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June 10, 2021 14 mins

In Episode 19 of the Business 360 Podcast, we bring back Karan Nijhawan (Episode 18) to talk about a very unique and effective way to network. It’s called Human Connection Dinners

 Karan will discuss how these dinners can be used to close sales and get clients. Additionally, he will explain the clear distinction between a Human Connection Dinner and a standard “dinner meeting” or networking event. 

 For more information, visit www.ThinkBusiness360.com 

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Episode Transcript

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Rushab Kamdar (00:03):
Welcome to the Business 360 Podcast where we
will take a 360 degree view ofall things business in under 30
minutes.
I'm Rushab Kamdar, a serialentrepreneur who's owned
businesses, and I currently helpbusinesses.
On this podcast, we're going tobe learning about the different
types of businesses.

(00:26):
What's going on, BusinessHeroes?
Welcome to episode 19.
In this week, we're continuingour conversation with our guests
from last week, Karan Nijhawan.
If you remember last week, Karanspoke about Solopreneur
Strategies.
If you are a one-person businessand you wanted to learn tips,
tricks, strategies, and thepitfalls to avoid as you're

(00:49):
going through your solopreneurjourney, definitely check out
episode 18.
This week, Karan is actuallygoing to talk about something
that his consulting practicedoes.
It's very unique.
It's called Human ConnectionDinners.
It's a form of networking, aunique strategy that can align
you with prospects in a way thatyou never imagined.

(01:10):
So if you're interested inlearning how to do networking,
where you sit down withprospects, with clients, break
bread, don't talk business, andactually build a bond and
relationship.
You're going to want to checkout how Karan built a business
where he's done over 184 HumanConnection Dinners.
Let's get to it.

(01:34):
You started this company Jube afew years ago.
And as I mentioned in the intro,you've hosted 184 Human
Connection Dinners.
So maybe you can let thelisteners know what exactly are
these dinners, how are youdeepening these relationships
for your customers and for themto do it with their customers?

Karan Nijhawan (01:52):
Yeah, man.
Great question.
So Jube is two words puttogether Just Be.
Just Be, um, this was a name, Ithink my sister helped me create
back when I'm like, I'm going toquit my nine to five.
I don't know how to start abusiness.
What should I name it?
So Jube was really a by-productof, you know, think about the
last networking event you wentto, or the last couple of
networking events you went to.
Oftentimes just hearing the wordnetworking makes people want to

(02:14):
cringe.
They feel like they got to be ontheir, A game.
They got to bring businesscards, they got to wear their
best suit from the closet.
And it's just this vibe of like,I want to go to meet new and
interesting people, but I alsodon't want to be pitched nor do
I want to hang out with peoplewho aren't anything like me.
So I think the thing aboutnetworking that scares people is
that it's a, it's a free for allapproach where everyone can come

(02:36):
in and go as they please.
And I just, I just found that Iwasn't really building
relationships and I come from apretty small city of like
110,000 people.
So like when you go to theevents, you kind of know
everyone.
So I was just being, you know,pitch slapped at every
networking event, had walkawaywith a stack of business cards.
And I would realize that none ofthese business cards, like I

(02:57):
barely remember what the personlooks like.
I have no idea what theconversation was about, cause it
was all about them trying tosell me on something.
And maybe I even probably fellinto the trap back when I was in
my corporate days of treatingnetworking events as sales
opportunities.
So after going to so many ofthese events and not really
building real relationships, Iread a book called Mastermind
Dinners, which was all aboutbringing people together over

(03:19):
food.
And I thought that that was apretty unique idea.
Nobody was doing it in St.
John's Newfoundland at the time.
So I would reach out tostrangers entrepreneurs,
business owners, thinking tomyself if I hang out with other
business owners maybe one dayI'll become one.
Maybe one day I'll reap some ofthe benefits.
Maybe I can reap some of theirlearnings, some of their
headaches, some of the trialsand tribulations that they've

(03:40):
gone through.
And the only rule of the, of theevent was simple.
As you can't bring your businesscard.
So, you know, you get an invitefrom a stranger saying I'm
inviting you to a networkingdinner, but you can't really
network the old way and youcan't bring your business card.
It was kind of interesting,right?
It piqued curiosity.
And I found that these dinnerswere more about deep, meaningful

(04:02):
relationships such as impostersyndrome, such as troubles with
anxiety and depression andtroubles with relationships at
home, troubles about not makingpayroll.
Conversations that entrepreneursare all having, but didn't have
a place to congregate and havethose honest conversations.
So dinner by dinner, I startedbringing people together.
And what I thought was going tobe business conversations very

