Don’t Pick a Job You Hate (The 3 Question Test)

You should not do what your parents want you to do you should do what you're wired to do there are people in this world that only you can help Erica can't reach them I can't reach them but something about you whether it's building something with your hands creating something digitally I could go through every job in the world and on the other end of that job is a person and when we do something at work that We're good at and that we enjoy and that matters to us we are giving ourselves away Ken Coleman is

a career coach author and radio host who inspires people to find and pursue their dream jobs on the Ken Coleman show he helps listeners Advance their careers and find true professional fulfillment people feel like they can't actually make a change and not hurt themselves financially there's just so much fear there I think fear of the unknown is the Biggest fear we humans face I really do like fear of failure okay that's a biggie but fear of the unknown is crippling am I good at it and can I get better do I enjoy the work and

do I care about the results of my job and if the answer is no to any one of those three it's going to eventually put you in that disengaged kind of a zombie kind of existence hi it's Erica Colberg and before we dive into today's podcast episode I have an exciting announcement That can help you save an extra, without having to Penny pinch or change your lifestyle on Monday I'm running my free five day savings challenge where you'll discover simple and creative ways that you can save extra money every month and whatever you want to

do with that extra money is up to you I'll just show you how to save it the challenge is totally free to join all you need to do is go to erica.com slgo Erica is with a K and you can Secure your spot by the way these strategies that you're going to discover can help you easily save money whether you're a budgeting novice or a finance expert and they're going to get better and better throughout the week but I have to tell you I'm so excited about this and don't want you to miss out in

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and you're listening to the Erica taught me Podcast so 68% of people are disengaged at work in the US why do you think that is because they're just not doing work that they're created to do wired to do it's just something's off now now tactically we get really practical in looking at it either they're in the wrong seat you know the type of job or role just isn't a good fit for them or they're on the wrong bus and that can happen too you know where essentially what's confusing for a lot of people and Could

be really almost depressing Erica is if you go I am wired for this work I'm I'm good at it I enjoy it uh it creates results that I care about but it's a toxic work environment that can be really confusing and it's almost like The Head and the Heart are having this weird wrestling match cuz when you think about the work you go oh this is exciting and I want to get to this but when you're in an environment that's not healthy then it starts to Just wear on you mentally and emotionally and so that's

another reason too but it's one of those two reasons you're either not in the right role doing what you're really wired to do or you're just in a bad environment and so that creates what Gallup calls this disengagement it's not a strong hate emotion it's just more of a you know it's just I got to do it and I got to get a paycheck and this is kind of where I'm at right now so That's where we're at and by the way this translates globally as well we see the numbers are pretty similar globally a

little bit higher uh globally but still a global work pandemic yeah okay so just so I can understand analogy if you're in the wrong seat that means that the role is it's not right for you not right yeah so in that company or at any company like if you're a lawyer if you're in the wrong seat does that mean you should not be a lawyer or you should Not be a lawyer at that law firm it could be that you shouldn't be a lawyer or it could be that the type of legal work that you're

doing is not how you're wired so if we look at of course in this new book we we call it find the work you're wired to do so to to really answer this question it's a great question so everybody's wired with Talent everybody comes in little babies you know they develop in toddlers and then they're in grade school and pretty Early on a parent can see talent and teachers and coaches can see Talent so that's think of talent as a tool right that you can use and the more experience and education we get we turn

it into a sharpened skill so that's talent what we do best then you move to what type of work lights us up mihi chent Mi high is a legendary psychologist his Ted Talk still you know millions and millions and millions of views and he identified what he calls as flow a state of flow and in Describing flow he this idea that I look forward to doing legal work when I'm engaged in the legal work time seems to stand still and when I'm done with the legal work I can look back and go well it was

a full day exhausting day man that was really awesome and and I'm ready to hit it again the so that's what we love to do we call that passion in this book and then finally what are the results of your work that you look at You go that's meaningful to me all work creates a result cause and effect so that's the sense of mission so if you are a lawyer in this case and you don't enjoy your work we first start with okay am I really good at it the answer is yes all right so

it's not a Talent issue I'm not frustrated because I'm not good enough so then we're going to look to do I enjoy this type of work well if you're a if you're a litigator but you don't enjoy the Litigating the public presenting like you and I kind of like this stuff you know we're we're performers we we dig the cameras and the lights you know but if that's exhausting to you then we've got a red alarm here ding ding ding ding ding what's going on well maybe you enjoy more of the research and the you

know diving in the details and so as a litigator in front of an audience it's draining to you versus when you're behind the scenes maybe Digging in and research that gives you energy so we've got a clue there and then you look at that third element of results that I care about well do you want to get somebody off that's been charged with a crime do you get really excited about the Justice piece they were wrongly accused or whatever or do you want to put the bad guys in jail we get that that result matters

too so if you're that lawyer who you're good at the Lawyering as far as understanding the law the details but you don't enjoy the performance nature but you do enjoy behind the- scenes research and then what you care about is efficiency and process then you go I shouldn't be litigating as a public defender maybe I should be in corporate law helping companies operate more efficiently because I help them save money on taxes or I help them deal with regulation it's a long answer but that's how you go okay Am I good at it do I

enjoy it does it create a result it being the work I'm doing that I actually care about like I'm excited to tell my friends or my spouse or my parents about it so okay these are the three wires then it's the talent what you do best passion what you love to do and results Mission results that you care deeply about got it when those are wired together then it works perfectly yeah you're just feeling alive but there are a lot of people where they Might have one or two wires working but then the passion isn't

