Ep 203 - The Art of Engaging Virtual Events with Susanna Reay

Have you ever wondered how to create an engaging and thought-provoking virtual event that caters to both introverts and extroverts? In today's episode, join host David Hall and award-winning business clarity coach Susanna Reay as they uncover the secrets behind her successful Super Fast Authority Think Tank Summit. You'll learn about the power of personalized outreach, the benefits of interactive breakout rooms, and how to foster meaningful conversations in an online setting.

Key takeaways include:

• Strategies for maintaining high engagement during virtual events.
• The importance of scheduling breaks and managing energy effectively.
• How to build authority and credibility in your field through unique and effective approaches.

Why should you listen? This episode offers valuable insights on organizing impactful online events while respecting your personal energy limits and taking advantage of introvert strengths like reflectiveness and deep listening. Whether you're hosting or participating, you'll gain actionable tips to maximize your virtual experiences.

Tune in to this compelling discussion and be strong.

Episode Link: QuietandStrong.com/203

Susanna Reay is an award-winning business clarity coach, author of The Introvert Way® Roadmap and speaker who’s been supporting expert business owners to magnify their impact globally with scalable service offers for over 20 years.

Contact Susanna:

Website: Susannareay.com

Get Susanna's Book: The Introvert Way™ Roadmap: Use your introvert superpowers to design and scale a profitable knowledge-based business

Socials: LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook 

Join Susanna's Facebook Community:  Introvert Entrepreneur Powerhouse Community

- - -

Contact the Host of the Quiet and Strong Podcast:

David Hall

Author, Speaker, Educator, Podcaster

quietandstrong.com
Gobio.link/quietandstrong
david [at] quietandstrong.com

Take the FREE Personality Assessment:

Typefinder Personality Assessment

Follow David on your favorite social platform:

Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn | Youtube

Get David's book:
Minding Your Time: Time Management, Productivity, and Success, Especially for Introverts

You may also like:
Quiet & Strong Merchandise

Transcript

Susanna Reay [00:00:00]:
If you've got a new or different idea, step up and do it. Like have the courage to ask for support and do find some people you trust to have a sounding board, a bit of a sense check, and that was like at the start for me. I was in a small room with just a few people and I went, 'I've got this idea. Is it crazy?' And if they went yes, I was like, 'Okay, I think I'm doing this.'

David Hall [00:00:37]:
Hello. Welcome to episode 203 of the Quiet and Strong podcast, especially for introverts. I'm your host, David Hall. I'm the creator of quiet and strong dot com. This is a weekly podcast dedicated to understanding the strengths and needs of introverts along with strategies for success. Introversion is not something to fix, but to be embraced. Normally, we'll our each episode on a Monday. Be sure to subscribe on your favorite platform.

David Hall [00:01:03]:
Leave a review or rating. That would mean a lot to me and help others find the show. Tell a friend about the podcast and help get the word out there that introversion is a beautiful thing. Susanna Ray is an award winning business clarity coach, author of the introvert way road map, and speaker who's been supporting expert business owners to magnify their impact globally with scalable service offers for over 20 years. Alright. Well, welcome to the client or I should say, welcome back to the client strong podcast, Susanna. It's so great to have you back.

Susanna Reay [00:01:38]:
It's great to be back. As you said, it's been quite a few episodes since the last one, so you've been very busy in the meantime.

David Hall [00:01:45]:
Yeah. Yeah. So you're on episode 105, so I encourage people to go back and listen to that episode. But we're gonna talk about something that you that you recently did, so we'll get into that.

Susanna Reay [00:01:55]:
So Yeah. Yeah. Totally.

David Hall [00:01:57]:
So just as a summary, you know, you're a fellow introvert. Just just tell us and, again, people can go back and listen for more details on this, but tell us what does being an introvert mean to you and your strengths and your needs.

Susanna Reay [00:02:11]:
Being an introvert to me is really about how I manage and harness my energies over anything else. So it also does link to some personality traits that I do believe, at least for myself as an introvert, great listening comes in there. A lot of independent and self motivation I see with a lot of introverts as well. Like, we've got that internal locus of, yeah, motivation to make us do something. We don't need the external accountability quite so much. Being reflective, which is why I think most introverts know they're reflective. They seem to have gone into all those personality tests and gone, yeah. Why am I like this? Whereas my more extroverted friends go, oh, I've never heard that term.

Susanna Reay [00:03:01]:
And I'm like, I think reflectiveness is one of those things that introverts tend to do. But I think that really helps in business as well because by being reflective you can look back on what's worked and what's happened and what hasn't. But also it leads to a certain curiosity and being observant as well as to how other people are operating, how people are responding, because you want to kind of sit back a little and see what's going on and then make the move and jump in. So for me that's sort of the whole energy piece around introversion is linked to those things. So it's honouring the pause quite often as well. Yeah.

