Your Happy Hour - Episode 25: Cultivating a Proactive Approach to Your Career

Episode Date: May 24, 2024

Happy Friday everyone!Tune in to episode 25 and let’s chat about: Cultivating a Proactive Approach to Your Career.In this episode we are joined by Erica Mattison who is an Executive Coach, Certified Career Advisor and Master Certified Life Coach and who is supporting people to Lead With their Strengths and Cultivate a Proactive Approach to Their Career.We unpack topics like: the curious world of networking, work-life balance, understanding your life story in the context of career, living from one dream job to the next, embracing happenstances, the value of intentional exploration and finding that thing - that lights you up inside.We’ll be here - every Friday - celebrating with you!Connect with us @ friday-feels.co▶ Podcast Chapters01:10 Welcome Erica!03:51 Embrace the Happenstances05:13 On the Cusp of Choices & Communication07:52 The Curious World of Networking and Work-life Balance13:40 Young Professionals and The Dream Job26:20 Your Story Beyond the Personality Tests33:34 Born for your Career: Find the Balance, Integration and Flow48:15 The value of intentional exploration49:41 Finding that thing that lights you up inside52:12 Gems of the Week!58:33 Connect with Erica01:00:00 Final thoughts, next week and farewell

Happy Friday beautiful people and hello to you all out there tuning in for your first sip of the weekend. you're tuned into your happy hour with friday feels we're celebrating all you working professionals out there doing your crazy craft embracing the beauty of being human and connecting authentically we are host sarge nicole we're living and working around the world and we're holding space for you and keeping it raw and real as we share fresh content with you every week so follow us on linkedin at friday feels and instagram at these friday feels for updates throughout the week in our last episode we had a great conversation with the dynamic and driven founder of 88 music management and madam eight publishing madeline van guen who chatted to us on how breakthroughs have led her

to running two successful businesses today. And this week, we have the darling Erica Madison, who is an executive coach, a certified career advisor, and also a master certified life coach, and who is working with individuals to empower, to lead with their strengths and cultivate a proactive approach to having a career. So a very big welcome to you, Erica. You are talking to us on this very interesting topic of the tipping point and it's really great to have

you here with us today. Thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be here. So do you want to tell us a little bit about your story and kind of why this topic is important to you? And just tell us a little bit about your journey and how you got to be where you are today. A number of people were coming to me interested in learning about my career journey. They wanted to find out how I had created a job for myself and they wanted to enter that space. They wanted to make a positive difference working

on issues that they care about, like sustainability. And so what I found is, as my career was evolving, I was attracting people who were interested in the kinds of work that I was doing. And I discovered that there were ways that I could be of service to them by meeting with them for informational interviews, providing guidance and advice and making introductions. But what I also discovered was that I wasn't finding it particularly rewarding. It was like there was something missing. Now, keep in mind, I had a full time job while this was happening. So I was only dedicating a certain amount of time and energy to it. It was something I was doing on the side as a service. So what ended up happening was I started thinking about ways

that I could have more impact and ways that the work could feel more rewarding for me. So how do we create win-win situations? How do we make it so that this is something that really works for everybody involved? And so what ended up happening was I decided to form this as a side business. That was about 10 years ago, and a lot has happened since then. And most recently, just over two years ago, I decided to, actually, I decided a little bit before that, but two years ago, a little over two years ago, I left my job. At the time, I was working in higher education in a director level role in strategic communications. And I felt that I was really being called to lean into the work of coaching to create more space and time to focus on it and to have impact with my clients. And so that has been the latest part of the journey.

Exciting. Oh, that's awesome. And, you know, I'm just thinking back now to how we all came to be here is when I met you in DC on a home exchange. And so it was really great to kind of yeah learn more about your world and you also do some podcasting yourself and and that's awesome and yeah it was just this beautiful moment where we were all these home exchange people in one house you know thanks to Stephen for putting us all together and you and I just connected and you know kind of struck up a

conversation about coaching and doing cool things in the world and I still have a photo somewhere with nice little Gracie so yeah what like chance meeting um but also I don't really believe in chance so well in the career world if I could just add um we call that happenstance we there's there's actually a thing in the career development world that is called happenstance. And there are theories and books and all kinds of things about this, but it's really the idea that we create our own luck. And there are lessons that we can learn from that, that we can apply to our careers and our lives. Yeah, that's really interesting. I've never heard that phrase, but I don't believe in coincidence.

