September 10, 2025 • 35 mins
In this episode of Career Coaching Secrets, our guest is Carla Taylor a seasoned career strategist dedicated to helping professionals unlock their full potential through proven coaching techniques, leadership development, and resume transformation. With a wealth of experience cultivating confidence and clarity in career transitions, Carla shares actionable insights and empowering stories from her time enabling clients to thrive in competitive job markets. Don’t miss how she distills years of expertise into practical tips you can apply right now.
You can find her on:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/carlajtaylor/
https://bringyourbrilliance.net/
You can also watch this podcast on YouTube at:
https://www.youtube.com/@CareerCoachingSecrets
If you are a career coach looking to grow your business you can find out more about Purple Circle at http://joinpurplecircle.com
Get Exclusive Access to Our In-Depth Analysis of 71 Successful Career Coaches, Learn exactly what worked (and what didn't) in the career coaching industry in 2024: https://joinpurplecircle.com/white-paper-replay
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_03 (00:00):
And so to me, I believe it was definitely a God
thing that these things all cameto be.
But as I started doing more andmore with creating lots of
different programs andfacilitating a lot of different
programs, I taught everything,farming equipment.
I taught about so many differentthings, but the ones that really
resonated so deeply with me wereall of the leadership
(00:20):
development back then.
We called them soft skills,right?
But all the things about howpeople connect and relate and
communicate and all of thosethings.
And so I realized I reallywanted to be more of a trainer
and a facilitator.
And I loved also the strategyand the curriculum architecture
and all that, because that's mynumber one strength is strategy.
And I'm up there as well.
But I just love being in frontof people.
SPEAKER_00 (00:42):
Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast
where we talk with successfulcareer coaches on how they built
their success and the hardlessons they learned along the
way.
My name is Davis Nguyen, and I'mthe founder of Purple Circle,
where we help career coachesscale their business to$100,000
years,$100,000 months, and even$100,000 weeks.
Before Purple Circle, I've grownseveral seven and eight figure
career coaching business myself,and I've been a consultant at
(01:03):
two career coaching businessesthat are doing over a hundred
million dollars each.
Whether you're an establishedcoach or building your practice
for the first time, you'lldiscover the secrets to
elevating your coachingbusiness.
Nice.
SPEAKER_04 (01:13):
Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of
Career Coaching Secrets Podcast.
I'm your host, Regen, andtoday's guest is Carla Taylor,
an executive leadership andcareer coach, keynote speaker,
and co-author of CareerHappiness in the Age of AI.
With more than 25 years ofexperience guiding leaders and
organizations throughtransformation, Carla
(01:35):
specializes in helping peoplealign their strengths, navigate
change with confidence, anddesign careers and cultures that
are both future-ready, anddeeply fulfilling.
As the founder of Bring YourBrilliance and a number one
international bestsellingauthor, Carla has developed
innovative coaching frameworksthat empower professionals to
discover their true value,unlock their brilliance and
(01:57):
thrive in today's rapidlyshifting world of work.
And it's a pleasure for me tohave her on the podcast today.
Welcome to the show, Carla.
SPEAKER_03 (02:04):
Thank you so very much.
I'm happy to be here.
SPEAKER_04 (02:06):
Thank you for coming, Carla.
I wanted to talk to you aboutwhen it comes to your coaching
business and your beginnings.
First of all, how long has itbeen since you actually started
coaching?
And then when thinking aboutbusiness itself, I think it's
been almost seven years, buthave you been coaching before
that?
How did this start and whatinspired you to do this?
SPEAKER_03 (02:26):
Well, yeah, that's such a great question.
So for me, I actually started myentire journey wanting to just
learn.
I've always been an avidlearner.
I've always been very futurefocused, but I also didn't know
what I wanted to do because Ihad a lot of different options
and possibilities of what Icould possibly do.
So even in college, way back incollege, I took way more credits
(02:47):
than you're even supposed to ina semester.
Like you're supposed to do 12 to18 and I always did 20 to 21
because I just wanted to learnas much as I could and try to
figure out my own career path.
And I couldn't quite figure itout because nothing was standing
out to me.
And so, so much of what I'velearned along the way is what I
was seeking for myself first,which I think happens for a lot
of people, of course.
But I also grew up livinginternationally.
(03:09):
And so I've already had such awide variety of experiences in
my life, even back when I wasstill in college.
But since then, I've done somany things and so many
different things in my owncareer.
Again, it was more of a, let metry this, let me try that, you
know, and the 20s really are forexploration, which is a great
thing to be doing.
I explored, I did a lot ofdifferent things in a lot of
different ways.
(03:30):
And so back then, it wasactually a really bad thing to
have a lot of career moves,because it's like, oh, you're
not loyal, you're notconsistent, you know, whatever.
Now it's like, well, why are youbeing stagnant, staying in the
same place for so long?
So finally, the world caught up.
with me.
And looking for people who had alot of diverse experiences and
things.
But no, it was just part of itwas me seeking.
(03:52):
But as far as becoming a coachitself.
So I started down this path oftrying to figure out different
things.
And I just found one job becauseit was at a language school that
I had actually taken Japanesefrom when we moved to Japan.
And so I was like, oh, this is agreat organization.
I ended up working for them atfirst as an English instructor.
And then I ran the whole frontdesk and all that.
And then I ended up leading allthe intercultural programs.
(04:14):
So that was really fun.
and awesome.
Every job I was taking, I keptbeing like, wow, like this needs
to be better for people to learnthe job itself.
And I started just like creatingmanuals or ways to train myself
and then whoever came after me.
So I was naturally drawn to thatfor sure.
I didn't even know that therewas a thing, there was a degree
(04:34):
in that, which is actuallycalled instructional design.
And even how I ended up gettinga master's degree in
instructional design.
But again, it wasn't something Iknew about.
It literally was, I was gettingready to get engaged my not yet
fiance at the time we weretalking about moving to
indianapolis we were down inatlanta and my cousin had just
interviewed in it which is whatmy boyfriend at the time was in
(04:56):
so we were trying to find herand ask her hey who should he
talk to in indianapolis if hewants to start interviewing well
this was before cell phones andso we tracked her down at her
mom's house my aunt and so i wastelling her what we were looking
for what my questions were and isaid well my plan is to go move
in with my parents save somemoney for a year to get a
master's degree, you know, andgo from there.
(05:17):
And she's like, hang on asecond.
My mom wants to ask you aquestion.
So my aunt gets on the phone.
This is a Sunday night.
I remember very distinctly.
We got off the phone at 10 PM,but she was like, how would you
like to come to Iowa and livewith us for free and get your
master's degree for free?
And I was like, well, I haven'teven taken the GRE.
Like I was just gatheringinformation.
I wasn't prepared to startanything yet.
(05:37):
And basically they're like,well, your uncle is a professor.
He has a graduate chip open.
It would actually be free foryou.
It'll pay you a stipend.
You can do it in a year and itstarts in a week.
Well, I haven't even taken theGRE.
I haven't done any of thesethings.
They're like, well, we know theDean.
We could probably get thatwaived.
I'm like, well, I'd at leasthave to give two weeks notice at
work.
(05:57):
And they were like, well, youcould probably start a week
late.
We could probably get thatsorted out.
So I did the next morning,Monday morning, I was giving my
two weeks notice and I was upkeeping my entire life to go off
to this incredible opportunitythat really fell in my lap.
And the degree that I didn'teven know what I wanted.
I knew I liked writing, but Ididn't know training.
There was a degree in anythingin the training or adult
(06:19):
education.
world, that was the degree.
That was what my uncle was aprofessor in that area.
And so she's like, I think hemight like it.
And it was perfect.
It was exactly what I didn'tknow I was looking for.
And so that started me on thispath then of working with
training, learning anddevelopment, leadership
development, organizationaldevelopment, all of those things
(06:40):
that I've always been interestedin.
I actually had figured that muchout in my undergrad that I
really was fascinated by howpeople work better together.
Management was my minor there.
It was something I was alreadyinterested in.
But again, I didn't know thatpath or that degree even
existed.
And so to me, I believe it wasdefinitely a God thing that
these things all came to be.
(07:01):
But as I started doing more andmore with creating lots of
different programs andfacilitating a lot of different
programs, I taught everything,farming equipment.
I taught about so many differentthings, but the ones that really
resonated so deeply with me wereall of the leadership
development back then.
We called them soft skills, butall the things about how people
connect and relate andcommunicate and all of those
(07:21):
things and so I realized Ireally wanted to be more of a
trainer and a facilitator and Iloved also the strategy and the
curriculum architecture and allthat because that's like my
number one strength is strategyand I'm up there as well but I
just love being in front ofpeople and talking with people
as well and so and that's theother thing I took a speech
class in college and I wasterrified I hated it I was like
(07:44):
I will never do that again andmy very first day coming into
that graduate semester master'sdegree program starting a week
late like the very first thing Ihaven't even met anybody yet
they're like come on and I justgo with them and we go to this
massive auditorium in front ofthis hundreds of students and
they're like do that like so I'mstanding on a stage reading
slides I've never seen that wasmy thrown into the deep end
(08:06):
introduction to that graduateassistant role so obviously I
had to get over my fear now Ilove it I love being able to
impact people a lot of differentways but being on a stage in
front of people which is sofunny because I was so shy
growing up.
