Why Change Feels So Scary

Amy Evans: Welcome back to Women in Sales Leadership. We are talking about something that I'm actually nervous to discuss with you today because we're talking about change and how change is scary, making pivots, and how thinking about it and contemplating and doing all the research feels somehow safe. But there becomes a moment where you just have to flip and go and do something. Otherwise, the pain that that we inflict on ourselves is just it's hard because we are built to make progress.

Not always strive, striving is different, but progress. So this is what you're gonna get in today's episode. We are gonna talk about the truth of the challenge. Of how hard it is to actually make a change, to get yourself mentally ready for it, ⁓ the thinking and overthinking that happens along the way.

And then maybe we'll find a path to some kind of letting go. I don't know if I'm gonna be able to tie this up in a perfect bow for you because I'm doing this conversation, this topic today, because I am in the middle of this right now. And I'm actually Freaked out that I'm talking about it. ⁓ I'd prefer so much more to just like hide in my hole and not tell you all or share what's really going on.

But then I realize that you all might be dealing with this as well. And so buckle up. It's gonna be a real conversation about making change and making a pivot and taking action and how to get to it and Look, I'm not gonna give it to you in some kind of way that's like wrapped up in some kind of like perfect bow of what you ought to do or what you should do. But in listening to this conversation, maybe you'll see something for yourself.

And my hope is that it inspires you. This show is built to inspire founders, CEOs, sales leaders, and aspiring sales leaders, and anybody. Who is wanting to grow and progress in their leadership and their career to drive more revenue, to hit their number, right? All the things and not lose themselves along the way.

That's the part that's the trick, finding a way to stay you in the process. So this is what we're gonna get into. And I've got a couple notes I'm gonna refer to to keep myself organized for you all. So, who ⁓ What's going on?

⁓ last thing. I should also remind you, I still work one on one with sales leaders. I'm about to announce something to you that's not fully baked yet, but I'm gonna give it to you anyway because I'm following my own advice, which is to just like do the damn thing, right? ⁓ I still work with sales leaders and I work with them or even individual contributors.

I work with a hand select group of one on one individuals. And if that is something that's been calling out to you and you've been wanting to do it, but you haven't done it, today is your day, babe. Reach out to me. Have a one hour conversation.

We're just going to talk about you. You're going to get value no matter what. How do you get access to that? You go to amievinscoaching.

com forward slash work with me. Again, that's amievinscoaching.com forward slash work with me. You will find your free conversation with me waiting for you there.

Go get it. And if you get to the middle of this conversation, you're like, I know somebody who needs to be listening to this right now, give a gift. It's the best gift that you can give. Just like shoot a tax, say, you gotta listen to this episode.

It's for you. I thought about you. Hope you get something out of it. Be generous.

You all are so generous with your s with all the people you are that are in your lives giving little gifts like that. Is one thing you can do to just like share the love. So let's talk about the love because I'm feeling scared right now and I need love. So let's get to it.

Like I am with it. So scared. and this is the reality that I'm in. And this is where I've seen so many leaders, whether they're CEOs or sales leaders or any of us, we get so freaked out.

when it's time to make a change or something has to change and we have to go a different direction. And it could be all multitudes of going a different direction, where like, is it a new job or changing companies, or you've been going after a certain market for a certain amount of time and all of a sudden you realize that at that ideal customer profile, oops, it's not what you thought it was gonna be. And you've got to pivot. everything in your business to now make another bet and go after it.

Boy, that's what I'm into right now. So it's that, it's that knowing of like, I've got to do something because what's going on right now isn't working. And so I think one of the easiest things to acknowledge is like, or maybe not, what's not working, If you really are honest, right? And we are so honest here because we are measured on did you hit the number or not?

And it's not by it's like binary. There's no subjectivity to it. Like you know, either you did or you didn't. And there's always a conversation you can have about why and the circumstances.

And don't get me wrong, there are circumstances and there can be a why. However, there's a moment where you've got to just look yourself in the mirror and say, Okay, this isn't working. And this is the opportunity that you have right now. You're like, Amy, I didn't sign up for this.

I'm just trying to get through my walk. I'm just trying to fill my laundry right now. No, yes, you did. You clicked play, so here you are.

