Remarkable People Podcast

Charlene Norman | Facing Adversity, Rising Up, & the 6 Steps to Getting What You Want Out of Life

May 17, 2022 David Pasqualone / Charlene Norman Season 5 Episode 501
Remarkable People Podcast
Charlene Norman | Facing Adversity, Rising Up, & the 6 Steps to Getting What You Want Out of Life
RPP+ Hanging Out with David Pasqualone & Friends!
Support the show & get subscriber-only content.
Starting at $4/month Subscribe
Show Notes Transcript

Did you hear the one about the young woman who dreamed of winning the lottery, but never bought a lottery ticket? You know, the one where the young girl turned into a successful business woman who loved to help people grow, and then got critically ill when she was hit with a crazy bacterial virus.  After being in a coma for a week, she woke up, had a stroke, and learned to reevaluate her life, and ultimately connect with us today. In this episode, you're not just going to hear our guests remarkable story, but you're going to be able to glean a bunch of valuable life, and business advice. So get your pen and paper ready. Take good notes. And like our slogan says, don't just listen, but do what you hear, repeat it each day, so you can have a great life, in this world, and in eternity to come. Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Charlene Norman story!

"Nothing ever happens to us, it happens for us.” - Charlene Norman

 

GUEST BIO: 

Charlene Norman is a Chief Empathy Officer & Truth Teller with a dexterity of the ultimate trifecta: change, business success and personal transformation. She uses her 360-degree view of business, adds in decades of leading companies through ever-changing dynamics, and harnesses her ability to make people and processes more effective. Then, by wrapping those power skills with a deep understanding of engaging the power of the human brain, she is steadfast in guiding business owners committed to their hopes and dreams of growing BIG and leaving a lasting legacy. Charlene has always believed in breaking the past barriers and is part of the new frontier pushing the boundaries for the future. She knows 3 THINGS: (1) business is not nearly as complicated as it seems, (2) making money and making an impact on the world is one, and the same and, (3) all business starts and ends with people.

 

EPISODE PROUDLY SPONSORED BY: 

 

SHOW NOTES, GUEST CONTACT INFO, SPECIAL OFFERS, & OTHER RESOURCES MENTIONED:

Guest Contact Info:

  • Website: https://www.bulletproofyourbusinessnow.com
  • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/canorman/
  • Twitter: https://twitter.com/CharleneNorman
  • Facebo
Support the show

Want Even More? 😃
Let's Hang Out! Support the Remarkable People Podcast by signing up for RPP+!

RPP+ (aka Hanging Out with David Pasqualone & Friends) is a podcast that continues the conversation with guests from the Remarkable People Podcast, gives you access to new guest interviews not available anywhere else, and offers you discounts and specials to help you grow and achieve your purpose.

Subscribe now to access this exclusive content and help the us reach more people. And rest assured knowing that 100% of every dollar you donate goes to supporting our vision: To deliver powerful content to people that brings hope, peace, and personal growth in a way in which enriches their life and glorifies God. – 2 Timothy 2:1-3

Copy & paste this link in your browser now to subscribe: https://www.buzzsprout.com/563095/supporters/new

Have a Remarkable day and see you at the top! 💪

Ascending Together,
David Pasqualone


THE NOT-SO-FINE-PRINT DISCLAIMER:

While we are very thankful for all of our guests, please understand that we do not necessarily share or endorse the same beliefs, worldviews, or positions that they may hold. We respectfully agree to disagree in some areas, and thank God for the blessing and privilege of free will.

Charlene Norman | Facing Adversity, Rising Up, & the 6 Steps to Getting What You Want Out of Life | E89

Hello friends. Welcome to this week's remarkable episode of the podcast. Today we're hanging out with Charlene Norman. Charlene's life is remarkable, and she's going to take us through her journey. However, we get so excited and we jump into so many topics in her six steps to winning that we actually forget.

A giant chunk of her life and we have to go backwards to hear it. So this isn't the most organized podcast and that's my fault. However, it is packed with power. It's great for not just the new professional, working themselves through corporate life. It's not just for the existing professional looking to grow and hit that next level, but it's great for all aspects of life.

Cause like Charlene and I discuss, it's not about this little compartmentalize area, all of life. All true. Everything that works comes from God and has the same foundational steps. So you're going to hear from Charlene, how she grew up, how she always wanted to win the lottery. Yes. She never bought a lottery ticket, but then she learned how to grow as a person, how to be successful, how to help others become successful.

And then she gets hit with a crazy, crazy virus. Bacteria. I can't remember what it was considered, but she's in a coma for a week, wakes [00:02:00] up, had a stroke and it helped her to reevaluate her life and ultimately connect us today. So in this episode, you're not just going to get Charlene's remarkable story, but you're actually going a lot more of a clickable life and business advice.

So get your pen and paper ready. Take good notes. And like our slogan says, don't just listen, but do what you hear repeated each day. So you can have a great life in this world and the attorney to come. So I'm David Pasqualone and let's enjoy this interview together with our friend Charlene Norman.

INTERVIEW E89 Charlene Norman: Hey Charlene, how are you today? I am terrific. David, how are you, man? I'm fantastic. Remarkable evening. So I just told all our audience about you and what to expect in this episode.

And they are pumped. Like [00:03:00] I am. So let us not waste any time. Can you please share with us your story? You can start all the way back through childbirth, going through chronologically up to where we are today. And then at that point, we'll transition into where is Charlene and where are you going? So then hopefully after you've helped us for an hour, we can help you get to your next goal.

All right. So go back in your life, start off wherever you want. And just let us know who is Charlene? What, how did God use circumstances to form you and grow you? And then please share with us, you know, what you overcame, what you achieved, what you suffered and had to, you know, face and then the practical steps of how you overcame it.

So we can't do easy. Right? It's so easy. Yes. And here's the best part. I can't remember what it was like when I was a baby. So we don't have to go back that far. No, that's yeah. We [00:04:00] just want to know basically where you were born and if you, some people like my story it's it starts in my childhood, you know, but for some people they have like what they consider a quote unquote, normal childhood.

Everything's great. Just go through the basics and bring us through. So I am Canadian. I am your Canuck guest. I was born in a little tiny town of 10,000. And I had a happy childhood for all intents and purposes. It was all happy. Nothing too out of the ordinary happened. I. I had from the time I was about 10, I started thinking about becoming independent now who at 10 does this kind of stuff, what starts plotting out?

Okay. When I leave home, I'm going to have to pay for rent. I'm going to have to pay for this. I'm going to have to pay for that. So I spent a lot of my time from 10 until about 18 figuring out how I was going to pay for things, which is absolutely crazy [00:05:00] for a young girl of 10 years old. But when I was 20, I had a most amazing fantasy.

And that fantasy was, I wanted to win the $25 million lottery. Now everybody wants this, right. Here's the problem. You can't win a lottery if you don't buy lottery tickets. And I've never bought a lottery ticket in my entire life, but I've always had this fantasy of winning $25 million. And what was I going to do with it?

A million dollars was going to go to my retirement and $24 million. I was going to put into a fund and I was going to give it away at incredibly wonderful interest rates and incredibly flexible terms to any business owner who required it. The only caveat was the business owner needed me. To be on his or her advisory board.

Now, this all sounds really [00:06:00] cool, except I was 20 years old. I had not started my career at that point. I had no education and I don't know about you, but I don't know any 20 year old who has the kahuna is little on the experience to talk to business owners and advise them on anything. So not having a desire to go out, buy a lottery ticket.

You can see that I already had two steps against me. So with that background, I'll just say the next 30 years were spent basically getting the experience necessary. To advise all business owners. And I left the small town. I moved to the big city. I got myself onto the treadmill and I made it all the way up to the top.

When I say I made it all the way up to the top, I was fortunate enough to have a whole pile of giants [00:07:00] to stand on their shoulders so that I ultimately could be the person who was the grand Poobah of companies that were between the size of $35 million in revenue and approaching a billion dollars in revenue.

I was the, yeah, the buck stops here. I'm not thrilled. I sure you can say you're proud of doing that kind of stuff, but that wasn't me, who I was, was still the person I was at 20 years old, wanting to help business owners make their mark. I learned how to. Make millionaires in my career. It was nothing for me to figure out, okay, if we make this more money, this way, this can fall to the bottom line.

