Creating Confidence with Heather Monahan - #108: Ever Wondered About Clubhouse? Come Behind The Scenes And Listen In On A Live Q&A with Heather!

Episode Date: April 28, 2021

So many of you wonder what I do on Clubhouse every week! Now is your chance to listen in and hear a Confidence and Cocktails Q&A session where I answer your questions in real time. Plus this time, I h...ave the negotiation expert, Alex Carter, marketing media star, Hala Taha, and other special guests, along with me to give real actionable advice. Together we uplift, support, and empower everyone in the room and we invite you to join in. Rate, Review, and Subscribe to the podcast here! To inquire about my coaching program opportunity visit https://mentorship.heathermonahan.com/    Review this podcast on Apple Podcast using this LINK and when you DM me the screen shot, I buy you my $299 video course as a thank you!    My book Confidence Creator is available now! get it right HERE   If you are looking for more tips you can download my free E-book at my website and thank you! https://heathermonahan.com    *If you'd like to ask a question and be featured during the wrap up segment of Creating Confidence, contact Heather Monahan directly through her website and don’t forget to subscribe to the mailing list so you don’t skip a beat to all things Confidence Creating!     See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Come on this journey with me. Each week when you join me, we are going to chase down our goals. We'll overcome adversity and set you up for a better tomorrow. I'm ready for my close-up. Hi, and welcome back. I'm so excited for you to hear what I have for you today. Okay, for anyone who has not been to Clubhouse yet, and I know there's a lot of you for various reasons, right?
Starting point is 00:00:24 You can only get on Clubhouse if you have an iPhone. A lot of people don't have iPhones. So that's one reason. Some people just say they haven't downloaded the app. They need an invite, right? There's all these reasons why you can't get on. But I've been asked a lot about what happens on Clubhouse. So I'll give you a quick breakdown of what I do on Clubhouse. So I've been on Clubhouse for maybe the past almost two months now, probably six to eight weeks. And each week I host a room where people come up, ask questions. We give real time answers, feedback, encouragement, super fun, so interesting. Every week is different. And I partner with a lot of my friends like Alex Carter, Halataha, a bunch of different people. Almost every week, we have new people showing up to add value. If you're looking to, first you can just come to the room and listen, right? You don't have to jump up on stage. But if you'd like to, you just raise your hand, we pull you up and you get to ask your question. So a lot of times people say to me, you know, I,
Starting point is 00:01:28 want one-on-one coaching, but I can't afford it. This is exactly the solution for you. The other solution I have, of course, is you can always shoot me a DM. With your questions, I answer them live on the podcast each week. So that's another solution for you. And of course, I still have my group coaching and one-on-one executive coaching and consulting. So we've got solutions for you. If you've got challenges out there, I've got a solution. But today, for everyone who has not been able to make Clubhouse, If you haven't joined yet, we are going to give you a taste. I'm super excited to hear what you think. If you want to hear more episodes like this, if you want to join Clubhouse, let me know,
Starting point is 00:02:06 hit me up in the DMs, give me some feedback so I know what you want to hear. But today what you're getting a chance to do is listen in to one of my rooms that I've already done on Clubhouse in real time. You are jumping in right into the Clubhouse room with me. You're going to hear people raising their hands, asking questions. and the feedback that they're getting in real time. I can't wait to hear what you think. So hold tight.
Starting point is 00:02:33 We're going to be right back with your first clubhouse room. Welcome back. Super excited. This is our first confident and cocktails with my good friend Alex Carter, Paula Taha, and we are firing up some great people in this room to answer, ask them what questions they have and shoot out some great advice. So Bailey, it looks like you are first up. How can we help you?
Starting point is 00:02:55 I am just starting in the network marketing space, but it kind of sent me on like a self-help journey more than anything. And I guess I'm just trying to like you guys seem just hearing your stories are super, super powerful and inspirational. And I guess just any advice you have for someone coming from mental health issues, anxiety, depression, and just overcoming what people think and just getting out of that. I'm trying to build my business on social media. I live in Green Bay, Wisconsin, which sounds bigger just because we have the Packers, but it's not. It's a small town. So just any advice you guys would have on starting up a business, on being more confident
Starting point is 00:03:38 and having the confidence in myself that it's going to take to live the life that I want. Bailey, I'm so proud of you, number one, for raising your hand and coming up on stage. That's an act of creating confidence. You're new here, yet you still jumped up. You just shared so much about your personal life. I'm so flipping proud of you and so excited for the journey that you are embarking. Please come back here every Friday. You know, we really are influenced so much by the people we surround ourselves with.
Starting point is 00:04:07 And a lot of people will say, I don't have great people in my space or I don't know how to access them. This is a safe place you can come every week. Alex holds a lot of rooms, hollow holds a lot of rooms. Start leveraging Clubhouse to help lift you up and level you up and really challenge. you to grow and we will absolutely do that for you here. I did want to mention one thing that I heard you say you apologize when you had a problem with your mic. We don't apologize in this room. We thank people for their patience. We thank them for their understanding. And I want to challenge you for the next seven days, Bailey. No sorry. Really challenge yourself. And DM me Clubhouse. You're going to get
Starting point is 00:04:46 directed to my website with my free ebook. And I also have a download on my website to help you stop saying. sorry. And it really breaks down through all the different ways that you can reframe situations and make it about gratitude and about the other person. Alex, I'm handing this over to you. Oh, I love this room so much. Every time I hear Heather talk, I just get so pumped up. I then want to go out and like make 10 power moves after we're done. So Bailey, I want to pick up on something you said. You know, you talked and I've looked at your bio. First of all, I love this. Not a boss, babe. Just a boss. I'm feeling that energy, Bailey, okay? But you also talked about, you know, taking control of your life and learning to thrive through anxiety and depression.
Starting point is 00:05:35 And here's the thing, Bailey. So many people deal with this. And I know I do. And I want to encourage you that your pain point is actually your power. So the fact that you have gone through anxiety and depression, and now you're teaching people how to thrive through the same thing, that might be a pain point, but it's also the seat of your greatest power. Because when you have been through something like that, that's real.
Starting point is 00:06:06 And people want to connect with that. And that then gives you a platform to influence and to inspire so many people. You know, hearing Heather, an incredibly powerful woman talk about her story of being fired and shining a light on shame and finding your confidence, not being dependent on anyone else for your confidence, but creating it, right? That's a pain point that she turned into her greatest power. And I think the key is going to be that for you, Bailey.
Starting point is 00:06:37 Lean into the areas that you have struggled, and you're going to be the person that shows other people the way through. I can't wait to see what happens, and please stay in touch. Oh my gosh. You guys are literally, I'm like tearing up over here. I absolutely love it. Just one other thing I wanted to say. Thank you guys so much. It really means the world to me to get your guys as insight and hear what you have to say. And I will definitely work on not saying sorry for the next seven days. But the other thing, I want to grow my clubhouse following so anyone can follow me. And I would love, love, love if I could ever maybe in the future have any of you talk with me on Clubhouse and just do. rooms together. I really have been super, super drawn to this app, but I'm not sure why yet. So I'm trying to pave my way and figure out what I'm doing here. So thank you guys so much. I will definitely
Starting point is 00:07:31 be joining you guys every Friday. I have to go bartender actually, so I'll be serving the cocktails instead of having them. But I'll probably just have one because you guys are talking to me. So thank you guys again. Have a great weekend. Thank you so much, Bailey. I'm so happy that we've provided value. I hope to see you each and every week here at confidence and cocktails. So we're going to move this along. And for those of you who just join the room, we have this confidence and cocktail session every single Friday at 5 p.m. So it's something you guys can always look forward to. And if you have a question for Heather or Alex, raise your hand so that we can get you here on stage and so that we can answer your
Starting point is 00:08:09 question. Typically what happens is that everybody starts to raise their hand in the middle of the session and then a lot of people don't get answered. So if you definitely have a question, raise your hand so that we can make sure we can get to you. So, Mary, you're up next. How can we help you? Thank you so much. First of all, I love this platform. I'm pretty new to Clubhouse as well. And I wish Bailey was still on because her courage gave me courage to speak up and ask my questions. Heather, Alexander, Hall, I thank you for putting this together. I look forward to hopping on when I read it in my calendar. I've built a business in the network marketing space. And now I'm looking to do some things a little bit differently and
Starting point is 00:08:44 to take on some new businesses. And I'm finding myself just kind of, gosh, like overthinking things, right? And doubting myself, even though I've already had success, what do you do to shift the self-doubts that you have as you're thinking of a new project or a new business or a book or any of those big things? And then I am 43 years old and sometimes wonder, you know, have I missed the boat on some of these things? Is there anything that you guys do maybe on a daily basis or anything on that
Starting point is 00:09:13 would be so helpful. Oh my gosh, Mary, you're so in the right place. I'm so excited that you're here with us. So we are going to share a couple of key things with you. But first of all, I want to jump on 43, right? Because that, I'm 46, so you're a young pup. And here's what I want you to know. At 43, I wrote and self-published my first book confidence creator. I had no idea what was going to happen with that. At 44, I launched my podcast, which is number 17 on the entrepreneur chart on Apple podcast. I had no idea what was going to happen with that. At 44, what did I do when I was 44? Oh, I delivered my TEDx talk that was promoted to TED and translating to six languages. At 45, I was added as faculty to Harvard, and we've actually got the professor that did it up here on stage, and I can't wait to
Starting point is 00:10:00 introduce you guys to him in a minute. He's amazing. And at 46, I signed with Harper Collins leadership. Mary, 43 is when it starts happening. It is not too late. You are not too. old, you are in your prime and you are ready to take off. So let's get going. Let's get you taking some steps to build some momentum for you. For everybody, you know, 2020 was such a difficult down year and that cut all of our momentum. I feel like for most people, 19 was a pretty decent year and that gives you momentum to start picking up speed, moving faster. I want you to take 2021 as the pickup right from 2019. We are going to build a lot of momentum this. I can already see it happening.