So I'm sure, yeah, life is probably like a series of happenstances. It's interesting to have you on for this theme of the tipping point this month, because a lot of people we are chatting to are kind of hitting these points in their lives where they're wondering, I'll be taking this leap of faith am i am i gonna yeah we keep talking about a ledge i don't know why that's come up as an analogy but am i jumping off the ledge am i gonna be flying

into a certain direction and you kind of help people on that cusp of decision making and or to lead that the journey before and after so yeah it's really really cool to kind of get that insight and also just learn a little bit more about how that's helped you in your life so yeah so as an undergraduate I majored in psychology and I've always been really fascinated by people by motivation by behavior by decision, related to that issues around communication. I feel that so much of our day to day life comes down to communication. How clearly do we communicate? How effectively do we communicate? How do we tailor our message and the way that we communicate based on who we are communicating to or with. And so my work in communications and my work as a coach enables me to constantly be studying these topics and be bringing my learnings to my work with my

clients. You know, you mentioned how we met and, you know, some lessons from that, I would say are that it's about being open to possibilities. It's about being curious, developing what we call the growth mindset. And, you know, getting to know people asking questions, and seeing what we have in common. Through those kinds of exchanges, we can discover all kinds of possibilities. Collaborations, work opportunities, what have you. Friendships, right? So many things that we have to gain. And it all really starts from a place of curiosity and getting to know one another.

And to be honest, that's huge when it comes to career development, when it comes to figure out your next steps, what you want to do for your next chapter, whether that's get a nine to five,, you know, living and working in different places, depending on the time of year, or what we're feeling called to, or who we're coming in contact with. I really like the idea of communication that you brought up. I've recently been having conversations with my own clients around opening up to being curious, like saying, I'd be curious if life could look like this. I'd be curious if life, you know, if magically this could happen and like letting that be in the world. And the feedback's been really cool.

You know, people are really opening up to possibilities. But one thing that I've noticed, and you kind of touched on this a little, is the idea of communication and networking and building relationships is not always as easy for people I think Saj, you and I often talk about the idea that like networking events feel forced sometimes you know and so a lot of people don't reach out because the idea of networking or the idea of communicating with people is kind of like it has to happen in a structured way and it's there's stress around it so I'm curious what has been like your experience with people and how you guide them to just collaborate and

connect and network in a way that's organic or know, have you found that as other people kind of voice that that stress around it? Yes, the word networking brings up lots of feelings for lots of people for many reasons. Maybe you've been to a networking event, and you felt sort of awkward and uncomfortable. Maybe you didn't know anybody there. Maybe you didn't feel like the people were really welcoming or friendly. Maybe you felt like you didn't really fit in. Or you didn't feel like the people were really welcoming or friendly. Maybe you felt like you didn't really fit in. Or you didn't know what to say when you did start to have a conversation. Or maybe you thought the conversations were sort of boring. Or maybe you didn't know what to do leading up to the event or after the event. And maybe you felt like it was sort of a waste of

your time. So there could be so many reasons that people have all sorts of opinions and feelings about the word networking, the concept of networking, networking events, and so forth. I really invite them to not think of it so much as networking, think of it more as relationship building, think of it as getting to know people, learning about them, learning about each other, and seeing how you can be of service to one another. It's really all about creating mutual benefit. It's not just take, take, take. And it's not just give, give, give. It's really, it needs to be both if it's going to be a balanced, fulfilling, rewarding type of relationship. That goes for your personal life. that also goes for your professional life. It's really not that different. Sometimes we create these, I would say very

artificial separations of career, and then over here, life, or work and personal life, or what have you. And part of why I not only became a certified career coach, but then also a certified life coach and master certified life coach is that I really believe that these things are more connected and interdependent than we sometimes like to think. I believe that there are reasons that we sometimes create these separations in our minds. And we try to have these things be very distinct. And I think it's often to our detriment. There are a lot of negative consequences that come from trying to have these very separate parts of our life. I think the people you look at who really are living life to its

fullest, they love what they're working on, they have rich personal lives, they're taking good care of themselves, and so forth. I bet that more times than not, those people don't have these very strict lines separating personal from professional lives, that they're actually quite integrated. And so a lot of the time I hear people use the phrase work-life balance. I prefer to think of it as work-life integration or work-life harmony, because it's not like a seesaw where one goes up and the other one goes down and it's that simple. It's really not like that. Life is messy. It's complicated. These things are interconnected. And he was sharing about how this was for the Career Buzz podcast, which I'm a guest host of. And he was sharing about how the relationships that he's formed in his personal life have been very beneficial for him in his professional life. And that the friends that he got to know during his time at Boston University, have been huge supports for him, people who've

really helped him so much in his career, and he also has helped them in their careers. And those are true friendships where they are supporting each other with their careers. And so if you are somebody who is thinking, I need to have my work life over here and my personal life totally separate over here and only think of getting to know people for my career as this really rigid networking that you do at events exclusively. And there has to be a really clear reason you're having that conversation. I would say it might be time for a reframe. reason you're having that conversation, I would say it might be time for a reframe. Yeah, I was gonna ask you what you thought of work life balance. That's a big term. But it's a good point that, you know, people who are doing it well, kind of probably do look at it as that. What would you say your advice would be for we have a lot of young professionals that kind of

listen on and really kind of appreciate the authenticity of our guests and sharing, you know, not scripted, you know, what they teach in their coaching classes, but really an honest look. You obviously work with a lot of clients and you also work with a lot of organizations to kind of share these insights what would you say to people who are younger just starting out in their career journey and looking for some advice on where to go or also if you could comment on the notion of the dream job do you think that is a real thing? And what would your advice as someone who's backed in psychology, also a life coach, also a career coach and seeing it from different angles? Maybe you could share some of your insights with them.

