The Meeting Planners podcast source for what’s new and exciting in meetings and events industry!
Todays guest is Speaker Kivi Bernhard. Kive is based in Atlanta, Georgia, and was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa. Kivi uses the hunting habits and techniques of the African leopard, perhaps the most successful feline predator on earth, Kivi draws metaphors of personal and corporate leadership, trust and success that will leave you spellbound.
I hope you enjoy the interview. We are trying to find speakers who are out of the ordinary to really engage your audiences.
For more on Kivi head over to his website- for more information and video.
http://www.kivibernhard.com/
Mike McAllen of Grass Shack Events & Media http://www.grassshackroad.com/
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Transcripts:
Female: You are listening to the Meetings Podcast with Mike McAllen, Jon Trask and Tom Hillmer. The Meeting Planner podcast source for what’s new and exciting in the meetings and events industry. The information and opinions expressed in this podcast are of Mr. McAllen, Mr. Trask and Mr. Hillmer and are theirs alone and do not reflect the opinions of their past, present or future employers.
Please send in your question and comments to MeetingsPodcast@gmail.com and make sure to visit our website for pictures, video and show notes at www.MeetingsPodcast.com.
Mike McAllen: Welcome back to the Meeting Podcast. I’m Mike McAllen of Grass Shack Events and Media and today’s guest is speaker Kivi Bernhard and Kivi is based in Atlanta, George and was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa. Kivi uses his hunting habits and techniques of the African Leopard, perhaps the most successful feline predator on earth, Kivi draws metaphors of personal and corporate leadership, trust and success that will leave you spellbound. I thought this is a really interesting way and that’s what brings him to its interesting way of presenting and that’s why I invited him to be on Meeting Podcast. Hi, Kivi and thank you for being on the show.
Kivi Bernhard: Thank you so much, my pleasure to be here.
Mike McAllen: Can you tell us a little bit more about yourself? Your background and …
Kivi Bernhard: Sure, so …
Mike McAllen: On the way you talk.
Kivi Bernhard: [00:01:26] but people think I’m from the South because I live in Atlanta George but in fact from away South man, I mean you’ll keep on moving another 10,000 miles before I hit home, [00:01:38] on Africa is where obviously I was born and raise and, you know, my wife and I – my wife is actually originally from Pittsburg Pennsylvania. We meet at friends wedding and mutual friends wedding in Pittsburg and that’s where I met Juliana and married her two years later. We lived in South Africa and we then relocated to the United State about 11 years ago and we spent some time originally in Pittsburg Pennsylvania. How? I’m not sure but we did and we now we live at Atlanta George and that’s kind we’re base out of here.
So, you know Mike in fact my original background is in the diamond business, we keep and polish loose diamonds in Johanna Griggs, South Africa and we wholesale distribute to retail jewelers and manufacturing jewelers and dealer, you know, all over the world, that’s on a good day. On a bad day we do exactly the same thing and really my passion has always been Africa and it’s wild life and I was very privileged and fortunate at the young age of six or seven, my dad took me into the bush for the very first time and the truth is that is where my love affair with Africa begun and it’s just absolutely, totally part in puzzle of who I am as a human being and The Hunt for Success, which was my award winning keynote of presentation, a pretty good business presentation. Really is the synthesis of the business experience we had here in the United States, building our business literally from the ground up and because of foreign exchange control Mike that was in place in South Africa at the time, we were not able to move money from South Africa and when my wife and I relocated here, we did so, in 1997 was 13 pieces of luggage and four daughters and $860.22.
Mike McAllen: So, your wife met this diamond trader and …
Kivi Bernhard: That’s right.
Mike McAllen: With her offer feet and then put here back with no money.
Kivi Bernhard: That’s exactly right. That’s right. But diamonds are forever so, you know, we were there and really that’s my story and you know over the period of time, so we have been extremely blessed and fortunate, you know, to build our business here in the United State. It’s’ truly one of the most magnificent damagers sees anywhere in the world and there is opportunity here like they’re really is, no more else in the world. We have, you know, we’ve built our business and about three years ago, I sort of just developed the intellectually component of Leopardology, critical business thinking from Africa most successful and predator and then mixed it up with award winning footage from Londolozi, South Africa, the most exclusive Private Game Reserve in the world and that developed what is now known as The Hunt for Success, you know and …
Mike McAllen: It’s a great idea.
