Millennial in the Middle

Danielle Farage is a LinkedIn top voice for Gen Z and a work futurist speaker and writer. In this episode, Danielle tells her story of how she embraced the new perspective on work and how she is helping other people do the same. This USC grad records her side of the episode from an AirBnB in Paris, along her journey of remote work and networking.

Follow along with her blog and podcast all of which can be found on LinkedIn. https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielle-farage/

Today Connor interviews Kiannalie Sarmiento. Kiannalie is a great example of a young Gen Z jumping into her career and chasing her passions. At 19, she went to a coding bootcamp and immediately fell in love with product development and technology. She is very passionate about community and has gone the extra mile to create spaces of inclusion and connection. She has served as the Utah Chapter Leader in the 'Latinas in Tech' organization. This interview has a lot of insight about generational differences, culture and the importance of diversity. 

Today Connor invites Eric Espinosa on the show to discuss business, life and his experience living abroad. Eric  is an avid entrepreneur and had his first exit not too long after being out of college. He most recently founded Coconut VA and serves as CEO. Last year, he and his wife set a goal to live abroad and travel most of the year. He talks about how he was traveling the world, without an itinerary and still growing his business. He also went and spent over a month experiencing the daily life of a Virtual Assistant in the Philippines to understand the needs of those he was helping to employ. He gained a great perspective by living in a 400 square foot apartment, working through the night and doing it on a typical income.

Follow along with Eric on LinkedIn and join his #VacationLaptopless movement!

Hunter Saunders has become a good friend recently after joining Connor's team at Opt. As Connor has worked with him for the last couple months it has been clear that he is the personification of Gen Z. He is 23 years old, intelligent, and is taking advantage of what the world has to offer. His insight and depth of understanding about his generation is impressive and informative. In this episode, Connor gets Hunter's perspective on the generational divide, what makes us different and what brings us together.

Last week Queen Elizabeth passed away after an unprecedented 70+ year on the throne. Connor had the news broken to him in real time on a call with a business partner who is British. This raw moment of emotion showed him a unique perspective. In this episode Connor talks about the lessons we can learn from the Queen's legacy as it relates to respecting our previous generations while making improvements and progress moving forward.

Connor has spent a lot of episodes talking about the past, today he is talking about the future. Tyler Doyle is a celebrity in the metaverse. He is the most prominent influencer in the game Upland. In fact, he just returned from a conference in Las Vegas where he was named "Broadcaster of the Year." He has made a career out of investing in the metaverse and teaching others on how to make REAL money in the VIRTUAL world. If you aren't convinced that evolution is happening and coming at us faster than ever, you need to listen to this episode.

Follow @Loyldoyl on social media, particularly his youtube channel if you are interested in learning more.

A brief description of Upland...

Built at the intersection of the real and virtual world, Upland gives you the power to buy, sell and trade properties based on real-world addresses, just like the one you live at today… but in the virtual world.

The digital properties you collect in Upland don’t have any association or rights to the correlating properties in the real world, however, the addresses do mirror real-life locations. Upland’s economy is powered by an in-game currency called UPX (pronounced “UP-EX”).

Once you own a property in Upland, you can start to collect UPX earnings on it every 3 hours. Pretty nifty, right?

Complete property collections in order to boost your UPX earnings and win a one-time UPX award.

Trade your properties with other Uplanders in the marketplace - for UPX or other properties in order to grow your property portfolio and UPX earnings!

Have you spotted a property that you want which is already owned by someone else? No problem! you can always make an offer for the property - even if it's not actively up for sale on the marketplace!

To Life, Liberty and Property!

Connor interviews Josh Barney to discuss how technology has affected  the way we think, communicate and work together. As a Gen Xer, Josh didn't grow up with the type of innovations that he now deals with on a day-to-day basis. He has been on the front lines of watching these changes happen at warp speed. Josh has worked in tech roles across many different industries including the military, sports, and entertainment. Josh talks about his time working for the Department of Defense and one of his more recent projects leading the technology team for the Utah Jazz. This interview will give you a different perspective on innovation, technology and where we are headed.

Click here to read the Sports Illustrated article about the story Josh tells in the interview about how the Jazz helped a 7 year old blind fan watch a game.

https://www.si.com/media/2017/05/08/utah-jazz-esight-technology-blind-fan

What is Vulnerability is cool? It's a movement!

As a child, Jenna a was a victim of sexual abuse. That experience created a dark cloud over her mental health, relationships and life for years. Like most victims of abuse, she didn't share her story for a long time and internalized all the pain.  In her 20s she started openly sharing her experience and her journey of embracing counseling and self-growth. As she was vulnerable on social media, she was blown away by the response. So many individuals reached out that had been through similar experiences and didn't have a forum to talk about it. As the responses continued to pile up, Jenna went into action and started hosting events that would be a place of healing. The Vulnerability is Cool movement was born.

In this episode Jenna shares her own story and talks about the impact these events have had on the lives of so many women. To keep up with this movement follow @VulnerabilityisCool and @JennaJarvisJarvis.

Meet Jason Petersen, Connor’s primary business partner and Founder at Opt. Connor met Jason at the end of 2021 and it didn't take long for the two of them to find a rhythm of working together. Jason's ability to take a big idea and turn it into a reality has been crucial to Opt getting off the ground.

Today's episode is about Jason’s experiences in life and business prior to Opt. Jason has started up seven companies and led them to successful exits.  He has been a part of software companies, multiple real estate firms, a business services, consumer goods, wholesale distribution. He has also personally acquired six bankrupt businesses directly and got each turned around in less than six months. One, an Inc. 5000 company, is now one of the largest corporations in its market in North America (Hansen Lighting).

Along the way he has learned invaluable lessons on communication, business and leadership. He tells Connor some of his most important observations applicable to all areas of life including what he calls FLOW: The First Law of Winning.

Have you ever wondered how a digital nomad can actually be effective on the road? Do you even know what a digital nomad is? You need to hear today's conversation with Spencer Wight and Akram Nassri. 

They are the owners of an agency called Strategic Growth Partners and have seen incredible success approaching life with the "new school" mentality of working smarter not harder and living an adventurous life along the way. Listening to these two displays the shift we are seeing in the younger generations when it comes to what we value and how we choose to live our lives. 

Follow them on social media as they embark on an adventure of living abroad with no return date planned. @SpencerWight @Akram.Nassri