Disruption changes the status quo of a particular industry. It can be good or bad. In your company, how can you utilize disruption in your favor? Shawn Kanungo is an internationally recognized speaker, consultant, and disruption strategist. He has spoken on some of the biggest stages across the world for many different industries. He has even been called the "best virtual speaker ever" by Forbes Magazine.
In this episode, Shawn shares his insights on:
How to become a prolific speaker/presenter
How the optical industry can embrace disruption
How to inspire innovation
Tune in to this episode now to know how to leverage disruption!
Be sure to connect with Shawn at ShawnKanungo.com.
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Watch the episode here
Listen to the podcast here
Shawn Kanungo - How To Leverage Disruption
Thank you all for taking the time to join me here to learn and grow. I'm so grateful for the support and I'm going to ask a quick favor right off the top. If you get any value from previous episodes, if you love this episode, which I'm sure you will, please do share it. Take a screenshot and throw it up on Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn, and wherever you are. Text a friend and tell them that I'm talking with Shawn Kanungo because this is going to be such a great conversation.
If you don't know Shawn, he is an epic speaker. He's spoken on massive stages across the world for massive organizations. He is an innovation strategist. He spent twelve years at Deloitte in innovation strategy and now he goes around the world talking to companies about disruption and innovation. He's just a super fun and energetic guy, so I'm excited to have him on the show. Thank you so much for coming on, Shawn.
I'm super excited to be on and, to be honest with you, the way that I actually met you, if you don't mind me getting into it, is because of the podcast. I was going down to Orlando for Transitions Academy. I was in Toronto. I was grabbing a bite and then I saw you grabbing and eating this burger. I texted one of my best friends of the world. Her name is Sonia Delhon. She's an optometrist in Edmonton. We talked every single day.
I took a picture of you mid-bite, and I told Sonia who you're friends with. You guys went to school together in Boston. I'm like, “Is this Harbir?” She's like, “Yeah, it is.” I'm like, “I listen to this podcast.” Then I came up to you and I said, “Are you Harbir?” It turns out, we ended up in Orlando. We took an Uber ride. We saw each other there a couple of times. You asked me a question on State. I was at Vision Expo. I did a presentation there. You were there. I was in Dubai for Essilor India. Do you show up on the screen through a video? We are just meant to be together. I don't know. We're just meant to be. I'm so grateful that we are friendly now and we're buddies. It's amazing, these collisions that happen through these conferences.
I forgot about the Dubai thing. That was so funny. I wish I was physically there in person. That would've been super cool.
He was unreal to see. We were doing rehearsals for this Essilor India event and the team was going through some of their videos. I was talking to somebody and then I heard your voice. I'm surprised. During the actual presentation of the Essilor team, then I recorded it. I sent it to you. I tagged you on Instagram. It was so cool.
I appreciate you doing that. That was cool because I had no idea that that was playing there. I appreciate that. It comes full circle. I appreciate that you had already listened to the show and it was a weird moment for me for someone that I've never met before to walk up to me in the airport and be like, “Are you Harbir?” My wife and my friends that joked about the video that we shared eventually after from Transitions, and they were like, “You felt like you're famous or something.” The thought crossed my mind, but I was like, “There's got to be something more because there are not that many people who listen up.”
If you've gone this far, but after all this hoopla that we chatted about how we know each other, if you've gone this far. I think rate, review, and follow this show because, as I wanted to learn more about the optometry space or eye care space, part of the reason why I jumped on this show is its sounds.
You are putting in the time and effort to make this great and we need voices like yours in this space that are putting on content and looking at the eye care space in different ways. You're getting really great guests. To me, it's been amazing insight and learning from the people that you are just bringing experts together and it's been a great learning for myself. Somebody who's not in this space. I'm not in this industry. Your show has been amazing resource for me just to learn about this space. I want to thank you. If you're reading this, give this guy a rating and review, please.
Thank you. I appreciate that. I'm glad the show could be a resource for someone outside the industry to learn a bit about what we're doing. The goal of the show is to provide insight to those who are within the industry, but I'd love to bring on guests like yourself who are not in the industry, so we can see and hear your insights from a totally different perspective and then apply them to our industry so we can grow and do different things differently.
That's basically what you're about is this disruption and innovation and I want to bring that to eye care. If we just rest on our laurels and if we just continue to do the same thing that we've always done, the profession's going to die. That's what I want to get into. First of all, tell me about what is innovation, strategy or disruption. You are a disruption strategist. Tell me what that means.
