Ep. 178 From One on One Coaching To Thousand Employee Assessments with Jeff Harnois

What happens when you stop chasing revenue and start chasing value instead? Jeff Harnois, founder of iBridge, discovered this shift transformed everything about his business approach and client relationships. After building a successful executive coaching practice that became referral-only, Jeff made a bold pivot that quadrupled his annual revenue while serving clients at an entirely different scale. His journey from individual contributor to Fortune 50 leadership roles, and eventually founding iBridge in 2017, reflects both strategic insight and personal grit as the first in his family to earn a college degree.

In this conversation, Jeff reveals the specific moment when a client asked for assessments for 1,000 employees instead of a single workshop, fundamentally changing how he thought about scale and impact. You'll discover his "platinum rule" approach to leadership, the psychological predictors that determine whether organizational transformation will succeed, and why he believes no two bridges between current state and desired state are ever the same. Jeff's methodology focuses on bridging mindset, behavior, and performance while delivering measurable business impact for Fortune 50 organizations and other enterprise clients.


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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hello everyone, Welcome to Achieving Success with Olivia Akin.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
I am your host, Olivia.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Ackin each week we will discuss the romp of achieving
your personal and professional success. We will give you real
life stories on growing personally and professionally to achieve your
life and career goals with the help of some top
notch guests. Today we are speaking with Jeff Harnois. Jeff
is the founder and principal coach of Iverridge, an organizational

(00:34):
transformation firm dedicated to enabling leaders and teams to perform
at their highest levels. Over the years, Jeff has partnered
with executives across Fortune fifty organizations and other midsides to
large companies to drive large scale transformation, elevate leadership capability,

(00:55):
and strengthen team cohesion.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Known for his ability to abridge.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
Mindset, behavior, and performance, Jeff has built a reputation for
turning leadership theory into measurable business impact. His path to
the c suite and ultimately fund founding Iebridge in twenty
seventeen reflects both strategic insight and personal grit. Beginning as
an individual contributor, Jeff advanced through leadership roles in several

(01:24):
Fortune fifty companies, including a decade at Apple before leading
multiple startups and successful exits. As the first in his
family to earn a college degree, completing both undergrad and
graduate studies while working full time and raising a family,
Jeff's story embodies perseverance and a deep understanding of growth

(01:47):
with incomplex and high performing environments. In today's episode, we'll
explore how Jeff's business has evolved since his last appearance,
how his client partnerships have deepened and expanded, and what's
next for Ibridge and his work in advancing organizational performance.
You can find Jeff by going to his website at

(02:08):
ibridge dot com. Hello Jeff, it's fantastic having you.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
On the show.

Speaker 3 (02:13):
Olivia, it's fantastic to see you again.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
I am so excited for this and welcome back. And
let's begin where we always begin, on the question of
what does success mean I look like to you today
and how has that definition changed since we last talked
in twenty twenty three.

Speaker 4 (02:33):
Yeah, I think I'll go with the last part of
that first, which is the definition of success for me
and it's changed.

Speaker 3 (02:41):
The truth is, I don't think it has changed.

Speaker 4 (02:44):
Much in terms of the focus of that and it
really comes down to me. Success to me is defined
as the ability to create value for my clients. When
I achieve that with them, then than I am successful.

Speaker 3 (03:01):
There's a direct relationship there between the two, and.

Speaker 1 (03:05):
I think that is also so important and a lot
of time we overlook, right, we want to build, we
want to grow, we want to make an impact, but
there needs to be cohesion and there needs to be alignment.
And you know, saying yes to everyone is not.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
In alignment all the time.

Speaker 1 (03:25):
With what your goals is for the impact you want
to make as well, not just organizationally but personally as
a business. What else? What like talk what you also
want to be putting out there. You don't want to
be always known as the company that can serve everyone

(03:46):
if the impact you're trying to make does.

Speaker 2 (03:48):
Not serve everyone.

Speaker 3 (03:50):
That's that's really really well said.

Speaker 4 (03:53):
In fact, often when we meet prospects, organization or people
that we are contemplating doing business with, we often begin
that process by having a discovery conversation. And you know,
the discovery is really focused on what problems are you

(04:13):
trying to solve at the organizational level, And then the
question is do we have a remedy for that, or
do we have the capability of building a remedy for that,
And if the answer is no, then we really want
to sort of end the conversation there.

Speaker 3 (04:31):
We don't want to waste our time.

Speaker 4 (04:32):
We certainly don't want to waste their time, because obviously
someday in the future they may come back because we
do have the remedy for them. But to your point
about saying no to those things that don't really fit
in our center lane, that's a discipline that I think
a lot of early stage companies really struggle with.

Speaker 2 (04:52):
Oh yeah, I mean I did it for a while.
I just was like, yeah, okay, we'll figure it out.

Speaker 1 (04:58):
Not in the sense of deliverable, in the sense of
for me internally, as I was building a business and
wanting to grow, it was Oh, you're not within what
the price range is.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Okay, we'll work it out, right, we'll do this.