Starting point is 00:10:44 It's happening to be a clubhouse from these meetings that we're all having coming together. It inspires me to take more action. And I truly believe, Mary, I would rather move fast and break things than not do anything at all. And let me explain to you what I mean by that. My book Confidence Creator has three mistakes. I wrongaged my child in that book. Some people would be really disappointed in that. But you know what?
Starting point is 00:11:09 I'm really proud of it. I move fast. I didn't know what the heck I was doing, but I knew I had a story to tell and I had something to teach. And I know speed to market is critical in any business. And it's critical for you, Mary, in your business. So I want you to move fast and break things. Be the person that creates the book with three mistakes versus the person that's laying on a deathbed someday saying, I had the perfect book. It was going to be wonderful, but I never got to write it. And it's so, Dad, actually my mentor, this just popped in my mind, one of my big mentors from my radio days in the media business, wonderful dear friend of mine passed away last year. And at the end of his life,
Starting point is 00:11:51 he started writing a book. And that book never got to come to fruition because he became ill and passed away. And I dedicate part of my new book. I wrote a chapter about him in my new book because I was so committed to that idea that he had so much greatness within him that will live on and me and so many other people that he touched. That's his legacy. However, I knew he really wanted to get that book out there. So I committed to him that I would deliver on that. And I put a chapter about everything that, who he was and what he stood for in my book. So Mary, it doesn't have to be a book. It can be a business. It can be an idea of whatever it is. But don't let it die inside of you. Perfection is just a veil and cover for fear. So start calling it what it really is. Alex, over to you.
Starting point is 00:12:34 Wow, Heather. I mean, I feel like we heard this question. and we both had the same reaction. Because Mary, truly, when they say life begins at 40, that is real. I want to tell you where I was at 40. At 40, I was in a really prestigious job where people would look at me from the outside and say, that woman has everything. She has it all.
Starting point is 00:13:01 And inside, I was deeply unhappy because I was busy chasing everybody else's, dreams for my life and not my own. I worked so hard on other people's priorities for me that I drove myself to a nervous breakdown. I worked so, so hard on things that didn't fill me up and didn't bring me joy, that I ended up being unable to sleep at night. I accidentally overdosed on Ambien and I drove into work blacked out. Okay. So that was 40. And in that moment, I said, this stops now. From now on, I'm going to live my life. I'm going to go for my dreams and I'm going to step into my calling. And I have to tell you that since then, life has been incredible beyond my
Starting point is 00:13:53 wildest imaginings. I started working on projects that fulfilled me. And when I did that, and I let go of everything that wasn't mine, I let go of everything that wasn't serving me. I stepped off it. I said, I've done, and I reprioritized my entire life. And Mary, you're at that inflection point, and I want you to know that everything good, everything beautiful is on the other side of the fear that you're experiencing now. Heather always says, fear is a green light that means go. And when I finally stepped into that, here's what happened. So at 43, I won the Lifetime Teaching Award from Columbia University.
Starting point is 00:14:36 It's their highest teaching honor. At 44, I published my first book from Simon & Schuster, and despite the pandemic, despite my entire book tour being canceled, I went out and worked my network like a boss and made my book, the first ever negotiation book, written by a woman, to make the Wall Street Journal business bestseller list. And at 45, as I sit here today, I have never, ever been more comfortable in my own skin, in my own power.
Starting point is 00:15:08 I surround myself only with people who fully support me and my vision for my life. And if you are not on board for that vision, then I wish you the best and our paths are going to take us in different directions. And Mary, you got on this stage tonight because you are ready for more. because you're hearing a voice inside you saying there's something more that's out there for me and you're going to go and grab it now. And my advice to you is to talk about this and put this out into the universe as often as you can. That's what I did, Mary. I told everybody, I'm writing a book. I'm getting this out there. And the more I said it, the more I stepped into the vision of who that person was. And so that work starts for you here tonight. I think you should come back to this
Starting point is 00:16:00 room over and over again, and I can't wait to see what happens for you. Welcome to your 40s. Life is gorgeous. Stay in touch. I loved everything you guys said. Absolutely needed to hear everything tonight. So thank you so much. Thank you so much, Mary. Selena, you're up next. What is your question for Heather and Alex. Hi, ladies. Hi, Heather. Hi, Alex. Hi, Hela. It's so nice to be on the stage and just want to say thank you so much for hosting this room. I've been following all your content on LinkedIn and absolutely inspire by whatever that you guys just said earlier. Earlier this week, it's about IWD, right, International Women's Day on Monday. And I've been like hosting, I'm all about like women and Carmen and all about like inspiring by women leaders like you.
Starting point is 00:16:48 girls and when we cheer on each other, there's always incredible things happen and truly believing on that. But I caught myself when I'm running the IWD webinar campaign as well as sometimes running clubhouse room, I caught myself consciously that I couldn't be able to basically communicate concisely as well as succinct in love. So yeah, I just discover that lately about myself and every time when I, you know, call up to the stage like this, I have like a little bit panic about talking and speaking and actually that's my job every single day for, you know, speaking events as well as, you know, just basically talking with different clients and presenting. So I'm just wondering whether you girls have any sort of like suggestion for me to do about
Starting point is 00:17:39 that as well as I know for a fact that all of you are speaking daily, you know, in your talk show, in your broadcasts, as well as multiple different interviews, I just really want to hear from you, your thought about how to be a more concise communicator as well as more confidence than when you're speaking. Thank you. Selena, first of all, super proud of you for being this vulnerable and sharing this, and thank you for doing that. You're definitely helping others that are here, you know, feeling the same way. So a couple of things. When you feel nervous and you're about to speak, yes, you should feel nervous. That means you care.
Starting point is 00:18:14 I think that it would be terrible if we weren't a little nervous, right? I'm always a little nervous. I want to do a great job for people and I want to go all in and deliver the best. So we should be a little nervous. There's a fine line between fear and excitement. So one of the ways that I knock back fear and I knock back that nervous feeling is I stand up. So first of all, stand up if you're sitting down. I want you to stand up because jumping around and moving around will completely start changing the way you are thinking.
