The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Interconnected Success: Mastering the 7 Key Areas of Impact in Business and Life by Stephan Szugat

Episode Date: December 23, 2024

Interconnected Success: Mastering the 7 Key Areas of Impact in Business and Life by Stephan Szugat Selfcoaching365.com Amazon.com "Interconnected Success: Mastering the 7 Key Areas of Impact in Business and Life" invites you on a transformative voyage toward prosperity and fulfilment in both your professional endeavours and personal aspirations. Dive into the vibrant narratives of accomplished business owners, seasoned managers, and visionary entrepreneurs as they traverse the dynamic landscape of running a business. In this compelling narrative, you'll unearth the elusive secrets to success, meticulously crafted from the wisdom of those who have walked the path before you. Bid farewell to the turmoil of uncertainty, the frustration of misalignment, and the stagnation of profitability as you embark on a journey illuminated by clarity, purpose, and strategic acumen. Through riveting stories, actionable insights, and practical guidance, "Unlocking Success" empowers you to embrace each twist and turn of the entrepreneurial journey with confidence and resilience. Discover the joy that arises from knowing precisely what steps to take and when, as you unlock the full potential of your business and personal life alike. Whether you're a budding entrepreneur, seasoned professional, or anyone seeking to transcend the boundaries of conventional success, this book is your compass in the exhilarating maze of life and business, guiding you toward the pinnacle of achievement and fulfilment.

You wanted the best. You've got the best podcast, the hottest podcast in the world. The Chris Voss Show, the preeminent podcast with guests so smart you may experience serious brain bleed. The CEOs, authors, thought leaders, visionaries, and motivators. Get ready, get ready, strap yourself in. Keep in keep your hands arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times because you're about to go on a monster education roller coaster with your brain now here's your host chris voss hi folks it's voss here from the chris voss show.com ladies and gentlemen the irelanda sings that makes the official welcome to the show as always the chris voss show a family that loves you,

but doesn't judge you, at least not as harshly as the rest of your family, because, well, they know what you did in 1974, and we don't talk about it, but they still blame you for the episode with the cat. Anyway, I don't know if I'm speaking up. Right now, someone's out there in the audience going, oh, shit, he knows. Anyway, guys, we have an amazing author on the show.

In the meantime, we want you to refer your friends and relatives. Remember, the Chris Foss Show is a giant multi-level marketing organization where you have to have a downline of five referrals under you of your family relatives that also subscribe to the show. No, I'm just kidding. There's nothing like that. We don't do that sort of thing. But, no, seriously, we do.

We check. So, get on it. Go to goodreads.com, fortuneschrisfoss, linkedin. We don't do that sort of thing. But no, seriously, we do. We check. So get on it. Go to Goodreads.com, FortunessCrispFoss, LinkedIn.com, FortunessCrispFoss. CrispFoss1 on the TikTok and CrispFossFacebook.com. Today we have an exciting young man on the show with us today, all the way from Germany. And he's promised not to start any world wars for me, at least during the show. You know, they did too. So they're troublemakers over there um and and you know i am german so uh that's part of the

problem but but we left before the before the uh the uh the un i don't know i don't have a joke for that we left we left before the unsettling whatever that was anyway uh we're trying to do german jokes in the chris voss show today it's not working so good job improv boy uh he is the author of the latest book called out june 11th 2024 called interconnected success mastering the seven key areas of impact in business and life so those of you who aren't interested in success and you want to lose miserably, this show's not for you. But if you want to interconnect success and to master your life and business, this is the show for you to listen to.

