114: Know Yourself, Not Just Your Direction - Mark Herschberg

Catie Harris is a nurse practitioner who believes nurses are uniquely qualified to be entrepreneurs. As the CEO and owner of , a mentorship program that empowers nurses to monetize their knowledge and develop business skills, Catie inspires them to change how healthcare is perceived and delivered. Through individual coaching, live events, and signature group programs, thousands of nurses have been empowered with the knowledge and skills they need to build profitable businesses of their own. ​As a child, Catie was quite introverted and didn’t socialize easily. Her family moved multiple times, which meant going to new schools, and she found this to be consistently difficult. ​At 16, Catie had a vivid dream in which she saw herself working as a nurse, and from then on, it was clear she would go to nursing school. Catie never questioned that decision to this day. What she had not anticipated was the level of interpersonal interactions she would need to engage in as a nursing student. The adjustment throughout her rotations in different clinical areas was painful, yet Catie persevered and eventually discovered the strength of her introverted personality. As is typical of most introverted people, Catie was not a small-talk type of person. She was much better at listening. So when there were families in the hospital who were identified as difficult or temperamental, Catie was assigned to meet with them because she would go in, and just listen to them. By the time they were done venting, they would express thanks for how helpful Catie had been. Catie found that it helped her too. ​Catie continued with her training to get her nurse practitioner's degree. Always curious, her nursing experience included work in multiple clinical areas. Eventually, she focused on her own business to teach and support nurses who wanted to become entrepreneurs.​ In this week’s  learn more about Catie’s journey:​ Catie strives to show nurses around the world how their hard-earned knowledge and skills can transcend the hospital system into a profitable business. Her podcast, , highlights the unique stories of men and women who have embraced adversity and overcome countless obstacles to pursue work that has greater meaning while sharing their experience of being a nurse entrepreneur. Learn more and connect with Catie here:

Donna Serdula is the founder and president of Vision Board Media, a professional branding company that helps individuals and companies tell their unique stories on LinkedIn and beyond. Donna has authored two editions of . Bringing dynamic brand storytelling to the masses and empowering people to dream big – that’s the ink in her pen. Donna’s website, , is where she and her team of over 20 writers and coaches help people collide with opportunities and transform their lives via future-forward career branding. You’d never know it now, but Donna was a shy little kid. During college, she was interested in pursuing work in development and production in the film industry. While she did work as an intern in the film industry, getting established after graduation proved challenging, so she accepted an invitation from her father to join him in his business. They sold estimating software to autobody shops. Within the first few years, Donna was training people in several industries intersecting with their business on the use of the software and other tools. She realized she loved to help people discover technology, and this led her to move into other arenas, including designing websites and helping people with their LinkedIn profiles. Over the course of the next several years, Donna worked as a reseller in software sales, and she noticed a couple of patterns. While she sold the same software as her competitors, people wanted to do business with her because they could see she understood their industry, had their backs, and was willing to engage with them in ways that were not purely transactional. How did she do this? She used LinkedIn as a part of her networking strategy to make connections and develop relationships. In this week’s learn more about Donna’s journey: After being laid off from a company she had closed over $1M in business for in 2009, Donna decided it was time to start her own business. She's shared her LinkedIn expertise at global conferences, presented keynotes and workshops, and has been featured on a number of high-profile news outlets. Learn more and connect with Donna here:

This week’s podcast features a delightful conversation I had with Doug Lennick and Chuck Wachendorfer from , a leadership development firm serving many industries. Together, they co-authored the book . Their experience and knowledge show readers how to be positive and impactful leaders. Doug and Chuck offer practical and evidence-based guidance through eight key principles that are essential to one’s ability to lead others: Aim to be Yourself Know Your Real Self Ignite Integrity and Responsibility Embrace Empathy and Compassion Decide Wisely Let Go of What You Know Achieve Purposeful Goals Empower Others They share many examples and lessons learned from their experiences in financial services and the stories of leaders in various industries, illustrating the book’s eight essential principles. Exercises and frameworks are threaded throughout each chapter, enabling the reader to explore their own leadership development and professional directions. Doug and Chuck conclude that the best leaders are “people-wise.” I wholeheartedly agree! In this week’s learn about Chuck and Doug’s journeys: Before founding think2perform, Doug Lennick, a certified financial planner (CFP), was Executive Vice President – Advice and Retail Distribution for American Express Financial Advisors (now Ameriprise Financial). In that capacity, he led an organization of 17,000 field and corporate associates to unprecedented success. Chuck Wachendorfer is a renowned leadership development professional who has worked with clients including American Express, Wells Fargo, Comerica Bank, TD Wealth of Canada, and Charles Schwab. His insights on leadership have been featured in CNN Money, Forbes, Fortune, and The Denver Post. Learn more and connect with Doug and Chuck here:

and are on a mission to inspire women to redefine success by blending ancient wisdom with modern leadership. They have co-authored a book, to be released on February 14, 2024, .  Rimi, a previous guest on my , and Samantha shared their origin stories with me, including how they met and developed the work that evolved into their book. They each made significant changes in their lives towards a deeper sense of purpose and well-being. Then, Samantha and her husband stayed at the owned by Rimi and her husband in the Azores. The women made a fast connection based on their common interests in health and well-being and kept in touch weekly after Samantha returned home to the US. Rimi and Samantha began to plan a nutrition and yoga retreat for April 2020, which did not occur, yet they continued to talk, and a powerful theme surfaced. Samantha shared, “I’m tired of being told to be resilient. Resilience is not enough to deal with the stressors and challenges of the day.” They developed an online course, Going Beyond Resilience. The response from participants was so transformative that Rimi and Samantha created the term Rootsilience ("root - zeel - ience"), which informed their book.  Rootsilience takes the notion of "resilience" a step deeper and teaches us to be grounded, rooted, and able to respond to stressors from a place of stability rather than being stretched beyond our limits. We need to rise beyond resilience to Rootsilience. Beyond Resilience to Rootsilience combines three key branches: conscious leadership, healing foods, and mind-body integration. The book highlights experiences from Rimi’s and Samantha’s lives, illustrating key lessons for women leaders. Check out their to recognize the connectedness of your leadership behavior and your emotional, physical, and mental signs of ease and dis-ease. In this week’s  learn more about Rimi’s and Samantha’s journeys: Rimi Chakraborty is a keynote speaker, author, yoga teacher, and leadership consulting coach for groups, teams, and individuals dedicated to developing conscious leaders. Samantha Anderson is a Certified Health and Wellness Coach and a certified Functional Medicine Health Coach with decades of experience as a nonprofit and philanthropy consultant. She speaks to women leaders about cultivating purpose and vision. Learn more and connect with Rimi and Samantha here:

When Jesse Janelle was in elementary school, she experienced a lot of anxiety. When feeling panicked, she went to the nurses' office, visiting there regularly. Jesse didn’t know it then, but this is where her personal and professional development journey began. One day, 11-year-old Jesse was in the nurse's office having a particularly bad panic attack. The nurse called in the guidance counselor, who was asked to help sometimes. Jesse must have been extra anxious this time because the guidance counselor shook her by the shoulders and yelled, “Stop it right now,” in her face. At that moment, Jesse became disassociated from her body. Her thoughts separated from her ‘felt sense’: her ability to know what was happening in her body. Jesse later understood this to be her sense of self-trust. Going into high school and then college, Jesse was high-performing. Attending Boston College, she got straight A's. Because she wasn't feeling connected to her body, she intellectualized many of her struggles. Jesse studied psychology and meditation, attaching deep academic and intellectual perspectives to those arenas. Around her graduation from college, Jesse began to connect with those areas in a felt way, enabling her to be more in touch with who she really was. Jesse's professional career began as an intern at Harvard Medical School's Institute of Coaching in its founding years, where she got immersed in evidence-based coaching research. As her experience and expertise grew, she consulted and coached leaders in top organizations such as McKinsey, Mass General Hospital, The Walt Disney Company, and Amazon.  Today, Jesse is the founder and CEO of . She is an ICF-certified transformational coach and speaker. Jesse has distilled her learnings from her work in leadership development, psychology, ontology, somatics, and spirituality into a coaching method she calls Soul Sessions. This method is grounded in metaphor coaching and intuitive inquiry. This method can be learned and applied independently of a professional coaching session. Using a surprising tool, tarot cards, Jesse helps professionals access and unlock the power of their intuition to make better decisions faster. In this week’s learn more about Jesse’s journey: Jesse was selected in 2022 for the inaugural cohort of Forefront, powered by Marshall Goldsmith and the 100 coaches, for her impact on the field of leadership development. In 2023, she delivered her TEDx talk, .   Learn more and connect with Jesse here:  Save 7 hours a week with a 7-minute daily tarot self-coaching practice:

Christopher Knudsen’s first work experience was on a framing crew at 15 years old in his father’s construction company. He credits those early years with instilling the work ethic he has today. Chris learned how to create momentum for himself, which gave him a sense of ownership and pride in his work. Today, Chris is a published author, university instructor, entrepreneur, and consultant. He works as an independent fractional CMO and is the CEO at , an advertising firm focused on direct-to-consumer companies. Chris’s main focus is to help businesses and ideas flourish alongside technological advancements.  Chris authored  to share his journey to entrepreneurship and to teach his readers how to start their own businesses. In this week’s  learn more about Chris’s journey: Chris earned his MBA from the Gore School of Business at Westminster College. As an adjunct instructor, he taught the capstone strategy course and business plan development, social marketing, and entrepreneurship courses for ten years. He was the former CMO at Purple Mattress and has started and sold many companies, including 3DplusMe, a venture-funded consumer 3D printing and scanning company. Learn more and connect with Chris here:  Website: Special Audience Giveaway:  Book:  LinkedIn -

A couple of years ago,  was in a group tennis lesson. The instructor, an 84-year-old former HR director, started with an icebreaker game: Two Truths and a Lie. People said things like, I have two cats, I like oatmeal cookies, and I love to ride my bike. Stephanie shared, “I've written two books, been on MTV in my bikini, and was a contestant on a game show.” Everyone exclaimed, “Wow!” ​As the game continued, Stephanie hoped she inspired the next person to dig a little deeper, but it returned to I like dogs. She wondered, am I unusual? (Stephanie’s truths were: she was on MTV in a bikini and had written two books.) Surely, other people must have wow moments. Yet, even her wow moments happened years ago. Stephanie decided it was time to change that. Soon after, she volunteered to join a radio host friend who was going to help out a nearby city that had experienced a devastating flood. It was a wow moment for her. Stephanie, a professional writer, planned to write a blog about it. But as soon as she returned home, life’s routines kicked in and it was easy to put it on the back burner. ​Then everything changed. Just after Christmas 2022, Stephanie’s husband was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. Four months later, he passed away. From that moment on, Stephanie committed to putting more wow moments into her life and she shares them in her . It is inspiring, and thought-provoking. ​ Stephanie has been a writer and author for over three decades. She's been a  covering leadership, productivity, and careers for the last nine years. ​ ​ In this week’s  learn more about Stephanie’s journey: In 2006, Stephanie launched a website, The Organized Parent, selling products to help busy moms. Five years later, she sold the company to FranklinCovey. Her writing has appeared in Inc., Entrepreneur, Success, and Parade, and she has written for companies such as U.S. Bank, Smartsheet, Mastercard, LinkedIn, and Intel.   Learn more and connect with Stephanie here:

Dr. Michelle Drapkin was an honors student in high school, yet she did not graduate with her class. Why? She had cut so many classes that her attendance record disqualified her from graduating. Michelle was lost. Her mother was ill with cancer (she survived!), and no one was paying attention to her activities, or lack thereof. To get her diploma, Michelle was sent to summer school, where the teachers had nothing to offer an honors student. After two days, they let her go. Michelle attended college on schedule. ​Michelle studied psychology and Spanish at Franklin and Marshall with the goal of becoming a Spanish-speaking psychologist. She studied abroad to develop her language skills and aspired to get a PhD in clinical psychology. Michelle hit a roadblock when she was not accepted into any of the graduate programs she applied to. She points to this experience as “failure being part of the process.” While deeply disappointed, this did not stop her. She applied to be a Fulbright Scholar, for more graduate programs and various jobs, all of which were highly competitive. Nothing came through, except Michelle received some helpful advice to get more research experience to strengthen her chances of getting accepted to graduate school. She landed a research role at the University of Pennsylvania and applied to graduate school two years later. By then, Michelle knew exactly what she wanted to do.​ Today, Michelle is a board-certified Clinical Psychologist who has dedicated her career to using psychological research to help people. She is the Owner/Director of the . Michelle provides individual and couples therapy, consults with healthcare tech startups, and delivers training on communication/motivation and health/wellbeing at work and in life.​ In this week’s  learn more about Michelle’s journey: Michelle is the author of  from New Harbinger Publications She held a nationwide role at the Department of Veterans Affairs and was on faculty at the University of Pennsylvania. Learn more and connect with Michelle here:

Ellie Steinbrink grew up on a farm in Iowa. She was always drawn to wearing different outfits to suit the various activities she was engaged in around the farm. Ellie credits her parents for fostering a very creative environment. Her Mom is an artist who introduced her to colors, forms, textures, and patterns. Ellie’s Dad runs the farm with a strategic business mindset, offering her his own creative perspectives. In high school, Ellie was involved in theater and communications. As she set out for college, Ellie wanted to study marketing with the goal of working for an advertising agency. ​ Starting as an intern in an advertising agency, Ellie learned the ropes, which led her to work on the client service side of the business. For the next 15 years, she worked in advertising agencies, elevating to a Director of Client Services role. She created marketing, brands, advertising, content, and social strategies for clients ranging from Fortune 500 giants to small businesses. It was a lot of fun until the stretch between her family life and professional demands became too tight. Ellie engaged a coach to recalibrate her priorities and then took a part-time role as a marketing lead for a small business. For 4 years, Ellie enjoyed the role, but gradually, she had growing feelings that she wanted to do something else. Yet, there was a reluctance to step away from a career in which she had invested so much. ​ In 2020, Ellie took the opportunity to merge her professional experience with her passion for personal styling and started her business, , in Omaha, Nebraska. As an expert stylist and personal brand coach, she teaches women how to define and own their unique style, aligning their insides with their outsides to feel confident in their own skin. ​ In this week’s  learn more about Ellie’s journey: Ellie is offering my subscribers a free guide: ​ What does your outfit say about you to your audience before you even speak? This free guide includes Ellie’s 6 go-to style tips for making your outfits more impactful.     Learn more and connect with Ellie here:

Janine Kwoh is the owner and designer of , a Brooklyn, NY-based collection of greeting cards and gifts that reflect and celebrate a diversity of identities and life experiences. Her goal is to create products that others will recognize some of themselves in and feel a bit more seen, more connected, and less alone. Janine returns to the Work from the Inside Out podcast to share an update since she was my guest on episode 11, 4-1/2 years ago. Since then, she has authored , an illustrated book on grief for anyone who is grieving the death of a loved one. Additionally, Janine has expanded her product lines with a variety of new items.  Currently, Janine is grappling with the challenges of how to scale her business to meet the demands of her customers and community of followers while maintaining the integrity of her brand and the quality of life she wants to live. In this week’s  follow the update on Janine’s journey and her work today: Janine uses an antique printing press to letterpress print every card one-at-a-time and also paints in many designs by hand.  She enjoys the physical process and distinctive final look-and-feel that comes with using old printing machines and techniques, while experimenting with modern images and sentiments. Learn more and connect with Janine here: