So you are an introvert?

Peter Anthony (00:04.592)
G'day, David, how you going?

David Hall (00:06.852)
Hey, it's good to be here, Peter. Thanks for having me on today.

Peter Anthony (00:10.582)
Absolute pleasure. You know why it's such a pleasure? Because I am endlessly fascinated with this whole idea of introversion and introverts. And I thought it might be useful just to clarify, how would you define an introvert? I mean, you're a world leader and expert in this space. I'm just really curious to know how you define an introvert.

David Hall (00:34.596)
Okay. And there's definitely a lot of misunderstanding about it for sure. What I say is we're deep thinkers. And then some people are often are also deep feelers. They're empathic. They could be both deep. In my case, I'm a deep thinker, but I know lots of people that are also deep thinkers and deep feelers. And that's, that's a big part of the definition. And a lot of times I hear,

Peter Anthony (00:50.64)
Yeah.

David Hall (01:04.004)
hear people say, well, the main difference between introversion and extroversion is how they get their energy. There's truth in there. But I think if that's the only definition, it's very lacking. You know, I think that, you know, I'm a deep thinker. Sometimes I do need to recharge. Oh, and the other part of the definition they say is, and they recharge by being alone and extroverts recharge by socializing. And again,

Peter Anthony (01:10.736)
Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (01:16.208)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (01:31.056)
Yes.

David Hall (01:33.316)
those things are true. But it's not the full picture, you know. So as an introvert, as a deep thinker, I do need some time to recharge. And I say, I need some recharge, recharge after certain situations, and certain people, right? It's not all people. It's not all people. And you know, sometimes like, you know,

Peter Anthony (01:38.542)
Okay, okay.

Peter Anthony (01:52.752)
Yeah. Yeah.

David Hall (01:58.286)
I'm really gonna enjoy this conversation with you. I might need a break after I might not, you know, I might just feel recharged by it, you know, just depending on the topic. And the other part of it is, it goes beyond that. We need time alone for lots of things. We need time alone to think, to make some plans, to focus on some work. So as a deep thinker, and there's a lot of great strengths with that. I'm very analytical.

Peter Anthony (02:08.304)
Yeah.

David Hall (02:26.788)
Other introverts have different strengths. And because we're deep thinkers, lots of strengths come with it. And we just need to understand that. And there's so many myths that we can get into that today about what introversion is, what introversion isn't. But I'll say, introverts can do whatever they want. Their just strategies might be different. It might look different how they go about something. And that probably, probably the two biggest myths and we could talk about more.

Peter Anthony (02:29.168)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (02:38.256)
Yeah, yeah.

David Hall (02:55.3)
Probably the two biggest miss is that introvert equals introversion equals shyness. Okay. Either introverts or extroverts can be shy. I say that I was shy when I was younger, because I didn't understand my introversion. I didn't understand that I was a deep thinker that I usually think before I speak. And that's a very natural process for me. And the good news is, if you're shy,

Peter Anthony (02:55.44)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (03:00.176)
Yeah, yeah.

David Hall (03:25.284)
either introvert or extrovert, you can learn ways to get confident, you know, but it doesn't definitely doesn't equal shyness. And the other big myth is that we don't like people. And I think that there's a very, yeah, yeah, I think there's, you know, and we're about half the population. So I think it's a very small percentage out there that don't want any human contact. I think, you know, I don't know what the percentage is, but maybe it's less than a percent. Almost everybody likes people. It's just, it looks different.

Peter Anthony (03:29.774)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (03:36.496)
You're not very friendly.

David Hall (03:54.668)
you know, how much people interaction we need and that kind of thing. Yeah, there's so much that we could talk about around those things.

Peter Anthony (04:01.936)
Yeah, because I was reading an article in the Journal of Psychology and what they were talking about was it's more relevant now to talk about people being ambiverts, not introverts or extroverts, because it's likely there's a, each of us have an introverted aspect and an extroverted aspect. It's going to depend upon things. Like you mentioned some great things there. It depends on how I'm feeling. It depends on who I'm talking to.

It depends on what the topic is. It's going to vary. You wouldn't say, I'm always extroverted or I'm always introverted. If you're a deep thinker, you think you're going to be deep thinking all the time. There's going to be some times when you might just get a bit light and just want a bit of a break from deep thinking.

David Hall (04:44.898)
Well...

David Hall (04:50.372)
Yeah. And when I talk, you'll hear me say things like usually, generally. Um, I personally don't use the term Ambervert because my, my core, my preference is that I naturally go into my inner world, my imagination. And, um, it, a lot of times what I, when I hear people use the word Ambervert, what I, what I usually hear is that they say that, you know, I need my time alone.

Peter Anthony (04:55.758)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (04:59.856)
No? Okay.

Peter Anthony (05:07.44)
Yeah.

David Hall (05:19.844)
but I also like people. And I'm like, well, if that's the definition, then I'm, I'm an ambervert or extrovert, you know, because I like people, but it's about preferences, you know, it's like, what do I usually do? And most of the time, you know, I'm going to drift inward, I'm going to, you know, spend some time alone. I'm gonna need some time alone for all kinds of different things. And of course, again, we could do anything. You know, I gave a speech today and I talked about how I love it.

Peter Anthony (05:22.032)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (05:27.312)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (05:37.328)
Yeah.

David Hall (05:49.604)
But I've learned that my approach to it, it just looks different. The way I prepare is going to be different than an extroverted friend. So, you know, I say my preference is introversion for sure. And then we, we do all kinds of things and I don't, I don't call any activities extroverted. I just say I'm an introvert. I love giving public speaking, but I need to prepare differently.