Starting point is 00:18:44 and feeling. Grab your lavender essential oil. I keep mine right next to my computer. And when I'm out in the real world, it's in my pocket because if I get really, really nervous, I start sniffing that. I get centered. I get calm. And I focus on a time when I did a fantastic job in a similar situation where I felt nervous. Sleena, you're going to start doing that and thinking about today that you're supported, that you have all of these people behind you. You aren't alone. You're nervous because you care. You start jumping around. You're in,
Starting point is 00:19:17 really smell that essential oil. Get yourself centered. And my killer hack is I have a playlist that I only use when I'm about to do something huge. And that can be coming into clubhouse, right? It can be whatever is huge for you that day. But this is actually taken from a psychology study called Pavla's Law, which was a study done with dogs where you ring a bell. and feed the dog immediately after, the dog's brain becomes trained and primed to know the minute
Starting point is 00:19:51 the bell rings, the dog starts salivating. The dog knows food is coming. So I leverage that playlist, this really powerful playlist that is the music that I love that hypes me up. I only let myself listen to it right before I do something major. The minute I'm in the Uber, I can picture myself right now going to a huge event and I'm scared to death. And I've done all the other things. I jumped around. I put my best foot forward. I invest in myself. I get an outfit I'm super excited about. I smell my lavender. I get in that Uber and I hit play. And once Jay-Z drops, let me tell you something. Nothing will change that zone that I get in. Nothing can take me out of that commitment to I am about to go kill it. So I want you to create that playlist for you. Get in the
Starting point is 00:20:42 habit and practice of playing it right before your big events, right before you come up on stage at Clubhouse. Remind yourself, you're excited, not nervous. And it's great because you really care. And you're going to keep reminding yourself of that and keep thinking about these days like today where we're all behind you and carry us with you. We will be there with you in spirit. Alex, over to you. Oh my God, Heather, you're like dropping the fire tonight. Selena, I'm so glad you got up on stage. I have a question to ask you, Selena. I see that you went to college in Hong Kong.
Starting point is 00:21:17 How many languages do you speak, Selena? I spoke four languages, but English is something that I learned like only primary school. So it might not be my natural language, but I try very hard to speak concisely. So when Heather talking about, you know, having the sense, having the playlist, I think those are really, really useful. But I also want to learn how to communicate better in structure. And earlier, like I share, I was running this IWD International Women's Day webinar. And one of the speaker and panelists was sharing, cutting like women and men have very different communication skills where, like, for women, I also caught myself. like email, even saying email, I'll be like, dear, and then say thank you, loads of thank you,
Starting point is 00:22:08 say a lot of please. But for men, email is just super concise. So I want to learn how to be concise, but equally not losing my identity and style. So yeah, I would love to hear Alex, what do you think about I could improve better on that? Yes. So first of all, the reason I asked you that question is because I just want to reflect to you that you speak four languages and English is not your first language. So you are here conducting an advanced conversation in one of your four languages. So I wanted to take a moment to pause and recognize your achievements and that you are already a badass for being able to conduct business and conversations in multiple languages. Okay, so I want to reframe that for you first. The second thing I want you to know is that you don't have to be flawless to be persuasive
Starting point is 00:22:56 or an inspiration. When I see somebody get up in one of the four languages they speak and make an incredibly persuasive presentation, as you just did, and ask an incredibly incisive question as you just did, you should know that you don't have to be 100% flawless for people to look in the room and say, wow, saluna is incredible. I have to tell you that the moments, in fact, when I am not 100% perfect are often the moments that I connect with people the most. Because people don't want perfection. They want to see someone who is striving to better themselves every day. And that's exactly what you're doing. You know, the last thing I want to say to you is you talked about speech patterns with men and women. This is so incredibly important, Selena, and it's been a huge topic of conversation here right at the moment. You know, both online and in person, women feel pressure to be more concise, to be more likable. And, you know, you. You know, there are ways in which we can get penalized differently from men for the way we speak. One of the things that Heather talked about up top is eliminating certain things from your speech like over-apologizing.
Starting point is 00:24:15 This is something if you go to Heather's socials, if you go to my social channels on Instagram, you're going to see that both of us have talked about this. There are a few simple tweaks that you can make. For example, eliminate I'm sorry, simply say thank you. or don't say I think or I guess. Instead, just state your point. Don't apologize for your expertise. These are little things, Selena, that it doesn't matter whether you're operating in your first language or not that all of us can use to really not apologize for our expertise, not apologize for our accomplishments, and be able to advocate for ourselves and display confidence in any arena. want to reflect to you that you already are extremely impressive. If you follow Heather and start implementing a few of these small tweaks, I think you're only going to take yourself to even greater heights. And I can't wait to see what you accomplish. Good luck and come back to see us again.
Starting point is 00:25:18 Selena, I think you had such a great question. If I could just add a few things. So to me, it feels like you also may want to incorporate some more preparation and think about the things. that people often ask you about, especially in rooms like clubhouse. So if people are asking to introduce yourself or your business, you need to make sure that you write those things down, that you have bullet points of, you know, what you say when you describe yourself and what are the main points that you want to hit. And when that's really clear, you won't say all the fluff because a lot of the times we fill in with fluff because we don't know what to say next. And it's an excuse for us to kind of get more time to think. But if you write down bullet points,
Starting point is 00:26:00 points in terms of what's the most important thing you're going to say when somebody asked to introduce yourself or your business or the key stories and experiences in your life, then you will be more concise when they say, you know, you have 60 seconds to say your pitch or whatever it is, because you'll have already known that and practice that over and over again every time that you're asked. So I would also say in addition to everything that Heather and Alex said, also be sure to incorporate some more preparation. Well, Selena, how did we help you today? Are you satisfied with all these answers. Absolutely. I have been just dropping down all the notes. And thank you so much. And I would definitely come back. I learn a lot, really. So thank you so much, ladies. Amazing. Well,
Starting point is 00:26:41 everybody here, I just want to reset the room really quickly. You are listening to Confidence and Cocktails. This is a session that we have each and every Friday at 5 p.m. It features Heather Monaghan. She is a number one sales expert. She's also a confidence creator and is the host of the Creating Confidence podcast and special guests today. Heather and Alex team up with in clubhouse rooms all week. Alex is the world's number one female negotiator. She's also a Columbia law professor. And next up on the stage is John. Heather, do you want to introduce John to the stage? Thank you, Hala. So I'm super excited. This is really, I have to give you guys a little bit of backstory. So about two and a half years ago, I put a post up on LinkedIn. And if you're not on
Starting point is 00:27:25 LinkedIn. Get on LinkedIn. It is the most amazing platform for business. I put a post up on LinkedIn about some sales tips and I got a DM from a man I didn't know asking me if I wanted to be a guest professor at Harvard for a class. I thought Ashton Cutcher had brought back his old show, punts, and I hope some of you know what that show was. I thought, no way. Why would Harvard ever want me to teach? I couldn't get into Harvard. Why would I? Why would I? be able to teach at Harvard. Well, I jumped on a call with this man, John Westman, who happens to be here right now with us today. And he gave me such an amazing gift. He shared with me how he saw me, which was a beautiful way that I did not see myself. And when he explained to me all the value,
Starting point is 00:28:15 he thought that I could add from my unique place in the world, I accepted. And he brought me into his class and I got the opportunity to be a guest professor at Harvard for a session. And it was amazing. And I saw in that room, while there were very intelligent people, they didn't have the real world experience that I had. I had a unique perspective and angle that added value. And they added value to me. That day, I took Harvard off a pedestal and realized we are all equal. And that day, I started a friendship with my friend John, who is here now. And it wouldn't, you know, fast forward to January 2nd, 2021. I get a message from my friends saying I just got the opportunity to bring someone on to teach the semester with me. I'd like it to be you. So he nominated
Starting point is 00:29:06 me. I was approved. And now we work together teaching professional selling and sales leadership at Harvard. And it is still mind blowing to me. It is my L Woods moment. I am so freaking grateful for it. I've made the most amazing context. But I was scared. to death that first day. And I just want to thank John Westman so much for giving me that opportunity. John, the mic is yours. Oh, wow. Well, you're certainly welcome. I've had to learn how to say that. And, you know, the gift is you to our course, for sure. I'm listening to this and feeling grateful to hear Heather and Alex's point of view and everybody's points of view here. You know, I don't have the lived experience of being a woman. I am older. I'm 63. I'm an old white dude. I'm a
Starting point is 00:29:51 And it's like, I don't know, I'm just really inspired by this and touched by how powerful everyone listening to this must be. And then the kind of the power that Heather and Alex are transferring to people, I just think is fantastic. I did want to say one thing, though, thinking about these people wanting to do stuff at any age, I do, these are two living examples who are, you know, world class, top of the world. I just go back to a quote by Gordon Parks, who's an African-American kind of generalist but photographer. And his quote I'm looking at right now is enthusiasm is the electricity of life. How do you get it? You act enthusiastic until you make it a habit. And then he goes on.