there or the talent isn't there the mission isn't there well we're here in New York right now Wall Street is famous for this there's stories every year and you can go see this stuff that you've got people that are crushing it on Wall Street here in finance they're good at their job but we see this where High performers don't enjoy their job but they've just always been good at math and numbers maybe Their parents said hey go get this you so they go to a Ivy League school they knock down this huge job but they

don't love it they don't love the work and that eventually sucks the soul out of you no matter how much money you're making how good you're doing so it's you're it's a great observation you could be really good at something but not enjoy it and eventually that does weigh down on you that can really burn you out and so for these three how do You figure out what the issue is is it if it's not obvious like if you are disengaged at work how do you go through the process of elimination of figuring out which

wire is not being fulfilled yeah well obviously we've got a great assessment that I think will do that for you but practically speaking you want to look in those areas am I good at this work like and let's get some 360 review here let's get your leader let's get some teammates involved you know if You're really confused I love self-awareness it's a superpower so beyond that 360 go back in your life and go have I always been good at math or have I been good at verbal skills or whatever you're doing go let's just for

a moment press pause on everything and let's determine am I good at this do I have the talent necessary to win all right check all right so if the answer is yes then check it's not that if it's not go wait a second I'm I shouldn't be Doing this I'm I'm average you know like if we use a scale of one to 10 one being suck and 10 being awesome yeah if you're a six or a seven at something you better be paying attention to that to go all right I can bust it and go

get some more skill and be an eight maybe a nine if I'm a six or seven I mean if I'm a seven I can be a nine okay but if I'm a four or five we should probably do something else because you Could bust it and then just be barely above average to use simple terms so then we move to Passion so we first talked about Talent what I do best now what do I enjoy doing most and I've got to look at my day and here's a fun little exercise you would walk around if

you will on your phone or if you're one of these people like to write it down and I would I would for a week every time you're doing some of your core tasks I would stop and pause and go does This drain me or does it fire me up like does this give me energy or does it suck energy and I would literally go suck energy give energy suck give right whatever and I would be looking at that and that's a really good exercise to go oh if I'm spending 50% of my day doing things

that drain me we have a real problem I think you want to get to a point where you're about 75% 80% yeah rule of them because we always have to I Hate meetings to confess to you I hate meetings do you yeah I'm like a creative high energy I got to be thinking moving and oh I hate meetings but guess what I have a lot of people that work with me and help me and support me they need me to show up to meetings so I got to be an adult but I can tell you

this you can look at my schedule my schedule is not dominated by meetings so that's a rule of thumb and so we're looking at how much in my day am I spending doing work I enjoy the third piece is just all about results this is about personal values you know like are you working for an organization that is putting out a product or service that you believe in start there and then you back into all right my role so say I'm a lawyer okay and I'm representing an organization or I work for an org I'm

a corporate lawyer I'm working for the Organization okay do I believe in the product service do I believe in the culture the values the way the company runs the way it treats people what's it social imprint whatever your thing matters to you that matters so pay attention to it so then you pull back to then being the lawyer and you go all right even though I'm in the numbers or I'm doing regulation I really enjoy efficiency productivity and so I'm contributing to that And I believe in this company but if the converse is true that

you enjoy the work and the efficiency but you don't like the company again that's going to wear on you so that's where you start walking through this and it's a self-awareness game at all points am I good at it and can I get better do I enjoy the work and do I care about the results of my job job and if the answer is no to any one of those three it's going to eventually put you In that disengaged kind of a zombie kind of existence and how do you figure out if let's say you

have the talent you have the passion you like the outcome but the workplace that you're in is just toxic how do you figure out whether it is time to quit or whether you stay in there but try to speak to management make some changes and figure it out that's a great question I think you start there I I think you have to take it to your leader and see if the leader Is a aware of it and and and big clue here Erica if it's toxic on your particular team Your Leader is either unaware of

it or intentionally not dealing with it or they're the problem because of that that's exact they are the problem so they're not dealing with it because they're just like I this this is dysfunction is normal to me and that's really true in most cases but I do think to your point you have to take it to your leader So that we develop a little emotional grit here you know the idea of going I'm going to learn to have difficult conversations and not be a jerk I'm not GNA be a baby but I'm going to go

and say hey here's what I see do you see this and and then based on what they say there now we know what we're going to do because if they see it and they say I do see it what do you think we should do that'd be a healthy leadership response and then you could speak to well here's What I think we could do but I'm willing to be a part of the change uh then you give them a chance to change it if they don't change it then I think you're done starting a business

is a dream come true for a lot of people and being your own boss is amazing building a team and watching your idea become a reality can be an incredible feeling but as your business scales so do the cost and the headaches maybe you're experiencing this your team is drowning in complex systems And processes that should take minutes are taking days you need netsuite by Oracle netsuite is the number one Cloud Financial system bringing accounting financial management inventory HR into one platform and one source of Truth you improve efficiency by bringing all your major business

processes into one platform slashing manual tasks and errors and you know I'm all about efficiency over 37,000 companies have already made the move so do the math see How you'll profit with netsuite by popular demand netsuite has extended its one-of-a-kind flexible financing program for a few more weeks head to netsuite.com for all the details that's netsuite.com Erica is with a K I'll put the link in the description what is the best way to have those conversations because those are tough conversations yeah and and and you're bringing up a very good point there's a Huge amount