Kivi Bernhard: Yes and we’ve just have the tremendous, you know, privilege and opportunity to work with meeting planner and speaker bureau all over the world and you know share with critical business leadership and sale teams.
Mike McAllen: I can’t – I have never been to Africa or the bush but I had recently experience recently where I was up in Glacier National Park, so I don’t know if you’ve got there in Montana and the Yellowstone and we got to see some grizzly bears and things like that and I watched (bears 00:05:19) where they’re actually kill and an (elephant 00:05:20) there which was kind of crazy but it kind of – it funny to think that when I was watching your, I watch some of your video online on your website and I was amazed, you know, it brought me back to kind of thing and how exciting that whole thing is and what a great idea to tie this all end.
Kivi Bernhard: Right, you know, Mike it’s just be seeing – look the hunting ground that you and I live in, the World of Commerce, the world of progression and mobilization of an idea, a concept, service, product into, you know, the corporate jungles of you know, World Global Trading in instance but absolutely no difference, see – here’s the key factor out there in the bush there’s no Wal-Mart, there’s no McDonald, you cannot get a sandwich and all this. If you don’t mobilize toward your client closure opportunity, it’s simply not coming to you and it’s really equation of hunter or hunted and what people are amazes to discover is that effective and efficient predators, actually spend more time engaging life than they do taking it and that in fact what makes them so successful at what they do.
Mike McAllen: Yes I was wondering how you pick the African Leopard instead of like a lion or a cheetah or crocodile or something.
Kivi Bernhard: Right, so it’s an interesting question there, you know, my life is always been for the African Leopard. First of all it’s just a majestic magnificent, you know, animal. I mean this is beautiful animal but secondarily let me share this with you, the Leopard is a solo solitary hunter, you know, Mike it does not have the huge conglomerate corporative of a land pride, you know, 6, 9, 13, 21.
Mike McAllen: Right.
Kivi Bernhard: It doesn’t have massive resource, like wild dogs for example or Hyena in [00:07:16] of 22, 28 and in fact is that that’s the economy that you and I trading, you know, years to years economy which is absolutely of, you know, I said listen if you wanted to come to the market place and consume market share, hey, all you going to do is just apply massive resource, human resource, financial resource, infrastructure resource and just take and consume your market, that is history because today you have corporate account instead of literally watching every single dollar spent which is now accountable in the market place. So, you know top level management and corporate CEO structures are looking for effective and efficient individuals that comprise effective and efficient teams and see this is whole paradigm shift that’s taking place in the market, you know, it use to be that successful teams entirely dependent on successful infrastructure and resource, today it’s really the emphasis.
Successful teams are simply contractive of successful individuals and the function of management that they’re showing today are really to, you know, take individuals within the team and maximize their opportunity and empower them for efficiency and efficacy. So, you know it’s very much like the hunt of leopard. It’s a solo solitary hunt. No one is going to do it for you. You, I mean you’re going to study your market territory. You need to study your client, you need to study your competitive predators, you know, you’ve got to be out there being effective with technology, effective with, you know, your education and skill level enhancement. You’ve got to be out there, you know, becoming the most effective whatever, sales person, sales manager, you know, IT consultant, accountant, lawyer, doctor, you can be.
Mike McAllen: Right, it makes perfect sense, makes perfect sense. So, I see you also do seminars and focus groups, can you tell me what exactly Breakfast in the Bush with Kivi?
Kivi Bernhard: All right, Breakfast in the Bush with Kivi and I can guarantee you a lot of the meeting planners have not had breakfast in the bush with Kivi, so you know, it was actually developed – it’s primarily let me say this Mike, I, you know, I do a lot of keynotes, I am sort of primarily (Hayad 00:09:40) and booked as a keynote speaker to either open general session, close general session, very often I’ll be brought in, you know, perhaps as I often done a self keynote and then as well, I get brought in to do sort of breakout or focus group with top – or maybe, you know, middle to top management or CEO level management and sort of more as a focus group kind of early on in the morning or something to that affect prior to the days, you know, close out session.
