The Traveling Introvert

I would like to talk about calenders so some people are ruled by their to do list, some people are ruled by their project management and some people are ruled by their calendar. Regardless if you are ruled by any of these, when someone wants to set up time with you, your calendar is kind of important. And so nothing is more frustrating to somebody than having you send your in important information that's needed for a call in an email that isn't a calendar invite, considering so many people are working online these days.

And if you do have even if you do have a simple Gmail account, your Gmail account is attached to a calendar. If you have an outlook account, your outlook is attached to a calendar. If you're on Apple, then it will be attached to Aikau like it goes hand in hand. It's very rare that you have access to like an email situation where you cannot add it to a calendar. If you don't if you send information just in an email, it means the person can lose that email.

It means the person then has to copy and paste it into their calendar to make sure that it pops up. And they remember you are creating extra work for the other person that you want to meet. And the assumption is you want to make meeting with you as quick and painless as possible. So making that person have to open that email, open their calendar. And it's especially worse if they have to do a time zone conversion and put it in their calendar.

So you've got a meeting. It's like two thirty UK time, but you're in central United States. You then have to go Google the time difference, put it in your calendar, hope it's right and then go ahead and copy and paste all the information. Why would you want someone to have to do that? That is that is painful and unprofessional and makes the person hate you just a little bit, to be fair. And then there's the other type of person who will send you an email going, hey, we should meet at this time.

I'll send you a link closer to the time. So then again, you have to copy and paste the information. And then if you're preparing for the day and you want everything in order, but you don't have this link, and if you're jumping from meeting to meeting, you know, maybe you only check your email three times a day, maybe you only check your email once a day. But because of this particular person, you then have to go and look, try and find that email or wait for that email to come through, assuming it comes through on time, try not to get distracted by all the other emails you're seeing.

Find that information and then copy and paste it wherever you need it. Again, frustrating people who do not send calendar invites. Please, please, please think about the person on the other end and what they have to go through just to attend your meeting, which I'm sure you have. It's very important for you and things that you want to talk about and will be great for everyone concerned. But at the same time, you are making it that much harder for someone to meet with you and do it with a good frame of mind and a good reference.

So if you are that person that doesn't send Calenda invites and there might be a reason for it, maybe you don't you're not run by your calendar. Maybe you run by your to do list or your your email. But the thing is, you just making it hard for people to find that information. And if you are leading the meeting. Yes. You sending out that that link ten minutes before works for you. But do you think about other people, especially when they've message you to express this this problem, at least message them back and say, OK, well, this is why I do X, Y and Z.

It could be the systems issue. It could be the way stuff is set up at work. But explaining it to somebody, especially when they've asked about it, is really helpful. Ignoring the email. That's not great. So thank you for listening. This is Janice at The Career Introvert dot com helping people build their brand and get hired. I would love to answer any questions that you have here on the show. Please email me at Jannis at The Career Introvert dot com.

Have a great rest of your day.

Introvert today I want to talk about developing compassion as an introvert, something happened to me this week where someone I was working with very last minute, like, had set them a deadline and the deadline came and the message that same day. And I was like, oh, I can't do this, I'll get back to you. And then disappeared for a couple of days now instead of viewing it and being like, OK, well, they missed a deadline.

This is a problem. I tried to view it with compassion and curiosity. And so I message, hey, this isn't like you. I hope everything is OK. Please get back to me when you can. And just by doing that, the person said, Oh, you know what? Actually, I'm sick. I'm not feeling so good. Can we put this off for another couple of days so I can get better? So instead of me saying, oh, hey, you haven't done this thing, why haven't you done this thing?

You're late. And I gave you a deadline a week ago. Why are you leaving it? Last minute I decided to be compassionate. And just by showing that compassion, the person came and showed up and said, hey, this is what's happened, which was great. And then when they were ready, they were like, hey, thank you for for asking. Yeah, I'm feeling better now. I'm ready to do whatever needs doing. And they came back and worked really, really hard.