of fear involved with having a difficult conversation with your boss because you're afraid they're going to let you go and that's we have to acknowledge that and so the simple rule kind of the golden rule treat others as you would want to be treated I think you put yourself in your boss's shoes and go how would I want someone to bring this to me that may help you with some landmines of things you might say and I think you come in and you go hey here's What I'm seeing do you see this and leave it

could a it's a question not a statement you know you and I just met we've met briefly before but hanging out if if if I'm just making statements all the time to you about what I think you're going to walk away and go wow there's you know guy's pretty sure of everything you know like if we're become friends and I'm always just making statements and I'm never asking you what you think about a situation It's offputting so that creates with your leader a natural defense mechanism if you come in going we've got a dumpster fire

out here as opposed to going hey I'm noticing this and this and this do you see that way different posture that they should have if they're a normal human being and not really unhealthy yeah you've given them something to consider and put their stamp on at that point you're going to find out really quickly whether or not They're open to this and so trust yourself if the leader's not open and doesn't see it you got to go all right I can't be a part of the change back to your original question if if the leader

willing to make change and they genuinely are appreciative that you've brought this to them and they want you to be a part of the solution they're going okay I'm I'm running like a chick of my head cut off I didn't see it but now I think I can I'm going to pay attention to this now you go oh we might be able to make some change if you don't get that response it's time to start looking and my advice by the way you're a money expert I actually want to return the question I always tell

people when they call my show and ask me I say don't leave something go to Something in other words yeah be an adult bite the stick grd it out unless it's abusive unless you are in emotional or physical danger mental As well then let's go find something and let's leave let's step from one dock to another dock you know or one boat to another boat do you agree with that no unless you've got Financial Freedom yeah absolutely I think finding a replacement job is the much better route than leaving with nothing lined up I'm curious

for a lot of people if the boss is the problem let's say the boss doesn't respect your time outside of work so they are always having you stay Late they're texting you emailing you slacking you on weekends how would you address that when your boss is the problem how do you tell them that their behavior is encroaching on your personal time yeah very good question I thank you again same posture is before but what you're going to say is Hey listen um what are your expectations for me um based on my job description and where

I'm at are I just need to know are you expecting me to be responsive to Email and text on the weekend well we know the answer because they're texting you for crying out L email I'd get some clarification on but if your boss is texting you it it's to me there needs to be a boundary but we've got to start with what do they think the boundary should be and it might be a situation where they go oh like just that polite but firm and clear what is your expectation for me on text on weekends

Or nights after the hour you know I just want to make sure that I'm responsive to you but I don't normally work at night like lay it out like that so they go oh okay by asking the what is your expectation again we're using a question not a statement hopefully not making them defensive but also putting it in their hands it's like I'm handing you a question you got to tell me and then have them be clear on it here's the Other great news about this you get this in writing too true and now you've

kind of got a signal this is how they're expecting me to do work and I don't want to work that way they don't respect personal boundaries and I will tell you Erica I think that only gets worse I toly agree and I think sometimes it's it's unintentional so truly if you bring it up in that way they may learn and F fix their ways cuz even for me I know sometimes I get very excited on weekends With all these creative ideas so then I'm like assigning them to my team on slack but then they're getting

stressed out because they're seeing these slack notifications so now what I've learned to do on slack is there's you can set a timer where I can send a message but it won't actually send to them until 9:00 a.m. on Monday so I do that now where even though I have the ideas on the weekends they won't actually see my message until 91 I want to praise you For that that right there is leadership 10 one on boundaries you were you were emotionally Savvy enough that you felt it or maybe one of your staff I heard

it you heard it great but you did something about it but you also you handled it so healthy in that you were like well I still need to operate at my best so that you you get an idea boom let's get it in slack but you also then operated in the best interest of your team it's brilliant leadership really I applaud That and by the way that's just maturity that's a healthy person listen you will run the best people away if you don't respect their boundaries so I I think that's the way you approach it

because I do think you're right I think most leaders are operating in their own operating system we all have our own system and they're just not thinking about how it feels on the other end but by the way all of them have followed somebody at Some point so I think in bringing it up that way hopefully they go oh oops I should probably yeah come up with some better system like you did since you've coached over 10,000 people what are the big problems that they're coming to you with that you think are fixable like some

are not and your recommendation is going to be probably to look for a new job but what are the big ones that are fixable well I would start with you can control the type of work that you do and You can control whether or not you're going to stay in a bad environment now what you can't control is who's creating that environment we've really talked through that but you can say all right there are healthy companies out there um there are other Alternatives and I think a lot of people just feel so stuck because let's

be honest it's a pain in the rear to to change jobs okay so that's a big one and of course we talked about hey uh you people are trying to Figure out where am I most fulfilled and that's why I came up with that that that's by the way where we came up the methodology that if you use what you do best to do you enjoy to produce results you care about guess what you're pretty happy camper even on the worst days all right I think another big one is people feel like they can't actually

make a change and not hurt themselves financially it comes back to Money it's so much psychology coaching on these things to go this idea that you change and all of a sudden you're going to go back backwards financially or that there's going to be this huge interruption in income or that you're going to go do something different and you're going to suck so bad that you get fired there's just so much fear there so I would simplify those three scenarios that I get a lot into fear fear of the unknown I think Fear of the

unknown is the biggest fear we humans face I really do like fear of failure okay that's a biggie fear of re rejection that's a biggie in the professional world and personally but fear of the unknown is crippling and and so I'm constantly trying to help people realize hey are you going to do something stupid from a character standpoint and get fired are you really going to take a job that you're miserable at as far as Talent Like you just suck so bad they know you're fake day one I mean and so they kind of laugh