And you might want to listen to it four or five times. We have Stephen Sugat on the show with us today. We'll be talking to him about his book, his insights, and how you can make your life better. And if he doesn't make your life better, we're going to keep bringing him on the show until you get it. Anyway, Stephan is a former interim manager for finance and accounting. Today he's a coach and author. He mainly coaches business owners and managers to gain clarity about what matters most. Profits, of course. No, I'm just kidding. Boosting focus on what to do and about taking encouraged actions while aligning business and personal goals. He also helps individuals about gaining clarity and experiencing happiness within. Throughout his

life, he learned various methods to find that the simple things work best. Who knew? Happiness is what we all seek and mostly overlook that it comes from within us, along with my seven other personalities. Stephen has helped his clients to see and experience this inner joy as easy and simple as possible. Welcome to the show, Stephan. How are you? Thanks for having me, Chris.

I'm doing good. I think Stephen flipped into the bio there, didn't it, from me? We'll see if we can fix that in post. So, Stephan, give us your... I'm just reading bios here. So, Stephan, give us your dot coms. Where can people find you on the interwebs? Of course, it's

StephanZugart.com and also it's SelfCoaching365.com and you can find me on LinkedIn as well as on Facebook. Yeah, and that's wherecoaching365.com, and you can find me on LinkedIn as well as on Facebook. Yeah, and that's where you connect with me. Connect with him. So give us a 30,000 overview. What's in your new book?

So what's in my new book? As it says, Interconnected Success, I was wondering the whole time when I was an interim manager for finance and accounting that there must be something more in common with businesses than just accounting. So I said okay what is it? So I sat down and compared every client I had been with and I came up with these seven areas. I said oh this is interesting they are really common with every business. And to my surprise, I found out they are also common in our private life, in our personal life. So I said, that's interesting. So there's definitely overlap between the two or consistent modalities

of values and integrity that have that. So maybe that's why there's an overlap. Is that why? Yeah. The thing is, I usually, and that was always my intention back then, even as an interim in the show, seeing that you have one life. Part of that life is in the business world, and part of the life is in your personal personal world but you have to match that everyone talks about work-life balance but it's not about that it's really aligning these things business is one side of a coin and personal life is the

other side you can divide them you can separate them. So what was the proponent that made you want to write the book? Was there a moment the light went on and said, hey, we should write a book, eh? Yeah, that was the first thing came up about, I would say, 15 years ago. I was joking with another interim manager. We had been in the same company and have been exchanging stories from our experience. And out of nowhere, we just had been joking and saying, hey, we need to write a book about this. So many awesome stories and some really having been fun talking about. And while I was starting writing this book, I remembered that. And I said, oh, yeah, that's the idea.

To bring the coaching model that I created, which involves these seven areas, blending it in with the stories from my interim management experience. So tell us about your journey through life. You've written three books, I think, at the very least. How did you grow up? What were some of your influences, parental shaping, and what made you go down the roads you took? Well, I grew up in a rural town, a really small town, which was pretty good to grow up.

The only thing that was annoying sometimes was that nearly everything or everyone knew you in that town, right? So you couldn't be nasty or something because everyone would know and your parents as well. So that was the only backside of that. So and when I grew up, one moment I felt like, oh, this town is too small. I need to go further on right so the next the next step was the next bigger town about 35 miles away where i started my apprenticeship in wholesale and expert export and that was pretty interesting and that was my first um experience of being in business and and the owner of that company it was a small company i think we

had about 20 20 something employees or something so and this business owner he was really a man of integrity so you can count on his word and and he probably gave up on some of uh really good um contracts just because he said no it's it's not there's no mutual benefit so that was really my first experience in business and from that i started going back to school because my intention was to go to a university, do some study. And I really did, I started, but I chose the wrong profession. I started with mechanical engineering. Because I always had interest in technology. So I was, whatever it was, everything that was turning was having my interest. But then starting and going into mechanical engineering myself. And the funny thing is, I love numbers. Because that's why I ended up in finance and accounting. And, and I still, I have not figured out why this happened, that I didn't finish the mechanical engineering study, because I had so many issues with all these construction calculations.