Starting point is 00:30:35 And I just am like, man, I got nothing to add to this. This is just inspiring and I love it. So the gift is you, Heather, to our class. You know, we're loving your contributions. It's all about conversations. It's all about conversations. When you want more, start your business with Northwest registered agent and get access to thousands of free guides, tools, and legal forms to help you launch and protect your business. All in one place. Build your complete business identity with Northwest today. Northwest registered agents has been helping small business owners and entrepreneurs launch and grow businesses for nearly 30 years. They are the largest registered agent and LLC service in the U.S. with over 1,500 corporate guides, real people who know your local laws and can help you in your business every step of the way. Build your business identity
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Starting point is 00:34:14 Thank you. So much, John, means the world to have you support me, mentor me, and encourage me and the opportunities you give me so incredibly grateful. Hala, back to you. Amazing. Well, John, we'll leave you up on stage here in case you have any value to share during the conversation tonight. Storm, you're up next.
Starting point is 00:34:31 What is your question to the panel? Awesome. Thank you so much. So I want to make a statement before a question if that's okay. So I stumbled into this room last week. And I've got to tell you, I consider myself to be a strong, focused woman. and I have connected with many different women's groups. And when I stepped into this room last week,
Starting point is 00:34:51 I knew that I had found women of strength. And I need to commend you both, Heather, Alex, you guys are just unbelievable examples of strength. I sit back and I look at you guys are saying your life starts at 40. Well, I'm going to be 56 next year and I believe my best life is still ahead of me. So with my heart.
Starting point is 00:35:12 What I want to ask you guys, and hopefully it's not too controversial. But I want to ask you both a question. I find so often, especially the more success you have, we're so polarized and male and female are on opposite sides of the fence so much. And so we put ourselves in an opposition phase rather than a collaborative phase. As strong women who have such great voices, how do you remain strong but still celebrate the fact that you're beautiful women?
Starting point is 00:35:39 Storm, that's a really interesting question. And one, we've never been asked in all of these clubhouse events. So I'm super appreciative that you bring that up. You know, I'll take it just back to my experience. When I was younger in corporate America, I was told I should wear my hair back in a bun, you know, a tight bun. I should probably add glasses, even though I didn't need them at the time. Sadly, I do need them now, which is the whole universe's joke.
Starting point is 00:36:05 And also, I should wear pantsuits. And so I did that. For a while, I changed the way that I looked. I really, you know, steered away from being feminine and tried to be more aggressive. So I was creating a persona that wasn't really me. Now, I found success in corporate America like that. However, and this is what's the key, the key part here is until the day I really decided, I made a deliberate decision a few years ago that I was going to create confidence within me at work
Starting point is 00:36:36 because I was allowing somebody else treating me badly at work to chip away at my confidence. And I had had enough. I started a campaign for myself, to myself, about myself. And I launched a media campaign for myself. If you want to see the whole story, you can check out my TED Talk. It's 10 minutes. It's super powerful. And you can do the same for you. During that time, what I realized was I was I was showing up as a watered down version of me. It wasn't the real me. So I decided to start blowing my hair out. I just started in wearing it down. I decided to start wearing my fantastic red dress, my blue dress. I started showing up as the real me, which also is a more feminine side of me.
Starting point is 00:37:19 I started showing up as a vulnerable me. I sent an email to my entire female team across my company saying on International Women's Day four years ago, saying I'm disappointed that I haven't done this sooner. I'm reaching out today to let you know I am struggling with three. things. And here they are, and I bullet pointed them. And then I said, and I'm super proud of these three things. I'd love it if you could all respond back with three things you're struggling with and three things you're proud of because I want us to have a community of women supporting women. That we called it lightning in a bottle. That email went crazy and everybody was so excited about it. I started to become a more vulnerable, real version of me. And as I stepped into being more
Starting point is 00:38:01 feminine, I really started becoming much more powerful at work, much more successful at work, and much more creative, which had not been part of who I was as I was trying to, you know, create this fake version of myself. And I connected more with men and women as I showed up as that real me. So I've really found my power in being more feminine, in being more real. Alex, how about you? Gosh, Heather, this is incredible. I've had a similar journey. And, you know, talking about from the approach of negotiation, so I'm a negotiation professor and trainer, and there's tons of research to show that what people respond to in negotiation is authenticity. And so if you are putting on a version of yourself, whether that's you're a woman trying to make yourself hard and masculine,
Starting point is 00:38:55 or you're a collaborator who feels like you have to put on this competitive veneer in order to be powerful or successful, people can see that. And you actually reduce your power as a result. I would say for me, I've grown up, maybe similar to Heather, being a woman in very male dominated environments. And I think I imbibed this message that somehow to be powerful meant that I had to be all hard edges. And so I couldn't be soft. I couldn't dress feminine and still be 100% in my power. And similar to Heather, I came to a journey where I've now, at age 45, never felt more well-rounded,
Starting point is 00:39:43 more myself, more feminine, and yet more powerful in my entire life. But one of the dimensions I would add to this is that I became a mom. And there was a time when I thought I couldn't really be a mother because I was too hard driving. I was too ambitious in my career. And that meant that I, you know, I couldn't really be an appropriate mother. And I went ahead and had a daughter anyway. And it is just incredible on a personal note, being a mom and seeing how my daughter doesn't care, you know, what I do. in my career or how hard I am or how impressive or all of that. She just needs me and my presence and my time. And there's something about the purity of that relationship that's made me realize
Starting point is 00:40:35 I don't have to be so edgy or hard all the time. I can just be soft. I can be myself and I can just be. And I would say that for me is one of the greatest gifts of being a mother is that it's allowed me to see and a mother to a girl that, being feminine is being incredibly powerful. Full stop. Thanks for that great, great question. Storm. Back to you. I hope that Alex and Heather helped to answer your question. Do you feel satisfied with their responses? Absolutely. I will, if I will always be in this room, I think you guys are
Starting point is 00:41:10 incredible, powerful examples. And I thank you for your truth. And I thank you for being everything that I have been looking for. So thank you. Amazing. Well, everybody, you are tuning in to confidence and cocktails right now. We're here with Heather Monaghan and Alex Carter. We are doing a Q&A, an open Q&A. So if you have questions for Alex and Heather, raise your hand now. And if we have time, we will make sure we bring you up on the stage. So Storm, I'm going to move you down to the audience. Thank you so much for having the courage to ask your question. We're going to move on to Madhu. How can we help you today? Hey, everybody. I'm Madhu. And first off, I'm so glad I came across this room today.
Starting point is 00:41:48 there's just been so much amazing advice, information, and just like general overall good vibes and the perfect way to end the week, right, on a Friday. So thank you for that. I'm a tech consultant and I am also a solopuna. I have a small brand for fashion. And if you take me, I can sell the hell out of my products. I can talk at length about how they made, where they made and why you need them in your life. right but when it comes to talking about myself be it at work at my job or even um talking as the
Starting point is 00:42:27 designer behind my brand i fall flat like literally flat on my face just going back to what hala spoke about was i try to prep before calls or you know any time i think that i might have to talk about myself but more often than not i'm kind of it just happens spontaneously right some meeting and I have to like step in with a question and then obviously they want to know what I do, who I am. And so when it comes to that, I just kind of like draw blank. So the kind of information that I'm hoping to hear from you both, Heather Alexandra, is how do I build that confidence to talk about myself without the fear of, you know, overselling myself? Because I know that I'm not overselling, but there's always this fear that holds me back.
Starting point is 00:43:18 Just a little bit more context there is I've taken a few personality tests and more often than not, I am a servant leader. So, yeah, just leaving that out there. Madhu, thank you so much for that question. I love it. And this is, I completely get you, first of all, right? I've been there. I've been in your shoes.
Starting point is 00:43:39 Number one, I love that you celebrate that you are an amazing salesperson. shout out. That is major confidence building right there. I'm super excited that you shared that. So you have the potential. You know what it feels like. However, when it comes to promoting yourself, it feels really uncomfortable, correct? Exactly. What is it that you're afraid of? You're afraid people will think that you're speaking too highly of yourself? Yes. So that I'm speaking too highly of myself and that the expectations are going to be right up there and I'm not going to be able to meet them. Okay, here's what we know. You actually will be able to meet them. Let me just break down a couple of key things for you. Number one, people speak about us the way we speak about ourselves. That was a hard lesson for me to learn in business. If I try to diminish or dim my light when I speak about me, others will do the same. Well, Heather, you know, she's okay. She's all right. You know, she might be able to get that job done. I decided if I keep speaking about myself in a watered down way, others will. keep that conversation going. That is not the conversation you want to have. You're not going to get
Starting point is 00:44:47 the opportunities in business that you want. Think about a man or a woman that you can channel in those moments. That's what I would do. I'll never forget. I had to go on an international news program and two minutes before I went on air. Someone said to me, this woman is going to attack you. Just get ready for it. And I thought, okay, who can I channel going into a very difficult situation that I can just steamroll that will allow me to steamroll somebody. And I thought Donald Trump, nothing about politics, but when that man is being interviewed by someone and he doesn't like a question, he steamrolls them. So I channeled Donald Trump in that interview. And this woman asked me about international business and all these things I didn't know anything about. In my mind,
Starting point is 00:45:31 I thought, how would Donald Trump answer? And I just said, great question. But let's go back to what really matters here. And I brought back to the U.S., which is what I knew. So what I to share with you is channeling personas and personalities works. I've done it. I've done it successfully and you can do it. So channel me, channel whoever you want in that next situation when someone throws you a curveball. The other thing that I would say is, you know, there are going to be other people in that meeting. There are going to be people that are going to respond to you. And there are people that you don't even realize that you're going to impact from these conversations. Do it for those people if you can't do it for yourself until you start to build that momentum.
Starting point is 00:46:10 do it for other women. Stand up and speak the way that you want people to speak about you when you're not around because you're doing it for the people that are going to be coming after you. And if you have a daughter, holy cow, I don't know if you do, but if you do, do it for her. Alex? Yeah, Madu, this is a great question. And Heather gave you incredible advice. So, Madu, if you're receiving value from this room tonight, know that the only reason
Starting point is 00:46:40 that you are here is that Heather and I both learned to step into our expertise and tell our own story and claim our worth in the public sphere. So when Heather says, do it for the people coming after you, she's right. Because here's the thing. When you claim your expertise, and by the way, this is part of negotiation. You know, I train people in negotiation. It's not just numbers, Madu, it's learning how to tell your story. It's about the messages. And so when you learn how to claim your expertise, that's negotiating. And you are opening up so many opportunities to serve thousands of other people. People are going to look to you, Madu, to see what is possible? What can I achieve? You know, I'm a big believer that each one of us has a calling and that we have a
Starting point is 00:47:38 message that only we can deliver to the world. And there are people out there right now, Madu, who are waiting for you to step into your expertise, to claim it, and to fully offer everything you have. I don't want you to make them wait any longer and know that when you step into your expertise, when you ask for more, the next person who does it is going to have an easier road. So go out there, Madu, be the message and know truly that if somebody can't support you for all that you are and all that you have to offer, then like Heather did before, it's time to get a new company and get a new circle because the people around you who support you for who you are, those are the people that you want to be in business with for the long term and no one else. If they
Starting point is 00:48:35 can't accept it. That's their problem, not yours. Stay in touch, Madu. Can't wait to hear what comes next for you. Madhu, are you happy with these responses? Did we help you today? Oh my God, that was amazing. And I completely connect with the last tip that Alexandra gave me about having people who support you, right? That should be your community. That should be the people who are around you. So 2020 has been a year of detoxing. I have been getting away from some negative people. So I will definitely keep that in mind along with everything else that Heather and Alexandra have dropped today. Thank you so much, guys.
Starting point is 00:49:16 Perfect, Madhio. I hope you come back each and every Friday so that we can keep along with your journey. Gian, you're up next to the stage. How can we help you today? It's Jean, not Gian. That's okay. So I actually have something, I don't really have advice. I have a plug.
Starting point is 00:49:30 It's a plug that I think will serve a lot of entrepreneurs and women. And if it's okay, I just want to explain it. I have a three-decade career in business, and I've been through many journeys. And I'm part of an organization that has been on this week of International Women's Day and the kickoff of Women's History Month, recognizing that there are two million women that have been shelved out of the workforce this year because of the pandemic, the nature of their jobs and the fact that child care very often falls to the female in the household. And we all decided that we need to do something about it.
Starting point is 00:50:12 And we've created a campaign, which is, and there are many similar campaigns, but this one is aimed at mentoring any woman who wants advice on how to get back into the workforce or build their business. Hashtag to the number two, two million mentor, mentor, minutes. I have so far, this is a group of powerhouse women all over the country in leadership positions who are willing to give their time to try and help women get back into the workforce or give them advice on how to lift them up in their business. It's been a fabulous experience. There are many initiatives. They're kind of similar. But if anybody out there is interested in getting somebody's time to just give them advice, in addition to your own initiative,
Starting point is 00:50:59 which is fabulous. I just wanted to give a shout out for it. My inspiration is a quote that I've used as my North Star, which is from women's civil rights activists and suffragists who fought for the women's right to vote, who fought for people of color back at the turn of the century. And her big motto was lift while you climb, which is it's not enough to be successful on your own. You have to bring others along with you. So that's why I'm part of this initiative. I just welcome everybody. to go look for hashtag. Awesome. Two million mentor minutes.
Starting point is 00:51:33 Nice. Thank you so much, Gene. Thank you so much for letting us know. Sharon, you're up next. You are tuning in to Confidence and Cocktails. What is your question for sales and confidence expert, Heather Monaghan, and negotiation expert, Alex Carter? More of a kudos, ladies. First of all, what gets better than confidence in cocktails?
Starting point is 00:51:56 And I'm sitting here now with a glass of Sauvignon Blanc and just finished up a clubhouse thing myself and just came on to you. Kudos for you, ladies, for having this. And I probably am a little bit more wiser. That's what I'd like to sometimes think of a little bit more senior years. And first of all, ladies, why fit in when we were born to stand out? And what Heather and Alexandra and everyone are saying is so true. I mean, when I started my career, it was all about the little. little blue suit with a button top with a little bow tie and the hair pulled back. And that's when I
Starting point is 00:52:32 started corporate. Before that, I started, I was in TV. And I was actually told on a few counts and thankfully, look at these gorgeous women that are on stage here tonight. But I was told rather I was too pretty for this or to that in a male dominated world as we were just starting to break in. Cut to now, I speak all over the world and I've owned my own companies for 30 some odd years and started my own business. I know somebody was talking about that. It may have been hollow just a little bit before about having a child. And I moved from the C-suite and started my own companies because I needed the flexibility, but I also wanted to be a wonderful role model. Because the one thing I, other than unconditional love that we can give our children is self-confidence and self-esteem. believing in themselves from a young age. So now I speak about leadership, confidence, teamwork, and
Starting point is 00:53:26 success. Why am I on Clubhouse? I'm not about selling things. I'm about helping, especially women, to build up and find more confidence in who you are and how you live your life. And for me, I do have several events and one of the biggest topics I speak on is being uniquely you. That's Y-O-U, uniquely you, but it's all about believing in you in your authenticity. And somebody was asking before about, you know, they felt like they were bragging about talking about themselves. Listen, it's not bragging. If you have the education, the experience and the expertise, go for it because nobody is ever going to be a better cheerleader for you than yourself. And that's what Heather and Alexandra and Hala are creating with this.
Starting point is 00:54:17 So this particular platform and this particular room really rocks and resonates and should resonate with women from all backgrounds from all over. I really work with leadership image and building people up. So your leadership image, and that's what Heather and Alexander were also talking about, is who you are. Your leadership is what you do. But before I give the stand-down, I'm just going to give you a little bit of advice. It's very simple for everybody to remember.
