The Guide System
A fellow Second as your 1-1 connection point to the global community of Seconds and all of the relationships and resources we’re building bridges to
If you're a Second and join any part of the community, you'll be assigned a Guide. =)
Hey, it’s Nathan, and I’m here to introduce the How to be Second Guide System.
We’re *pretty sure* this is massive and something fundamentally different than I’ve ever experienced in my life… but I also don’t want to overhype it… 😅
Here’s what I’ll be tackling:
- What do you get?
- An example interaction
- WHY is it?
- How does it work?
- What does that mean for YOU?
- Can I become a Guide?
[As usual, here’s a video I made walking through almost all of it.)
What do you get?
A real human (a fellow Second!) who knows you (at least a little) that can be your 1-1 connection point to the global community of Seconds, and also all of the relationships and resources we’re building bridges to, who will reach out to you (with zero pressure) every few months and is always available to be reached out to. Someone who’s on your side as a fellow Second and can open doors to community and resources (with no incentive to sell you anything) without you having to cross your fingers and “go networking” or broadcast yourself to a bunch of strangers hoping to find connections, and belonging. (At H2B2, we do a lot of that on behalf of all Seconds, haha)
And this costs you… nothing. *(Well… maybe it costs “being a little uncomfortable” sometimes)*
An example interaction
Guide: Hey you, it’s Nathan. =) Touching base to see if anything has shifted in your life since we last connected, and what you’re working on right now?
You: Hey Nathan, yeah, I got a new role at work (promoted to head of marketing) and actually relocated to near Chicago. It’s been a lot.
Guide: That’s so much! Gratz on the promotion! How are you settling in?
You: Mostly head down at work, and we haven’t been here long but we’ve been to a couple of the obvious places like “the bean” and stuff.
Guide: Totally! There are some fellow Seconds in the Chicago area and of course we have some stuff for people in Marketing - before I assume and throw stuff at you, would you say your ready for anything I can connect you to? (Resources, people?)
You: Yeah connecting with some local Seconds sounds great - and sure, whatever you think would be helpful for marketing stuff.
Guide: Awesome - I’ll send a connecting email between you and here are some links! Always available to touch base of course, but if I don’t hear from you I’ll check back in a few months. 👍
*P.S. Maybe see you at the meetup soon!*
Why are we doing this?
We’re opening doors and building bridges because we’re a global community and we want Seconds to be interconnected and know they’re not alone. Because that is good for Seconds.
At How to be Second we want you to have a relationship with someone who inspires you. Recognition for your efforts in your language. Resources for yourself, and those you care for. Work you feel good about bringing into the world. And, Belonging. All good things for humans in general, that seconds need in their particularly Secondy way.
We believe the guide system is the connective tissue of the community that does the work of supporting all of those things together.
How does it work?
If you are a Second and you have interacted with the H2B2 community in any way, you will be placed into the guide system and assigned a guide.
Guides introduce themselves when they’re assigned to someone, are always available to be reached out to, and pro-actively touch base every 3-6 months. They see what you're working on and provide resources or connections (or not), based on what you’re ready for.
That’s it.
**How it does NOT work:**
Not a bunch of swapping - Guides commit to BEING guides for 2 years (seriously) so they can actually build relationships and context.
Not sales/marketing - H2B2 will not allow sales or marketing to dictate what kind of support a guide gives. So how do we prevent that? Well, first of all, there are no incentives for the guides to sell anything, AND they will remain a neutral third party by simply not allowing guides to also be a “Specialist” for the Seconds they guide, eg: you can't be someone's guide and also their coach. Also, Guides are 100% volunteer, so the financial health of H2B2 does not affect the Guides.
Not automated - We’re telling guides “It’s human connection; if the workload is too much we’ll reduce the amount of people you’re assigned to, but don’t automate this.”
Not a bunch of poking - Guides aren’t expected to follow up with you if you don’t respond - we’re actually telling most of the guides “Expect a 10% reply rate”. If they reach out, and you stay silent… well, they’ll reach out again in 6 months.
Not a Replacement - The guides aren’t expected to have long calls, maintain office hours, provide Therapy, Coaching, etc, or become best friends with all of the people they work with… *but there's also nothing preventing you from becoming best friends. It IS a community after all.*
Can I become a Guide?
Hey! I (Samantha) am stepping in to write this section because I am the person at How to be Second who is organizing and training all of these awesome people who said Yes to being a Guide.
I have always found myself gravitating towards connecting people and taking care of them so it was not hard to raise my hand when Nathan started ideating about the community connecting on a deeper level. We have talked a lot about this Guide System building bridges and opening doors for Seconds and it brings me great joy to be a part of that.
The short answer is YES, you can become a Guide. We have a plan and a process and some documents all made up and ready to go that dive into the details (because of course we do!). Our best guess is a time commitment of 1-2 hours a month, and our highest priority is communicating with all of the Guides as we navigate how our best laid plans actually play out.
If any of this talk about connection or community sparks a desire in you to know more, I’d love to have a conversation about being a Guide. We know that Seconds connecting with Seconds is GOOD, and the more Guides we get the more opportunities we have for that connection. It’s going to be so fun getting to know one another and I cannot wait to see what happens.