Focusing on the "Person" in Salesperson. Just as much as the Sales with Heather Foidart

Speaker A: What up, everybody? Welcome to another episode of the live Better Sell Better podcast. This is your host, Kevin Dorsey, AKA kd. And today we're gonna talk about reinventing yourself, Right? How can you reinvent yourself? How can you reinvent your career? So often we might fall into a career. So often we might fall into a job, we might fall into a company that maybe doesn't connect with us, maybe isn't our forever job, maybe has us miserable, burnt out, worn down, whatever else. But so often we feel stuck. How do we change? How do we navigate the career path? How do we find and ideally create the career and the role that makes us happy, allows us to live the lifestyle we're looking to live and honestly just have more joy in life. And that is why I'm so happy to have Heather Feidhart on the show with me today. She's the director of sales at Fidelity Labs, uh, a startup incubator with infidelity. And she is going to talk to us about how to do this because she coaches reps, she coaches leaders, she coaches people on how to navigate and reinvent their careers. Heather, welcome to the show.

Speaker B: Thank you so much. It's quite the intro. I got to try to match that energy now.

Speaker A: I mean, that's kind of why I do it. I've been told it's the only reason some people show up to be a guest on the show is just to hear their intro and then they're like, I love it. That was good. Um, so as we dive into this, right, because, you know, we don't do a lot of prep for these shows, I pretty much just ask someone, what is the topic? And we go from there. And this was the topic you picked, like, how to reinvent your career, how to build a career you love. Because why, why is this so top of mind? Like, why, if you get to pick one thing and this is it, why is this where you're putting so much energy and focus right now?

Speaker B: Yeah, I think, you know, it's been a topic that's been near and dear to my heart forever. Uh, it's something that I've had to do kind of throughout my career. I've been in sales for about 15 years, sort of oscillated between startups and large companies and individual contributor and leaders. And now I have the opportunity to work with a lot of sellers and aspiring leaders today. And the bottom line is really just that sellers are unhappy. Uh, like you said, workers in tech are burnt out. And in my opinion, it really is just boiling down to so many People making career decisions based on the perception of, you know, quote unquote, what they should do, uh, rather than what they love to do and rather than what they're great at. So really, um, it's a topic that I'm passionate about. You know, just before we kind of hit, I was on LinkedIn and I saw, you know, very top of mind, very topical today that uh, the LinkedIn top story was that 47% of workers surveyed, um, over the last six months are planning to change jobs this year in 2024. Uh, and if you look at the stats just across, you know, tech in general, it stays 47%. That's a lot of people who are really unhappy with where they're at and wanting to make a change. Um, so you know, at the end of the day I think, you know, we've all been there, uh, maybe some of your listeners are a bit earlier in their career and at that point in time you might just to take kind of whatever comes along and be opportunistic and walk through any doors that you know, might appear open, um, for you. Um, but at some point, um, there comes kind of a bit of that rub where you have to really start being intentional about what it is that you want in your career. And more importantly what I'm seeing not happening is being really honest about kind of what makes you happy and what aspects of your career on a day to day level is it that you enjoy? Um, I think at the end of the day, you know, we spend so much time with our co workers and in our careers and that comes home with us. It impacts our mental health and our sense of purpose and our sense of well being. So it's so important that we start to be really intentional about our careers and putting ourselves in situations where we can use our strengths on a day to day basis and uh, feel kind of proud about what it is that we do.

Speaker A: So you've been in the game for a minute, like I have now. Have you noticed a shift? Like I don't feel like it's always been this way. Like you're talking about 50% almost are not just looking for a new job but like unhappy. To me those are also very different categories. Right. Of like they're unhappy. Like have you noticed a shift? Has it always been this way? You feel like, like what is your observation been?

