ship Zoo.

Daniel Franco: 2:04:48

Oh, hey, The Shih Tzus. Yeah,

Vinh Giang: 2:04:53

that is probably best I could. I've said it to my son. Nothing Nothing fancy.

Daniel Franco: 2:05:01

Yeah, no. Yes. No, my business partner has a Shih Tzu. Okay. And the dog in the actual terms and the thing just barks in zoom calls.

Vinh Giang: 2:05:12

Just what's your best joke, by the way? And on that?

Daniel Franco: 2:05:15

Oh, I've, I've had a few. I've set the set a few. I've got to come up with a new one. All right. Now say a new one. Yeah. Okay. If you. I mean, how do you? How do you get an elephant into a refrigerator? How? Open a door, push the elephant. Close the door. That was good. That was really good. Well, how do you get into RAF into the frigerator?

Vinh Giang: 2:05:45

You open the door, and you push it in?

Daniel Franco: 2:05:47

No. You open the door. Take the elephant out.

Vinh Giang: 2:05:54

Oh, that's good. That's good. Oh, that's really I was so worried. I wasn't gonna laugh. And I'd have to protect

Daniel Franco: 2:06:04

animal jacks. Very good. Thank you so much. for your time today. What's next? Where are you going? You're going back to America. You

Vinh Giang: 2:06:12

Yeah. I've got two tours planned next year. Very good. I've I've because I've said to my wife, I almost was just going to not travel anymore. But there's a part of me that still wants to fly. And I don't want to be in a cage. Yeah. So I want to do a couple of tours next year in the US, but I will live in Adelaide. Ultimately, I just want to be able to a couple of months of the year and then come home.

Daniel Franco: 2:06:33

We're very lucky to have you and thank you for everything that you're doing. Obviously, you're changing people's lives every day. But thank you in South Australia and Australia in the world. Keep up the good work and really appreciate everything you do. Thank you, brother. Thanks for having me. No worries. Thank you guys. Take care all the best. Thanks for listening to the podcast. Or you can check out the show notes if there was anything of interest to you and find out more about us at Synergyiq.com.au. I am going to ask though, if you did like the podcast, it would absolutely mean the world to me if you could subscribe, rate and review. And if you didn't like it, that's alright too. There's no need to do anything. Take care guys. All the best.

Synergy IQ: 2:07:14

Thank you once again for joining us here at creating synergy. It's been great spending this time with you. Please jump on to the synergy IQ Facebook and LinkedIn page where the discussion continues after the show. Join our mailing list so you'll know what's happening next at Synergyiq.com.au. And of course don't forget to subscribe to this podcast. And if you really enjoyed it, please share it with your friends.