David Hall [00:03:49]:
I love my sleep. Adore sleep. And, you know, we as introverts, you know, we're not all the same. But I think that what you described, being reflective and being observant, I think we all share those gifts. And our gifts, they're like, we're we're deep thinking. We have a lot of gifts that come from it, but we would also need to check out our energy and and get the sleep and other recharge that we need.

Susanna Reay [00:04:15]:
Yeah. To me, it's always I've always with all my clients, I'd say it's the power of the pause. Like, if they're struggling with something, it's step away. So one of my energy builders in the day, if I find I'm hitting a brick wall, I will literally dam tools, go out in nature, just go for a walk. And that will be, sorry David, no podcast, nothing. I will literally I need to be left with my own thoughts to unwind from that. And I know that's for me to gather my energy whereas if I then go into a consumption mode that's still draining my energy. So I find it quite hilarious because I don't own a dog or anything but I'm normally in the dog walker's field, It's part of the route and people say, where's your dog? And I'm like, no.

Susanna Reay [00:05:03]:
I'm just taking myself for a walk because it helps you think. Well, it helps me think anyway.

David Hall [00:05:09]:
Yeah. Yeah. And we gotta figure out what those things are for each of us. So last time we talked about your book, the introvert way road map. So, you know, people can go back and listen to more details, but summarize what that book is all about.

Susanna Reay [00:05:22]:
So the introvert way road map is basically a step by step overview of looking at what are those key four phases which I call startup, growth, momentum and authority that you go through in your service business and where to focus at each level because in my experience having worked over 20 years with entrepreneurs trying to scale online is sometimes there's big leaps into the future before they've put the foundations in place. So the book just covers in sequence like where you need to establish yourself and you can go through those phases quite quickly if you do them in the sequence, but I find if people leap forward to try and do the momentum piece and they haven't done the startup piece, then things can come tumbling down. So it just lays things out quite clearly. It's a full colour book with lots of frameworks, drawings, diagrams because I'm very visual in nature as well, So it's an easy fast read. I think most people would read it in under an hour.

David Hall [00:06:30]:
Yeah. Yeah. And I found that very helpful myself. So

Susanna Reay [00:06:33]:
Thank you.

David Hall [00:06:35]:
And so the latest thing, you recently held the super fast authority Think Tank Summit, and I was able to attend some of these sessions. We're in different time zones, so I couldn't do the 2 AM sessions, but but I really enjoyed enjoyed it. So tell us more about that, and where where did you get the idea to do it?

Susanna Reay [00:06:54]:
The idea for creating it like, the initial vision was a think tank summit in terms of bringing deep thinkers, brilliant brains together because my network is very international. So yes, I'm British, I'm in Britain at the moment but I have contacts all around the world and I've been hearing over the last year or so there's been a lot of noise about online stuff is dead, everything's going back to in person, events are where it's at, you've gotta get out, and obviously the introvert in me went, nah. That's not true. Online can still totally work, but it's gotta be set up differently. Say goodbye to the boring summits of old, which are just about consumption consumption consumption, like you listen to a talk, that's it, and then you listen to another one and it's like smooshing so much information. And I'm like 2024 is the year of content overload with AI just producing content and for me it was like I wanna bring back connection, I want to bring back collaboration. And that was the premise of the whole event to begin with of how can I bring people together and then it synced up with well what is that topic? What will people be interested in to help them? Because I was reaching out to expert business owners, those in the business of transformation, so coaches, consultants, designers, creators, therapists, facilitators, teachers, everyone in that space is to gain momentum in your business. You need to grow your authority and the faster you can do that, the bigger the impact, the greater your business is.

Susanna Reay [00:08:47]:
So that's how I pulled the two concepts together and that vision sort of came to me. It was back in June time and the think tank summit was live at the start of November. So there was quite a lot of prep time between a and b, the start and the production.

David Hall [00:09:06]:
Okay. Talk to us about authority. What do you mean in that in this context?

Susanna Reay [00:09:10]:
So authority in this context is that magic combination of credibility, visibility, your expertise, and social proof. So it's how do you gather these elements? So people say 'I like him, I like David, he's got authority, he's been running his podcast because he's got all this social proof behind him, he's been doing it long enough and this is the experience, the expertise, so you're not a flash in the pan. So how can you grow and show that? So your clients and prospects have that trust and faith in you to do what you're promising to do.

David Hall [00:09:51]:
Yeah. So how did you set up the summit to do this, the super fast authority? What was the the structure of it?

Susanna Reay [00:09:59]:
So there was a couple of key differences that I created. The first was I wanted each session to start with a succinct ideally 15 minutes. In the end they varied between 12 and 20 minutes because speakers sometimes it's hard to get them to be succinct. But the idea was 15 minutes, share one big idea. I didn't want information overload. I wanted one concept, one idea that they're known for and they would discuss that and then at the end of that 15 minutes they would ask a question to those who were gathered live in the room. Then what we would do is we would brainstorm that question together, come up with the ideas around that question for everyone who was live, and then we'd also think about how can we move that idea into action. And this was a critical piece for me because I find everyone has loads and loads and loads and loads of ideas but it's moving it into action.