Speaker 1 (05:16):
That doesn't help me my business, you know, other things
grow be able to deliver the right way either, And
it took time learning that. Just saying yes to every client,
you know, could also be frustrating to me because then
if you're not clear in alignment, they might not be happy.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
With the results.

Speaker 3 (05:38):
Because yeah, sirry for the interruption.

Speaker 4 (05:40):
It goes back to what I was saying earlier about
you know, my definition of success is the ability to
create value for my client. If our priority is chasing revenue, right,
and it's not chasing those types of clients where we
can provide value, we've lost so much and that process.

(06:02):
On the other hand, when we go the other way,
when we do deliver value, what we find is a
significant increase in customer loyalty, We see a significant increase
in repeat engagements and ongoing business relationships with them. And
then one of my favorites is we see our clients
referring us to other potential clients. When you're chasing revenue,

(06:25):
I think a lot of those things at a minimum
are compromised, but often they're just taking off the table completely.
So focusing on that value delivery, I think is one
of the keys for success.

Speaker 1 (06:38):
And while you were saying that, I was also thinking
of like that journey, right, that growth journey that a
lot of entrepreneurs go through and even I went through,
is as you grow and as you're saying no, or
you're in a you could be in a tight spot
time of year, right, and you're just you get into

(06:59):
the mindset frame if you're not careful of money, money, money,
what's the dollar coming in?

Speaker 2 (07:05):
How do I get that dollar? And to your point,
like you said, you start to get.

Speaker 1 (07:09):
Into that frame of mind of looking at everyone, every
potential client as a dollar amount and if it doesn't
work out, it's onto the next how can we bring
the dollar so forth and so on. But what ends
up having is not only are you not attracting the
right people you want to work with, but you're not
attracting the other individuals either, because they can feel okay,

(07:32):
they're only trying to get the money.

Speaker 2 (07:34):
They're trying to get that money.

Speaker 1 (07:35):
That's right, And it sets this tone where as you said,
if you go people first, how can we impact first?

Speaker 2 (07:44):
How can we provide value?

Speaker 1 (07:47):
Not only do people see that, they go, okay, I
got to I have to.

Speaker 2 (07:52):
Work with this person.

Speaker 1 (07:53):
Not only did they have the best experience, they saw value,
They saw how much you went above and beyond. As
you mentioned, they start referring people and now those pipelines.

Speaker 4 (08:05):
Yeah, and you know, just to sort of tie that off,
we're not we're not chasing anyone anymore because we don't
have to. And I absolutely understand, especially in the early days,
having to to put revenue points on the board. It's
you know, it's a matter of critical success. But I

(08:26):
think you want to get out of that mode as
fast as possible and get back and refocusing on you
know that value creation and value delivery. And then, you know,
since we're talking about this, I read a book. I
guess maybe it was about six or eight months ago.
The name of the book is is Getting Naked, and
it's written by a guy named Patrick Lencioni. Some of

(08:49):
your audience will will probably know Lyncioni from the Five
Dysfunctions of a Team book that is now and it's
twentieth year of publication. And the thesis that of Getting
Naked is really about, you know, from a consulting standpoint,
do you chase the business opportunity right or do you

(09:13):
approach the business opportunity from a value creation and delivery
standpoint first? And it's a parable like many of Lencioni's
books are essentially the main character in the book had
to learn the lesson that you can sit down with
the prospect and you can literally get into problem solving
with them. In real time and that relationship development. In

(09:36):
other words, you don't have to pay for my time upfront.
Let's do a little work together and see if we've
got a good match here, and see if I'm heading
in the right direction. More importantly, let's see if I
have value to add.

Speaker 3 (09:48):
To your work.

Speaker 4 (09:49):
And again, client loyalty goes off the chart when you
focus on things. The main character in the book learned
that you can charge a premium when you approach value
first versus revenue first.

Speaker 1 (10:03):
And going back a little bit since your last appearance,
what has changed most in how you run I Bridged,
in your approach, or your offerings, or how you partner
with clients and why did those changes for you become necessary?

Speaker 4 (10:21):
I love this question, Olivia, because I really love this story.
A few years ago, just to sort of bring everyone
back up to speed, I formed I Bridged as an
executive career coaching firm.

Speaker 3 (10:38):
We had so much success.

Speaker 4 (10:40):
In that space that we ended up turning off all
of our outbound marketing, and even to this day, we
are still referral only when it comes to that. But
one on one coaching is not scalable at its base level.
It's exchanging time for money, and one of the limitations

(11:04):
of scale is there's only a certain amount of time.
There's only so many clients you can work with on
a daily basis, and so I thought, you know, gosh,
we're creating really high trust relationships with our clients. They're
typically in a leadership level role. What else can we
do for them? And so I pivoted my company from

(11:25):
career coaching into executive development. The idea was, we're helping
you get into these organizations again generally at leadership level roles.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
Can we help you succeed more.

