Hoehn’s Musings

Recently, I caught up with a friend who I hadn’t talked to in about a year.  He was telling me how he wanted to leave his part-time job so he could go to film school and become a video editor.  I asked if he’d ever done any editing before, and he said, “No, but I think it’d be a lot of fun.  I would love to edit trailers for big Hollywood movies.”

Kill me now.

He wanted to go to film school — a.k.a. guaranteed six-figure debt and high chance of failure ahead — with ZERO hands-on experience in anything related to film.  Unbelievable.

I see this all the time.  People want to get their MBA because they love the idea of being a CEO.  Or they want to write a book because they love the idea of calling themselves an author.  Or they want to buy a patent because they love the idea of their product being on a shelf in Walmart.

Why in the world are people willing to dish out thousands of dollars when they could have quickly discovered, for free, that it wouldn’t work out?

You want to be a film editor?  Try making a basic slideshow of family pictures on your computer.

You want to be a CEO?  Shadow a first-time entrepreneur and see what their daily routine is like.

You want to be an author?  Write a successful blog first.

You want to be an inventor?  Sell one — just one — unit of your product on ebay.

You want to stop falling in love with your half-baked ideas?  Fail cheap.  You’ll build momentum that way.

When I was 15 years old, there was no Youtube.  The only central location I knew about for finding interesting videos was Kazaa.  That’s where I found this:

If you know anything about the history of sports, you’ll definitely want to watch it.  It’s kinda slow for the first minute, but trust me, the whole thing is awesome.

ESPN’s “Images of the Century” catalyzed my interest in video editing.  I must have watched it 100 times back in high school.  I remember showing it to several of my friends, and being amazed that this video could give all of us goosebumps.  It was the first time I became consciously aware of how powerful images were when combined with the right music, and how pacing and transitions could rapidly seize a person’s attention and put them in a trance.

I owe a lot to whoever edited “Images of the Century.”  He awoke my appreciation for the art of editing, as well as my desire to go out and learn it.

I got two calls from the Youtube celeb, Mr. Chi-City, last week.  I emailed him my phone number after he posted on Twitter that he wanted to talk to some of his fans.  Apparently, almost 700 people emailed him with their numbers… and he called all of us.  Twice.

The first time he called me, we talked for 10 minutes.  He was candid, really nice, and didn’t seem like he was in a rush to get off and make the next call.  I asked him a few fairly predictable questions…

How has doing your Youtube videos affected your life? “A lot of women, man, a lot of women.  Haha!”

What do you have planned for the future? “I don’t know, man.  A few entertainment companies have talked with me about setting something up, but I’m not really interested.  I just like doing my videos.  I’ll probably go out to LA at some point and talk with them, just because how often does a guy like me, with no talent, get offers from people like that?”

We talked about some other stuff, made a few jokes, then I wished him the best of luck and said I’d continue watching his videos.  Then he called me a few days later, unexpectedly, and left me this message:

Awesome.  I love this guy.

There’s something to be said about this gimmick of his, and we can take away a few lessons from Chi-City:

• Connecting with fans. How can you not love a guy who makes 1,100 calls over the course of six days, not selling anything, but just wanting to connect?  That is a big physical effort, saying the same thing to jackass fans like me, over and over.  How often do you think he found the person on the other end of the phone interesting?  Rarely.  But that doesn’t matter — he cared about connecting and spreading the love.  For me, that’s the very core of good marketing.  Well done.
• Authenticity. People love him because he’s funny, ridiculous, high energy, over-the-top, and excessively gregarious.  But we also love him because we know it’s not an act.  He definitely plays up his personality on camera, but it’s pretty obvious he acts that way all the time — flaws and all.  And it’s hard not to like him for it.

Anyways, I wanted to write this post to show my appreciation for someone who’s not trying to immediately cash in on a viral video he made and the small amount of internet fame that came with it.  Chi-City, you seem like a cool guy and I hope to be hit with one of your freeze pops someday.

This is great to do if you read a lot of books on a particular topic, and constantly like to reference the ideas from them.

This is an important lesson I learned the hard way.  It’s common sense advice that you don’t really think about until you’ve screwed things up, so hopefully this post will save someone from an awkward/painful situation in the future.

Last year, when I was still in school, I was dating a girl who wanted to go into advertising after graduation.  In spite of my warnings that traditional advertising was in decline and wasn’t a good long-term choice, she insisted that she still wanted to pursue it.  Because I was good friends with a bunch of people in that industry from the internship I did, I said I’d put in a good word for her.

Now, this girl was not dumb (in the academic sense).  She had a really high GPA, flawless record, and was a genuinely sweet person.  But I knew from the time I’d spent with her that she wasn’t all that sharp.  She didn’t grasp basic concepts easily, she actually had to bust her ass to get that high GPA, and worst of all, she was shy and afraid to ask questions.  Even though I was aware of all this, I told my old boss that she was legit and passed her resume on.

She got the internship, of course.  And when I talked to my boss a few months later, she suggested that I either not recommend people in the future or develop a stronger filter.

It was stupid on my part, because I really valued the relationship I had with my boss.  The recommendation I gave reflected poorly on me, and her trust in me was shaken.  It just wasn’t worth it.  Favors are overrated.

I’ve learned my lesson since then.  I don’t say anyone is legit anymore unless I’m 100% confident and have witnessed their work ethic/talent/creativity/passion firsthand.

If your recommendation has the potential to really screw somebody over (in time and/or money wasted), you can’t take the situation lightly.  You need to carefully balance the person’s track record with your gut feeling.  I knew this girl had a good track record, but my gut was telling me the situation was going to be a disaster.

If you really want to maintain a person’s trust and respect, do them a favor and be coompletely transparent.  Don’t do anyone a favor just because they’re your friend.  If you absolutely have to make a recommendation, give that person a few options.  Say, “I recommend Person A, B, and C.  They’re all good, but I think you should pick whoever suits your needs best.”  It’s an easy way to do damage control.  When they have options, it’s their fault if they make the wrong choice, not yours.