So developing compassion is something that can be hard for introverts because we might think in our own head and make assumptions. And so just stepping out a little bit and avoiding negative talk, for example, don't allow yourself to speak negatively about yourself or about others. It's OK to sort of there's this difference between derogatory statements and acceptance of a mistake. So and also practising self kindness and other kindness and practise being kind to others, not assuming that you know exactly what's going on and go with curiosity and ask questions, stop making assumptions, because that is what gets you and it can get you in a bad headspace and isn't fair to the other person because you are making assumptions on their behalf.

So think about the same encouraging advice that you would give a friend or family member and do that maybe for people that you work with or for staff or for higher ups. The other thing that is really, really helpful when when developing compassion is not comparing yourself to other people. Comparison is the theft of joy. I know that's from somewhere. It's not me, but it really is all individuals. And we all have our own paths and things that have happened to us and things that we are going to do.

We are all in different stages in our journey and that is OK. Comparing yourself and beating yourself up about different things isn't healthy for you and doesn't help you move forward. Everyone has different abilities and positivity about themselves. If you have something that you think is a problem, try and refocus it in a different way. And the other thing is to recognise your learning opportunities and be patient. So be patient not just with yourself, but with others, especially right now.

There is a lot going on. So being patient and going in with curiosity, any time you want to make a change, remember, it's not going to happen overnight. I'm currently in a competition sort of with a group of people and we get to set our own targets. And people have tried to change five different things at once. And I found it very difficult. But they kind of set themselves up for failure by expecting that to work. So instead craft a plan that will enable you to tackle little things bit by bit.

And over time you'll deal with one thing at a time, get one thing done, and then move on to the other self. Compassion and compassion for others takes time if you're not accustomed to thinking about yourself and or others in this way. And so it's really important to kind of do that both in work and personal life, because it will help you grow immensely as a person will help grow your business. So thank you for listening. This is [email protected] helping introverts build their brand and get hired.

If you have any questions, please email me at [email protected] and I will answer your questions in the podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

surprise episode on travel. But this can be related to everyday things. So I was listening to a podcast the other day that made a light bulb go off in my mind. So travel can be especially fatiguing because of the amount of decisions you have to make that you wouldn't normally have to make. So, for example, every day you normally probably get up, go to work, come back from work, eat, brush your teeth, your shower, do all of those things.

Some of it is probably rote and some of it is new things. But we know that we can only make a certain amount of decisions per day before we get decision fatigue. And so this is why people end up crying in airports out of frustration. Part of it can be the system. And part of it is when you are traveling, almost everything you do requires you to make a decision. What time are you going to the airport? When you get to the airport, you go left or right.

Where's the check in desk? Which Check-In desk do you pick? Then you pick that check in desk, you load up all your stuff and then you go through. Which line do you pick for security? Do you which lounge do you go to? Where do you go and get food? What food do you get? What's available? Is it going to be food that you like? Oh, where's my gate finding my gate. How do I find my gate.

Look left. Look right. Do I take the left, I take the stairs. All of these tiny tiny decisions. But you're making them almost constantly, which is not what you would normally be doing. And every day occurrences. And then there's the once you get on the plane, what do you do? Do you have like do you read, do you eat? Do you know what time you going to get set. Oh you get drinks.

Is it different airline like all of these things that you have to make decisions upon and that's just if everything goes OK, hey, what happens if your flight then gets delayed?

What if you have to stay overnight? What if you then have to pick a hotel to stay at? What if you then have to pick up when the next flight out? Which flight should I pick? Which airport when it go? Is it going to be direct? And do I have to pick new seats? What happens to my luggage? All of these things end up increasing your decision fatigue hugely. And that's why when you then have to make a decision of no eggs or no eggs, you kind of stand there going, I don't know, just feed me.

I don't know, because you've had to make all of these little micro decisions so much. And this is why. Travel can be super stressful, so when you are traveling again, please keep that in mind. But in the meantime, let's take this decision fatigue and apply it to everyday life.

This is why checklists and subtasks and managing your tasks is super, super important. Having like a task manager can help you immensely because you don't have to make all of these decisions planning the night before what you're going to do, putting it in your task manager and then the next day you just get up and work through the task. Yes, stuff will come up, but at the end of the day, you have less decisions to make off the cuff.