Speaker 4 (11:36):
Quickly in that new role? And so I've reaged partnered
with a company called Wiley. Wiley is a two point
two billion dollar publishing firm, one of the oldest in
the country, and we licensed some content, again very focused
on leadership development and team cohesion. And when I pivoted

(12:00):
into that space, I was looking for engagement opportunities to
do a workshop as an example. One of my strategies
was my career clients would then introduce me to these enterprises,
and that strategy has worked very well for us. In fact,

(12:25):
almost all of our business comes from client referrals, and
so our entire growth strategy has been leveraging the relationships
we create and the value that we deliver for our
clients to open up new business for us. Well. In
one particular case, one of my clients, who was the
director of recruiting, introduced me to the chief human resources officer,

(12:49):
and as I spoke with her and talked through what
our capabilities were, she said, yeah, we'll take six of
those and we'll get assessments for a thousand employees in
our company. And it was such a transformational shift for
me because I went in that that that moment, I
went from thinking about selling an engagement to engaging an

(13:13):
entire enterprise, an entire company. And so my scale, you know,
even though it was instinctive, I didn't know how big
it could get. I just knew that doing one on
one coaching wasn't going to get and get me there.
And you know, revenues essentially quadrupled on an annual basis

(13:34):
as a result of that particular shift, and that time
was phenomenal. We were having really good success, our clients
were having really good success with us, again from a
leadership standpoint, from a team cohesion standpoint, trickling down into
things like cultural improvements and performance and output perform improvements

(13:56):
and at a higher level, at a human level, they
were having significant lead better relationships with the people that
you know, you spend a lot of time with. And
then it occurred to me, you know, we made that leap,
what's the next leap? And the next leap is doing
that same thing now at the institutional level, and so

(14:18):
we have now pivoted into the organizational transformation space. We're
still using the same tools in the same technique, but
my growth strategy is now targeting a much higher level
at a larger scale in the organizations that we target.

Speaker 3 (14:33):
Does that make sense?

Speaker 2 (14:34):
Well, it does.

Speaker 1 (14:35):
And as you're saying this, like my brain's like yep, yeph,
loving it, loving it, because recently I had a conversation
with someone about you know, I've been growing my podcast
consulting and achieving success overall, right, and this conversation of okay,

(14:58):
now getting it to that next level, that next goal
within the next you know gear, okay, and serving as
many people as possible and making it really personable and
really impactful, because that is why I started this, and
very much from our previous conversations while you started that

(15:21):
is how do I do that? And serve everyone and
take it to the next level. And one of the
things that got brought up is doing.

Speaker 2 (15:31):
One on one. Doing group is only going to take
you so far.

Speaker 1 (15:36):
There's only so many hours, and doing everything on a
one on one basis, there's only so much groom for
growth in it at the end of the day, right,
because there's only so many hours in the day. And
so as you were saying that, I was like, yeah,
because that's again that next thing of how do you

(15:57):
serve more people? What do we offer and how can
we offer it while bringing that same value to the
table and making no one feel like it's a less
than service or this or that. Yeah, And so that

(16:17):
being said, you have leaders and teams closed gaps between
intention and execution. When you look back, what's a client
transformation that surprised even you and something that broke down
your own assumptions about what's possible.

Speaker 3 (16:36):
That is such a great question.

Speaker 4 (16:40):
One of the things that I think, because I understand
what I'm about to say, has contributed to the success
that we've done, which is no two teams are alike,
no two leaders are alike.

Speaker 3 (16:56):
We can get clear.

Speaker 4 (16:58):
This is some of the language and model that we
use in my business. We can get clear on what
your current state is, we can get clear on what
your desired state is. And that's usually the transformation that
we're trying to make. Where are you today? Where would
you like to be in the near future? And then
also when you get to that new desired state, what

(17:18):
does that open up for you? Okay, so that modeling
is generally fairly generic in you know, in every engagement
that we go into, we want to understand what that
gap is, where are you today? Where would you like
to be? But what you can't do is prescribe a
generic remedy for that. And this is where the name

(17:42):
I bridged, I think really makes a lot of sense.
We are building the bridges between where you are today
and where you want to be, but no two bridges.

Speaker 3 (17:50):
Are the same.

Speaker 4 (17:52):
And so when I go into an organization, part of
what makes what we do so stinking fun is that
we have to understand what those differences are, what the
psychological limitations are, what the physical limitations are, what the
organization or internal political you know, limitations are to be

(18:14):
able to get them to.

Speaker 3 (18:15):
That next level.