Susanna Reay [00:11:05]:
And by talking it through with people and then saying this is what I can do' that makes it sort of unique. So it was very much about connection, collaboration, who can help each other. And there was a little introvert piece that I put in that at the end of the talks so it was 15 minute talk question was posed and then the whole room was silent for a couple of minutes because as an introvert I was like, 'I want to digest what I just heard before I talk about it. So all the extroverts were like, yay. We wanna go into the breakout room. Someone to start talking. And I was like, let's just honor the introverts. Have this moment to pause, to write down your own notes, finish it off.

Susanna Reay [00:11:51]:
What does it mean to you? Before we start getting swayed by what others are saying? And I had some really great feedback from that little element of people going, I've never had that done before. I love that. So I knew I had my people in the room with me.

David Hall [00:12:09]:
Yeah. Yeah. That's so great. A couple of things on that. So even whether it be an online event or an in person event, likely half of your people that are joining are introverts, and we can make online and in person events more introvert friendly. You know, it's gonna you got you have to cater to introverts and extroverts, but you can take those little elements, give the introvert some time to think that can really, you know, give great results to the individual and also the the setting.

Susanna Reay [00:12:38]:
And what was really interesting is some of the people who were part of it and I knew and they outwardly say no I'm more extroverted than nature did say I like that. I did actually like it.' And, you know, and this is where I think whenever we create events, for me as well, I absolutely wanted to have full diversity of my speakers, of the participants, and allow for everyone to just feel at home and at ease. And one of the things that cropped up during the week is I also had some women attend who, because of their religion, didn't want to go into breakout rooms with men because it's against their religion, and they felt they could ask. So as we were facilitating that behind the scenes, they requested that, we made it happen, and they felt they could join in in the right way. So there's a lot of background facilitation that I think a lot of people aren't aware of when they're thinking of running an event, but actually having that full diversity meant I did have a fully diverse attendee base as well coming into the think tank, which is what I wanted because different cultures, different countries, different attitudes, different opinions, For me, that's what makes a really good conversation.

David Hall [00:14:02]:
Yeah. And then the other piece, I've been to many online summits and attended many sessions, and some of them are really good. But when you just attend 10 or 12 sessions and you're not speaking about it to anyone, you really aren't gonna take away the content from all those sessions. You know, you might think of something that you implement, but it's not as powerful as after talking briefly about something, you know, your one idea where you discuss and articulate it and people share their ideas. That that's powerful.

Susanna Reay [00:14:36]:
Yeah. There's something, and I'm sure there's educational research in this space that if you lean and listen and then discuss and then also write down because that's the other element I don't believe I've mentioned yet, but I use Miro which is an interactive whiteboard software. So what we were also doing as people were sharing in the chat in Zoom is my facilitator was transferring comments onto this big whiteboard. So as people were talking, they were also seeing on screen those words come up visually and then people could go back asynchronously as well outside of the live sessions. Go in and we had a chatty cafe space where people could put their introductions, put what they would recommend and there was a networking space but it was done in that very sort of soft space. I purposely kept it out of Facebook as well. I don't know if you recognize or realize that

David Hall [00:15:38]:
but I

Susanna Reay [00:15:38]:
was like, there's no Facebook happening here because I wanted it to be about the live, the connections, easy, open access for everyone. And on the Miro board, you could be completely anonymous if you so wish. You could put your details if you wished. It really was about if you've got something to say, I want to hear it, basically.

David Hall [00:15:59]:
Yeah. And I think most of us are pretty visual people. So to share visually, it's powerful. But also, you know, the introverts could share their thoughts in writing, you know, and whether they want it, you know, if they wanted to. And, you know, often, that's how we really understand our own thoughts is by writing them out and then sharing them like that on the the board. It it was effective.

Susanna Reay [00:16:23]:
And one of the things that I got very used to during the room as well is I'm quite an empath in nature. I'm very good at reading faces. So I was encouraging people to stay on camera and at various points, depending how the session conversation was going or what people shared, I got a sense of who to also call up onto the stage because this was always a big premise around it. Is it The speakers were more conversation kickstarters, they weren't the stars of the show. I knew I needed a few names to get people to say oh I'll go along and see what they've got to say', but I actually wanted the attendees to share their voice because at every in person conference I've gone to it's often that gold is in the conversations in the corridors talking to fellow attendees, like what did they take away from the session, what is coming up for them, And so in the Zoom room as well we'd have a breakout room, we'd come back, I'd ask people to share and if someone put something really, you know, very full of wisdom and it might have just been in chat but if I I could read their face and I'd be like, do you want to step up and just share a bit more around that?' And everyone went, 'yes' at that point because it's about that invitation. And again I find introverts need to be invited whereas extroverts will raise their hand and go I've got something to share. But often when you invite to the stage the introvert you get deeper wisdom coming through because they've just thought that bit more deeply about the topic on hand.