and like so it's that that's the bigie is the fear of the unknown and so I think it's confidence I think most of the coaching I do comes down to confidence yeah I think for fear fear of the known is real it's a real thing and I've felt it so many times one of the best exercises I always do when I fear the unknown is just you can pretty much figure out what the scenarios are So I list out all the scenarios the best case scenarios and the worst case scenarios and then balance it out

even though it is unknown I don't know what scenario it's going to go down is the best case scenario far greater than the worst case scenario like for me when I was quitting my job I listed those out like the best case scenario was that I would be able to build a company that would help so many people and have impact the worst case scenario was that I would run out of money and have to go back to a law firm and so when I looked at it like that it wasn't really fear of the

unknown it's it was just seeing the two outcomes and both were okay I was fine with them yeah which is brilliant I mean you actually did go okay I know what the best and worst case scenar are so whatever's in between yeah I'm going to be okay with that when you when you laid all that out did you feel just a natural confidence to go this is AB Absol like when you said I can always go back to being a lawyer in a firm did that give you a ton of courage or did it just

give you a little bit of confidence and as you begin to take steps everything kind of Grew From there I'm just curious for you personally I think for me it was that if you don't change your situation nothing will change like if I stayed in the law firm a year 5 years 10 years down the line nothing would have changed and I would have just Wondered like what if what if I had left and I I don't like the wh ifs I like to figure out what can happen so even though I was scared and

obviously there was a personal situation with my grandpa passing away and I just didn't I didn't want someone to control my time that was my big motivator and and I just yeah I felt like I had no choice it was this conviction towards jumping into the unknown yeah you know what I think it is I think every Human has that same feeling you have you just acted on it but I think the choice you said no choice I love it I think you were choosing to live a life that you can reminisce about as opposed

to choosing a life that you will regret I love that like deep down can we just get real everybody like the soul crave to know what's on the other side and no one really wants to if we all get this opportunity to be old people yeah and Look back and go I don't want to have a bunch of what is yeah I think that's so right one of the best exercises I did for every pivotal decision in my life and even for my husband I remember when he was considering quitting and he was scared of

the unknown I wrote a letter to him with all of my thoughts about like okay here's the best case scenario here's here's the worst case scenario and he did this exercise himself too and then we came to a family consensus for Him to quit his job but it's I think if you take it goes back to what you were saying about self-awareness if you take time to really think deeply about what are your goals what are your aspirations what is going to happen if you don't leave what happens if you do leave what could happen

you'll find Clarity in that yes and and what I love about you guys are running to something even now but back then you it's and it really is the shift don't don't we all kind of want to Say I want to take a shot I want the adventure and but I'm going to go to something not run away from something and so you started out our conversation we look at 68% of Americans and I think the number is close to 80 worldwide a lot of people that are kind of showing up every day to whatever

it is sometimes even working for themselves and it's just a j o and and and they're going and deep down they're going what could be what Should be what must be and they're having the conversation yeah they're just not acting on it and I think that's the key and I love I love what you have done to say we're going to be adventurers and we're running to something and you really model this by the way I mean you really are using what you do best to do what you love to produce results you care about

what a shift because most people would look at you uh before you made the change and go What are you doing you're you're a lawyer you're you're young like the sky is the limit problem is that's not the sky that you're reaching for so I I again I you really are the model of this no I mean you really are I mean and and how much much joy do you have now compared to the Joy you had before I love it I love did you have any Joy before when you were a lawyer I'm just

curious I when I think about the three wires I really liked the talent part I Loved being so analytical and doing doing the work but the outcome was not for me because really as a corporate lawyer what I was doing was helping the big corporations get bigger and wealthier and that's like that's not why I went to law school that's not what I wanted to do with my life I really wanted to advocate for people and help people and impact people's lives not that's the third wire everybody that's the mission you just that's the results

That you cared about right you love the analytical part but it wasn't creating a result that mattered to you you wanted to help people not big giant corporations yeah that's huge I love this this is helping me think through like okay I'm I feel validated K says I made the right decision well you there's no question about it I don't know the audience could see it but I felt like I saw emotion in your eyes as I was just kind of talking with you about the joy Of what you have now I felt I saw

that and that's real and uh that and by the way here's what's fun for your audience and they already know this but I'm going to call it out to your audience because they love you you have a lot of people following you which means you're helping a lot of people this is working so you don't need me to validate anything the the folks that you're helping are validating you and it's really fun by the way because You're you you are really truly doing what you're wired to do thank you yeah I I have a question

so I think a lot of of people you alluded to this earlier but a lot of people follow this predetermined path that they think is the right path or they think will make them their parents proud or they think will give them a high-paying job how do you should you avoid that like I very much felt like I in college I wanted to become a doctor all of my Life from when I was in elementary school I wanted to become a doctor to help people and then in college I did really badly at organic chemistry

which is a prerequisite so then I was like okay this is not going to work there's the talent wire so you realize oh I don't have it I don't have it so then I was like okay what else doctor lawyer okay lawyer has helped people so that's how I went on the lawyer path to help people and also make my parents proud Yes is it okay for people to go down that path or should we not think about what Society or anyone wants of us I love love love this question I don't know if this

is going to be controversial but push me on it I'll unpack it uh you should not do what your parents want you to do you should do what you're wired to do and I'm not trying to be cute but that's why we titled this little book that because I said it I don't know how many times I've Said that just coaching people you should do you okay let's just make it 2024 be you you were created to fill a unique role in this world you are needed you must do it in other words to everybody

who's listening and watching watchingg this I'm going to talk right to the camera there are people in this world that only you can help Erica can't reach them I can't reach them but something about you whether it's Building something with your hands creating something digitally loving on someone in physical therapy or emotional what whatever I could go through every job in the world and on the other end of that job Erica is a person and when we do something at work that we're good at and that we enjoy and that matters to us we are

giving ourselves away and the most confused caller that I've ever had on the show They're all on the same boat I'll they'll say I have no idea what I want to do and I'll say sure you do come on tell me one thing you'd love to do and their first answer is always I just want to help people well this could be a programmer who's never customer facing but he or she is writing code that has a direct impact on people's lives so every healthy person on the planet wants to help people all right so