Speaker 4 (18:16):
And then we have to understand the capacity of our
clients and then we have to understand what's the resistance
from a psychological and so there's a lot, a lot
of moving parts, and it's always really really interesting. So
I wanted to say that to set the foundation to
answer your question. I don't know that there's that any

(18:38):
one of those has surprised me. I think that every
one of them has. There's there's always a revelation or
a revealing event, meaning we think we know what we're
dealing with, we think we understand the problem, we think
we understand the architecture for that bridge, and then as

(19:00):
we start implementing, something comes up that we weren't expecting.
And you know that happens one hundred percent of the time.
That's that's the nature of our business. So I can't
say that there was any time that I was surprised.
What I would say to you, though, is that I
think a lot of my clients are surprised that they
were actually able to make it, you know, to the

(19:24):
to that other side, to the desired state. I think
a lot of my clients have skepticism. I come in.
I come in by the way. My personality type is
very realistic. I'm a realist. I'm not overly optimistic. I'm
not overly pessimistic. I'm very realistic, like we're gonna I'm
not too hyperbolic. We're going to figure out what what

(19:44):
really can work. And so I'm really comfortable and confident
in their ability to make the change. Many of them
just aren't sure, and then when they get to the
other side, they're like, wow, unbelievable.

Speaker 3 (19:57):
Didn't think it was possible, had a lot of skepticism.

Speaker 4 (20:00):
It is like, cool, now you're here, Where do we
go next?

Speaker 1 (20:05):
Well, and that being said, as you mentioned bridging that
gap and no two bridges are the same. Bridging is
baked into your brand in your experience. What separates the
leaders who make that bridge successfully, which sounds like it's
a lot if we work with you, and that aligning

(20:26):
the mindset, the emotional and behavior from those who get
stuck and stay stuck.

Speaker 2 (20:33):
Are their early warning signs.

Speaker 4 (20:36):
Things to look for, Yes, yeah, yeah, there's there are
a couple of traits that will give us a really
I would call them predictors, right, things, things that are
behavioral or operational that will predict whether or not this
organization or these people are going to be able to
make the transformation. On a leadership level, it always comes

(20:57):
down to what I call the impetus for change. Do
you have a personal stake in making this change? Are
you the one driving it? And if you are, generally
your ability, your resiliency, your adaptability, those things are generally high.

(21:18):
On the other hand, if you're being told that you
have to make this change, which sometimes happens, are you
going to buy in right? If you're not willing to
buy in, if you're not willing to do the work.
We can generally see that pretty early, and then that
actually then becomes the focus of what we're doing because

(21:40):
at the end of the day, if we don't get
that buy in, our ability to be successful and the
organization to be able to realize the change that they
were looking for is completely compromised. If the leader is
stuck in that way. We don't have issues with intellectual capacity,
we don't have issues with cycles and priorities, We work.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
With all of that stuff. But if the person doesn't
have an if the leader doesn't have an impetus for change,
we're doa We're dead on arrival.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
So how when that comes up and those situations come up,
how do you deal with that to make a simple question.

Speaker 4 (22:26):
Yeah, we kind of set an expectation up front if
it looks like we're going to have that kind of resistance,
and then we have really really direct conversations with the
executive leadership to say what options are on the table here,

(22:48):
how critical is it to your business that this change
takes place. If the answer comes back that it's critical,
it is a must get done kind of thing, and
we do have those everyone in a while, then they
have to also be willing to make a change at
that leadership level. And sometimes that's an intervention where you know,

(23:09):
the leader that we're working with, their boss comes in
and gives some nudging and some encouragement up to and
including a reorg, you know, changing the org design.

Speaker 2 (23:23):
And going back a little bit to.

Speaker 1 (23:27):
A conversation we were having. Growth always it's very rare,
does not come with complexity when it hits when it's
you working with you know, organizations and having those hard
conversations right and setting expectations. As Ibridge has also scaled
while serving individuals in their own scale zone, how do

(23:51):
you ensure that culture, quality and coaching from your end
and the depth of that don't get diluted And.

Speaker 2 (23:59):
What systems or garrels have you put up.

Speaker 1 (24:02):
To maintain that as you grow, is you change change
the business and who you're serving, sometimes there's integrity that
stays in place.

Speaker 4 (24:13):
Again, that's just such a deep and rich question, Olivia.
And here's why. One of the things that I've learned,
and I'm guilty of this myself, younger entrepreneurs or newer
entrepreneurs again, are sort of chasing revenue versus chasing value.
How do we make sure that we're delivering is we

(24:37):
we set the goals in advance. Here's the distinction. I'm
not interested in selling you a product or a service.
That's not my mindset. There was a time when that
was my mindset, and in some ways it was probably
necessary for me to have that mindset for my business
to survive. So I don't want this to sound like

(24:57):
I'm you know, like I'm putting in a negative light. Again,
I think there is a time and an appropriate place
for that. But where we are today, we have to
deliver value. If we're not delivering value, we're not doing
our job. And so oftentimes what we do is we
set specific goals and outcomes that are associated with the work,

(25:18):
and then we check along the way to see if
we're making progress towards those It's something that isn't you know,
we don't guess at it, and we don't we're not
too soft about it.

Speaker 3 (25:29):
We're pretty clear about what.

Speaker 4 (25:30):
We want to achieve, and so we build in little
check ins to say, are we moving in the right direction?
Are we moving at the right pace and cadence? Are
we delivering enough forward progress for us to be on
time for you know what it is that we're trying
to get done. So that's one of the I would
call it more of an operational and a bit more

(25:53):
of a strategic guard rail around how we're doing. On
the people side of it, we created some technology it's
called the Eyebridge one eighty, which is basically a measurement
instrument between the leader and the employee. And what we

(26:13):
do is we pre establish the criteria that we want
to measure them against. The manager will rate that individual
on a five scale. The individual will then rate themselves
and then we get to see where alignment exists and
where the gaps are, and so we can pick those gaps.
We can create a development plan as an example around that,

(26:36):
and then we come back and we remeasure It's like
we said, these were your top ten priorities.

Speaker 3 (26:40):
How are you doing?

Speaker 4 (26:42):
And that's one of the ways that we focus on
sort of the measurement component. But at the end of
the day, and this is absolutely the key, did we
get the behavioral change that we wanted, did we get
the leadership change that we wanted? Is the team performing
at a higher level. When those things happen, we know

(27:04):
that we've gotten it right. And we when they don't happen,
we know we're not done.

Speaker 1 (27:09):
I love that because I think having deliverable, having expectations
and marks and circle backs and those touch bases are.

Speaker 2 (27:17):
Really key to anything.

Speaker 1 (27:19):
Like you know, when we talk about podcasting, for example,
because that's what I do.

Speaker 2 (27:25):
So the thing I.

Speaker 1 (27:26):
Could really tie to is people look at me after
they've talked to other podcast consultants or we'll go in
that avenue of like getting on podcasts and I'm like, Okay,
you're definitely going to get on four top one to
top ten percent.

Speaker 2 (27:41):
Here's the timeline to expect this is.

Speaker 1 (27:44):
The process here, there's along every step, there's a check.
You know, there's always those check and balances, and there's
always here's the deliverable, here's the expectation, here's what will
end up happening. And I'll get sometimes how do you know?
Like how am I guaranteed for? And I'm like, what

(28:05):
do you meet?

Speaker 2 (28:06):
You know?

Speaker 1 (28:06):
Like to me, it's like, my mindset is, let's deliver,
let's add value. Let's make sure we're all on the
same page on how this can end and how it
will end. Where like people will be like, well, other
people have told me pay a monthly fee, and then
they'll try and whatever happens happens, And I'm.

Speaker 2 (28:24):
Like, yeah, yeah, right, it's those differentials.

Speaker 1 (28:28):
But for me to your point of like, whenever I
go to work with someone as a client, right, knowing
that mindset, having that mindset, knowing the importance of it,
I always go, Okay, what's the deliverables?

Speaker 2 (28:41):
How are we.

Speaker 1 (28:41):
Getting from here to point B? What are we walking
away with? And when they stumble on that, that's when
my red flags also go up. Yeah, I think there's
such a value and need in that. And it also
goes back to transparency and communication.

Speaker 4 (29:00):
Transparency, communication expectations, setting discipline, and managing deliverables. There's a
lot there. One of the things that I would then
you know, based on what you've said in reflecting my comments,
one of the pieces of advice that I would give
you for you know, for everyone is think of this

(29:21):
as an opportunity for your next level up, which is
to say, we can agree on what the deliverables are,
so you're going to pay me a fee or whatever
the financial structure is, and I'm going to deliver these
things for you.

Speaker 3 (29:37):
The next level is what did those things.

Speaker 4 (29:40):
Do for you for your business? Did they help you succeed?
Did they help you move? Did they help you hit
your strategic goals? When you understand that, you understand your
value proposition right, and so it's like the question on
my mind is what difference did your work make for
your client? When you can answer that you understand what

(30:03):
your value proposition is and that's what you then should
be selling. This is this is moving up from selling
a product or a service into that value proposition modality.
I have a I have a parallel example here for you.
I launched my business, so I get solicited by marketing

(30:23):
people you know, on a daily basis. Oh, we can
we can help you with lead gen, we can help you,
we can put a lot of revenue in your pocket,
and it's like okay.

Speaker 3 (30:32):
Then you get on the.

Speaker 4 (30:33):
Phone with them and what it turns out is they're
actually just trying to sell a service.

Speaker 3 (30:40):
And I say, well, how do you measure your success?

Speaker 4 (30:43):
Well, you know, number of outbound outreaches, and then how
much engagement are we getting, and then how many clickthroughs
are we getting and how many are going to the
blog and how many are going to the website. And
I always say back to them the same thing. I
don't care about any of that. I don't care about

(31:04):
any of that. And more importantly, I'm not willing to
pay you for that. M Here's what I am willing
to pay you for get me some clients.

Speaker 3 (31:16):
That's that's now.