I had, you know, I never wasbrave enough to even talk to
many people and so fascinatinghow my life has taken so many.
(08:27):
I'll never do that.
And then here I am doing that.
I
SPEAKER_04 (08:30):
just wanted to ask when you made the move, were you
actually in Japan or was it?
SPEAKER_03 (08:35):
No.
So I had grown up.
So Indianapolis is my dad workedfor Eli Lilly and that's the
world headquarters.
And so he'd gotten intointernational business when I
was pretty young.
But then when I was like infourth, fifth and sixth grade,
we lived in Taipei, Taiwan, andmy dad was working in Asia and
And then I came back toIndianapolis for a few years,
and then we went to Japan for myhigh school years.
So I graduated from high schoolin Japan, but then I went to
(08:57):
college at Indiana University.
Then I moved down to Atlantafive days after I graduated.
Again, a very spontaneous, let'sjust do this and figure it out.
I didn't have a job lined up.
I was just like, I want to gosomewhere else.
And after trying to get work,and back then your degree really
mattered.
And since I had taken so manydifferent courses in undergrad,
I ended up graduating with ageneral studies degree, but with
(09:18):
a management minor.
because I could either graduatein three and a half years, which
I ended up stretching out tofour, or it would have taken me
an extra year to actually get amanagement major.
And so I'm like, well, I'll justdo it this way, get my degree,
it'll be fine.
But then I found back then itreally wasn't fine because
people didn't take the generalstudies degree as seriously.
And so I kept finding roleswhere I wasn't at the next level
(09:40):
where I really should have been.
And so I was like, I need to goget a master's degree if I want
to be taken seriously.
So I did that, but I went fromAtlanta to Iowa.
you know, city to right out inthe country where my aunt and
uncle live.
And then I moved toIndianapolis.
So it was actually a goodtransition to get back to
Indiana because for me, theMidwest just didn't feel
vibrant, exciting place like alot of the other places I've
(10:02):
lived as well.
But that's where I ended upraising my children.
And so it's all as it was meantto be.
I'm sure I got into the trainingand learning and development
world, created all sorts ofdifferent trainings and things,
loved working with people.
But I was still doing it eitherat like the organizational
change management level,employee engagement things like
that.
I was doing it at a team level.
I wasn't doing much of theone-on-one coaching at that
(10:23):
time.
And so, well, I ended up havingtriplets.
That was a step out of my careermoment for sure.
SPEAKER_01 (10:29):
And
SPEAKER_03 (10:31):
so I myself was working for Eli Lilly at the
time.
And so I stayed home for thefirst two years of having my
kids.
And then I actually ended upgoing through a divorce.
And so I needed to figure outwhat was next.
And it was 2009.
So I don't know if you recall,it was like this huge recession
and nobody was hiring.
And I was trying to get work atthat point.
I would get, actually, I'd getlike the top one or two
(10:52):
candidates that I'd get all theway through the interviews.
And then they'd be like, oh, weactually can't hire for that
position at all right now.
And I was like, oh my gosh, thisis awful.
And so someone said to me atthat point, I had a master's
degree.
They're like, especially with amaster's degree, it could take
you 12 to 18 months at thispoint to find a role.
So why not spend that timebuilding your own business?
And I was like, oh, I've neverdone that before.
You know, it was really scary,but I did.
(11:14):
And again, I just kind of jumpedinto it and figured it out along
the way.
A lot of things I'd obviouslydo.
differently now but that was in2009 and so at that time i've
done a lot of really cooltraining and even gotten some
certifications and things when iwas at lily and so i created a
program called ignite yourstrengths and my first company
was called ignite consulting andi was mostly doing these team
(11:35):
workshops and series ofworkshops on disc communication
styles and strengths findercombined and it was a really
powerful program for teams toreally learn a lot about
themselves and those who did thefull program as a year-long
program really massivelytransformed And it was so
amazing, you know, all thethings you learn about in
strengths finder and strengthsbased approach, but a lot of
people will just do the oneworkshop, although they'll take
(11:57):
the assessment and not do a lotwith it.
But when you actually put it inthe work and shift things across
your team, and even across theorganization, I had a couple
organizations who actuallyallowed me to teach all of the
teams.
At one point, we had them all inthe same room.
And it was I don't know how manypeople but it was so cool,
because not only could the teamitself figure out what they
would need to do with strengthsacross the team, but then the
(12:18):
teams across the organization.
could say well this team'sreally good at influencing and
this team's really good ataccounting or you know whatever
and so they could figure outways to leverage across the
entire organization it was socool and so people who actually
do that I got to see them prettygood you know they started out
here there's this team of peopleright and then it was like like
they just soared and went tothis massive new level
(12:40):
individually but also as a teamand even like the team itself
started winning all these awardsand it was just really really
amazing to see what happens whenpeople put it into practice I
never could understand peoplewho are like fangirls or
whatever that are like all aboutcelebrities and especially
because I grew up meeting evencelebrities but a lot of really
you know big important peopleand stuff so I've always just
been like I'm comfortable withanybody like from the top person
(13:01):
to the lowest I can relate toanybody wherever they are and I
was like oh celebrities are coolbut they're just people still
but the one person that I havealways been like oh my gosh he's
amazing everything I've everdone has been based on his work
is Marcus Buckingham who ofcourse used to be with Gallup
and then created his own companyas well but he's all about
strengths and love plus work ishis newest book and like
(13:23):
everything he does.
And I had his video.
And so in my Ignite YourStrengths class, I would play
that first video from TrombonePlayer Wanted, which is, you
know, was one of his first videoseries.
And so I'd see him, you know,talking every time I taught you
for hundreds and hundreds andhundreds of sessions.
And so I was always just like,Oh my gosh, he's so amazing.
And so after I started my owncompany, that's when I got a
(13:45):
coaching certification as well.
And at that point, I actuallymade made the decision, that was
when ICF was pretty new,International Coaching
Federation.
And because I'd already paid fora master's degree and had so
many years, you know, 15 yearsof experience at this point, I
didn't feel like I needed tospend a huge amount of money for
something.
I didn't know if it was actuallygoing to ever be super legit at
that time.
So I chose not to go down thatpath.
(14:07):
And I now probably would havedone that differently because
especially if you want to bedoing coaching in corporate
worlds, they often will onlyallow people who've had the ICF
certification.
And so that being a deal breakerfor me but what I found is if I
don't actually call myself acoach and I come in more as a
consultant then they'll stillhire but if I had to do it over
again I probably would have goneahead with ICF at that point but
(14:30):
at this point I've coachedhundreds of people I've taught
so many classes I've worked withso many organizations I don't
feel the need to go back and tryto do that too because I found
different entry points anddifferent ways to still help
people but what was so coolabout when I finally got my
coaching certification that'swhen I started working with
individuals and it was amazingto me that you know you can
(14:50):
influence the entireorganization with some of these
big things and that's incredibleto be able to do and you can
really help teams come bettertogether and everything else but
the deep transformation and thespeed of transformation happens
at the individual level and so Iactually found I loved all three
and so for years I struggledwith okay should I go after the
big organizational thing shouldI go after the team should I go
(15:11):
after the individuals and everytime I was like okay I'm just
going to choose one and stayhere it didn't feel like enough
for me I felt like but they'vegot all these other skills I'm
not using that I want to be incontribution to.
And so that was actually one ofmy own learnings about my own
career.
And one of the reasons why thepeople I help the most, usually
they're mid-career and usuallythey have like a
multi-potential, multi-facetedkind of like they could do a lot
(15:34):
of different things.
And they've been stuck in thisworld where people say, well,
you just have to choose one.
The rest of that sentence is youhave to choose one at a time.
And one of the people I've lovedalong the way also is Barbara
Scherr.
And she was a very well-knowncareer coach back in like the
80s.
and 90s, I think.
She used to have a show on PBSand do all sorts of things.
But she wrote a book, I Can DoAnything If Only I Knew What It
(15:55):
Was.
She wrote a book calledWishcraft and several other job
related books.
And one of her terms was ascanner.
And a scanner is thatmulti-potential light, that
multifaceted person who, youknow, some people even would put
the ADHD people in that thing,although she actually
differentiates between the two.
But they're the ones who areconstantly looking at different
things.
And part of what makes themthrive is variety.
(16:16):
That's Being able to balance,okay, I'm going to do this much
with teams, this much withorganizations, this much with
individuals, rather than tryingto just stay in one is where I
thrive and what I love to do andhow I can really show up in a
lot of different ways and helppeople at different levels.
And so I also help people whoare like me, who are trying to
(16:37):
figure out what do I want to doand how can I put it together
and have been told their wholelives, well, you're doing it
wrong.
No, we're doing it the way itworks for us.
And there's different tools thatwe need that maybe other people
don't because they can just pickone and stay in one lane, never
vary from it.
So I really found, you know, I'mso good at all three of those
levels because I have such avisionary strategy vision.
(17:00):
I can see as soon as I meetsomeone, whether it's a person,
a team or an organization, I cansee them at their fullest
potential.