And you get to be with this. So there's something that you have that's going on in your life that you know needs change, whether it's work or home or relationship or whatever. And Underneath that knowing of change is this freaking fear. It's fear.

And I I have never found a way to get around this. Like it doesn't go away ever, ever, ever. And I think what is so fascinating, I think it was it's Tony Robbins who talks about these seven human needs all the time. And so we have we've got two that like kind of juxtapose each other.

So three really. All right, let me explain. So the f one that we have to have is progress. So progress.

We're gonna put that in our back pocket because I'm gonna come back to that in a second. The other thing that we want as a humans, as a human need is certainty. Certainty. And then crazy insane is that right next to certainty, we also need novelty.

Like think about it. Trying something new, going someplace new, the new restaurant, the new trip. The new team, the new product, pick your whatever your new thing is, right? So when we're about to pivot, and I am in this right now, like I am pivoting what I'm doing, what I'm focusing on fully, because well, I'll explain that in a second.

But getting back to the fear of it, and it's like one part of our body and our mind is calling out for certainty. And it's the devil we know. We know where we are. We know what we're doing.

We know the message. We know the team. We know the company. We and in that is this sense of comfort.

You're like, I know it. I don't have to learn something. I don't have to stretch myself. But in it also that knowing that we see is also know.

It's not working for you. And herein lies the rub. So we've got something that's not working and or an opportunity that might be better to pivot, to chase toward a new market, a new team, new company, new job, maybe even a new relationship. Right?

But we've got something we know that feels safe. And I think this then what has been happening for me is that okay, awareness, I see that I want to make a pivot and I know I can't keep doing what I'm doing. And then there's this moment of like, well, what am I gonna do now? And what are you gonna do now?

Because you know something needs to change. And this is where things get so freaking uncomfortable and have been uncomfortable for me. Because what I've been in the middle of limbo on is I have spent the past year focusing solely on, primarily focusing solely on coaching sales leaders. And I've had some amazing leaders that I've worked with.

And I am so like honored and privileged that those leaders came to me and wanted support. And I was able to give what I had to them and give them the things I wish I'd always had when I was a sales leader trying to figure it out all by myself and not asking for a lot of help along the way wasn't good at that. So what I'm pivoting toward and what is being called to me was I suddenly started to get like ⁓ I had a CEO like chase me for a year trying to get me to come work with him.

in some capacity. And finally, it took a year because when he first approached me about it, it was like, no, hard no, no thanks. I love you. You're a great person.

I admire you. We'd worked together before and I would love to work with you, but like that's not what I'm doing right now. Right. I'm doing this other thing and I'm going to go explore this other thing.

CEO comes back. You know, we stay in touch a little bit, right? But he comes back a year later and he's like, Amy, I think it's time for us to talk again. And so finally, I'm open to it.

I'm thinking, I don't know if I can help you or not, but I want to listen to what you want me to do and what you think needs to happen here, right? Like I had this preconceived idea when he reached out to me the year before that. It needed to l be a certain way and be all baked out and be so perfect, right? Like, ⁓ a plan.

When we started to work together in February of this year. I was scared out of my mind. But I knew I could help him. And he's a phenomenal leader.

Like checked all my boxes of being a phenomenal leader, someone that I could help. And I didn't know how it was going to turn out. And I said yes. I was ready to accept a little more risk at that point, right?

And I also maybe was ready to colour outside the lines of this little box that I had created for what I was doing with my practice in my coaching and my consulting work. And I think that's what I've I've seen that happen in the people that I work with as well. Like this is a common, I'm not immune to any of this. So what's what I've seen too is like you you realize that you need to do something, you know something's not working, you get stuck in this like, ⁓ but I need I don't want to make a mistake.

Whatever I do next, whatever that might be for yourself, I don't want to screw it up. I don't want to waste time, I don't want to mace waste money or sacrifice money or go to the wrong opportunity or the wrong company or the blah blah blah blah blah. Right? As if there's only one path.

Because when you I would when I know this about me and I perhaps maybe this is something for you too. When I look back at what I've done in my career, and every time I made a change or a shift or a pivot, ⁓ I was totally scared out of my mind. I was always scared. But you know what was also so that was true.

