LinkedIn Post: The Weekly Show

Source: NSFW Podcast ep. 124 — "Privilege Can't See Itself" with Lindsi Bollinger (episode-124-privilege-can-t-see-itself-with-lindsi-bollinger.txt, opening monologue ~0:00–0:40)

Topic: Consistency and a schedule build a network better than a plan

I didn't have a plan for growing the show. I had a weekly time.

When I wanted to build community around the podcast, I didn't write a strategy doc or map out a funnel. I just started a talk show and put it on a schedule. Every week, same time, I'd sit down with somebody and talk for a couple hours. That was the whole play.

Over time the people who showed up became the community. One of them, Lindsi, came on as a guest and now we do more and more stuff together, basically joined at the hip. That only happened because there was a thing happening every week that she could find.

I watch people in business do this backwards all the time. They want the network and the referrals, so they hit one happy hour, maybe a conference, collect some cards, and wait. Nothing compounds because there's no schedule.

The people with a real network didn't build it in an afternoon. They built a weekly reason to talk to people and kept showing up.

If you want a community around your work, stop waiting for a plan. Pick a time, put it on the calendar, talk to one person a week. The plan shows up later.

draft from corpus — based on NSFW Podcast ep. 124