David Hall [00:18:02]:
Yeah. And you know you might give the you're you're giving them a little bit of notice, and they might still be waiting. Like, I'm still thinking about this thought, but calling on them, you know, they're gonna share, you know, their and often we share our best pieces of wisdom because, you know, introverts tend to or extroverts, sorry, tend to think out loud, whereas we're processing and we're sharing what we think is most important. So when you're calling on them, you you are getting what they think is most important.

Susanna Reay [00:18:29]:
Absolutely. And it was one of the things I loved. And, again when I was reading through the feedback afterwards because I did do a survey every session had an exit survey as well is people really appreciated the nurturing and collaborative atmosphere that it harnessed. And I think for me that was one of my biggest takeaways because that was part of my goal. That is part of my nature. I like to cheerlead everyone. I'm not like, no, let's just shine on the spotlight on you, one person. I'm like, no.

Susanna Reay [00:19:03]:
Yeah. Everyone's got something worthy of sharing.

David Hall [00:19:06]:
There's something else that you said that made me think of something that I hadn't thought of. So, you know, I like to go to in person conference. And sometimes maybe they're you're in the big room and you're around a round table of 8 people and you're sharing. I enjoy that, but guess what? I don't enjoy it when I can't hear. And often you often the room is so noisy. You're try and you're trying to connect with somebody new and you can't hear a thing. But in this session, you had breakouts and guess what? The sound was great, you know, and you could connect with with the people in your breakout session. And so that's definitely a benefit of the way you did this over the in person event.

Susanna Reay [00:19:48]:
That is oh, I love that you said that because that's what I love about working online is I've got my very own volume button right in front of me because I suffer from exactly that, that if there's chatter going on around me that you would never get me going down to a coffee house and working because my brain just gets distracted. I need the silence, but I also my voice goes quite rapidly if I'm in a noisy situation and you're raising raising raising your voice. As you say, those people they've got great things to share so I want to hear them, but quite often I've got used to as well at big events. I'll find the outside space like the balcony on the edge of a hotel or somewhere outside and even at the weekend I was actually at a business retreat and there was 20 of us and it got a bit noisy and I was like 'I need to clear my head.' So I went to one of the other people there and said, 'hey are you up for a walk and talk because I'd quite like to, you know, go a bit deeper on this with you?' and they're like, 'yeah.' And I was like, 'Brilliant.' I was the only one who did that and one of the people running it was like, 'Yo I spotted you out the window. Like what were you 2 up to?' And I was like, this is how I work.' So what I would like to just encourage listeners is if you find yourself in that space, don't be worried about asking for something different that suits you. Because I find generally people are like, oh, that's quite a good idea actually. Yeah. I'll be up for that.

Susanna Reay [00:21:23]:
And they appreciate the break no matter what their personality is as most people like to step away from those busy spaces. But as you say, working online, breakout rooms, it's small. We didn't have breakout rooms bigger than 4 people, So you could all have a chance to talk.

David Hall [00:21:41]:
Yeah. I love that that you you know, this may be different, but this is what works for me, you know, having and so it was a couple things. Right? It was like getting out of the noisy space, but having that deeper connection, you know, with with the one person. The other thing is in situations like that, sometimes it's just a matter. You just need a a break. And I know that oftentimes introverts feel weird, like, oh, I can't just go take a walk by myself at at this event. But, yes, you can. You know? Figure out.

David Hall [00:22:10]:
Is it a a chat I need with a person or 2, or is it just some quick time alone? Whatever. You know? Figure out what works for you and not necessarily what everybody else is doing.

Susanna Reay [00:22:20]:
Yeah. I quite often do take myself out on my own as well and I'm like, yes. Just take some minutes to decompress and no one ever misses you. I know we all think we're amazing but actually an event like that no one cares if you step out for 10 minutes and they don't even notice. So even if you feel awkward, no one else even notices.

David Hall [00:22:40]:
Right. And then

Susanna Reay [00:22:40]:
you come back and they go, oh, wow. You're bouncy and fresh. I'm like, yes. I've been with no one for the last 15 minutes. It's

David Hall [00:22:46]:
been bad. Yeah. So do you think that, deep thinkers were drawn to this event?

Susanna Reay [00:22:53]:
I think so. The because of the conversations that we then had. And I had some people who weren't planning on attending many sessions, and then they got completely drawn in and hooked because they realized it did energize them, they liked the format. So it definitely grew in momentum as well and during the week it was really lovely. The main place where the buzz online was created was in LinkedIn and there was a lot of posts and I kept getting more and more sign ups through the week and even since then as well. People going, oh I really want to attend. It sounded amazing and I couldn't get there.' And I'm like, 'Yes, if in your business you cannot find 1 hour in a 5 day week to join me live. We need to talk because that's how I help my clients create the space in their week.