I can see exactly where theycould go and how they could be
at their best.
It just is almost instant forme.
That has made me really good atall three of those levels.
But especially with theone-on-one, I can really come
along somebody and help themthrough whatever it is that
(17:22):
they're feeling challenged with.
And everybody in every life haschallenges as well as successes
along the way.
Nobody has a problem free life.
So you end up whether you callyourself a leadership coach or a
career coach or whatever othertype of coach, you end up
coaching their whole life,really, because everything is
connected and everything isrelated.
And so by being able to come inalongside and kind of walk
(17:43):
people through that phase oftheir life, that has also been
some of the most rewarding workfor me.
and being able to see them,especially, and for a while, I
did a lot of outplacement careercoaching.
So especially there, I wassometimes even in the room as
they were getting fired, which Iwould not recommend putting the
outplacement coach in that roombecause then they associate you
with that negative event.
However, some organizations didthat anyway.
(18:04):
But when I meet them, usually onthe day they got fired, they
were devastated and they were insuch breakdown that they
couldn't even, like, I knew theyweren't going to remember
anything with me on that firstmeeting.
But I also knew my job today isto let you know you're going to
be okay and i'm going to be herewhen you're ready let's not
start next week take a week ortwo or three even to breathe to
(18:25):
rest to do what you need to doto take care of yourself when
you are at a place emotionallythat you're ready to get started
i'll be here and i knew evenwhen some of those first
meetings were so hard i also hadthis joy because i knew that
they were going to end up notonly finding their way from
there but every single time i'dsee people who would have never
(18:45):
left that job or you knowwhatever different reasons and
And every single one of them, atleast that worked with me, ended
up in a much better place thanwhere they'd been.
So I knew they were going to gosomewhere so much better.
But I'd get so excited for them.
Even in that first day, I hadone person ever who walked into
that room after immediatelybeing fired.
And she was like, I'm free.
(19:07):
She was so excited.
She had been feeling stuckbecause she cared so much about
her teammate and the people thatshe was working with.
But she hated the job.
And she'd been wanting it foryears.
and she felt so relieved whenshe got fired and didn't have to
be the one to quit.
SPEAKER_01 (19:24):
She
SPEAKER_03 (19:25):
was the only person I've seen coming with that much
joy at that moment.
SPEAKER_04 (19:29):
What about like thinking about your journey and
it's exciting to see how manyshifts you've done throughout
your life.
It's like amazing.
SPEAKER_03 (19:37):
There's actually way more than I've even mentioned,
but yes, I am the queen ofresilience and reinvention for
sure.
SPEAKER_04 (19:43):
Where is it going next?
So like thinking about thefuture for the next one to three
years Yes.
Are you now working towards somespecific goals with your
coaching business?
SPEAKER_03 (19:53):
I really have taken a lot of different paths.
So I did all the training anddevelopment stuff.
And then I started working as aleadership consultant for a
hospital, but I was under HR andthe HR people I was working for
had no vision.
They were all about complianceand finding people doing things
wrong.
And a couple of them didn't evenbelieve in leadership
development.
And why are you even here?
And it was just so hard to be inthat
SPEAKER_01 (20:15):
stunted
SPEAKER_03 (20:16):
place.
And I was at an HR conferenceAnd it was a great conference.
It was in Indianapolis, but itwas like the leaders of that
conference were more visionary,but most of the attendees
weren't.
And I'm sure you've heard ofSeth Godin, but Seth Godin was a
speaker there.
And he was begging people.
He was like, Indiana, you areflying too low.
(20:38):
You have to look up.
You have to see what's coming.
You have to be more futurefocused and ready to do new
things.
And most people in that room,and he even said, the majority
of you aren't even going tounderstand You know what I'm
saying?
But they didn't.
He's like, but I know there'sjust a couple of you in this
room.
And I'm like, me, me, me.
You get it, you know?
And even at his book signingafterwards, most of those people
(20:58):
had never heard of him.
They didn't know who he was.
And you know, those of us, Ithink there was like, literally,
I think there was maybe 20people in line for his book
signing.
And this was a conference oflike 3000 or more.
There were really only a handfulof us who understood anything
about who he was.
But that was a defining momentfor me that I was like, why am I
in this room full of people whoare nothing like me?
Mm-hmm.
(21:48):
And so while I was there, I waslike, oh, my gosh, it was night
and day energy and differencebetween the HR slow, sad
conference.
And it was sad.
I mean, there was amazing peoplethere.
It just didn't feel like my fit.
And so I just realized I want tobe in this more vibrant world.
And so I was like, what could Ido?
I'm not a tech person.
That's not my background.
(22:09):
But I ended up having thisvision of creating on demand
co-working as a platform.
And so I did that for two years.
I had several spaces inIndianapolis and Chicago.
And as fate would have it, myinvestor and I both realized
things weren't quite taking off.
He actually didn't know thatmuch about tech either.
We realized we were spending toomuch money.
We needed somebody who was atech expert on our team.
(22:29):
And we could have either doubleddown.
And the other thing that was amoment for me in that decision
was I went out to California.
And in the same day, I went tothe Redwood Forest in the
morning for the first timeseeing the Redwoods.
And they actually had this bigtree.
And it was about innovation.
And they actually had a steamengine train where they talked
about the tech technology forthat.
And they actually shared thestory that Tesla was this huge
(22:51):
inventor, but nobody really knewhis name because other people
had stolen the credit for it.
And that's why Elon Musk namedhis company Tesla, because he
wanted his name to be honoredfor the technology advances that
he brought to the world.
But this timeline of this tree,it was like nothing for however
many, you know, hundreds orthousands of years, not
thousands, but however long thetree had been alive up to that
point.
And then the first invention wasa printing press.
(23:13):
And then it was going, so therewas like shorter and shorter and
shorter and shorter timesbetween the the next inventions
until we got to more of thecurrent.
And then it was like constant,right?
So really, really nothing toslow, to faster, to faster, to
like constant change.
So that was something I'mthinking about.
And then I go to Google,Facebook, and Apple all in the
same afternoon, because they'reall really close to each other.
(23:34):
So I spent a couple hours ateach after being in the Redwood
forest in the morning.
And so I'm there, you know, Ihave a tech startup at the time
and I'm like, this is theepitome of success where, you
know, I can take my tech startuptoo.
And I was like, wait a second.
I stepped out of hr and bigcompanies and big business to be
where the vibrant movers andshakers are and where there's
(23:54):
all this energy and my goal isto create a corporation and it
was like i want to be in theredwood forest this isn't what i
actually want to be my end goali want to have a lifestyle
business where i can actually doit from anywhere i can go
different places i'm notbuilding this huge company
that's not me and so that waspart of what had happened right
(24:14):
before we i came back from thatand my investor and i sat down
and said okay let's not do thisanymore.
Right after that, COVID hit.
So thank God we weren't tryingto do a co-working business
during COVID.
And so at that point, you know,again, I have to completely
reinvent myself.
I had stepped away from all thelearning and development stuff
that I was doing, even though Iactually was doing some
trainings within the co-workingspace.
(24:36):
But I said, okay, I just did allthis big stuff, doing all these
different moving parts, allthese different things, having
to hire different people fordifferent things.
What can I do that's just meright now to just like breathe
for a dialing into LinkedIn.
And I'd been on LinkedIn sinceprobably the very beginning.
And I had started to see it wayback at the beginning.
It was really just an onlineresume.
(24:56):
There wasn't a whole lot goingon as far as community or
anything else.
And then I saw people startingto bring a lot more content and
the content creators.
And there were just a few ofthem at the very beginning.
And a lot of people were like,this is not that kind of
platform and really tried toshut them down.
And they're like, no, we thinkthere's more available here.
You know, I saw one of the firstviral, you know, things on
LinkedIn and we're like, you cango viral on LinkedIn like that.
(25:18):
just was kind of unheard of backthen and so I'd always been a
fan of the platform and Irealized I actually know quite a
bit I've seen a lot of thingsI've connected with a lot of
these thought leaders so I'mgoing to tell people with their
LinkedIn I can do that just me Ican coach people with their
careers and LinkedIn and thingslike that and so that's what I
started doing for about a yearand a half to two years I think
so I did that and then COVIDhappened while I was doing that
(25:38):
and I had just posted as mycover photo on my LinkedIn this
question that said aren't youtired of playing small and it
was meant for my clients myprospects and I see that every
day as I'm going out there fortwo weeks.
And then I'm like, wait asecond, that question was for
me.
And that was right after my dadhad died.
He was this incredibleinternational business leader.
And he had this huge leadershiplegacy and mentoring.
(26:02):
He actually had mentored the manwho's now the president of
Elanco, which is the animalhealth division of Lilly at the
time.
And that man started a mentoringcompany in Indianapolis, which
has now gone national.
And he'd been mentored directlyby my dad.
And so I felt like even that waspart of my dad's legacy.
And then all these people arefreaking out during COVID
saying, oh my gosh, how do wework remotely?
(26:24):
How do we connect people thatare across the world?
How can we possibly?
And I'm like, I know all theseanswers.
This is what we've been doing inemployee engagement.
This is stuff that I've beenworking on.