Speaker 4 (31:18):
Now you're adding value to my business, and I want
to pay you generously for that. I don't mind organizations
that provide service, and I don't mind people who buy service.
But again, I'm so deep in the on the deep
end of the pool of creating value, I also want
it for my own business.

Speaker 2 (31:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (31:39):
And that's the thing too of the perspective, right, if
you want value in your business as a client to
someone else in their business, why aren't you thinking about
that same way bottom down, exactly right right. It goes
back to the saying, treat people the way you want
to be treated, treat your business the way you want

(32:02):
other people to treat your business.

Speaker 4 (32:05):
I'm smiling and I'm laughing a little bit about that,
because you know, a lot of the work that we
do Olivia is around psychology and psychological profiles. And one
of the things that I ask people often when I'm
doing a workshop is I'll say, who knows what the
golden rule is? And we see everybody's hand go up,
and you know, I'll ask someone to repeat it, treat

(32:27):
others how you want to be treated. And I said, well,
what's better than that? What's better than the golden rule?
Is there something better? And you see people looking around
and there's kind of a question, and I said, have
you heard of the platinum rule? And people will sit
back and they'll go, well, not really, the platinum rule
is treat others, not how you want to be treated,
but how they want to be treated. And that's one

(32:49):
of the things that we teach in the work that
we do with disc and with Myers Briggs is helping
you understand what is it that the people you're talking
to what they need. That's what I'm looking for in
a client engagement. I don't want to treat them how
I want to be treated, because that.

Speaker 3 (33:06):
Might not be what they want.

Speaker 4 (33:08):
I want to get clear on what they want and
what they need and how they want it, and then
I want to deliver at that and you know, on
that frequency.

Speaker 1 (33:17):
And then being said, as we talked about in your
first interview in twenty twenty twenty three, and now I
brought it up again in your introduction, you were the
first in your family to go to college and that
still shows up in what you do and how you
show up and deliver and expectations and in your conversations regularly.

Speaker 2 (33:42):
What parts of that.

Speaker 1 (33:44):
Identity still show up in your leadership today and what
parts have you released or redefined?

Speaker 4 (33:53):
Another really really good question, Olivia, and this is this
is a little bit of a deep vein for me.
In my mother's family, she had twelve brothers and sisters.
So if you can just imagine, I want to give
you the scale here. You know, each one of them
having anywhere from three to ten children each. So you know,

(34:14):
my first level cousins on that side of the family
are they're in the hundreds and then you know, thousands
when we get into second level. So on a very
personal level, being the first to go to college, to
me felt like I was setting a new paradigm. My

(34:36):
family on that side were very, very hard workers. They
were home builders and road builders, and so college was
never a priority for them.

Speaker 3 (34:50):
And so.

Speaker 4 (34:51):
By working through it and it changed a familial and
a generational There was a generational shift in my family,
I think because of it. And now I've got a
whole bunch of cousins that have, you know, gone to
college at a minimum, and some of them have also
gotten up into the graduate level. And so, you know,

(35:13):
on a personal front, I think that that was a
really good thing. How it relates to my business, it's
maybe a deeper and longer conversation. I will say this
one of the things very early in my graduate program
a professor said to the room, and it was profound

(35:34):
for me and it resonates with me today. He said,
your entire career in education from k all the way
through bachelor's degree is what we call barf education. And
his definition of barf education was we barf it out,

(35:54):
you consume it, and you barfit back. We put information
out and then we test to see if you remember
it and can recite it. At the graduate level, we
are going to move away from that model completely. We
are not interested in what you remember. We're interested in

(36:14):
what you can do with what you're learning.

Speaker 3 (36:18):
We want you.

Speaker 4 (36:19):
To contribute to the field of study or to the
body of work. And that was mind bending for me.
It's like, Oh, it's not about how smart you are
from an academic standpoint, it's how capable you are to
take that information and then go create something with it.

(36:39):
That has absolutely propelled me in my business. So it
kind of goes back to what we were talking about earlier.
I don't sell products and I don't sell services. I
sell outcomes and value. I want my clients to understand
I'm not coming in to do a corporate training day
with you. I'm coming in to unlock your potential. And

(37:05):
that's that mindset shift that came from the academic component,
and when they get on board with it, really really
magnificent things happen.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
Yeah, and it's one of those things too.

Speaker 1 (37:19):
When you were sharing that answer, I was like, I
just had this conversation recently, Is that right? I was presenting, Well,
it looked a little different. I was presenting at a
university and I opened the floor up for questions and
first students were hesitant, and I joked, I was like, listen,

(37:41):
I was a professor, so I will call on you.
I was like, I'll give someone because I know that
breaks the ice once they know and see how I'll
actually answer and be transparent with it. People search in
their hands up, so I'm like, I'll give someone ten seconds,
and then after that I'm gonna start calling.

Speaker 2 (38:02):
And so the first person answer asked.

