Lan Phan, Author of #DoThisDaily and CEO at community of SEVEN

Erik  00:03

We want to welcome all of our listeners to another episode of MRP, Minority Report Podcast, with Erik and Kerel. Each episode we talk with real operators and leaders in media, tech and business. And we're excited. We have Lan Phan on again today. We are super thrilled. Hey, Lan, welcome!

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Lan Phan  00:22

Hey! So glad to be back.

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Kerel  00:25

Welcome back. Welcome back.

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Erik  00:26

Welcome back. And in fact, Lan, we were just doing a little bit of pre planning and then thinking about, like, you know, the last time you were on was actually April of 2021.

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Lan Phan  00:41

Time flies. Time flies. (laughs)

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Kerel  00:44

I was gonna say, boy, has the world changed, a few times. (laughs)

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Lan Phan  00:51

I feel like it's changed every two, three months.

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Erik  00:54

Absolutely. You could have for like three years in one year. (laughs)

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Lan Phan  00:58

Totally! You know, you have the pandemic, everyone getting laid off, and then you had like the great resignation, then you had the DEI movement, then you have people getting laid off again. It's like bananas and an attack on DE&I. It's bananas.

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Kerel  01:12

Yeah, yeah. And I feel like I could be wrong, but I feel like right around that time, April 2021 is just like we were starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel for the pandemic. Right? Right, where people were starting to maybe get back out in person again. And obviously, there's been other things going on in our industry, in the world, and how have you been and what's new since the last time we spoke?

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Lan Phan  01:42

You know, as you and Erik were speaking, one of the things that just popped in my head was that life doesn't get easier, but you get stronger. And that's just as a collective. Right? Like, we all want the world to get better. We want to fight for, like, justice, and all this other stuff and it gets so frustrating because we see the ebbs and the flows, right? But I believe that good always wins. So, you know, like I said, we get tougher, the world doesn't get easier. In terms of what I've been through, so I wrote a book #DoThisDaily, which is out since April 2. So that was kind of the big news for me. I kind of took like about three, four years writing it on and off with a lot of like, stopping in between. And finally in, I've told the story a few times, the last time I was about to quit, Anita, who you've had as a guest, said "I'm pre ordering" and she wrote me a check, so many books. And at that point, I was like, "Okay, I can't let her down." And so I finished the book, like a month or two months after that. So it's just like the power of perseverance. I think that's just a lot of the lessons I've learned in the past few months.

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Erik  03:00

Oh, that's great. What a great story, too, the power of perseverance. And I think, also in the book, you have a lot of great stories and anecdotes, and also inspirational sort of material. But I'd love for you to sort of talk to us about that process. What was that like, you know, writing your book and pulling all that together?

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Lan Phan  03:21

I think a lot of it is kind of the genesis of me, like the beginning of the pandemic, getting laid off of Fortune Magazine and I had no advertising budget. And so I just started posting on LinkedIn every day because hey, I just got laid off, I got a lot of extra time on my hands. And so I started posting on LinkedIn lessons that I wanted to kind of learn or things that I was kind of going through at that time. So you know, my posts on LinkedIn started getting traction, but I started posting as community of SEVEN. And then after two, three years, I was able to get that to about 250,000 followers. And then I started posting as myself, Lan Phan, probably two years ago, when I had spent a summer with my mother who's kind of slowly in advanced stage dementia. And it made me realize that I had to take up more space. Because the reason why I wasn't posting as myself was because, you know, I always told myself, I'm an introvert, I'm more of the behind the scenes person. I felt much more comfortable posting as community of SEVEN. But then, me kind of posting as myself was like this testament to I need to take up more space in the world. What kind of lessons do I want to teach my daughter? You know, because my daughter is half Jamaican half Vietnamese, so she kind of has a duality in terms of life that she has to live. And I want her to take up space. I want her to own her voice. And I wasn't doing that and how am I a role model to her if I'm not taking more space in the world, right?

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Erik  05:02

You know, it's interesting as you describe that, Lan, I was thinking literally about like, kind of like your own words just being true in everything you just said, you know, about the you have to start somewhere and kind of breaking out there, you know? And I loved a post you had about a year ago talking about conquering your fears, and sort of getting uncomfortable and all of these wins, which are kind of like putting you outside of where you thought you were, right? Like, working outside of that, it makes me think so much about your posts where you talk about that.