So this is why planning your day is hugely beneficial, even if it's just three things. Three top things that you want to get done today can be top two things that you want to get done per day, put it on your to do list and then checking it off is a really good feeling. Anything that you can do to reduce the amount of decisions that you have to make per day will help you in the long run. Even something as simple as what to cook, I know a lot of people like when they're doing laundry, is launching a book and the podcast like have a really heavy week.

They tend to meal prep for the entire week. So they don't have to think about food. They can just concentrate on that thing that they're doing or you have a regular delivery. So it's done like clockwork. So, you know, every other Saturday you just get the same veg every time stops you having to think and scroll through the list of veg that might be available to you. So I highly recommend just bit by bit in your everyday life, see what you can do to reduce the amount of decisions that you have to make daily.

That way you will increase your creativity, space and bandwidth and decrease your likelihood of getting decision fatigue. Thank you for listening. This is [email protected]. If you have any questions for me, please email me at [email protected]. Helping build Bill Brand and get odd. Thank you for listening. Have a great rest of your week.

, I'm going to talk about this particular topic, which was inspired by a friend of mine, which is when your mind won't get in sync with your planner. So I am one of those people that plans using my calendar every now and then. Your brain doesn't want to do what's on your calendar. For whatever reason, it might be a mental health session. So having a plan for when you got this stuff planned in your calendar and you've got things to do and you want to do this and that, maybe for your clients, for you business for yourself, but your mind's just like you're not having a good day to day.

We don't necessarily want to do that. But even if we did, it would be do it poorly. It would take you three times the amount of time. So maybe you just shouldn't do it. Yes. Sometimes your mind just doesn't want to be in sync with your calendar. So what do you do? Do you have a plan? Do you have a way of do you are you transparent? Do you have a way of letting people know, you know what?

Right now I'm not having a good mental health day, so I won't be able to do X, Y and Z until whatever time it is. Do you have that option in your business when you're building it around yourself? Do you have that option with companies? It's really important. There's a couple of companies that I've seen that are giving during this time of quarantine and lockdown to extra mental health days per day, per day. I wish per month that you can use at your discretion because sometimes you just just need that mental health day.

You as a business owner, do you give yourself mental health days? Do you even give yourself vacation days? This is a question. So what do I do when my mind doesn't want to work with my current calendar? First thing I do is try and take two minutes and figure out what it is. Do I need a break? Do I need to do a different type of work? Do I just need to fix a thing that's bothering my brain or do I just need to take the rest of the time, day, week, month off?

I sit still, figure that out. After doing that, write down anything that has to happen or the world will burn in the next twenty four hours. But those things, can you delegate them, communicate with the other person, say I can't do this until this time. Will the world still burn or can you do a different version of it? Does it have to be the full completed version or can you just send an email going. I've started.

Well I've done this much. Can you do that so you can then go and take the time off that you and your brain require? After that, move everything out of your calendar that you don't need, put you out of office, can be out of office. That says I will get back to you within the next 72 hours. That gives you a little space. You have to say you're taking time off. Just say checking the mailbox for 72 hours or whatever it might be, and then move everything in your calendar over.

So you have that free space. And then once that happens and you can then get everything to a brain dump, get everything out of your brain that's currently bothering it, toss that you have to do things that you're thinking about, all that other stuff, get it out, don't do anything with it. Just just just get it out. And then once you do that, go away and do something that is not related to your work but brings you peace and grounds you.

And so maybe you just need that time alone. Maybe you just need to listen to music. Maybe you just need to need some dough, whatever it might be that brings you peace and calmness and centers you go ahead and do that. That is what I recommend when when your mind just wanted to do what you set out for it. And sometimes that can just be because you've over estimated like how much you can do in a day, or it could be because you just have a foggy day that happens and that's OK.

So if this is something you haven't thought about before, maybe think about it now. Do you have a foggy brain day or mental health day plan or an emergency mental health plan? Sometimes you wake up in the first half of days. Great. And the second half of the year, like, I can't deal. Do you have a plan checklist of things that you can do to relieve the pressure from you so you can go ahead and take that rest that you need?

If not, I highly recommend you do that now. It's like a disaster recovery plan. What do you do? Right, because you and your mental health come first, because if that doesn't work, nothing else will work in your business life. Same with your career. Pick jobs or companies, if you can, that do care about mental health. If your accountant in a position and I know a couple of my clients are where they are in a position where they can't move and be, mental health isn't a priority.

See if you can get vacation days on a regular basis every Saturday by Friday, whatever it might be to help give you. And release that pressure and give you the space that you need to recharge. Thank you for listening. This is Janice from The Career Introvert dot com, helping you build your brand and get hired. Have a great rest of your week.

I'd like to talk about a couple of things you should do when you're looking into moving jobs and looking at new opportunities. If there is an organization that has posted a position, that's great, see how long that position has been posted and then do your research on the company.

And most of the time people will kind of look on Glassdoor and that's it. Or look on LinkedIn and that's it. Or go search the company's website and that's it. But really think about where they really should be looking to go to somewhere like trust pilot and see what customers are saying about the company. Are they saying good things? Are they saying bad things? Even if they are saying bad things? How is the company responding to that feedback?

Are they giving the same response time and time again? Are they actively responding or have they not responding at all? That's very interesting. And what departments are people complaining about? Are they complaining about logistics, other complaining about customer service or complaining about management? Because that will give you a really good idea of where the trouble spots are in that organization. Another thing that you can do is sometimes depending on the organization, they might have a Facebook group.

So it's a really good idea to see if you can be part of that Facebook group. And again, see what people are talking about. Are the comments free or are people being muted or what kind of discussion is happening there? Is it positive? Is it happy? Is it saying nice things? How involved is the company in this Facebook group that, again, can tell you a lot about how they deal with conflict, which is really important?

Some organizations will go ahead and just ban and mute everything and tamp it down and others will come back and join it and talk to and build into a discussion and a learning opportunity. Those are the kind of organizations that you really want to work for, whereas if you see that they're trying to reach people and stifle what they're saying, that's probably what happens within the organization itself day to day. Another place to go is the Better Business Bureau, because that's an unbiased place.

And again, take a look and see what's being said and how people are responding. So those are just three really key things that you can go ahead and do. I guess you could go on Twitter and Reddit as well. But those trust pilot, Facebook group and Better Better Business Bureau are three really good places for unfiltered and unbiased customer feedback. And don't get me wrong, I do know that customers generally will complain when something negative and won't say positive things.

It takes far more effort. However, knowing how a company deals with conflict or bad news and negative information is really interesting and gives you an insight into the company culture and can also give you fodder to ask questions. Should you get that interview? And it could be like, Oh, I saw that. I know six months ago you had this problem. Has this now been resolved or how did you go about resolving it? Is this why I'm the new hire?

Like, you can give you a really good insight. If they've been having a specific problem and you're being hired for a role that is really linked to it, that you will have a very clear idea of maybe what needs to be responded or what needs to happen, and that can give you a leg up. So these are things to think about when you are looking for new roles. Of course, go ahead and see if you can talk to people who've worked there.

Go on, Glassdoor, do as much research as you can. But those are three very specific things that you can do that gives you an insight that isn't the norm of games. Look at their website and seeing what their vision and mission statement is is helpful to know what that is. But are they living up to that vision and that mission, or how can you help them rise to that occasion? So thank you for listening. This is Janice from The Career Introvert dot com helping you build your brand and get hired.

Should you have any questions, please email me at [email protected]. Have a great rest of your day.

Today, I want to talk about comfort zones, and the reason this came up is because recently I was speaking at a UK startup event and I was talking about how when you're building your business as an introvert, as a human, you should be building your business around you, your likes, you wants and your needs.

And some of that was talking about time blocking, setting boundaries, using systems and generally making a list of things that ground you and recharge you. And on the other hand, making a list of things that are deal breakers for you, things that you don't like doing are not good at doing, because those are things that should not be the core of your business that you are building for yourself.

And it so happens, as I was giving this talk that there was a comment in the comment section and someone said, but getting out of your comfort zone is where you learn the most. Surely it's better to learn all the things that you don't know so you can become good at them. And so here is my pushback towards that. Yes, you can push yourself out of your comfort zone to learn new things, but you don't have to learn everything.