Speaker B: I think, um, so I've been coaching folks for um, several years and I think my observation is really just around you kind of get this, that midpoint of your career kind of like I said earlier where you know, you decide that you want to have kind of a career in sales and then all of a sudden you're thinking like, do I go into leadership? Do I do a different kind of sales? Do I change industries? Um, and now we have kind of so many choice and so many different options. Like I know when I think back to when I started out my career in sales, um, there was full cycle account executives and that was it. Like there was no VR, there was no rev ops, there was no so many of these specializations that we have now, which is incredible. I think there's just been this rapid pace and change in terms of innovation and now ongoing with AI, um, that there's whole new career paths that we're not even aware of. And so I think at some point people stop and kind of reflect and look around them and think, you know, I don't know if I'm in the right seat anymore.

Speaker A: Mhm. So let's kind of keep going down that path there then. Right. Like what, I guess, what are the signs or what are the questions you have people ask themselves to know, like whether they're in the right seat for them? Or is it a, you know, because there's a. It could be a role issue, it could be a company issue, it could be just maybe not a role fit issue. Like what are some of the things people should be looking at, listening for, like asking themselves to know, like is it time for a change or is this actually worth kind of sticking out?

Speaker B: Yeah, I think one of the things that's top of mind for, for me, and maybe it's just a lot of the folks that I'm working with from a kind of a coaching perspective is kind of when you're at that inflection point and you're saying to yourself, you know, maybe I should move to say you're a bdr. And maybe you're thinking account executive or um, maybe you're an uh, emerg emerging account executive and you're thinking enterprise or maybe you're about ready to think about leadership. Um, start to really think about what it is you want for yourself and what are the types of activities that you want to be doing kind of on a day to day basis. And for me I bring up those examples. It's because when people start to think about their careers as a very linear kind of progression, that somebody else is predefined. You're not defining and you're doing it because you again should do it. That word should is always coming up. Take a Step back and take a beat back and say, why should I do that? You know, why is this important to me? What is it that I'm looking to gain or to learn? Um, you know, I'll give you an example. So, um, one of the things I constantly hear is people think, oh, I've been in sales for a few years, you know, made some good money. You know, I like doing it. Um, maybe I should get into sales management. And the first thing, and it's the, you know, common story. I've seen it a million times. You know, you see your bestseller get promoted into a leadership role, and then they're miserable. And you have that high turnover in sales leadership. Um, one of the highest, I think, in any corporate positions. And so I like to just start with one question. And it's my favorite question to ask because people always have like a really strong, almost like visceral reaction to this question. And then they say, I'm thinking about getting into management or should I get into management? Uh, the question really is, would you rather do a job yourself or would you rather be responsible for other people's work? Uh, and it's fascinating to see people's body language because it's almost this visceral reaction where you can see it right away. They're like, oh, no, I don't know. I like to have control of things. I like to own the outcome. I like to be in the driver's seat. You know, that might be an indication that you might not be best suited for a leadership role, but maybe you can use your leadership aspirations in a different kind of role. Maybe you'd be better suited to, um, say, enterprise sales, where you are leading, but you're kind of leading through influence, but you're not ultimately responsible for other people's work. Um, so it's starting to ask yourself kind of some of those, those questions. Um, the other one I hear, um, often is, so if a seller is doing really well, you know, they're hitting quota, they're liking what they're doing, maybe they're in like an emergency or a mid market, for example, and they say, okay, well, I got to get to that rung. Because that's what you do, that's what sellers do. And there's this, you know, linear progression that people laid out for me. But sometimes those skills aren't always transferable. Right. So continuing on through that example, um, maybe if what it is that you love to do kind of day in, day out is like, you love the thrill of the win, like, there is no Better point in time in your day than to see, you know, DocuSign completed in your inbox. Like, that's your heaven, that's your nirvana thrilled, and that's what you're proud to tell your friends and family about at the end of the day. Um, so maybe for you, going into enterprise isn't going to make a lot of sense because you're really only going to have those moments a handful of times throughout the course of a year. Um, you're not going to get those little like, dopamine hits that you really love and like that you really love about your job. Um, so that's, I think the first place to start is kind of really understanding, um, what it is you love and really kind of getting into the nuance of some of those details. And um, I can tell you a little bit more about a couple of other examples there as well.