I've been on a podcast that's called find your dream job. So I do have to say, I do believe in that. And I have had my dream job so many times, I've made a lot of pivots in my career. And I remember time and time again, when I would land a job just feeling like, Oh, my goodness, this is amazing. This is such an incredible role. This is an organization that is aligned with my values. I deeply believe in the mission, whether it was a for profit, a government agency, or a nonprofit organization, because they to work at NGOs, right? Nonprofit organizations, non governmental organizations, you can work in so many different spaces and have a positive impact. But I do remember that feeling like this is just this incredible role. It's such a good match for me. I'm so excited about the work I'm going to do and the people I'm going to be around and the things I'm going to learn. And in many ways, these were my dream jobs. And that doesn't mean that it is your forever job.

Just like a home, a home might be your dream home, whether it's whatever kind of home it is, it might be your dream home in that moment. And it might match your lifestyle, your needs, your goals, your wants, your budget, what have you so well, for a certain period of time. But change is an inevitable and constant part of living. Just look at nature, if you need a reminder of that. Change is all all around us and we need to get comfortable with change i i kind of get tired of hearing constantly like change is hard people don't like change and i don't think those narratives are particularly helpful in fact i think they're quite unhelpful that is basically like fighting against gravity. Good luck to you. So let's embrace change. Let's get better at doing that. Let's become more resilient. Back to your question about dream jobs.

Just because something might feel like your dream job right now doesn't mean that it is always going to feel like your dream job. There are a lot of reasons for that. The world is changing. We're changing. Organizations are changing. I have clients who've been in situations where there was a merger, there was an acquisition, there was a new leadership team, there were changes in their industry, right? There's so many different kinds of change. And as you're in a role, you learn, you grow, you discover what you really love doing and what you don't really love doing. And so you're able to take those experiences and those learnings and then apply that moving

forward. So it's important to be adaptable and create this sense of fluidity in your career and recognize that even if you have a moment of stability, that might be for six months or six years, but it's not going to be forever. Change is coming. It might be self-initiated or it might be other initiated, but change is here with us all the time. And we need to get comfortable with that. I also want to go back to this notion of work-life integration and say that when you're working for an organization or building a business, what have you, that is aligned with your values and you're in a role that taps into your strengths, meaning the intersection of your skills and what you enjoy doing, when you're in that kind of setting, work is rewarding.

Work is fulfilling. There's a concept and there are books written on this topic of flow. And we can enter a state of flow when we are sufficiently challenged. Flow does not simply come from doing something easy that's fun and relaxing. That's not actually where flow comes from. Flow is a state of pure enjoyment where you are sufficiently challenged and you are tapping into your strengths. So keeping that in mind, what I would say is the people who fall into the trap of feeling like their career or their job is their enemy, and they need to give as little time and energy to it as possible, and have as much time for

relaxation and enjoyment as possible. that is something that needs attention. Because in an optimal situation, you feel like your career is working for you. It is life giving, not life sucking. It is contributing to your happiness, to your goals, to the kind of life that you wish to create. Now, the way that I think this particularly applies to people who are in the earlier stages of their career is that increasingly today, people want to work at places and be engaged in work that feels aligned with what's important to them, whether that's working on corporate social responsibility, environmental social governance, climate change,

sustainability, public health, equity issues, the list goes on, right? Human rights, there's so many areas, so many keywords that you can be searching for and thinking about and talking about with people. And so when you can be searching for and thinking about and talking about with people. And so when you can be working on something that you care about, that might be as a volunteer, that might be for compensation, that might be for some kind of exchange of something valuable. That's not just money. When you can do that,

you are more likely to feel satisfied in your career and in your life. There's a Japanese concept called ikigai, which I often introduce to my clients. And that's really about living a fulfilling, meaningful, purposeful life. And it is said that the key to living in that way is to use your resources to be doing work that is aligned with what you care about, what you're good at. It's at the intersection of what the world needs, and how you can be rewarded. And that is something to focus on you might not get that right away as you launch your career it might take years to build your self-awareness build your strengths build your network learn from your experiences but i would say it is a worthwhile endeavor. I tend to agree from a point of where we are now I guess after everything we've been through and starting Friday feels you know yeah I think that's really

nice Ipoh thank you for sharing those insights. I also think that you know for people who are starting off and looking for their actual dream job you made a statement which I think is true is it takes a little bit of time right to figure out what you like and what you don't like what you think you like um you might start off thinking wow the life of an influencer is awesome but then realizing the amount of hours that you have to put in, content creation that you have to spend editing, things like that, all of the hard that goes in that you don't actually see. And that could go for anything. And so usually, you know, we also mentioned that it's important to kind of take the take your time and figure out what, you know, what you're really attracted to, what you're bringing into your life and what you really enjoy to help bring that piece of Ikigai so that you really understand what your skills are and what you enjoy doing versus what you think you enjoy doing. to hear different perspectives on that, I think, and how we've seen it work well