The whole point of being a business owner is that you don't do all the things because you know what you are good at and where your zone of helping people is. And there's a reason why you pay people to be accountants because they're good at that. You, as a business owner might need to just know a general idea of what your accounting should look like. But you are not an accountant and might not file your own taxes depending on which country you're in.

But in general, that is not something that is in your zone of expertise.

So while, yes, get out of your comfort zone can be good to a certain degree, but not if it is at the detriment of your business. So if this means that you are learning how to do email marketing, for example, but you don't like writing, then that's probably to the detriment of your business because you could be spending two, four, six, eight, 10 hours on this email marketing that you don't enjoy and are not good at when you could be spending those two, four, six, eight, 10 hours with your clients providing excellent service doing what you do best.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am not totally against get out of your comfort zone. But it is one of those phrases that gets tossed around a lot, especially when we're talking to introvert entrepreneurs or even just introverts in general in regards to networking or public speaking or talking to people on the phone, cold calling.

A lot of the time you will find and I'm generalizing here, extroverts very much like what do you just need to get out of your comfort zone and do blah, blah, blah, or even people who just don't necessarily have an understanding of what introversion means to you might say, well, just get out of your comfort zone and do this, that and the other. We are all individual. We all have things that we like to do and don't like to do.

That is just life. We also have things that we are good at, things that we are not good at. That is just life telling people to oh well, just suck it up and get out of your comfort zone isn't supportive and isn't constructive. A different way of going about that conversation is finding out. OK, so you don't like networking. What is it about networking that you don't enjoy? Is a specific type of networking? Is it that you don't like going to a new venue?

Is it that you don't like talking to people and then drilling down to find out what exactly it is specifically about networking that that person doesn't like, and then coming up with finding out if it's something that's important to them and they want to do, and then coming up with a solution together, working with them on what it would take to make that happen in that thing a reality. Is it going with somebody else? Is it only doing networking events from where I mean now from home, but only doing networking events that apply to certain topics, maybe networking events that are not business related, and then you just grow your friendships, which will help grow your business.

That is a supportive way of helping someone get out of their comfort zone. But just telling someone you should get out of your comfort zone doesn't do it. Thank you for listening. This is [email protected] helping you build your brand and get hired. Have a great rest of your week.

today I want to talk about Introvert instinct  something that I I guess for the longest while I don't have and now I'm starting to believe I do have to a certain degree. And I don't know whether it's because I reflect this kind of thing or because stuff has happened. But learning to trust your emotions is really interesting because we are all born with a certain amount of intuition. The problem is from a very young age, we're often told to maybe ignore our feelings or our feelings are not justified or our feelings are just wrong.

Much like force feeding, an infant can cause the child to start ignoring the natural hunger control mechanisms. It's the same with emotions. The more we're taught to push down our feelings, the more likely we are not to trust our emotions. Sometimes you get a gut feeling, a feeling in your gut, a gut feeling that something is wrong. Everyone has a natural ability to know that something's sort of not right in any given situation. The problem is, over time, you may have pushed down those feelings as maybe wrong or crazy.

You might meet a new person who you've no real known reason makes you feel like something's a little off. You could talk to someone and believe that they're lying. Wait, while you may not want to react to these instances because they are not cause for immediate danger, keeping an open mind and keeping your eyes open, chances are you might find out that you write more than you're wrong. Sometimes you might feel a tug to help somebody. TV commercials are really good at like using these emotions when they want you to send money to the starving children in Africa or donate to save abused animals feelings.

What you feel when you're watching those commercials are normal and you should respect them. However, when you do feel compelled to help people, don't push it down, really offer help. But just keep in mind what you're thinking about things. And another thing that our intuition helps us with is maybe we feel pulled to do something different, you might be sitting in a cubicle, bored to tears, waiting desperately to do something different, but you're kind of afraid to change and you're not sure what to do.