You can grab this. Here's how we do this. So finding a better way, finding a different way, making a difference was super easy for [00:08:00] me. My entire career, I would say on or about 50 years old, I said, fine, I'm going off and I'm going to go do my own thing. And I, I, and I, and I did pretty good. I found some companies who needed help.

I helped them, but then life kinda got in the way the universe said, well, we have other things for you, dear. We're going to give you a viral infection. And that viral infection was streptococcal meningitis, which has the delightful. Delightful objective of starving your body of all the oxygen. So your spine and your brain are effectively starved of that wonderful H2O factor, which basically means you have seizures and strokes.

And if it's not caught in time, you're dead. [00:09:00] I woke up one day, seven years ago in hospital. My husband was beside me and he said to me, honey, I'm so delighted that you are awake now you've been sleeping and don't worry, you're in the hospital and you've had a stroke and I'm not going to go and tell the doctor that you're awake.

Well, he lied to me. What I didn't know was I had been in Tacoma for a week.

I'm not going to say that I'm special and that whatever happened to me. W w was terrific, amazing spellbinding, but for me it was a big deal, but I, I just want to stop and say every single one of us humans is going to lose their job [00:10:00] or lose their marriage or lose somebody very, very important to them because they, that person died or they're going to be felled by some kind of awful illness or disease.

I don't care who you are. We're all going to have it. What I call when life just delivers us the worst possible lemons, some of us are strong. Some of us are weak. Some of us find out how strong we are. There's others find out how weak we are, but we're all going to have that one or two moments in our lives when our worlds are completely turned upside down.

And the awful part of it is we never learned any of it in school. We never learned any of it in work. We never have had any coping [00:11:00] lessons and suddenly we're casting what I call a drift in a boat going now, what the hell do I do? So if it's okay with you, David, I would like to talk about what the hell it was that I did because I thought it was.

But I later found out that no, this is how the smart business people, the elite athletes and the best people who get to the top of their game or are at the top of their game, actually think and act yeah, 100%. That's why we're here. I mean, I've got a bunch of questions already, but keep going and we'll go back and go through all the questions.

So I'm lying in the hospital and I did not believe my husband. I'm not a doctor. I don't know what I'm talking about when it comes to medical stuff. But what I had was a vision in my head and that vision was to work two letters and oh no, [00:12:00] I am not. I am not disabled. I, this stroke business, no way, I am not going to leave the vaulted position of being the number one breadwinner in the family.

Because some silly little bug decided to come into my body. I am going to beat this. So the reason I'm I'm sharing this piece with you first is any time in my life. In my entire career, I set myself a goal and I would put a picture in my head of what that goal meant. And it didn't matter what the picture was.

I knew what the picture meant to me. And so that kept me focused to keep on moving. And I'll be perfectly honest. There were years when I didn't have a picture in my head or a vision of what I wanted to do. And frankly, nothing really exciting happened in those times. But in the times that I had a picture in my [00:13:00] head, I never failed to meet my dream.

I never failed to surpass what I had set myself up for. And I'm not bragging. It was what I wanted or better at all times. But I had to take the first step of planting that picture. And, and this is what I say to all of my clients, all business owners, all people, if you want something, put that picture in your head, because then it's always front and center.

You know what you're focused on and you just keep on going. Now, the only thing I had was, no, I am fine. And I just kept that in my head until I was fine. So there were five things, six things that I did. [00:14:00] And as I say, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a psychologist. But what I did was I took everything that I had ever learned to be successful in business, and I had helped everyone else and I turned it on myself.

So the six levels I'll just tell you really quickly are number one, make a decision. Number two is grab your energy. Number three is ask yourself a bunch of questions. Number four is focus. And number five is take action. Number six, I'm sorry is take action. So make a decision, grab your energy, get very clear.

Ask yourself some questions, focus in and take action. Those are the six steps I know. I'll just break it down and make it a little bit more, less theoretical and a little bit more practical. So I'm [00:15:00] lying in the hospital. And I've got two options. I can lie in the hospital forever, or I can get off my behind and do something I'm not perfect.

I'm like every other human being. So I'm very good having a pity party. So I had a pity party for a day. Having a pity party is kind of a waste of exercise for me, but it made me feel better. So the one after that day passed, I thought I'm going for it. I don't care. What's going to happen. I know better than everyone else.

I'm going to do this. So in business, the smart business people know they have to launch a product. They have to hire or fire. They have to buy or sell a business. There are no halfway measures for anyone in business. There are no halfway measures for the elites who decide they are going [00:16:00] to go to the top.

They're either in it or they're not in it. So you're in it a hundred percent or it's zero. And it's really important. I think, to make that distinction you're in it to win whatever win means and there's no halfway measures. So that's the first step. Does that, does that, is that, was that clear? Yes, very much so percent.

Okay. So after you've made the decision that this is what we're going to do or not, then you want to get very smart about pulling in your energy.

A favorite way to pull in energy is to look around and see who has things worse than I do. Now that may sound a little silly, but what that does is it forces me to look at what I actually have and saying, man, [00:17:00] I am really lucky. A lot of folks call that finding gratitude. I don't, I look at it as just taking stock of what I have and knowing that my energy is going to be filled up and it's going to be filled up because I look around the world and I say, well, they don't have what I have and I may not have what those people over there have, but I'm still coming out ahead of the game.

So what does that mean? It means that I spent few hours in my hospital bed listening to the other patients in the ward. And I listened to people whose tongue was stuck to the roof of their mouth. I listened to people who couldn't move out of their beds. I listened to people, ring the bell and have to wait for the nurses to come and take them to a shower or to go to the bathroom.

And I realized that, well, I can [00:18:00] stand up the walls, need a lot of support these days so I can help the wall stand, stand tall. I can go. That means that I can move myself no matter how slowly across the room to open up the drapes to see the outside. That means I can go and walk to the bathroom by myself.

I can take a shower by myself. I am really lucky. I am way better. Then all these other people that I'm hearing, I'm not seeing them. I hearing them also the fact that my brain cells are totally screwed up. Doesn't matter. I can still think. And for those people who are patient enough with me, I can still talk to them.

It may not make much sense, but they're patient with me. I'm okay, I'm going to do this. And so what you do is you build up your energy reserves. So in business, what that means is you look at how far you've come. You [00:19:00] take stock of your successes. You don't focus on your weaknesses. You take stock of what you've done.

Now. It could be that you've moved mountains. To get where you are. It could mean that. Yeah, you might've had some late nights, but you're seeing the beginnings of some profit, or it could also mean that you spent 10 or 15 years buried in your business. And it's about time to come up and smell the roses and say, you know what?

It's pretty darn good. What I've created here, what my team and I have actually moved my vision. So it's very important, really important to pull up your energy reserves. Why do I say that? Because you're setting yourself up for a very long path. You don't know how long that path is going to be. You don't want the timeframe and you don't know how hard it is, [00:20:00] which means you want to come out of the gate, filled with emotional energy.

The third step is the clarity piece. Actually. Can I ask you, I want to go back cause I have so many questions about your personal life. And then now we're getting to these practical steps so we can wait on the personal life, but I want to dig into the steps while we're going through. So the first thing you talked about make a decision.

So you went through your life and you help companies running a company, running your own organization or running your personal life. It's like a house, a shed, or a mansion, all the same foundation, all the same steps, just a different scale. So when you're setting goals, the first step was to decide what you wanted.

And then you were going to, at this point, move to step two is grab energy. But when you're [00:21:00] getting this energy for the young professional who doesn't have those experiences. Or for the person who's really self-deprecating has a bad self image for those people who have achieved great things, but they perceive themselves as a loser or trash.

How do you talk to those people to get that initial energy? First off? None of us came into this world, imperfect. We all came into this world. Perfect. We all came into this world with gifts and talents. Those gifts and talents are ours to discover if you're a young person, you haven't discovered them all yet.

And that's a normal thing and you will discover what you're made of. You will discover what lights you up. You will discover what you're good at. You can start by, by looking at what you are good at. And even [00:22:00] if you're 20 years old, there's still, there's something you're good at. We all have that focus in on that because that's what brings you pleasure.

