Dismantling Corporate Hierarchy and The Power of Shared Experiences w/ Paul Jones (Part 1) - Ep. 9

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Today we're joined by Paul Jones, founder of Bridgio, a connection chemist and owner of a community-led GTM. Paul began his career as a river guide in Jackson Hole and the founder of Driftwood Paddle Adventures, where he led thousands of people through outdoor experiences built on trust, clarity, and shared momentum. Today, he brings that same philosophy to the business world. As founder of Bridgio, Paul helps companies replace cold outreach with warm connection by building curated go-to-market communities that drive referrals, trust, and real pipeline. Paul's built over 40 go-to-market communities for B2B brands and facilitated more than 500 webinar sessions. Intimate peer learning events that surface insights and strengthen relationships. Paul's mission is to cultivate relationships and connection desserts and help leaders turn human connection into a competitive advantage. Paul, thank you for being on the show.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Hey, thanks for having me, Drum. Appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:20

So, I mean, right off the bat, something I didn't know about you, and obviously we've talked a few times is you were a river guide in Jackson Hall. How did you leave this out?

SPEAKER_01 1:34

Oh, it sounds so long ago now. Um I've I came from the outdoor industry. So, I mean, when I was 13, 14, I was working for the Boy Scouts. I would I would ship off for the summer and I would teach merit badges at for the Boy Scouts uh during during summer camp. Um and then I just was in and out of all these different outdoor type industry places. So I worked for Outward Bound for a while as an instructor. Um and then I was a river guide during the summers, uh going through college up in Jackson, Wyoming, um, which that section of water is white water. It's in the springtime, there's one rapid that's a class four called Lunch Counter, um, which is a lot of fun. And in the summertimes, um, when the when the water is at the right height, you can actually surf it. So you'll see surfers out there surfing the first, the front wave of lunch counter, which is super fun. Um, so I we we just it was it was a commercial loop, man. We went on four to five trips a day. We'd take people down, we'd put them in the boat, or sorry, we'd put them in the boat, take them down, get them on the butt on the bus, come back up to the front of the beginning of the river, and then do it again four times. And so we were taking a lot of people down uh going through rapids. You know what's interesting is um when you're going through that many times on a single river, on a single section, five times a day, you start to realize that the whole like risk mitigation thing is um it is risk mitigation. You can never completely eliminate risk. Your skill can never compensate 100% of the time for the river. Sometimes you might have the most perfect line, and if lunch counter just decides to curl up on you and just smash down on you, like it's going to happen. Like you know, it you're gonna you're about to to to get ready for an adventure. So that was that was always fun, is is it was never predictable. Um, your lines, even if you thought they were great, weren't sometimes you got knocked off your lines, sometimes the raft flipped, sometimes people fell in. Um, and so I just I love that variability, and I also love the camaraderie of the raft. I mean, Jackson Hole is a pretty international place, so you would see people from all over the world uh that would come there to to go see you know the Tetons and Yellowstone. And then a lot of the adventurous people, they'd take a side note and they'd come and do some of the whitewater. So on in a raft, we would have you know a hedge fund manager and a and a heart surgeon. There wouldn't seem to be anything related except they all share this common adventurous spirit. And so it was always really interesting to me because the bus ride, sometimes as a guide, you'd have to take the bus down to hit to get a trip, and then of course you'd have to um come back on the bus sometimes. It was always funny because the the trip down to the put to the put in on the bus was about a 45-minute drive, and the bus was just quiet. People were a little nervous, people didn't know each other, and then the bus back. You could barely hear anyone speaking because they were they had just gone through this adventurous experience, and their adrenaline was pumped up, but they also made a couple friends. That surgeon, that heart surgeon, and the and the hedge fund manager, they're talking, exchanging, you know, all sorts of stuff. Like, so just the energy difference was was really palpable. And then, you know, I came into the business world and I was like, oh, this feels like the bus ride down to the put in. It's awkward, no one really knows each other. So, how can I, as a guide, how can I try to craft connection experiences that are gonna get the bus ride home energy where people are connecting and stuff? So that's why that has that tie-in there.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

Wow. Um, no, that's amazing. And I know exactly what you mean with those bus rides. Uh and it's it's usually after some kind of shared experience that uh that you know, like what is the like what is what makes up the thing that m just forces people, not you know, not forces, but makes people get uh, you know, I feel like sometimes it's uh on uh on a level that it especially when you're in nature, I I would imagine uh if you know if you're a hedge fund manager and or and then there's someone who's you know maybe works at McDonald's, right? But on the river you're you no one everyone's on the same level because the river is the boss there. And it doesn't matter how expensive your watches, or it doesn't matter how shitty your car is or whatever, uh any element in business world uh or any other area of their life, like you're all it's you're just the same. Uh and that like I feel like I feel like that's something especially in business networking events uh that you know that I uh that I will ever attend. Uh there is that that energy of uh uh in the room, and it's you know in all rooms and it's uh it varies of that like unspoken energy that you can just feel where there is this natural hierarchy kind of taking place uh depending on who's in it and who and even in this com even in conversations. Like there's this seems like there's this uh to me it feels like almost like a battle that we the participants might not even know that they're a part of to get a little bit of an edge. Um but it's when your guard is let down, is when is when I think that's you know, like that's what creates that bus ride back, where like it doesn't matter who you are, how much money you have, what you've accomplished, what you haven't accomplished, uh and it really like it removes everything that allows just humans just to connect for uh and you know, in that case, connect on a shared experience.

SPEAKER_01 8:14

100%. And yeah, I I love something that a word that you said, and Jerome, congrats, you're the first person that has said this word, but I think about it a lot, and and I think you summarized it perfectly, which is hierarchy. When you are attending these business events or when you're participating in a in a corporate environment, you are surrounded by this hierarchy that makes you behave in a certain way and it makes you think in a certain way, right? And so um you were you were talking about you know these shared experiences. And I think what I learned and what I have learned over the last six years is that it's not just like physically I shared an experience with you, right? You and I can connect through our independent, overlapping shared experiences, meaning that it can be just as fun. And this is where I got inspired to start Bridgio. I remember I was doing a lot of networking when I uh was first starting this business, and I came across um a guy named Robert, and we got talking, and I'm a naturally curious person, so I'm just gonna be asking people questions about their lives, and um, so I was just asking him questions about his life, and um turns out that he was back in the day, he was a grateful dead deadhead and and an original one, like back in the like when they were performing in bars and stuff. And I was like, you know what's so interesting, Robert? If if I went to a company and I asked everyone in that company what's your favorite type of music, rock, country, you know, RB, whatever, everyone's gonna pick. And then inside of rock, if I ask you what's your favorite band, and let's say we have a thousand-person company, well, maybe five people are gonna say the Grateful Dead, maybe three people are gonna say the Grateful Dead. So then if I get those three people together, the hierarchy falls away. I Robert could be in that room with the CEO of that company in a traditional hierarchy. The the CEO is gonna be above Robert. But because I sorted people, and this is the connection chemistry part of it, but because I sorted people in an intentional way around shared experiences, that hierarchy completely dissipates. And when Robert's in that room with the CEO, guess how the hierarchy is remade? It's remade around the shared experience and who has the most experience with that shared experience. So, in that particular case, Robert is basically the one that knows the most about the Grateful Dead. The CEO is gonna be asking Robert about his experiences. What was it like back when they were performing in the bars? What was you know so-and-so doing, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so now all of a sudden, it's not that the Robert and the CEO and whoever else is gonna be in that room need to have a shared experience together, but they can gather together to discuss elements of a shared experience, and in a way, you get that bus ride back, you get that same energy.

SPEAKER_00 11:32

Yeah, no, it's hmm. And I as far as like what you know, because uh, you know, I th I feel like now, and you've got me thinking too, is because I I feel like that's how you and I first connected was on the topic of human connection. Um because you know both of us uh place extremely high importance uh on that, especially in business. Uh how how big a how big of a role do you think with the experience, uh with it being something in nature? Because I think obviously you're a avid outdoorsman. You love nature, and you behind you there's uh you have a a picture of uh is that's that's out in Utah, right? Oh, is it okay? Um and like obviously you've spent a lot of time outdoors. I sp grew up in New Zealand and uh spent a lot of time outdoors and I love being in the outdoors. Uh, you know, my um like there's uh there's something to you know places like that that I feel like really do enhance those kind of uh those kind of memories or moments or experiences that you just it I feel like it could be hard to hard to manufacture not not having those in nature. Like how big do you do you think the nature aspect plays a big role in creating the bus ride back?