Speaker 1 (38:04):
The question, and all of a sudden another hands raising
and calling them. And this one individual goes to me,
so obviously you went to undergrad and grad and I
now have a degree or certification in every business area
talked on. You know, the stages, the ted stages, all that,

(38:25):
and he goes, but you also talk to a lot
of individuals and what you do and the industry you
broke into and where it is, you know, podcasting and
podcast consulting when you started four years ago. There's credibility
there and this and that. You don't learn that in college.
So all that being said, he goes in a world,

(38:47):
especially post COVID, where you know, getting that degree is
not necessarily the same emphasis as pre COVID because people
have seen certain things pro or post college. What is
your input on it, especially since you work in an
industry you did not learn how to do through going

(39:10):
to college.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
And I was like, that's a really interesting question. Right
to your point.

Speaker 1 (39:18):
I leaned into it with the fact college is good
to learn the fundamentals to learn, you know, and even
lower in school, right it teaches you certain data, certain
information being able to pull that out that those skills
are really important. I said, But it's also about the networking,

(39:42):
the opportunities you get to connect with people. And I said,
then creating where you can create from those things is
a very different thing in grad school. You know, there
were people in my program that went straight through and
I learned through my own experience of going and working

(40:04):
and then coming back and even in college, like I
was always the kid being like, okay, but how does
this apply because for half of my college career, I
was already working in professional sports, so I had that,
you know, baseline, and for me, you know, taking that
into grad level where I was able to apply it,

(40:27):
where I was looking at things going on in the
space compared to those kids who went straight through.

Speaker 2 (40:33):
I said, that is a disservice in my eyes.

Speaker 1 (40:35):
No college should offer a straight through three plus one,
two plus two, whatever you want to call it program,
because that connectivity it grad school was meant for other things.

Speaker 2 (40:49):
And you saw, I mean, there was a gap.

Speaker 1 (40:51):
You saw it in the grad level when there were
individuals who had come back or were working and taking
my classes versus students who didn't. But I also say,
every everyone in my experiences and life experiences, business experiences,
education experiences led me to be able to do what

(41:14):
I do now having those understandings. But I said, there
are individuals who can be very successful without going to college.
There are people that if you were, if you want to,
like my boyfriend serve in the military. He is a
chief engineer in the US Coast Guard. He listed and

(41:36):
went into boot camp right after graduation. His knowledge on
engineering is some of the best I've like spoke to
the way he problem solves, the.

Speaker 2 (41:45):
Way he understands I'm like, oh my god.

Speaker 1 (41:49):
Like I've worked with engineers before, and this is like
a next level. So it's not for everyone, but it's
understanding it.

Speaker 3 (41:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (41:59):
I think one of the one of the things that
came up for me while you were talking. Is this
idea of do you have some you know, world professional
work experience that you can take what you're learning academically
and sort of balance that off from a what does
this mean that I'm learning?

Speaker 3 (42:17):
And how is it used?

Speaker 4 (42:18):
Even right? If we want to go to that level.
I went to college at night. I was working full
time at a fortune fifty company at the time and
trying to raise a family. But what I was learning
academically I was able to see in, you know, in
my day job kind of a thing. And so I

(42:40):
think that what I took away from that experience was
significantly better than someone just coming out of high school
and going right into school staying on an academic track.
And I think that's especially true to your point when
we see the young people who go right through their
bachelor's program into a master's or a PhD program without
any practical work experience. So, and there are pros and cons.

(43:04):
I don't want it to sound like I have a
you know, a strong opinion about it either way. I'm
just saying, you know, the track that I went on,
where it was intermixed school and work, it was phenomenal.

Speaker 3 (43:15):
For me.

Speaker 1 (43:17):
And on that note, and to also kind of wrap
up with our last question, because I can't believe.

Speaker 2 (43:22):
The time is fun. I know, right, but as it
always does when we talk.

Speaker 1 (43:28):
If someone listening right now wants to lean into more
effectiveness and alignment in their role or their team, what's
a one concrete experiment or practice you'd invite them to
run over the next week, and how should they measure
that impact?

Speaker 3 (43:47):
Yeah, I don't know that I have a simple answer
for that.

Speaker 4 (43:53):
When I think about that, that kind of question and
what that arc might look like, the big picture for
me looks like you really need to understand yourself.

Speaker 3 (44:01):
First.

Speaker 4 (44:02):
We start with a psychometric assessment, so we get a
really clear picture.

Speaker 3 (44:06):
Of who you are. When we know that, we.

Speaker 4 (44:10):
Understand what your communication preferences are, what your communication style is,
We understand how you think, how you process information, how
you make decisions, how you show up in conflict, how
you create and operationalized trust. All of that stuff becomes
available for you to understand who you are. Then we

(44:34):
look at your team, your function, your organization, and we
say what do they need from you? And that's what
makes this work so interesting. There's nothing prescriptive about this.
It's very, very diagnostic upfront because as an example, and
I'll just pull these out, if you're a leader in

(44:57):
a technical environment, Let's say that you lead a team
of developers. What they need from you is a little
bit of vision and strategy and a lot of hands
on coaching development problem solving, shoulder to shoulder kind of work.
If you're working with a group of product engineers or

(45:18):
product managers, they don't want you in their business at all, right.
They want you as a resource that they can soundboard.
They want you to block and tackle for them, you know,
when they're pitching a new idea or asking for investment dollars.

