EP. 80- Get Your CAREER On Course! with 7x WSJ Best Selling Author Scott Jeffrey Miller I Expert Quick Tips

Welcome to do this not that the podcast for marketers you'll walk away from each episode with actionable tips you can test immediately you'll hear from the best minds in marketing who will share tactics quick wins and pitfalls to avoid also dig into life pop culture and the chaos that is our everyday i'm jay schwedelson let's do this not that.

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We jump into today's episode i am super excited to share that today's guest scott jeffrey miller has joined the guru podcast network with his brand new podcast career on course scott is a seven time wall street journal bestselling author and this podcast is the most incredible resource for anyone looking to explore a new career or level up the career that they're in you have to check it out careeroncourse on all the platforms and also at gurupodcastnetwork dot com okay here's today's episode welcome back to do this not that and sometimes i'm saying i'm excited doing these podcasts but no then that's not always true this time i am because you know what in your career if you're lucky you get a handful of people that you work with that actually become your friends and today one of my actual real life work people that became my friends is here today and that is scott jeffrey miller now if you don't know scott you'll never need to drink coffee again after hearing him talk because he is like more energy than i could ever have he is the seven time best selling author of some of the most amazing management and marketing books and he has his latest book out called career on course and today we are going to go through some really quick win strategies about how to take your career from accidental to intentional and that is awesome so scott welcome to the podcast thanks.

For being here jay i'm on fire thank you so much for the spotlight the platform let's transfer some genius into all of your listeners and viewers.

Always you're a genius so before we get into all things that is your genius and you're going to share some of that wisdom how did scott become scott.

Who are you oh i became scott for two things one a lot of people believed in me right people believed in me more than i believed in myself they forgave me they pre forgave me they took me to the woodshed and had high courage conversations shepherded me into responsible professional and two i worked my you know what off forget chat gpt right now good work ethic is something that is super valuable and super relevant in everyone's career yes work smarter but don't work smarter than harder you and i are two of the hardest working people i know and we're sufficiently smart but like you i host a couple of podcasts i've interviewed five hundred people top of their game none of them are the world's expert or the smartest person their topic maybe they are maybe they're not what they all do have in common is they outworked everybody else in their industry best selling author business titan celebrity actor podcaster they worked really hard and that has been the core theme to my thirty five year career as a chief marketing officer as an agency founder as an author podcaster radio host keynote speaker i just try to work as hard as i can.

Well i subscribe to that you know when you think you've done it all just keep pushing even further and let's get into some of these actionable things where people can get their career on course so i've heard you talk about knowing your professional value what does that.

Mean so this is a little counterintuitive right so the book is called career on course ten strategies to take your career from accidental to intentional i just after thirty years including a decade as the cmo of a global public company i saw so many people's careers implode or stagnate or become what i call a career cul de sac because they weren't more intentional strategy number one is called know your professional values now most of us have heard the phrase you know you have to define your values like most organizations have their values written on a wall somewhere as a personal as a person you need to articulate what are your personal values this is not news i know my seven personal values that i illustrate them in an acronym fil pal p h i l p a l purpose health integrity loyalty positivity abundance and learning these are my seven personal values and i make all my decisions around them follow me on youtube or tiktok or instagram or linkedin and you'll see my role as a parent as an entrepreneur as a husband as a friend they align with my personal values most people have not jay taken the time to articulate write down and hierarchically organize their personal values no one takes it beyond that and articulates their professional values against the vitriol of some people on reddit i think you need two sets of values that integrate for example jay my number one professional value is to maximize my income i'm the sole provider for four people in my family and i take that role very seriously my number two professional value meaning the things that i value in my career my employer number two is to work with and for a brand that i'm proud of that i respect that if i come to a cocktail party you say where do you work i say franklin covey you say i love franklin covey not i hate franklin covey and number three is to work with and for people that i like and love and that like and love me those were my three guiding professional values and i made all my decisions around them by the way number one was maximize income could i have owned a hedge fund not smart enough but the point is i probably could have made more money somewhere else but i also wanted to work with a brand that i respected with people that i liked and love my advice to everyone is make two sets of values by the way your professional values might be you want equity you want a title you want to do a stint in asia you are a voracious learner you want to lead a team you want to retire you want work life balance write down and commit to your priorities your list of professional and personal values because they will at some point come in conflict with each other and that isn't always bad you won't know why you're having a struggle in this or that part of your life if you haven't written them down and said oh my number one professional value is maximize my income but my number one personal value is family and being near my in laws or my grandparents well if you're in sales or marketing you may be required to move around the nation or you know change jobs and you may be unwilling to do that if you're here for the duration of your parents or grandparents caregiving or life it's important to write them down to know when they are in conflict and and when should one trump the other well.

You know it's funny i never thought of it i never had it articulated to me but i feel like i try to do that without even knowing it like i've always wanted to make sure i can be a part of what's going on in my family right and i know that i have left stuff on the table i've left money on the table left opportunity on the table because i want to get out of work at a certain time i don't want to go on every travel every conference every everything i'm leaving some money on the table because to your point that's part of my value like that's what i am focused on so i think that's really important for people to to really take a moment and reflect on themselves and see what what is your value and and along those same lines you you say things like study yourself yeah what does that mean what i should get a mirror out and look to see if i have any stuff to wash off my face how do you study yourself yes to.

A larger extent this strategy is all about self awareness i have had a thirty five year career of which thirty years was formerly leading people i've interviewed thousands of job candidates i've hired hundreds and i've had the responsibility of terminating about eighteen people in my career jay i've never had to fire anybody because they lacked the technical skill they had the degree they had the certification they had the credential every single person i've ever had to terminate for non market budget reasons was because they lacked self awareness they had no idea what it was like to work with them collaborate with them go to a trade show with them be in a zoom call with them they just lacked self awareness so this one is about studying yourself i think what too often we do is and it's well placed well intended is we start studying other people seth godin dan pink ar huffington brene brown we study our favorite podcast host our favorite entrepreneurs we subscribe to and we learn their past and their journey and by all means i think we should do that i am a voracious studier of other people however what i think most people lack is the same discipline the same curiosity to study yourself take me for example i am a very loud charismatic sometimes even annoyingly energetic person it's my brand it generally not even a little bit that same energy and perceived charisma look at my voice look at my hand gestures i'm in your face this is how i am fifteen hours a day it repels some people believe it or not sometimes i need to lower my voice lengthen my cadence calm down a bit half your audience is liking me for the first time on this podcast right now the point is we should spend time introspectively why do i respond that way why am i the first person to always answer a question why am i always a solution looking for a problem why why do i act this way why do i do that way usually because your parents quite frankly inculcated this in you or your caregivers forgive them but this is a powerful exercise to get feedback to go to trusted people to say hey what are three things i do that delights you what are three things that i do that annoy you what do you think my superpower is what do you think is the biggest trait that is my superpower but i overplay it so it becomes a liability for me all of us have blind spots and if you want to study yourself you can't do that alone and you know in a retreat you've got to ask trusted people in your life what do i do that annoys you what do i do that delights you and then calibrate where should you make changes this is vital to growing your career.

And don't be defensive you know when people give you that advice and they say you know you are a little annoying or whatever you got to receive that and say thank you thank you for telling me right let's talk about.

That most people are cowards this is not a character flaw this is a personality trait most people will not tell you the truth why because they don't want to be the bad guy they don't think you can handle it they don't have the skills to articulate in a way that won't offend you they either have an excess of courage or a deficiency of diplomacy these are skills most people haven't developed so when i go to jay and say jay what are three things that i do that you think are my biggest achilles heel i have to make it safe for jay to tell me his truth and when jay does tell me to your point jay i can't deny it deflect it dispute it or say ah you know but but jim always does that and i react to that no i have to say jay can i tell you thank you so much that was such a gift by the way that kind of hurt of course because i have a conscience but i appreciate that jay can i ask you a question when i'm doing that what's going on i know you're not a psychiatrist jay but do i seem insecure do i seem in over my head do i seem jealous why do you think i'm doing that the more you can get specific jay the more that i can modify this and by the way don't ask for jay's opinion if you aren't serious about making changes in your life because the quickest way to get jay to never tell you any input again is to ask for it and then not implement it or deny it but the biggest way to make jay become your champion is to have jay catch you changing your behaviors and when jay is in a situation where someone is questioning your competence or your character jay is going to say can i tell you i've had different experience with scott scott actually asked me a few months ago about this and i gave him some feedback and since then i've seen remarkable changes in his behavior i think you want to like give him a second chance now jay becomes my biggest champion and benefactor i love that turn.

It around it's a whole flip the script on everybody so let's see can we sneak in one more before we get to some chaos i want to sneak in one more thing which is a long term plan for your career i think that almost everybody is focused on the now i'm the marketing director of this i am working at this company i own this small business i'm focused on today this month maybe the next six months but how do you actually make a long term plan for yourself and in your career is that possible or is that just a pipe.