and how we've seen you navigate when you're, let's say, flipping burgers at McDonald's so that you can pay the bill so that you can go to school so that you can take that unpaid internship so that you can do what you like. Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, and if I could add something there that you just

were talking about something where you think you know what you want. And there's a phrase called miss wanting, which is when you think you want a thing. Is that really the thing you want? And through coaching through supporting my clients to reflect on their lived experiences, to increase their clarity and to engage in intentional exploration so they can navigate their future as they go through these cycles of stability and change. There are best practices that can be employed that can help you reduce the chance that you're just thinking that something sounds really great, but then that you get into it and you say, wow, this I was way off base, this is terrible.

So a lot of the time, what people are looking for is they're looking for a reality check. They're coming to me as an outside party, who can really help them be realistic about what they are considering. Now, I see my role as their career partner to be to help them increase their level of awareness, not only of the industry that they're interested in or industries, but also their self awareness, because that's really what it comes down to, to lead a rewarding career. You can't only be knowledgeable about yourself or only be knowledgeable about your target career. You need to become knowledgeable about both. And so sometimes people are looking for shortcuts. They might be looking to work with a headhunter or recruiter,

just have some hiring manager DM them. But I'll tell you, there's work that needs to happen so that you have clarity about what you bring to the table and what you want. Because if you let somebody else dictate to you what kinds of roles you're going to consider, because you're just waiting around for somebody to message you and invite you to apply to something, you are ceding a whole lot of power to other people. And it might be because that's a comfortable place for you to be. Maybe you haven't felt very empowered for most of your life. And so you're sort of comfortable with other people having the power. But I view my role as somebody who is here to help you feel more empowered in your life, more proactive about your

career and life choices. And that means not just giving the power over to somebody who's going to come hand you an opportunity and say, why don't you apply for this, but really for you to do the work of clarifying what kind of an industry, what kind of an organization, what type of role and what type of culture and arrangement is going to best match you, who you are authentically you, not who you think you should be, not what you think your career should be, not what your parents think it should be, but authentically you, what is going to be a good fit for you? What are your thoughts on the personality tests? Do you feel like they're a good reflection of people's strengths and weaknesses and where they should go?

There are so many tools out there. What I will say is there are so many tools. And one of the things that I noticed is that a lot of people who are trying to figure out their careers on their own, they tend to get really overwhelmed because there are just so many options out there. And I get it. tend to get really overwhelmed because there are just so many options out there. And I get it. So what I would say is one of the benefits of working with a career professional is that you have a curated collection of things to focus on. So let me give you an example. I use what's called

a narrative assessment approach with my clients. So what does that mean? That's a storytelling approach. It means that I'm helping you as the client, tap into your lived experience through storytelling. And then what I'm doing is I'm doing what's called story listening. I'm asking you questions, and I'm listening very carefully to what you're saying, and sometimes what you're not saying, and also how you're saying it. And I'm helping you record this so that we can really create what's called a clarification sketch. All of these different data points that tap into your desires, your natural interests, your strengths, your personal qualities, things like curiosity, and so forth. And we're identifying possibilities. Once you identify or generate the possibilities, then you can move into prioritizing

those possibilities. So I'm a fan of whatever tool is going to help you. But as a professional, it's important to me that I don't just go after every bright, shiny object. It is a tendency I have. So it is something I have to actively, you know, work not to do and instead, actually commit to using certain frameworks and approaches. And the good thing about committing is that once you make a commitment, you can go all in with something. So for instance, this narrative assessment approach that I that I have trained in that I'm certified in, and that I've used with loads of clients, and I've seen just how powerful and impactful it is, I can become an expert in that, because I've committed to it, right? I've

put in the time to really learning how to have that be at the core of my practice. So what I would say to people is, yes, there are lots of different, you know, assessments and tools and websites and things. It's important to really find an approach that works for you. That's going to be highly effective that you can stick with. Because what I'll say is what I notice all the time is that people go through these, these cycles, they'll get into this vicious cycle in their career where they're all excited about applying to jobs. They're like, okay, I need to get a job.

So they start applying. Then what happens? Well, they might not really be consistently using best practices. They might be just sending out tons of applications. They're not tailored for the particular opportunity. And then what happens? Most of the time, they don't hear anything back.

They don't even get a rejection. They just get no response. Crickets. Then what happens? They start to feel really depleted. They start to get down on themselves. They start to wonder, what's wrong with me? Don't I have skills? They start questioning all these things.

Their confidence erodes. They are just at a loss. They feel stuck. They don't feel empowered. They don't know what to do differently. They're frustrated. They're just at a loss. They feel stuck. They don't feel empowered. They don't know what to do differently. They're frustrated. They're burned out. They're tired.