I don't know if my buildings would have been stronger than anyone else's. Maybe they would have been more expensive, I guess. So, yeah, and from there, because that mechanical engineering didn't work out for me, and I was working on the side with an American company already and the finance and accounting department, they just gave me the chance to really go through all the finance and accounting department they just gave me the chance to really go through all the departments in accounting whatever it was accounts payable receivables and whatever you can name and and I said why that's that's

interesting too so and I still had the, the connection with technology because back then this, this company was selling high end mainframe computers and mid range systems. So something that only really big companies have today. So, so I still have that technology side of things. And it took a while until I ended up in interim management. But that was the most interesting experience for me because really devoting myself to one company at a time, I could dive so deep into

these businesses and understand their whole business model and whatever drives them. That really, I learned so much I was most of the times I was joking with, with the ones who hired me that, hey, I'm the most expensive apprentice you ever had because I'm learning with every job. So, yeah, and then out of a sudden, I experienced that I was not talking with my clients about the numbers that much anymore. It was more about strategy, giving them feedback about ideas they had

and what project they have in the business and what they can do to improve profits and so on. And I wonder, because that happened with many of my clients at the same time, I said, what the heck I'm doing? And I realized, oh, that's coaching. It's called coaching. And I get myself into a course and learned about how to do coaching in a professional way instead of what I was doing from a natural. I used to do coaching naked it wasn't very professionally told me so i had to start wearing clothes exactly

all i could do on that joke sorry folks it's a pun so um yeah and from there i just decided to get into coaching and uh and because of that, I was getting back to that idea that what is common about businesses besides accounting. And I came up with these seven areas. Yeah. And then I wrote a book about it. Wrote a book about it. Wrote a book about it. So, you know, it looks like you talk about the seven key areas. And on the cover, I see dependencies, strategy, let's see, profits and finances, processes, rules and regulations, stakeholder. And I'm having trouble making this one out because i've got a camera

in my way strategy strategy you know it's a it's on the far right it's multi-ality well you have to wrong book i guess mutuality oh mutuality oh yeah yeah it's the. Okay. I've got a camera in the way of the screen. Mutuality. It's your book cover. I mean. Dependencies and Mutuality. That's right.

We had a guy on the show one time, and he had like 12 steps of how to be better in business. So I asked him, I said, hey, can you give us a sample of some of the 12 steps? And he totally blanked. Totally blanked. I was like, you wrote this book, right? It might have 12 steps? And he totally blanked. Totally blanked. He was like, you wrote this book, right? It might have been a ghostwriting book. Well, you can do that. Some of your own steps.

So you have these seven key areas of impact, strategy, dependencies, stakeholder, processes. Why did you break these down into seven? Why are there maybe only seven? That's a good question. Why are they so key? While I was in the process of creating this coaching model I call it interrelations

because we all have these interconnections. Some are obvious, some we can't see sometimes. So while I was in the process at one moment i had just five areas and i went over them and worked with them a little bit and i and i said well there's something missing something felt there was something off then i came up with um a few more, I think I was back to nine or something. And then it felt like,

it's too much. It can be nine areas. And I found that two of them really fit into other areas. So I ended up with the seven and started working with them again and started to see where I can find them all over the place. With every business I had been with, with every idea I have, even with projects, I can see these seven areas. And then I recognized, oh, they are in my personal life as well. They might have different names in my personal life than from a business perspective, but that's what I came up with. And I call them key areas because when you really take a look deeper to them, you can see that they are crucial for running a successful business. So if your processes are not in order, well, that will hurt your business profits with

the time. So here you go with the profits, right? If your profit's not in order, you can't serve your customers that much or pay your employees. And that are your stakeholders. Or you can even not fulfill your dependencies because your business depends on your customers, your vendors, your suppliers and whatever. And it's not that you balance these seven areas one time and that's done for every moment in the coming future. That's not possible from my point of view it's that's why

i have it on the cover as like a wheel because it's it's like a wheel turning all the time so that's what is life right life is always changing and so you have to see what is the area I need to focus most on? But don't forget about the others. Yeah. And I mean, they're interchangeable, right? I mean, you've got to balance them all and find what works. Strategies are really important. Understanding processes are really important. You know how maybe your supply chain or your or your production? You know goes from point A to point Z and how things pass it through and innovations you can make in those processes

That's really important to have Dependencies what are dependencies is that like when I put my children to work in the coal mine or something? What is what is it? What is it? If you depend on what they bring home, that would be a dependency. And I don't think that would be a mutual one because your children might not find that.

I'm drinking too much vodka or cocaine in a dependency during business. Well, that's another dependency. And I usually say dependencies could be good or bad. And if you depend on any drugs, that might be a bad one. But anyway, so let's see. Dependencies, as I said, just take the human body, for example.

The human body depends on air. You need food. You need something to drink. So that your body keeps staying alive. But on the other hand, you might depend on a bottle of wine sometimes because that's good for your emotion. Right? So you feel, oh, that's good. I just relax and enjoy my time.

And a business could have so many phases dependencies. As I said, you depend on good processes, you depend on your customers, you depend on money flowing through your business. And then it goes hand in hand with all the other six areas.

Yeah, and plays into that. So tease out some of the other two books. You have two books that you have as well. Yeah, and plays into that. So tease out some of the other two books. You have two books, too, that you have as well. Yeah, the other one is the Love Yourself Workbook. And that's really about recognizing that whatever you're looking for, the love and the happiness is really inside of you. And it's relatively simple to bring it up. And so you just ask yourself,

could I be happier? And the answer is yes. You decide. It's really just a decision to be happy. And that's the other book about. Feel great. It's your decision. Because it really is your decision. If you feel bad because your business is not running that good well how is that happening you have to fake it till you make it in that case is that how that works well not really yeah maybe for a time until you realize oh really this this works it comes from inside so it might at the beginning it might be like you fake something but from my point of view it's most important that you really allow yourself to feel that happiness because the happiness is really inside of us and usually we say i'm happy when

i get this better job when my business is successful, if I have this good relationship. But what is it? What do we do with that? A lot of people do that. They put off being happy. Yeah, you postpone your happiness. I'll be happy when I make $100,000 this month. I'll be happy when I make $2 million this year. I'll be happy when i make two million this year i'll be happy when uh you know uh i can finally give the attention to love of someone who likes me or something you know there's i think people have all these different rules to be happy but really i think when you say that

gratitude is a great way to find your way to happiness what do you think about that? That's exactly gratitude is one big, uh, big thing in there. Yeah. So, and we have all the time we can grateful, be grateful for, for whatever we have in life. Even if our situation might look, uh, not as decent as we like to have it, but you probably will find something that really brings up gratitude. I film when I'm in my most kind of spoiled, miserable, where I'm just like, I'm not happy, and life isn't fair, whatever. Or, you know, if I'm just kind of depressed a little bit,

which is probably the same thing. And I find that I try and turn to gratitude. And I think I started kind of learning it when I moved back to California in my adulthood and My parents kidnapped us and took us away from California's children Enslaved us in the state of Utah and the freezing cold. I'm just kidding halfway But I Not a snow kid and But I would yeah, I would Yeah I would be all depressed

I'd be you know grieving over some Loss or some problems And I would go down to the beach And sit on the beach And watch the sunset And I would go down there You know with the world full of problems And all this stuff and I'd sit on the beach

And the beach Would remind me I'd listen to the Lapping of late waves which are kind of meditative I would see this beautiful ocean and the spectacular vista the Sun going down and I would realize that I would look at the sand and I'd realize the sand has been here for eons of time these guys have been lapping at the shore for eons of time. These guys have been lapping at the shore for eons of time. In the grand scheme of things, God, my problems don't matter anything

to, you know. Me and my problems will be gone in a few years and they'll be like, and this will still be here. Exactly. It would put them in perspective, my problems in perspective, and I kind of put, it would put them in perspective, my problems in perspective. And I kind of go, you know, I think I've kind of overblown my problems a little bit.