We used to call it telecommutinginstead of remote work, but it
was stuff that I'd already donea lot of.
I realized I'd already beenbuilding out a bunch of
solutions over the years too.
And I realized I was actuallybuilding a system and it was all
the answers of what peopleneeded.
(26:45):
And I was playing way too smallby only focusing on in
individuals one-on-one onLinkedIn things.
And so I decided, okay, it'stime for me to get bigger again.
That's when I started my, well,I'd already been doing the
podcast called Bring YourBrilliance.
And that was about showcasingother people's brilliance.
You know, I'd already done a lotof the career coaching and
outplacement coaching at thetime.
And I meet all these people incorporate who wanted to do
(27:05):
something else.
They wanted to go start theirown business or do whatever
else, but they were terrified.
They're like, I can't, like, howcan I, I wouldn't have benefits.
I wouldn't have this.
I wouldn't have that.
I don't even know what to do.
And I was looking, I've about 10years or more ahead for some
reason.
I don't know.
That's just how I'm wired.
And I had seen before COVID,everybody was already predicting
there was going to be this massexodus of like the baby boomers
(27:28):
and everything else that therewas going to be a lot fewer, but
bigger corporations.
And then people were going tostart doing gig economy and all
these different things that thewhole entire workforce was
shifting.
And that's actually why Istarted the coworking thing was
because I was like, man, there'sgoing to be a lot of people
falling through the cracks.
And here I am helping theseincredible professionals that
had their company pay foroutplacement.
(27:49):
But what about all these otherpeople who don't get
outplacement coaching?
They're going to need help.
They're going to need to figureout where to go.
How do we catch them as theyfall?
Where are they going to go ifthey don't know where to go?
And I looked ahead to like, evenI looked out for like India and
some other countries that wereahead of the US as far as having
gone through massive economicshifts.
And their co-working spaces werethriving.
(28:10):
And that's where everybody wouldgo to get the pulse of the
economy of the community and allthat stuff.
And I was like, that's wherepeople are going to go is these
co-working spaces that's wherewe can touch them so yes my
vehicle was connecting people toco-working spaces but my
ultimate goal was to actuallyconnect people teach them how to
collaborate and help them figureout their next steps so it was
like a career coaching versionof that was my ultimate goal was
(28:32):
to actually give them what theyneeded so that they could get to
their next step and so now as Itell you all this everything had
this theme but at the time I waslike why am I doing this and
then this and then this and youknow like I was going in so many
different directions and yeteverything had this theme of how
helping people bring theirbrilliance.
And when I started my podcast, Iwas always the person behind the
(28:53):
scenes.
I was always like, you go outand do these amazing things.
You go out and do those amazingthings.
And they would and they thriveand they'd have these amazing
lives.
But I was the behind the scenesperson.
And when I started doing mypodcast, I worked with a graphic
designer.
And I was like, I really feellike I need a new name for my
business at this point,everything else.
He's like, well, why don't youcall it bring your brilliance.
And he wanted to do a brandingof my face, even for my podcast,
(29:15):
you know, next to the wordsbring your brilliance.
I'm like, I can't call myselfbrilliant I can't he's like why
not like I teach everybody elseto own their brilliance and be
able to talk about theirsignificant strengths and
contributions and things likethat and then I was afraid to do
it myself you know that was whenI made that shift and started
putting myself out there andputting myself out front and
realizing how scary it reallywas and like admiring my clients
(29:37):
even more and understanding themso much more you just got to get
out there and do it done isbetter than perfect and don't be
afraid and actually was at aconference and I'm going to say
a swear word so you might wantto leave it out if you need to.
But there was a man who'd comefrom a corporate, he worked at
IBM and he started doing a lotof social media stuff and things
like that.
And he was like, just do thedamn thing.
Push the damn button.
(29:58):
He had a hat that said that.
He's like, just do it becauseyou're going to learn more every
time you do it.
So everybody's going to startwith that first pancake.
You know, everybody's going tohave that messy beginning.
That's okay.
That's where you're going tolearn.
That's where you're going togrow.
That's got to take action inorder to action.
So I did.
And I ended up growing myLinkedIn to over 11,000 people.
and doing a lot on there.
(30:19):
But yeah, I've always been myown guinea pig.
Even when I was teaching otherpeople to do it, I've done a lot
of the other things that I'vedone the put myself out front
part.
And now I've done that.
SPEAKER_04 (30:28):
Thank you.
Thank you for sharing all ofthat.
Sorry about that.
You've actually answered quite afew of my questions.
I really appreciate that.
If there's any advice within thelast minute that we can give to
coaches who are listening whowant to scale their impact?
Is there anything else you'dlike to add?
SPEAKER_03 (30:45):
So as I was doing all those things, as I had that
big opportunity, moment about Iwas playing too small and
calling my company, then bringyour brilliance.
I had also basically been giftedthis entire career development
program.
It was actually from the man whohad run the entire career
development program for EliLilly, which is a huge global
company for 28 years.
(31:05):
And he didn't know that I hadworked at Lilly.
He didn't know that my dad hadworked at Lilly, but he was in
Indianapolis and he wasretiring.
And Lilly was actually, it wasone of the most highly
benchmarked, like just thisphenomenal program.
Most of those people have spenttheir entire career there.
So all these incredible businesspeople having incredible success
in their careers.
But for some reason, when he wasretiring, Lily decided to throw
that whole program out and justget some new brand line, new
(31:27):
online one.
And this man, his name is JohnBice.
He was so heartbroken.
He's like, this is my legacy.
Why are they getting rid of it?
I can't die with me.
And so he went out to theIndianapolis community, found a
handful of career coaches, whichis what I was doing at that
time.
And so he said, take it, make ityour own, do whatever you want
with it.
Just don't let it die with me.
And so I created that into firsta program and then a book called
(31:50):
the Career Happiness Project.
And I actually wrote it while Iwas running the outplacement
career center in Cincinnati atOmniSource.
I was staying there during theweek.
And I'd always said if I couldhave a week or two in a hotel
room, I would write a book.
Well, I had almost nine monthsof being every week at this
hotel room, which is also Ithink how I survived my triplets
being 13 that year.
That was a tough year, let metell you.
(32:11):
But I wrote the book and Iactually got to use all my
content and exercises with theseoutplacement clients.
initially to do some testing ofit but I started using that as
my career coaching program forseveral years and then I finally
published the book and so Ipublished that in 20 I don't
know what year it was but prettyrecently 2023 maybe and two
weeks to the day after Ipublished it I happened to be at
(32:33):
another HR conference this timesomebody had invited me to come
with them and I didn't even knowMarcus Buckingham was the
speaker and so I got to meet himin person I got a picture with
him I actually signed my book tohim as he was signing his book
to me got a picture with himholding my book.
And I was so excited as my wholefangirl thing.
I was like, I finally understoodlike, I was like, Oh my gosh,
(32:56):
this might be like my mostexciting day ever.
He's like, really?
But it was such an incrediblemoment for me.
And so because I actually hadthat book in my hand, I walk
into a co working space.
And there's so many things in mylife, too.
And this woman who I'd knownwhen she worked at Lily crazy
patterns here said, Oh my gosh,you need to be this professor.
He's looking for somebody who'sgot career development, is that
(33:18):
your book?
And I said, yes.
So she connected me withProfessor Fazi and he's the one
that I'm now creating thiscollege textbook and curriculum
called Career Happiness in theAge of AI.
So what's next is we're creatingthis college curriculum.
It's incredible as far as hislife's work for more than 25
years, he's been studying AI andhe's one of the top AI experts
in the world, like beforeanybody else had even really
(33:39):
heard of it.
And he has really honed in onthe three areas of human skills
that are ever more going to beneeded in our AI world.
And so we're teaching people howto focus on and align with and
develop their careers, keepingthose three areas of human
skills in mind, as well as howto navigate how to, you know,
what do you need to think aboutwhen you're putting out your
(34:01):
resume and doing your LinkedIn?
And what are the AI?
What are the applicant trackingsystems looking for?
What are the different AIsseeing across the platforms, as
well as the people and what youneed to be doing.
And so it's a really solid,powerful book, we're actually
working with a publisher now, itshould be out by the end of this
year, I think, maybe even alittle bit sooner.
And I'm already teaching someworkshops on that.
(34:22):
So I have a workshop coming upnext week, actually, which is
specifically geared towardslearning and development
professionals and how they'reactually the MVPs of the
superpowers of what we areneeding in the age of AI, the
new AI era.
SPEAKER_04 (34:35):
What I'm thinking is we can actually continue this
conversation further because Ihave a couple more questions to
ask you.
But right now, I'm going to haveto jump off.
I just got one other guest thatis waiting.
So stay How about we continue?
I'm going to keep this recordingand then we're going to merge it
with another one.
So what you can do is bookanother session with me.
(34:55):
I'm going to send you the linkover email and then we can
continue the rest of theconversation.
Sorry, I didn't mean to cut youoff, but just wanted to because
someone else is waiting.
I understand.
So thank you and we'll continuethe rest of it on the second
part of it.
So thank you so much.
SPEAKER_03 (35:11):
Okay, thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (35:13):
Bye.