Speaker A: So how do you coach people on? I'll say like, like the balance. Because there has been, I'll say, I don't know if it's a shift or not, but like the, the narrative got really heavily pushed of like, you know, do what you love, do what you love. You gotta love the, the process. Whereas it's like there's parts of any job that aren't always the most enjoyable thing. Right. And I think sometimes people get lost in that. Sometimes like they're in a job where it's like they're focused on the things they don't like in it versus the things that, that they do. Like. But it's almost hard to find like this role that's like the I'm, uh, only doing what I love type thing in terms of the activities. How do people like navigate that or balance maybe the trade offs of like, because as like, you know, I'm an svp, there are things I love about it. There are things that drive me absolutely insane. Yeah, I was like, like, do I love everything I do? The answer is no. It's just there's the parts that I do love offset it. Like how, how do you help people navigate that? Because I think especially for people early on, I feel like they sometimes make, they take do what you love too far and like they miss out on, you know, some of the things that would have gotten to them to where they want to be. I hope the question makes sense.

Speaker B: Yeah, it does. There's, I'd love to answer that question. There's a couple of resources actually that come, um, you know, kind of top of mind, a couple of books that kind of help. Maybe Answer a couple of those questions that I would recommend to anybody who sort of having that question, uh, is a bit older now, but it's a great book. I think it's a, uh, Mark Manson book, uh, the Subtle Art of Not Giving F word. And that's a great book because, you know, he'll talk a little bit about kind of, you know, every job has, you know, horrible components, the things that we don't want to do. Um, but you just have to kind of find your own brand of the things that you don't mind doing. Like you're never really going to love everything that you do. I think that's an unreasonable expectation. Um, it's more about getting grounded in the reality of what the day to day activities of the role is going to entail. Um, I think that's kind of the key thing. And then maybe striving for a balance. So maybe, you know, getting to do the things that you love kind of maybe 50% of the time versus those things that you loathe doing. Um, listen, just in the world of sales in general, nobody wants to be in their CRM all the time making activity updates. You don't want to be running reports for your team. Like nobody really ever wants to be doing that. It's just a nature of the role. And so probably put that in the load category. Um, but one of the things, there's a second book recommendation actually I'd love to make too. Uh, it's a book that's recently actually come out called, um, Love and Work by Marcus Buckingham. And he has this concept of talking a little bit about. He refers to them as red threads. But really what he's talking about is kind of honing in on the specifics of the things that you really love to do. And when we say love, um, let me just break that down a little bit because when we talk about love, um, really we're talking about like, how can you do more of the things that you enjoy and that you're naturally great at. Ah, every day. And one of the good ways to think about that is like the activities where maybe you lose track of time or where you naturally enter a bit of a flow state, or where your colleagues come to you and they're like, hey, you're really great at this. Can you kind of teach me that or coach me on that or share with me kind of your tips and tricks? Um, it's, it's those activities. It's the, and sometimes it can be really getting into like the crux of what it Is. And so, like, an example, um, that I can even give for myself. So I love giving presentations. I think it's a blast. I'm one of these people, you know, maybe occupational hazard. I love to give sales presentations. Um, but it's not asking the question of, like, what is it that you love about that presentation? Um, I get really jazzed up after it goes well. But if I really break it down, um, was it the designing of it? Not really. Uh, was it the storyboarding of it? Yes, absolutely. I love storyboarding a great presentation. I love using client examples. Um, was it the execution or the flawless delivery? No, I'm not motivated by perfection. Um, was it maybe that the presentation kind of resonated with the audience? Yes, that's something I absolutely love, like, knowing that my presentation resonates. Uh, and more importantly, I'm really motivated by momentum. So if I deliver a great presentation, at the end of the day, what it is that makes me feel so good is that I moved others to act. And maybe it's that I got a yes to my next steps. Um, that's specifically what I love. It's not about the presentation. It's not about the PowerPoint. It's a little bit about the storyboarding. Um, but it's mostly about kind of that aspect of kind of momentum and that forward movement that really jazzes me up. And so it's kind of really getting into. Getting deep into those activities. And so one of the first things that I'll have my clients do, if they're really just kind of clueless about, like, I don't know, like, I'm a little burnt out. Nothing's, uh, really bringing me joy right now. I'll say, okay, well, take the pressure off the things that you love. Like, we just put that on the side for now. And maybe take an audit of everything you've done all week. At the end of the day, every day, look at how you spent your time. You know, maybe you spent, um, two hours prospecting. Maybe you spent two hours in client meetings. Maybe you spent a couple hours on internal conversations. Maybe you spent some time with your product and dev team. Think about the specific activities that you were doing there and which of the ones felt like they were kind of energy givers versus the things that drained your energy. And then think about, break it down a little more. Like, what was it about that activity? So, um, I can tell you right now, for example, I'm working on some, um, you know, custom development items for a really big opportunity of mine. Um, but sitting in Some of those design meetings and going over the technical details and the nuances. Energy drain for me. So I don't really love to spend a lot of time in there. So I know that I would make a terrible solution engineer, I'd be a terrible product manager. Uh, these kind of roles would not be suited for me. Um, so it's starting to really kind of break it down and really think critically about it. Like, what was that about it? That kind of jazzed me up or that made me excited or, you know, got me, um, feeling at my best or feeling like I'm in a flow state. Mhm.