To define disruption. Disruption is something, someone, or some technology coming out of nowhere and changing the status quo of a particular industry. My job is to walk into organizations and work with leaders to essentially disrupt themselves before they get disrupted by the market. It's to continuously look at what other industries are doing when it comes to innovation. How are they going off and innovating their businesses and their practices? I try to help organizations and leaders see where they can apply these innovations in their own businesses. I've had the great fortune of working with some amazing companies around the world when it comes to this idea of innovation and disruption.
Disruption is something, someone, or some technology that comes out of nowhere and changes the status quo of a particular industry.
The beautiful thing is that I'm not an expert in their particular industry. I am not an expert in eye care. What I have the pleasure of doing is looking at every other industry and seeing how you can take bits and pieces and copy and remix ideas from other places and implement them within your industry. That is a little bit of what I do.
We need that in eye care. As optometrists, we tend to be slow to move and we feel like we are getting disrupted. One of the ideas I like is my friend Brianna Rhue, who's been on the show and I think you met her at Vegas in Vision Expo. The way she says it is to become the disruptor instead of being the disrupted. She's a disruptor herself. She's got this technology company. I like that and I'm starting to share that, not just in the show, but I'm doing these lectures. I'm throwing that in those times for us to be the ones who disrupt.
Before we get into that, you are an innovator. You are trying to push the boundaries of what's happening within this space. Let's be honest. It's a very traditional space. It's a very slow-moving space. How do you feel being or trying to push this industry in new ways and what is that like? The immune system usually of an industry rejects you. It rejects new ideas. How do you feel doing that?
People sometimes ask me things like that and I look back over the years like a teenager and as an adult. I've weirdly put myself in really uncomfortable positions. I don't really understand why even in social settings. They'll be an open mic or something like that. I don't even know how to sing that word or whatever. I'll say, “Fine, I'll go.” It's terrible. I know I did not look good, sound good, or whatever, but I'm like, “I'll do it.”
I'm comfortable with being a little out of place and with people potentially judging me and maybe not looking very good. I'm okay with that because as the saying goes, it's at the end of your comfort zone is where you grow. I'm comfortable with being uncomfortable. I don't know why or how. I've just kind of done it over the years.
About that slow-moving thing, a few years ago, it was right before COVID or something like that, we had our conference here in BC and I did a lecture on digital branding and social. These are lectures that are for credit. We needed credit every year to keep our license, so it was a good turnout.
There were 100 and something people in this little thing and it was full. I was not expecting how many people to turn out for that lecture. At the end of it, somebody put their hand up and goes, “Why do we need this information? What's the purpose of this? Why are you doing this lecture?” Either my presentation was really bad or I'm further ahead than I realized in this conversation, these people don't realize the value of having a digital footprint or presence at all. Having a digital footprint is not a new thing. That's a ten-year-old thing at that point.
There's a lot of that at so many different levels where there are people in the industry. The majority of the industry's kind of slow to move and recognize where there's an opportunity. I'm just comfortable with just getting out there and just talking about it. The more times you say something to people, eventually, they'll kind of catch on and say, “Maybe I should be online. Maybe I should be on social media and have eCommerce.” It's weird that I don't get frustrated about it really a whole lot. I feel like I'm sharing the right message. I'm just going to keep sharing it.
That's amazing and I'm glad that didn't detract you from continuing on it. I think you're on the right path. I think the punchline is that the world is it continues to move towards digital. The world values digital, and I know we'll talk a little bit about it. The fact that you are trying to push this industry to embrace digital or even content is a beautiful thing.
It's just one of the things when you do lectures that are on something that's a bit of a newer or an uncomfortable topic or something that people are not embracing it. You'll get some glossy looks and that type of thing. You just have to. I mentioned Brianna. You got to keep pushing people and tell them to get comfortable with disruption. Our industry needs that otherwise. We end up just complaining about the fact that things are not going our way and there's no value and benefit in that.
Not to put age about it because there are some older optometrists who are really forward-thinking. It's nice to see the groundswell of the younger optometrists, generally speaking, are more comfortable with technology. More importantly, schools are starting to implement conversations about disruption and the various eCommerce, digital players, and things that are out there. Technologies that are out there and coming. AI and other virtual stuff are coming.
That's a good point. We should chat about that because, to me, the tragedy is that in optometry school, they barely touch the business side of things. They barely touch the disruption. How do you innovate your practices? How do you delight customers in new ways? How do you create a brand? How do you develop a community? How do you work with creators? They don't teach any of that stuff. How do you build alliances and joint ventures? How do you work with a startup? They don't teach any of that, and I get it. There's a medical side to it. I look at the business and it's like 70% about trust and how you do that in new ways or in a digital way. That's the game now.
How To Leverage Disruption: The tragedy is that in optometry school, they barely touch the business side of things and the disruption.
I see a new opportunity for you, Shawn. Professor Shawn Kanungo, you can go around to the schools doing these lectures. Do a lecture series on all this. That's all you. It's your forte.