So what happens? They stop. What I'm doing isn't working. Let me just stop. Let me go to the beach. Let me go play video games. Let me go on a trip to Europe. Let me go sit and watch some show. Whatever it is that they are just going to try to stop

the pain, right? So then what happens? They're not engaging with their network. They're not getting out tailored job applications. They're not building their skills. They're not increasing their level of self-awareness. Their confidence is still in the dumps. You know, what is improving? Really,

it's just procrastination, they're just putting it off. So the work is to help people stop that cycle. Because there's no momentum, when that's the case, because it's start, stop, start, stop, they'll go through these cycles of Okay, let me apply to a lot of jobs, then it's the case, because it's start, stop, start, stop, they'll go through these cycles of, okay, let me apply to a lot of jobs, then it's not working, I fall into that negative place. Now I don't want to talk to anybody or do anything or put myself out there because it's not working. So a certain amount of days, weeks, months or years go by, then they say, Oh, gee, I'm really miserable in my situation, I better go back to it. What do they do usually what they were doing before? Guess what, it still doesn't work. We're not

born knowing how to create rewarding careers, it's something that we need to learn. And so the cycle repeats itself. And then we wonder why we've been in the same job for a decade, and we're unhappy. Well well because that's been the cycle so it's a matter of helping people learn and form new ways of doing things and new ways of being do you believe that it takes like 30 is it 30 days to 21 days to create a habit what's the day number well there are a lot of books out there on that topic. I don't know exactly how long it takes, but there are books and studies I've read on that

topic. And what I will say is that when it comes to creating a rewarding career, once you can build momentum, which can happen very quickly when you have the right support and resources and tools and mindset. I help people build momentum often within the course of just a few weeks, usually less than a month, sometimes two weeks, sometimes even less time than that. It really depends on how ready they are to do the work, how open they are to changing some thought patterns and approaching things in a new way. But momentum can be built very quickly. And then there are certain practices that need to happen so that you can sustain that momentum and help you advance your goals. And so that's what I would say in terms of habits. It's's really a matter of uh doing away

with that old model of okay i'm i'm doing this thing and then you're doing stuff but it doesn't work and then you get all depleted and you stop and then nothing's happening and then you go at it again and then you do this over and over and over again and then you feel totally burned out and frustrated from it that's when people often come to me and they say help I can't take it anymore I don't know what I'm doing wrong help me figure it out and help me make progress on my goals yeah it's interesting like as you've been talking kind of felt like these three big words jumping out at me and it's it's like balance you know you're talking about work-life balance earlier, but it's really about having balance in your own life, integration, and then flow.

But what's really interesting, I think, you know, you mentioned that we aren't born into having these careers and we have to work hard at it. But I think what's really cool is when you're in the flow of your own being and some realizing more and more is, and you're saying like doing that hard work and yourself and you integrate the things that you need to of who you really are you are kind of born for a certain direction in life and I think if you can embrace that flow and keep in in balance with who you are you probably will end up in your dream jobs along your lifetime you know

and not not hit all these these barriers I think often the barriers are are they there to help us kind of crack open so the light can come in but I think that you can you know avoid them in a way if you if you stick with your intuition and what you're naturally like you say inclined to do so it's an interesting one this concept of a career that's kind of a bit of a calling a bit of a yeah a life mission a bit of you know expression of self in the world and yeah I think we we kind of bucket this thing as like well like you say like a job or whatever that's outside of ourselves. But yeah, I think it's really cool to know that it's such an extension of you in the world. And

yeah, I think it's, yeah, just we put it nicely. But those big words jump out at me. And I've just seen how the momentum has increased for me the moment I've addressed those three big things, even in just the last while. So I think that's really great. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, when when we help people tell their stories from their early years, you know, somewhere around eight years old, you can find out so many things about what somebody's really passionate about. So for me, for instance, I've always loved to write, I was making storybooks for as long as I can remember, probably even before I have memories. And, and, you know, right now, I'm working on my book,

and my first book, and I'm excited about that. And that will be that will be available very soon. So it's all around clarifying your career direction. And so if you talk with folks about, you know, what were you passionate about as a very young person, all of these interesting things can come up that we sometimes forget about. is we don't see the connection between what we loved when we were younger and how we can be in the world today. There's a lot of fear around it, right? I've done some learning about this notion that we can choose to come from love or fear. There are many authors like Gary Zukav, who I had the pleasure of meeting recently at a women's vibrancy retreat hosted by by a coach, I've done work with Mariah Brown. And and he he does a lot of work on this, this topic of either coming from love or fear. That is something that I've shared with a lot of my clients, and they found it to be very impactful. It's this question that we can continually ask ourselves throughout the day. Am I coming from love or fear?

If we allow ourselves to come from a place of love, we will often go back to the things that brought us joy, brought us fulfillment, made us feel whole from the earlier years in our life. If we let fear dictate, we will have all of these messages, all of this chatter, this inner critic who will say things to us like, yeah, but who cares? That's silly. Well, you can never make a living doing that, etc, etc. All of this can't do language when what we need is the can do attitude that comes from focusing on bringing in more love into our lives into our careers self-love and love for others i like that me too it's funny how we lose these things along the way right and it's always a reason, I guess, for the journey.