Speaker A: And I love the distinction there of like, you know, there's things that you love. There's also things that you are good at. I call it kind of like zone of genius. It's like, what's that Zona genius where like, when you're in it, you're not thinking like you just do. And I loved your presentation example because I'm borderline the exact same way. It's like, like my team knows this design. Absolutely not. Don't ask me to design anything. It's going to have five bullet points on each slide. That's all you're, you're getting. Right. But it is, it's the, uh, I love the light bulb moments. And I love, like, you know, I talk with my team. It's like a lot of people love the clothes. I love the seduction. I love that process. Right. Of like moving someone along this path. Like, I know I have you closed three weeks before you know that you're closed. Like, I, uh, just love that process. And I just think that's so fun to hear on that side. And so we'll make a little bit of a pivot here in terms of the questions. Because I want to ask about pivoting because, you know, okay, let's say I've been in sales for a little bit and I'm like, I don't know if this is what I want to do, but technically I don't have any ops, uh, experience yet, or I don't have any marketing experience yet, or I don't have any leadership experience. Like, how do you work to like make that pivot? Because I do feel like sometimes sellers get stuck in sales because like, they don't feel like they have experience in anything else. And so they're like, how do. Unless they get lucky at a company that allows a very smooth transition, like, what are things that they could be doing or thinking about to try to actually make a career pattern? Because I loved your, um, description coming into this call, like, reinvent your career. Like, I loved that language there. So now it's like, all right, maybe sales, the day to day activities are not what I love. It looks like ops, day to day activities is something I'd love. How do I reinvent? How do I make that pivot?