We'll do it together.
Give me a couple of whatever off the top of your head. A couple of things about disruption like mindset-wise. It's not just optometrists. It's people in eyecare in general. Is there something a way we need to change the way we think so we can be comfortable with disruption and welcome it?
I think to have a disruption mindset is number one, to not be so siloed in your particular industry and in your particular craft or practice. The reason why you have been successful is because you have had focus. The problem is that now industry lines are blurring. You need to have a deep generalist mindset. You need to have an understanding of what's happening across different industries and different verticals, not only from a business standpoint but also from your patient, consumer, and customer perspective.
They're seeing things in ways that you may not be seeing it. Their experiences on Amazon and Uber by touching a button and how they interact with other services will impact what you do in your practice. You have to be constantly looking at what other industries are doing and how people are interacting with those companies and consuming content and services in new ways, because, at the end of the day, is going to impact how you deliver your patient experiences. This idea of becoming a deep generalist is important to have this disruption mindset.
The other thing that's really important is not get complacent. Not to fall into the status quo of what you're doing now and it's not about transforming. I'm not asking any of these to go off and start doing these artificial intelligence eye readings off people's phones. No. I think it's about starting small and continuously experimenting around new ways of how you can make your processes a little bit faster or how you can make your client or customer experiences a little bit more delightful.
You can put out that piece of content that might be a little bit more uncomfortable for you. That, to me, is innovation, and it's just about creating value in fundamentally new ways and it could be very small. I want to demystify this whole idea of innovation and disruption that it has to be this big, massive, or transformative thing when it can be like the smallest step in the world.
That's a really cool way of looking at it. When I see disruption, I think of some large change that has to happen, but really it can be a small step-by-step process.
That's how disruption starts. Every disruptive technology or every disruptor, it starts small. It starts in the basement, garages, and weird people on the internet. It just starts small and then it bubbles up. If you want to disrupt yourself, you have to take that same approach, which is to start small with a small experiment and then it goes from there.
Every disruptive technology, every disruptor, starts small. If you want to disrupt yourself, you have to take that same approach—starting with a small experiment and then going from there.
That's a great piece of advice. A simple mindset switch right there is just to do the small uncomfortable things. It's perfect.
To be honest with you, do you know how hard it is to change people's minds? I cannot pummel people with this information and convince people to change. The more information that I give when it comes to disruption and innovation and how other people think, that's not going to change anybody's mind.
If you're reading this and you're getting pummeled with information, that's not going to change anybody's mind. What's going to change your mind that this is important is when you start to flex the muscle. When you go get off this show, you're running at your desk or in your car right now. The change you are going to go off and make is like when you go back into your practice. You're like, “Let's just try something new.”
That is the biggest mindset shift to me. You have to go off and try it and do something different. That's the quickest way to change your mind. You have to actually take some sort of action. That's the key. You have to do it and then learn from it and then go from there 100%. If anybody hasn't seen Shawn speak, please go to ShawKanungo.com or where can they go? YouTube?
Put in Shawn Kanungo anywhere, TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube, or Facebook.
Search this guy and Forbes said that's the best virtual presentation ever. I was like, “Who is this guy?” I watched your stuff and I was amazed. For virtual, you're on a stage in an empty auditorium. All this cool setup. In live presentations, like when I saw you at Transitions, your presentations are at a different level. One is your energy and the way you speak and your body language.
The other is the visuals that you have. By far, your presentations are the best that I've ever seen. I know my word is not the same as Forbes, but it's incredible. I want to ask you a little bit about that because many of us, myself included, want to be better at performing and presenting. I use perform deliberately because a lot of times when you're speaking, even giving a CE lecture, when you get one of these accredited lectures, most people go up on stage, “Here's how we do this thing and here's the next thing.”
We can make those fun, vibrant, and energetic. There's no reason not to. In fact, we should be trying to push the boundaries, so I want to learn from you. Please share a few of the things that you've done. I know you didn't get to where you are overnight. For somebody who's starting out and is perhaps standing at the podium and talking. What's the next step? How do I get bigger and louder?
It's interesting because I'm still learning the craft. I still feel like a rookie in the game and I see amazing speakers everywhere. I get inspired by rock stars, standup comedians, and other speakers that are doing cool things and people on video. I'm almost trying to get better and I'm actually not the best. I have a lot of filler words. I'm not the best, most articulate speaker, but to me, it's about the message at the end of the day.