Peter Anthony (06:01.07)
Yeah, okay.

Peter Anthony (06:10.736)
Yes, and maybe a more introverted person might find that a bit more exhausting and they might need to like recharge afterwards, like you get back into that deep thinking. It's hard to be deep thinking and talking at the same time. Yeah.

David Hall (06:26.628)
Yeah, and I think you hit on something right. That's what it is. It's like people are going to vary in how much they are going into their inner world and how much they're paying attention to what's going on around them. And so that's where you know, but I think you do have a preference. Most people are going to have a preference one way or the other that what they mostly do.

Peter Anthony (06:45.424)
Yes, yes. It's interesting too, I was working with a group of engineers in the UK recently and these engineers wanted to learn how to connect better with clients because they had like client manager and client service roles in these big jobs. And these were very deep thinking introverted engineers. Right.

and highly specialized skills that they'd spent 20 years pretty much alone studying and they quite liked it. They quite liked that studying, not just the deep thinking, but they enjoyed the expertise that that deep thinking generated. It's challenging to become an expert on something unless you spend a lot of time deep thinking, studying and analyzing it. And they found...

it endlessly fascinating. These are people that would spend a decade studying how liquid travels through a pipe, for example, and how much the pipe vibrates as the liquid's traveling through it. They found that fascinating, right? It's good there's people like that. You think, well, how relevant is this? That was the question I asked. I'm just curious.

David Hall (07:57.42)
Yeah, I was just going to say that, yeah.

Peter Anthony (08:07.096)
How was that relevant? And the answer he gave was that there's a lot of natural gas pipes around the world that need to travel through marine parks and marine reserves. And how much the pipe vibrates as the liquid or gas is traveling through it has an effect on the reef fish and the environment. And he cared a lot about the environment. And he loved understanding whether or not this particular pipe would impact that environment. Plus it meant...

the client could get approval for the project that was being proposed, for example. So it was deep thinking. He loved how things traveled through pipes, which is great. But it also had like a social or a pro -social outcome as well. That's what he was doing. And when I got a chance to understand that, I thought, wow, I really respect this. I respect.

David Hall (09:04.484)
Yeah, you said it. It's like we need people to do that and we need people to do all kinds of things. And likely something like you just described, they probably, you know, are an introvert, you know, and, and we, we need introverts to do that deep thinking to come up with creative, innovative solutions. And, uh, you know, we need everybody, everybody has their different strengths and skills, but I'm glad that somebody's doing that. Just like you said.

Peter Anthony (09:15.504)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (09:21.168)
Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (09:29.888)
Yeah, I'm glad someone's doing it. And you think of all these all these niches, like this real expertise, whether it's expertise in AI or engineering or geology or whatever it might be. You think it's very likely it was the introverts that were thinking very deeply over a long period of time in this very specific area that developed that expertise that we can all enjoy and share. So you think, well, that's...

That's a superpower, if you like, or it's something that introverts are contributing to the world over and above their extroverted colleagues. Not that I'm, this is an extrovert bashing session. Yeah, I think it's, it's interesting too. You talked about the people part. I'm curious about your thoughts on this, because traditionally extroverts have been,

David Hall (10:12.644)
Yeah, no.

Peter Anthony (10:25.808)
named like the people people. The people that like people and that are very gregarious and chatty and funny and cracking jokes and life of the party. You think well, that's one type of being social. But it seems like an introverted way of being social is not talking to 100 people, but maybe having fewer deeper relationships with less people, like more worthwhile, deeper.

connected relationships, is that what you say that's the case? Like with, does that come with a deep thinking?

David Hall (11:01.764)
Yeah, absolutely. So a couple different things. We definitely, we thrive often in one -on -one or small group situations. And it's, so it's not that we don't like people. It's just, I use the example of a networking event. Let's say you walk into a networking event and you don't know anybody, the extrovert is going to...

Peter Anthony (11:21.168)
Yeah, yeah.

David Hall (11:30.244)
it's gonna want to meet everybody really quickly. I've been with an extroverted friend that just really was interested in meeting everybody and that's never gonna be me. So not only is it not effective for me in building relationships, it's draining and what I need to do in that situation is have a goal.

What do I want? And that's what this whole conversation really is. What do you want and how are you going to get there with your personality strengths? So what do I want? And if I talk to the right people and I have a couple of really good deep conversations, I might be satisfied. Where the extrovert might not because they wanted to meet all 100 people kind of thing.

Peter Anthony (12:16.88)
Yeah, yeah. And potentially, you at that networking event might talk to two people, but you may build better, stronger, deeper relationships with those few where the extrovert might have like very more surface level conversations with a lot of them. So if the introvert picks the right people, you're that networking event, what happens upon the right people.

It might be more valuable to be introverted in a networking event. Could not. Yeah. You go.

David Hall (12:49.156)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

And yeah, and you know, sometimes as an introvert, you might be the life of the party, but it just has to be the right party. You know, it, you know, maybe, yeah, maybe a smaller party, you know, people, you know, it just, it all depends. And, you know, we really do like to go deeper in conversations. I used to have a really hard time with small talk because I honestly, you know, it wasn't,

Peter Anthony (13:01.936)
Okay, okay, a small party. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (13:18.352)
Yeah.

David Hall (13:20.558)
It wasn't getting to the deeper conversation I wanted to have. I've since learned how to do it much better. I enjoy it sometimes, but it really helps build relationships to get to those deeper conversations. I think that for me, I just don't want to get stuck there. I don't want to have just lots and lots of excessive small talk, but it's good to have to build those relationships. But that's a lot of it is we want to go deep into conversations and...