Back to the question if I am focused on doing what my parents want me to do what my friends say I should do what my guidance counselor or my favorite teacher or my favorite coach or my older brother my older sister whatever if I'm doing that and it is not what I'm supposed to be doing who I am being really who I am then you are not doing what you're wired to do and then it means you're not helping the people that you're supposed to Help so that's how I come at that I no now

if your parents or and anybody else suggest something that you are wired to do and you can go through this self-awareness exercise and they actually are healthy and they're not projecting their lack of doing something on you you get all this y then yes but only to the extent that whatever is being suggested to you you can validate that it is who you really are I find it hard though to Figure out like what it is you want to do I remember even when I was 18 years old feeling that pressure at the time I

thought I wanted to be a doctor again but it it's a lot of pressure to put on a young person say what do you want to do with your life and I found that for me I learned best through process of elimination like I figure out I figured out what I didn't want to do or what didn't suit me to ultimately get to this path at age 29 where I figured out that Okay I didn't want to be a corporate lawyer full-time I wanted to help people and even now I'm still figuring it out like

what do I want to do with the rest of my life I think I have a good feeling but things can change so is it I I just don't understand is it process of elimination or is it that like how will you know what you're supposed to do I think it is process of elimination uh on on some level but I also think it depends on how you're how you come at Decisions okay so there are thinkers and feelers if I were to just take the entire world and put us into two groups you have

your thinkers and you got your feelers that's just how we make decisions now if you're a feeler doesn't mean there's not thought involved obviously and if you're a thinker doesn't mean that emotions not involved but let's take your your process of elimination I think it works but I would say the methodology That we've been talking about helps us with eliminating so as you start to look at things oh I think maybe I want to be a doctor okay instead of doing all this deep thinking about is that because I watched gry's Anatomy when I was

a sophomore in high school you know or is there something there so so let's go okay doctor what do you have to be good in to be a doctor well that's an easy answer to figure out Math and Science okay are you good at math and science if You suck at math and science and you've been killing yourself through your entire academic career to get a c in math or science I'm not saying you can't be a doctor but I'm saying we got a warning sign right process of elimination yeah if you're getting FS medicine

sign for you by the way that would be me that entire side of my brain is dead Math and Science I'm awful that always have been so then let's go to okay do I Enjoy what's involved in being a doctor like how like how difficult is this process let's go get aware let's talk to some doctors because you're going to have to really really enjoy the thing that they do in order to go through all the stuff they have to do to do that right so if a surgeon the surgeon has to do all this

other stuff painstaking process just to get a chance to cut on somebody to make their life better so are you willing to Do all this other stuff I call it suffering to then get to do this thing that's fun so for me it was broadcasting I had to do a lot of stuff that was awful awful jobs like really awful like introduce mimes and balloon artists in the early days do high school football play byplay on the internet when no one's listening all for the chance to be sitting here with you today but I was

willing to do that because I Love communicating to coach oh so you knew like from a young age you knew that this was what you were meant to do well back to the question I didn't know that it was this but I did know that it was going to be communicating publicly because I was the kid that volunteered in kindergarten for the high school play to be the newspaper boy that's a string from the soul I remember I remember like yesterday Erica when the teacher asked The question you know who wants to volunteer to be

in the play you're going to be a newspaper boy or something and I remember like you know little kids will push the armpit up to get the hand higher where's that come from I'm five I don't know who I am but I would tell you that's a real heart reaction something in five-year-old me was like I want to get in front of a crowd you know so that's Instinct um so So I always knew that it was going to be some type of Public Communication role I thought it was going to be politics thank God

uh that I realize much like you that's not the place I want to be and and I'll say this it's because of the because of the results piece like good at the communication good at understanding policy good at debate all those things enjoy that serving the public doing something good for our fellow Man but legislation and infighting and Party politics and Camp G forget it so so it is a process of elimination so a young person doesn't have to pick a career at 18 in my mind but I do think they need to be become

self-aware as early as being a sophomore we have a student version of this assessment that allows the student just to go oh okay I know at this point in my life I'm good at this stuff and I enjoy some of this over here and I do care About this that can be identified as a teen in fact research shows Erica that a lot of adults return to an idea a fantasy that they had when they were nine or 10 years of age when they're most happy at work so it's not my opinion that's what the

data says so I get back to that design piece and you can meet an empathetic kid at nine you your parents will go this kid has always loved animals or always went for the suffering Animal or always helped their classmate and that person if they're true to themselves will eventually end up in a professional role through process of elimination if they go well what are the problems I most want to solve that gets to the missional result so I might ident ify a problem that I care deeply about and then I figure out the people

and then who's helping those people makees sense makes sense so if you go I've always wanted to help people are Struggling physically okay well now we start to learn what are those physical problems you most get excited about that could be physical therapy to being a physician assistant to a nurse to a doctor you get the point so it is process of elimination but you got to know what we're eliminating am I good at it do I enjoy it does it create a result I care about that's your process of elimination what do you say