So being scared and frightened doesn't go away. No matter what the job was, no matter how experienced I was, no matter how like part of me felt confident about it, right? There was always this part of like, what if you can't do it? ⁓ And What what's there also is this worry about it being perfect.

This worry about not making the mistake and not messing it up. And when I look back, even the mistakes, like at the time I would have been like, ⁓ my God, this was such a mistake. Okay. And I'll give you a few of them.

Okay, I t I t I followed a leader to a company where it was such a shit show. that and he was a great leader. I loved this leader. And it was two leaders actually that I loved.

I was like, this is so perfect. I get to work with my favorite people. It's going to be awesome. You know, he was honest with me from the start.

He's like, Amy, this place is jacked up. And I'm like, okay, sure, it's jacked up, but we're going to fix it together because we are powerful. You know, we're going to be this like, you know, th three amigos and get it all figured out. And we showed up.

And unfortunately, it was so jacked up that like no amount of us being amazing was gonna unjack it. So I for the first time in my life, like I found myself like I this company doesn't even show up on my resume. That's how ashamed I was of it. That like I was there for six months and I got out.

I left. And so like ran away. Ran away from that. I was like, ⁓ that was a mistake.

Never make that a mistake again. Then I had another I had a great experien I had an actually I went straight to another tough experience. Like I had a tough experience, but it was that other tough experience that was a hard you know, jacked up culture, ⁓ micromanaging, executives who were horrible to work with. Not my immediate execs, but like the senior execs were just, I don't know, they were sad human beings and they took it out on their teams and they they weren't pleasant and it wasn't joyful and it wasn't the kind of vibe that I like to have when I'm out there like laying it all out.

And no one does, by the way. ⁓ so the Those two experiences, I mean, that third one was a giant I talk about that one a lot. That's the one where they gave me a pip after I turned around the whole team. Right.

Like in the moment, you would have asked me, like, Amy, those were mistakes. I'm like, well, but let's talk about what it I learned about myself there and what I got out of it. A, I tried something, I ran an experiment. And I'm kind of talking about this.

I'm like talking myself through this right now, folks. So you're like gonna hear me like self talking my way through this. I ran an experiment and it didn't work. I tried something and it didn't work out.

What does that mean about me? Does it mean I'm perfect? Nope. Never have been.

Actually not interested in that anymore being perfect. There was one time I thought I did, but ⁓ what it taught me about myself in that the place I was for six months was that I was I had standards. I had standards of culture, I had stand self-respect, I had enough c courage that I was as a single breadwinner that I could, you know. ⁓ leave a company after six months and it wasn't gonna like ruin my career or or like look bad.

Like who cares? Nobody knew about it except for me and the executives that were there. It's like not even on my resume. I just shared with you all about it.

I'm not ashamed of it. You know, there was I wasn't willing to stand for something that was not that was below my standards. And it was okay to say, you know what, this isn't working for me. I'm out.

And not to try to turn these into like some sort of like, ⁓ look, it was a jacked up situation and there's some sort of silver lining. Look, I'm just telling you the reality of what happened, the reality of what happened. And this the other job that I had that was, you know, I turned around the business, they put me on a pip, they wanted me to micromanage. I didn't want to micromanage because I was like, Hey, I don't lead that way.

And if that's how you want me to lead, then I don't know what to tell you. I hit their numbers anyway. ⁓ but I talk about that job a lot because it was that job And like who I was forced to be when I also, again, was like, not my standards. You're not up to my standards culturally.

You're not up to my standards values-wise. And I'm out. I'm out. And who I had to be in order to get out of there created these big opportunities for me where I had these, I got these two huge job offers, making more money than I've ever made before.

So I ran an exp I ran these experiments. And one was a short experiment. It definitely was a hard note. Didn't work.

The other one was another experiment. And I learned so many amazing things. I gained so much freaking experience in a crummy situation, turning around an underperforming team and ⁓ having to completely redo comp plans. being able to completely take control of strategy and execute it and Turn around a culture of a business.