Peter Anthony (13:26.832)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (13:32.976)
Yes, yeah.

Peter Anthony (13:45.264)
Yes.

David Hall (13:50.244)
we want to we do want to be social, but it might look different. Sometimes we're going to need to recharge. I was on I was on somebody else's podcast, and it was a husband and wife and they talk and their thing is that they were opposites one is extrovert one who was an introvert and the wife said, My husband doesn't like to go dancing with me. Like, okay, tell me more. And she's like, and he said, Well,

Peter Anthony (13:59.024)
Yes, yes.

Peter Anthony (14:09.998)
Yeah.

David Hall (14:18.766)
At 12 o 'clock, I love going dancing with my wife, but at 12 o 'clock, I'm done. At 3 a .m., she's just getting started. So it was just kind of a different perspective.

Peter Anthony (14:25.04)
Hahaha!

Peter Anthony (14:29.424)
Yes, yes. You talked about small talk there. I guess if I'm an introvert and I'm meeting strangers, and you think everyone in your life, with the exception potentially of your parents or maybe your siblings, were strangers before you met them, right? Everyone started off as a stranger, right? Even some great friends you might have for 20 or 30 years, you started off as strangers. And it's likely it would have begun with small talk.

David Hall (14:47.108)
Right. That's right. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (14:58.48)
it wouldn't have begun like a very deep existential conversation straight away. It warms to that. But I guess what you're saying to us, David, is that introverts prefer to get into the deep rim of the pool a bit quicker than maybe the extroverts do, who will just stay on the surface for a little longer. Is that true?

David Hall (15:03.94)
Right, right.

David Hall (15:20.58)
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, extroverts like deep conversations too. I think it's like, they like all conversations, you know, and the small talk is fine. And introverts, we don't like it as much. And we struggle with it too, because a lot of this conversation is as an introvert, we naturally think and then speak and we share what we think is most important.

Peter Anthony (15:28.336)
Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (15:33.744)
Yes sir.

David Hall (15:48.036)
The natural process for extroverts is to generally think out loud and they share most everything. And when you don't understand that there could be a lot of confusion. And so if you're trying to think on the spot and you're in a new situation with someone you haven't met, it might be tough to come up with topics to talk about. And so it can be helpful. And I'm not going to say you can prepare for everything in your life, every conversation, but.

Peter Anthony (15:52.176)
Yes, yeah.

Peter Anthony (16:10.384)
Yeah, yeah.

David Hall (16:17.188)
You can't think ahead of time if you're going to an event, hey, what's some things I could talk about? Or you can pay attention to things that are going on in the environment and come up with things to talk about. But that's why we struggle with small talk is because we're not good at always thinking on the spot situations that we haven't been in before.

Peter Anthony (16:33.775)
Yes. So the extrovert is more likely to be thinking first and then talking, whereas the extrovert is more likely to be talking first and then thinking.

David Hall (16:41.86)
Yeah, yeah, and not.

David Hall (16:46.5)
Yeah, that was one of my big epiphanies when I learned to embrace who I was was, oh, okay, that's a good thing. And it's not going to change. The other thing, Peter, it's crazy. Like, I think I talk tons compared to what I used to be. But another epiphany was, I am never going to talk as much as extrovert and people might still call me quiet, even though I think I'm talking a lot, because I'm always going to think and then speak.

Peter Anthony (17:01.52)
Yes.

Peter Anthony (17:10.672)
Yeah.

David Hall (17:14.722)
You know, it's interesting. And I said this to you before we started recording. If you're asking me about something that I've never, ever thought about before, I'm going to need to think. But if you're talking to me about something I've given a lot of thought to, like introversion, I could talk all day long without being prepared. And there might not be that pause of thinking and then speaking, because it's on the surface.

Peter Anthony (17:27.952)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (17:42.672)
It almost seems to me, and the introverts I've met, because I spend a lot of time coaching technical skill professionals, like engineers, accountants, lawyers, who are primarily introverted. I haven't done assessments on them, but that's my impression of them when I meet them. And there seems to be a higher duty of care, I find.

when I'm dealing with introverts, they have a high duty of care about the integrity of what they're saying, the integrity of what they're doing, the integrity of their thoughts. And sometimes that integrity gets in the way, because it's almost they want to get it right before they say it. But sometimes you get it right while you're saying it or while that meeting or conversation is taking place.

And one of the things I encourage introverts to do is to speak up just a little bit earlier, even when the thought's not fully formed. Because it may form in the process, rather than you waiting for it to be perfect, and then allow people to access your wisdom. Because while you're waiting for it to be perfect, the moment might have passed when that thought could have been really useful. Does that make sense?

David Hall (18:52.578)
Yeah.

David Hall (19:11.268)
It's a real struggle. So, so we do, we are, you know, you ask me something, I'm starting to think, you know, the ideas are rolling around in my head. And I do want to come up with the perfect response. And so there's, there's lots of things you can do. I mean, you can definitely prepare ahead of time. If we're talking about a meeting situation.

Peter Anthony (19:13.4)
Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (19:23.374)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (19:30.736)
Yes, yeah.

David Hall (19:40.356)
You can get the agenda, see if there's any research you need to do. You can make your own little agenda like, okay, what do I need to research? Is there points I wanna make? You can do all of that. But at some point, you do have to realize, okay, this is the best answer I'm gonna come up with. I will also say, again, the meeting situation, you do want it to be...

Peter Anthony (19:40.4)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (19:44.4)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (20:01.04)
Yes, yeah.