to people who are in their 40s and 50s And 60s and say I don't love my job but it feels too late for me to make a big switch it's not too late it is not too late what we got to do though is we got to say all right I'm going to be very strategic about this and not emotional so we've got real life we got expenses if we've got a lot of debt Deb I'm going to tell you right now I would start clearing the debt because here's what I know when and you

you're the expert here I mean I'm co-host of the Ramsey Show on the largest podcast in the world on money so I will say this that I have some experience you know listening to people do debt-free screams or they tell us their journey and I will tell you this a debt-free person has more margin financially which means they have more freedom emotionally to make a decision like this so if you're in your 40s and 50s I want to acknowledge that people could be in some Financial situations that are tough yeah so it's really hard To

make a professional pivot decision when we've got emotional baggage around our money and we're scared so I want to get stable financially and emotionally first that'd be my first piece of advice I wouldn't even have you take I mean you could take this assessment you could real this but it's kind of like I don't even know if it's clear if you're stressed out financially yeah so let's get stable financially and emotionally then we start to go all right what are My options let's get self-aware I call it retreating back to Clarity you know when we

were kids we played freeze tag and we're always scared of the person chasing us and we got to Bass we're like you know and we calm down that's what I mean here and when we can get back to Clarity of who we are we go I'm 45 and I'm a CPA and it became a CPA because my dad was a CPA and I was always good with numbers and I got A's in my accounting Classes and my dad recommended it I went to his college you get the drill so you start there and you go

okay I know I'm good at it but I clearly don't enjoy it what do I enjoy and let's figure that out okay so we know you're good at processing numbers so we're going to get some Clues from there and here's a by the way here's a three-part question that I would give to anybody in that situation and to your audience if they even if they get this This assessment results and they go okay I see me for the first time but I'm still having a time ideating on what I can do and choosing and this

helps those people in the midcareer situation who are the people I want to help the problem or desire they have the solution to that problem or desire that I get excited about there's with practical questions because now we start ideating remember it's all about people can you say that was one more time yes Who are the people I want to help and we begin to just think right free free of professional choice just who do I want to help okay so I want to help people are struggling with money if that's the answer all right

what's the problem or desire they have that's the second question well they want Financial Freedom they have no margin they're stressed out of their mind and they so we know that so then we say what are the solutions to that problem that I get Excited about that's where we ideate so give you an example of a caller she called into my show she was making $350,000 a year she starts the call off saying she's miserable I start asking a couple quick questions get caught up what do you do I'm in pharmaceutical sales I go why

she goes because I'm really good at selling and I knew it could make a lot of money I said congratulations how much money you making she said $350,000 I said why are you calling me today I knew the answer she goes I'm miserable I said okay so I walked her through those three questions and I said turn your brain off and I want you to answer with your heart said number one who are the people you want to help she said women who are struggling physically I said wow that's great I said what's the problem

what's what's underneath the physical struggle she has bad lifestyle choices they're overweight and they've Got a you know cacophony of physical issues I said great what's the solution to that problem that you could get excited about if I guaranteed you that you could get qualified and you can do it and she said I think it would be nutritionist and and and health coach and I said that's awesome I said can I ask you why those are your answers and she began to cry she got really emotional and she said Ken I've lost 60 lbs over

the last 6 months and has Changed my life in every way and I want to help other women who are going through that she's crying and she's telling me this that's the process this woman was at the age of the person you asked she was in her mid-40s killing it financially so we walked her through the rest of that call all right so let's get around some health coaches nutritionists let's learn everything about it by just having coffee or lunch with people that Are winning in that space let's learn everything we can about it to

validate I call that clarify and verify that that this is the thing we know it's there here but is this the best way to go about helping those women yeah and so so let's figure that out then let's figure out if you have the talent to pull it off if you do ding ding ding we've got a winner so by going through that with her we knew she she enjoyed the idea of coaching and helping women she can sell So the communication piece is a no-brainer so that's how you do it that's a real life

situation and so those three questions are what I would call ideation questions and they let us see out here real Clarity so now it's not confusing but when I can't see the answers to those three questions who are the people I want to help a problem or desire that they have and the the solutions to those problems or desires if we can't see that the world out there Looks really scary but once we see that everything else melts away I love that and I think great thing too for example for that lady the health coaching

she could do that while she still has her full-time 350k job she could start it in the evenings the weekend see if she really likes it and then hopefully if she starts making money from that and it gets a place where she's comfortable to leave her full-time job then she makes the switch cuz I don't think it has to Be so like quit your job and then start your passion you should absolutely if you can start your passion while you're still working the fulltime job job I think you're absolutely right let me add another scenario

there she could go get qualified do all that on the side but instead of starting it for herself but starting for herself is a viable option but she could keep knocking down that 350 maybe now that she's super motivated to a clear goal maybe she UPS her salary By another 100K and you know what she's doing she's stacking cash she's stacking cash to then have a full year salary maybe to then start it on the side and go all in or or or maybe maybe maybe she goes and works for somebody she takes her time

she gets qualified she's stacking cash and then she goes Works directly for somebody where she doesn't have to start it on her own that that's the point you have options here but now she's going into work and she's selling With a little more zip because now she has a dream and she sees a path to the dream I went on to your website it's Ken coleman.com assessment and we'll put that link in the show notes for people and took your career assessment yes we have I want to show you the results and you tell me