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Lan Phan  05:32

Well, I think everyone thinks that you gain confidence, like, you're born confident, and then you can act. But it's actually in the action of doing that you gain confidence. So you have to start before you're ready. You have to start while you're afraid. And the more you do it, the less afraid you become. And I think that's the irony. Most people are waiting for confidence before they start, but that confidence doesn't happen until you, you know, you keep on doing it, you fall, you get up, you fall, you get up, right? I think about the Japanese proverb, fall seven times get up eight, right? And I think we need to just constantly fall and get up. And the hard part is we're in a world in the US where we're asked to be perfect, that it's not okay to fail, and especially for people of color, right? That there's, you know, the whole adage work twice as hard for half the pay. So you have this mentality of you just have to be 10 times better than anyone else in order just to get half the recognition. Right? And I think it's just one of the process where you just need to keep on acting, keep on getting better, until you become a master of whatever you're doing. I never felt comfortable writing until I started writing every day. I've been told by bosses, Lan, you're not a good writer, you know what I mean? And so I just had to keep on writing even though other people doubted me, even though I had some impostor syndrome there. And I had to keep on doing it until I built the confidence. And I'm writing a book now. And so that's like, one of those things where I would not have imagined this four or five years ago, because I had given up on this dream. I had wanted to write a book since I was 12.

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Kerel  07:29

That was the question I was gonna ask you, has that always been a-

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Lan Phan  07:33

Since I was 12! But I was like, "Oh, this is too late for me. I'm a mother. I'm turning 50 this year." And I joke around and I say, "I'm turning 50 this year and I just figured out what I want to do when I grow up." And you know what? That's fine. I'd rather be a late bloomer. But still, you know, search for my dream and chase my dreams, even if I'm at the tender age of like, 50. (laughs)

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Kerel  08:00

Yeah, you know, I don't look at it as being a late bloomer for anyone that does something important, but when they get in their 40s, 50s, or 60s, right, this is the right time for you. Right? Like it's yeah, I've always sort of approached it that way. Everyone is different. And everyone's journey is different. And this just, I think, happens to be the right time for you to write a book.

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Lan Phan  08:24

Yeah, exactly. And you know, what, I wouldn't have been ready. Like all of the stories that I've had, you know, on posting on LinkedIn and also in my book, were things that I had to go through corporate America. Like, I wouldn't have been able to write this book in my 20s. I couldn't have written it in my 30s because I was still gaining the experience and the knowledge,

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Kerel  08:46

Right. What was the motivation behind writing the book?

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Lan Phan  08:51

You know what it was? To two people really, my daughter is one, because I realized that she's watching everything I'm doing. I don't want to have my doubts be her ceiling, if that makes sense. And the other thing is my mother. You know, we were Vietnamese refugees. My mom sacrificed everything for my family. She was a hairdresser, grew up in Inglewood. California, never made more than 15,000 a year. And I think about like how she left all of her dreams. She wanted to travel. She wanted to do all these things. But she never did the things that she wanted to do because she sacrificed for her family. And I just don't want to live with any regrets. And so I think that was kind of my passion. And my mom is 87 now, 88, and I wanted to write the book while she was still alive.

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Erik  09:49

Lan, I think about, you know, some words you said as you're describing all this, be who you needed when you were younger. Be who you needed when you were younger. Talk about that.

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Lan Phan  10:03

Yeah, that was inspired by Brad Montague. He is a New York Times bestselling author, like he had basically posted this picture of him and it would just say, "Be who you needed when you were younger." Just, that image, like, just stopped me in my tracks.

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Erik  10:21

Yeah.

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Lan Phan  10:22

And so I basically kind of had posted, you know, this whole story about, sometimes we don't get what we need when we're younger, right? And our goal as we get older is to be the people we needed when we were younger. The goal is to break generational curses, right? I struggle with that all the time with my daughter. And I think that's the whole thing is, my parents did the best that they could with what they had, but they just also had a lot of trauma, especially a lot of the friends that I have, you know what I mean? Like, we grew up with a lot of trauma, whether it's growing up poor or whether it's just growing up in environments where you just never had enough, or you weren't respected because of the way you looked or your religion, because you had a, disability, whatever it might be, right, whatever the luggage that you had. And I think the goal is to kind of break those generational curses, and you do that for the next generation. The thing that motivates me is knowing that my daughter is watching me and whatever I do makes it possible for her to do. So I used to be the General Manager of See Her, which is a gender equality initiative for the advertising industry. And we had a model, "if you could see her, you could be her." And it's that notion of seeing someone that looks like you, sounds like you, doing the unimaginable. And so, for me, it's much different today. but when I was growing up in the 80s, and the 90s, and all this other stuff, I never saw anyone that looked like me in a positive way on TV, in the media. And so I want to be that role model for someone, especially my daughter.

