The Long and The Short Of It

Episode 320 - 10 Lessons

Transcript:

Jen: Hello, Peter.

Pete: Hello, Jen.

Jen: So on a recent episode about games, I mentioned to you that I had recently run a workshop where I shared ten lessons that I had learned in twenty years of coaching Broadway actors. And then offline, I read them to you, and then was like, "Maybe this is an episode." So Pete, we're going to find out if we can make an episode out of Jen Waldman's twenty years and ten lessons, in no particular order.

Pete: This is The Long and The Short Of It.

Pete: There's probably ten episodes, is my first thought.

Jen: There could be.

Pete: Each one might be an episode. But maybe you could read them, and I could pick a couple? What do you think?

Jen: Yes. And you know what's so funny, Pete? After I put this list of ten lessons together, I was like, "Is this maybe the table of contents for the book?"

Pete: The book...dun, dun, dun. It returns.

Jen: We'll see.

Pete: It returns.

Jen: Oh gosh. Okay, I'll read all ten of them. For context, for anyone who's listening to this podcast for the first time, for the last twenty years, I have been coaching Broadway actors, both as their acting coach and as their career coach. So, this list is specific to how to build a meaningful and sustainable and fulfilling career in the arts.

Pete: Yeah. Also, if we have a brand new listener in Episode three-hundred-and-something-or-other...hi. Thanks for joining.

Jen: Hi! Thanks so much for being here.

Pete: Oh my god, how fun.

Jen: So here they are, Jen Waldman's twenty years and ten lessons, in no particular order. Number One: If you don't know where you're going, any road will get you there. (I didn't make that up. I stole that language, but I love it.)

Pete: That's good language.

Jen: Number Two: Your marketing tells a story...whether you know it or not, whether you like it or not. So know it and like it. Number Three: Type is a distraction. Number Four: It's not about who you know, it's about who you are willing to introduce yourself to. Number Five: If it doesn't exist in the calendar, it doesn't exist. And Pete, the side note on this one is: If it doesn't exist in the contract, it doesn't exist.

Pete: Ah-hah, alright. I feel like I should be responding to each one, but I'm biting my tongue.

Jen: Bite down, because we've got five more to go.

Pete: We've still got five to go.

Jen: Number Six: Have taste, dammit. Number Seven: Communication is the answer. Number Eight: No amount of good marketing can make up for a lack of chops. Number Nine: You are running a business. Number Ten: The more you know, the more you know.

Pete: I have to say, even just the titles of these are so clever and Jen Waldman.

Jen: Thanks. I wrote them all, except the first one.

Pete: You make them so fun. This is definitely the table of contents for your book, by the way. Okay, I want to pick a bunch but I don't have time to pick a bunch, so I'm just going to pick a couple.

Jen: Okay.

Pete: The first one I want to hear you explain and see if I can make this relevant to my world, my work...which, for that new listener, if you're there, is working with leaders and executives within companies. I do a bunch of executive coaching and leadership development facilitation. So, let's see if we can connect some dots between all these things. I just, I mean, I love the term "lack of chops". So Number Eight, I think was about, "Even if your marketing is awesome, it won't make up for a lack of chops." Is that right?

Jen: That's right.

Pete: Alright. Tell me more. Tell me more.

Jen: So in my industry, so much of what people are trying to do is "get in the room". They want to be in the room where it happens. They need to be in the room, in front of the people who actually are the decision makers. And so, a lot of time, energy, effort, creativity, money, honestly, is funneled into creating marketing assets across lots of different platforms, lots of different media, to help them get into the room. But once you get into the room, you actually have to be able to do the thing.

Pete: Right. Right.

Jen: And so, it's important to have a very healthy balance of strategic work toward the actual career building, and then the craft and skill building that it takes to be an excellent artist. You have to be able to turn your talent into skill, and present that skill.