Speaker B: Yeah, so this always depends on everybody's kind of personal circumstance. But there's a couple of, um, I guess clues or things that you can think through. So if you're lucky enough to kind of be employed, you're in a sales role, but you're thinking about making a change, change, um, that's a great time to look across your organization and look to people who might be in roles kind of similar to the one that you're sort of aspiring to get to. And I think this is where it goes down again to that day to day nuance. Like, so, you know, in your example, if it's operations that you might want to go, does your organization have revenue operations? Um, this might be an opportunity for you to kind of create a path for yourself. But before you do that, you need to make sure that you are actually going to be excited kind of about that day to day reality. And so I would always encourage people to, um, maybe go to other operational groups within your organization and start to ask. You know, people are always really willing to help. I think people are more often reluctant to ask for help than people are to give help. And so if you're lucky enough to be in an organization where you feel you have a great culture, um, don't look outside of it necessarily as your first step, but look inside of the organization and start reaching out to people who have kind of similar roles. Start to learn a little bit more about their day to day. Uh, put your hand up to see if there's any way that you can get involved. Almost like doing a little bit of a proof of concept on yourself. So, um, operational people have no shortage of projects that they need support on. So I would say find a way to get involved and find a way to start solving problems for these people. And then sure enough, you'll probably build yourself a bit of a mentor who can help you make that shift. Um, in that operational example as well, I would say, you know, if you don't have revenue operations, maybe look to have that conversation with, um, your leader and you know, the leader of the organization to say, maybe this is a role that the company needs, needs kind of on the horizon and then do everything you can to put yourself in a position to be the only choice within the company. So educate yourself, find mentors, put your hands up, run towards problems, um, seek kind of outside guidance. Like I said, just be willing to ask for help. Um, but if you are finding yourself in a position where maybe you've been laid off or you're outside of work, this one gets a little bit tricky. And I say that because it's just going to depend on your personal kind of circumstance. I know that the job market can be a little bit tough right now. And um, I'm a realist. I understand that people need to get into positions. So if you're in sales today, but you want to be in an operational role, but you have zero operational experience, it might not be the best time to try to make that pivot out of the gate, but rather to position yourself within an organization where you know, you share those aspirations, those aspirations are supported, and then you can kind of co create a plan to get there. Um, so, so that's kind of my, my advice. It's really hard if you don't have any kind of relationship with a company, maybe that you're applying or that you aspire to work to. Um, if you don't have any experience field. Um, I'll give an example. So I have a lot of sellers right now. There's kind of a big trend. I'm not sure. I'm sure, Katie, you've seen this too, over the last like year or so where sellers are really burnt out from carrying these heavy and unrealistic quotas. And so the natural reaction is, well, maybe I'll go into customer success or account management. But, um, they don't have any experience necessarily in that area and they're finding themselves, um, not able to make that, that switch. And so I always like to just caution if you're trying to do kind of like a wholesale change in your focus, it's not an area that you don't have experience with. It's better to align yourself with an organization that's growing and has open positions where you can find like a mentor and support to get you to that end goal that you're trying to get to.

Speaker A: Yeah, and I really, really like. And I'll say I appreciate how you broke that down of like the, the realism side too, of like the m. Where the market is like, I know people personally that have like left good jobs because it wasn't what they loved and they wanted to make a career pivot. But then like they're shocked to find out that they can't get those jobs. You know, it's like I want to get into ops or I want to get into marketing. I want to get into cs. Like they left the jobs and then they can't land that next one. Right. And now they're like, well, do I have to go back? And my advice would be like sometimes you have to land and expand. Just like sales go get. Okay, there's. If you see a job at a company in CS or op ops, but they also have a sales role, maybe consider land the sales role.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: Expand into that ops role. And like if you use the same process you just talked about, get a, get a mentor, shadow them, offer like I was like, offer to take like the grunt work away. Like, because you're also, you're going to get a feel for like what is the grunt work of um, that role. So if I go to you and say, hey, like what's, what's the stuff that you don't want to deal with? Could I spend a few hours on that each day to help you? You do that. And then I experience that and I go, oh, I don't like this either.

Speaker B: Exactly.

Speaker A: Then I learn a little bit there. So I think that's really important is like asking for help seeking, guidance seeking, mentorship. Because that also will give you the relationships ideally to get into some of these roles, which I think is also really, really important.