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Erik  12:18

Lan, as you're describing that too, I think about an image that's in your book. Tell me about the illustration, I believe your brother helped to illustrate.

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Lan Phan  12:28

Oh, yeah, wait. I don't even know if I could find it here, but-

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Erik  12:32

Yeah, it's about everyone's growth looking different.

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Lan Phan  12:35

So you know, I think the power of this is, you can't always judge growth on the surface level. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it's not happening. Everyone's growth looks different. So you know, I think it's just this notion, we as a society compare ourselves, especially with social media. I see kids who are like in their 20s, thinking, "Oh, I'm a failure, because I haven't made a million dollars in my 20s, or 30s." We're in this world where we're comparing each other to like, the whole materialism kind of aspect of it, right? And no one is showing their real selves on social media, you're just seeing the best curated parts, right? And I think it's this notion of like, stuck with the comparison game, that just because you're not where you're at compared to the people you might see on the outside, doesn't mean that you're not growing. Because your roots are strong, right? And I'd rather have strong roots than a pretty flower that will die and wither away. And I think that was kind of the whole message in that story. It's funny because I had had my brother recreate an image that I had kind of found on social media, but this whole book was kind of like a family affair, because my daughter, she is a published illustrator, because she has a drawing in the book as well. (laughs) So it's a kind of a funny story. The reason why community of SEVEN where I got the name was that when I had gotten laid off from Fortune magazine, I was supposed to build up a startup within Fortune, got to hired number five - I was supposed to have a team of 100 - got to hire number five, got laid off and said, I had to lay off my entire team. So I brought the girls together and I was like, "Look, I'm going to either build my business and hire you back. We're gonna meet every week, and help you find your next job." And so on our zoom calls, it would be those five girls, me, which is six of us and then Morgan, my daughter who's in kindergarten at that time would join. So she drew that picture. And that was the original community of SEVEN and where the name came from.

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Erik  14:42

Oh, I see. I see. I like that Lan. Thanks for sharing those illustrations. Those are great to know those are in the book. "#DoThisDaily: How to Find Success, Happiness and Purpose in Life and Work." Tell us about the book. Who's it intended for? Who will really benefit from reading the book?

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Lan Phan  15:04

Yeah, I mean, I will say that I kind of write for myself. So I write for the introverts, the givers in the world, the empaths in the world. And so, you know, the type of person I was, I was always the kind of the doer, right? I was the behind the scenes fixers, I would be the person doing the decks, doing the work, but not presenting it because my boss would do that (laughs) Right? And I think in the corporate America, there's a lot of people of color that have been the doers, but you're not necessarily presenters, if that makes sense. Where you have other people taking your work and doing all that, that was my career for 20, 30 years. (laughs) Like, I was excellent at what I did, but I'd never, you know, "Well, you're not a natural public speaker." I've had bosses tell me, "Well I don't want you to talk to the client. I'll do that." So you just work on the deck, right? So I kind of came with that mentality. And I was able to kind of climb the corporate ladder and get pretty kind of high position C-suite exec after, you know, several years, several decades. But the whole notion of the book, is really, when I had the first iteration of community of SEVEN, I was really curating these masterminds with CEOs and Founders. And so it was 1000s of dollars to join this program and it was really successful. And I basically went through this whole process of how do you find your purpose and your reason for being? And more importantly, how do you live it? And what I realized, though, was that it was nice to make successful people more successful, but I wanted to help more people. That I had a bigger purpose and it was my faith, being of service to others, and freedom. And so with the book, what I ended up doing was, that was kind of my first iteration, that and creating my YouTube channel where I was able to kind of do free content. So my whole goal is how do you democratize training and development? Because in the past, I didn't get my first executive coach or training until I was way into my 40s, early 40s. Right? And what I've noticed in corporate America, is that it's usually not people who look like you and me, right, that are getting the executive training and development. And you need that in order to excel to the C-suite or the VPS and up, right? So it becomes a catch 22. And I remember I had these conversations when I was at Fortune Magazine, who do you consider the high potentials? And usually, the high potentials didn't look like me. Right? And so I wanted to democratize training and develop, so I wanted to put my knowledge in the book. And so the book is really based on four different secrets, though, honestly, these aren't secrets. When you look at kind of self development and purpose, there are some fundamental, you know, belief systems, right? Your mindset, Carol Dweck, there's a lot of the same kind of concepts. And even when you look at different books that we've had in the past, you know, it goes as far as the Bible to stoic work and then if you go back stoic, you got Lao Tzu, right, but we're all kind of talking about the same thing. I really kind of wanted to make it simple. So the whole goal for me and what I do when I post is like kind of creating, picking complex concepts and making it really simple and digestible. So I broke it down into four sections. These are the things that you need to really be able to kind of refine what your purpose is and how to live it. So the first secret is really about answering this question. What matters most? And it sounds so simple, but most people don't go through it, or don't ask themselves these questions.