David Hall (20:09.316)
speak early like you're saying and also get your thought out in that meeting. But I think we also, if we're possible, also allow introverts to come back after the meeting. And that's not what that's not the ideal to me. Ideal is, you know, when the conversation is happening, you know, give your best response. But we're possible, let the introvert come back after and share some thoughts, you know, before the decisions made kind of thing. But yeah, it's a it's a real struggle where, you know, we're trying to get out that perfect thought and.

Peter Anthony (20:24.784)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (20:31.802)
Yeah, yeah.

David Hall (20:39.01)
That's not always possible.

Peter Anthony (20:40.482)
Yes, yes, particularly like, I guess, in a group environment, like a meeting environment where there might be, I don't know, 10 people in the room, and they're going through a structured agenda or a view or an update or whatever it might be. And the introvert is often the last one to be speaking up, usually. And you think, well,

and they don't feel as comfortable, it seems introverts don't feel as comfortable in those group situations. It was one -on -one potentially, but the more people in the room, the less comfortable they seem to be voicing those views or voicing those opinions. And maybe, you mentioned an interesting word earlier too, David, this getting it perfect. I'm wondering if being an introvert is correlated with perfectionism. Would you say introverts...

are more likely to be perfectionistic as well.

David Hall (21:36.004)
Not sure, but maybe, but definitely, but definitely since they're not sharing everything, when it comes to that, I think that we probably are more perfectionistic because the extrovert sharing everything. So there's gonna be good and bad in there, but the introvert says they're not sharing as frequently. They wanna get it as perfect as they can. And again, I definitely, you do need to speak early.

Peter Anthony (21:37.104)
No, maybe.

Peter Anthony (21:52.208)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (21:59.28)
Yes.

David Hall (22:05.188)
I do believe that as an introvert, you can gain confidence by understanding how you operate, by preparing ahead of time as much as you can, but also just realizing that you have given things a lot of thought and you have a lot of important things to say, and you need to speak early. So the conversation hasn't already really progressed and your thought isn't considered anymore because others have shared before you.

Peter Anthony (22:05.23)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (22:20.08)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (22:30.16)
Yes, other introverts have said before you, or the conversation has moved on, it's made a decision now it's the next topic and you haven't made that really crucial contribution. And that's your job too, right? I mean, I think it's useful to be empathetic and understanding of introverts. But I guess introverts also need to understand that they do need to make that contribution.

David Hall (22:33.282)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Peter Anthony (22:56.592)
whether they feel 100 % comfortable or not, because it's likely most people in that room don't feel 100 % comfortable with the topic that's being discussed. If there was a really simple, easy answer, you wouldn't need a room full of people to be talking about it, right? You'd be thinking, well, the reason we're discussing this is we need various perspectives. The other interesting thought I had as you were just talking then too, David, is this.

David Hall (22:56.9)
Yes.

David Hall (23:06.786)
Right.

David Hall (23:14.532)
Good point, yes.

Peter Anthony (23:25.872)
This whole idea of wisdom of a crowd, and that's this idea that a smart, well -formed team makes a smarter decision than its smartest member. And well -formed means it's diverse. There's different perspectives in the room. And the idea is that when you've got different perspectives and the team is well -formed in terms of diversity and it's got a way of making a decision, that's

Diverse thinking is partly, say, one aspect of diverse thinking is introverted thinking, deep thinking. And give that on the table so that then the group or the team can make a smarter decision. Does that make sense? Yeah.

David Hall (24:11.012)
Yeah, and often the best decisions are made by, you know, a bunch of ideas coming together. I will say, and likely extroverts are gonna actually need that group brainstorming. I've definitely benefited from group brainstorming, but I also wanna be acknowledged for things that I do come up with on my own, you know, spending time.

Peter Anthony (24:19.48)
Yes.

Peter Anthony (24:39.65)
Okay.

David Hall (24:40.824)
whether it's an idea driving into work and I have this great idea while I'm in my car, I think it's both. So like I really value the team and group types of things, but also introverts can come up and extroverts too can come up with some great ideas on their own. And we have to look at both.

Peter Anthony (25:00.272)
Yeah, look at both, look at that whole range of aspects. So what would you say the biggest weaknesses of introverts are, like in your experience? Because you're working with introverts all the time, right? I don't want you to give us too many insider tips. I'm just wondering, what would you say are the most consistent weaknesses that introverts might have?

David Hall (25:16.93)
Yeah.

David Hall (25:21.828)
Hahaha.

David Hall (25:30.084)
Okay, so about half the population are introverts. And definitely, there's some I know some very confident and outspoken introverts. I know some introverts who have always known who they are from the time they were born. I've known some others that, like myself, have had to come to learn to embrace it. And there's some other people that haven't embraced it.

Peter Anthony (25:34.864)
Yeah.

David Hall (25:59.364)
So there's a couple of different types of weaknesses. So a weakness for me, several years back now was not understanding my introversion. So there's introverts out there that don't understand, hey, I think before I speak and my friend here is speaking in order to think, if they don't understand, that can be a problem. So not understanding.

is a problem, but not a problem for everybody. I think just.

acknowledging that I do need to think before I speak that that can be you know it's it's not it is it is a weakness you know that I can't always think of anything on the spot but there's strategies around that you know that I can't always come up with something and like I said never going to talk as much as an expert but that's not necessarily a weakness. Let's see.

Peter Anthony (26:51.12)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (26:59.408)
Yes. So you'd say that the first weakness of introversion would be not recognising it, and the second would be for some, and the second would be not accepting it. Once you've recognised it, not saying, hey, this is okay. It's actually more than okay. It's a superpower in some ways.

David Hall (27:08.612)
or some.