Speaking of the journey, what do you feel has been like the hardest tipping point for you along your journey? Sure. I would say that when it comes to making decisions that feel scary, that's something that I've experienced and certainly my clients, it's often

we'll make it into what we'll use what's called black and white thinking or all all or nothing thinking. And that's really to our detriment. It does not do us service to view things in that way. I'll give you an example. When I was thinking about leaving my full time employment to go all in with my coaching practice a few years ago, it felt like this scary decision, stressful, you know, lots of things wrapped up in it. It was something I went back and forth about a lot. And, you know, it's, I'm just even remembering it, there's like all the stuff that comes up right in terms of like, what other people were saying to me, and other people were, you know, all this stuff, right. And I was kind of making into, okay, all or nothing, either I have to be all in with my coaching practice and be entirely self employed,

or I need to be full time or in my job and have my business on the side. So that in a way that wasn't all or nothing, because I was already like experimenting in the sense of I had my side business and it was growing. But I was kind of making it into this decision of okay, either this or that. I was recently working with a client who was in a situation it into this decision of, okay, either this or that. I was recently working with a client who was in a situation where he thought to himself, okay, I either need to go all in with my business that I'm working on growing, or I need to just focus on applying for jobs and not be at all distracted with this dream of my business. With him, I said, look, at the end of the day, are the skills that you're going to use in scenario A, all that different than the skills that you would be using in scenario B?

Or is this almost just, these are just details? Like, yes, there are some differences in how you will market yourself if you want to be considered for a nine to five role versus if you want to be somebody that people hire as an independent consultant, for sure. But isn't like 80% of what you're talking about here the same whether you go path A or path B? And he said, Oh, my gosh, yeah, like, I hadn't even thought of it in that way. I'm making it into like these two dramatically different options for myself, when really, a lot of the things that I would do to position myself for success with scenario A are the same as what I would do to position myself for success with scenario B. So sometimes we make things into this big decision, or this all or nothing kind of situation when it isn't that and it really doesn't have to be like

that. So, you know, my work is is all around how do we get out of our own way? How do we get unstuck? And there are certain best practices that can be used for your individual situation and who you are, that are going to help you make that kind of progress. So in my case, going back to that story, I took my time, I said, I'm going to take the steps that one would take if one wanted to have their business fully support them and be fully self employed. So I started taking steps, I did a lot of research, I talked to a lot of people, I had coaches I worked with, attended workshops, I read things, I listened to things, I really soaked up a lot of information about how to be self employed,

how to be an entrepreneur, and so forth. And I started taking those actions based on what I was learning. And then I felt more and more ready, I felt more and more prepared. So it's not like one day, I just woke up and said, I'm leaving my job, I quit, goodbye. It was something that evolved. It was something that evolved. And what actually ended up happening was I was able to go down to part time in my job for a limited amount of time while I worked on wrapping up a major project. That was helpful. I kept having benefits from the university, I kept having paychecks, you know, there were changes, because I was now not full time. But there was still some of that that I had as an employee. Meanwhile, it gave me more space to build my practice over the course of those weeks. And then an interesting thing happened. Once I actually left my role at the university, I got contacted almost immediately by somebody I had as an acquaintance through my work in the coaching world and through my affiliation with the university as well, where she also worked.

And she said, we're looking for a career coach to work with us part time over the summer to support the MBA students. Would you be interested? I know that you just went out on your own. Maybe this would be helpful to you. And we could certainly use your experience. I ended up taking that part-time role. And that, again, it wasn't just luck that that came to me. I had put myself in situations where I had gotten to know people in the career development world. I was networking, I was participating in, what I was doing, the direction I was going in, which then invited engagement from my network. If I'd been silent about it, how would that opportunity have come to me? But no, I was sharing about what I was doing. And so it made it possible for people to collaborate, support me, share relevant opportunities, and so forth. And so then I worked in that capacity for several months while continuing to build my business. So that's just

an example. I have loads of other examples like that from my work with my clients and from my own life. But I would say that, you know, to summarize, if you're thinking that it's either path a or path b it's time to start seeing things uh in a more nuanced way and that's something that that we do through the work of coaching that's really cool yeah there's always a third way right there's always and a fourth and a fifth and a sixth and then often what ends up happening is some kind of hybrid of a couple of those different options yeah yeah you kind of carve your own rainbow path along the way. And yeah, I think it's really something that's coming up a lot from all these conversations around the tipping point.