That's what brings you joy. So the whole thing, I may be a little different than other people, but I believe all of us humans are here for joy. Give joy, receive joy, be joy now. And that's a weird thing coming from somebody who's who's, who's been a hot and heavy and very hard nose business person. I know it doesn't make any sense, but that's just me.

I believe we all came here in perfect form all, and we have everything we need to cultivate the life that we want. What we need. What we need to focus on is what makes us happy. [00:23:00] One thing that all humans take most humans not. Okay, so maybe 99.9% humans take a lot of joy from is helping others being of service to others.

And the reason I say that is when you're helping someone else in their horrible life, it helps you feel so much better about your own life. So if you want energy, you want to find energy, find people who could use your help. That's the easiest way to do it. That may sound a little bit hokey, but joy moves freely.

Joy is just an energy and it's our responsibility to move that energy through one another. And make it the best that we can for our own lives. Does that, does that make sense, David? Yes, absolutely. I want to [00:24:00] reframe my question a little bit though what you're saying and trying to get that young professional or the person who has low confidence, if they don't have, let's say here's their goal, here's where they are.

If they don't have previous successes that they can think of in their professional life, do you recommend they look at successes in other areas of their life? Yes, absolutely. Okay. So, so human beings have this have had this ridiculous idea that our only worth our only image of ourselves is this big money-making successful, whatever.

We have all every single human being I've ever met with has fallen into the trap of I'm only as good as the money that I come, that I, that I make. I'm only as good as the title that I wear. I'm only as good as the [00:25:00] company that I work for. I'm worth nothing when I'm 20, I'm worth gazillions when I'm 40 and at 60 or 70 year over the hill.

Okay. So that is wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong. It's an old mentality that it's just, it's just wrong. Every human being has an identity. That is not what they work for. It's what you live for. So when I say you, you, you were born with certain talents and skills. What I'm referring to is they're, they're buried in your DNA and as you're a child or as a teenager or as a university student, You may not be aware exactly what those things are.

But for example, if you play a musical instrument, if you make friends very easily, if you love playing chess, or if you like playing computer games with your buddies or [00:26:00] whatever, you learn that there were things that light you up. Well, those things that light you up have absolutely nothing to do with your work.

They have everything to do with you personally. And it's those personal things that we always fall back on to get our energy. It has nothing, absolutely nothing to do with. On that track to be successful in our careers. What I want you to focus on is how can you be successful in your personal life? And the easiest way that I can say you can be successful in your personal life is to pay attention to those things that bring you joy.

And one really easy way to bring joy into your life. If you're unsure is to help others to be of service to others. Does that make a little bit more sense? Yes. Yes it does. [00:27:00] So if we're looking at the steps, you're saying we make a decision of what we want. You know, Ben Stein said the indispensable first step in getting the things.

You want to life is this decide what you want. You know, the Bible says where there's no vision, the people perish. So everything you're saying lines up with the Bible God's standard and it lines up with reality. We know. So that's great. Grabbing your energy is taken those past successes and the things you've achieved and saying, we're just going to do this again to a different scale.

Is that correct? That is correct. That's all it is. Okay. And now get very clear. Talk about that step, step three. So can I just make one other point? It's your show? You can do whatever you want about grabbing the energy. I don't care how old you are, does not matter as we move through life. We have a bunch of [00:28:00] experiences that impact us some impact us negatively.

Some impact us positively. What I can promise you is those experiences as you get older. So say you're 20 or 25. If you compare yourself to when you were 10 or 15, those experiences have lay layered on one another. So when you're 25, what you don't think about what you don't realize is you can be drawing on experiences from when you were 10 from when you were 12 from when you were 18.

And the good news is if they were positive experiences, they are the pieces that make you stronger as you move along. So I just want to be clear life. Doesn't start when you're 20 life, doesn't start. When you reach the pinnacle of making, I dunno, a hundred thousand dollars [00:29:00] life starts when you're born and the experience that you get.

Layer on one, one upon another, so that as you're moving along, you're becoming a better version of yourself. You're becoming the person that you're ultimately going to be. It's a journey. It's not a destination. Okay. So that's, that was the last piece I wanted to talk about energy. You'll be surprised at what you pull up that you've been through and you've said, oh, hell, I've passed on that one.

I can do this. No problem. It becomes natural for all of us. We don't think about it. We've never really thought about that. So now to get clear. Okay. What is it that I have? So going back to the hospital. Okay. What did I have? Well, I had a brain that I thought was working pretty good. Wasn't working at top-notch, but it was working pretty good, which meant I could still plan.

It [00:30:00] meant I could still remember pieces of my life that I knew I could do. What does that mean? It means that I can do a list. I could do a list of what have I got going for me.

I knew that I had personal discipline. I'm not perfect, but I knew that if I set my mind to it, I could make it happen. So that was a real big thing for me. I knew I had a very positive mindset so that if things came along sure, I could get mad and I could swear like a sailor, but I get over it really, really quickly.

I knew that I was basically decent kind person, so that. Anyone. I met, always got a smile first. Now those seem really small. I'll be the first to admit it, but I took those three things and I said, well, what can I do with that? And I [00:31:00] moved to stage four. I'll also be honest with you. I was very clear about what I couldn't do.

I couldn't run a marathon. It would take me 15 minutes to walk just a few feet, but I did not let that get me down. I didn't dwell on it because what I did was I focused on, well, here's the good things that I can do. Here's what I have. So let me put that now into a business context or a personal context, the fact that you don't have knowledge doesn't mean you're lacking.

It just means you don't have no. And it's easy to go and get that knowledge and you can get that knowledge from many different places. The fact that you've got a brilliant idea and maybe the market's not ready for you. Well, it just means the market's not ready for you. It means you take a [00:32:00] very honest viewpoint and say, so I might not be able to do it in six months, but I might definitely have a good shot at it within three years at 20 years old, you're saying, well, I don't have a lot, no inexperience.

You don't. But if you have a lot of enthusiasm, if you have a lot of politeness, if you have a willingness to learn, if you have an ability that someone else doesn't have. Those actually are amazing gifts that you can use moving forward. So what you want to do is just be really honest and say, what do I have?

And if you say you have nothing, I'm going to say go back to the, back to the drawing board again, because you were born perfect. You were born with gifts and talents, and it's your personal side. It's your soft skills. It's your ability to communicate. It's your ability to get [00:33:00] along. That's gonna be the thing that moves you forward.

It's not going to be what you don't know. It's going to be your ability to make friends get along with people, understand what people are going through. Have a little bit of emotional intelligence, be nice, be kind. Those things are going to rocket you to the top faster than you'll ever, ever believe. So if you're thinking you don't have any.

Then think about your personality. What is it that people love about you? Because those things are the core of your being. Does that make sense, David? Oh, 100%. And I think a lot of people struggle with, they hear the demons in their head. They hear the thoughts of the past. They hear you stink. You're no good.

You have no talent, you have no ability. And what you said is to go back and remember that, you know, God made you with a purpose and a plan and perfect, and you have gifts and abilities. You may have not discovered [00:34:00] them yet, or you may be rejected, but they're there. So if you were to just kind of recap again, how do you discover and find those gifts?

Because some people really are listening to you now and they are struggling to say, yeah, I'm that guy who has no value. I'm that girl who really has no gifts. So what would you say to those people talking to write to them in the camera? I want you to go to the bathroom. I want you to look in the mirror.

I want you to look at the person. Who's standing there opposite of you. And I want you to take a really, really deep breath and say to that person, you are enough. And I love you just the way you are. And I want you to do that every single day, four times a day. How many times a day do we go to the bathroom?

Okay. Every time you go to the bathroom, look in the mirror, look straight in the eyes of that person and say, [00:35:00] you are enough. And I love you just the way you are, because here's the thing I would love to help everyone, but I can't, people have to begin the journey themselves and they have to want to do it.

And the easiest and the best way that I know to give anybody a little bit of a pause. Is to get them to focus on loving themselves. First, we cannot move forward in our lives unless we love at least a piece of ourselves. I'm not asking you to love yourself entirely. I'm asking you to love just the person in the mirror that you see, which is only probably what from your chest up.