That's it for this episode ofCareer Coaching Secrets.
If you enjoyed thisconversation, you can subscribe
to YouTube, Spotify, ApplePodcasts, or wherever you're
listening to this episode tocatch future episodes.
This conversation was brought toyou by Purple Circle, where we
help career coaches scale theirbusiness to seven and eight
figures without burning out.
To learn more about PurpleCircle, our community, and how
(35:33):
we can help you grow yourbusiness, visit
joinpurplecircle.com.
And so to me, I believe it was definitely a God
thing that these things all cameto be.
But as I started doing more andmore with creating lots of
different programs andfacilitating a lot of different
programs, I taught everything,farming equipment.
I taught about so many differentthings, but the ones that really
resonated so deeply with me wereall of the leadership
(00:20):
development back then.
We called them soft skills,right?
But all the things about howpeople connect and relate and
communicate and all of thosethings.
And so I realized I reallywanted to be more of a trainer
and a facilitator.
And I loved also the strategyand the curriculum architecture
and all that, because that's mynumber one strength is strategy.
And I'm up there as well.
But I just love being in frontof people.
SPEAKER_00 (00:42):
Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast
where we talk with successfulcareer coaches on how they built
their success and the hardlessons they learned along the
way.
My name is Davis Nguyen, and I'mthe founder of Purple Circle,
where we help career coachesscale their business to$100,000
years,$100,000 months, and even$100,000 weeks.
Before Purple Circle, I've grownseveral seven and eight figure
career coaching business myself,and I've been a consultant at
(01:03):
two career coaching businessesthat are doing over a hundred
million dollars each.
Whether you're an establishedcoach or building your practice
for the first time, you'lldiscover the secrets to
elevating your coachingbusiness.
Nice.
SPEAKER_04 (01:13):
Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of
Career Coaching Secrets Podcast.
I'm your host, Regen, andtoday's guest is Carla Taylor,
an executive leadership andcareer coach, keynote speaker,
and co-author of CareerHappiness in the Age of AI.
With more than 25 years ofexperience guiding leaders and
organizations throughtransformation, Carla
(01:35):
specializes in helping peoplealign their strengths, navigate
change with confidence, anddesign careers and cultures that
are both future-ready, anddeeply fulfilling.
As the founder of Bring YourBrilliance and a number one
international bestsellingauthor, Carla has developed
innovative coaching frameworksthat empower professionals to
discover their true value,unlock their brilliance and
(01:57):
thrive in today's rapidlyshifting world of work.
And it's a pleasure for me tohave her on the podcast today.
Welcome to the show, Carla.
SPEAKER_03 (02:04):
Thank you so very much.
I'm happy to be here.
SPEAKER_04 (02:06):
Thank you for coming, Carla.
I wanted to talk to you aboutwhen it comes to your coaching
business and your beginnings.
First of all, how long has itbeen since you actually started
coaching?
And then when thinking aboutbusiness itself, I think it's
been almost seven years, buthave you been coaching before
that?
How did this start and whatinspired you to do this?
SPEAKER_03 (02:26):
Well, yeah, that's such a great question.
So for me, I actually started myentire journey wanting to just
learn.
I've always been an avidlearner.
I've always been very futurefocused, but I also didn't know
what I wanted to do because Ihad a lot of different options
and possibilities of what Icould possibly do.
So even in college, way back incollege, I took way more credits
(02:47):
than you're even supposed to ina semester.
Like you're supposed to do 12 to18 and I always did 20 to 21
because I just wanted to learnas much as I could and try to
figure out my own career path.
And I couldn't quite figure itout because nothing was standing
out to me.
And so, so much of what I'velearned along the way is what I
was seeking for myself first,which I think happens for a lot
of people, of course.
But I also grew up livinginternationally.
(03:09):
And so I've already had such awide variety of experiences in
my life, even back when I wasstill in college.
But since then, I've done somany things and so many
different things in my owncareer.
Again, it was more of a, let metry this, let me try that, you
know, and the 20s really are forexploration, which is a great
thing to be doing.
I explored, I did a lot ofdifferent things in a lot of
different ways.
(03:30):
And so back then, it wasactually a really bad thing to
have a lot of career moves,because it's like, oh, you're
not loyal, you're notconsistent, you know, whatever.
Now it's like, well, why are youbeing stagnant, staying in the
same place for so long?
So finally, the world caught up.
with me.
And looking for people who had alot of diverse experiences and
things.
But no, it was just part of itwas me seeking.
(03:52):
But as far as becoming a coachitself.
So I started down this path oftrying to figure out different
things.
And I just found one job becauseit was at a language school that
I had actually taken Japanesefrom when we moved to Japan.
And so I was like, oh, this is agreat organization.
I ended up working for them atfirst as an English instructor.
And then I ran the whole frontdesk and all that.
And then I ended up leading allthe intercultural programs.
(04:14):
So that was really fun.
and awesome.
Every job I was taking, I keptbeing like, wow, like this needs
to be better for people to learnthe job itself.
And I started just like creatingmanuals or ways to train myself
and then whoever came after me.
So I was naturally drawn to thatfor sure.
I didn't even know that therewas a thing, there was a degree
(04:34):
in that, which is actuallycalled instructional design.
And even how I ended up gettinga master's degree in
instructional design.
But again, it wasn't something Iknew about.
It literally was, I was gettingready to get engaged my not yet
fiance at the time we weretalking about moving to
indianapolis we were down inatlanta and my cousin had just
interviewed in it which is whatmy boyfriend at the time was in
(04:56):
so we were trying to find herand ask her hey who should he
talk to in indianapolis if hewants to start interviewing well
this was before cell phones andso we tracked her down at her
mom's house my aunt and so i wastelling her what we were looking
for what my questions were and isaid well my plan is to go move
in with my parents save somemoney for a year to get a
master's degree, you know, andgo from there.
(05:17):
And she's like, hang on asecond.
My mom wants to ask you aquestion.
So my aunt gets on the phone.
This is a Sunday night.
I remember very distinctly.
We got off the phone at 10 PM,but she was like, how would you
like to come to Iowa and livewith us for free and get your
master's degree for free?
And I was like, well, I haven'teven taken the GRE.
Like I was just gatheringinformation.
I wasn't prepared to startanything yet.
(05:37):
And basically they're like,well, your uncle is a professor.
He has a graduate chip open.
It would actually be free foryou.
It'll pay you a stipend.
You can do it in a year and itstarts in a week.
Well, I haven't even taken theGRE.
I haven't done any of thesethings.
They're like, well, we know theDean.
We could probably get thatwaived.
I'm like, well, I'd at leasthave to give two weeks notice at
work.
(05:57):
And they were like, well, youcould probably start a week
late.
We could probably get thatsorted out.
So I did the next morning,Monday morning, I was giving my
two weeks notice and I was upkeeping my entire life to go off
to this incredible opportunitythat really fell in my lap.
And the degree that I didn'teven know what I wanted.
I knew I liked writing, but Ididn't know training.
There was a degree in anythingin the training or adult
(06:19):
education.
world, that was the degree.
That was what my uncle was aprofessor in that area.
And so she's like, I think hemight like it.
And it was perfect.
It was exactly what I didn'tknow I was looking for.
And so that started me on thispath then of working with
training, learning anddevelopment, leadership
development, organizationaldevelopment, all of those things
(06:40):
that I've always been interestedin.
I actually had figured that muchout in my undergrad that I
really was fascinated by howpeople work better together.
Management was my minor there.
It was something I was alreadyinterested in.
But again, I didn't know thatpath or that degree even
existed.
And so to me, I believe it wasdefinitely a God thing that
these things all came to be.
(07:01):
But as I started doing more andmore with creating lots of
different programs andfacilitating a lot of different
programs, I taught everything,farming equipment.
I taught about so many differentthings, but the ones that really
resonated so deeply with me wereall of the leadership
development back then.
We called them soft skills, butall the things about how people
connect and relate andcommunicate and all of those
(07:21):
things and so I realized Ireally wanted to be more of a
trainer and a facilitator and Iloved also the strategy and the
curriculum architecture and allthat because that's like my
number one strength is strategyand I'm up there as well but I
just love being in front ofpeople and talking with people
as well and so and that's theother thing I took a speech
class in college and I wasterrified I hated it I was like
(07:44):
I will never do that again andmy very first day coming into
that graduate semester master'sdegree program starting a week
late like the very first thing Ihaven't even met anybody yet
they're like come on and I justgo with them and we go to this
massive auditorium in front ofthis hundreds of students and
they're like do that like so I'mstanding on a stage reading
slides I've never seen that wasmy thrown into the deep end
(08:06):
introduction to that graduateassistant role so obviously I
had to get over my fear now Ilove it I love being able to
impact people a lot of differentways but being on a stage in
front of people which is sofunny because I was so shy
growing up.
I had, you know, I never wasbrave enough to even talk to
many people and so fascinatinghow my life has taken so many.
(08:27):
I'll never do that.
And then here I am doing that.
I
SPEAKER_04 (08:30):
just wanted to ask when you made the move, were you
actually in Japan or was it?
SPEAKER_03 (08:35):
No.
So I had grown up.