Susanna Reay [00:23:52]:
And if you're so busy, it's something you want to do, you've signed up for, but you didn't attend, and it was completely free for listeners at this point to understand that it was free to attend live and I'm like there's different ways of working and for me growing my business this is part of the introvert way is I think we need to make sure we're not filling our weight fully. So we are allowing ourselves time to think, to explore new ideas, make new connections because those connections and collaborations will open up new opportunities for you.

David Hall [00:24:29]:
Yeah. So let's let's talk a little bit about that. How did you manage your energy? So I'm thinking, man, Suzanne is doing these 4 4 sessions Monday through Friday, back to back. She's on the spot. You know, I know you're a fellow introvert. So how did you manage your energy during that?

Susanna Reay [00:24:45]:
So there was a couple of things. In advance, I made sure that the weekend before, I literally did nothing. So I was, like, filling up my battery the weekend before. And then I made sure during the week I also had my wing woman who was my online producer. So she was handling all the Zoom rooms, the breakout rooms, the Miro boards. So we'd had a couple of tech rehearsals the couple of weeks prior. So I've come from I love theatre work and things. So I'm always into dress rehearsals, tech rehearsals, let's make sure before so I wasn't panicking too much in the week.

Susanna Reay [00:25:25]:
So one was the energy in advance. The second was having that person behind the scenes to support me. And that also included during the sessions. She was asking me, hey, do you wanna go in the breakout rooms in this session or not? And if I felt my energy lower, I would say no. If I was feeling a bit higher or I was like, oh, but I really want to speak to that person in the room, host privileges, I got to choose which breakout room I went into. But she was helping me in those sessions also manage and the way I ran it is they were 1 hour spot on. We always kept to that. So it was no more than 60 minutes for any session which meant I had on the whole 45, 50 minutes downtime between each session.

Susanna Reay [00:26:14]:
And I cancelled all client work that week. I just focused fully on it so I wasn't having to then check email or do anything else. So again between the sessions I was just walking out of my office into the garden fresh air re energising. So I was keeping high. And it did get to a point and I did share quite a funny photo of me looking quite frazzled online and I actually took that. It was on the Wednesday evening that I think I got to the sort of peak tiredness because at the start of the week I was not sleeping so well because of excitement and adrenaline, like nerves, or like what what the hell am I doing? Like I don't know why I'm doing this. There was all that in advance. By Wednesday, you know, it's that midday hump and then I was like I need to sleep And I slept for 11 hours.

Susanna Reay [00:27:07]:
And then I woke up Thursday and went, right. I can do this. And then I was off again. And it and for me, it was about having all those mini breaks but also clearing my schedule. And then the weekend after, absolutely nothing on as well. Purposely, I sort of went, no. I'm not doing family commitments. Nothing.

Susanna Reay [00:27:27]:
You know? I am going to pretty much spend most of the weekend sleeping, and I did, and it was brilliant.

David Hall [00:27:35]:
Yeah. I love your plan. That's amazing. And, yes, we should prepare and make sure the technology is gonna work. And I mean, that's for introverts and extroverts. But I mean, it can be so stressful when you're getting up to give a presentation and the technology fails. But you also had somebody there. You had somebody supporting you, which is so important.

David Hall [00:27:56]:
We can't do everything ourselves. You know? If we're giving a presentation, we should have someone to do the technology, especially if there's breakout rooms or maybe you're doing a survey or or something like that. We absolutely should have somebody so you don't have to worry about everything.

Susanna Reay [00:28:12]:
Yeah. And it got to the point that, you know, before I opened I think we had it was like 450 sign ups. So I was like, right, I better up my Zoom, like room limits' and various things like that, which, you know, it was like $10 to up from 100 to 500 and we never actually got over 100 live, but it's little things like that that I'm like, 'for the sake of $10 I'm gonna pay that $10 just to get it off my like, oh what if?' Suddenly everyone because I had no idea which speaker was going to pull in more people, where people would be more available. And yeah. So I had 460 sign up and then we had the attendees spread throughout the week basically in all the different sessions. So I think the maximum we had in one session was about 50.

David Hall [00:29:09]:
Okay. And, you know, if you need to sleep 11 hours, you had a plan for it. Like that, you're probably not doing that all the time, but it was okay because that's what you needed right then.

Susanna Reay [00:29:21]:
Yeah. I warned my family and my husband had taken over all kid duty that week.

