Exceptional Admins | A Podcast for Assistants
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Exceptional Admins | A Podcast for Assistants
p.s. Taking Risks (E: 112)
SUMMARY:
An insightful episode that covers the psychology and action one needs to consider when thinking about taking risks.
INTENTION:
To offer the listener unmatched insight into the importance of embracing being uncomfortable and taking risks (aka chances).
EXCERPT:
"If I take a risk (aka chance) right now, what's the reward?" Hilani
NEWSLETTER:
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IN THIS EPISODE:
Book: Invisible Influence
Article: Taking Smart Risks
Episode with DB "Helping you Emotionally Win the Day" releases 4/7/2024
DISCOVER:
Website: Exceptional Admins
Outreach: LinkedIn Community
Reading: Book Page
Social: Instagram
Be a Guest on the Show: Form Bottom of Page
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The administrative profession holds both unique and unexpected demands each day, making each real unique, much like your thumbprint. Welcome to another PS episode. In each episode, we explore a single topic of interest that is on the minds of so many aspiring professionals my mission as a dedicated partner to busy executives and a career architect to administrative individuals. I bring in each episode unparalleled insights into the challenges, aspirations and strategies that gives permission to career focused individuals to achieve their next level of success. These Permission Slip episodes are unique moments for you to reflect and create a plan that helps you continue to learn and thrive on the job each day. Enjoy, hello everyone, and welcome to another PS episode.
Speaker 1:I am so excited to be in front of the microphone bringing an article on the Exceptional Admins website to life. Through this particular episode, we're talking about taking risks, smart risks, thinking about risk reward. We're thinking about taking chances or being chance adverse, meaning you want to stay away from taking chances. I want to open up your thoughts and invite today into your suite of strengths some thoughts around how you want to address taking more chances. I want to plug right here at the top this is an article inspired by an article on the website that also has an assessment. I believe it's 10, if not definitely 12, but no more than 12 questions that really let you know. Are you risk inclined or risk adverse, or, as we like to say, taking chances? We take chances when we're making decisions on a daily basis, and some are natural, some cause us to pause and some of the things we want to think about. Just leading into the top, here is what do you need to know? And so an administrative professional right, taking chances, aka those risks they can be key factors in your success. And totally tied to that is the quote, like headline, of you know, get out of your comfort zone. And I challenge and for my regular listeners this shouldn't be a surprise if you're a new listener, welcome. Thanks for hitting play Getting out of your comfort zone is an incomplete directive.
Speaker 1:Hear me out. Once you get out of your comfort zone, even if it's like one leg out of the circle, now what I want to have you adopt into your vocabulary, which is a big thing here at the company to inspire so many of you embrace being uncomfortable. That's ultimately what they're trying to promote with getting out of the comfort zone, and so I would rather all of you consider adding, I want to embrace being uncomfortable right now because it's a micro risk. It's a big risk, whatever that risk you're going to be facing to take and then segue into and still keeping on. What do you need to know when you think about and I talk about this with my kids if you made that decision, what are one or two scenarios of outcome? And as administrative individuals, you're making that decision without even really being conscious of it. When you're putting stuff on the calendar, where does this apply within the day and the rhythm of my executive's energy and time? And if you're going to think about taking a risk of sandwiching a really important person between two other really important meetings, you know, hopefully, that the reward of that risk of scheduling has a positive return right, not a negative other than your executive now being completely depleted, depending on who's on the front and the back end of that appointment. But you know the priorities, so you make those chances, you make decisions based on the chance of something great happening. I know also many of you on the opposite again thinking about what do you need to know when you're making a decision and you're like that's not going to be a great thing, it's possibly because it's not a good risk to take, and so you're often in your job making decisions based on risks. So I want to talk a little bit about the emotion and again, just as a quick reminder as we segue, we're going to embrace being uncomfortable as a way to step into taking chances. We're not talking about speeding or reckless decision making on chances. People make risky decisions when they do investments. I mean, look at how your company makes decisions based on risk. That's attached to reward, and so if you added anything second into your vocabulary, I want you to be thinking about risk reward. If I take a risk right now, what is the reward? And that, again, is where I was saying what are the two things that could happen? Maybe you already know three things. Both the two of the three are really bad and one is great. Is that worth it? Right? And it's those calculations. And so let's talk about some bias that settles in when we're thinking about taking risks.
Speaker 1:Bias we all know this in the administrative profession and if you didn't know it, this point blank I'm going to spell it out. There's bias attached to the title Just assistant, right? Just executive assistant. That's the bias. It's very detrimental to our psychology, our advancement potential, and that's from the outside. But I will tell you, as I say often on the show and through the coaching and workshops that I run, it is on you to change their perception, be it recalculate, their bias of the profession, based on how you're engaging with people specific to your personal brand. So that bias, you know what is it? This refers to the unconscious mental shortcuts right that influence our decisions, often without us even realizing it. It's like a filter through which we see the world. The way that I see an instant or an incident happen. Two people next to me might see it just a little bit differently and that's because of how they see the world. That's the bias we have to face. That because it's going to constantly be a part. It's been around for millions of, or should say thousands of years.
Speaker 1:Okay, recognizing bias and decision making when we have an opportunity to assess the risk, as I was mentioning with that risk reward, it either confirms our bias or it sort of changes your bias, because you're taking in the information and deciding what's the risk reward. The challenges that come with that are cloudy judgment If you're not fully, with a lot of context, and so we talk a lot about on the show and again in training. What's the context? Just the extra information, blind spots, maybe that someone's not sharing with you, which then totally puts you guys in a place of being exhausted because you have to come up with more questions to get in their head, which I realize that some of us like it. Some of us are tired, keep pushing through. So, to overcome the bias, we need to be just aware of it. We need to know when we're making assumptions, when we're using bias based on our own view of the world, and that's where it's also really important.
Speaker 1:Much to smart risks is the mindful listening I like to talk about, which is my replacement term for active. Active to me isn't really connecting and making that actionable step. Where you want to be mindful, I'm in the moment, my mind is present and I'm mindful in hearing what you have to say and so having diverse perspectives, getting other people's buy-in on information. We love surveys. We want to see, we want to see goals on the LinkedIn business page, a lot Like what are people thinking? How are they viewing stuff? And so taking in an overcoming bias is really important when you're thinking about taking smart risks and chances and such. So easing into smart risks.
Speaker 1:Okay, let's shift our focus to the smart risk. These aren't reckless, right? They're calculated moves that have the potential for significant payoff. Okay, some of the wonderful admins I've been blessed to help in their career in place, they do have a space of comfort when they're talking to me on Hulani. I really want the top end of the salary and I say let's talk about it so we can quantify right, so that we can have that Calculated move supported, versus just the feeling of I want more money, which a lot of money is driven by feeling and I don't challenge that to At all discredit that they're worth top comp. But we need to have that conversation so that the move is calculated when we're moving to the point of compensation for an offer. There's also this dialogue that they have with me, which is obviously not the hiring company. That does give the space to take a smart risk on themselves, because the reward for that risk is, yes, the conversation.
Speaker 1:I would love to see more people who I'm not able to totally help, but more people to really think about that Quantifiable information that backs. So it takes away the emotion which is the bias also in this profession, a very high emotional profession. A group of professionals takes that away, and so Assessing of how to take a smart risk is what is some of the data that backs the decision to quote, take that chance or take that risk? And and knowing where that's at is extremely important. The second thing, which I had mentioned earlier, is, you know, before taking a risk is essential to assess the potential Outcomes. If I had said just moments ago there's three and two are not great, is one out of three worth it? I don't know right. And that's where leaning into buy-in and information from other people is extremely important gathering the information, quantifying the risks involved in the big thing.