So Indianapolis is my dad workedfor Eli Lilly and that's the
world headquarters.
And so he'd gotten intointernational business when I
was pretty young.
But then when I was like infourth, fifth and sixth grade,
we lived in Taipei, Taiwan, andmy dad was working in Asia and
And then I came back toIndianapolis for a few years,
and then we went to Japan for myhigh school years.
So I graduated from high schoolin Japan, but then I went to
(08:57):
college at Indiana University.
Then I moved down to Atlantafive days after I graduated.
Again, a very spontaneous, let'sjust do this and figure it out.
I didn't have a job lined up.
I was just like, I want to gosomewhere else.
And after trying to get work,and back then your degree really
mattered.
And since I had taken so manydifferent courses in undergrad,
I ended up graduating with ageneral studies degree, but with
(09:18):
a management minor.
because I could either graduatein three and a half years, which
I ended up stretching out tofour, or it would have taken me
an extra year to actually get amanagement major.
And so I'm like, well, I'll justdo it this way, get my degree,
it'll be fine.
But then I found back then itreally wasn't fine because
people didn't take the generalstudies degree as seriously.
And so I kept finding roleswhere I wasn't at the next level
(09:40):
where I really should have been.
And so I was like, I need to goget a master's degree if I want
to be taken seriously.
So I did that, but I went fromAtlanta to Iowa.
you know, city to right out inthe country where my aunt and
uncle live.
And then I moved toIndianapolis.
So it was actually a goodtransition to get back to
Indiana because for me, theMidwest just didn't feel
vibrant, exciting place like alot of the other places I've
(10:02):
lived as well.
But that's where I ended upraising my children.
And so it's all as it was meantto be.
I'm sure I got into the trainingand learning and development
world, created all sorts ofdifferent trainings and things,
loved working with people.
But I was still doing it eitherat like the organizational
change management level,employee engagement things like
that.
I was doing it at a team level.
I wasn't doing much of theone-on-one coaching at that
(10:23):
time.
And so, well, I ended up havingtriplets.
That was a step out of my careermoment for sure.
SPEAKER_01 (10:29):
And
SPEAKER_03 (10:31):
so I myself was working for Eli Lilly at the
time.
And so I stayed home for thefirst two years of having my
kids.
And then I actually ended upgoing through a divorce.
And so I needed to figure outwhat was next.
And it was 2009.
So I don't know if you recall,it was like this huge recession
and nobody was hiring.
And I was trying to get work atthat point.
I would get, actually, I'd getlike the top one or two
(10:52):
candidates that I'd get all theway through the interviews.
And then they'd be like, oh, weactually can't hire for that
position at all right now.
And I was like, oh my gosh, thisis awful.
And so someone said to me atthat point, I had a master's
degree.
They're like, especially with amaster's degree, it could take
you 12 to 18 months at thispoint to find a role.
So why not spend that timebuilding your own business?
And I was like, oh, I've neverdone that before.
You know, it was really scary,but I did.
(11:14):
And again, I just kind of jumpedinto it and figured it out along
the way.
A lot of things I'd obviouslydo.
differently now but that was in2009 and so at that time i've
done a lot of really cooltraining and even gotten some
certifications and things when iwas at lily and so i created a
program called ignite yourstrengths and my first company
was called ignite consulting andi was mostly doing these team
(11:35):
workshops and series ofworkshops on disc communication
styles and strengths findercombined and it was a really
powerful program for teams toreally learn a lot about
themselves and those who did thefull program as a year-long
program really massivelytransformed And it was so
amazing, you know, all thethings you learn about in
strengths finder and strengthsbased approach, but a lot of
people will just do the oneworkshop, although they'll take
(11:57):
the assessment and not do a lotwith it.
But when you actually put it inthe work and shift things across
your team, and even across theorganization, I had a couple
organizations who actuallyallowed me to teach all of the
teams.
At one point, we had them all inthe same room.
And it was I don't know how manypeople but it was so cool,
because not only could the teamitself figure out what they
would need to do with strengthsacross the team, but then the
(12:18):
teams across the organization.
could say well this team'sreally good at influencing and
this team's really good ataccounting or you know whatever
and so they could figure outways to leverage across the
entire organization it was socool and so people who actually
do that I got to see them prettygood you know they started out
here there's this team of peopleright and then it was like like
they just soared and went tothis massive new level
(12:40):
individually but also as a teamand even like the team itself
started winning all these awardsand it was just really really
amazing to see what happens whenpeople put it into practice I
never could understand peoplewho are like fangirls or
whatever that are like all aboutcelebrities and especially
because I grew up meeting evencelebrities but a lot of really
you know big important peopleand stuff so I've always just
been like I'm comfortable withanybody like from the top person
(13:01):
to the lowest I can relate toanybody wherever they are and I
was like oh celebrities are coolbut they're just people still
but the one person that I havealways been like oh my gosh he's
amazing everything I've everdone has been based on his work
is Marcus Buckingham who ofcourse used to be with Gallup
and then created his own companyas well but he's all about
strengths and love plus work ishis newest book and like
(13:23):
everything he does.
And I had his video.
And so in my Ignite YourStrengths class, I would play
that first video from TrombonePlayer Wanted, which is, you
know, was one of his first videoseries.
And so I'd see him, you know,talking every time I taught you
for hundreds and hundreds andhundreds of sessions.
And so I was always just like,Oh my gosh, he's so amazing.
And so after I started my owncompany, that's when I got a
(13:45):
coaching certification as well.
And at that point, I actuallymade made the decision, that was
when ICF was pretty new,International Coaching
Federation.
And because I'd already paid fora master's degree and had so
many years, you know, 15 yearsof experience at this point, I
didn't feel like I needed tospend a huge amount of money for
something.
I didn't know if it was actuallygoing to ever be super legit at
that time.
So I chose not to go down thatpath.
(14:07):
And I now probably would havedone that differently because
especially if you want to bedoing coaching in corporate
worlds, they often will onlyallow people who've had the ICF
certification.
And so that being a deal breakerfor me but what I found is if I
don't actually call myself acoach and I come in more as a
consultant then they'll stillhire but if I had to do it over
again I probably would have goneahead with ICF at that point but
(14:30):
at this point I've coachedhundreds of people I've taught
so many classes I've worked withso many organizations I don't
feel the need to go back and tryto do that too because I found
different entry points anddifferent ways to still help
people but what was so coolabout when I finally got my
coaching certification that'swhen I started working with
individuals and it was amazingto me that you know you can
(14:50):
influence the entireorganization with some of these
big things and that's incredibleto be able to do and you can
really help teams come bettertogether and everything else but
the deep transformation and thespeed of transformation happens
at the individual level and so Iactually found I loved all three
and so for years I struggledwith okay should I go after the
big organizational thing shouldI go after the team should I go
(15:11):
after the individuals and everytime I was like okay I'm just
going to choose one and stayhere it didn't feel like enough
for me I felt like but they'vegot all these other skills I'm
not using that I want to be incontribution to.
And so that was actually one ofmy own learnings about my own
career.
And one of the reasons why thepeople I help the most, usually
they're mid-career and usuallythey have like a
multi-potential, multi-facetedkind of like they could do a lot
(15:34):
of different things.
And they've been stuck in thisworld where people say, well,
you just have to choose one.
The rest of that sentence is youhave to choose one at a time.
And one of the people I've lovedalong the way also is Barbara
Scherr.
And she was a very well-knowncareer coach back in like the
80s.
and 90s, I think.
She used to have a show on PBSand do all sorts of things.
But she wrote a book, I Can DoAnything If Only I Knew What It
(15:55):
Was.
She wrote a book calledWishcraft and several other job
related books.
And one of her terms was ascanner.
And a scanner is thatmulti-potential light, that
multifaceted person who, youknow, some people even would put
the ADHD people in that thing,although she actually
differentiates between the two.
But they're the ones who areconstantly looking at different
things.
And part of what makes themthrive is variety.
(16:16):
That's Being able to balance,okay, I'm going to do this much
with teams, this much withorganizations, this much with
individuals, rather than tryingto just stay in one is where I
thrive and what I love to do andhow I can really show up in a
lot of different ways and helppeople at different levels.
And so I also help people whoare like me, who are trying to
(16:37):
figure out what do I want to doand how can I put it together
and have been told their wholelives, well, you're doing it
wrong.
No, we're doing it the way itworks for us.
And there's different tools thatwe need that maybe other people
don't because they can just pickone and stay in one lane, never
vary from it.
So I really found, you know, I'mso good at all three of those
levels because I have such avisionary strategy vision.
(17:00):
I can see as soon as I meetsomeone, whether it's a person,
a team or an organization, I cansee them at their fullest
potential.
I can see exactly where theycould go and how they could be
at their best.
It just is almost instant forme.
That has made me really good atall three of those levels.
But especially with theone-on-one, I can really come
along somebody and help themthrough whatever it is that
(17:22):
they're feeling challenged with.
And everybody in every life haschallenges as well as successes
along the way.
Nobody has a problem free life.
So you end up whether you callyourself a leadership coach or a
career coach or whatever othertype of coach, you end up
coaching their whole life,really, because everything is
connected and everything isrelated.