David Hall (27:15.556)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah. Yeah, there's superpowers that come with it. And so just kind of understanding that that how you operate. So there's not necessarily weakness. Like I said, you can get whatever you want out of life. But sometimes you have to understand your natural abilities that that you're not going to really change.

Peter Anthony (27:22.544)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (27:34.736)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (27:39.28)
I remember many years ago when I first started consulting in the HR space, there was this whole idea about rounding people out, which was about understanding what people's strengths were and then rounding them out by giving them a job that was the opposite to their strengths. So if you weren't good with detail, they'd give you a job that had a lot of detail in it so you could learn detail.

or if you're really interested in it, they give you like a sales role. So you could learn that the whole idea was to round people out, right? And you'd have like these big like strengths assessments and work out where your strengths and weaknesses were. And what you've got to do, David, is you've got to work on those weaknesses, right? And get them all rounded, David. And I was, I was, when I first came across it, I was amazed. I thought, really, is this?

David Hall (28:29.91)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (28:36.112)
And I was still relatively young and inexperienced. I was just, how it's done? You get rounded out. It didn't work, by the way. I think it was just like a HR strategy that kept HR employed for a period of time. Because rounding people out takes a long time. Right? Yeah.

David Hall (28:56.26)
And it's the worst approach. We need to really recognize what we're good at. And I'm a big picture person, and the details kind of fall into place. But I know people that can really, you know, that is their, they're really good at the details. I'm not saying I'm not, but that's their focus. And, you know, to try to make me just be a detailed person. In fact, you know, in college, I started out as a computer programmer, and then I soon figured out.

Peter Anthony (29:04.302)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Peter Anthony (29:15.918)
Yeah.

David Hall (29:26.052)
the details all day long, that's not gonna be where I'm gonna be effective or happy, you know, and we really need to look at where we're gonna get most return on investment is working in our strengths. And if we can work in our strengths, most of the time, that's where we're gonna be most effective. Are you familiar with Marcus Buckingham? He did a lot of work with strengths. He still does.

Peter Anthony (29:31.792)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (29:41.072)
Yes, yeah.

Peter Anthony (29:49.178)
Yes, I am. Yeah, yeah.

your strengths to work. I think Put Your Strengths To Work. I think that was one of the books. Yeah. Yeah.

David Hall (29:55.364)
Yeah, yeah, that's one of his books. Yeah, he's recently done something called love and work. And he talks about if you can work in your strengths, most of the time, that's the ideal. There's always going to be something that you don't like to do, or you're not particularly good at that you have to do in your job. But if we can spend the majority of our time working in those things that we have strengths in, that's where we're going to be the best, you know, be the most efficient, be the happiest, because in our weaknesses, we are going to be drained, you know,

Peter Anthony (30:06.448)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (30:25.264)
Yeah, yeah, we're gonna be trained. I really liked his work and I liked one part I remember from Marcus Buckingham was he was talking about strengths is not necessarily things that you're good at, but things that make you feel strong and good. That they nourish you when you do them because you think there are some things that you may be good at that you actually don't like. And that was true of me in my early career. There were things that I was doing.

David Hall (30:40.898)
Yeah.

David Hall (30:48.644)
Yeah, that's true. That's true.

Peter Anthony (30:55.184)
And a career path I went down that I really didn't like. And that was a sales career path. And I was sort of pushed and prodded and given financial incentives to spend more time in sales roles. And I really didn't like it. I happened to be good at it in a bizarre way because I didn't like selling. I liked collaborating with people.

I got better sales results, but I was pushed further away from collaborating and more into selling, which wasn't collaborating. So it was weird how that worked. And you think, well, we'd all be better off if we focused on our strengths, correct? Because we're all contributing something unique to that particular world that we live in, whether your world's a family or it's a town or a business or whatever it might be. Is that how it works?

David Hall (31:38.306)
Yeah.

David Hall (31:49.444)
Yeah. And when you were in sales, just curious, was there a certain kind of like template you're supposed to follow? Like this is the way to do sales.

Peter Anthony (31:56.56)
Yeah, absolutely. In fact, it was at IBM. I joined in the days when IBM had one year of sales training, right? And it was my first job out of university. It was the reason I went there was they said, we're going to give you a year of training and so you're going to learn how to sell and...

We're also going to teach you IT and computing. I thought, well, they gave you a car. My mom was saying, that's great, you're get a car. They're paying like twice as much as any other role I was going for at the time. I was like 21, 22 back then. And the strange thing was that they gave you a senior salesperson to work with, like to be your mentor. And straight away, almost from the moment I joined, Rod and I, the mentor I had, we were selling a lot and I was selling a lot. And I found...

the more I followed the process I was being taught, the less I sold, right? So I was like a maverick, but they couldn't ignore me because I was selling a lot, right? I wasn't actually selling, clients were buying from me, which is very different than selling. And they're buying from me because I cared and I worked really hard and I cared about them.

And I basically just positioned IBM as an organization that could give them what they wanted. But the more successful I got at that, the more I got bigger sales targets, sales teams, and I liked it less and less because I could collaborate less. And I was encouraged to sort of not necessarily do what was in the best interest of the client.

I remember it didn't sit well with me and I knew it didn't work. I remember one of my bosses saying to me, Peter, who are you working for? And I said, I'm working for the client.

David Hall (33:40.6)
Yeah, and that part didn't sit well with you.

Peter Anthony (33:55.44)
because I find when I'm working for the client, I'm more successful than if I'm working for IBM. I happen to be working for IBM, but I'm really working for the client. And I want them to feel that and sense that. I want them to feel that and make it really obvious to them that I'll walk away if we can't do something that works for them. So it was a real conflict because it was like my strength, my strength wasn't selling, but I sort of pushed into that environment, pushed into that. And I'm curious about whether, like I'm sure other people like,

David Hall (33:56.418)
Yeah.