That's not even half your body. So make friends with a little bit first, and I promise you, I promise you if you do [00:36:00] that three or four times a day for 30 days, you are not going to believe how much better you feel after the first week after the first two weeks. And after that month, you're not the same person.

And I know this because I did it myself. Yes. And a lot of people listening have been trained and conditioned, oh, that's pride. That's that's wrong. That's vanity. No, that's not what Shirlene saying. She's not in channeling you correct me if I'm speaking out of turn. But what Shirleen's saying is God loves us.

We need to love ourselves as well. Respect ourselves. Be thankful who God created in us. And if you think pride is just thinking, I'm the best. It's not, you need to read the book called the Calvary road. It taught or the Bible, but the Bible and the Calvary road are two great books. And it shows that pride.

Isn't just, when we think we're the best it can be when we think we're the [00:37:00] worst or anytime we put us as a center. And what Charlene isn't saying is make us the center of the world. What she's saying is have confidence and to have love for ourselves in a healthy way, and to move forward in that confidence.

So you can achieve. And for you to achieve, is that correct? That's absolutely what I'm saying, sir. Absolutely. Yeah. So, cause that's something I used to struggle with and I still do at times in different ways. But if you are the person that thinks I can't love myself, that's a lie from the devil. You need to get that out of your head because God loves you and you need to love yourself too and loving yourself.

And that confidence is not wrong. That's how God intended it. It's balanced and pure. And if you think you're a piece of trash, that's actually a form of pride and you need to get that out of your head. Cause thinking you're the best or you're the worst or same sin. I spent most of my life being very confident, very, very confident.[00:38:00]

I wasn't boastful. I wasn't a braggart and I, and I worked very hard to stay humble, but I was incredibly confident. There was nothing that I ever thought of that I couldn't do. When I was on the other side of the, my healing journey and my brain was not nearly as good. I, I believe that my brain was not nearly as good as what it used to be, because I could not argue like the lawyer that I wasn't before I could always argue and win every argument.

Okay. So I thought, oh, that's a pretty good skill. I w after I, after I finished all my rehab, I couldn't argue the way I used to. I, I no longer thought the way that I used to. And I thought, oh, I'm less than I've lost a fundamental piece of me. And now I'm [00:39:00] garbage. I'm worthless. So to go from being highly confident, down to I'm a piece of garbage.

That was a really hard, weird thing for me to go through. And I'm speaking from personal experience. When I say speak to the person in the mirror and tell that person that he or she is enough and tell that person, you love that person just the way they are. I'm speaking from real hard won experience, because I didn't feel that I was, I felt that I was broken and I didn't feel I'd ever get back to where I was.

The truth is I became more than I became more than an, and it never even occurred to me that I would ever do that. But I did. And this is why I really stress to anyone who is [00:40:00] thinking that, that, you know, they're garbage or they're never going to, or they're worthless. I'm telling you no. No, your not, you are loved.

And if you tell yourself you love yourself, and if you tell yourself that you are enough, and if you repeat that to yourself for 30 days, I promise you, your world will definitely definitely expand. And you'll be able to take all the steps that David was talking about to move yourself forward. Yeah. And speak, but let's move forward with your steps.

Cause these are great. So you have to make a decision set, a goal. You have grabbed your energy from past successes and experiences. Three is get very clear about what you can and can't do just kind of personal inventory. And then your, are we ready to move on to step [00:41:00] four, to ask ourself questions, ask ourselves questions.

And this is what I called the strategic. Look of what you want. So one of the, one of the, the difference between strategy and tactics strategy is the bigger picture. What do I want to accomplish? What can I do to accomplish that? And then the tactics are the individual steps that you need to take.

So let me just talk in terms of the big piece first, what is it that I want, I want to walk out of here and I want to walk out of here as fast as I possibly can. So my goal is to be 150% cured, healthy, whatever the word is that you want is that realistic? Probably not. The next goal is okay, let me at least walk out of this hospital.

So what can I do about that? [00:42:00] Well, I can start. By making friends with all the people on my ward. That's a, that's a goal within the strategy. I can start by strengthening my body. That's a goal within the strategy. I haven't talked about tactics yet. I've told you how I'm going to do it, but you set yourself.

Here's what I'm going to do.

So what I did was I moved from the, if this is what I can do, I can increase my level of activity. I can get more physically fit. I can do a bunch of these silly exercises that just works my brain to death because my objective, my whole strategy is to get myself healthy enough that I can walk home. Then the next step is [00:43:00] okay.

So, where am I going to focus or am I going to have faith and confidence and all this stuff? So let me just hover between those two. The strategy was I was going to be as nice as I could to the people on my floor. What I actually did was I became miss sunshine. I w and this now goes back to what we were talking about earlier now, your communication and your personal skills become the massive piece of you.

So I went out and I visited every single person on the ward. Now, can I talk particularly well? No, but I can smile. And I've been told I have a lovely smile. So I set myself up that every day I would go and I would have a job. Or have a, have a wish to everyone to have a [00:44:00] great day or just smile. Some people I could exchange pleasantries with other people.

I just hold their hand for a minute, but I set myself up that I was miss happiness or miss sunshine, my roommate, she was in really bad shape. So I set myself up as part of my physical therapy that I could do on my own was I would walk the 10 or 15 feet to the window. I would open up the drapes. They were on her side, not mine.

I would help this woman feed herself because we were short staffed nurses and I would brighten up her day. Do you know how much energy I got just by doing those little things? It was amazing. Okay. Now you'd say, well, Charlene, that, that, you know, you can't do that in business. Yes, you can. So you've [00:45:00] decided that you're going to go off and you're going to launch this product and you know that you don't have all the things that you need, but there are certain things you can do.

Great. If you are like personally, a personable person, which means basically you get along with a lot of people, you got a nice personality and you know, the difference between moving fast and Remi slow and, and you treat people with respect. It's going to be incredibly easy for you to decide how you're going to go find the help that you need.

It's going to be incredibly easy for you to start looking at your chest board of your business and setting things up and saying, okay, I can't do this until I do this. So let me map it out first. You're not talking tactics at this stage. You're mopping out the basic steps you're going to need. And so if you're going to go and [00:46:00] launch a product, probably one of those steps is making sure you got a good marketing plan.

Probably one of those steps is making sure that, huh, before we launched this thing, maybe we should do a little bit of research to make sure that we've got a market that we're, we're matching our market with the product. Not always something that's always done. Maybe one of the things you need to do is do we need to go and talk, talk to our financial people to make sure we have enough money.

These are not actions yet. These are the steps necessary to make sure the strategy which is so launched. This thing gets launched. Does that make sense? Yes. A hundred percent. Absolutely. Let's take the example of the young fellow or woman who's 20. Who's not really sure what they're doing. If let's just say you've got a little bit of self-confidence and a little bit of self-love, let's just say you can now begin to see the world a [00:47:00] little bit differently.

What is it that you want to do? Probably you want to go find a job or perhaps go study some more. It doesn't matter which it is, but that's your goal that you've set for yourself. Find a job, go for study. So let's take the, find the job thing. A lot of people just say, well, I can't find a job or I just have to go to McDonald's actually, that's not true.

There are many jobs that are not highlighted. The reason they're not highlighted, they're not advertised is because. A lot of employers have been totally soured on what they see as, as negative stuff in the marketplace. But it's called the secret job market. It's been around for like eons and eons and it will always exist.

How do you find, how do you tap into it? Well, what you want to do is if you want to find a job, [00:48:00] figure out actions to do that one, talk to everybody, you know, and say, I love to work doing X, Y, Z. Do you know anybody to talk to people that maybe your parents know, or maybe your teachers know prep yourself for interviews?

Prep yourself for good resume presentation. The usual way of doing resumes is, is garbage. There are better ways. So get yourself prepping well, every one of these things is going to require lots of little actions. I'm not talking about the actions right now. I'm talking about the goals for the strategy of getting a job, getting a job takes work, everything takes work.