And so by being able to come inalongside and kind of walk
(17:43):
people through that phase oftheir life, that has also been
some of the most rewarding workfor me.
and being able to see them,especially, and for a while, I
did a lot of outplacement careercoaching.
So especially there, I wassometimes even in the room as
they were getting fired, which Iwould not recommend putting the
outplacement coach in that roombecause then they associate you
with that negative event.
However, some organizations didthat anyway.
(18:04):
But when I meet them, usually onthe day they got fired, they
were devastated and they were insuch breakdown that they
couldn't even, like, I knew theyweren't going to remember
anything with me on that firstmeeting.
But I also knew my job today isto let you know you're going to
be okay and i'm going to be herewhen you're ready let's not
start next week take a week ortwo or three even to breathe to
(18:25):
rest to do what you need to doto take care of yourself when
you are at a place emotionallythat you're ready to get started
i'll be here and i knew evenwhen some of those first
meetings were so hard i also hadthis joy because i knew that
they were going to end up notonly finding their way from
there but every single time i'dsee people who would have never
(18:45):
left that job or you knowwhatever different reasons and
And every single one of them, atleast that worked with me, ended
up in a much better place thanwhere they'd been.
So I knew they were going to gosomewhere so much better.
But I'd get so excited for them.
Even in that first day, I hadone person ever who walked into
that room after immediatelybeing fired.
And she was like, I'm free.
(19:07):
She was so excited.
She had been feeling stuckbecause she cared so much about
her teammate and the people thatshe was working with.
But she hated the job.
And she'd been wanting it foryears.
and she felt so relieved whenshe got fired and didn't have to
be the one to quit.
SPEAKER_01 (19:24):
She
SPEAKER_03 (19:25):
was the only person I've seen coming with that much
joy at that moment.
SPEAKER_04 (19:29):
What about like thinking about your journey and
it's exciting to see how manyshifts you've done throughout
your life.
It's like amazing.
SPEAKER_03 (19:37):
There's actually way more than I've even mentioned,
but yes, I am the queen ofresilience and reinvention for
sure.
SPEAKER_04 (19:43):
Where is it going next?
So like thinking about thefuture for the next one to three
years Yes.
Are you now working towards somespecific goals with your
coaching business?
SPEAKER_03 (19:53):
I really have taken a lot of different paths.
So I did all the training anddevelopment stuff.
And then I started working as aleadership consultant for a
hospital, but I was under HR andthe HR people I was working for
had no vision.
They were all about complianceand finding people doing things
wrong.
And a couple of them didn't evenbelieve in leadership
development.
And why are you even here?
And it was just so hard to be inthat
SPEAKER_01 (20:15):
stunted
SPEAKER_03 (20:16):
place.
And I was at an HR conferenceAnd it was a great conference.
It was in Indianapolis, but itwas like the leaders of that
conference were more visionary,but most of the attendees
weren't.
And I'm sure you've heard ofSeth Godin, but Seth Godin was a
speaker there.
And he was begging people.
He was like, Indiana, you areflying too low.
(20:38):
You have to look up.
You have to see what's coming.
You have to be more futurefocused and ready to do new
things.
And most people in that room,and he even said, the majority
of you aren't even going tounderstand You know what I'm
saying?
But they didn't.
He's like, but I know there'sjust a couple of you in this
room.
And I'm like, me, me, me.
You get it, you know?
And even at his book signingafterwards, most of those people
(20:58):
had never heard of him.
They didn't know who he was.
And you know, those of us, Ithink there was like, literally,
I think there was maybe 20people in line for his book
signing.
And this was a conference oflike 3000 or more.
There were really only a handfulof us who understood anything
about who he was.
But that was a defining momentfor me that I was like, why am I
in this room full of people whoare nothing like me?
Mm-hmm.
(21:48):
And so while I was there, I waslike, oh, my gosh, it was night
and day energy and differencebetween the HR slow, sad
conference.
And it was sad.
I mean, there was amazing peoplethere.
It just didn't feel like my fit.
And so I just realized I want tobe in this more vibrant world.
And so I was like, what could Ido?
I'm not a tech person.
That's not my background.
(22:09):
But I ended up having thisvision of creating on demand
co-working as a platform.
And so I did that for two years.
I had several spaces inIndianapolis and Chicago.
And as fate would have it, myinvestor and I both realized
things weren't quite taking off.
He actually didn't know thatmuch about tech either.
We realized we were spending toomuch money.
We needed somebody who was atech expert on our team.
(22:29):
And we could have either doubleddown.
And the other thing that was amoment for me in that decision
was I went out to California.
And in the same day, I went tothe Redwood Forest in the
morning for the first timeseeing the Redwoods.
And they actually had this bigtree.
And it was about innovation.
And they actually had a steamengine train where they talked
about the tech technology forthat.
And they actually shared thestory that Tesla was this huge
(22:51):
inventor, but nobody really knewhis name because other people
had stolen the credit for it.
And that's why Elon Musk namedhis company Tesla, because he
wanted his name to be honoredfor the technology advances that
he brought to the world.
But this timeline of this tree,it was like nothing for however
many, you know, hundreds orthousands of years, not
thousands, but however long thetree had been alive up to that
point.
And then the first invention wasa printing press.
(23:13):
And then it was going, so therewas like shorter and shorter and
shorter and shorter timesbetween the the next inventions
until we got to more of thecurrent.
And then it was like constant,right?
So really, really nothing toslow, to faster, to faster, to
like constant change.
So that was something I'mthinking about.
And then I go to Google,Facebook, and Apple all in the
same afternoon, because they'reall really close to each other.
(23:34):
So I spent a couple hours ateach after being in the Redwood
forest in the morning.
And so I'm there, you know, Ihave a tech startup at the time
and I'm like, this is theepitome of success where, you
know, I can take my tech startuptoo.
And I was like, wait a second.
I stepped out of hr and bigcompanies and big business to be
where the vibrant movers andshakers are and where there's
(23:54):
all this energy and my goal isto create a corporation and it
was like i want to be in theredwood forest this isn't what i
actually want to be my end goali want to have a lifestyle
business where i can actually doit from anywhere i can go
different places i'm notbuilding this huge company
that's not me and so that waspart of what had happened right
(24:14):
before we i came back from thatand my investor and i sat down
and said okay let's not do thisanymore.
Right after that, COVID hit.
So thank God we weren't tryingto do a co-working business
during COVID.
And so at that point, you know,again, I have to completely
reinvent myself.
I had stepped away from all thelearning and development stuff
that I was doing, even though Iactually was doing some
trainings within the co-workingspace.
(24:36):
But I said, okay, I just did allthis big stuff, doing all these
different moving parts, allthese different things, having
to hire different people fordifferent things.
What can I do that's just meright now to just like breathe
for a dialing into LinkedIn.
And I'd been on LinkedIn sinceprobably the very beginning.
And I had started to see it wayback at the beginning.
It was really just an onlineresume.
(24:56):
There wasn't a whole lot goingon as far as community or
anything else.
And then I saw people startingto bring a lot more content and
the content creators.
And there were just a few ofthem at the very beginning.
And a lot of people were like,this is not that kind of
platform and really tried toshut them down.
And they're like, no, we thinkthere's more available here.
You know, I saw one of the firstviral, you know, things on
LinkedIn and we're like, you cango viral on LinkedIn like that.
(25:18):
just was kind of unheard of backthen and so I'd always been a
fan of the platform and Irealized I actually know quite a
bit I've seen a lot of thingsI've connected with a lot of
these thought leaders so I'mgoing to tell people with their
LinkedIn I can do that just me Ican coach people with their
careers and LinkedIn and thingslike that and so that's what I
started doing for about a yearand a half to two years I think
so I did that and then COVIDhappened while I was doing that
(25:38):
and I had just posted as mycover photo on my LinkedIn this
question that said aren't youtired of playing small and it
was meant for my clients myprospects and I see that every
day as I'm going out there fortwo weeks.
And then I'm like, wait asecond, that question was for
me.
And that was right after my dadhad died.
He was this incredibleinternational business leader.
And he had this huge leadershiplegacy and mentoring.
(26:02):
He actually had mentored the manwho's now the president of
Elanco, which is the animalhealth division of Lilly at the
time.
And that man started a mentoringcompany in Indianapolis, which
has now gone national.
And he'd been mentored directlyby my dad.
And so I felt like even that waspart of my dad's legacy.
And then all these people arefreaking out during COVID
saying, oh my gosh, how do wework remotely?
(26:24):
How do we connect people thatare across the world?
How can we possibly?
And I'm like, I know all theseanswers.
This is what we've been doing inemployee engagement.
This is stuff that I've beenworking on.
We used to call it telecommutinginstead of remote work, but it
was stuff that I'd already donea lot of.
I realized I'd already beenbuilding out a bunch of
solutions over the years too.
And I realized I was actuallybuilding a system and it was all
the answers of what peopleneeded.
(26:45):
And I was playing way too smallby only focusing on in
individuals one-on-one onLinkedIn things.
And so I decided, okay, it'stime for me to get bigger again.
That's when I started my, well,I'd already been doing the
podcast called Bring YourBrilliance.