David Hall [00:29:26]:
He was

Susanna Reay [00:29:27]:
doing all the dinners. So when I exited, it was like, no. There there was literally no other duties going on. And I think if I hadn't have done that and cleared the decks I would have been a lot more of a wreck. But what I did also realise is because the conversations they were interesting, they were deep, people were having breakthroughs in the live rooms about where they could go with their business and that actually really energises me. So the conversations energized me rather than drained me. So it wasn't as bad as it might sound outwardly. And because we were always we were doing sort of micro segments of 10 minutes this, 10 minutes that, so it's not like I was constantly on the go even though as an attendee, it felt more constant.

Susanna Reay [00:30:18]:
But for myself, I did have it was like an up and down during the sessions even where I could step away.

David Hall [00:30:25]:
Yeah. I love that because that's a big myth right there. We don't like, some people say introverts. The difference is is that we get drained by people and energized by being alone, and I don't like that definition. It's too simplistic for me. We absolutely you know, I say I can get drained by certain situations, and I'll even say certain people. But some conversations can absolutely energize me. Like, this conversation is energizing me.

David Hall [00:30:53]:
I love talking with you, and it's I think, where we get drained and this is what we need to understand. What does drain you? What drains me is staying at small talk for too long. That's what drains me. And and trying to come up with interesting things to say for too long of a period of time. But you get me talking about something like this that's interesting. I might be energized by it.

Susanna Reay [00:31:14]:
Yeah. I am totally as well. And this is where, like, all the topics. I mean, the things we covered, we went from, like, collaborative spaces to emotional intelligence and AI to productivity, email, LinkedIn. I mean, honestly, we covered such a broad spectrum of topics in the week. It never felt any form of repetition as well. So it wasn't like I was having the same conversations and I think this is why there were certain people who came along to multiple sessions because they realised they were taking away these other elements and when you ask me you know what does authority mean to you? What came out of the week as well? And we are actually still creating and developing the Superfast Authority Insights Report that will be available in December time is that authority is about I see it visually as a cliff face where you see the stratas of rocks that have developed over time and I see your authority is like that. There's lots of different layers that you need to build up.

Susanna Reay [00:32:21]:
There's not one thing that creates your authority. You need to pull different elements together and that was what we were covering through the week And it's like, well, where's my touchstone in this space? Where's the touchstone in that space? And then you build the cliff of authority when you've stacked all these things together.

David Hall [00:32:43]:
Yeah. Yeah. And, again, I love your plan that you built. You weren't trying to take clients the those afternoons. You had an additional support person with your husband taking care of some other things. And that's what it's all about. We can be absolutely amazing, but what do we need? You know, what what does what do we need to for our energy and to recharge and to prepare all of that? So did you see people that were participating that built relationships from this event?

Susanna Reay [00:33:10]:
Very much so. And even since then because at the start of every session as well, I've seen a lot of people become a lot more active on LinkedIn. So at the start of every session, I was be saying, hey, drop your LinkedIn links in the chat box.' So I was positively encouraging people to reach out and connect and I've since seen even people form those collaborations and do things together and go, 'Yes, this is great, let's get on a call.' And I spoke to someone and he was like, oh yeah, I met up with this person and the other who I met at the think tank' and we had a great conversation. And that just fills me with joy because good people attract good people And the more we can all work together and collaborate, everyone will do better in my my head. I'm like, I'm not competition. I'm always collaboration over competition.

David Hall [00:34:05]:
Yeah. That's great. And another introvert myth, we absolutely wanna connect with people, but some ways don't work as well for us or not effective. But, you know, sounds like this was really a good way for introverts to connect. And I found myself in the breakout sessions connecting with these people that I hadn't met before. So, you know, again, we wanna connect, but let's create some ways that are are better.

Susanna Reay [00:34:28]:
Yes. Small rooms. That for me is critical. When you can have that 1 on 1 deeper conversation, and this is why we kept the rooms to threes and fours because it gives people a chance to be heard and to speak and I think it's a lot harder when you're in front of 8 or 10 people to share quite so much, basically. So small rooms definitely benefit me. So, yeah, I set it up to to suit me at the end of the day.

David Hall [00:35:00]:
But, I mean, you get more than 3 or 4, and you're not all gonna share. You're not all gonna share equally. So 3 to 4 is a good magic number for that where everybody is taking a turn and getting to know each other. I I thought that was very effective.

Susanna Reay [00:35:15]:
Yeah. There was a lot behind it, a lot of forethought. And one of the speakers was a productivity ninja, Haley Watts. And I actually reached out to her and it was in the summer. And I was like, Haley, my brain is exploding. So she was like, use this app to do list and just put down all the tasks. I brain dumped. Half an hour later, I had 230 tasks in my head to do with the summit that I was just like, zoom.