They're really not that bad in the grand scheme of things. And maybe I just need to get that. And it would just help me shift perspective. And I think that's what kind of gratitude does. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I do something similar, but we don't have a beach close here, so I go to the forest. Oh. And the forest is always quiet, and even if you just watch the trees and maybe you touch some of them and you feel, hey, they are standing there for decades maybe 400 years or longer and

it's yeah that is it's the same what you just mentioned is you feel that your problems are not as big as they uh seem to be yeah and also the uh being outside uh refreshes the mind anyway so you know you need that vitamin d you need that fresh air, and sometimes you really need that. You know, you get kind of sick sitting indoors all day long. I found that one thing that really helps me and helps restart my circadian

rhythms and vitamin D, you know, natural vitamin D, is go out and sit in the sun in the morning. That really helps kind of replenish your body's natural way of processing that stuff and you know a lot of people suffer depression from being vitamin d deficient and so you know and then just kind of having a gratitude moment i started doing a thing during the spring and summer where i would go out in the mornings with my coffee and sit with my dogs in the yard and I just kind of I just be

appreciative of them appreciative of my life I'd read a little bit of meditations from Marcus Aurelius and yeah it's crazy times. Absolutely, absolutely. So it's always a good thing to step back and just recognize what's there, what you love. You can even find something in life, whatever your situation is, you can always find something that you love. So maybe something, a good book, maybe, as you just mentioned, your pets, if you have some. And I know pets could be really a good thing

to bring up the mood. There's always something to laugh about. Yeah. My dogs, they know when I'm hurting. They know when I'm having issues. And they'll come to me and be like, hey, man, it's not that bad. It's not that bad. You're going to be okay.

Exactly. I think that's a great place to be and very important as well. So any more thoughts we want to tease out about your book we of course want people to buy it but any more thoughts we want to tease out about it um well the thing is you it's not that you just work on one area you you work on one area that you focus on and and there is in in the book is uh i call it the measure wheel it's a simple self-assessment tool that helps you to determine which is the one area i need to focus most on but while working on that area it's uh you have to work on all others because you will see that there are these interrelations between all these seven areas

so you can't avoid them and um and i kept the uh the the the assessment tool really simple it's just a self-judgment you don't need to juggle a lot of numbers or dive into big data or something it's simple straightforward it might take about a minute maybe five if you're slow, and that's it. And then you know where you are at. Well, this should be interesting. Now tell us about some of the services you offer on your website over there. People can get involved at Self-Coaching 365. Yeah, so on the website Self-Coaching 365 yeah so on my on the website self-coaching 365 i offer online courses that

are based on the uh on the book and their interrelations coaching model it's a self-paced course and of course there is some support in the background if uh if it's needed so people can just drop me an email or open a support ticket whatever they like so and on top of that comes a group coaching offer that's open for everyone who is participating in the online course and there are two courses actually the one is more the business related which is called the interconnected success navigating the maze and the other one is more the business related, which is called the interconnected success navigating the maze. And the other one is the ultimate insights course, which is all my experience I have made as a leader while I was an interim manager how I was leading my teams what worked

best for me and that's all condensed in one course it's it's it's a really quick done course, but it has a lot of ideas and things I did work out for me for nearly two decades. And they're easy things to do. Yeah. So give people a final pitch out to order up the book, how they can reach out to you to get to know you and your services better and the dot coms for people. So my dot coms are stefanzuga.com and selfcoaching365.com. And you can find me on LinkedIn and Facebook. And of course, if you are going to my website, the selfcoaching365.com, you find a subscribe form for the newsletter in the footer. And if you hit reply to these newsletter emails,

you just get in contact with me as well. Well, it's been fun to have you on the show, Stefan. We really appreciate it and very insightful. And people can definitely learn from your wisdom and experience so they can live their life better and live their business better. Both. Thanks for having me. Thank you. Thanks for tuning in. Go you. And thanks to our audience for tuning in.

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