SPEAKER_01 13:15

Yes, I I I I think it does, but I I don't think that it's the only role that creates that energy, that high energy. So for example, um I love live concerts, and and when I get when people talk who love live music, when they get together, it is just it's just the energy boom bounces right back up. So that's a that's an awesome shared experience. Um books that you're reading, like the the list actually goes on and on and on. Um, nature is a given one, it's it's a very simple one, and and I think people generally have a lot of their most powerful experiences, but also like building a business, right? So if if you're surrounded with entrepreneurs and founders and stuff, just that alone. Ideas have their own energy to them. So I I think that the list goes on and on. When I first started, it was all about the outdoors, but then I quickly realized that a lot of things matter to a lot of people, and the internet made it possible for us to find all the people to that matter to all the things, if that makes sense. So um and I don't I'm not talking from a silo perspective because I definitely think we're too echo-chambered today, and that's what creates most of our problems. But I do believe you can build experiences where someone that might you might not agree with politically lands in the same room with you because of a shared love interest that gives you enough empathy to accept them and accept their viewpoints and and still, you know, have a fun conversation.

SPEAKER_00 14:57

No, that's a great point. Um the concert, uh, your concert uh example uh is uh that's definitely no one that I've experienced. And um, you know, it's uh my wife and I are actually we're going to we're really excited. Uh we so we went to uh we we were in Boston for the first time last year in October, uh and we did a tour of Fenway Park, and we saw uh I don't know if how familiar you are with this, but because I had no idea. I had no idea that that's Fenway Park is like one of the most desired places for musicians to have concerts. Like it's there's like all they had a wall of photos of everyone who's ever performed uh at Fenway, and it was just legends in music. And just the tour guide was talking about how the atmosphere is like and that's I looked up and I saw quotes of some of these legends saying like that the atmosphere that was present at Fenway was look was like none other no other atmosphere that they've ever performed of ever, even with larger crowds. Um and it was like so intimate. Uh and so we're actually going to uh we're going to Fenway uh next I can't remember if it's June or June or July. I think it's July. Uh July to uh to go to a Noah Khan concert, and apparently those are super and so uh I'm super excited for that. And uh but you that example, uh like concerts, but then also like here in Kansas City, uh there's nothing like the atmosphere at in the middle of the winter when it's freezing cold during a Chiefs playoff game. Nothing is like like you don't feel the cold. It is like so loud and and so like it's like the it's like it's like everyone's you know, and it's I think that's touches to your point. There's inside that stadium there's people that believe all spectrums of political beliefs, or uh probably, you know, a magnitude of different people from different religions and backgrounds and ways of thinking who would disagree on certain things and probably you know could probably assume that uh you know a a lot of these people wouldn't get along in some other settings, but then uh it's like it creates this hive mind, this uh like Unity. You yeah, this unification of everyone's energy because everyone's there to see the Chiefs. Uh well not everyone, obviously there's fans from the other teams, but the vast majority is is all die hard Chiefs fans. Because only the diehard Chiefs fans will get out there when it's 20, 30 degrees uh to watch them play in a uh play in a football game. And it's like there's something about like that kind of energy. You know, there's different moments uh where that kind of stuff um you feel that and it's like I feel like that is like that is like the high that that uh is like worth chasing because I feel like that is a positive a positive thing and it's uh like so much so many good feelings come from that.