Mike McAllen: Okay.
Kivi Bernhard: What will often happen is that speaker bureau and that’s really kind the developed out of it any specific a bureau that I work within at Dallas, International Speaker Bureau had a client for whom I’d might, I had done a major platform at closing session platform and they wanted me to come back in about three months later to deal with the top management structures instead of just follow some of the themes of Leopardology through and keep them current in the organization and I said, “Yes, hey listen why don’t you just offer them, you know, breakfast with Kivin in the bush” and it really just rolled of my tongue at the time that, you know, surging a course of conference call and that kind that stock and just become – kind of a real, you know, selling point for them and other bureaus and planners that I deal within they book me, you know, pick it up, you know, it’s become – a quite popular thing, breakfast you know with Kivi in the bush.
Very often book simultaneously with keynote and then I’ll bundle the package and you know kind the just go in there and that’s exactly what it is, that’s a two – two and a half hours session. It will be morning breakfast typically at 8:00 to 10:30 kind of event and really what it does Mike is that allows us to take, you know, the six pillars positive predatory thinking, you know, known as Leopardology and then kind the view with two or three, four issues that the organizational corporation or association is kind of specifically dealing with and I take them and falter to them through at a management level and a more personal kind of nerdy greedy specific level within over the course of, you know, breakfast and it really allows us to, you know, to allow for Leopardology to be (sub-medic 00:12:10) in their sort of HR and management style psyche through, you know, over the course of time and …
Mike McAllen: Yes, I think it’s great for companies and planners, they’d love to have options and it’s great that you have, I mean it’s obvious you’re a great keynote speaker but to have this other things that you can also wheel and deal around with, this is …
Kivi Bernhard: Absolutely.
Mike McAllen: Pretty cool and I also see you have another one that is Executive Retreat in South Africa which I would like to be invited on.
Kivi Bernhard: Oh, baby you know that’s all over.
Mike McAllen: Can you tell me a little bit more about that?
Kivi Bernhard: Absolutely, I mean it’s – without question sort of a cheery on the top that, you know, given the economy it’s not something that is for the lighthearted, you know, in terms of the pocketbook because it can be …
Mike McAllen: You won’t get AIG there anytime soon.
Kivi Bernhard: Actually an AIG, it looks like they have to spend money freely we may but …
Mike McAllen: I guess you’re right. –
Kivi Bernhard: It’s not $400,000 but it does land up at around instead of $8000, $9000 a hit in the skim of it, you know, when you look at that for an executive retreat for top level, you know, CEO or top level management, it becomes you know a really once in a life time event and Mike what this is about is, you know, through my affiliation with Londolozi Game Reserve in South Africa, I have accesses to the famous Londolozi Game Reserve at large which is without doubt, you know, perhaps the most exclusive private game reserve of in the world and most luxurious, you know – literally the leap of luxury that surrounded by the big five, you know, of Africa and it was, you know, cutting edge and state of the art facilities.
So, it’s an opportunity to take high level sort of small focus teams within organizations for some real hardcore strategic thinking or an strategic planning in an environment and in a mindset to tell you the truth, it really that it cannot duplicate anywhere else in the world and typically what will happen there Mike is, you know, they’ll fly into Johannesburg at over Friday, Saturday, some of them I’ll meet them Sunday morning. We’ll fly out to Londolozi which is about, you know, about of two hour flight and an half, maybe flight from Johannesburg and, you know, we’ll come in to Healdsburg drive 45 minutes into Londolozi. They’ll settle in and basically what will happen is, they’ll begin and end each day you know with an exclusive game drive with the two of the trackers at Londolozi and myself, you know, take them out into the bush.