It's about truly delivering something that you are unbelievably passionate about and doing that in a way that is story based. Doing that in a way that's authentic and genuine to yourself. Regardless of the fact that you are not the most polished speaker in the world, it's about the message and storytelling at the end of the day. My recommendation when it comes to speaking, and there are lots of great resources out there, is to try to connect with people. It's to create stories that will tug on people's heartstrings that will resonate with people that will be relatable at the end of the day.
How To Leverage Disruption: It's about delivering something that you are unbelievably passionate about and doing that in a story-based way, in a way that's authentic and genuine to yourself.
The other thing is that I think a lot of times, if you're saying something that is not informative, insightful, or funny, if it doesn't create value, then why are you saying it? You should only create a presentation that creates value. To get very technical on you, the way that I break down a presentation, let's say it's a 60-minute presentation. There are only so many concepts that I can bring. Let's say there are 4 or 5 concepts.
I want to be able to make sure that those concepts are actually provocative and insightful. There's something in there that maybe people in that room have not heard of or that they've never even thought of in that particular way. I'm trying to dissect those particular concepts. Bringing examples or stories and doing it in a way that is almost counterintuitive and pushes people to think. I begin every single presentation by saying, “You are going to disagree with me at the end of this presentation,” and it's going to create tension.
If I create a tension throughout that presentation for you, that means I did my job. If you agree with everything that I say or that I didn't do my job or didn't say something that you already don't know, I'm trying to provoke. I'm trying to get you to think. That's what a great presentation does, that you're meditating on this later. You're like, “That's the biggest compliment to me.” It's like I was thinking about on the drive home. I was thinking about that. That's my one piece of advice.
Tension creates attention.
Tension creates attention.
I like that. Let's go. I'm going to steal that.
It's not fluff. You're deliberately presenting concepts in a way that will make a person kind of be like, “What? I know I've done that.” One of those concepts I wanted to talk about was your idea of waste. I don't want you to give away what you know here but the concept of waste. It resonated with me. Maybe one other time I heard it and I thought it was valuable.
There are a couple of podcasts I listen to entrepreneurial types that happened to have come up very infrequently, but with these two podcasts, but the idea of doing things in the less efficient way might create more value. Correct me if I'm wrong. Some people might look at it as wasteful, but I'd love for you to share that and what the benefit of that is.
The idea to get technical is the idea of costly signaling. Costly signaling is the idea that by putting in extraordinary effort, maybe even wasteful effort, can result in greater significance, value, or meaning with your end customer, end patient, or your end user, for example. The highly digital world. When everything is efficient and seamless, and we can press a button and get something delivered to your door. To double down on things that are more meaningful can actually create more value.
As an example, for those of you reading this, I showed up here with a nice camera. I showed up here with a nice piece of audio. I didn't have to do that. I could have showed up in my hotel room, my AirPods on, but no. I wanted this to sound delicious and put in the extra effort for the camera and audio to sound great because maybe there will be five more people that read this and be like, “That was interesting. I read this because it sounds like he put in a lot of effort.”
The crazy part is, as humans, we are rational because this sounds better in your ear. What's going to happen is that the message is going to land a little bit deeper with you. When we think about our business, we're always thinking about how do we make it so efficient. It's like how do we make things more meaningful, magical, and memorable with our end customers, and that might require more waste.
When we did our virtual keynotes and presentations, I would rent out 700-person theaters to do virtual presentations. It sounds absurd. I'm doing it all over Zoom, but it shows that somebody put in this much effort and it must be valuable it comes back to everything that we think. For example, lipstick is made up of all the same ingredients, but there are some companies that put a little bit more time in the texture and the weight of the thing, and we just feel a little bit better.
This is why, for example, wine, it is statistically shown that if wine is served in a better wine glass, for some reason, in our mind, it tastes a little bit better. This is absurd, but it comes back to the way that we consume. The way that we consume whatever is all clouded by perception at the end of the day. I believe that by putting in effort, it can result in so much more meaning with our end patients or customers.
How To Leverage Disruption: Putting in effort can result in so much more meaning with our end patients or customers.
That concept really resonated deeply with me. I have used to own an eCommerce eyewear brand. A lot of that was building relationships and trust. To do that, I felt like I had to go out of my way. I had to do some of these inefficient things. I wrote a handwritten thank you card to every single person and every single pair of glasses.
It doesn't take that long, but it's a lot less efficient than just simply box it and ship it. There's a story about a much bigger company that I heard when I was starting my eyewear brand that led me to think about that inefficient and wasteful way to approach the company. It was about Airbnb when they were very little and it's still part of the Y Combinator and they were sitting down with the guy at Y Combinator. It was like it's not really picking up the way they thought it was supposed to and whatever. They realized that the photograph’s properties were not as good as they should have been.
He goes, “Why don't you guys go out to New York and do it yourself?” All the way to New York and take photos? That's crazy. That's so inefficient. That's inexpensive. That's what he said. Sometimes you got to do the inefficient and wasteful things. We know the punchline of that story. They turned out to be fairly large company, but because they did that wasteful thing in the beginning, a lot of people probably would not have done. That stuck with me. I love that you talking about it too.
Look at all the things that we think are wasteful now. As everything is so Zoom related. Why do I have to meet that person? Why don't we just Zoom? It's just easier. It's more efficient. When you meet with somebody, it might be that 45 minutes to drive there and maybe the 45 minutes of the conversation is probably a waste of time, but you might build a deeper relationship. You might build that deeper trust. You might meet somebody you haven't met before, which is in a highly digital world.
Don't disagree that some things have to be digital. To make it really practical for your audience, booking and setting up a fast, seamless, and efficient booking site is really great. At the same time, providing extraordinary customer experience and extraordinary customer support when they're in trouble and maximizing those moments will create even more value.
Providing extraordinary customer experience and support when they're in trouble and maximizing those moments will create even more value.
You have to do both. You have to be really great at digital and you have to be really great at creating and maximizing those moments. You have to be great at both. I try to show up with anything that I do. Do it with effort. That's why I'm trying to learn about the industry when I do a presentation. I'm trying to create slides that are beautiful and relevant. I'm trying to show up with effort in everything that I do.
I can tell that it comes true 100%. As I said, there's nobody that I know. I'm sure because you are a speaker. You speak internationally, you go to these conferences, you see other keynote speakers, and you can see others doing certain things. I haven't seen it, so I have nothing really else to compare you to other than what I've seen.
It’s a totally different level and it's inspired me to up my game dramatically. In fact, after Transitions, I was putting together a new lecture that I've just started to do. I did it for the first time in Vegas at Vision Expo. Your presentation now, it is not anywhere near your level, but it still inspired me to take it to a whole another level. It's significantly more visual and storytelling. While still providing that educational aspect, the slides don't have as many words for me to regurgitate for people to write down. It's like, “Here's an image. Let me tell you a story and then you can extrapolate the value from it.” I love doing it. The number one thing you said earlier that I heard after that lecture was true and authentic to you. I was like, “That was it. That’s the best.
That means the world that you took that extra effort and it was fun for you. You got that feedback that it was authentic, genuine, and great.
Thanks. I appreciate it. You're helping me elevate. I'm going to keep trying to take it to a different level. I'm going to be doing that lecture a few more times. Hopefully, getting good feedback. The costly signaling theory. I think that was an important one, and I think that's something that many of us as business owners need to take away. We know as business owners, we need to make things efficient, but we also need to keep in mind where we can do that extra little thing. Sometimes it's a small thing like handwriting a note, but it has a disproportionate fact on the end user or the customer.
We forget that human beings value everything. Products and services, it's all based on a story. Yes, there's utility in many things, but for many of our experiences, it's based on a story that we tell. We need to understand that everything that we deliver is a story at the end of the day. How do we make that story better for folks?
How To Leverage Disruption: We forget that human beings value everything based on a story. There's utility in many things, but for many of our experiences, we need to understand that everything we deliver is a story at the end of the day.
We have to think about that too. Like I said earlier, I used the word perform because we have to think about ourselves as performing. We're not acting and faking it, but we are performing and giving the person a podcast, almost the person we're interacting with, whether virtually or in person. You want them to leave feeling like the experience was elevated.
I want to go back to something we were talking about. You asked me the question I'd like to get your perspective on. I was saying how I've kind of been comfortable with being in uncomfortable positions. I've been comfortable sort of putting myself out there and getting whatever feedback I get back, but a lot of people are not comfortable with that.
This was the question I asked you on stage at transitions. What would you say to somebody who has an idea, wants to be a disruptor, wants to put themselves out there but is afraid of the backlash or the negative comments or people laughing at them because that was what you're talking about? You got to be comfortable being laughed at. What advice would you give to that person?
I remember I was speaking with one of my brothers-in-law. Super successful, sold as first company, and made millions off of it. He went to this entrepreneur circle. All these entrepreneurs. They also made it super successful. All came up with disruptive ideas. I was just fascinated. I'm like, “You're like in the Illuminati. What did you learn from the Illuminati?”
He said something to me that changed my perspective of the world. He said, “All those people in that room, they were just as vulnerable as everybody on the street. They didn't know where their next direction was going to be. They felt this idea that other people are disrupting and don't know what they were doing. They're going in the ether in this forest, and they have no idea where they're going to end up.”
The main punchline is that no one really knows what the hell they're doing, and to me, that's inspiring. That's inspiring in the sense there is no path, playbook, or blueprint. Even the most successful people in the world understand that there is no blueprint. To me, that's inspiring. If you have a particular idea and want to disrupt, I think the thing that holds us back a ton is that, “I haven't done this before. How do I go off and do this?”
