Introduction - About me, my mission and what you can look forward to for the podcast

7 00:00:35,730 --> 00:00:42,990 life. So it's been interesting staying indoors for this COVID crisis and I

8 00:00:42,990 --> 00:00:46,800 thought I'd just get started with doing this podcast, because I've been putting it

9 00:00:46,800 --> 00:00:52,260 off for... I don't know how long. And I thought I'd just (kind of) get down to it

10 00:00:52,260 --> 00:00:58,440 and do it! Production value might be very low but I thought a lot of the

11 00:00:58,440 --> 00:01:02,940 content that I can share would resonate with a lot of folks. So I wanted to do a

12 00:01:02,940 --> 00:01:08,100 bit of an introductory podcast just to share more about myself for those that

13 00:01:08,100 --> 00:01:13,740 don't know. So Luki Danukarjanto. Luki is fine. I'm Indonesian

14 00:01:13,740 --> 00:01:17,819 which is where the last name comes from. For those that are curious. The fun fact

15 00:01:17,819 --> 00:01:22,049 about me that I usually share, is that I'm ancestrally Chinese, so I'm actually

16 00:01:22,049 --> 00:01:28,590 part of the Chan lineage. And the fun fact is is my dad was a Tan when he was

17 00:01:28,590 --> 00:01:33,539 born. And due to some civil unrest and some challenges with the country he

18 00:01:33,539 --> 00:01:38,389 decided to change his last name to Danukarjanto and if you're ever in

19 00:01:38,389 --> 00:01:44,009 Indonesia and need a "resourceful worker" then you can ask for a "Danukarjanto"

20 00:01:44,009 --> 00:01:48,119 and they'll get you one right away. That's a bit about me and then I

21 00:01:48,119 --> 00:01:52,319 basically ended up moving to Toronto when I was very young. I ended up doing a

22 00:01:52,319 --> 00:01:56,549 degree in computer science of all things, just because, well, #1. my dad worked at

23 00:01:56,549 --> 00:02:00,749 IBM so it seemed to make sense. #2. the dot-com bubble was growing at the time.

24 00:02:00,749 --> 00:02:05,999 We didn't know it was (a bubble) at the time. Or at least I didn't and #3 being a teenage

25 00:02:05,999 --> 00:02:10,229 boy wanting to get into computer games; seemed like it made sense. Unfortunately

26 00:02:10,229 --> 00:02:13,740 when I graduated the dot-com bubble just burst so

27 00:02:13,740 --> 00:02:20,640 it was kind of like this time where just before, 9/11 had happened, the dot-com bubble

28 00:02:20,640 --> 00:02:25,650 burst and then shortly thereafter SARS took place so it is eerily reminiscent

29 00:02:25,650 --> 00:02:28,470 of what's happening right now. but unfortunately, all three of them

30 00:02:28,470 --> 00:02:33,570 are happening at the same time right now! I graduated during that time and it was

31 00:02:33,570 --> 00:02:38,520 pretty tough for folks in tech to get a job. I luckily had some co-op

32 00:02:38,520 --> 00:02:41,820 experience so I was getting some offers but not necessarily the ones that I

33 00:02:41,820 --> 00:02:47,040 wanted. But as luck would have it, I had a friend whose brother, he was looking for

34 00:02:47,040 --> 00:02:52,640 a coder, a developer, so he helped me get an interview and I got the job. And it

35 00:02:52,640 --> 00:02:56,760 turns out after a couple of months of doing that, I realized, you know what, I

36 00:02:56,760 --> 00:03:01,740 don't particularly like coding. So well what do you do in that circumstance, when

37 00:03:01,740 --> 00:03:05,610 you spent four years training for a degree and then realize, well this really

38 00:03:05,610 --> 00:03:10,320 isn't for you? But as luck would have it the company that I ended up working for

39 00:03:10,320 --> 00:03:15,720 was Deloitte. I was on the technology consulting side so I basically moved

40 00:03:15,720 --> 00:03:20,310 around in the firm more into the business side. So I did coding, (then) I became a

41 00:03:20,310 --> 00:03:25,740 technical lead. I did functional business analysis type work. Then testing, change