what you think okay this is great so this is fun folks she's giving me access here we're looking at okay so we're going to look at first thing is what the what the assessment does and I'm not going to explain it to great detail unless you want me to but your report which we're getting ready to look at focuses on your top three talents what you do best your top three passions the work you enjoy doing most and then we focus on one primary missional result which is what motivates you the most so so let's

look at Talent this is what she does best and we group the world of talent into 12 buckets just to keep it simple so Talent number one by the way Before we dive into this you agree with these results you answered it honestly it's great it was very accurate so Erica's top talent is execution okay now I'm not going to go through the the summary because you can do that but we have a section in here of how you wow others and what others say about you and so if you have the top talent of

execution you wow people with your Mastery of details your focus you knock a list out like it's nothing uh and then What others say about you hey you're so productive can you help me get this done okay so the talent of execution bottom line is this tells me that you are very naturally hyperfocused on priorities and you plow through them that's it so that that's the thing you agree that's what you're best all right so then we'll look at let's go next so this is really interesting this is fun for me so I need to

explain this to the audience so the talent to for her is Justice now I chose This word because I consider this a soft skill and as I was looking at I did extensive research on every Talent skill database in the world this simply means you're really good at seeing right and wrong it is very clear to you what is right and what is wrong you don't operate in Gray areas is this true yes okay so that's what we mean by the talent of justice so how she Wows others with this Talent is it's always defining

right and wrong fighting for right right And wrong social change matters to you you will take a clear stand that's all this means okay and then the third top talent is logic now you said this earlier this is fun you said earlier in the conversation when you were a lawyer what you did enjoy was the analysis the diving in and so the talent of logic is just great thinking your analytical side of your brain is just highend high performance okay so this is interesting so we see Two things we see two things here in this

we see number one you have a high skill level for thinking and doing that's the combination of execution and logic but what's really awesome is you have a real talent for feeling as well that Justice piece is about right or wrong all right so let's look next at uh your top three passions what she enjoys doing okay no shock here okay if I had a whiteboard we'd have execution Justice and logic okay and then we'd write the first thing that she loves doing is solving so solving here the way I describe this is you lose

track of time when you're attacking a problem you get energy when you go give me something that needs fixed get out of the way some people the opposite is true they'll see a problem they stress out you say get out of the way I got this it gives you enjoyment what are your favorite problems to solve I'm just Curious I like marketing problems right now good so what puzzle is that describe that puzzle for you when you look at marketing problems what what puzzle are you solving is it we're not getting to enough people or

we yeah or how do we get those people that we do reach to be more engaged with our offerings interesting all right and so let's go back to justice for a second Like the Justice piece I'm going to go back into Talent the work you're doing now what are you solving for people that you believe is right does that make sense we want to help people get better with their money right what's the Injustice with so many people the Injustice is that the financial education system is horrific and we're not taught about money in school

yet expected to know about it and so we end up feeling very lonely and ashamed and Confused when we're adults and trying to manage our finances and so would you say that we know the answer that everything you're doing now and what you will do in the future will be about solving that Injustice yes you see how this comes together yeah it's really fun okay let's quickly look at and again top passion number two advocating this is using your voice to speak on behalf of a cause or people people and I would say you're doing

both you are taking on a cause That is helping a lot of people a lot of people and around the world too have you had any fun stories I'm sure you have of of somebody that's maybe from maybe an underdeveloped country or that has listened to your podcast or watched a video or seen a social post that you've changed their views on money and giving them a path forward I'm sure you get this yes I think so I think there are a lot of people who listen to the podcast and feel like their lives have

been Transformed because of it I remember one person commented on um an episode I did with Morgan howle who wrote the psychology of money and he said you know one day I hope to be able to afford that book because it seems like that book could be lifechanging so I tracked him down and we we were in contact via email and I sent him money to buy that book The Morgan helel book which I do think is life-changing so oh I love that so again you as this now what we'd call an Influencer uh a

new media personality whatever you want to call it you are advocating for people so this is so exciting I knew this was going to yield really fun results but this is really fun for me so this is cool protecting now this is an interesting result for somebody that's in the space you're in protecting is the passion of defending the vulnerable shielding people from danger but it has a lot of applications you see a lot of People that'll get this result who may be in medicine or law enforce ment uh social workers but here's what's interesting

if the audience is picking up on this we've got advocating okay we've got uh the top one was solving advocating and protecting here's what's really interesting for a lawyer who's really good at their job who realized one day corporate law is sucking the soul out of my body these results are Screaming people people people I'm going to come back to that in a second this is really cool we'll keep moving so the protecting here is you want to protect people from making bad decisions or essentially now that protecting goes into a advocating role to say

all right you're already in a bunch of financial junk I'm going to help you walk out of it really cool and I think there's just a bunch of bad financial advice and a lot of people That have the wrong motives in the finance space who are just giving terrible advice to follow yeah all right this is fun so knowing what I know about the assessment Because by the way I actually spent three years writing this and coming up with this so usually I can try to figure people's result out I was going to come up

with you were going to have a people missional result now for the audience I want to make sure they understand this the reason that we Focused only on one primary mission is I did all this research on motivation the science of motivation and so the results in this assessment are based on what science has found out about the six intrinsic motivators fancy word it just simply means you do something because you want to okay your top result is influence this is you want to influence people's thinking feeling and acting around money is that a fair

statement I'm trying to simplify it so this is Exciting so here's what I see so there's four types of work in the world I'm trying to simplify this for the audience you could take every job every career path and put it into four four categories okay ideal work work I'll explain these in a second people work process work and object work all right idea work that's the space that you and I are in content writing books you know teaching idea work we get that people work that's that's just focused there's A direct result of people