Pete: I mean, you won't get any arguments from me. Snap, snap, snap. I think that one translation of this into my world is, it's very common for folks working in an organization to strive to be promoted, to strive to get a pay rise, to strive to get to the next level or the next rung on the corporate ladder, or to proceed in perceived status, I guess, in some way. Nothing wrong with that. It's very motivating for a lot of people, maybe there's a particular reason why. It's all great. And perhaps one of the most common phenomenons I observe is when someone who has been a really really good subject matter expert or individual contributor, is what they call it (an IC, in corporate lingo), what often happens in an organization is the next band of promotion actually puts you in a leadership position, where all of a sudden you are leading a team of subject matter experts. You are not necessarily required to be the subject matter expert. So there's a change in required skill set, which I think is a bit like you ended up in the room that you wanted to end up in. You ended up in the promotional band that you wanted to be in, have you got the chops to be a leader?

Jen: Right.

Pete: Have you got the desire or the want to actually be a leader? Do you want to have a team who you now are responsible for guiding and coaching and cajoling and casting a vision for? And for some people, the answer is actually, "Oh, no. I just wanted the paycheck, and I didn't actually think about that."

Jen: Right.

Pete: "I actually want to be an individual contributor," which is totally okay, and there's nothing wrong with being an awesome IC. And you need to think about that before you end up in the room, I think. You need to think about, "Do I want to be the kind of person who's leading a team," prior to it happening. This is why one of the really awesome pushes I've seen, or trends I've seen in my world is organizations opening up leadership development programs, like the ones that I run, to people who aren't necessarily in "formal leadership or management" positions. And I think it's awesome. I think we can all learn leadership skills, because that enables us to work on our chops for when we end up in that position, or helping us decide if we want to end up in that position. So, I love that. We've got to have chops. You've got to have skill. So true. So true.

Jen: Yeah. You know, what's really interesting is what you just pointed out, that sometimes the place you want to go sounds really good, and then you get there and realize you don't actually want to be there.

Pete: Right.

Jen: There is an amazing actor named Mary Kate Morrissey, she's currently playing Elphaba on Broadway. She's incredible. You know, follow her. She's really great. But recently, she posted this video of a day in the life of a person playing Elphaba on Broadway on her Instagram, and basically her entire day is devoted to warming up for the show. She warms up her voice several times a day. She steams. She pulls her tongue. She stretches. She goes to the gym. She does a warm up. She checks in. Then, she does another warm up. It's like, her life is playing Elphaba on Broadway. It's not just the bow at the end of the show.

Pete: Right.

Jen: It's not just the applause. Like, it is her life. And I loved that she was willing to post this and show people what goes into the job that a lot of people think they want.

Pete: It's so good. I love that. And I mean, looking at Instagram, for people who post a day in the life of, is such a great use of that tool. The other one I was thinking of, and I was given this advice like very very young in my career, "Go and talk to the person who's doing the thing that you think you want to do, and ask them what it's like."

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: "And they'll help you see things that you can't see, just by looking at it from the outside."

Jen: Hmm.

Pete: Which might be great. Which might be like, one of the paths I was thinking I'd be interested in, I ended up talking to some people and being like, "Oh, this is like a super technical role that I definitely don't want to be doing. I'd be so isolated and removed from spending time with people, which is where I get a lot of energy." And so, learning that prior to actually applying for a job in that space was really helpful.

Jen: Well, you just made a very gentle segue to Number Ten, which is: The more you know, the more you know.

Pete: Oh my god, okay. I wasn't going to pick that one, but tell me more.

Jen: Well, what we were just talking about, you know, asking someone who is in the position that you think you want to be in, "What is it like to be you," then you'll know more, and then you'll be able to know more.

Pete: Yeah. The thing I was struggling with this one which is why I didn't pick it was, I also feel like the more I know, the more I realize I don't know.

Jen: Well, there's that too.

Pete: Which, I guess is still knowing something. It's knowing what you don't know.