(04:24):
quickly it just gravitatedtowards life conversations.
And then I found a way tomonetize these dinners.
And then I started doing thesedinners for companies and for
their prospects and for theirleads.
And I started doing that forcompanies and their teammates
and their employees, becauseultimately I felt like
networking was broken and thatnetworking kind of like the
iceberg, right, like when youmeet someone, you kind of just

(04:46):
meet the top of them.
You miss out on the big piece,which is really on the bottom.
Um, and my dinners were kind ofthe opposite.
Like you, you didn't really meetthe top 11% of the iceberg.
You met like the bottom, uh,89%.
So yeah.
Dinners by dinners, these, theseexperiences just became catalyst

(05:06):
moments in people's lives whereyears would go by and they would
still not forget that dinnerbecause they had a life-changing
conversation or they got a pieceof feedback on their business
that completely changed thedirection of where their
business was headed.
And I realized nobody else wasreally doing it with my flavor,
with my vibe, with my intensity,with my passion and I think it's

(05:26):
the, it's like that it's thatone decision I made four years
ago that it's continued to paydividends for years.

Rushab Kamdar (05:33):
And when you do these dinners, you're
essentially hosting them, right?
You're moderating it, right, sothat even the clients or the
customers that you have, andthen they bring their prospects
to these dinners, you're still amoderator in those dinners?

Karan Nijhawan (05:46):
Absolutely.
So, I mean, you think about anysort of group dynamic,
especially when you're tryingto, you know, wine and dine your
clients, or you're trying toclose business.
The less you focus on thetransaction, the less you focus
on the actual sale, the morelikely you are to make the sale.
So all of these dinners havenever been about selling a
product or service.
They've always been aboutselling yourself, building the
relationship with you as a humanto your client or to your

(06:09):
prospect.
The by-product of really goodhuman to human relationships is
people want to do business withyou, of course, they build that
knowing, liking, and trust thatwe hear about all the times and
the words of influence andpsychology of sales, these
dinners are just moments in timewhere you spend two to three
hours, sometimes five hours atdinner with a group of strangers
and you'll leave feeling likefamily because the depth of the

(06:29):
conversation with a moderator,um, I don't ask questions like
what are you doing this weekendor who's your favorite sports
team or what are you watching onNetflix today?
Like, those are very normalconversations that we ask where
we don't know what else to talkabout.
So I've got this Rolodex ofreally deep, meaningful invoking
questions, both on paper and inmy mind, because I've been doing

(06:51):
this for four years where I knowhow to navigate a conversation
in a group setting, kind of likean orchestra where I'm the
conductor and little do theparticipants know that every
question that I asked isbringing them to a deeper and
deeper and deeper and deeperplace, emotionally
physiologically, mentally,spiritually.
They're just going deeper anddeeper to the point where, by
the question number three orfour for the group, you know,

(07:14):
90% of the time people arebawling, they're in tears.
It's because they've, they'vegotten to a place in a group
environment where they're aboutto share some secrets or they're
about to share some moments intheir life that maybe had a
profound impact on them.
Um, so yeah, these dinners havebeen referred to as therapy by a
lot of people, that have beenreferred to as like masterminds
by a lot of people andultimately it's just this

(07:34):
cathartic experience of like,wow, I've been holding onto this
thought for 20 years and thisdinner, which has nothing to do
with the food, allowed me tobecome someone new.

Rushab Kamdar (07:47):
So let me, I ask you this then, but, you know,
this is very interesting, but ifyou're bringing, um, a company
and their potential customerstogether in a dinner, but you're
not talking necessarilybusiness, how do they
essentially create that dynamicwhere the customer or the
prospect is like, you know whatI want to work with this

(08:07):
company, especially when thesedinners can get emotional and,
and very deep.

Karan Nijhawan (08:13):
I mean, you think of a typical prospecting
cycle, whether you're anentrepreneur, whether you're a
solopreneur, whether you're afortune 500 company.
The typical prospecting cycleis, you know, you've gotta count
reps, you reach out, you try tobuild the relationship over
zoom, you sign a contract.
And like that's kinda how therelationship goes.
And then to take it a stepfurther, yes, some people do
like to wine and dine theirclients, but it still feels very

(08:33):
transactional.
Now, when, when you bring agroup together and you talk 0%
about work and what you do andhow good your services and you
focus a hundred percent on theconversation around your client,
around your prospect, and reallymake them feel like you're
creating this experience thatthey've never been to before
they walk away having not beenpitched, having not learned