So map out some of the pieces. And if you don't know what the pieces are ask, there was a million people out here who would love to help you. And, and, and nobody, nobody thinks [00:49:00] you're silly, ridiculous, stupid, dumb, because you're asking we all have to start somewhere and as. Gone through the chain. We've actually learned some shortcuts and here's the thing.

Every single one of us is wrapped up in our own lives. We do not think about your problems. We do not think about what you need. The only way to get our attention is to ask. And when you, we, when you ask us, we go, oh yeah, Hey, have you tried this? I'll introduce you to this. It's really simple. But it starts again with the, you ask first, does that make sense, David?

Yes. 100%. And I agree completely. And I was kind of chuckling. Like if you saw me smiling, I remember thinking when people would say they're having a baby and they're all excited. Okay. I'm happy for you, but I don't care. You know what I mean? It's like, [00:50:00] I'm happy for you. That's part of your day. Okay. Let's focus on what we have to do.

And then when I was 25, And we were having our first child. I was so excited. You just want to tell everybody, and then I realized, dude, people love you, but they don't care. You know, that's not what you're here for. So that actually reminded me of that experience in my life. When you said, if you're not asking the questions, you know, people have it, but they're just not thinking of it.

They're not in the same space you are at that moment. So throat human existence, we've all are have, or will go through the same experiences to a degree, but you might have to say something to trigger their mind, to tap them back into that moment. And then you're going to get a flood of experience that you just can't buy.

So, yeah. So I think that's beautiful. And then the other thing is that hidden job market. I didn't know anything. I mean, when I, when you get out of college, you don't know [00:51:00] anything, you, you know, book stuff and, you know, the experiences you've had, but you don't know about the hidden job market, so to speak.

And I remember just, God put it inside me. It'd be like, well, what company do you want to work for? And where do you want to go? It wasn't like the standard questions. And I ended up having someone come to where I was working and tell me how great their job was. And when I heard it, I actually thought the individual is lying.

So I researched the company and the CEO and the COO. And I put my back then it was fax machines, remember of fax machines. So I faxed my resume. I called and left a voicemail, email was out, and I just had the impression I had the mental stuff. That the guy was either going to hire me or Sue me for harassment.

So that was how I got my first real job. Like I was blessed with jobs, but that was my first like career step. And I even remember in the interview, [00:52:00] I just laughed and smiled exactly what you're saying. And he's like, you know, why should I hire? You have no experience. And I'm like, cause we're gonna see each other again, this is a great field.

It's a great market. The big question is, am I going to be working for you and making you money or your competitor? And the dude just bust out, laugh. And after a moment of shock and he hired me. So what you're saying is going through the traditional resumes and HR people, that is a low success rate, but when you actually hunt for what you want and make that your full-time job and you're prayerfully, considering the options, it works, it absolutely does work.

And I want to add something. I think the world has changed in the last, at least the last 30 years in the, our, our, our parents and our grandparents always believed that, oh, well, you just get one job. You stick with that job forever. And then you retire the gold watch days. Yes. Yes. They're long gone.

They're [00:53:00] long gone. And also over the last 30 years, there's been so much consolidation. There's been so many companies that have closed their doors, gone out of business and what that's done or, or merged. And, and the, the downside to all that is so many people have lost their jobs through no fault of their own.

And that's a fact of life. It was very hard on all those people who lost their job. In the very beginning. And even now it's still hard when you lose your job because your identity is tied up in that. So if you're starting out and you're saying, well, I don't know what company I want to work for. I don't know what I want to do.

I'm going to say that's okay. That's just fine. Give yourself six to 12 months for [00:54:00] every company for the first five years. If that's what you want to do, even do it for the first 10. But because by that point, you're only, let's just say you're only 30. You've now tried a bunch of stuff. You've seen how things work.

Every one of those experiences is going to stack on top of another, on top of another, and all of a sudden your going to come to, oh my God, this is what I should be doing. I love this. And that's when you can make the best decision. For you yourself, this whole business about don't job hunt, this whole business about, oh, only stay with one company or two companies you're through come it's garbage.

And I think the young people of today are way smarter than our generation David, because they grew up with technology there's there's so, so they're used to going fast. They're used to [00:55:00] gathering all kinds of stuff. They're used to doctor and professor Google at all times. There are drawbacks to that.

However, I think their brains are turned in a different direction than ours were and they can handle mentally moving from job to job.

Yes. Yes. It's a different mindset completely. And the culture, if you looked at my resume and many other people's resume,

15, 20 years ago, they'd be like, you're a job. And I'm like, no, I'm not a job hopper. I went in there, I turned the company around 12 to 18 months, and then I moved on. I left them in great shape and good circumstances. We still have a great relationship, but people just couldn't grasp that. You'd go into company, turn around and leave.

Now in 2022, they're called [00:56:00] consultants. Right. And they're hired all the time. So you were ahead of the curve in your day. And then what I was doing, I was doing what God put in me. I didn't want to stay with the company 20 years. I wanted to go in and fix the problems and leave and do it to the next one, you know, help as many people as I can.

And I think what you're saying is the generation that's today, you know, there's things that frustrate the tar out of our generation with their mentality, but a huge advantage is that just that technology and the ability to latch and D latch onto projects and companies. So some of the older generations see that as disloyal.

But it's not if they're there two or three years, but they're bringing you two, three years of value in high return on investment, shut up and enjoy it. All right. Why don't worry about it? No, I absolutely agree. And, and I'll, I'll, I'll make, I'll make my argument for why communication, why soft [00:57:00] skills, why your ability or your ability to, to talk to people, to interact, to understand why that is so paramount and important these right now, and is going to be over the next 10 to 15 years is that damn technology thing that's in our hands has really destroyed so many people's ability to carry on a conversation.

Yes. And so what's happening is what I see happening is technology has really helped no question, but what it's done is Rob, the humans that are, are coming up, have the ability to have a, a really good conversation of the ability of the ones that are coming up to actually understand what the other person is saying and thinking, because texting is not a conversation.

Texting is not a relationship to have a relationship. You have to talk actually, physically [00:58:00] talk, go through the mental, messy business of having human to human contact. And so what I want to stress to all the young people today, that's the area that you want to focus on. That's the area you want to bring up in your life, master in your life, and then you'll be unstoppable because you've already have mastered your technology since you were a baby.

Now master your communication skills, you are going to be in so demand. So demand that working for a company two to three years, and then seeing other opportunities. This you're going to come naturally to you, but it's the communication side. It's the personal side. It's the emotional intelligence side.

It's the ability to get along with relate, be respectful of, and, and you're not bragging. It's not about bragging. It's being respectful of all the differences you master that [00:59:00] piece. You are set for life. Yes. And I think history proves that. I mean, how many great men and women throughout history. Didn't necessarily do anything themselves, but they were the catalyst, the visionary, they motivate people.

They kept people, you know, on task and they did it through communication. And, you know, you have the great money families all over the world and every error and they might not have known that much about their industry, but they hired the right people that did, and it all worked. So, yeah. No, I couldn't agree more.

I mean, It's like Ronald Reagan. He was one of the greatest communicators of all time. And he was one of the greatest presidents or leaders our country's ever seen. He took interest rates for houses. Over 30%. Unemployment was through the roof.

People were in chaos, in every area and there's complete division within the United States and through communication and a clear [01:00:00] vision. He brought everything together. So I think we need that today. Canada needs that today in so many countries need that today, but like you said, it starts with ourselves and our families and our communities and through the corporate world that all works.

All, all truth comes from God. It's all the same. It is. And, and what I will say about today's market in particular, we, we hear about the great resignation. We hear about so many business people saying, well, there's a shortage of labor. The labor is bad. The, this the, that actually I don't believe any of that.

I believe we're all perfect in our own way. There's not a shortage of labor. There's a shortage of good managers and leaders. And a lot of the managers and leaders of today don't know how to properly communicate. Don't know how to properly lead again. It's not necessarily their fault. They didn't have good [01:01:00] examples growing up.

They weren't taught this. But the kids of today, the younger people, anybody who's under 30 has the most amazing opportunity. If you grab all the skills and really, really push yourself to be the absolute, best personal version of yourself, the ability to get along with people, the ability to understand people, the ability to be empathetic, the ability to respect, add those to your technical ability.