42 00:03:25,740 --> 00:03:30,120 management, training, project management, advisory and spent over twelve years

43 00:03:30,120 --> 00:03:36,750 there. And by the end of it, I was a "global subject matter expert in sourcing

44 00:03:36,750 --> 00:03:40,680 and procurement technologies" which happens when you stay at a

45 00:03:40,680 --> 00:03:46,470 place for over 12 years! And why a lot of folks want to speak to me, is, I actually

46 00:03:46,470 --> 00:03:52,980 used to also run their undergrad campus recruiting program (for tech consulting). So from 2006 to 2015

47 00:03:52,980 --> 00:03:58,350 when I left, (something around there) then I literally had the "LIST" that said yes or

48 00:03:58,350 --> 00:04:04,740 no for anyone that got hired across all of the universities across Canada. so all

49 00:04:04,740 --> 00:04:09,360 the things that I share about resumes, interviews and networking come from my

50 00:04:09,360 --> 00:04:14,730 experience. I was heavy into the talent management side, so in our

51 00:04:14,730 --> 00:04:19,170 experienced (hire) recruiting. I actually was part of that leadership team. Our group

52 00:04:19,170 --> 00:04:24,270 hired a couple hundred every year. I got into, kind of, "practice management",

53 00:04:24,270 --> 00:04:27,430 the people management of my team. And that's where I (kind of)

54 00:04:27,430 --> 00:04:32,050 understood (kind of) the coaching and the mentoring side, that I actually had an

55 00:04:32,050 --> 00:04:37,690 interest in. And well it seemed like a pretty good path. I was a senior manager.

56 00:04:37,690 --> 00:04:41,590 Next step would have been partner and for those that don't know partner, that's

57 00:04:41,590 --> 00:04:47,400 kind of a C-level executive. At the top of the heap. And folks sometimes ask, well

58 00:04:47,400 --> 00:04:54,460 why did you end up leaving? And my short answer is: family. As a management

59 00:04:54,460 --> 00:04:59,470 consultant, as a consultant, I travelled quite a bit. In my 12 years there, I

60 00:04:59,470 --> 00:05:04,690 was probably on a plane roughly 9 of those years. So Monday morning, I would wake

61 00:05:04,690 --> 00:05:10,539 up for a 6 or 7 a.m. flight. 8 a.m. if I was lucky. And then Thursday would come back.

62 00:05:10,539 --> 00:05:16,000 Spend the weekend with the family and loved ones. And then head back out. So I

63 00:05:16,000 --> 00:05:22,389 ended up having some kids and watching my son grow up over FaceTime wasn't

64 00:05:22,389 --> 00:05:28,780 exactly the ideal of parenthood; of being a dad; that I wanted. So the firm was

65 00:05:28,780 --> 00:05:34,210 really good in trying to keep me local and then trying to find me roles that

66 00:05:34,210 --> 00:05:39,789 that would kind of suit my needs. But unfortunately, this was one where I knew

67 00:05:39,789 --> 00:05:44,139 the expectation would be that eventually I would I would have to travel, right? And

68 00:05:44,139 --> 00:05:47,620 after the end of the day, I was always a little bit entrepreneurial. I wanted to

69 00:05:47,620 --> 00:05:53,260 open up my own restaurant. I wanted to open up a tutoring school. So I finally

70 00:05:53,260 --> 00:06:00,099 got the courage to start something and I ended up becoming a career coach. so I

71 00:06:00,099 --> 00:06:04,120 started a little venture where I was hopefully going to unlock people's

72 00:06:04,120 --> 00:06:09,310 career potential and now what I do is work with a lot of post-secondary

73 00:06:09,310 --> 00:06:14,789 institutes. With companies as well, usually in (kind of) the entry-level and

74 00:06:14,789 --> 00:06:20,349 help people in transition. So whether they'd be graduating and going into a job.

75 00:06:20,349 --> 00:06:25,479 Or they're (kind of) ready for the next step in their career or that sort

76 00:06:25,479 --> 00:06:31,419 of thing. I'll help unlock their career potential, which was the subtitle of my

77 00:06:31,419 --> 00:06:36,279 book "Stuff I Wish I Knew Earlier" how to unlock your career potential. Which is

78 00:06:36,279 --> 00:06:39,789 really what this podcast is about. It's sharing some of the insights that were

79 00:06:39,789 --> 00:06:42,400 in the book and then extending on that and adding to it

80 00:06:42,400 --> 00:06:47,460 because the book was published in 2017. And since then I've learned way more!