They're scared because it's uncertainty. We would rather choose death over uncertainty. We fear uncertainty more than death itself. You can get it. It's against our nature to go down this lonely, uncomfortable, and scary. However, if we can understand that when we're sitting in that fire, when it's uncomfortable and lonely, that means we're actually pushing ourselves outside of our comfort zone and trying something new.
One of the most beautiful ways to make that journey a little bit more comfortable is to try convincing one person around you. It could be a fan, follower, or partner to come along on the journey with you. You have to make those inroads, whether it's a product, service, or new process. You have to show them that there is some value there, but you just have to convince one and then the journey will be a little bit more comfortable.
Eventually, you'll convince another person and then you'll sort of build a movement around what you're doing and that will make the journey a little less scary for you. Every disruptor and innovator goes down that path and they will always go down that path. No one really knows what they're doing. I think that's inspiring. To me, when I'm trying something new. Now, I'm like, “I don't know what I'm doing, but I know this is where I should be.”
The idea of even successful people don't really know what they're doing is inspiring and it's a powerful thought. In my mind, if I'm starting something new, I'm afraid that somebody who has done it before or knows more than me is going to judge me for doing it wrong or not doing a good job, but most people are so consumed with their own insecurities or their own things that they're trying to do that they're not even going to pay attention to your faults, flaws, or failures, so it's worth getting out there. In fact, they might come to you and be like, “How did you do that thing more than anything else?” I think that that's a good way of looking at it and starting with that one person.
What I learned working with organizations is that starting in management consulting, what I would do is I would go on a company. Part of the reason why they hire you is they're like, “All the best practices from this industry and other industries.” What I would do, I'm like, “This is consulting. You take the best practices from these other industries or in this industry, remix it, and put it into what they're doing.”
What I realized is that that's not making anything innovative. That's what you're supposed to do. What I realized is that actual real strategy consulting. Real innovation consulting is working with the client to do something you and they have never done before, which is what creates the results. It's not the same thing you've been implementing with other clients in the past. It's actually working and collaborating with them to build something new.
The fact that both of you and the client are both doing something that you've never done before. My thought would be you are helping them do something they've never done before, but you've seen it before, but you're saying that's not the goal. That's crazy and scary almost for you. I would imagine I don't know where this is going to go, but let's see what we can create.
What I realized there are some consultants that are there to help them do something that the industry. Some companies are just trying to get up to standard. Being in innovation, your job is not to create or copy and paste innovations. It's to create. It's to handhold them through creating something new. It's been an amazing ride and experience to try to do that, and that's why I love what I do.
If you are innovative, your job is not to copy and paste innovations. It's to handhold them through creating something new.
What's the best, biggest, or most exciting stage that you've spoken on?
It was an awesome stage. It was amazing. To be honest with you, I just came back from something and we had to push this a little bit. I'm actually on this advisory board for the University of Alberta and talking to students. It was like a speed dating thing where they could meet me and there were hundreds of students that sort of came through and I met them at once.
It's not a stage. I'm sitting at a table, but I find it so valuable to give back to these students and provide value to them. I'm at the age now where I've been punched in the face way too many times that now I can go back and give some advice and learn from them too. I'm also learning from them. To me, those experiences and being able to be on that stage is not even a stage is really the most rewarding because I know that I'm going to say something to them that they will remember.
I remember just talking to these students and asking them a question. I'm like, “What are you guys looking for? Coming out of school, what do you want right away?” One guy that was sitting there, he was like, “We want to get money. We want to be able to retire right away.” Everybody around him was like, “Money right off the gate.”
I told him. I'm like, “I'm 38 years old. The fact that you were coming out of school and you're saying that the most important thing to you is money is the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life.” I said that exact thing and I said, “If you optimize for status right off the get,” and I see this mistake all the time with kids coming out of school. They're optimizing for position, title, and brand docking to get like $1,000 or $1,500 more on their salary.
Are you going to make $1 million in twenty years? Why are you worrying about that small amount of money that you're going to get right off the get? I know some people might have financial concerns within their family, so I get that. For most people in that room, they didn't. If you're optimizing for status right off the get, then you are fundamentally setting yourself up for failure later. You should be optimizing for experiences and whatnot.
I'm bringing this up to say that I saw that shift and they're like, “I might have just changed their trajectory right there and then.” You and I. We have kids. We've been in our industries for a while now, and I see you're passionate about your work. I'm certainly passionate about what I'm doing, but there are so many people that we know and I know we're getting philosophical, but how many people do you know that are your friends?