And nothing's going to stop you. You will out shine. So whatever is in place, whatever you don't like today, you will out shine. Whatever's there. Yeah. That's well said. So with continuing in this, you had steps one through four. And we ended with ask yourself questions to strategic look of what you want. Is there anything else you want to add to step four before we move to step five focusing?

[01:02:00] No. No. All right. And step five, focus. Talk to us about focus. So focus is basically what will I do? So the best example I can give you in a hospital, what will I do? I am going to work harder than anyone else. I am going to do what I normally do, which is 10 times the work. So for example, what I did was I said to the speech pathologist and the physical therapist and all the other experts, I said, you give me homework.

And they looked at me like I was crazy. And I said, I want that homework because what I am going to do is 10 times what anyone else has ever done. And they looked at me and said, nobody ever does that. And I said, I don't care. Give me the homework. I want the homework and I want exercises and I will do it.

And the reason why I really focus in on this [01:03:00] particular step is this is all about the guts that you have inside of you. I believe in business, especially in the early years, you want to do 10 times more than you would normally do. So if you figure, okay, I can make a phone call once a day. I'm going to say, make 10, just make 10.

If you say you can make a hundred phone calls, I'll say, well, first off, I think you're absolutely crazy, but make a thousand, which basically means you, you now change the way your operation runs. So if you think you can do a hundred, I believe you can do 10 times. That's what's going to push you over. If you think you can do 10 calls a day, I'm going to say to you, no, you can't do a hundred.

Why? Because the best of the best never do the basics. The best of the best do it to 10 times. [01:04:00] If you ask any athlete about how much they train, they don't train an hour a day. They train 12 hours a day. They may take time off to have a nap. They may take time off to eat. They may take time to do other bits within their curriculum, but no athlete.

That's going to make it and get an Olympic goal. No athlete. That's going to be a world champion ever dies. One, two and three times. They do it 10. It's always the power of 10. And I'm not suggesting you do the power of 10 for your entire life, because none of us can sustain that stuff. I'm suggesting that there are going to be periods in your life where you want to go play flat out.

And that's what I did. And that was the absolute secret to everything that I've ever done. There are periods and you will learn. You do get smart. There are periods where you're going [01:05:00] to play flat out. So let's take one quick example. You want to go get a job? Okay. You've made it. I'm going to get a job.

Great. What are you going to do? What are you going to focus on? Well, that means I'm going to give up playing with my friends for a while. It means I'm going to spend five hours a day and I'm only going to look for a job. It means I'm going to be so focused. I'm going to get that damn job in the shortest time frame possible, because really that's what it's about in business

in business. It's having faith and confidence exactly the same way you have faith and confidence in yourself. It's having faith and confidence that the processes you have in place, that the people you have hired in there are in place. And that the ideas and the plans that you've got in place are [01:06:00] going to work.

It's all about, yes, I'm at that stage. I believe in myself, this is how I'm going to do it. It's a big leap. When you believe in yourself, it's a big, big leap. When you believe in your team, it's a big leap the first time. And the second time, it's not a big leap after you do it. Three, four, and five times. And after you've done it, 10 times, it's nothing.

It's the way you function. Does that make sense? Yes, totally. You know, you play how you practice and the more you practice, the easier it gets and second nature. So that makes total sense. So, oh, go ahead. I don't want to suggest to anyone that you play your life flat out like that seven days a week, 52 weeks a year.

That is a recipe for disaster. [01:07:00] I am. I am saying you only do it for short periods of time. I don't want anyone killing themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Burnout's real. We actually just had a guest on the show, Sharon Grossman and her whole expertise was burnout and I've personally experienced myself. I'm sure you have too.

I mean, even if you didn't, it could have been burnout that led your body to be a little bit weaker that allowed that horrible parasite to get inside of you. I mean, but the thing is like, what you're saying is there season. Of everything. There are seasons where we rest or seasons before we kill it. But if you're always on that high speed, kill it mode, you're going to run a fuel and you need to carry you are.

Yes, absolutely. So now that we've taken up to five, the last level is the hardest level. It's the level of action. And you know what? Everyone [01:08:00] has ideas and ideas are worth a dime a dozen until we all do that. One thing which is called execute take action. Now here's the other thing. You can take two steps and you have taken action, but two steps is never enough and the journey is never as fast as we want.

It's always long. And so what happens is taking action means doing the same thing and sticking to the plans and taking the same tactics every single day, day in and day out. And you get bored with it. It's enough to numb the brain. It's enough to say, oh my God, is this ever going to take effect? And in the hospital, I spent [01:09:00] two whole months doing the same boring stuff every single day.

And I was frustrated because this is the piece where it's, you're now going to find out if you're as, as solid and strong, as you've been thinking you are, this is the piece where basically the rubber meets the road. You've got to put in the time you've got to do the work and the work is boring. It's not fun.

You've had all the fun stuff. Now it's time to deliver. And the awful thing is no one can tell you ever how long it's going to take. It's going to take, as long as it's going to take for me, it took two months, two awful long months, but then things moved and here's what happens. The minute things start to move.

You go down to level [01:10:00] two. Oh my God, you grab all that energy because you can feel it working. And that propels you forward to keep rising back up to level six, to keep ongoing. So what does that mean for a 20 year old? It means. You're going out and doing those interviews and you're getting bloody good at those interviews.

You're getting really close to those interviews. And then all of a sudden, you see you one day, you get three offers on the same day and you're going, oh my God, how can I possibly be in this situation? But the reason you're in that situation is because you never gave up. And that's the key. You kept plotting.

You stuck to the plan. You didn't deviate. You said, I'm going to do this. Here's how I'm going to do it. And you stayed with it for a business. What does that mean? Generally in the first and the first five to 10 years of a business life, it's really hard because [01:11:00] the referrals don't come nearly as fast as you'd like, because the cashflow runs out faster than you can keep coming in.

It doesn't matter. You, you, you, you eat peanut butter and wieners for dinner because you believe so much in your idea because you know, you've got the goods that this is going to work after you hit 10 years. Now it's ramping it up. You've got a plan in place and it's really boring. Why cause you going around saying the same thing 20 different times a day to 50 different people, 50 different groups of people, and it's all boring.

And you're thinking, man, I have said this a million times and you have, but you haven't said it to mammalian audiences and that's the key. So you keep at it and you don't deviate or you analyze it after you've been at, [01:12:00] at it for at least six to nine months, and then you make changes. But what. Really gets in everybody's way is they change things after a couple of days, or they change things after a couple of weeks or they change things after a month or two, or they get distracted with some other really amazing idea that I call a shiny object that just came blowing in and, oh, well that might work too.

And that, that causes one destruction and two puts us way behind the eight ball. And I don't want anyone to be behind the eight ball. I want you to keep motoring from level six to level, to level six, to level two, bring that energy up, gives you the, gives you the impetus to move back into level six and keep at it.

And I promise you, I've seen this time and time again, and I am walking [01:13:00] proof of this. If you do these six levels decisions. Energy clarity questions or strategic focus have faith and confidence and take action. You will get what you want or something better. It never, ever, ever is not what you wanted.

That's fantastic. And when I'm listening to this episode, it's, we've been hanging out, we've enjoying the conversation and talking. Normally we share the guest's entire story. And then as we go through, they pull out nuggets that we can apply to our lives. In this. I feel like we blew past your story in jumped, right into meet the, the six levels of getting what you [01:14:00] want out of life or something.

So before we come to the point, Charlene of this is where you are today and where you're going. You've just helped us for over an hour. Two questions I have for you. Number one, is there anything we missed in your life history that's significant or that you want to cover? And then the second question is, and it may tie into, this is you went from childhood to become a successful executive of businesses.

What happened in that interim? You know, how did you get there? So the first thing is, is there anything we missed that you want to share? And the second is between your childhood and becoming an executive. What did you do to prepare yourself for what happened to your life to prepare you for that type of leadership?

So the first question, no, I think I've filled in all the, all the bits. I'll just end that segment with nothing ever happened. [01:15:00] To us. Everything happens for us. That may mean we have more lessons to learn. That may mean we have to grow a bit more to become the person that we want. And that may mean that we have a few years before we learn what exactly it was that we gained from it.