You feel that you're being pulled in a different direction, but you just don't know what to do about that feeling. And maybe you don't even recognize it as a feeling. Maybe you just think that you're having a bad day. If you do feel pulled in a new direction, take the time to give it some real consideration instead of nixing it. Because if you go ahead and fix it immediately, it's not necessarily the best thing to do. And also, you might not feel confident in your abilities.

That's something we kind of learn at a young age and that it's really hard to unlearn when you're not feeling confident. Don't push those feelings down or away. You're right to feel that way. But you need to think why you're feeling that way when you feel good about yourself is not misplaced pride or bragging. And so often people, especially women, are taught from a young age not to boast about their abilities. This tends to put young women at a disadvantage from their male counterparts when it comes to job and fair pay.

Allow yourself to feel confident when it is appropriate and acknowledge the different emotions you experience. Don't push away any emotions that you have about drugs, alcohol or food. Instead, allow yourself to experience a full range of emotions as appropriate, because learning what these feelings and emotions are and how to deal with them is super, super important to knowing when you're just having a bad day or when you're just feeling off. Write down your feelings, keeping a feeding's journal for yourself to help you process different feelings that you're having and different things that you note other people might be having reactions to, situations can be useful as datapoints.

Your journal can help you work through your emotions in a healthy way, as well as give you something to look back on when you're having trouble. And one thing that's really helpful is to test your judgment, accuracy. So if you're afraid to go with your gut due to having pushed down the skull from a young age, pick one thing to test. For example, if you feel the need to switch jobs, start job hunting in earnest, it won't help to go on some job interviews and test your intuition.

You might find the job of a lifetime. Or if you feel strange, then then don't go ahead and do it. As you learn to trust your emotions by practicing actually feeling them, you're going to get better at discerning what's right from wrong and what's just like a weird feeling. And that's what I've been learning. I've had some gut instincts about a couple of things and I've been afraid to move forward with them. And I've had someone point out to me that any time I've had that feeling have been more or less correct.

So I should just go with it and said, that's what I'm doing over a couple of things these next few months. I hope you have a great week. Feel free to reach out to me at [email protected], helping introverts build their brand and get hired.

Interview questions or things that might come up that are a red flag, that you probably shouldn't work for that organization or company. And this has come about because of various clients that I've worked with and various people that it's the start of the year. People are looking for new jobs. They want to make sure they have some sort of job security. But at the same time, they don't want to just say yes to anything.

So what could be a red flag when you were in the interview stage or even just reading through the job description stage of a role? So any time a role says, you will be wearing many hats. This is normally a sign that they're going to assign you two or three positions worth of work, rather, for the wage of one. It's one of those things. It's like, what do you do a little bit of this or a little bit of that.

But you also might be going to this team, another really big red flag that the company hasn't thought through. What that role actually is going to do is when they say that you'll be reporting to two or more people because it means they're not sure what you're going to be doing that have enough work for one full well under one department. So they're kind of splitting you up into two different departments. And then either both departments try and take ownership of you and your work or neither takes ownership of you on your work.

And then it gets really, really weird.

Another phrase that comes up a lot that is can be a red flag is everyone's like family here. So here's the thing. With organizations that tend to treat their workers like family is that means they expect you to work overtime or give up your weekends or be at your beck and call because family is available all the time. Right. You can call your mom, dad, sister, whatever, and any time of the night and they will back you up.

And so that is seen as a very big red flag. Also underpaying most people who work for a family organization or work for like my mom, dad, sister, whatever, a they might be qualified for the job. And B, they do it not realizing their worth and therefore are underpaid and overutilized. So we treat everyone like family here, not necessarily always the best sign or also when you are required to wear company logo clothing that you must purchase yourself from the company.

I've heard that come up a couple times when they're really, really happy that someone actually turned up for an interview because it means that maybe no one's turning up for the interviews or they're really desperate to hire. And most of the time when someone is desperate to hire, it means they haven't thought through what the world's going to do, where it resides, or the person who used to have that role left for a very good reason. And therefore, it's possibly not the best thing to be getting into.