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Kerel  19:02

Or are not true to themselves when answering that question too.

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Lan Phan  19:06

So true. Because a lot of times, what we do is we define society's version of what happiness is and we adopt them and make them our own. And so I worked with a lot of CEOs and the first thing I always ask them is, what brings you joy? Inevitably, there's always silence, and they can't answer this. And here's the thing, if you can't define what brings you joy, how do you expect to get there? Right? So I always say life is like a GPS. A GPS is worthless, unless you have an address. And yes, you might be able to get where you want to get without the address, but you're gonna, you know, maybe have to do a u turn, you're gonna get lost, you might fall off a cliff. Right? So that address is really, in life, is intentionality. So the more you're able to define what matters most to you, the better you're able to get there. So when you answer the question "What matters most?" then you kind of really are able to create your core values. From your core values, they become your North Star. The second, you know, secret that I talk about in my book, is your mindset creates your destiny. So I always think of Henry Ford's quote, "Whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right." And it's this whole notion of, you know, do you have a growth mindset or a fixed mindset? We look at Carol Dweck's work kind of in terms of the growth mindset and, really, the belief systems. Like, all of us have self doubt, everyone has impostor syndrome. You know, I always think about the quote in terms of courage, right? "Courage isn't the absence of fear. It's feeling afraid and doing it anyway." And it's this whole notion of like moving forward even when you feel unsure, unready, because everyone feels unsure and unready. Right? The third secret is really about consistency. So change requires consistency, it's a daily action, we become what we do daily. And it's not about this once in a lifetime change, it's about the consistent change of making a decision each day to become more and more of who you want to be and who you aspire. And that's why the importance of knowing what matters most to you in the back of your mind becomes important because that becomes your GPS, your North Star. And the last secret is really about change requires changing who we are. Change, I always say that change is simple, but it's not easy. There's only two ways to change. It's what you add into your life, and what you take away. So if I'm trying to change who I am, I have to take away the self doubt, I have to take away the toxic relationships, I have to take away the bad habits. And I have to put in healthy relationships, I have to add in sleep, I have to add in self care. And you know, before we got on, I was kind of telling you and Erik that I'm getting over a flu. So I'm on day two of my flu right now and health is one of those things that you take for granted until you get sick. Because I was laid out. Yesterday I would not have been able to do this interview. And I just stayed in bed all day. But like you don't realize how important your health is, until you get sick. And before you can find success, happiness or purpose in work and life, you need to take care of your health. And many of us aren't taking care of our health, our mental well being. And if you don't have your health, nothing matters.

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Kerel  22:54

So true. Nothing matters. I tell people that all the time. That is the foundation on which you can build everything upon. Your health. And Lan, thank you for going through sort of the highlights and keys to the book. Where can everyone find the book? Where can they purchase it?

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Lan Phan  23:09

Yeah, they can buy it anywhere books are sold, you know, Amazon, Walmart, independent bookstores, just anywhere books are sold.

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Kerel  23:17

Awesome, awesome.

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Lan Phan  23:19

And make sure when you buy it also leave a review, because that's how- that helps authors. (laughs)

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Kerel  23:24

There you go. That's a fantastic point. Fantastic point. I have a marketing slash building community question for you. I teach university classes and I tell my students all the time that building your network, building a community, and really diving into a platform like LinkedIn is super important for your career growth and development. You've done a fantastic job of that. Last I looked you have 119,000 followers on your personal LinkedIn account. Another 259,000 followers on community of SEVEN. What has been sort of the, I don't even want to call it a secret, but what's been most important to growing a community to the size that you have it today?