Jen: Exactly. Like basically, my point with that is, stay curious and be a lifelong learner.

Pete: Have a growth mindset, yeah. Agreed. Again, Jen Waldman drops the hammer. Alright, well, I'm picking fun ones that you've come up with sassy titles for, because I'm just so curious about learning more about them. So this one, Number Six: Have taste, dammit. What does that mean?

Jen: So it started as, "Have taste." And then, when I was delivering the workshop, I kept saying, "...dammit." And I was like, "I think that just turned into, 'Have taste, dammit."

Pete: Yeah, it's got to have the "dammit".

Jen: And, okay, I work in the arts. Like, people go into the arts because there is something that they love that draws them to it. And then once a person makes a commitment to be a professional artist, especially in the performing arts, where someone else is doing the writing and the choreographing and the directing and you're, you know, you need to get cast in order to work, a lot of people pretend like they have no taste or that they have no preference for anything. "I just, I like anything. I'll do anything. I'll respond to anything." And what I have found is that the people who are working at the level I want to be working, they have taste and they lean into their taste. And sometimes, my taste is different, and so maybe they're not my ideal collaborator. And then sometimes, I'm obsessed with someone's taste. So anyone in my arts world who knows me, knows that my favorite musical of all time is Adam Guettel and Tina Landau's Floyd Collins. It is a particular taste. It is my taste. And I think it says something, for people who know that piece, about who I am, what I like, what I respond to, the kind of work I want to do. And if they don't like my taste, then they should go find someone who shares their taste.

Pete: Right.

Jen: So have taste, dammit.

Pete: Dammit. I love this one from two perspectives that are initially coming to mind. I'm sure there are others. The first perspective is the clarity in what you stand for...

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: ...or what perspectives you have, feels really important. I coach a bunch of CEOs, and have done so for many many years across multiple organizations in many different countries, some of them in not-for-profits, some of them in technology companies, some of them in very very public-facing companies. And one of the frustrations I hear a lot from said CEOs, or anyone in these executive teams, is how frustrated they get when their team doesn't challenge them on their ideas, doesn't have a perspective or a question, even, of their own. In fact, they'll just go, "Whatever you say," or like, "Yeah, that sounds like a great idea, Jen," even if they don't actually believe it. They sort of nod their head along, and they don't want to rock the boat too much. This happens so much in corporations. And I've literally heard these words come out of CEOs mouths (multiple), "I should be made to feel uncomfortable." And I think that is really stemming from this fact that there should be opinions or perspectives or ideas or questions that people bring to the CEO that they disagree with, and they should be made to feel uncomfortable about that, and like wrestle with that, and try and make sense of that, because it makes them and the organization itself and the decisions they make better.

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: I like it from the sense of, "Have taste. Like, have a perspective. Have an opinion on this project. Have a question about whether we should execute on this particular thing that we're talking about executing on." And so I really like that, because it forces you to put skin in the game.

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: But the other lens I like it through is sort of tailing onto what you said at the end, which is, also be okay with if your taste doesn't match up with someone else's. That's okay. You can take your energy and your talents and your perspectives elsewhere.

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: That just because you have taste, doesn't mean everyone that you choose to work for or with, or what company you work with, is going to be like, "Great. We love that taste here." It could be that that is not the taste for this particular group of people, because they have a different opinion or idea about how things should be done. So I like it as a reminder, or like a Seth Godin-ism, which is, "Turnover is okay."

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: That we should be seeking to have organizations or teams that are full of people who want to be there. And that, if that's not the case, turnover is okay. So, I like it. Have taste, dammit.

Jen: Yes.

Pete: Okay, I feel like we probably have time for one more.

Jen: Okay. This is fun.

Pete: This is really fun. I feel like I'm having a tough decision, but I'm going to go...I'm tossing up between Two and Four. I'm going to go with Four: It's not who you know, but who you introduce yourself to. Is that what you said?

Jen: It's: It's not about who you know, it's about who you're willing to introduce yourself to.