And I think Madeline mentioned it last week. And Vanessa mentioned this. It's like they put it out there. They went and spoke to people about it and said like hey this is what i'm thinking of doing or you know what is how does this sound or how does this resonate and like you said you kind of you did the same and i think yeah i think that's really important and part of this theme is like you can't take that leap of faith thinking like you can on your own but it's so much cooler if you like put it out there and you have a supportive system that's you know kind of giving you wings as you fly into whatever

it is next you know um you can drink red bull as well but like that's only going to get you so far so topic around isolation right is is coming up for me as you share that and it's something that you know kind of the flip side of isolation is connection. And a lot of the time I hear people share that when they're job searching, they're feeling very isolated, they're feeling very alone. So being part of group settings can help working with a coach can help there are different things that can help. I also hear the same thing from a lot of people who are entrepreneurs, people who are self-employed, people who are independent consultants. They often say that they feel very isolated. And it's interesting to think about how in both of those settings, whether you're job searching or you are self-employed, it's up to you to decide what that experience is like.

It's partly through your mindset, and it's partly through your day-to-day actions. So what kinds of settings are you putting yourself in? For instance, I'm recording this from my co-working community. For me, community is really important. And as soon as I left my job, I said, Oh, now I can join a co-working community, which I've always wanted to do, because I'm gonna have more time to really take advantage of that membership and be part of that community. And it has a number of benefits. And I totally love it. And and there are, you know, millions of people around the world who I think can relate to that. So whether you're working from home,

you're job seeking, you're self-employed, whatever the situation is, focus on what you have power over. What can you control? A lot of the time you have more power than you realize and then you acknowledge to yourself. So whether it's your physical environment, whether it's, you know, your interpersonal experiences, whatever it might be,

you might actually have more power than you have realized. And so I would encourage you to explore that, to have fun, be playful in what we say in the work I do is intentional exploration. So going out and trying different things and seeing what feels good to you. And don't feel like you have to conform to some standard, or, you know, some picture of something that you've been brought up to believe or you think is the norm, because that might not work for you. That just may not be a great fit. So giving yourself the permission to be playful, to engage in intentional exploration, and to really make the experience what you want it to be, right? Because some people, they job search for a long period of time. And you don't want that to be a miserable experience.

I say, look, this job search is part of your career. It is not separate from your career. This is literally part of your career. And so what do you want it to be like? What do you want to feel like? Who do you want to surround yourself with? What kind of a place do you want to be in? How do you want to use your resources? What do you want to learn more about? And so really having that be integrated into how you think about your career. I really love that. I've never thought about that, like that in between transition periods of life that we try get over with so quickly and sweep under the rug, you know, and it's like really embracing that. I think that's a beautiful gem that you're giving us

there. So I know we're going to probably head into some gems of the week, but I do have one quick question and that is, you are a mentor to a lot of people along their journeys. But what has been the best professional advice that you've received along your journey? A mentor of mine, Mary Karen Rogers, who's very dear to me. She supported me as my career counselor when I was a law student. And I was trying to figure out exactly what I wanted to do next and I guess a couple things she shared with me one was as you're talking about what you you don't like and what you like you know if somebody can look

at you as you're saying these things and help you pinpoint the moment when your face lights up, that is incredibly illuminating. That's a clue that that's a direction to explore. And I think that that was really pivotal for me because she saw that when I was speaking about public policy and the intersection of law, public policy and environmental issues, really, that's when my face lit up and I ended up going and getting my dream job as a

legislative director at a statewide environmental protection advocacy organization, working as a lobbyist, working on climate change and other environmental issues. And that was one thing that she shared that was really impactful. Another thing was she said, imagine that your career or life is like a Rubik's cube. It's like this thing, you know, you're kind of this puzzle and you're like constantly just trying to get that right combination. And I think it goes back to what we were talking about earlier, where, you know, you need to be willing to experiment to try things, to see what happens to have different conversations, and to kind of dip your toe into different things and see how

the water feels to you. And it's going to be different at different points in your life, right? You know, right now this water might feel really fantastic for you. And in five months or five years, it really may not. And so it's important to be aware of that and then to cultivate the practices, the mindset, the skills and the resources that will help you adapt so that you

can be resilient throughout your career and your life. No, I think that's awesome. You know, thank you for sharing that. I think it's a unique insight to ask someone that does it for a living, what's your best professional advice? And then to kind of wrap up, what we usually do is gems of the week, things that have been filling our cup, what's enabling and empowering you to be a successful working professional in the world this week. So I can start. So for me this week, I think it's been really interesting. We've been hiring for a social media intern and also business development. And it's been really positive feedback, very interesting being on the other side of the screen, and then also seeing what we actually look for. And it really made me reflect on me being a job candidate. And I'm a big

fan of experimenting and kind of seeing what works and really looking at the opportunities holistically rather than saying, I want to be in this industry. I really look at the team and the company and see if it's a good fit for me at that time. And so it was just very interesting kind of sitting on the other side because sometimes that mindset takes me into all different types of industries and roles. And it's very interesting at being on the other side and saying like, this is exactly what we're looking for. We are open minded to a certain degree. But just it's been a really great past week, interviewing so many super talented young professionals and hearing what resonates with them Friday feels and with the podcast. And it's very, I guess I would say it

makes me feel really hopeful about the future. I think sometimes, you know, during this economic climate, and during this year, just hearing about professional stories and talking to people have a lot of experience, it's nice to see the young professional, the young talent that's coming up, being so talented and hopeful about, you know, what they're creating in the world. And that was a unique perspective I probably haven't had before in my life. So for this week, I thought it's been really powerful to kind of share and advise in that respect and hear, you know, different points of view made me really feel hopeful so that was that was kind of what my week looked like what about you Nicole I really love that yeah and it's been an incredible experience I can echo what you

are saying you know I've also felt like inspired by the. I mean, we're very motivated in what we're doing and putting out in the world, but it's so wonderful when you have a community that's kind of driving that together. So yeah, I'm very excited for the people who join the team soon as interns. And for me, it's been a really exciting week of releasing my music video into the world.