I learned so much. I learned so much. And I think as I'm like saying this out loud right now, and there's like we still have to pay the bills, right? There's no like, hey, I just gotta go and run experiments my whole time and get to just try things and see what works and doesn't work.

No, we don't have that luxury because we've got families to take care of and financial commitments to have to meet. But what hasn't happened every time I've tried something and it didn't work out exactly as I thought it would, you know what? It didn't kill me. I didn't have to sell everything I own and move into a a shelter.

Right? Like to take it completely to an extreme. The worst thing that could possibly happen with any of these changes is that it doesn't work out and then you shift and do something else. So Like I'm feeling this right now as I'm saying this to you because I need to hear these words too.

Right. Y'all think I'm doing this conversation for you. I am. I swear half the time I'm just talking to myself because I need to hear this too.

I don't have all the answers. Nobody does. So ⁓ so these experiments that we run, right? Now there's there's homework you can do that'll help you run better experiments, right?

There there's research you can do, and the trick is to not get yourself so wrapped up in like at some point you have to just say I've done enough research. I'm gonna just go talk to somebody. I'm gonna just go. Go take action.

I'm just gonna do the thing and get out of the research it forever mode. Because what we're trying to save ourselves from is like this thought that we could make a mistake. It's so dangerous to be unable or unwilling to make mistakes. That's where we get stuck and curl up in a ball.

And I have been doing that. I have, because I've known what I wanted to do and the change I wanted to make for, ⁓ let's see, about three months now. And right now I'm getting in action on it. I had to go through a little bit of a process.

To say, okay, I'm really ready to do it. My hope is maybe I'll be faster next time. Maybe I'll get better at like being ready to pivot and charge forward confidently in another direction and just say, What the what the hell? What do I have to lose?

Right. We're gonna go for it. I'm going for it. I'm going for it.

So this pivot that I'm working on. And I've alluded to it already, is that, you know, I had a CEO chase me down. ⁓ we worked together. I was scared to death.

I was like, I don't know how this is gonna turn out, but I came up with a plan. He liked it. We worked together, and there was stuff that happened while we were working together that n I never could have anticipated and he couldn't have anticipated that turned out to be huge wins. Huge wins.

For his organization. ⁓ I was brought in to help him. I was brought in to help him just like get a sales strategy down and like get real on his forecast. Like he had a vision of I wanna be at this number in three years, I want to be at this number this year.

How am I gonna get there? I said, Great, let's get out your forecast. Let's look at everything that you have in pipe and what you're gonna track toward each quarter. And let's look at the accounts that you already have that you think you can write.

I mapped out the plan just like we would map out a territory plan, right, y'all? For those of us who are sales leaders on this call, like come on one ⁓ one sales. I did that for him. And in the midst of learning where all of the revenue came from in his business, 80% of his revenue was coming from this one partner relationship where they were doing subcontracting work.

Subcontracting work, right? And so where there was a set rate that they were getting paid out by the partner for the subcontracting work. And when I looked at that rate and I talked to the CEO, I said, You know this isn't market rate. And he said, I know it's not market.

Right. I said, How long have you been doing this? He's like, Two years. And I said, Are they happy with you?

Yes. Okay. So then we mapped out this plan to renegotiate this hourly rate for his business. I would have never thought this was going to be part of the pro conversation when we were we started this engagement together where I came in and said, Okay, show me your revenue, show me what your pipeline is.

Let's talk about how you're gonna go to market and how we're gonna do everything, right? All of a sudden, kimono comes open and we see, holy smokes, there's a quick win ling right in front of us called go renegotiate this deal that it that represents 80% of your business right now. And so we did that. I mapped out the strategy for him to go negotiate the deal.

And it took him about three weeks to get the negotiation done. And in three weeks he he'd seen he had jump bumped that revenue up Over twenty percent. Twenty percent increase in revenue off of one negotiation, right? I'm extremely proud of that.

And ⁓ anyway, in working with that CEO, I don't know, I work with all of when and I work with my leaders that I coach, I work with the ICs that I coach, somebody, ⁓ any of my clients that I work with, I always have a debrief with them. So I say, All right, we're gonna at the very end, we're gonna sit down and talk about what went well, what you wish would have gone better, and you know, what would you recommend I do differently or all the feedback. I want feedback, babe, because that's the only way I improve is for someone to tell me.