This is how they’ll open and close each day, come back in for breakfast and then begin, you know, a morning session of, you know, some strategic thinking planning and I’ll take, you know, two of the two of the positive predatory thinking each day and really, again just falter them through kind of, you know, pertinent critical issues that they are dealing with on a micro cosmic scale within their corporation organization and, you know, by the end of the day kind of really falter them through into action taking, you know, strategic planning where they can, you know, come back into the organization and really you know manifest some of this ideas at night, you know, they’ll have dinner in a open amphitheater, you know, with the bonfire, I love that, you know.
Mike McAllen: Yes.
Kivi Bernhard: We’ll bring in one of the – yes one of the witch doctor from neighboring village, one of the Sangomas traditional witch doctor, you know, who work out and with the stories of, you know, ancestral stories and, you know, magnificent stories of time in the bush and it just, it’s really a life transforming thing. It’s from Primordial, it’s just give you an opportunity to really get in touch, you know, with your sort of earthly instinct and knowing what you are as human being. So, what you know, we’ve done a couple of these and again it’s normally something that gets followed up after a keynote, you know, couple of months maybe or year so later.
Mike McAllen: It’s sound very cool.
Kivi Bernhard: Yes.
Mike McAllen: Yes, so you tailor your speeches to the specific companies, how do you go about doing that, is that –
Kivi Bernhard: Yes, it’s actually a specific thing for me Mike and I’m kind the really honored and privileged to be regarded as having a talent for this by fellow, NSA, National Speakers Association colleagues of mine, you know, to be able to really take, you see the magic here is to retain your core message and, you know, your core kind the communication point but at the same time seamlessly instead of weave the clients personalize culture and internal message, you know, seamlessly into your delivery and that is the magic of customization. In other words not to leave off and depart, you know, from your new incoming and let your, you know, creativity to the extent that they no longer recognize, you know, any of their own internal messaging.
That’s really the things of this to have this kind of seamless transition and this is something that – look it takes a little bit of skill, it takes a little of practice but it’s really about researching and being able to listen as a professional speaker and that’s an interesting component right there because as speakers we tend to speak well but we don’t tend to listen well and, you know, we’re not professional hearers, we’re professional, you know, speakers and the magic is pre – you know during a conference call or pre-keynote platform preparation in term of your research time prior to the event. It’s about truly listening and understanding the core issues and honing in on what the kind the key critical issue that they’re dealing with right now is about whether that’s a change management issue, a trust issue, a leadership issue, organizational issue, a retention issue, you know, so you got to listen for it.
Mike McAllen: You know its sounds like a real versatile keynote option for people out there, so where can people find more information about you?
Kivi Bernhard: You know Mike we are presented, I mean now a lot of meeting planners use speaker bureau, we are presented by many, many speaker bureaus and I think the major bureau, yes, in the United State. So, we’re on a lot of people of database, you know, we can found all over the place but of course people can, you know, contact me directly and do have access to my office directly. My office manager Diana is in the office Monday through Friday when I’m out traveling, she does manage my schedule and my calendar and can quickly in a value of all sort of information. The best place to gain quick information on me and to get really sense of what I do is at my website, mike@www.kivibernhard.com or you can actually just go to the huntforsuccess.com and there’s a lot of information, there’s a video out there and I’ve been you know …
Mike McAllen: Yes.
Kivi Bernhard: All sort of other detail, yes.
Mike McAllen: That’s great and I’ll put a link in the show note on our webpage too, so they can …
Kivi Bernhard: That would be great.
Mike McAllen: End up there if they want to do that and I want to thank you so much for talking with me today, I know you’re a busy guy, so thank you so much and do [00:21:00] together and talk event somebody
Kivi Bernhard: Absolutely, it’s been my pleasure Mike and thank you and best of luck and success to you.
Mike McAllen: Thank you. So, I’ll talk to you later. Bye-bye.
Female: We appreciate and thank you for listening to the Meetings Podcast. You can find Mike McAllen at GrassShackRoad.com, Jon Trask at AlliantEvents.com, and Tom Hillmer at CreativeGroupinc.com. The Meetings Podcast theme music comes from the Delgado Brothers which can be found at DelgadoBrothers.com. Special thanks to RipTideGraphics.com for the audio editing of this podcast
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