The Power of Being Vulnerable
By Cheval John
We see stories of how high profile A-listers are living the dream that everyone aspires to.
Whether it is Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks and Shark Tank star, Sir Richard Branson, of the Virgin Group or Barbara Cochran of the Corcoran Group, we think that that we can’t achieve the dream life.
We don’t see the journey of how the people achieved their success.
We think that there is a silver bullet to achieving success in your business, life, etc.
What we fail to understand is that the most successful have faced failure in their lives and business.
We also believe that if we share our failures with the world, then we will lose the respect that we have earned.
We don’t want our vulnerability to “tarnish” our brand that we built.
We want the masses to see our strong side.
If businesses want to succeed in this social media world, then they must be vulnerable because people deal with people.
They have to be more vulnerable because millennials only will deal with brands who are authentic.
Millennials don’t want to feel like they are being sold to.
Who can blame them.
Most were about to enter the workforce during the Great Recession of 2008.
They saw their parents suffer because of the wreckless decisions that people on Wall Street made.
That is why they are so sensitive and wary of the broadcasting that brands are doing to sell to them.
And if they see that you are not being transparent with them, they will showcase their frustration on social media.
That can hurt your business and your brand in the long run.
For businesses that are waking up to the reality of being more vulnerable, here are two people who shared their journey to achieving success and in the process have built a strong following.
Pat Flynn
Many might have heard of Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income.
If you have not, then here is a summary.
Mr. Flynn had got laid off from his architecture firm in 2008.
He was figuring what he was going to do next.
Earlier in the year, he passed the exam to earn the LEED Accredited Professional credential.
This credential is huge if a person is an architect.
After participating in forums, he saw a way to help architects pass the LEED exam and also create income.
So create a course on how to pass the LEED exam and was able to generate money.
As a person who wanted to stay as transparent as possible, he started the Smart Passive Income blog to show everyone how he makes money and also share valuable information about the struggles of running an online business.
In addition to his blog, the Smart Passive Income podcast has brought more traffic to his website.
As a result of his success, he has spoken at conferences across the world and has been featured in media outlets like the New York Times.
For most people, the success would go to their minds because they feel that they arrived.
However, Mr. Flynn is not most people.
He has remained true to himself and has showed his failures along the way.
In his keynote address at Podcast Movement 15, he shared with us the first episode that he did in 2008.
Though it was entertaining for us, which the episode was bad, he was willing to be vulnerable with everyone to share that we should not allow fear to stop us from pursuing our goals of podcasting.
Nancy Duarte
Nancy Duarte has written four books and runs her successful business, Duarte.com, and is a LinkedIn influencer.
You would say that she has everything together.
However, she shared her vulnerability with everyone when she nearly lost trust with her employees.
In her LinkedIn article, “It Took Me 20 Years To Fail Fast,” she chatted about her presentation on how to prepare for an economic downturn during a staff meeting.
As she was finished with the presentation, most of the staff told her that they had lost respect for her because of the way she shared the presentation.
In her words, it took a long time before she earned back her credibility with her staff.
Her willingness to share her vulnerability allowed her to gain more respect with potential customers and clients.
So if you are still on the fence of whether to share your vulnerability, here are two simple steps to get over that fear:
1. Be Yourself: No one else can replicate your unique personality
2. Drop Your Pride: Remember that people are probably going through the same thing that you overcame.
Have you felt scared to share your vulnerability and if so, how did you overcome your fear?
Achieving Career Success Is Hard Work
By Cheval John
Sometimes things might not go the way you planned it if you are trying to build your business or achieve your career goals.
Life always “gets” in the way of your plans.
The ones who are successful are the ones who understands that they must adjust to what life throws at them.
At times, they might complain about the fact that they did not get into the desired university like Harvard.
Or complain that they were not drafted by a specific team if they are a professional athlete.
However, they decided to push through their shortcomings on not achieving their desired goals and work very hard to be successful.
That is what separates the most successful people who are in the minority and the rest of the world who decide to complain and feel sorry for themselves.
Jerry Rice, who is the all-time leading receiver in the National Football League (NFL), was overlooked by many major universities because they thought he was not the right fit for their football programs.
So he ended up playing football at Mississippi Valley State University in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS).
During his time in the FCS, he excelled as a wide receiver and even had a huge campaign during the 1984 season when Mississippi Valley State scored 629 points that helped them to gain national attention.
After his collegiate career was over, he was drafted by the San Francisco 49ners, where he won two Super Bowls in 1989 and 1994, respectively.