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Lan Phan  24:12

Focus on what you can give to others. So it's this whole notion of like, having the service mentality of what you post shouldn't be boastful, you know, it should be, how can you help the person reading this? So my success metric, because in the beginning, I would only have one or two kind of likes and you know, for some people it will get, it's really frustrating. But for me, I just was like, could I help one person reading my post? And if it could, then it will be worth it. And so I just have this mentality of how can I help that one person? And you know, it's crazy Kerel because I've had people reach out to me and say, you know, "I was considering committing suicide and I read your post and I stopped. Right?

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Erik  25:00

Wow.

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Lan Phan  25:00

"Or this really helped my relationship with my wife or my daughter." And for me, that means the world to me. That's more than any reviews or likes or whatnot. And I think if you kind of come with this mentality of how can you be of service to others, then it really helps reframe things for you. I think that's why introverts and givers are such on LinkedIn, at least, do well, compared to other platforms like Instagram, where it's about, this is how I look, you know what I mean? This is what I wear.

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Kerel  25:34

Yeah.

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Lan Phan  25:34

LinkedIn is really about being of service people, because people are hurting these days. And I think, you know, especially during the pandemic, it was evident as well, that, you know, there's a loneliness epidemic in the world. And I sometimes take for granted, like me and my husband, we have a great community where we live of great friends and neighbors, and I have friends from high school and junior high. Some people haven't developed that muscle to develop those community. And so like, a lot of times I post for those people. You know, one of the things that I used to always do, because, you know, I was in kind of Client Services, so I'd go to big conferences and my goal was to make CEOs and Founders and C-suite Executives feel special. But for me, I would treat anyone who was there the same. And that was just my mentality. So if I saw someone standing alone, this just happened even last week I was at a Ralph Lauren kind of event, you know, for the USOC and I saw a woman standing alone, and I was with my daughter, and I was like, "Hey, you should go and speak to her. She's alone." And my daughter was a little hesitant at first and I was like, "Here, come with me." And so I started talking to her. And I was like, "Hey, I noticed that you're standing-" because it's, you know, a room full of people and everyone is kind of paired off with their friends. And I saw this older woman standing alone, I just went up to her and I was like, "Hey, how are you doing?" And I was like, "I noticed you're standing alone. Are you waiting for a friend?" She's like, "Yeah," so I was like, "Well, I just wanted to keep you company." And like, little things like that, the humaneness aspect of just making sure if someone feels welcomed and at home, when you have that mentality, it spreads, right? You're just making someone feel at home. And I think the same thing can be done on social media. How do you build community? It's not about you. It's about service. It's about getting people, like, if you look at my posts, some of them have like a million impressions, like, 5, 600 comments. It's in the comment section where people are talking to each other, not to me. And that's where community lives. It's not about them following me, it's about them curating this community, where they are both teachers and learners. And I think that's the, I won't say it's a mistake, but I think that's a mistake that most people on social media try to do is, it's about followers, collecting followers. It's not about collecting followers. It's about how do you become of service to other people? And I think that mentality shift makes a big difference.

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Erik  28:18

That's great. Well, Lan, you certainly built a large community, a large network, and thanks for sharing some of those secrets, because I think that'll be really helpful and impactful to others. And so, Lan I can't thank you enough. We've had such a good time talking with you and learning so much more. What are some ways that folks can stay in touch with you? It sounds like LinkedIn is obviously one of them. (laughs) What are some other ways, Lan?

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Lan Phan  28:42

(laughs) So I'm on LinkedIn, like I'm on Facebook as well. Instagram, it's the SEVEN if you want to kind of talk, that's more of my personal stuff, family pictures, etc. And then my website is LanPhan.co. Like, co not com. (laughs)

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Erik  28:59

Awesome. Awesome. Well, thanks everyone for listening and watching another episode. You can find a lot more episodes where you find all of your audio. And I want to leave one more gem that you've shared with everybody for everyone else. I think it's one of the best ones, it's, "Want to get rich quick? Start by counting your blessings." So, thanks a lot, Lan.

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Lan Phan  29:22

Amen. Thank you!

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Kerel  29:24

Have a good one.

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Erik  29:25

Thanks everyone for listening.

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