Starting point is 00:54:51 And that's your ABCs. And what do they mean? Your ABCs are to always be confident. Because when you are confident and you believe in you, others will believe in you. Because you have to believe in yourself in an authentic way. And then you will be able to take charge and go anywhere in the world you want to be. If your anxiety, depression, or ADHD are more than a rough patch, you don't need just another meditation app. Takayatry makes it easy to see a psychiatrist online using your insurance in days.
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Starting point is 00:56:17 Head to tachiatry.com slash confidence and complete the short assessment to get matched with an in-network psychiatrist in just a few minutes. That's tachiatry.com slash confidence to get matched in minutes. That's beautiful, Sharon. I'm sure Christine and I'm done speaking. That's beautiful, Sharon. Sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off. We're just running out of time here. The event is a about to be over. And actually, Alex here has to run. So I'm going to allow Alex to say goodbye to the group here. Yeah, thank you so much. And I think one of the things that Sharon raised and that's been a theme of tonight is, you know, people talked about lifting others up. And I wrote a book called Ask for More, but I'm all about not just asking for more for yourself, but for others. And I want
Starting point is 00:57:03 people to know here tonight that the women on this panel, Heather Monaghan and Halataha, are the people who lift others up behind the scenes and that support me and support each other. And so I want to say to everybody in this room, please follow the wonderful women on this stage. We're creating a community here today. And I want to thank Heather and Holla so much for being the type of women leaders that I love to collaborate with who believe in lifting others as they climb. And I'm so glad to have spent a Friday night here with all of you. Look forward to seeing you again next week. Thanks, Alex. You're the best We appreciate you so much. All right, folks.
Starting point is 00:57:42 So, Alex, thank you so much again for joining us. We're going to continue on here and finish up the stage. Nuran, you are up next. What is your question for Heather Monaghan? I was just listening while I was doing my walk. I usually get out to walk a little bit so when the weather is nice. And I got a lot of insights and a lot of confidence built just by listening to you, to you ladies.
Starting point is 00:58:06 And I admire your strength. I come into the clubhouse sometimes and I just build my confidence just by listening and seeing that how other people are doing it and they don't fall back and they keep going. That's all I want to say. I just love you guys. Oh, thank you so much, Neuron. Thank you for coming up and saying that. We so appreciate you.
Starting point is 00:58:29 Please keep coming back. We'd love to have you here every week. I got to the house and so I'm going to get notifications every time you guys coming in. Perfect. That's what everybody should do. do if you haven't yet, make sure you're following Heather. Tap the bell for always follow her here on Clubhouse and on Instagram so you guys can always keep up to date with her. And I think our favorite thing when it comes to hosting these rooms, and Heather, correct me
Starting point is 00:58:52 if I'm wrong, it's when it's the recurring faces come up and share like what happened next. Like Ellie is always in this room. I don't know if you guys, if she's tuning in today. But, you know, those folks who come week over week, it's so much fun to keep up with these story. So make sure you guys come here again next Friday, 5 p.m. It's kind of a tradition. We have confidence in cocktails every single Friday. So Lexi, you're the last person on the stage here. How can we help you? Hi. So I'm new to this. So when I see me, guys, virtually at least. So I'm 22, relatively young. I actually been in my industry for about eight years now. So I was 15. And I ended up actually leaving a corporate position for a Fortune 500 company in the
Starting point is 00:59:35 of COVID and started my own business. But I am having a little bit of trouble when it's coming to like building my inner resilience because I'm so young and I'm basically the owner of the firm. I'm trying to like, I guess my question is the perception of others often come to create like an internal tension for me. And I wanted to know like how do you come off both nice and tough in a leadership position to be seen as like competent and do I have to minimize my feminine side in order to get that across? Because my industry. Like the sales industry, specifically for what I sell, is more of a male dominant industry. But if I come off a certain way, sometimes I may come off as a bitch, excuse my French,
Starting point is 01:00:15 what do you like recommend in order to, you know, come off as both nice and strong and tough? Lexi, did you win my contest today on LinkedIn? Yes, I did. I'm so happy you're here. Okay, guys, if you don't follow me on LinkedIn, definitely give me a follow. I ran a contest today to give away an invite to Clubhouse to be here today. Lexi won. I'm super excited that you're here, Lexi.
Starting point is 01:00:40 And congratulations. You are a complete boss. It took me getting fired at 42 years old, right, to go out on my own. You bossed up at a younger age, a much younger age. And during a pandemic, I am so cheering you on. I am your hype girl. I'm so excited for you. So right move, invest in yourself, take that chance.
Starting point is 01:01:04 You brought up a few times that you were young when you were speaking. And I want you to start seeing young as your advantage point. And I'm going to hand this to Hala after because Hala is quote unquote young too, but she's a boss who rolled the dice on herself, jumped all in on herself just like you. And that's actually your superpower. We all need a unique value proposition, something that makes us different and unique, right? I've been building this unique value proposition my entire career, but now I leverage that I got fired, right?
Starting point is 01:01:35 I leverage that I have expertise and years of experience. However, you conversely can leverage the fact that you see things through a different lens. You have a fresh perspective, right? You bring a value in a perspective others don't have. The fact that you're a woman is going to give you a totally different perspective than the men, you are so needed at the table. You're the one that took the leap and left the corporate job. You are the boss and start stepping into that.
Starting point is 01:02:07 The sooner you can start stepping into that power, the sooner it's going to be your unique value proposition. It's going to be the thing that makes that difference maker for you. So instead of seeing it as a negative, let's reframe it. And Hala, I have to hand us to you because it's your story. Yeah, of course. So first of all, Lexi, super impressed, like read your profile. And it seems like you've already accomplished a lot at such a young age and you're just diving into being an entrepreneur and seemingly having a lot of success.
Starting point is 01:02:35 So kudos to you, first of all. I echo what Heather said in terms of being young as an advantage, especially it seems like you're in the technology space. This type of environment is changing every single day. And so even people that might have 10 years of experience when it comes to the actual industry and how things work today, they might only have a couple years of relevant experience. And so when it comes to actual level of expertise, you're right up there with everyone else because the landscape changes so fast. So first of all, you need to realize that. Second of all, I'm a young business owner as well. I started Yap Media, which is a social media and podcast marketing agency six months ago.
Starting point is 01:03:12 I'm almost at a million in recurring annual revenue. I have over 30 paid employees. And so things are scaling really fast. And, you know, some of my prospects have mentioned to me that they feel that my. My team is very young, and it's true. A lot of my team is under 30 years old. And we are trying to right now recruit senior leaders, but something to think about with something like your business, where you are having a lot of success, is why not start
Starting point is 01:03:38 to put together an advisory board? There's a lot of senior leaders, especially now in COVID, who are out of a job and who would prefer to have these advisory roles in your company and may not even want to be compensated. They may want to instead act on a referral basis and may. and maybe you give them, you know, some sort of a kickback for whatever deals they bring in, or they may want to have it on their LinkedIn profile because it is, you know, you're a hot up-and-coming company that has a lot of potential. And so I just think that it's, you know, an idea for you to consider having advisory roles.
Starting point is 01:04:11 And that way you will level up the seniority in your organization and maybe you won't get as much pushback for being a young leader when people know that you've got senior executives kind of guiding your ship. And that's the kind of thing that I'm thinking about today as well. So that was really helpful. Actually, coincidentally, I do have senior advisors. One of them, he's actually kind of kept secret just because he has a lot of people in my industry, I used to work for HP specifically and Visual Edge Technologies, which is another tech company. But a lot of them came from that.
Starting point is 01:04:42 And since they have a non-compete, they have to be kind of like held quiet until their non-compete expires. But I'm definitely looking for senior advisors. That was really great. You nailed it on that. since that is basically what I'm trying to do with my niche. So definitely thank you guys so much. I'm super excited to be here every other week following. And I'm going to continue following you guys and best of wishes to all of you.
Starting point is 01:05:05 Thank you so much, Lexi. We wish you the best of luck. We have a new moderator who has just joined us on the stage. Polina, would you introduce yourself? Hi, everyone. Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening wherever you're located.