They're now sitting at 40 years old. They're like, “I don't know if I made the right decision in life. I wonder if I should do something else right now. I wonder if I got into marketing, I would've been happier than being a doctor now.” I would say that 80% of the conversations I'm having with my closest friends are having that discussions internally. I don't want these kids growing up, when they get to my age, to be like, “I actually followed a path that I probably shouldn't be on.” What are your thoughts?
I have never had any issues with making the conversation philosophical. I'm happy to go down that path anytime. I 100% agree with you. That resonates deeply because of the conversations I'm having with optometrists. I did this series of conversations with six capsules of episodes about the future of our profession. One of the common discussion points was like, what are new grads or young optometrists doing? What are they choosing?
They're being enticed by money. Corporations are giving them forgivable loans or they're giving them incentives, bonuses, and things like that. My question to them is, “Are you going to pick the money or will you pick your happiness and the betterment of your profession?” Sometimes those things align and that's amazing, but a lot of times, they don't.
You're going to take the money and work in an organization that may not be the most conducive to you having a fulfilling career. Also, maybe not conducive to the betterment of the profession in the long term based on the corporation's goals. You could choose to potentially make less money, but you are expanding your scope. You're learning more. You're taking the bumps and the lumps because it's going to make you better at what you do in the future.
That is a key question and topic of discussion these days. I'm biased because I'm the guy who didn't take the money and took the lumps and the hard road to get to where I am. If somebody were to look at me and say that they like what I'm doing, that's how I got there. I'm not going to tell you I'm successful or I'm better than anybody.
If you look at me, you say, “You seem to have done something right. That's the way I went.” I didn't, for better or worse, take the money upfront. That's my experience. I 100% agree with you, but I'm biased because that's my life and that's my road. I appreciate you sharing that and I think that's going to be an important message for people in our industry to know.
I hope that people in this industry keep dreaming. Keep dreaming of things you want to do with your practice and business. A lot of folks that I meet within this particular industry are thinking about other things. They've run their practices like well-oiled machines. I think that there is so much more to explore in this industry. We haven't even cracked the surface of what's possible.
I think this industry is one of the most important industries in the world. We can't get complacent because this is people's livelihood. This is the most important asset that we have is our eyesight. In my opinion, your duty actually is to continuously innovate. Your duty is to go off and try to experiment because this super important.
How To Leverage Disruption: The optometry industry is one of the most important industries in the world. We can't get complacent because this is people's livelihood; the most important asset we have is our eyesight.
It's great that you have the opportunity to influence young people at that very impressionable age to give them that insight from your perspective about having the passion, experience, and value of that versus taking the money upfront. In the long-term, you probably end up making about the same amount of money. If you take that extra $10,000 or $20,000 upfront now, it is not going to affect whatever that last number is at the end of your life, so I appreciate that insight. Shawn, I always ask two questions when I wrap up the interview. Before I get to that, I want you to please share with us where can people find you, listen to you, and see you. Where can they go?
First of all, follow this show, subscribe, rate, and review wherever you are. Spotify. That's the most important thing. I started this conversation by saying that 99.99% of your audience have never heard of me and don't know who I am, but they know who you are. You're putting in so much effort into this show. Follow Harbir everywhere. He is on every social media, TikTok and whatnot. You can follow me after you follow this show and him. I'm @ShawnKanungo anywhere you can find me on LinkedIn and all social media platforms, so that's what I'd say to that.
Thank you. I love it. Thanks for being the hype. I appreciate that very much. Please go find Shawn, and yes, please do rate and review the show as well, but go find Shawn. I guarantee you are going to be inspired in so many different ways. The theories, thoughts, and lessons that you share are really high value. The quality of your content alone is inspirational. It's going to inspire. There are a lot of content creators in the eye care space, and reading your stuff is going to inspire them to up their game.
There are some people out there putting out super high-quality stuff, but even then, watching you, I think, is going to help elevate the game. Go follow Shawn. Follow him on all platforms. Shawn, if you've listened to the show before, you probably know that there are these same two questions I ask every guest.
The first question is if we could go jump in a time machine and go back to a point in our life that was challenging and difficult. If you're comfortable, you can share that specific moment in what was happening, but more importantly, I'd like you to share the advice you would give young Shawn. It's like a rapper name, Young Shawn, at that time.
I was ready for this question and every time you ask it, I always reflect on my most difficult time. My most difficult time was when my father passed away. I was about 25 years old. I had to take over his accounting practice. I learn so much about how to take care of my family, run this practice, and sell a practice.
I became a man right away because before that, I was just a boy. I was partying. I was playing hockey. I wasn't focusing on my career. That was the day that I became a man. He died suddenly and I had to take care of everything. What I learned actually was I don't know if this is like an East Indian thing or Brown thing. When someone dies, there's usually a rush of people coming into your house, right?