So one thing, when you are also interviewing the company, a good question to ask your interviewer is, hey, so what do you like about working for this company if all they do is talk about the location and everything except the actual work and the job or the like? Oh, that's a good question. And they're like, the people are nice and run run for the hills because they can't tell you where they fit in the culture of the organization, how they make a difference and why they really enjoy working for that particular organization.

And so. Also, if you do get a video interview, see see if the person you're talking to looks tired because that that can be a thing, I ask them when they last worked weekends. Ask them what time they finished work. Ask them what time everyone else finishes work if you get to always finish at 5:00. But most of us are still here, eight or nine, because we had this project. And then if that's a one off, the next question obviously is how often does this happen in the past six months?

And if they like we've always had this big project, there's always something going on that means that over time is just normal, but probably not paid for it because you are salaried. So these are just things to think about when you are applying for a new job. One last one, if there are new hires and people have been there for 15 years, but nothing in between, it means there's no room for advancement. People are believed to be advanced and those who've been there for 15 years just keep their jobs.

So if you're looking for somewhere that you can move up, probably not the best fit for you. All right. Thank you for listening. This is [email protected] helping you build your brand and get hired. I hope you have a great rest of your week.

, I kind of want to talk about the bait and switch. This is something that I've experienced a couple times over the years. And just when I think I know when I'm going to be baited and switched on, I kind of have an idea, bam, it happens again. So let me give you an example of what a bait and switch might be. Someone reached out to me on LinkedIn and said, Oh, I heard about you through mental health, remote working.

I love that you work that you're doing and your values love to speak with you further, because I'm currently writing a book on these things and I want to talk to experts about the different views on mental health, remote working and that sort of a thing. Great. I'm like, here's my email address. Set up some time and then I say, OK, here's my calendar. OK, let's set up some time to talk. And the calendar actually says interfere with coaching expert, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And they mentioned you be speaking to one of my members of my team because I'm super busy, but they'll be doing the interview and that's fine. They have my blessing, OK? And, you know, I get my two day warning, my day warning, my No. Ten minute warning, get on the call. And the person admits it's the first day that it's not a problem. So we go through, he asks me, does it stop recording?

We say hello. We talk about general staff. Then halfway through, he starts recording. He asked me three questions, did not ask any follow up questions and or any sort of good interview techniques. It was, you know, ask question A I sort of answer, but not really. And then he doesn't answer ask any follow up questions. Now, bearing in mind that blocked off forty five minutes of my time for this interview. This interview consisted of three questions.

Then as soon as that was over, maybe seven minutes into the call, this person was so sure. I'd like to know more about X person's work. Would you like me to set up an interview with them? And I'm like, can you tell me more about the book? And so they said, I just started. I don't really know. And it's really, you know, passionate about and they want to do and they want to speak to people like you.

If anything comes up from the book, you know, we'll let you know so you can we can quote you and what have you. But would you like to speak to this person about what they want to do? Part of their membership group is bla bla bla bla bla. I say, wait a minute, you blocked out forty five minutes, of which you barely used seven to speak to me about my expertise, and now you're plugging a membership group to help me grow my business.

But ask me if that was a problem in the first place and why would I go to you for help? But that's what they did. They baited and switched. They made it look like they wanted my expertise on remote work because I've been doing it before. It became hip.

But really, they wanted me to join their membership group to help grow my business within their business. And it kind of started small l m me like you pay into it and then we might give you some stuff, but then you have to get other people. Well that's how we get people out. I don't know. So this was a bait and switch, but apparently they're fully aligned with my values and et cetera, et cetera. And would I like to set up some time to talk with boss person or actually both persons lead team?

Because obviously I'm not talking to her. So part of me wants to say no, but I'm going into this year with a open curiosity and discovery. This is my theme for this year of year of discovery. So what I want to do is go to the next section and see what this call will bring, what is their membership, how much it is, because nowhere on any websites that I have looked at has pricing, which is something that I should talk about in the next episode and what it is they're expecting from me.

And no, they did not make me sign anything for their book. So far there's been no contract because I ask the question, have they done something like this before? Because I have and I don't think you're doing it right. Not can get a straight answer on that. It was more like I know they're very passionate about it, but it's my first like any started with the last week, so I don't really know. PORKED, I don't know has had any onboarding.