Speaker 1:A lot of my intellectually curious admins out there I think you're the majority you want to seek and look and find information Because you, as so many of you say, you write lifelong learner for us here we like to call it building your library of knowledge and so on. And so that taking that starting point of a small risk, my biggest statement here Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid to start small. Taking manageable risks builds confidence and it sets the stage for larger. One risk on a personal level might be, you know, choosing to not eat breakfast at 7 am Like you normally do and waiting till 8 o'clock so that you kind of go into the intermittent fasting, right, that's a good risk. You're gonna be starving, could you be hangry, which is something I suffer from every now and then but just a small personal risk, starting with yourself versus in the business place, is going to build up the confidence that you know I like to take chances, chances that have good risk reward, and you're building out this bank of Instances that are the confidence you need to do a risk at the office and I don't know all of your jobs, but I'm sure you can find, even in working with other departments or advisors On how to take a smart risk at the office.
Speaker 1:I just touched on this, and so let's just move through this next segment of information specific to the emotions, and a really big one. I've conducted, conducted gosh 6000 calls in the last seven years. It's a lot of calls and it's amazing. We're in our eighth year now running the company and there's so much continuity in all the calls. There's this little, little tiny of undertone of fear and I don't want to be judged, which goes into the bias right, I don't want to be judged, I want to remove the just from my identity and I really want this job we're on the phone talking about. So let's talk about emotions and fear, failure specifically to taking risks.
Speaker 1:Failure is a natural part of any journey. I mean, especially when talking about risks and instead of fearing it, embrace the failure right. As we talked about a moment ago and I shared being uncomfortable, I mean there are times where I have to be really uncomfortable with new clients because they're oververbal processors. We're running out of time, but I need to hear that information. So the reward is letting them talk, letting them carry on, which is also very telling how they are on the job and probably running meetings over and so on. But I digress, embracing that uncomfortable, that potential of failure, but thinking about it as a powerful learning opportunity. I am absolutely so big about that and if I could just be with all of you and we're in a huge circle holding hands and we're saying brace, being uncomfortable, I would want you to feel the energy of the power that comes with. It's okay if I fail. By the way, we should probably think which could be another episode, like different tiers of failure, failure I don't even know what those tiers are, but making it less universal, like everything's a failure versus that's a micro failure or that's a tiny failure, but failure is also not a great word. So one of the things we've been doing a lot, especially in 2023, is where's the opportunity in the moment? Where's the opportunity in the moment as a replacement phrase? Again here, more vocabulary for all of you. The replacement phrase for that didn't go the way I wanted it to. That risk did not have a reward right, and so, thinking about the emotions, some most successful people face setbacks before really reaching their goals.
Speaker 1:I used to listen to a podcast called how I Built this and Rent the Runway the founder. She was being interviewed by Guy Ra's, the podcast host, and she talked about how she had like 156 different meetings to launch Rent the Runway and she was starting to lose her energy and passion. Can you imagine like 150? I mean so many of you too who go through tons of interviews and then don't get the offer? It's kind of the same thing. She kept pushing through and she's describing this amazing moment. She's in New York city in the back of a taxi, heading with all of her garments to Diane von Fossenberg's office to pitch it to her, but she got a call 10 minutes before the meeting from the executive assistant saying that the meeting is now canceled, diane doesn't have time to meet with you, and the founder was, excuse me, lying and saying, oh, can't hear you, and she was trying to act like she was in a tunnel in the city and couldn't hear, so that she didn't hear that she's not allowed to have this meeting. She showed up and Diane invested in her. I mean amazing, right. She took a huge, smart risk, one by lying, two, by faking it in the back of the cab and still pushing through, and so I share that story to think about the emotions that some of the most successful people face setbacks before reaching their goals. The next thing is that there's managing of the emotions managing. I have an amazing episode with a wonderful guy named DB helping you win the day, and he talks about emotional intelligence and that. You're gonna wanna check that episode out. I'll have that in the show notes as well. But here, real quick. The emotional roller coaster comes with taking risks. It's absolutely normal. I mentioned this actually many months ago on Instagram.