Every day, you have people coming for weeks. People just at your house, helping you more and whatnot. The day that people weed out, it must be the second week. It's like the fifteenth day and your house is empty and it's just you and your family and everybody has moved on and they should. Everybody should move on.
The realization is that everyone moves on. To me, life is short, so it's like you have to make every day count. I know this sounds like air and fairy and motivational, but everyone moves on at some point. No one is thinking about you beyond that point. It's a realization that. That's the day that I learned that you need to keep moving. That's why to this day, that day got me hungry and I'm still hungry to this day because I know that tomorrow may not come. That was the one inside thing that I got from that moment.
You have to make every day count because everyone moves on at some point.
Thank you for sharing that. That's heavy. Imagine, even after all these years, it's still hard to think about that time losing your father. I can only imagine how difficult that was, so thank you for sharing that, Shawn. There's something you said that reminded me of a clip of yours I saw and a stoic saying that I like to keep in mind, which is Memento Mori. I feel like that's a reminder there, like you said. This may be your last day, you don't know. It's a matter of you move forward, live your best life, and have a great day. I know you were speaking about that on stage. I don't know if you want to share a little bit about that.
Memento Mori is this idea that remember you will die. It's the reminder that life is short. As the story goes, there's this thing called the Roman Triumph. In Ancient Rome, the successful general, after a huge military parade down the street, would be the highest moment for this general. There would be a slave at the back of the chariot that would whisper in the ear. At the most important day of the general, the slave would whisper in the ear of the general, “Memento Mori.” Remember, you will die. You are still a mortal. Remember that tomorrow is a blessing.
I talk about the idea of disruption, and to me, it's like you never know what's going to disrupt you, the pandemic, a new technology, or somebody coming out of nowhere. It's a reminder to continuously innovate and to continuously be hungry, and try new ways of doing things. I have this app and it's called WeCroak. It reminds you five times a day that you will die and it's for you to reflect. I can't tell you how many times this is like you're with your kids or if you pick up your phone, you're like, “I should remember this moment.” It's a good reminder. It's a Bhutanese culture. They do this. They remind themselves five times a day and now you can do it through your app. WeCroak. That's my advice. Remember, you will die.
I think it's important. It sounds crude and it's not in the nicest thought to have to remind yourself, but there's a lot of value in it because it makes you want to make use of your day, your life, and your experiences. Thank you for sharing that. The final question is, everything that you've accomplished to this point, Shawn, how much of it would you say is due to luck and how much is due to hard work?
I would say that it is 90% hard work, 10% luck. There's luck in everything. I love luck. I think the hard work creates luck at the end of the day. If you don't put in the work, you don't get the luck. I work pretty hard and I'm trying to create more luck for myself.
How To Leverage Disruption: Hard work creates luck at the end of the day. If you don't put in the work, you don't get the luck.
That's a great answer and I know you work hard. I was on your website. The list is endless of the performances or the talks that you're doing. It's like 500 talks a year. I was like, “This guy.” How are you everywhere? It's crazy.
I'm here with you. That's the most important thing.
I appreciate it. With all of what you have going on, you have been an amazing guest. You have been very present and I appreciate that very much because I know you're a busy guy, so thank you so much, Shawn, for coming on. I know there is going to be so much value in this episode. I hope everybody reads it from start to finish. Go back and read again. You probably need to because there are so many gems in this one. Thank you so much, Shawn. I appreciate you coming on. Thanks, everybody, for tuning in to another episode of the show. As Shawn said earlier, make sure you rate, review, like, share, and do all of the good stuff. I appreciate it very much. I'll see you in the next episode.
Important Links
Brianna Rhue - Past episode - EPISODE 78 - BECOME THE DISRUPTOR WITH DR. BRIANNA RHUE
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LinkedIn - Shawn Kanungo
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Facebook - Shawn Kanungo
About Shawn Kanungo
Disruption Strategist
As a globally recognized innovation and disruption strategist, Shawn Kanungo works at the intersection of creativity, business, and technology. He spent 12 years at Deloitte working closely with leaders to help them better plan for the opportunities associated with disruptive innovation.
Kanungo’s work has been featured in the Globe and Mail, The Guardian, CBC, and CTV. He’s been recognized by Avenue Magazine as one of their “Top 40 Under 40”. In 2021, Forbes called Kanungo the “best virtual keynote speaker I’ve ever seen”.
A prolific content creator, Kanungo’s content on innovation has garnered millions of views across LinkedIn, TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook. His first book, The Bold Ones: Innovate and Disrupt to Become Truly Indispensable will be available on December 6, 2022.