SPEAKER_01 18:48

Yeah, and I think I think dwelling on those experiences is going to strengthen your neurons. It's going to I mean if you think about it, we're really just a ball of of memories. Um so being able to talk to people about the first time that you ever set foot on the edge of the Grand Canyon, what that was like, you know, or going to a Chiefs game when it was snowing, or whatever it might be. So again, I uh my theory has been that we should all be going out doing really cool experiences, but to build a relationship or at least start a relationship with someone, you don't have to have that shared experience physically together, but you can create that or recreate that same energy by just talking about it with other people who get what you do. And that right there is what creates that initial spark of authenticity and connection that could lead to a relationship where you do go to the Chiefs game together at some point in the future. So um, yeah, that's what I've been chasing. I've been chasing the bus ride home, but how do we do that in a digital way? Yeah, how how do we do that? And COVID, I started my business in COVID, so things got kind of weird, right? People were doing all kinds of interesting stuff. Um, virtual is burned out, but I think the thing that I left during that COVID period with was um obviously in-person is always the best. It's fun, it's amazing. Uh, you can build way deeper relationships. The drawbacks to in-person, though, is that it takes time. Um, it takes it takes time. Uh you have to it takes logistics. Like I went to a conference downtown, I'm in Utah. I went down to downtown Salt Lake City, had to drive a half an hour there, had to find parking, had to get my ticket, had to go, you know, in, figure out where there's just there's so many logistics. Whereas um online, all of those logistics are removed. And I think that's a huge plus. You and I met, you know, digitally, and I was okay taking the meeting. Like, if I have to drive to coffee and drive back, like I'm looking at like an hour and a half of meeting someone that I don't really know and don't know if I'm gonna like, right? But digitally, you can just dedicate a half an hour and boom, you're in, boom, you're out. And and if you have that kind of if you can find that kind of shared energy, then something can be built upon it. My network is much stronger nationally than it is locally here in Utah, um, simply because of how easy it is now to connect with people. So then the next question obviously is well, how come we haven't designed digital connection experiences? And I know people have tried, and I I think they've we've made massive mistakes because what people have tried to do is they've tried to mimic the way that we connect in real life digitally, and that just doesn't work. So the virtual happy hours. And yeah, all that stuff.

SPEAKER_00 22:12

All the cheesy stuff that I think feel like most people now, at least I did. I uh when I worked for different companies, is like, man, this is this feels more like an cringy obligation.

SPEAKER_01 22:25

Yeah, right, right. So, so what would digital require in order for us to take advantage of the fact that we can meet with people and have and get into conversations really quickly? Um, what would that require? And so I think that's those are the type of questions we should be asking ourselves right now. Because then instead of going to a conference where you uh you don't know people, you've actually built your network digitally first, and now you're going to a conference to meet people that you already know, and now you can have a shared experience with them at that conference, whether it's going out to dinner or whether it's going to a show or whether it's attending a speaker. So all of a sudden, that those relationships get even deeper. So um that's why for me I decided to go with the digital landscape first. So in my bio, it says um building connection in connection deserts. And so I try to identify connection deserts. I think the business world definitely has um significant a significant connection desert, and I think digitally also does too. So those are the two places, and the end goal of what I'm trying to do is I personally believe that if we can create a healthy culture of connection, a healthy society where connection is integrated into the structure of society, like healthy. Uh, the best book about this is bowling alone. You had PTAs back in the day, people were way more involved locally, uh, they were involved in school, things like that, that helped them insert themselves into a social structure. Well, digital's kind of shifted that quite a bit. So, what can we do to recreate the way that people connect? And I believe that if we can do that well and do that intentionally, ultimately more people are going to be happier and live happier lives. That research is very, very clear. The best predictor of a happy life is your relationships. But if you look at the data today, we we're in a loneliness epidemic, and we're in a loneliness epidemic because people are not feeling like they belong. Um and so I think that you can create that belonging by discussing experiences with other people that have had same those same similar experiences.