81 00:06:47,460 --> 00:06:51,870 So it's trying to share those insights with the world, is what I want to do.

82 00:06:51,870 --> 00:06:57,639 So that's kind of me, in a little bit more of a nutshell. But some of my goals

83 00:06:57,639 --> 00:07:03,400 and aims are to #1 I usually tell people that I want to "weave mentorship

84 00:07:03,400 --> 00:07:09,190 into the fabric of society" and I'm doing that, by, starting that by, "making Toronto

85 00:07:09,190 --> 00:07:13,930 the mentorship capital of the world". And how I intend to do that actually has

86 00:07:13,930 --> 00:07:17,800 changed a little bit, because originally I was going to find all the mentoring

87 00:07:17,800 --> 00:07:22,780 programs and make them more efficient, as management consultants do. Help them to

88 00:07:22,780 --> 00:07:27,340 get best practices and all that. But what I realized is that mentoring programs

89 00:07:27,340 --> 00:07:32,409 have a fundamental flaw right now where they have a mentor as a "bottleneck".

90 00:07:32,409 --> 00:07:37,810 So as a mentor, you might be able to help one, two maybe five people. If you really

91 00:07:37,810 --> 00:07:42,580 take on a lot of people. But really there's a bottleneck there.

92 00:07:42,580 --> 00:07:47,469 And there's really not enough Mentors out there. And because you're set for a

93 00:07:47,469 --> 00:07:52,509 period of time for weeks, for months, a year, then people often can't make that

94 00:07:52,509 --> 00:07:58,330 commitment. So what I've encountered or how I approached it instead is

95 00:07:58,330 --> 00:08:02,560 to make Toronto the "mentee-ship" capital of the world. And what that is, is

96 00:08:02,560 --> 00:08:07,690 equipping people with skills, soft-skills, on how to network, on empathy,

97 00:08:07,690 --> 00:08:14,620 positivity and really understanding "how do you take someone that you may

98 00:08:14,620 --> 00:08:19,650 not know and ask them for guidance and advice and have them be your mentor"? and

99 00:08:19,650 --> 00:08:24,759 mentoring can happen for just one session. or it can be longer-term. So to

100 00:08:24,759 --> 00:08:29,800 make Toronto the mentorship capital of the world. Then it went to my second

101 00:08:29,800 --> 00:08:34,360 goal which is to "Elevate education" so all those skills that you learn as a

102 00:08:34,360 --> 00:08:40,779 mentee or why not put that into the education system? Because what if at the

103 00:08:40,779 --> 00:08:45,519 beginning of school, you learned things like time management. What is your

104 00:08:45,519 --> 00:08:48,930 purpose. Effective communication. Empathy. Sales.

105 00:08:48,930 --> 00:08:52,990 Those types of things.What sort of great foundation would you

106 00:08:52,990 --> 00:08:58,660 have so that when you do learn things like accounting

107 00:08:58,660 --> 00:09:02,830 or things like coding or whatever then it makes it a much more worthwhile

108 00:09:02,830 --> 00:09:09,520 endeavour. Even basic skills like learning to learn. Memory techniques. What I found

109 00:09:09,520 --> 00:09:13,420 over the past couple years is that there's actually no such thing as a bad

110 00:09:13,420 --> 00:09:17,680 memory, it's the difference between a "trained memory" and an "untrained memory".