Starting point is 01:05:18 Super excited to stop by this room today. I'm Paulina Gromyn. I reside in New York. I've been an entrepreneur for 21 years. I'm an investor and I do a lot of things. So sales is the number one skill that you need to have. I love seeing women are much better in sales than men because they're intuitive. If you have any questions, I'm here, ask me anything. Amazing. I've gotten to know Paulina a little bit over the last few weeks. She is so talented, so experienced. I'm really exciting, excited to hear the value that she contributes today. So if you guys are just joining in now, You are listening to Confidence and Cocktails. We do the stream each and every Friday at 5 p.m. We are wrapping up the stage here, but make sure you follow all the moderators on stage. Tap the bell for always so you always know when we're hosting these amazing rooms. Heather hosts rooms in here all the time. So do I.
Starting point is 01:06:06 So does Paulina. So make sure you guys are following us. And if you're enjoying value, ping your friends in for the last 15, 20 minutes of this room. We still have an amazing conversation going. And this is also a great time to improve your social media. What you can do is take a screenshot of this app. And when you have time later today, you can tag us all here on social media. And then we're going to repost.
Starting point is 01:06:28 And that's a great hack to grow your social media. So right now, if you guys forgot to do this already, take a screenshot of this app and then tag us when you have some downtime later. And we'll definitely all reshare on our stories. So, Janie, you're up next. How can we help you? Hi. Thank you so much. First of all, for hosting this room.
Starting point is 01:06:45 This is amazing. So just a little bit of background about myself. I'm an IT project manager, consultant, so I'm very client-facing. And, you know, I'm relatively young as well. I work in the tech industry that's very male-dominated. And so a lot of the times I try to speak with intent while being assertive, but also being soft-spoken and having that, you know, the soft skills, because 90% of my job is communicating and leveraging my technical resources
Starting point is 01:07:15 to speak to the parts that I can't technically speak upon. And so one of the feedback that I actually received recently was that I was overconfident. And I wasn't really sure how to take that because I didn't even think that being too confident could come across as a bad thing. And so I just wanted to kind of get your feedback on that and see what your thoughts were and how I can navigate, kind of navigate that while being, you know, competent and continue to do more. my job well. Janie, thanks for such a great question. I don't believe there is a thing called overconfident.
Starting point is 01:07:56 I don't even know what that means, right? It's like what's over nice? You can't be too nice. You can't be too confident. There's more to this story. So I mean, who is the person that said this to you? Yeah. So it's actually one of my leads,
Starting point is 01:08:12 I guess he's the manager that I don't report directly to him. He's a level above me, but he kind of, you know, comes to me a lot with, you know, like, what's the status of the project, how is everything going? And so I'm the one managing the project. He kind of just briefly oversees it and comes to me for any updates that he needs that I report directly to our VP. So that's not really appropriate communication from the chain of command, right? So there's something else going on here. And again, we don't have the whole story on it. But what I would advise you to do, the next time someone
Starting point is 01:08:45 says something like that to you, I would ask a question back. I would say, I'm confused. I didn't know there was such a thing as overconfident. Can you elaborate? Can you give me an example? Right. You need to get to the heart of what's going on there. And John, I actually want to elicit your opinion here to hear from a senior leader, a man's perspective. Do you have any thoughts on this? First of all, thank you for the questions. Definitely. I agree with Heather. Totally. And you can just, it's all about behavior. This is what we interpret from other. You can say, so I would probe and say, so what did I say or do that led you to that?
Starting point is 01:09:23 And also, how does what you say impact my effectiveness? Because I hear some people saying they're young or whatever. Look, you are what you are. I am what I am. I can't change my age, my hair color, my losing my hair. You know, we just come in the package we are and embrace. And Heather's an expert embracing your truth. So I would, I'm with Heather on, first of all, don't let that impact you at all. Let that be motivation just to keep being you. And then probe a little bit if you choose to. Get with your boss. The self-reflection is always good. Get with your boss on what he or she, I said he was ridiculous. Hopefully, what she says. And really, you know, I feel like I've had the same feedback. I've had all kinds of people hate.
Starting point is 01:10:13 on me, my career, but not because I'm a woman, clearly, is for other reasons. And usually it's what, it's just about developing ourselves to be as strong as we can be, is my opinion. So I'm more, a best practice in sales is after each interaction, if you're in a team, you have a debrief, an after action report. What went well and what do we want to repeat and what didn't go well or what can we do to improve. So that's a forum that you can start instituting that and you can take the lead and you can actually say, okay, hey, let's debrief. What do you think went well? What do you think can be improved? And you can take control of the conversation. And then whatever comments this person puts, you can decide how to use it. But definitely don't do not interpret it
Starting point is 01:10:58 as anything that you necessarily have to change. I mean, I love how Heather talks about being a boss. If you're competent, then keep going. And it certainly sounds like you are. So that's the main thing. competence will eventually reign, even if you have to leave an organization because politically they no longer want someone who threatens them. That's okay. Look at what you can build if you do make a change. So I know that I don't, Heather, I hope. That's perfect, John. That was perfect. Yeah, I also, I love that this is women. You guys, you know, I don't have the lived experience. Listen to Heather. I would listen to people who've been through it as a woman. They know more than I do, and I totally defer to any of your discernment of these comments or what other people like
Starting point is 01:11:44 Heather can share with you. By the way, I'm going to plug Heather's coaching program. I don't even know if you're doing it anymore, Heather. Are you doing it? Oh my gosh, you crack me up. I'm not at the level that I was before because the speaking business has been picking up so much, but thank you. Okay, but if anybody gets a chance to reach out to Heather and say, be my coach, she had an incredible coaching program going. I really support that because there's only so much that it can be shared in this form. And Heather, I just, this is my first day on Clubhouse guys. Heather invited me. I just, I popped into a couple of rooms. I popped into this by accident. Heather put me up on the stage. I'm not supposed to be here. I mean, it's like, this is the, yeah, so all of it is like,
Starting point is 01:12:24 get more of Heather. She's amazing and transfers her power and confidence in a wonderful way. So that's my last thought. I think that's great. Thank you so much, John. And I concur. Heather is an amazing coach. She's one of my mentors. And so if you guys are interested in any of her programs, just DM her coaching.
Starting point is 01:12:45 And one of my team members will send you some information about her one-on-one coaching and her group coaching and the availability that she has now that speaking is picking up. So we'll get back to you. You could DM her coaching if you're interested in that. Janie, something else that I want to just tell you is that, It sounds like this person is trying to dim your strengths. And what I want you to realize is that when you have strengths and weaknesses, you're better off focusing on your strengths and not your weaknesses. And that's the big problem with feedback.
Starting point is 01:13:15 The big problem with feedback is that people are going to give you and point out your weaknesses and make you feel like you need to work on your weaknesses when in fact, you most likely will be better off focusing on your strengths. And so he's saying you're overconfident. I would be like, yeah, I'm overconfident. Actually, that's my biggest strength. And that's probably what's going to make you super successful and super wealthy and everything like that.
Starting point is 01:13:40 And don't let them dim your light in that regard. So I would just be like, that's a compliment. Thank you so much. You know, let me know, to John's point, how that affects my performance because I feel like my confidence helps me in X, Y, Z. So if you can help me understand why this is something I actually need to work on, let me know because as of now, you know, I'm. I know myself well enough that the reason why I've been successful so far is because of this strength.