Pete: Right.

Jen: Because there is this old adage that has been repeated a million times, "It's all about who you know."

Pete: Right.

Jen: Well, most of us, when we start, don't know anybody.

Pete: Right, it feels kind of static.

Jen: Correct. So I think it can feel deflating to buy in to, "It's all about who you know." It can be really de-energizing, de-motivating.

Pete: Because you could be like, "Well, I don't know anyone."

Jen: Exactly. "So, I might as well throw in the towel." So instead, I say, "It's all about who you're willing to introduce yourself to." Can you be courageous enough to put yourself and your work in front of the people you want to meet, and say, "I'd like to meet you."

Pete: Yeah. Key word there: Courageous.

Jen: And honestly, Pete, my entire career, from the day I arrived in New York City, has been built on who I was willing to introduce myself to. But that was very much because my dad...I told this story once upon a time. I had an opportunity to introduce myself to a casting director. I called my dad for advice, and he said, "Do you want to spend the rest of your life wondering what would have happened?"

Pete: Snap, dad.

Jen: So, I did it.

Pete: Love that.

Jen: Yeah. And that really was like a turning point. And so many of the great things in my life, including you, have happened because of being willing to introduce myself. And I'll just say, for the listeners right now who are like, "Oh god, I could never do this," please remind yourself that everyone you know, who is not a family member, is someone you didn't know originally.

Pete: Right.

Jen: And you are already an expert at introducing yourself to people. Do it.

Pete: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I felt it even myself, to be like, "I don't know how to introduce myself to people. I'm not very good at that." But you're right. Like clearly, we all are able to do it, and have done it. I mean, maybe the reason I was drawn to this is because I agree with you wholeheartedly, and I have a business that has been going for seven years entirely on word of mouth. I've never done any marketing. I don't have a social media presence at all for my business, and things are going great.

Jen: Yep.

Pete: And I feel like we need to hear these ideas said in different ways, from different people, and they hit us at different times. And I'll always remember exactly where I was sitting when I read this page from Derek Sivers, in his book Your Music and People, which is a book essentially targeted at musicians to help them build a career. And I mean, I feel like people in your industry would absolutely love this book and should read it, but there's this one page (I exactly remember where I was) and I'll paraphrase it, but it's basically, "If I assume your music is good...let's just take that as table stakes. If I assume you have the chops, your success as a musician will be determined by how many new people you meet."

Jen: Yep. That's right.

Pete: That was it. That's like, this is your marketing strategy. Get your craft to a point where it's really good, obviously. That's the like, you have to have done that. Then, you have to think about, "How many new people am I talking to about this thing that I love doing, or this way that I approach this problem?" This definitely applies in the world that I spend a lot of time in, leadership, is, "Who are you talking to about the change you're trying to make as a leader? Who are you talking to, that could be a peer of yours or a manager of yours, that could inspire you or challenge you or ask you questions?"That, having a static network is sort of feeding a fixed mindset. Whereas, having this idea of an introductory kind of posture, "I need to introduce myself. I need to spruik myself. I need to talk to other people," is like, it's an expansive growth mindset.

Jen: That's right.

Pete: So yes, please, to that. Yes, please.

Jen: Wow, Pete, this was really a lot of fun.

Pete: It was.

Jen: Thanks for letting me share this.

Pete: You should share these.

Jen: Yeah. I'm going to share them in the Box O' Goodies for the people who are subscribed, which you can do at thelongandtheshortpodcast.com.

Pete: Yeah.

Jen: And then, I will figure out some other way to share them moving forward. That is my commitment.

Pete: Book. Book. Book, book, book. Sounds like a book...or at least a blog post, come on.

Jen: Any publishers out there? Any publishers out there, reach out. Reach out. It's all about who you're willing to introduce yourself to.

Pete: Hello, Penguin. Are you there? Ah, that's funny. And that is The Long and The Short Of It.