Back in April I was at a leadership meeting in Atlanta and they brought in an outside speaker, Mike Lipkin. He is one of the best motivational speakers I’ve seen and although I’m simplifying a lot — I summarize his message as ‘either we become the best, or we become irrelevant. There is no middle ground.’ I liked his presentation style, energy and above all his story.
Mike and I got to connect after the session and this is where I learned his story. He’s a native of South Africa and emigrated in the late 80’s to Canada, then returned in ’93 to start a training and motivation company to help transform the nation. He’s now back in Canada (Toronto) and continues to build on his successes. Check out his full bio here on his website. He’s a captivating person and we talked about the concept of the passion formula and how TED is an amazing organization to learn & spread ideas.
During our conversation I focused on discovering his story and dropped some tidbits on how the passion formula parelleled to his journey. I felt like we bonded and I sparked the idea of getting some feedback on how I delivered the TEDx talk and ended by committing to sending him a linkedin message that week…and of course I sent that message the next day. I used the entire formula in our conversation: energy(spark) + focus + dosay
It took a month, but Mike did follow up with me and gave me the best input I’ve ever received on how to present ideas better. I was humbled to just get a response for that he’s been speaking professionally for over 20 years and a very busy guy. Perhaps our encounter was as memorable & pleasurable as sex 🙂 as those Harvard researchers proved (see the last blog post here). Anyways, he easily could’ve brushed me off but he didn’t…he remembered our chat and he took the time to watch the video and send a response. I like to think our chat stuck in his mind and I’m sure our paths will cross again.
Since then I’ve been following Mike on twitter (@mikelipkin) and he recently posted a video called ‘The Magic of Eye Contact’.
I’d highly suggest you watch the video below (it’s only 3 1/2 mins so take the time!) and consider his points the next time you engage with someone, esp. when your focusing on their story to make that passion formula connection! Enjoy!
Catch you again in a couple of weeks.
— Kyle (@Ryzner)
The Passion Formula 