Is that those, in fact the company culture or knows anything about the project that he is currently working on. That's really interesting. Um, so yes, if you have been the subject to a bait and switch, I would love to hear about it. Please email me at [email protected]. I know what happened, what you did. I will not mention companies or organizations, but please be aware that this happens. And it is it gives people a bad name.

Thanks for listening. This is [email protected].

today I talk about dreams, it's the end of the year. It's that kind of a thing going on. And one of the things that I got asked to do as part of a planning exercise was to write down things that I want to do in the next 12 months. And they wanted me to write down a list of things that might be obtainable or unobtainable just just to put it all out, get it on a piece of paper, all the things that I would like to do that I want to do sometime in the next 12 months.

And so I scribbled away, got about 10 and scribbled away more about 15, scribbled away a little bit more, got to about 17. And then I went to look at the next set of instructions and the next set of instructions was, you should have at least 50, at which point I was like, oh, 50 50 things that I would like to happen in the next 12 months. And they say, well, that's OK, go away.

Sometimes you think about things when you go when you're not thinking about it, this exercise should be done in one day. So you've made a start and I go away and come back with anything else that you think about. So I did and I got up to about 22 and even that was pushing it. And so I wrote to a friend of mine and I said, I'm doing this exercise about dreaming. And, you know, I've been accused of not dreaming big enough before.

And so I have this list and I've got twenty two. And she's like, oh that's good, that's twenty two. It's a good place to start. You can always add as the year goes on. So it's like, OK, that's, that's good. So then I went back to the exercise and the next step of the exercise was OK, now that you've got your list of 50 things that you would like to happen sometime in the 12 months, go ahead and cross off some things that are really just not going to happen.

Those pie in the sky dreams, for example, maybe some travel plans or some things that are not possible without gobs of money going to space, for example, probably not going to happen. So I went through my list and I scrubbed off three, three things, maybe four. That definitely, almost definitely not going to happen. And these were things that were travel related or things that I had, like, no control over. And I was going to move on to the next stage.

And I have these things and and eighty to ninety five percent of them are fairly obtainable. My dream list was a list of obtainable things that I could do. So I wrote to my friend again and I was like, so get this list and it's it's my bed and dream big enough. But I was like, what am I doing wrong here? And she said, All right, let me go look at the list. Let me look at the list.

Look how bad could the list be? And so I sent her this tiny list of twenty two things that I would like to do in the next year. And she was like, it's a great list. There's lots of like aspirational stuff on this list. Like, I don't I don't see why this is this is a problem that some of it is practical. Yes. But it is dreamy. Some of the things that you have and having, you know, and without having time to fill it all that that's great.

That is dreamy to make sure that you have space and time to do all of this stuff. So I go, OK, then there's some other steps to go and some more planning that I was doing a different exercise. And this exercise was about my business and about what I'm doing. And I had one goal for my business and it turned out that that wasn't the right goal. After going through and checking off and thinking about other things, I had like these three or four other things that were supporting my overall goal.

But at the end of the day, no matter how much planning you do, how many dreams you have and many goals you have, things will always change. And that is OK. And I think we forget that, especially when we think like New Year's resolutions and themes, this and that and the other. If this year has not taught us anything more, then things will always change. Things will not always go as you planned. So sometimes it's better not to have that hard core, rigid plan and just to have a vague idea of the direction that you.

Want to go in, I was doing planning I a planning session, and one person was very much like, I just want to have three months where I'm not launching and I'm not doing this and I'm just working. And that was great. And that works for her. Have another person that I plan planning with and she's very much like, no, I to do these eighteen thousand different things in this, I'm going to do it and this is what we're going to do that works for her.

But there are definitely clients that I work with where they have all these plans and they don't put in before time and don't put in time for life just happening and they get really frustrated with themselves when it doesn't work out. And that's something that I teach my clients, but also want everyone else to know life happens and being able to roll with it is a far better skill than having to stick to a rigid idea. And things have to be done a certain way.

Anyway, that's my thought for today. Thank you for listening. This is [email protected] helping you build your brand and get hired. I wish you a great year to come. Thanks for listening.