David Hall (34:15.618)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (34:25.424)
that could be listening to this might be in that situation too. There could be introverts that are being sort of pushed into environments where they feel less comfortable. And you think, well, maybe a little bit of discomfort's okay, but only you know how you feel, right? Only you know what your strengths are. And maybe encourage them to embrace that introversion. Say, hey, you know, I'm introverted, that's great, I love this.

David Hall (34:43.3)
Yeah.

David Hall (34:51.236)
Yeah, it's really just what you were describing. You did it in a different way. And I've heard from many successful salespeople that are introverts, just they're going to need to use their strengths to get there. The way they build relationships is going to be different. And if that's okay, you can be wildly successful like you were describing. But if you're following a certain template, it might not work for you and you might be miserable and not effective.

Peter Anthony (34:55.342)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (35:05.136)
Yeah.

It's different, yeah.

Peter Anthony (35:17.136)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, miserable and not effective. Yeah, not effective for anybody. Not effective for IBM, not effective for the client, not effective for you. It's also just being disingenuous too, right? It's not being honest. We all put personas on and we all put like a face on, but there can't be too much of a gap between how you're turning up or how you present yourself at work to how you really are. The bigger that gap is,

the more unhappy and stressed you're going to be. I'm sure that's true of introverts too. I'm not even sure, in having this conversation with you, whether I'm an introvert or not, because I think I'm an introvert, right?

David Hall (35:49.54)
Yeah, absolutely.

David Hall (35:59.908)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (36:00.944)
Because I do think, with your definition, I do think very deeply about things, sometimes far too deeply than is required. And often I need to think less deeply because I'm digging way too deep into this. I don't need to get that deep.

David Hall (36:19.716)
Yeah, and Peter, you know, we've talked before. You need your time. You need your time alone. You need to spend time with your friends and family. You know, those are that can be an introvert.

Peter Anthony (36:22.576)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (36:31.408)
Yeah, becoming an introvert. I'm just an introvert that likes asking questions and listening to the answers, right? And listening to the answers, because I'm going to learn stuff. I'm going to...

David Hall (36:36.58)
I love asking questions, you know? Yeah. When people talk to me, I probably ask them too many questions, you know? But that's from my introverted nature.

Peter Anthony (36:45.456)
Yeah, yes. And my mother taught me that when I was quite young. I was very introverted and I would stay in my room and read books and my family would come over like her brother and his family and I didn't want to come out and talk to them and I would stay in my room. She said, you can't do that. You're rude. This is your uncle. And the trick she taught me, I would have been about five or six, seven years old.

The trick she taught me was just ask questions. Come out and just ask your Uncle Harry questions like how he is, how was his experiences at Lumberjack, just ask him questions and listen to the answers. I found as an introverted kid that worked really well. Just ask questions because, and the amazing thing I find David is so few people do that.

David Hall (37:27.682)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (37:34.512)
They're like giving you, like you might spend an hour with somebody and you'll ask them questions and they won't ask you a single question back again. They'll just, I think that's the tip I'd give introverts. Not that I'm an expert on introversion, but that's the thing I'd suggest. If you are socially or professionally awkward, just ask questions.

David Hall (37:45.22)
Right.

Peter Anthony (38:02.96)
and listen to the answers. And then you'll do your deep thinking. Then you can learn from what you're hearing. And haven't got to do too much talking. Yeah.

David Hall (38:09.028)
Yeah, take a genuine interest in that person. Just really be interested, and you'll go far with that.

Peter Anthony (38:13.552)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (38:19.664)
Yes. So what you're saying is that introversion is not one thing. There's different varieties of it. You're a deep thinking introvert. Is that how you describe yourself?

David Hall (38:31.748)
I think all introverts are deep thinking. I think there's different facets to our personality. Like, you know, we mentioned a couple of them, like, you know, with 50 % of the population, we're not all alike. You know, you can't stereotype half the population. But, you know, where I mentioned, you know, somebody might be more in touch with their feelings, be, you know, empathic. Also on my show, I have a lot of people that are highly sensitive and

Peter Anthony (38:34.03)
Yeah, okay.

Peter Anthony (38:45.584)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (38:56.848)
Yeah.

David Hall (39:00.804)
That can be an introvert or extrovert, but it really plays into your personality, how you're sensitive to your environment. I happen to not be highly sensitive, but it's still really important to have these conversations to get to know other people. There's people that are, I mentioned big picture or details. There's all kinds of nuances to our personality. I just think that introversion and extroversion, that dichotomy is...

Peter Anthony (39:04.848)
Yeah.

David Hall (39:29.828)
there's a lot of misunderstanding. So even though I'm very interested in all the different personality aspects and different strengths that we have, my focus is introversion, extroversion, because that's definitely misunderstood. Like in my case, where I used to be shy, I'm not anymore. And I've really learned some strategies to be successful.

Peter Anthony (39:51.696)
So if I'm a shy person, like you said you used to be shy, I'm not shy anymore, what would be your not shy guidebook? I said like if you're shy and assuming you might be introverted and shy, it's very unlikely a very extroverted person would also be shy. They probably wouldn't correlate. But if I'm a shy person, how did you overcome shyness? I'm curious about that.

David Hall (40:21.924)
Yeah, and I mean, definitely extroverts can be shy, but I think it's different. And I feel worse for them. You know, I feel worse for the extroverted shy person, but I think everybody can gain everybody can gain confidence. So, you know, what is what, why is your confidence lacking? In my case, you know, it was the fact that I'm thinking and then speaking somebody else is talking a lot. And they're saying things like, why are you so quiet?