In the process of winning two Super Bowls, Mr. Rice became the all-time leading receiver in the NFL.
Mr. Rice did not allow the setback of not playing in a major collegiate football program to stop him from making it to the NFL.
Instead, he worked extremely hard to become one of the best receivers in the game of football and was able to achieve greatness as an NFL wide-receiver.
It is always important to never allow setbacks to ruin your chances of achieving your dreams as a writer, podcaster, professional athlete, etc.
If you put in the hard work and dedication, you will enjoy the richness of achieving success in your dream career.
Have you faced any setbacks on your journey to a dream career? You can leave your comments below.
Video courtesy of the NFL Network
Pushing To Achieve Your Career Goals
By Cheval John
Photo Courtesy of Stuart Miles
The thing about chasing your dreams as a writer, public relations practioner, sports professional, etc. is that things will not come easy.
You might think there is an easy path to achieving success.
That is not the case.
For example, those who aspire to play professional in Major League Baseball (MLB), have to go through the different levels of the minor league system.
If that person is really good, they will get called up to the Majors within a few years or even a year.
Now let’s delve deeper into the minor leagues.
The people who are in the minors don’t have a huge salary like their counter parts in the majors.
They have to travel for most of the year and probably have to pay their own way as well.
That can lead to them having stress and even doubt their abilities to be a major league baseball player if they have been in the minors for such a long time.
Most might think about quitting their journey to become a major league baseball player and will end up giving up on their dreams of playing baseball in the MLB.
For those who keep their dreams alive, they will eventually achieve their goals of playing baseball in the Majors.
People like Alan Zinter.
Mr. Zinter spent a long time trying to make it to MLB.
At that moment, he had a family to support and it seemed like he was not going to achieve his dreams of playing baseball in the Majors.
I can guess that they were times that Mr. Zinter wanted to quit.
But he saw that he had to keep on chasing his dreams because people were looking up to him.
Eventually, Mr. Zinter kept his dreams alive and made it to MLB in 2002 with the Houston Astros and again in 2004 with the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Though it was short lived, Mr. Zinter achieved his dreams of playing Major League Baseball.
Maybe you had thought of quitting your podcast, blog, writing career, etc. because not many people were listening or reading your blog.
You might have been feeling a sense of defeat because you see others are successful with their blogs or podcast with the high number of downloads or viewership.
The truth of the matter is that everyone have faced that sense of defeat and wanted to quit at one point or another in their writing or podcasting journey.
I know I have at one point or another wanted to quit podcasting or blogging.
The thing that has kept them going with their podcast or blog is they understood that it is a marathon and not a sprint.
The truth is that people are watching you whether you see it or not.
You have to keep on pushing towards the obstacles in order to achieve your goals as a writer, podcaster, professional athlete, etc.
You might never know who you will be impacting for the better when you finally achieve your goals of succeeding as a writer, podcaster, etc.
Arrogance Always Leads A Team To Lose
By Cheval John
The New York Giants had the football matchup won against the Dallas Cowboys at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas on Sunday night.
They were leading Dallas 26-20 with under two minutes to go and were in the red zone to possibly seal the win.
New York had forced three Dallas turnovers in the matchup.
Most of the time when a team have three or more turnovers, they should lose the game.
On the fourth down play, quarterback Eli Manning was flushed out of the pocket and threw the football away that resulted in the turnover of downs.
That football play by Manning left Dallas with about 1:40 to drive about 80 yards to take the lead.
Quarterback Tony Romo, who is currently leading the NFL with 4th quarter comebacks, was able to led the team down the field that included a game-winning touchdown pass to tight end Jason Witten to stun the Giants.
If Manning had taken the sack and not try to throw a touchdown pass in the red zone, Dallas would have only had less than a minute to go down the field and they would probably have not won.
Let’s just say that Manning gave Dallas an early Christmas gift that benefited Dallas.
When businesses don’t look at better options that will make them better, they will end up driving their company to the ground.
They will have the arrogant attitude that the old way of doing business still works in this day and age.
Companies who stay with the mindset of the old way of doing business will end up losing their customers and will be like Blockbuster, Kodak and the Giants.
When companies or solopreneurs take the time to listen to feedback from their mentors or customers,
they will always win new business and build fan loyalty.
What’s The Word?
Hope everyone will check out this episode of What’s The Word? with guest Scott Barlow, who is the founder of Happen To Your Career.
He shared about his journey to how he started Happen To Your Career and also his podcast by the same name.
Video courtesy of the NFL
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