And that was about showcasingother people's brilliance.
You know, I'd already done a lotof the career coaching and
outplacement coaching at thetime.
And I meet all these people incorporate who wanted to do
(27:05):
something else.
They wanted to go start theirown business or do whatever
else, but they were terrified.
They're like, I can't, like, howcan I, I wouldn't have benefits.
I wouldn't have this.
I wouldn't have that.
I don't even know what to do.
And I was looking, I've about 10years or more ahead for some
reason.
I don't know.
That's just how I'm wired.
And I had seen before COVID,everybody was already predicting
there was going to be this massexodus of like the baby boomers
(27:28):
and everything else that therewas going to be a lot fewer, but
bigger corporations.
And then people were going tostart doing gig economy and all
these different things that thewhole entire workforce was
shifting.
And that's actually why Istarted the coworking thing was
because I was like, man, there'sgoing to be a lot of people
falling through the cracks.
And here I am helping theseincredible professionals that
had their company pay foroutplacement.
(27:49):
But what about all these otherpeople who don't get
outplacement coaching?
They're going to need help.
They're going to need to figureout where to go.
How do we catch them as theyfall?
Where are they going to go ifthey don't know where to go?
And I looked ahead to like, evenI looked out for like India and
some other countries that wereahead of the US as far as having
gone through massive economicshifts.
And their co-working spaces werethriving.
(28:10):
And that's where everybody wouldgo to get the pulse of the
economy of the community and allthat stuff.
And I was like, that's wherepeople are going to go is these
co-working spaces that's wherewe can touch them so yes my
vehicle was connecting people toco-working spaces but my
ultimate goal was to actuallyconnect people teach them how to
collaborate and help them figureout their next steps so it was
like a career coaching versionof that was my ultimate goal was
(28:32):
to actually give them what theyneeded so that they could get to
their next step and so now as Itell you all this everything had
this theme but at the time I waslike why am I doing this and
then this and then this and youknow like I was going in so many
different directions and yeteverything had this theme of how
helping people bring theirbrilliance.
And when I started my podcast, Iwas always the person behind the
(28:53):
scenes.
I was always like, you go outand do these amazing things.
You go out and do those amazingthings.
And they would and they thriveand they'd have these amazing
lives.
But I was the behind the scenesperson.
And when I started doing mypodcast, I worked with a graphic
designer.
And I was like, I really feellike I need a new name for my
business at this point,everything else.
He's like, well, why don't youcall it bring your brilliance.
And he wanted to do a brandingof my face, even for my podcast,
(29:15):
you know, next to the wordsbring your brilliance.
I'm like, I can't call myselfbrilliant I can't he's like why
not like I teach everybody elseto own their brilliance and be
able to talk about theirsignificant strengths and
contributions and things likethat and then I was afraid to do
it myself you know that was whenI made that shift and started
putting myself out there andputting myself out front and
realizing how scary it reallywas and like admiring my clients
(29:37):
even more and understanding themso much more you just got to get
out there and do it done isbetter than perfect and don't be
afraid and actually was at aconference and I'm going to say
a swear word so you might wantto leave it out if you need to.
But there was a man who'd comefrom a corporate, he worked at
IBM and he started doing a lotof social media stuff and things
like that.
And he was like, just do thedamn thing.
Push the damn button.
(29:58):
He had a hat that said that.
He's like, just do it becauseyou're going to learn more every
time you do it.
So everybody's going to startwith that first pancake.
You know, everybody's going tohave that messy beginning.
That's okay.
That's where you're going tolearn.
That's where you're going togrow.
That's got to take action inorder to action.
So I did.
And I ended up growing myLinkedIn to over 11,000 people.
and doing a lot on there.
(30:19):
But yeah, I've always been myown guinea pig.
Even when I was teaching otherpeople to do it, I've done a lot
of the other things that I'vedone the put myself out front
part.
And now I've done that.
SPEAKER_04 (30:28):
Thank you.
Thank you for sharing all ofthat.
Sorry about that.
You've actually answered quite afew of my questions.
I really appreciate that.
If there's any advice within thelast minute that we can give to
coaches who are listening whowant to scale their impact?
Is there anything else you'dlike to add?
SPEAKER_03 (30:45):
So as I was doing all those things, as I had that
big opportunity, moment about Iwas playing too small and
calling my company, then bringyour brilliance.
I had also basically been giftedthis entire career development
program.
It was actually from the man whohad run the entire career
development program for EliLilly, which is a huge global
company for 28 years.
(31:05):
And he didn't know that I hadworked at Lilly.
He didn't know that my dad hadworked at Lilly, but he was in
Indianapolis and he wasretiring.
And Lilly was actually, it wasone of the most highly
benchmarked, like just thisphenomenal program.
Most of those people have spenttheir entire career there.
So all these incredible businesspeople having incredible success
in their careers.
But for some reason, when he wasretiring, Lily decided to throw
that whole program out and justget some new brand line, new
(31:27):
online one.
And this man, his name is JohnBice.
He was so heartbroken.
He's like, this is my legacy.
Why are they getting rid of it?
I can't die with me.
And so he went out to theIndianapolis community, found a
handful of career coaches, whichis what I was doing at that
time.
And so he said, take it, make ityour own, do whatever you want
with it.
Just don't let it die with me.
And so I created that into firsta program and then a book called
(31:50):
the Career Happiness Project.
And I actually wrote it while Iwas running the outplacement
career center in Cincinnati atOmniSource.
I was staying there during theweek.
And I'd always said if I couldhave a week or two in a hotel
room, I would write a book.
Well, I had almost nine monthsof being every week at this
hotel room, which is also Ithink how I survived my triplets
being 13 that year.
That was a tough year, let metell you.
(32:11):
But I wrote the book and Iactually got to use all my
content and exercises with theseoutplacement clients.
initially to do some testing ofit but I started using that as
my career coaching program forseveral years and then I finally
published the book and so Ipublished that in 20 I don't
know what year it was but prettyrecently 2023 maybe and two
weeks to the day after Ipublished it I happened to be at
(32:33):
another HR conference this timesomebody had invited me to come
with them and I didn't even knowMarcus Buckingham was the
speaker and so I got to meet himin person I got a picture with
him I actually signed my book tohim as he was signing his book
to me got a picture with himholding my book.
And I was so excited as my wholefangirl thing.
I was like, I finally understoodlike, I was like, Oh my gosh,
(32:56):
this might be like my mostexciting day ever.
He's like, really?
But it was such an incrediblemoment for me.
And so because I actually hadthat book in my hand, I walk
into a co working space.
And there's so many things in mylife, too.
And this woman who I'd knownwhen she worked at Lily crazy
patterns here said, Oh my gosh,you need to be this professor.
He's looking for somebody who'sgot career development, is that
(33:18):
your book?
And I said, yes.
So she connected me withProfessor Fazi and he's the one
that I'm now creating thiscollege textbook and curriculum
called Career Happiness in theAge of AI.
So what's next is we're creatingthis college curriculum.
It's incredible as far as hislife's work for more than 25
years, he's been studying AI andhe's one of the top AI experts
in the world, like beforeanybody else had even really
(33:39):
heard of it.
And he has really honed in onthe three areas of human skills
that are ever more going to beneeded in our AI world.
And so we're teaching people howto focus on and align with and
develop their careers, keepingthose three areas of human
skills in mind, as well as howto navigate how to, you know,
what do you need to think aboutwhen you're putting out your
(34:01):
resume and doing your LinkedIn?
And what are the AI?
What are the applicant trackingsystems looking for?
What are the different AIsseeing across the platforms, as
well as the people and what youneed to be doing.
And so it's a really solid,powerful book, we're actually
working with a publisher now, itshould be out by the end of this
year, I think, maybe even alittle bit sooner.
And I'm already teaching someworkshops on that.
(34:22):
So I have a workshop coming upnext week, actually, which is
specifically geared towardslearning and development
professionals and how they'reactually the MVPs of the
superpowers of what we areneeding in the age of AI, the
new AI era.
SPEAKER_04 (34:35):
What I'm thinking is we can actually continue this
conversation further because Ihave a couple more questions to
ask you.
But right now, I'm going to haveto jump off.
I just got one other guest thatis waiting.
So stay How about we continue?
I'm going to keep this recordingand then we're going to merge it
with another one.
So what you can do is bookanother session with me.
(34:55):
I'm going to send you the linkover email and then we can
continue the rest of theconversation.
Sorry, I didn't mean to cut youoff, but just wanted to because
someone else is waiting.
I understand.
So thank you and we'll continuethe rest of it on the second
part of it.
So thank you so much.
SPEAKER_03 (35:11):
Okay, thank you.
SPEAKER_00 (35:13):
Bye.
That's it for this episode ofCareer Coaching Secrets.
If you enjoyed thisconversation, you can subscribe
to YouTube, Spotify, ApplePodcasts, or wherever you're
listening to this episode tocatch future episodes.
This conversation was brought toyou by Purple Circle, where we
help career coaches scale theirbusiness to seven and eight
figures without burning out.
To learn more about PurpleCircle, our community, and how
(35:33):
we can help you grow yourbusiness, visit
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