And it's taken quite a long time to to get all this stuff going you know and it's you know listening to us talk today and kind of reflecting on my own journey of really pivoting in different directions over the last few years and I think it's just been beautiful to see it all come together and see how it's appreciated out in the world. And so thank you for all the love that everyone's been sending. And very excited. I've also been planning the next release,

which is coming very, very, very soon. So a lot of kind of on the heels of that and a lot of momentum. And, you know, you were talking about momentum earlier, Erika, but it's amazing how once you've made that shift and you step into actually get okay cool this is this is me in the world now and i'm owning that and and then things just flow and yeah it's beautiful so sometimes things take time you know if i think back to the pictures of when i was eight years old

i was dancing and performing for everyone. And then I, yeah, I don't know, life takes a journey, right? So it's really, really been an awesome week. Very fulfilling. So yeah. How about you, Erica? Thank you. Really exciting to hear about what you're experiencing.

I would say that I'm feeling very grateful. I have some wonderful mentors and teachers, coaches who I get to learn from, like Mark Franklin is one who is the founder of Career Cycles and the co-founder of One Life Tools. I've learned so much from him about the narrative assessment approach and being able to share that with people, whether it's online or in person, using the online storytelling platform that they've put together or the in-person Who You Are Matters conversation experience. This week, I facilitated a workshop at Harvard University for 20 job seekers at all different stages of their lives and careers coming from diverse backgrounds. You know, just all these different situations and dreams and strengths and possibilities, being able to bring people together and have them engage with each other, reflect, have fun, come away feeling more empowered, and getting to have conversation with them and hearing from them how helpful and enjoyable

they found that experience to be. That was very rewarding for me. And so I'm really excited to continue doing this work, to bring people together to help them increase their awareness and their sense of empowerment. I'm headed to a conference in a few days to connect with folks in the career world from all over. And this week, we finished working on the copy for my first book which is all about clarifying your career direction so that was a big deal I'm excited to release that into the world very soon and I already have ideas of client success stories and you know resources that that I'm excited to put into my next book which I will be starting to work on very soon.

So those are a few highlights from this week. Wow, that's super exciting. That's awesome. And congrats on the book coming out soon. I've been watching your journey from the sidelines on this. So very, very excited for you to release that into the world and yeah and and how can people find you just before we wrap up and connect yes i'm active on linkedin so they can find me there erica madison and erica madison coaching and consulting

my website is ericamadison.com e-r-i-c-a-m-a-T-T-I-S-O-N. And I welcome the chance to connect with your listeners who are looking to create rewarding careers. I offer clarity calls, which are a great way to get to know more about whether coaching could be your best next step. And I also host a complimentary career development masterclass online, which is an interactive event

that really helps people consider their careers in a new light and come away with some tangible next steps. So I hope to see your listeners at my next career development masterclass. I host those periodically throughout the year. So hope you can make it to the next one and then set up a clarity call. Let's talk and see if I can support you. I attended one of the classes and it was great. So highly recommend. Thanks so much. I was really glad to have you there. And I guess a thought to our audience

and everyone who's listening, you know, as you've been listening to Erica and us chat today, how are you cultivating your career? You know, what is being proactive in your career mean to you? And how are you defining and driving towards your dreams? We want to hear from you. Well, thank you so much, Erica, for coming on and sharing your experience with our listeners and also a lot of your insights. I thought it was really cool. I'm really intrigued when people come from a psychology background and then seeing them working and living in the world and what they take out of it. It's always really

cool for me to hear. So really enjoyed hearing that perspective. And for everyone else who is listening, you know, we'd love to hear from you. Remember to tag us using hashtag these Friday feels to share your stories and listen to us on all your favorite platforms and to work with us or have us broadcast Friday feels from your space

and organize your next workation. Reach out to us at hello at friday-feels.co. And next week, we are very excited to have Mr. Bruce Hamilton on air with us, so founder and general partner of Everybody Ventures. He's a passionate entrepreneur with experience in business development, marketing, and has a creative background in developing brands and helping them scale. So stay tuned as we unpack the very last episode of this topic of the tipping point before we tip into the month of June. But until next time, that is our mix. We've had so much fun mingling with you and we wish you safe travels into your bed, into the

night and into this awesome weekend. So see you next week and keep it real.