Starting point is 01:14:06 And so I'd love to see, you know, why you think I should scale that back because I'm not sure I'm aligned because of my track record here. And so I would maybe like, you know, stand in your power a bit about it. That's my perspective. Yeah. Thank you, everyone so much for your feedback. It's funny. I actually had a talk with my direct report about it and just asked him, I'm like, hey, so
Starting point is 01:14:26 this is the feedback that I received. what are your thoughts on it? And he actually started going into this kind of monologue about, you know, you're young and you work with a lot of men. And so they might have a different perspective if you're, you know, too assertive or if you speak with intent. And so I guess to kind of wrap on my end, his feedback to me to my question was just to continue to do what you're doing, which, you know, I'm kind of left confused because my feedback that I received, was you're overconfident and that may affect your work and your progress. And so I kind of just have been continuing to do what I'm doing. But I really appreciate all the feedback that I've
Starting point is 01:15:11 received today. I think it was really helpful and almost solidified my personal feelings about overconfidence because I really didn't think it was a thing either. So thank you so much for that. Yeah, it's really not a thing. There's nothing wrong with you. So don't let anybody dim your light, Jenny. I hope that, you know, you come back next week. Let us know what happened. And I hope that, you know, you stand up for yourself and you make sure that nobody tries to dim your light. So Natalie, you're up next. How can we help you? Hi, everyone. First of all, thank you very much for bringing you on stage. I actually did not expect to come up. But thank you very much. And I just wanted to compliment you all because this room was hosted by beautiful and successful women. And I'm
Starting point is 01:15:53 just like amazed by, you know, the conversations we're having here. And my question, Well, first of all, I just heard about the mentorship programs and all that, and like, I'm kind of interested because I was mentored by a male. And if I would give like a little bit of background about me, I am a UXWad designer and immigrant. I moved to the United States approximately seven years ago for school and then what happened, I stayed. Most of the businesses I worked for were tech related or entertainment or event related. So it's like Hollywood slash companies like SpaceX. which is like weird and odd, but yeah, my life was all over the place. And what I stumbled upon is when you are in like a very dominant, you know, male environment,
Starting point is 01:16:39 you kind of very often, you know, are subjectified or people would tell you like what Jenny was told, you know, you're overly confident, you're this, your dad, or you're supposed to behave this or that way. And I just want to ask you how to be that shark in the water, how to be, you know, that hundred, center in the water and like keep your confidence and be that woman that can make it and go far. Because, you know, if you will always listen to someone's opinion, I know it's not going to get us very far, but also like you kind of lose a little bit of yourself by hearing that feedback, especially from someone who stands higher than you. Thank you. All I want to say to this and I'm going to hand this to Polina is that you need to listen to
Starting point is 01:17:20 the one voice and opinion that matters in this world. And that is your own. tune into that voice over everything else and tune out all the other noise. And you might not be with your people. You will find your people. Keep listening to you and your intuition. Polina, you want to take this one? Oh, absolutely. Heather, I couldn't have said that better myself for years.
Starting point is 01:17:45 I listened to other people and always put other people on part of souls until I realize that I am dimming my light by doing that. You have to understand something that just because someone has advanced, let's say their career. It doesn't make them more qualified than you in many other areas. You have to consistently sell to yourself on the idea that you're amazing, that you are here for a reason, that you are going to influence people, and you have to work on your craft, but you have to sell the idea to yourself first. You come first, we sell yourself first, and then it's game over. Everything in life boils down to you versus you. That's all I got.
Starting point is 01:18:22 Amazing, Natalie. Did you find value in these responses? Yes, I did. And thank you very much, you guys, for hosting this room. And this was incredible. I will try to come back as much as I can. And yeah, just thank you very much. I'll follow all of you on social media. Thank you so much. We appreciate you, you know, having the courage to come here up on stage. Kinda, you are the last question of today. How can we help you? Hi, I just want to say, before I say anything, England is not my first language, so I may have some trouble. But I just want to share. because I just stepped in a clubhouse a couple days ago, and I really want to share. I sit in this room, which is incredibly nice. I mean, I really enjoyed listening to all the talking. So I just want to ask Heather as a more experienced woman.
Starting point is 01:19:15 I'm just 19 years old. I'm going to college. I mean, I'm stepping into another community and actually in another country. So I just want to ask her, what tips or advice is you wish someone gave you as a 19 years old? Oh, Kinda, that's such a great question. Thank you so much for asking it. So here's what I would say to my 19-year-old self. You are the key.
Starting point is 01:19:42 You are the answer. Stop looking for that answer from everybody surrounding you. Take bigger risks. If your intuition and your gut tell you something, go all. in on it. Don't hesitate. I talked about this earlier. Speed to market is critical, right? So many of us can hold ourselves back with fear or we cloak fear and call it perfectionism or we call it, someone called it, I'm a New Yorker so I can't do that. You can call it whatever you want. It's fear. Start seeing fear as a green light that means go and go faster. Making mistakes will actually move you forward.
Starting point is 01:20:22 That's a beautiful thing. That's a learning opportunity. You don't have to be the best at everything to show up. Getting a seat at the table means people want you there. Start raising your hand and contributing. You were invited to meetings for a reason. You don't have to put up with the way people treat you. You can actually teach people how to treat you.
Starting point is 01:20:43 I mean, I could go on a tangent right now for forever, but I wish so badly I had me back then. So for you, the most important thing you can do, is show up to this room and other rooms like this. Get yourself around people who are at a place that you want to be in the future. Surround yourself with great people who encourage you and are cheering you on and are lifting you up. Hala, take this one.
Starting point is 01:21:09 Yeah. So I would say it's all about mindset, right? I think when you're 19 years old, I really think that you need to do a lot of mindset work. I find that the reason why, like, I achieved a lot more success. and I think other people my age is because I really believed in myself and believed that life was limitless from a pretty young age. And I've overcomeed a lot of failure from a pretty young age where I'm not afraid of risks. And a lot of people are afraid of risks. And they don't take the little actions.
Starting point is 01:21:40 I'm not even talking about huge actions. They don't even take the little actions, like those little emails where, you know, they're going to say yes or no. every one of those yeses stacked upon each other will bring you towards success, right? So it's those little daily actions that people are scared to take because they don't have the right mindset. They don't realize that life is abundant and life is limitless. And so if you have any of those limiting beliefs, I would say as a young, a 19 year old woman, like, you know, try to listen to more self-improvement podcasts, try to learn how to meditate, try to learn about the law of attraction, try to reprogram your brain so that the daily opportunities,
Starting point is 01:22:17 and the daily things that get thrown your way, any negativity that comes your way, it's kind of just rolling off your back and it's not a big deal and you just keep moving towards progress. I think a lot of people your age, they get scared and then that's why they go the traditional. I'm just going to get a career. I'm going to follow everybody else. And then, you know, you become as successful as the risks that you take, right? And so I just think that mindset is really key at this age. And that's the advice that I would give you is to really try to have a healthy, positive mindset. Pauline, what do you think? I think that you have to understand that at this age, the most important thing is to be
Starting point is 01:22:53 curious, right? So be open to receiving different information and not relating it to yourself as if, like, if you don't understand something or you're not perfect, it's something that you failed. Be really curious. Open up your mind. There's so much abundant possibility for you because you're 19, because right now you don't have three children, you're not married. There's tons of opportunity. when you are in your power of curiosity, when you are absorbing information and fail forward. Definitely fail forward because you are going to be as successful as the people that you're around. Try to surround yourself with people who think really big,
Starting point is 01:23:32 who think ideas that are out of this world. Because being in proximity and around those people will propel you forward more than any career because when you are around visionaries, you will absorb that energy and amazing opportunities will come. to you as a result of that. Yeah, thank you so much. It really meant a lot. I mean, especially this time because I was kind of adopting myself, especially for college. I mean, I choose to study architecture and engineering while everyone around me go like, why did you choose it? You get to go for medicine or something like hire, go for it. But it really meant a lot. I mean, it's really,
Starting point is 01:24:12 it's really nice to speak to women that really encouraged you. Thank you so much for this meeting. Thank you so much, Kinda. And I'm so proud of you to come up here on stage. English is not your first language, but you sounded amazing. You did a great job. And so appreciate you. Yeah, having the confidence to do this.
Starting point is 01:24:27 We hope to see you. Yeah, of course. We hope to see you again next week. I learned by myself. I mean, I didn't go for an institute or something. So I was really, I was terrified. No, you did a great job. You shouldn't be scared.
Starting point is 01:24:40 You sounded totally fine. so don't be sure to raise your hand and we hope to see you again next week. Thank you. All right. Well, Heather, this concludes the Q&A segment. Do you have any last takeaways to share with the audience before we go? Paula, thank you so much for moderating and putting this together and for recording this for the podcast. And the big takeaway and theme that I'm hearing is people just keep stepping into fear.
Starting point is 01:25:04 Fear when English isn't your first language. Fear when you're the youngest in the room. Fear when you've never been on Clubhouse before. Keep stepping into fear. It's not too late. It's not too early. This is your moment. Keep showing up to places where people are encouraging you.
Starting point is 01:25:19 And we'll be back here every Friday cheering you on. Can't wait to see everybody here next week. Thank you for being there.

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