Speaker 3 (45:36):
And so the question from the leader standpoint is version.
Which of those versions of a leader are you naturally,
which do you like and prefer? And then does that
align to the organization that you're leading. Now, I don't
look at it from a disqualifying standpoint, meaning if that
wasn't your preference, if that's not your strength, that you're

(45:56):
not eligible for the rule.

Speaker 4 (45:58):
What it does mean is it's going to be significantly
harder for you to be successful in the role. I'm
okay with heart, I'm not afraid of heart. Most of
my clients aren't either. We're very capable of doing and
willing to do hard things. But you got to ask
yourself a question, is this where I want to be?
Because while you're stretching and adopting to be who you

(46:21):
need to be as a leader for that group, you're
not in your what I call natural habitat, which is
where you're going to excel. And so I don't know,
again to your question, I don't know that there's a
specific experiment to run other than be aware of what
your natural preferences are and then check in with your
team to.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
Find out if that's actually what they need.

Speaker 2 (46:43):
I love that, Jeff. How can people get in touch
with you if they want to connect with you?

Speaker 3 (46:47):
Yeah, there's a there's a couple of ways.

Speaker 4 (46:50):
Our website ibridged dot com and it's ibridged with a D.

Speaker 3 (46:56):
It's it's a.

Speaker 4 (46:57):
Past tense of crossing over rights. It's retrospectively looking at
what you where you came from. That's what I bridged is,
and then celebrating where you are now after making that transition.
So ibridge is a good place to go. There's a
link there to schedule time on my calendar. You can

(47:18):
find me on LinkedIn as well. I think I think
there's still a link there for you to be able
to schedule time. And then we had a podcast called
Ibridge Leadership Stories. We have transformed that into Transformational Leadership,
the Transformational Leadership Podcast. We launched the initial episode two

(47:45):
weeks ago and our first guest episode is launching tomorrow,
so you can find that on YouTube if you'd like
to follow there.

Speaker 2 (47:55):
Awesome.

Speaker 1 (47:56):
Well, thank you Jeff for all of your insight and
coming back around.

Speaker 2 (48:00):
Two as a guest.

Speaker 4 (48:02):
Olivia, thanks so much for your generosity and the invitation
to come back. I'll come back anytime.

Speaker 2 (48:08):
Well, You're always welcome. And a fun fact before I.

Speaker 1 (48:11):
Go into a few of the key takeaways that as
we were talking and you were talking about growth, that
it like sung In is the journey since twenty twenty three.
I forget if it got mentioned on that interview or not,
but that was the first part. I was the first
podcast that you were ever a guest on, and we

(48:33):
then work together to get you on other podcasts and
keeping in touch and following your journey and now having
you know, a podcast and getting in this sphase since
twenty twenty three where we started and now here it's
just so rewarding in the growth and now having you
back and doing an episode two has been so rewarding,

(48:56):
and I've loved seeing that journey for you. And that
being said, a few of our key takeaways from today's
conversation include, get out of the revenue mindset as quickly
as possible for your business. You know, as Jeff mentioned
in the over one of the many overarching themes of
today's conversation, but leading with passion, leading with purpose, and

(49:21):
relationship first and value first, but also understanding like yes,
when we all start businesses, we were coming from that
revenue mindset, and like we're not trying to tell you otherwise,
even Jeff said it, however, try to get away from
that as quickly as possible because it will suck you
in and then its scripple get hard. So I loved

(49:45):
that device as well as what is the gap between
where you are today and where you want to be?
And that's something I want to challenge everyone with.

Speaker 2 (49:54):
As well today.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
Of what Jeff brought up is, I want you to
sit down for a few minutes and evaluate and think
and reflect, maybe even journal about where you were today
and where you want to be and understanding and I
love this analogy that no two ridges are the same
as well as how are you providing values to others

(50:18):
in work in your life as well as what difference
did your asking yourself what difference did your work make
for your client? And understanding that is your value proposition.
You can be in business for five years and you
could evaluate and grow, but do check in with yourself,

(50:39):
ask yourself, what is the difference that my work.

Speaker 2 (50:43):
Did and the results my client game?

Speaker 1 (50:46):
And as Jeff mentioned as well, you can strain up
ask a client.

Speaker 2 (50:52):
You know that they'll tell you and that could give
you a value proposition you didn't even realize. And lastly,
the platinum rule treat others the way they want to
be treated.

Speaker 1 (51:05):
This was a great episode with our top notch guest
Jeff Harnoy. Thank you for listening and have a successful day.