(08:57):
maybe anything about yourproduct or service.
In fact, they walk away leavinglearned about, about themselves.
So I think it's like you haveyou as the client, you
facilitate this experience thatallows your client or your
prospect to grow and talk aboutsome of the stuff in life that
probably has a more profoundeffect on you than, than quote,

(09:18):
"business talk".
So when I do this in groupsettings, people ask me all the
time, like, how does it workwith strangers?
How does it work when peopledon't know each other?
How do you get people to openup?
The thing I do before everysingle question or every single
now breakout room on Zoom aswe've been doing these dinners
on Zoom is I lead the question,but I also share a personal
story first.
And when I get vulnerable andintimate and honest in front of

(09:41):
the entire group, what it doespsychologically and
subconsciously it creates thisbarrier of safety where people
feel safe and open enoughthinking, whoa, this guy just
went super deep.
Maybe I'll go super deep too.
And then again, as the questionsgo on throughout the course of
the night, the course of thenight, that's hilarious.
But yeah, the questions just getdeeper and deeper and deeper,

(10:03):
and it just creates this moreand more of an emotional bond.

Rushab Kamdar (10:07):
We've, we've known each other now, you know,
I don't know since December, Ithink, right?
So it's been, you know, five,six months for any, you know, if
anybody wants to timestamp this,this podcast interview, um, but
since knowing you, I've seenthat you have this unique way of
looking at entrepreneurship,solopreneurship, whatever we
want to call it, and you don'tnecessarily follow the standard
rhetoric that's out there.

(10:29):
Uh, in your own opinion, why doyou feel you have such a
different perspective onapproaching, uh, your own
business or approaching startinga business?

Karan Nijhawan (10:40):
Dude, my type A personality, my Virgo within me
that wants to see everystep-by-step, that wants to see
the document, the roadmap, theblueprint of what my business
looks like.
It's literally the one thing inbusiness that nobody can give
me, right?
So it's like the one thing aboutbusiness and starting your own
business is that there is nofundamental rule book or map or

(11:02):
blueprint.
It's literally you figuring itout.
Sure, you can take pieces thatinspire you and from other
business models but you get tocreate whatever it is you want
to create.
And I think I've seen too manypeople get sucked into this trap
of building a business that theydon't want because they think
it's the only option for them,where they created to make their
friends or their family happy,or they create it so that social

(11:25):
media thinks that this personhas got their stuff figured out
or that they've got this perfectlife.
So they'll rent the Lambo or theFerrari or whatever and they,
they, they create this persona.
I know when I go to bed atnight, the person who I speak to
the most myself, like thatperson needs to be satisfied,
right?
Before my fiance, before myparents, before my sister,

(11:48):
before you, before anyone elseexternally needs to be
satisfied, I need to besatisfied and I need to have a
good night's sleep every singlenight, knowing that I did the
right thing.
And I just feel like life is tooshort to follow a path that
you'd know is not for you orthat you feel like is not
fulfilled for you whether that'ssaying no to certain clients,
whether it's no to certainbusiness opportunities.
Like money can all, money can,can come and go.

(12:10):
Coming from a guy where moneywas always scarce, let me be the
first to say money is just aby-product of value and energy.
It comes and goes at the snap ofa button.
You can create a hundredthousand dollars tomorrow if you
really want to.
It's not even about moneyanymore.
So now I'm just feel, I feelsuper aligned well with myself
and I feel that those that seethat kind of energy radiate out

(12:32):
of me and they are in my groupenvironments where they get to
reap some of that energy forthemselves.
They know I'm just on a, I'mjust on a different path, man.
I'm just on a different missionand I really don't care what
others think of me or how itmight perceive me, or I just
know that like I'm doing theright thing with a group of
family members, aka, like mytribe who are with me every step

(12:55):
of the way.
So like, I don't need to befamous to everyone.
I just need to be famous to theright people.

Rushab Kamdar (13:02):
Hey, Business Heroes.
I want to thank our guest, KaranNijhawan.
We had sat down for an interviewon Solopreneur Strategies, which
was episode 18.
And we started talking aboutHuman Connection Dinners and the
information he provided was sovaluable that I ended up making
a second episode out of it.
So I hope you enjoyed it and Ilook forward to you joining us

(13:24):
next week, where we're going totalk about conscious
communication in theprofessional world and why it's
so important, specially in 2021.
Thank you for joining us on theBusiness 360 Podcast.
To learn more about our guest,go to thinkbusiness360.com.
In life, I follow two thingsthat keep me grounded.

(13:46):
Number one, if you only listento someone's successes and not
their failures, you've onlyheard half the story and number
two, compete with yourself andhelp everyone else.
You stay classy, BusinessHeroes.
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