111 00:09:17,680 --> 00:09:23,200 So imagine we were learning those types of skills in post-secondary. Or even in

112 00:09:23,200 --> 00:09:28,060 high school. Or even in elementary school if we could do that. So that's kind of my

113 00:09:28,060 --> 00:09:33,820 second big goal, to "Elevate education". And the third big one (goal) is to "positively

114 00:09:33,820 --> 00:09:39,070 impact a billion people" and through the educational efforts, through the

115 00:09:39,070 --> 00:09:45,880 mentorship, my goal is to impact as many people as I can. So I did the

116 00:09:45,880 --> 00:09:51,190 calculations and if I were to spend one second with every one of those billion

117 00:09:51,190 --> 00:09:55,630 people, it would actually take me 32-years to do so! So that doesn't seem

118 00:09:55,630 --> 00:10:01,000 like it's physically possible. So what I've opted for instead is there's a

119 00:10:01,000 --> 00:10:05,800 theory that within your lifetime you impact about 90,000 people. So my goal is

120 00:10:05,800 --> 00:10:10,510 to positively impact at least those 90,000 people. And then to have each of

121 00:10:10,510 --> 00:10:16,240 those impact 90,000 people. And then I'll get to my billion pretty quickly. But if

122 00:10:16,240 --> 00:10:18,840 I can make some systemic changes like through

123 00:10:18,840 --> 00:10:24,520 the "elevation of education" and to build more mentors and I think I can get pretty

124 00:10:24,520 --> 00:10:30,370 close to that billion during my lifetime. So what you can look forward to, in this

125 00:10:30,370 --> 00:10:36,100 podcast, is me, sharing my SIWIKE, the "Stuff I Wish I Knew Earlier" and it could

126 00:10:36,100 --> 00:10:40,600 be in all facets of life. It'll be things like job: so helping people with resumes,

127 00:10:40,600 --> 00:10:45,160 interviews, networking and even kind of job search strategy. so those basic

128 00:10:45,160 --> 00:10:50,290 things. And then also in the realm of careers. So things like "what is your

129 00:10:50,290 --> 00:10:55,570 purpose?". "Why am I here?" "How do I find something that I love and keep on doing

130 00:10:55,570 --> 00:11:02,020 it?". So thinking about that. And then the third part is on life so a lot of things

131 00:11:02,020 --> 00:11:06,940 that I've uncovered is things like psychology and

132 00:11:06,940 --> 00:11:11,440 self-care right? So making sure that "Are you taking care of your health?" Health as

133 00:11:11,440 --> 00:11:16,570 in: are you sleeping right? Eating and exercising? Because if you're not doing

134 00:11:16,570 --> 00:11:20,920 those types of things then everything else gets so much harder. So helping you

135 00:11:20,920 --> 00:11:24,660 in regards to that. And then there's health in terms of relationship health,

136 00:11:24,660 --> 00:11:29,980 mental health. There's things like financial health. As well so those little

137 00:11:29,980 --> 00:11:34,810 things that, if you start moving the needle on them then everything (kind of)

138 00:11:34,810 --> 00:11:41,490 compounds and escalates so that you have the ideal life thing. So I'll share that.

139 00:11:41,490 --> 00:11:46,870 Probably in me (kind of) talking about different resources and things that I've

140 00:11:46,870 --> 00:11:50,920 learned. Hopefully having some guests. And having conversations and

141 00:11:50,920 --> 00:11:56,320 maybe doing some excerpts from talks and workshops that I've done either live

142 00:11:56,320 --> 00:12:02,140 online or otherwise. So that's what you can look forward to in this SIWIKE "Stuff

143 00:12:02,140 --> 00:12:06,700 I Wish I Knew Earlier" podcast. And hopefully you'll join me for the first

144 00:12:06,700 --> 00:12:09,740 episode upcoming. Thanks everyone.

145 00:12:09,740 --> 00:12:14,620 Thanks for joining us on the SIWIKE "Stuff I wish

146 00:12:14,620 --> 00:12:19,630 I knew earlier" the podcast if you like the podcast please subscribe on iTunes,

147 00:12:19,630 --> 00:12:24,970 Stitcher or wherever you found this podcast. And if you can give us a review

148 00:12:24,970 --> 00:12:28,980 that would be very appreciated feel free to contact me on LinkedIn at

149 00:12:28,980 --> 00:12:30,940 http://linkedin.com/in/lukidanu

150 00:12:30,940 --> 00:12:37,150 L-U-K-I-D-A-N-U @lukidanu and the same on most social media platforms and I look

151 00:12:37,150 --> 00:12:41,250 forward to hearing from you! Thanks!

152 00:12:41,250 --> 00:12:43,310 Bye!