Peter Anthony (40:25.648)
It's less likely. Yeah.

Yeah.

Ha ha.

Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (40:40.976)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (40:48.112)
Yeah.

David Hall (40:51.724)
You know, no introvert likes to hear that, by the way. Why are you so quiet? Because it's hard to come back from that. No, I'm not. But yeah, I'm thinking.

Peter Anthony (40:51.984)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (40:59.152)
I'm not quiet, I'm thinking. It's very noisy on the inside. I might be quiet on the outside, but it's very noisy up here. Yeah. Yeah.

David Hall (41:05.092)
Yeah, yeah, right, right. Yes, it is. It is. So, so for the a lot of what I did to overcome shyness and gain confidence was understand who I was understand my unique gifts, you know, that I'm very analytical and you know, I think all introverts are deep thinkers or go inside. But you know, the analytical abilities are going to be different. Like, so that's a strength of mine.

And I'm not bragging, I'm just saying that's a strength of mine. There's a lot of strengths that other people have that I do not, you know, so.

Peter Anthony (41:33.552)
Yeah.

Yeah, he's calling it as you say, that's what it is. I mean, Patrick Mahomes is one of the best quarterbacks of all time, but that's just what it is. That's not boosting him up, that's just calling it how it is. Roger Federer is one of the best tennis players of all time. And that's just calling it how it is.

David Hall (41:41.412)
Yeah, and.

David Hall (41:49.282)
Yeah.

David Hall (41:58.05)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (42:02.352)
So you'd say what? If I'm shy, you'd say what? Be okay speaking up? Yeah.

David Hall (42:08.388)
Yeah, so get to know yourself, get to know what you need, get to know your strengths. Don't compare yourself to others, but realize, you know what, I have a lot of good things going for me and what I have to say is valuable, you know, change the messages that you're telling yourself, whatever it is that is making you feel less than or uncomfortable in situations. And it really is.

Peter Anthony (42:12.878)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (42:19.568)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (42:23.896)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (42:29.712)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (42:36.048)
Yeah.

David Hall (42:38.02)
telling yourself that you have these strengths and they're valuable. As an introvert, you can also feel strange about needing some time alone. You know, people might say you're a loner or a loo for lots of things, anti -social and just realizing, you know what, sometimes I'm going to spend some time with people, you know, and sometimes I need to take a break. Like, you know, yeah, go into a conference. You might really be enjoying the conference.

Peter Anthony (42:46.512)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (42:56.88)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (43:01.68)
Yeah, and recharge.

Yep.

David Hall (43:08.068)
But there comes a point where you're feeling overwhelmed. And maybe it's just a walk around the grounds of that, of that venue and just taking a minute. And there's a lot of people that don't feel comfortable with that. They feel weird if they're walking by themselves, but it might be just the medicine you need. So really accepting, accepting what you need. And it's never, it's never an excuse. It's never, you know, introversion is, isn't holding you back from anything. You just need to understand who you are, what your strengths are.

And maybe that time alone that you might need or that preparation. Preparation is so key for us, you know, to think ahead of time for certain things and just accepting all that and realizing that you're not perfect and nobody else is either.

Peter Anthony (43:43.952)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (43:52.08)
Yes, yes, yes. It's interesting, isn't that that word shy? You think, well, who's calling who shy? It's like, would an introvert call an introvert shy? Probably not. And sometimes, yeah.

David Hall (44:05.219)
Sometimes, sometimes we're, sometimes introverts don't, we don't understand ourselves and that could be a problem that we, that we're thinking somebody else is shy, but by the same measure that maybe we are too. So.

Peter Anthony (44:10.99)
Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (44:19.088)
Yeah, it sounds like we're talking about shyness as something that's like contemptuous or an insult, but often shyness can be quite endearing, kind of. If someone's a little shy, it can be quite endearing and quite charming in its own way. Like it takes you a while to get to know them, to unfold them, unwrap them. And that can be really, for someone like me, I find that really interesting, rather than someone that's just straight on a plate in front of you.

Yeah. Yeah.

David Hall (44:49.964)
Yeah, so I know exactly. Yeah what we're saying here If you're happy with of who you are great But it's the shy person That is too afraid to do things that they want to do that's that's where there's a problem when you lack confidence like you want to talk to somebody and

Peter Anthony (45:00.942)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (45:07.248)
Ah, okay. Okay.

David Hall (45:14.628)
just for example, and you don't feel like you can because some way you feel like you're less than that's where it's a problem. Just being quiet again. And like I said earlier, sometimes, you know, I don't think I'm being quiet, but you know, compared to somebody else, they're going to perceive me that way. And I've tried to run from that word. I've tried to run from the word quiet. I don't like if someone calls me quiet, but you know, I,

Peter Anthony (45:19.76)
Yeah. Yeah.

Peter Anthony (45:30.768)
Yes, yes. Yeah.

David Hall (45:41.699)
I've got to think a lot. And so sometimes I'm not going to be talking as much as the extrovert.

Peter Anthony (45:46.768)
Yeah, yeah. And it's so comparative to like quite compared to what? I mean, it's a good point you make about that shyness because you think, well, if I'm a little shy, I might not speak up for that new role at work. Whereas someone who's a little more confident might be speaking up for themselves a bit more or applying for a role where the introvert could be like better qualified, but they're a bit shy to speak up or like approaching a stranger or like.

David Hall (45:53.444)
Right.