Speaker B: Yeah. And I think the same applies for changing industries, I'll say as well. Um, because we're in a bit of a competitor or competitive, excuse me, marketplace, um, especially from an employment front, um, if you're in a specific field today. So for example, I'm in fintech, but say I wanted to make a wholesale pivot to um, health tech or like ed tech or something that I don't have a lot like any experience in at all. It's really hard to make those kind of pivots and reinventions, um, out of the gate. Like you kind of need a sponsor, you need people that you've worked with. One, uh, way to do it. If you're trying to make kind of like an industry pivot like that is to see if you've worked with clients in that, that space. Um, so as an example, um, you know, one of the ways that I got kind of into fintech in the, in the first place is I, uh, was working for a professional services company. Uh, and then I had a really exciting client I was the account manager for. I loved working with them. They were in Fintech. I got really interested in How I make the pivot into Fintech. And uh, I was able to do that because I had a relationship with the client and kind of a sponsor to help, you know, bring me in. Um, so I also just want to say, you know, be realistic in terms of those hard pivots too, between industry, um, when you're looking at, you know, applying for a new job or making that reinvention and you know, changing organizations, um, be very deliberate about kind of what your personal value proposition is. So what is your experience? And sure, a lot of those experiences will be transferable across industries. You know, you see it all the time with CEOs, where a CEO can go from high tech to manufacturing and what have you, but you really have to have kind of the right relationships and, and sponsors and people to help you make that pivot. Um, so I love the advice and the way that you framed it too, around kind of like a land and expand. Because the same strategy applies in that scenario.

Speaker A: Yeah, I think, and I'm sure you see this, it's like so many sellers don't approach the job hunt like a seller would approach the job hunt. Right. What are your thoughts on that?

Speaker B: So I think where people get tripped up. So I will say one of the things that, so there's, there's kind of that oft repeated advice in sales where it's a numbers game and it's all about activity and it's all about metrics. I think sometimes depending on the kind of seller you are, um, I think people try to take that blanket advice that they see all over LinkedIn and then they try to apply that to their job search. And so what they end up doing is they end up going for quantity, um, over quality, and they go for the volume. And so often I find when I start working with new clients, they're totally burnt out from the job search process. And when I ask them what they've done, I've applied to hundreds of jobs. But what they're doing is they're hitting that easy button on LinkedIn. They're not doing any research on the company. They're not, um, looking to understand the industry. They're not looking to understand things like who are their buyers and have you sold to that buyer group before? Um, what is the point of view that you bring to this organization? So they're taking kind of that, um, I guess the spray and pray to use another sales analogy approach to their job search instead of doing it very deliberately. So I would kind of recommend to folks, um, who are looking for a New opportunity right now. Treat it more like an enterprise sales motion. Um, find your target list of companies, the places that you would love to work for, and have a point of view about it. So sometimes people come to me and say, I want to work for a company like I'll say Snowflake, because they're high tech, I see that they're hiring and they had a couple of quarters of profitability. You could say the same is true for hundreds of companies, maybe thousands of companies in the US right now that fit that same criteria. So you got to get a little more specific, like what specifically is it about that company that makes you want to work there? Um, so I often recommend like start with 10, maybe 20, no more than 20 though. Uh, and really have kind of a point of view about what it is that you would bring to that organization, to that organization's culture, to the team, and then to the role itself. So really kind of break it down, treat it more like an enterprise motion. Get really, really, really specific. I often challenge my clients. Like if you can say, you know, if, if you were, if you know, Katie, you're the hiring manager and I come to you and I want to apply for a role on your team, it better be specific if the reasons why, um, you know, I think that why I want to work for you and why I want to work for your team, why I want to work for your company, is the same answer for all of the other 20 companies on my list. You haven't gone far enough, you haven't gotten specific enough and you haven't like done, you haven't done the work. I would say. Mhm.