Susanna Reay [00:35:47]:
Okay. That's why I was in overwhelm. And it was at that point that I went, I need the online producer. I need support with the email piece as well, scheduling all those things because there's a lot of moving parts. And it was your point earlier just to pick up on just because we can do something doesn't mean we should do it. And for me that was actually a huge learning is it helped me delegate a lot more in my own business because I knew I'd hit that wall and there was no way I wanted to end up in burnout, which I think I could have really easily done if I hadn't gone right, no, I need the support. And I also reached out to people to be promotional partners. So the whole event was free, the promotional partners, the logo was there but they weren't paying me, I wasn't paying them.

Susanna Reay [00:36:39]:
It was very much built on collaborations and friendships and relationships that I built over the years. And because they believed in the mission and the value and they wanted to be part of something new and different that they went, 'Yep, I'm here. I'm standing by your side. Let's do this. What can we do to help? And that to me just showed how amazing the online business community is.

David Hall [00:37:08]:
Yeah. That's awesome. And I'm thinking about your productivity tip. As introverts, we have so many ideas. That's one of our gifts. But if you have 230, I think that's a number you threw out. You're not gonna remember all those. You gotta capture them in the app or, you know, some online system or even write them down.

David Hall [00:37:28]:
And as you have them, it might be really good ideas, really important things to do, but we can't hold them all in our heads as powerful as our minds are.

Susanna Reay [00:37:38]:
Yeah. And one of the good things about putting it into an app in with Todoist is I could then share those boards with my supporters so they could see, okay. Well, this is the piece I can take from you, Susanna. That's what I know to do. Or they might look at something else and go, no, that's you. You need to make that decision. So it was even having the support there of them going, yeah, I can do that bit, but not that bit. And so I wasn't even having to always decide what to delegate and put out.

Susanna Reay [00:38:09]:
I just like, this is what I want to happen. This is my vision. This is who I want to reach. How can I do it? And as I say, as we're recording now, we're still gathering the insight report and pulling together to create a kind of state of the nation of what do expert entrepreneurs really feel about authority in growing their business, which ideas are the most interesting, and this will all start rolling through all my content over the next year. It's very much the start of something. You know, you start with a bang. That's what I reckon, and then you can sort of live off the after effects for a while.

David Hall [00:38:52]:
Yeah. So you dreamed up this event, and now it's all done. And you said you're looking at the insights. Was there something that surprised you that you learned that you weren't expecting?

Susanna Reay [00:39:01]:
I think the biggest thing that surprised me from it all was how fast everyone came into my vision. Because when I had this idea I did think like, oh my god, am I just going out there? I've not seen anyone do this before. Why haven't they? There's a reason.' And then I started talking to some as well the amazing speakers. So it started with talking to these top industry speakers and they were like, no, I love the idea. I want to be in a think tank summit with you.' And they would turn down regularly requests. Like they would get 5, 10 requests every week to be on other style summits. But it was the way I also did do something slightly unusual in how I approached them. It was very personalised and, you know, it wasn't just a cold email because I'm like it's that piece about connection and it just speed that people went, 'Wow, no, I want to be part of this.

Susanna Reay [00:40:02]:
I love this idea. I'm going to help you promote it.' And that was just really lovely. I wasn't expecting that. Normally when I've done things in the past, you just feel it's always just you solo spearheading something. But it was really nice having a whole team of cheerleaders around me going, yep, we're right behind you, Susanna, and we're going for it. And that that felt amazing.

David Hall [00:40:26]:
Yeah. And even the connection piece, because, you know, I get plenty of emails about the podcast and I get plenty of cold emails, but you really can make it craft an email where you are making a connection. And and those are the people that I'm more likely to connect with versus someone that reaches out that knows nothing about the show. You know? I'm more likely to to connect with that that person that does make the effort.

Susanna Reay [00:40:52]:
Yeah. One of the talks at the start of the week, which by a duo called Andrew and Pete, and they run Atomicon, which is the biggest conference in the UK for entrepreneurs for small business owners, and they talked about when you're looking at growing your authority super fast, it went through in just quite a few pieces, but one of my biggest takeaways was the remarkable ask. You can't just be normal if you want to stand out. So how can you do things differently? How can you make it different? Don't just send an email. I was connecting through DMs on different social channels. I was creating unique slide decks for every speaker that I wanted. And I was speaking to speakers who are totally acing us and our keynote speakers on, like, social media marketing world. But because my timeline was relatively short for them, they were like, 'Ah, not this time, but let me know next time.' But it means I've started the conversation.

Susanna Reay [00:41:54]:
And a lot of people hold themselves back by going, 'But I can't talk to this person.' They put people on pedestals. So, for example, I had Sue b Zimmerman who's at the Instagram expert and she's spoken, you know, keynote to social media marketing world, and she was like, no. You know, I'm just a normal person. I remember when I started, and it wasn't that long ago, but we're all just normal. But it's the way you reach out and show that you respect and trust and love what they're doing. It's not just like a notch basically or a checkbox to be ticked off. As you say, when people approach you for the podcast, you want to know why. What what's what are they going to share that's gonna be different for your listeners? How is it gonna benefit their listeners? You wanna feel loved, basically, because when you're hosting something, it's a lot of work.