And I'll never forget, we got on that call and the CEO said, he goes, Amy, I know that you really want me to tell you something that should have been better. And you're going to be disappointed by this conversation because I'm extremely pleased with how things went. You made such a difference for my team. The tools and the playbooks that you built out for us, we are still using them right now today.

In fact, we're on track for Q2 and we're gonna have our best Q two that we've had in years. And that all came from me just like getting past my fear. Of not being perfect. Yeah, because what my life is about is about making a difference.

Like I am here to make a difference. Everything I do is aligned on that. And the kind of difference that I want to make, I am getting emotional. Yeah.

God, I didn't expect this freaking podcast. It makes me cry. ⁓ right. What the difference is I'm committed to is just I want to elevate leaders and I don't I don't discriminate on who those leaders are.

Like if you're leading a business or you're leading revenue or you're leading yourself, I'm here to make a difference. I want you to get what you want for yourself out of your life, to have all the financial abundance that you want, to have a path to get to where you want to go, to have support, to have someone to bounce ideas off of, someone to rant to, to Try to believe it or not, like this happens sometimes. ⁓ I'm not a therapist, I'm not. However, leadership is being with people.

It is leading people toward where they want to go. And the unique skill that I bring to the table is I listen to people, I know what is available, I know what their powers are, I can see, I can I can tell what your powers are when we talk to you, when I talk to you. Right. There's the royal we, I don't know, who's who else is coming to the conversation besides you and me.

But that's what's there. That's what's there is this desire to bring out the best in all of us because we all want that. That's what we are living our lives for. We want to have fulfillment.

We want to have joy. We want to have success. We want to have great relationships. And that's what I do.

I bring out the best, whether it's the best in for a CEO who's trying to grow the business by 5X, or the best for a sales leader who is trying to lead her team, or in the middle of it is has an opportunity to get a promotion and become like the head of all of sales globally for the company. This is happening to one of my clients right now, right? Like I'm here to bring it out of you because we all need that. We don't do it alone.

When we're by ourselves and this is me too, like all of the why it can't work shows up and the why they're gonna say no shows up and how would they ever pick me and why me, right? I get to be a mirror that shows you and reflects back to you who you really are. And I know that you are amazing. You're powerful.

And you deserve great things in your life, right? And so if making a change or making a pivot is ahead of you or you're in the middle of it, trust yourself. Trust yourself. And please don't do it alone.

If you want support, babe, I'm here for you. Come get me or find somebody else. Like talk to one of your, talk to one of your people who you know is a champion, who you know is a cheerleader. Who you know will tell you the truth and say, like, get out of your own head, damn it.

Come on, you can do this, right? And not to cuss at you or berate you because you're not doing anything wrong. You are doing the best you can, and we all just need some support to get there. So this is the the support that I'm asking for from you is look, I produce this show, I ⁓ host the show, this show was born out of my imagination where I imagined a show.

That was built for women who are in sales leadership, whether they are in sales still, their founders, their CEOs, and or aspiring sales leaders. I built this thing because I wanted you to have someone who has walked 25 years in your shoes, who knows how hard it is to do what you do every day, and is committed to being here for you. And it's never gonna be perfect, but it's gonna be the best I can possibly give you. And if this show or this conversation has been great for you today and you've gotten something out of it, ⁓ man, it would mean so very, very much to me if you would follow the show.

Only about half of my listeners actually follow the show. If you follow the show, it actually makes it so that. more people get access to the show, the way the whole algorithm magic works, right? I'm just here to impact as many people as I possibly can.

And I hope this was impactful for you today. I am so grateful for you listening and being in this on in this conversation with me. And if you have but thought about it and you haven't taken action on it, I'm going to give you this invitation. I'm going to keep standing in a place of invitation for you.

You don't have to commit to work with me. I just want to meet you. I just want to talk with you. You'll get something out of this conversation.

Come find me at Amy Evanscoaching.com forward slash work with me. We'll grab time. We'll talk.

And in the meantime, go be the leader that you know you are.