Peter Anthony (46:16.464)
Like asking someone on a date or something like that if you you might there could be really great opportunities you're missing out on because You're not you're not getting all the treasures you deserve in your life. Yeah

David Hall (46:29.156)
Yeah. Yeah. And so that's when it's bad. It's when it's holding you back. But just as fact is needing some time alone. Those are fine things, you know, and I'm going to always use the word shy to mean that you're lacking confidence. And I'm going to use the word quiet. So I've accepted the word quiet for myself. Quiet and strong is the name of my website and podcast. And it's that I'm going to be thinking, I'm not afraid to speak up.

Peter Anthony (46:32.898)
Yes.

Peter Anthony (46:36.592)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (46:43.824)
Yes.

Peter Anthony (46:48.834)
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

David Hall (46:59.62)
But it's what do you want out of life? That's the question for everybody. Are they getting that? And so shy to me is you're being held back in some way.

Peter Anthony (47:04.4)
Yeah, yeah.

Peter Anthony (47:08.464)
Yeah. So how did you arrive at quiet and strong for the business?

David Hall (47:15.556)
So I am in a strengths training at work. I ended up in, it was called Strengths Quest back then. It's Strengths Finder now it's called CliftonStrengths and it's, you know, your 34 talents and you know, Marcus Buckingham was one of the ones that developed that instrument like we were talking about him before. And you know, it's your 34 themes of talent and you pick, you are shown your top five.

Peter Anthony (47:19.696)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (47:25.52)
Yeah.

Yes.

Peter Anthony (47:38.672)
Yes.

David Hall (47:45.604)
So I went through a lot of different trainings, you know, maybe three half days, three full days, lots of training like that. So I was getting kind of a more advanced training and it was three full days. And just like I'm talking, I'm thinking I'm speaking a lot. I'm participating, you know, in the big group discussion and the table discussions. I'm just, I'm just sharing all this stuff. And then after the three days was over,

Peter Anthony (47:47.856)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (48:14.766)
Yeah.

David Hall (48:15.524)
The facilitator pulled me aside and she was giving me a compliment and she said You're quiet and strong and when you speak people listen and and so the name stuck and that was then I named my my name my Websites named that and then the podcast but it's just kind of and I think that's true for a lot of introverts, you know because Yeah, we're thinking We're not sharing everything

Peter Anthony (48:19.832)
Okay.

Peter Anthony (48:26.576)
Oh.

Uh.

Peter Anthony (48:38.416)
Quiet and strong, yeah.

David Hall (48:45.028)
And so, you know, we might not be talking throughout the whole meeting. Some of it might be talking a lot more than us, but you're, you know, you've really worked on that idea in your head and what, you know, it could really be a gem when it comes out. And so, so it's stuck.

Peter Anthony (48:54.48)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (48:58.96)
It's stuck. I like it. I like white and strong. Finally, Dave, I'm just curious about pessimism. I'm wondering whether introverts are more likely to be pessimistic. Because when I think of the technical skill professionals I've worked with a lot, like I mentioned, the lawyers and the engineers and the accountants, they're overwhelmingly pessimistic because you want a pessimistic engineer, right?

You would spend over engineers the bridge. So it's not going to fall down. You want a pessimistic surgeon in lots of ways because they're going to over prepare and over study. You want a pessimistic lawyer looking for problems, looking for reasons or things you need to avoid. So it's, and I'm thinking the professions that tend to attract the introverts are also ones that appear to have.

David Hall (49:29.09)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (49:55.824)
like a more pessimistic explanatory style. Is that something that you've become aware of or that you've thought about?

David Hall (50:04.356)
I don't know. I mean, definitely, I would say that we spend a lot of time in our heads. So we can be more prone to overthinking, you know, which can definitely lead to anxiety. So I think we can. And of course, those things can happen to extroverts too. But I think we can be more prone to that. So I'm not sure about the pessimism. But you know, if you're overthinking, that definitely can make you

Peter Anthony (50:13.784)
Yeah, yeah.

Yes.

Peter Anthony (50:24.304)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Peter Anthony (50:30.736)
Yeah, you're overthinking and you like that guy going like an inch wide and a mile deep into something. Yeah, it's, it'd be interesting to see if that does correlate. I was just curious about your experience on whether you've seen that. It seems like the extroverts appear a lot more optimistic. Like they talk in a big picture and we can do this and.

David Hall (50:42.18)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (50:57.904)
It's all that so -called big picture stuff, right? And a bit of embellishment. I'll call it embellishment. Maybe like skirting around the truth, we can say.

David Hall (51:10.02)
Yeah, I mean, just speaking for myself, I am a big picture person. As an introvert, I'm very intuitive. I am more optimistic and, you know, look at look ahead to the future. But I do overthink and that does cause anxiety. So there's definitely something to it where we spend more time in our heads. But also spending more time in our heads, we can come up with some great visions for the future at the same time.

Peter Anthony (51:14.446)
Yeah.

Peter Anthony (51:26.544)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, more time, idiot.

Peter Anthony (51:36.656)
Yes, because deep thinking doesn't mean necessarily detailed thinking, right? It could be deep thinking about a big picture.

David Hall (51:45.412)
Yeah, there's there's both kinds of introverts. Some are more big pictures, some are more details and and then there's lots of other nuances to our personalities.

Peter Anthony (51:50.768)
Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, it's interesting. David, I could talk to you for hours. I love listening to your insights. I'm going to put it in the show notes to this podcast, your contact details that people want to learn more about quite and strong, or they're interested in learning more about introversion and the sort of things that you do. But for now, David, thank you, sir. And I love your introverted deep thinking insight.

David Hall (52:24.886)
Thank you, Peter. This has been a great conversation. I've enjoyed it very much.

Peter Anthony (52:28.944)
I'm Absolute pleasure.