But absolutely nothing happens to us. Absolutely. Everything happens for us. So that's powerful and true. And if you've never heard that before, pause, this episode really meditate on that. That's super powerful truth right there.

So how did I get from where I am, where I was, where I, where? Okay. I did not. I didn't have any [01:16:00] real clear cut goals of what I wanted to do in life. I was born a bossy girl. I was always the one who came up with ideas and said, okay guys, we're going to take this mountain. Let's go do this. Let's go do that.

I thought I wanted to become a teacher. I thought I wanted to become a pharmacist. I thought I wanted to maybe be a firefighter. I thought I wanted to join the army, but it was all thinking. I had no real ideas. My parents split when I was 18. So, and my father told me one day, well, you wanted a university education too bad, so sad.

My retirement fund is better. I'm taking the money that would've gone to your university fund and I'm putting it to my retirement. So that meant I had to go out and get a job and figure out what I wanted to do. I started out as a secretary. Inside of three months, the fellow that I was working for said, you are [01:17:00] too smart for be a secretary.

Have you ever thought about becoming an accountant? Nope. Okay. Well, here's a program that you can learn how to become an accountant at night and you can work during the day. So I said, oh, okay. Why not? I was, I was I was engaged to be married. I didn't really want to marry him. So that was a great excuse.

I was going to be just too busy to get married. It turns out finance didn't really turn me on. I really didn't like it too much, but I figured out a way to make it work for me. I went through 1, 2, 3 different jobs. They didn't last that long. Moving along to make more money. That's what motivated me.

So what did I want? I knew I was being underpaid, so I was always looking for the next financial job that would pay [01:18:00] me more. Then I, when I decided I couldn't make it in a small town of 10,000 and I made the leap and I said, okay, where do I want to work? I have no idea. I didn't know what companies were there, but I saw an ad for a beer company and I liked the particular beer, but I preferred wine, but okay, we'll try this or something.

My resume. And I sent my resume in, they called me. Then they, then they dragged their heels. So I didn't know any better. So I kept calling. I kept leaving messages. Exactly like you did, David, like what's going on. I'm really interested. Wanna want to do this? Blah, blah, blah. So it was 10 phone calls to the HR people.

Yeah, HR. People are not where you want to go. Trust me. They are just knowing. I know, and I don't want to speak bad about HR people, but I'm with you in real life. There are exceptional HR people, but I hate to say it they're far and few between usually HR, [01:19:00] people are all, like, they just don't get things done.

They don't get things done. The sales manager, for instance, I'll end up saying, Hey, hire this person. And they're like, okay, so what the hell was that four months for interviewing people? So, yeah, I'm not saying all HR, people like that, but the majority of ones I met in real life, it was like for job hiring it's just to me, it was a useless endeavor.

Now for other aspects of the organization, HR is crucial, but for hiring and firing, they just aren't wired for that. In my opinion. And Charlene, I think you have the same opinion from what you said. But I do want to make one point though. One job that I, so if you ever asked me, well, how did you get from this job to this job, to this job here?

Here's how talking to people work. One day I was at the doctor's office. Doctor's office says to me, so what are you doing? I'm looking for a new job. What are you looking for? Well, I'd like to be in accounting position in I [01:20:00] I'm currently in a CPA firm and I want to get a bigger seat. I know. So, and show, I will call so and so for you on that's how I got my interview was just talking, just talking to my doctor.

That was it. Okay. Maybe not everybody has a doctor. Maybe everybody's not comfortable talking to their doctor. I was comfortable talking. That's how I got my one job from one to the other. Then I took a leap and I said, okay, I applied. Job ad. That was not a good move. But what happened was I finally got in and I got in a rock bottom intern position.

I didn't like it, but I sucked it up and I said, I am going to the top one day, I got to pay my dues. I'm going to do this right now. That's how you have to change your mindset sometimes and say, okay, I'm just going to bite the bullet and I'm going to go do it. Then after that it just became people.[01:21:00]

People notice the smart people, people notice the people who are really good at getting along with people. People also notice people who will save their bacon. Here's a piece of advice. That's not often given out your job. It's not only to learn your job is to make your team and your boss. Okay, good. Yup.

A hundred percent people don't get that. People don't get that. They want the credit and it's like, this is what we need to do. Let's just get it done. Forget who gets the credit. I'm totally tracking with you. Yeah. And it has nothing to do. You're not sucking up to somebody, your fulfilling 10 times. And if 10 times scares you, then just do three times.

You want to do more than what's expected of you. [01:22:00] Because if you do more than what's expected of you, that's how you get attention. And if you do that in a smart way, and you make friends along the way, making friends that doesn't mean going out and having a beer, making friends means having people respect.

Not about liking you, you want to be respected. And the best way to get respect is to show empathy, to show compassion, to show kindness and to show respect. So, anyways the timing was perfect because I had jumped into this beer company, found out that I didn't really like beer. But the organization had any international division that it was trying to grow.

And that's where I from then on once I moved into the international division and I had gone from being a scumbag auditor to the really smart analyst, [01:23:00] then I could become. Whatever the next step was, I don't know, manager of something or other, whatever. That's when it started. And I just took off. So from 20 to 25 I paid my dues.

Really. I really paid my dues. And then from 25 onwards, it was like, okay, we're getting serious. And we're going to do absolutely everything we can. I stood on the giants. I stood on the shoulders of giants who went before me. What that means is a lot of smart people went ahead of me and they were still there.

I never, ever, ever to their face behind their back, talked bad about anybody. This is very important because when you're young, especially when you're under 35, you got to acknowledge the fact that you don't know everything. Even under 40, you don't know. I, I didn't come into my own until I [01:24:00] was in my forties.

I think most of us come into our own. When we're in the forties, I was always, I've always believed you need 20 years of experience underneath you before you become the best. You start to become the best version of yourself. So the best advice I can give you, anyone looking for a job don't bad mouth, anybody it's not worth it.

It just isn't worth it. Respect everybody. Don't roll over, be assertive, don't be aggressive and be open to when those weird things come out and somebody says, well, how about you take this job? And it's not a direct up and job. It's not a direct lateral sometimes. Sometimes. Yeah. It's a lateral move.

Not a vertical move. Don't be afraid of it. Yeah. Don't be afraid of them do not be afraid of them. So so that's, that's how I got to be where I was. It wasn't. It wasn't because I was born on the right side of the tracks. It wasn't because I was born with a silver spoon [01:25:00] in my mouth. I had to work twice as hard as, as, and five times as hard as any male that, cause that's what it was like.

I didn't get special treatment. I stood on my own on my own two feet, but I proved my worth. And that's the thing prove your worth. And I've, I think we've given you the tools. You already have the tech, if you upgrade and stay

up to date with your personal skills and then put a little bit of time into working on your mindset here on stackable. Yeah. And I want to, if can you add, before we wrap this episode up, a lot of people don't realize. It goes back to loving yourself and seeing value in yourself. Talk about the [01:26:00] importance of knowing your value.

Again, not being arrogant, not being prideful, not leveraging it and thinking I'm the best and you can't live without me. But talk about the importance of really understanding your value in the organization and what that means for vertical movement.

Vertical movements are not nearly as fast and, and as easy as we would like to believe vertical movements require us to learn a lot. What you're learning. Is how to fit with an organization. What's your learning is the best practices that organization has. What's your learning is to see how people interact, to watch [01:27:00] the blowups, to watch the mess ups, to watch the celebrations and integrate the best of it.

You don't integrate the worst of it. I feel sorry. I feel sorry for a lot of the tech startups in the the younger set of star startups that are coming through because people are going in and they don't have a background of here's how our company works. Here's us. Here's how venture capital works.

Here's how bankers work. Here's how people work. And people are the messiest bit of any organization. People. Messy managing people, leading people, it's all messy. So you're going to come in, you're going to come into an organization and you're going to have a whole pile of technical skills. So, so I don't care.

Choose your discipline. You're a lawyer, you're an architect, you're an accountant. [01:28:00] You're a plumber. Your I don't care what it is. You're trained in the technical aspects of whatever it is that you paid money for. You were never, ever, ever not once trained on how to manage messy people. And everybody's messy.