so that's a very broad application but I'm doing work that is people focused a lot of times you see people and idea work overlap in in careers okay then you got process work process work is a little bit more system focused these this could be a computer programmer all the way to a project manager we get that accountants that kind of stuff object work people working with their hands Builders sculptors that's the idea so Idea work people work process work object work your results are screaming people people people and the reason is is because your

top Mission result is influence that's all people you're motivated to help people so when someone gets the results like this and again we scroll back through and we go all right let's look at this okay we're looking at the top talents again what she does best execution now that's a process that falls in the process bucket Execution but you're going to see how they overlap Justice again driven towards right and wrong affecting people and then the last Talent logic now that's a process thing so I want people to understand when they get the results they

begin to see okay there's a lot of process in this as to what I do best so I need to be doing process type work and you are because you've systematically created a show programs you know products things of that nature and That's the way you that's what you're really good at doing but then when we go back through one more time to what you love doing it's all about solving you will not be happy ever Erica if you aren't waking up in a work function solving a big people problem it can't be solving some

legal you know document and helping a CEO figure out some regulation it must be a people problem this is the love piece by the way quick thing Talent is all technical think of them as Tools In a tool belt it's all up here the last two results passion what I love to do and results of matter it's all heart and we got to understand that and so solving people problems advocating for people that's her second top passion and then protecting people from Financial Pitfall Financial destruction you know uh that's so beautiful and again all about

influence so you're good at process but you love people work so that's if I simplified it at that it's As long as you're using that ability in the processed space to influence people to avoid or get out of those financial problems you're always going to be happy so 30 years from now you're going to evolve but it may change the only thing that's going to change here is maybe the problem changes so the reason I'm so so proud of these results is they move with you through your life yeah right you may get out of

the fin I'm not saying this But the point is if you were to Pivot 10 years from now from doing a financial show and everything you're doing it's okay as long as there's the the problem that you're going after is about influencing people to avoid the problem I love that question about that no I think these results are very accurate as soon as I saw them I was like yep that's me well here's what I want people to know the results will be Very accurate and you will feel as though my my assessment is reading

your mind it's not if you answer the questions honestly instinctively from the heart your results are going to blow you away but it's again it's the equivalent of sitting with me for an hour if I were to just walk you through yeah all the questions the good news this takes about 15 18 minutes and and well now some people can take longer if they they really think about it don't Think feel these things are based on feel that's so good so if you if we were to take the 68% of people who are disengaged at

work and you had to give them three action points to transform their life and give them a job that's they're with uh first would be going to kencoleman.com assessment take clear okay what are the two others uh get clear is one so we want to get clear on who we are okay and then what we want to do and where we can do it so that's what Get clear is and this tool does this for you and the little book that comes with it is me coaching you now that's get clear secondly once we know

what's out there let's get qualified there's and you may already be qualified but that's our second action item all right if I've got to get a certification you may not have to get a degree and I have a two-part question on that is a degree the only way to do this thing that I now know I want to do or is it agree the Best way to do this thing I now want to do and if the answer is no you and I both know there are a lot more options these days than existed 30

years ago it's less expensive less timec consuming so uh get clear is step one step two is get qualified that's the idea of what do I need to learn and do to get on this new new ladder to climb and then the third step is get connected let me tell you something I wrote a book years ago called the proximity principle and Became a bestseller surprised me but it was just based on the right people and the right places if I were to break that book down it would be if you put yourself around the

right people we're talking in context to this answer in the space I want to go to so I'm going from being a lawyer to being a money expert using your example well the proximity principle says if I'm around the right people and in the right places opportunities find me you shouldn't have To kick the door down if you're getting connected that's that third action step get connected get around people that are doing what you want to do learn from them take them to lunch buy them coffee like act like it's a master's program and you

got to interview these people and and it's like a little bucket walking around here's my little bucket of feedback and I'm going to learn so much knowledge and wisdom so that's the get Connected those three things get clear get qualified get connected and I'm going to tell you something this is not magic this isn't like motivational gibberish I'm giving you really practical steps that work for the most successful people in the world nobody gets where they are in a place of success without so much help and I would be connecting my face off and I

don't mean networking that's gross people see that coming a mile away you're like a Vampire you get what you want you leave them in a heap I'm talking about showing up with a heart to learn this is what I want to do you're doing it well how'd you get there okay that's knowledge what advice would you give me that's wisdom thank you very much people love giving their own advice uh and then say are there any other people you would recommend that I get with watch opportunities open for you and you keep doing that Erica

I'm Telling you someone's going to show up one day like that and you're not going to believe an opportunity that drops to everybody else in your lap but I'm telling you it came to you because you kept connecting and so that are those are the three steps you do that you'll be as successful as you want to be that is perfect and great way to go to our closing tradition so the podcast is called Erica toau me but Really today is all about Ken taught me so what do you want people to walk away saying

Ken Coleman taught me this yeah uh I want people to know that Ken taught me that I am uniquely wired and if I figure that out and he's got some tools to help me and I can do it on my own then I can also figure out where I can make my mark in this world and all the stress and all the pressure to answer that big question what should I do with my life is actually really simple and The answer is in here I love that thank you so much thanks for having me so

fun yay if you've enjoyed the episode please take a moment to leave a review it really helps support what we're doing thanks for listening and I'll talk to you next Tuesday on a brand new episode of Erica taught me