Speaker A: Yeah, I love that. The, it's, it's a sales process. We just are the product in that sales process. And people don't like you have to craft a pov. You have to get creative to stand out through the noise. Right? Like that easy button isn't going to do it. Um, depending on when people are listening to this. Like we just did an episode with Clint Heinecke. He just, he made a transition into Zoom info, right? Like came from non tech and within three years landed a um, great job at zoomingfo in the like he, he cold emailed the CEO, he got bunted down, he made some posts about it, got bunted to the CRO, hit it off of the CRO, found out where they were staying during Prez club, sent a bottle of champagne to like where they were at. Like just the follow up. Like he treated it like an enterprise sale. And I think you know if you think about it, this is a multi seven figure dollar contract. Contract, right. You land a 250k per year job, four years, that's, that's a million dollars. Are we treating it like that? And so often people do, they just, they just don't, they just don't do it. Now one word I want to dive into a little bit further is job versus career.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: Because your actual initial language, right, coming in is like how to reinvent your career and how to have a career that you love.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: I think sometimes people look at things like a job, they don't think about it as a career. So like how do you coach your, you know, your clients around, you know, call it like a career that you love, not just a job because a job is a point in time. Right. Whereas a career is years and years and years and years. How do you guide people through that part of the process?

Speaker B: Yeah, so the first thing that comes to mind, I was actually, um, of course we're connected on LinkedIn and you had done a podcast post, um, you know, again, depending on the time that people are listening to this, just a couple days ago, um, where you're talking a little bit about kind of like industry and so I'd love to, um, you know, when people think about career, I would love them to focus on industry a little bit more. Um, so being kind of an industry leader and a thought leader, an industry that excites you, for example. So when you think about your career, um, what's going to happen is you're going to gain a bunch of experience in kind of a certain field. So say it's high tech or ed tech or I don't know, fintech or whatever you want really. Um, you're going to get a certain level of expertise as the years go on and on and on. So I think it's really important to align yourself with an industry that you're actually excited about. Like one that, you know, if insurance doesn't excite you, well then probably don't spend all your time and energy trying to get a job and insurance that's not somewhere where you're going to build a longer term career. Um, like so for me, for example, um, I pretty much specialized in fintech. It's been nearly 15 years and I haven't strayed outside of it because I really love fintech and what I love about it is that it's always, always innovating and it's always kind of trying to be sort of cutting edge. It's always investing in technology now, Fintech is really applying kind of AI throughout our use cases and I find that very exciting. I like disruptive industries. I like industries that are fast moving, that are quick to change. Um, that's a lot of fun for me. So I would say try to find kind of an industry that you're excited about, because regardless of the seat that you take at any given kind of organization, um, you can create a really great career with some longevity, with a lots of financial success and reward if you can find an industry that you are personally excited about. And I think that's really kind of what, what it boils down to.

Speaker A: I love it. I love it because I do, I do think too often people are just focused on the job in front of them now and not the career they're trying to build. You know, I think because now in the Internet days, you never know who really said something. It just gets attributed to like, you know, somebody and eventually it ends up with Ben Franklin or Mark Twain, no matter what. But one of them, Tony Robbins, whoever, said something along the lines of, you know, people drastically overestimate what they can do in a year and drastically underestimate what they can do in three.

Speaker B: That's true.

Speaker A: And people don't play the long game. They're just looking at like, oh, I want to land this job now. Whereas if you took a three year approach and landed at a company and then expanded at that company and then got into and found a mentor and like invested, invested in yourself. Which is the other thing too, like I'd like to call out is like, if you're trying to craft your career and make pivots, like, you gotta educate yourself, like read, study coaching courses, like working with somebody, you know, like, I had a early mentor tell me the slowest way to learn something is through experience. Oh yeah, why take 20 years to get good at something if I can learn from someone who's been doing it for 20 years and then put some nuances to it. And so as we start to wrap this up here, right, the name of this podcast is Live Better Sell Better. Because I also have this weird idea that if we lived better, had more joy, energy, fulfillment, happiness outside of work, at the work and the jobs, the selling the career would be better as well. What would your live better advice be for people listening?

Speaker B: I love that question. I think, um, something that I've been just on, like a little bit of a personal tear about and something I, you know, keep chatting everyone's ear off about is learning how to listen to your Intuition. And I think that that would really serve you better in terms of being able to live better. And why that's so important is that we're just in this age of like, noise and content and messages and lots of. Everybody can be an expert that has, you know, a ring, light and a microphone. Um, so really learning how to tune out that noise and then listen to your own intuition and what makes sense to you. And, um, there's a couple of, I guess, uh, ways that you could do it. Um, so a lot of people will talk about meditation. I think that that's one way, that's a fabulous way. Um, but I think it can be as simple as, you know, adopting a little bit of an anti hustle mindset. I think it's really important to take time to ourselves to quiet out that noise. So taking a few minutes of just quiet reflection or just quiet time with no distractions, go for a walk without your headphones in. There's lots of different things that we can do to start to kind of listen to ourselves without that distraction. Uh, and one of the things I've been talking a lot about is just the concept of like a gut instinct. So instead of making all of your decisions sort of in your, in your head, feeling, um, them in your stomach a little bit, and a couple of the little, um, tricks or one trick that I find that works really, really well for me, it sounds a little woo woo, but I promise it works as something worth giving a try.

Speaker A: I love the woo woo stuff. Okay.

Speaker B: I'm super woo woo. So I talk about this all day. Um, it's really just, um, if you're trying to figure out what to do, ask yourself the question, ask it out loud, and then look in the mirror, um, see your reaction and see what you think. And that's a good way to kind of get out of your, you know, intellectual, rationalized mind and into kind of your gut, uh, instinct of what it is. And so earlier I said, there's a really important question. So if somebody's listening and they're thinking, you know, what's next for me, me in my career, do I want to pursue a leadership path? Try the question note that I posed earlier. Go look in the mirror and ask yourself, would I rather do a job myself or would I rather be responsible for other people's work and see how your body reacts. I promise you, your face, your gut, your shoulders might go up, you might kind of hunch over. Um, but it's kind of a brilliant, uh, technique. If you're somebody who's really in your head, um, to be able to start listening to your gut.

Speaker A: I love that one. I love it because it's something, you know, even as more studies come out on, like, called the second brain. That is our, our gut, like, literally, like how that works and the amount of neurons and things that are there, it is crazy to me. I love that. Just was on a call with a mentee of mine a few weeks ago, similarly, and she's like, yeah, I'm not really sure what I want to do. I was like, no, no, you know what you want to do. You're, you're talking yourself in and out of it. Like, that's what we did. We did like a quick kind of like break, like catch your breath. I said your first, I want your first response to this question, right? Your first one, right? Like this or this. It's like, well, this. Okay, done. That's. That's what you want. That's okay. You're letting the how and, uh, everything else get in the way of it. We know way, way more often, often what we need to do, which is making the choice to do so. So I love that, that one has not been given yet as a little better at piece of advice. So I love that as, as an end, trusting your gut, listening, uh, to your intuition, listening to how we approach things. So this was, this was phenomenal, Heather. Where can people find more of you? Where are you putting out content? Do you have like a newsletter, an ebook, anything that we can get into people's hands because they need more of this.

Speaker B: I love it. Well, thank you. So that's why to get in touch with me, um, connect with me on LinkedIn. So, Heather Hoydart, F O I D A R T. I'm actually building out a bit of a masterclass right now in terms of how to reinvent your career. Um, would love any of your listeners to be able to join, give feedback, attend that. And then I also do one on one coaching. So I have more of that details, um, up in my LinkedIn profile.

Speaker A: Amazing. Amazing. Well, good. I'm glad you got the one to one and the one one to many, because this is. We only really get one career, right? You can make a lot of pivots, but it's like that one career that's gonna support you, allow you to live the life that you want to and bring joy is so important. So, Heather, thank you so much. This was phenomenal.

Speaker B: Thank you for having me.