Susanna Reay [00:42:47]:
So and people don't appreciate that.

David Hall [00:42:50]:
Yeah. It's a lot of work, but you also there's a certain message that I have, and it needs to be in line with that. Definitely not against it because there's definitely people that don't understand introversion, and I don't wanna spread any myths on the show and bust them. You know?

Susanna Reay [00:43:08]:
Very much so. Yeah. This oh, we could talk for a very long time, couldn't we, David? Yeah. We sure could. Top it.

David Hall [00:43:16]:
We sure could. What'd you hear from participants?

Susanna Reay [00:43:19]:
As in their feedback or what they were sharing?

David Hall [00:43:23]:
Yeah. What did what did they tell you about the event?

Susanna Reay [00:43:25]:
So there was a lot of that. They absolutely really enjoyed

David Hall [00:43:27]:
the interactive whiteboard on top of

Susanna Reay [00:43:27]:
the breakout rooms. They felt, logistics. But also they just love the connection, the collaboration. There were certain talks. I must admit all the talks when I asked for the feedback from participants after, they all scored like 9 out of 10 or more because it varied. But what was really interesting is I asked 2 different questions on exit and one was about how thought provoking did you find this session and the other was how implementable did you find these ideas. And the top three were completely different in those two areas and that made me very happy because I wanted to hit those different levels. And I found the conversations which scored the highest for being the most thought provoking were things like talking about AI in relation to emotional intelligence.

Susanna Reay [00:44:34]:
And we might have had a smaller live room, I think we had maybe 15, 16 people in those, but the discussions were really deep and very thought provoking in terms of how people thought, 'okay so what are we going to do with this?' because quite often AI is just all about the tactics and like, oh what can I do for my prompts?' and all the rest of it? But instead we went deep and we were like, 'But what do you want from this? How do you want the future to be? Because we are ultimately in control of it.' And that opened up some really interesting conversations as well. So the participants were just all amazing. I loved every single person who turned up and they definitely reflected that back. There was always thank yous sprinkled everywhere at the end. So that that kept me happy obviously because I'm like, you know, they could have left at any time. The other thing with online they could have just rocked up for 5 minutes and then disappeared. But most people when they joined they joined for the full session. We have very little dropout during the hour.

Susanna Reay [00:45:44]:
So that was just another data signal to me that we'd got the mix right.

David Hall [00:45:50]:
Yeah. Well, congratulations on a great event. Is there anything else you wanna add today?

Susanna Reay [00:45:55]:
I think I think my main thing for your listeners is if you've got a new or different idea, step up and do it. Like have the courage to ask for support and do find some people you trust to have a sounding board, a bit of a sense check. And that was like at the start for me. I was in a small room with just a few people and I went, 'I've got this idea. Is it crazy?' And if they went, 'Yes,' I was like, 'Okay. I think I'm doing this.' And so if you're listening and you've got that, it's the courage that moves mountains and changes the world. So don't think, 'I've got to do something in the normal way.' Think about how you can pattern disrupt. How can you change what's happening around you, particularly if it's not suited to you and your personality? Instead create the space you want to see.

Susanna Reay [00:46:54]:
That is what I did and I loved it. And there might well be another one in a slightly different format. I've got no fixed dates as yet because I'm still tumbling out the end of the live one but obviously everyone involved in the first is now in my newsletter, in my subscriber list. So if this sounds interesting to you I would just say, you know, follow me, connect with me on Linkedin. I'm very active there. If you do, do send me a note as well and say, hey. I heard you chatting to David. Like, let me know where you've heard us, and that would be really cool.

Susanna Reay [00:47:28]:
But, yeah, just do something different, I think, would be my main takeaway.

David Hall [00:47:35]:
I love that. And, you know, just in the introvert extrovert context, so much is geared towards extroverts. Let's figure out a way that we can be effective for everyone. And thanks again. I'll be sure to put your LinkedIn in in the show notes so people can find you. But this has been a wonderful conversation.

Susanna Reay [00:47:53]:
Thank you. It's been a pleasure talking to you about this.

David Hall [00:47:56]:
Thank you so much for joining me today. I look forward to further connecting with you. Reach out at david@quietandstrong.com or check out the quiet and strong.com website, which includes blog posts and links to social media channels. Send me topics or guests you would like to see on the show. If you're interested in getting to know yourself better, there's now a free type finder personality assessment on the Quiet and Strong website. This free assessment will give you a brief report, including the 4 letter Myers Briggs code, and you can also have the option of purchasing the full report if you'd like to learn more. I'll add a link to the show notes. So many great things about being an introvert, and we need those to be understood.

David Hall [00:48:37]:
Get to know your introverted strengths and needs and be strong.