Speaker 1:You are a business of one, and what that means is you have a proposition quote for a service. So I'm personally a business of two. One and a half right, I've got two and a half, I've got Leah and a part-time communications assistant, and being a business of one as an executive assistant is you are propositioning out, proposing out use me for my services. Just like Starbucks wants to earn your business to buy their coffee. They're unique, the style in which they have their drink order to the cup and logo and the drink names and then you just go to McDonald's. They're a business of one, right. What they offer their coffee is not unique. So I want you to think about the emotions that are attached to being a business of one and that there's emotional roller coasters that come with a business owner who's got a company of 10,000 to you and me.
Speaker 1:So it's not about the fail, it's about how you get back up. So if you took a small risk and you realized there was a reward, and now you're building out a library of instances of taking some risks, you're going to grow into a space of there's nothing really big to lose here. I'm going for it and I would really love that for everyone. So the fear of what others think can be paralyzing. This could be a whole nother episode, so I won't park here for long at all. But here's the truth. Not everyone will understand your journey, and that's okay. Focus on your personal goals and let your success speak louder than any criticism. And that's a big thing there, because if they don't quote, see you the way you want to be seen, which, by the way, I talk about this in my personal branding course. It's 26 minutes, it's amazing, and it talks about the value of perception and not reputation and what the difference is between the two of those and giving people a place and opportunity to see you differently than the just that carries with this title, unfortunately.
Speaker 1:Okay, we're kind of coming to the end. Encouraging advice. I want to leave it with one. You want to check out the article. You definitely want to check out the article. You totally want to take the assessment less than a minute of your time really enlightening. We had fun putting that together as well as the now. What do you do after you've completed the assessment? And I want to emphasize the importance of embrace being uncomfortable. I want to emphasize the coolness behind the risk and that potential reward I want to also talk about everyone's journey is absolutely unique to you, which is why I'm so big on pushing personal branding. You are a personal brand, as I was just mentioning. You are a business of one. You need to create a center of influence. You need to earn agency, have a breath of command.
Speaker 1:There's an amazing book actually have it here on my desk Invisible influence. It's on our books page, so I'll have that in the show notes as well. The hidden forces that shape behavior. Jonah Berger amazing. I could not put this book down. I just happened to have been delayed for a flight and walked into the bookstore which is not normally something I do and it just jumped out at me and I grabbed it. I started reading it on the flight home. I couldn't close it. It's a great book totally worth reading. Invisible influence by Jonah Berger Remembering true, true learning happens when you step out of your comfort zone into embracing being what Uncomfortable?
Speaker 1:Right, there seems to be a lack of action after you quote leave the comfort zone, and so I want to then have the second part, which is the action is embraced, being uncomfortable, knowing also emotions to get high. How do you sort of regulate that? Talk about that in the assessment based on where you're at. You've taken it and we give you results. And building out your suite of strengths, growing your library of knowledge. These are key terms that we've been using for the last several years and I'm so excited that you hit play.
Speaker 1:If you really enjoyed this episode, share it with someone that's just thinking about taking a step into being uncomfortable in 2024. And I'm so excited that you all come back hit play Again. As I mentioned, if this is your first episode, welcome to the exceptional admins community and hitting play on the show. Be sure to check out the show notes everyone and wishing everyone a great day. Thanks for hitting play and spending some time with me. If this episode inspired you or provided valuable insights, please share it with your network and consider leaving a review. Your career journey is elevated each time you absorb new information. Set aside three minutes this week to explore a library of resources which includes many articles, fun assessments and free guides. Be sure to subscribe to our Friday newsletters so you never miss details for a new webinar or resource. Remember you're the reason you get up every day and work as hard as you do. Do things for you, your executive and your organization, and remember it's all worth it.