Why are they messy? Because everybody has lives. And we bring our lives to our business, even though we're not supposed to, we're supposed to leave at the door. We bring it with us and nobody. Nobody wants to be told or wrong. Nobody wants to be given extra work to someone else. Didn't get nobody. Nobody wants to be left out of the loop.

Nobody wants to be disrespected. Everybody wants happiness. Everybody wants joy that. Sure. There's a few people that are less than ideal, but most people, most people are decent, hardworking salt of [01:29:00] the earth. Very kind give you the shirt off their back, the kinds of people and

what we really, really need to learn in all of that chunk of time is how to manage a whole pile of different situations that come at you. It's how to manage the situations that arise from people.

It, when they have meltdowns, when they don't work, it's how to manage when your profits aren't right. It's how to manage. When you have to fire people, it's how to manage, how to, how to hire people. All that stuff is messy and it can't be learned in a day or a week or a month or a year. It takes time. And I think that's a mistake to be in a rush to learn it all because honestly, I'm still learning.

So if I'm still learning and you're 20 years old, I'm not stupid. I've never been [01:30:00] stupid in my life. You're not stupid. It just takes time. So be patient. Yes. And I absolutely agree with that and you cannot buy experience and you can't learn experience. So I'm totally tracking with you there, but for the person who's 40, 45, 50 years old, and they're within an organization, talk about the importance of their really understanding their value because they have put the time in, they have the experience, they have become the expert.

So where's that balance between being confident and knowing your value and the idiots who think they're irreplaceable? Well, I have a couple of things. I quit two jobs because I knew that my values did not match. The company's values. I knew that I had become so good at playing the game. I had lost myself.

When you realize that your [01:31:00] values are standing so strong and they're not in alignment with the organization that you're working for, leave it consider going out on your own or consider going to work with another company that whose values align closer to yours. I cannot stress that one enough. The second one is even though you've arrived.

And even though you're well-respected, I really hope that as you climb that ladder, you were a nice to everybody as you went up the ladder, because it took a long time to climb to the top. It will take seconds to climb, to fall to the bottom and. Honestly, the reason why people love you, the reason why people pay attention to you, the reason why people respect you is because of your title.

If you are not a decent [01:32:00] human being simultaneously, when you fall, no one is going to help you. But if you are a decent human being, everyone will bend over backwards for you because they see your value. You've shared your value. You've inspired them to raise their value with you. That's what you want.

That's what all good leaders I believe should be focused on is raising the people that they work with up and working themselves out of a job. If you do that, you've elevated everyone. When you fall, when you lose your job. When something happens that life is throwing you a curve, you will not believe who comes through for you.

And if you have, let's just take round numbers. If you've got 150 people [01:33:00] that you're constantly working with, I can promise you five people, five 10, if you're really lucky, we'll keep tabs on you after you've left. It's just the way it is. Your value is tied up in your worth as a person. And I think we can all agree that we, none of us, none of us have time.

None of us have respect for idiots who are full of themselves. I call it how big is your ego? Can you get through that door? If you can't get through the door? Definitely a problem. If people see your ego before they see you, you don't have any worth, but if people see you and then see your ego, you have a lot of worse.

And I'm not saying you can't have any ego. I'm not saying you can't be proud. And I'm not saying you can't blow your own horn occasionally. [01:34:00] Yeah. Just don't let it out very often.

Well, you've given our community myself included some great advice today. Some. Absolutely a pluggable steps they can take to further their career to further benefit their life. So with that, Charlene, where are you today and where are you heading next? So maybe we can help you get there.

I'm still morphing. I'm still morphing. I'm still helping companies. I'm help. I should say. I'm helping business owners be the best they can be and helping them take their businesses up the notches that they want. I never lost. Here's what happened? I never lost my smarts on how to take a company.

Just [01:35:00] grow it a hundred times. I never lost that. I never lost the ability to look at a situation and say, oh, just put those two things together and you'll get over here. I never lost all that. Thank God. I gained. I gained the ability of deep listening. I used to be a good listener. I was respected as being a good listener, but when you can't talk you learn to figure out the most important things that you need to say, and you, you end up paying much more close attention to the other person.

So I'm not withstanding in this interview today. I actually listen more than I talk. That, that has been a great gift that I never thought I would be able to say. And so what that means is I can listen very carefully to you and size you up very carefully to determine if what you're saying is actually what you want.

And I can turn [01:36:00] you then from, okay. If, what you want is this, then let's get you sized up to delivering that with what your gifts are. Apparently I've been told, I take a more holistic viewpoint now of business, because I believe that business starts with the guts of the person inside. So that means that there's some work as we've been discussing today.

There is a little bit of work that has to go on to make sure that you're ready to step into who you want to be. The easy part is mapping out how to get there. The hard part as we discussed was the action. So I help you stay accountable to your plans and. Refuse now to work with anyone who just wants to make a lot of money and buy a house, a second house, a cottage, a [01:37:00] boat, an airplane, like I've been there.

I've done that. And I'll tell you something. The biggest deal I ever did for someone was I was 50 million. I added 50 million to them. Which sounds fabulous, I guess, but it didn't change him. Personally. Money does not change us. If we are selfish, we will always be selfish, no matter how much money we have.

If we are generous, we will always be generous, no matter how much money we have. So I now am very careful to work with people that are not selfish. That with people who want to make a bigger impact in the world with people who want to do the right thing with their employees, those are my favorites.

My absolute favorites are, if you're not from this country, Canada or the us, I will help you [01:38:00] figure out and decode what it means to be a quick success. And a quick success to me is five years. I know so many immigrants who have landed and it's taken them 10 years and 15 years to get their business. I can, I can accelerate all that.

Why? Because I've lived here all my life. I know how these things work and there's nobody that wants to share that welcomely with immigrants. So I'll help you. I also help younger people. If, if you're just starting up, you're your, your, a new tech company. You've got the money, but you actually never run anything.

You need to have a mentor in your backend. That's me. I worry about your head and I worry about your business. Awesome. Now, if somebody wanted to get a hold of you, Charlene, what's the best way for them to reach you LinkedIn? The absolute best way I play on [01:39:00] LinkedIn, I don't play on Facebook. I don't do much on, I do nothing on Instagram.

I have WhatsApp. I don't know how to use it. But LinkedIn is my place. I'm there every single day and I have a reputation for getting back very quickly. Awesome. And I'll put a link to your LinkedIn in the show notes and all your other connections, even though you don't use them as much or as well, I will put those in there.

So if you're listening and you want to talk to Charlene, do you have any questions, please reach out to her and Charlene, is there any kind of like, you know, a lot of our guests, they might have a special or a book or any kind of link you want to share a promoted this. I'm working on my second book, so I'm not going to promote that.

What I do have is a takeaway of what we talked about and the, what I call the six steps of the winning mindset. So I actually have something that you can look at holding your hands and relisten to this [01:40:00] interview as many times as you want you to say, oh yeah, right. That's what she's talking about.

Oh, that's what that means. And I just find that it's easy to have in your hands to read and listen at the same time. It just reinforces it. I've got a link. I believe doesn't cost you anything except your email address. And I promise you it's good stuff. Awesome. So we'll put a link to that end. Thank you for offering that free to our community and Charlene, it's been great.

Hanging out with you today. You truly are a remarkable woman. And I look forward to continuing the friendship before we part for our listeners. Just remember. Don't just listen to the great content Charlene shared with us today. Like our slogan says, listen to it, do it, repeat the good parts each day. So you could have a great life in this world and an attorney to come.

So Charlene, thank you again for being here [01:41:00] so much. It's been a true pleasure. It's been applied. My absolute pleasure, sir. My absolute pleasure. Awesome. So thank you again. Shirlene into our listeners. We'd love you. Reach out to us, please like share rate, review this podcast, but more than anything, apply it for your own benefit.

Share it with your friends and family so we can all grow and glorify God. I'm David Pascoe alone. This was Charlene Norman, and we look forward to seeing you in another episode. Ciao.

The remarkable people podcast. Check it out.

the remarkable people podcast. Listen, do repeat for life.