SPEAKER_00 25:02

Yeah, I feel like we're like today, we're we're all connected with more people than ever in time, but we're also have less connections, like deep connections, you know. Social media, you know, for all its great benefits, uh uh which I can I uh I personally can s like I personally think the majority of those come on a business side of things. Like I just personally, like I'm uh I like I I just I've seen I've just read too much and seen too many uh negative effects of social media, like uh especially in like the you know young people, um and how it's affecting like so many. Like uh I listened to a a podcast last week uh and uh it was there was this uh lady who's like the lead global leading um expert on uh on sex, I think she was, and she was talking about how social media is like one of the biggest causes for like uh relationship problems and decl a huge decline in sex because and it was like crazy when she was talking about it because she was saying like before before it's like you there wasn't the social there wasn't social media, like you you and your wife, you uh your partner, you would go to bed, and then you wouldn't be scrolling on your phones till you fall asleep or whatever it was. You would sit there and then you would talk. And talking means you get deep and you talk about different things, and then that's like that helped transition and lead to intimacy. And now it's uh there's it's scroll, scroll, scroll. Holy shit, it's midnight, phone off, I gotta get to bed because I have to get up in the morning, and so it like leaves no time for uh any intimacy, right? And that's just one narrow um you know specific example, but like with social media, like you can have a million followers, but do you know any of them? Do any of them know you and feel like completely you know lonely, like you're saying? So my question is what have you found uh as some of the solutions to being able to accomplish that in a digital world?

SPEAKER_01 27:39

Uh um, okay, so I like to run these things called webinots. I I think that social learning theory is a really good start. So, how social learning theory is this idea that we move away from a one-to-many kind of uh conversation, meaning that you have a key opinion leader giving some expert advice on something and a whole bunch of people are listening. Social learning theory is um basically everyone is equal, sits around a table or sits around you know, digitally together, um, and they mutually explore uncertainty together. So they're exploring the things that don't necessarily have answers, which puts more emphasis on the right questions that lead to better engagements and better types of discussions. So I think that um there's a lot of opportunity with uh social learning structures and modalities where you bring people together to mutually explore uncertainty and uncovering what uncertainty is and defining it and pushing them in the right direction, um, helping facilitate them or guide them into viewing others as uh you know, in in the guiding world, we would often say it's not a matter of if you flip your boat, it's a matter of when. And your experience does has no bear on it the when you cannot eliminate the when. The when is going to happen. Um, it's the same concept of sometimes you win, sometimes you learn, right? And so with social learning theory, the premise is that we want you to bring your failures to the table. We want you to bring your wins to the table, we want you to bring your perspective to the table. And if we put if all of us at this table or all of us in this group put all of that out on the table, now we have some stuff that we can kind of sort through, understand, look at, and we have a better picture. It's the whole um, you know, I'm sure you've heard this four uh blind people are feeling different parts of an elephant, and they're all describing one's describing the tail, one's describing the trunk, one's just describing the husk. And everyone thinks that they're describing you know this one thing, but they're all describing it from different perspectives. And so essentially, social learning theory is okay, well, hey, let's just recognize that we don't know the answer, but we do know what we've experienced with this, and so how can we talk about this? Um, and so figuring out ways to create those kinds of experiences, I think, is a huge opportunity because there's so much more you can gain um from social learning than there is from listening. And and obviously, you know, we need keeping, we need speakers, we need those types of things. Um, but it's it's just a different type of learning that I think is experiential in and of itself. And the the thing that I actually like about that, and this goes back to it's not a matter of when you flip the raft, it's a matter of, or excuse me, it's not a matter of if you flip the raft, it's a matter of when. Um, the reason why I like social learning theory is it feels like you're just starting down the river. You don't know where this conversation's going to go. You don't know what rapids you might encounter. So crafting or facilitating or guiding people and helping them feel excited, um, anticipatory about a conversation with people that they don't know, I think that that can feel like going down a river because you don't know ultimately where the conversation is going to take you. And that what I try to do is make it so that that part of it feels fun. The fact that you don't know where this conversation is going to go. Some some people I've worked with are like, dude, you you wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. We don't have everything scripted out. No, you can't tell me where this event is gonna what's gonna happen at the end of this event. No, I cannot tell you. It's up to the participants, and some people just cannot handle that. A lot of people love it, some people can't handle that, but I think that's how you um that's how you build relationships and that's how you build connections. I mean, look at Burning Man. Burning Man, everyone shows up and and you just start to trade. Like we don't know what the outcome is gonna be. We're just trading for stuff, you know, and and people love it. People go to it every year, it's huge.