Dream well it's certainly possible but it is counterintuitive because most things in our life are requiring us to think short term right we all have a bit of an urgency addiction everybody has an attention span limitation now whether it's a medical diagnosis which is real for some neurodiverse people but also just there aren't less netflix channels coming there aren't less skus at whole foods right there are more choices and that are barraging us every day we have to think long term in a short term world my advocacy is to stop thinking about what's next i think all of us fell into a little bit of the impulsivity pre pandemic where people jumped for eight more thousand dollars or they were running from some leader and running towards something that seemed smart i think the pendulum like all things in life swung far one way and is swinging back another way here's my invitation don't just be thinking about what is the next job is it marketing manager is it product line director is it vp of marketing is it cmo i want everyone here to take a breath and i want you to think about your career in terms of decades not in terms of months or quarters or years those of you who are in your twenties or thirties you're going to work sorry thirty forty more years most of us will have a fifty year career when you think about twenty two out of college and retirement in your life late sixties or seventies if that's an option for many of you think about your career in terms of decades i would challenge you to think about what is the end look like what's the ultimate is it cmo is it ceo is it owner of the agency is it the vice president of a product line or the western region and then instead of forecasting your way up there you start there and you backcast if you want to become the cmo you you probably will need to be like the evp or the svp or the vp or the avp or the director you probably need supply chain experience and sales experience you need you know strong technical knowledge you need to start with the very end in mind now listen there is serendipity in everybody's career right you have to accommodate for serendipity interruptions but the people who have the most intentional careers are ones that plan their career out decades in advance and and like an airline pilot you're always going to be a little bit off course but if i knew i wanted to be a cmo at the age of fifty the only way to get there is to know i had to be a vp of business development i had to have sales background i had to know web and email and how to lead people how to have courageous conversations to understand how to build brand how to convert brand into revenue how to convert revenue into ebitda think long term with your career and then back cast as opposed.

To forecast when i hit the twenty year mark in my career which was years ago now i was talking to somebody and they said wow you know i don't know i don't know what my career is going to be or how much longer whatever this guy put his arm around me goes you're not even halfway through your career and i was at year twenty and it like blew my mind i was like holy crap i'm not even halfway there and i'm twenty years in like it's a long road and to your point you've got to like you got to think about where you want to be and then work work backwards i love that advice so let's get into some chaos this is the segment of this thing called since you didn't ask okay and this is what we talk about nothing to do with all this career stuff but i have a i have a question for you i'm not blowing smoke you literally need to follow scott jeffrey miller on all social media platforms i'm not exaggerating he's my number one favorite to follow i'm going to tell you why the dude shares way too much stuff that's going on in his life i mean i know that he has a champagne flute collection i know he sneaks his dog in to get coffee in the morning i know if which of his three sons are winning what tennis tournament they're playing in or losing or losing i know when they buy new shoes i know everything okay but here's my question about that did you share it all for a lot of us we when we go to share on social media especially professionally this is for me i share something i'm like i really hope this gets engagement because like you know i don't want to share something to be a dud that i'll feel like a dork or whatever now some of your posts get crazy engagement because you have big followings but some of your posts don't and i'm curious do you care like about the engagement do you ever say i can't post this it's too much or like what is your mindset because i don't know anybody like you that just just shares the way that you do you.

Know i think it depends on what your end in mind is my end in mind is to help as many people as possible in whatever role they're in that they can identify with me if it is the father of two young sons that are kicking my ass if it's coming up on my fifteen year wedding anniversary and hope she sticks around for a couple more months because it's been tough raising three young boys right financial ups and downs it's your career it's your friendships i share a lot of things i over share but i tell you i don't look at the likes i don't look at the comments because i know that ninety five percent of people don't make a comment and don't share a like i'll have a fairly public profile in the us as a seven time author and like you i host a fairly popular leadership podcast i can't go out to lunch in utah without someone seeing me at the grocery store or at a bar mitzvah or at a dinner and they say oh my gosh i love that you did this or that i'm thinking yeah that post got three likes but i know tens of thousands of people saw it and it built an impression maybe they liked me maybe they didn't like me so i just don't look at the likes and the comments because it is such an infinitesimal representation of the number of people who saw it or saw something beforehand so i try to share things that i think will help other people some of them are positive some of them are confessions right breakout session at a conference nobody showed up here's the deodorant my three sons are using to apply to their testicles because they're sweating too much right here's the picture of my colonoscopy which by the way got vitriol people thought it was sexual i don't know about you but i'm not sure that's why my colon was sexual my point is i try not to be inappropriate i just try to show this is real life right i have a nice car and i have a lovely wife and a family that this morning was just a shit show trying to get three sons out of bed brush their teeth calories in them do they have their homework have they combed their hair is their uniform tucked in get in the car it was that my wife stuck around was by the grace of god this morning because three young boys that have my energy and personality is wearing her thin i try to be i hate this word i try to be as.

Authentic as possible well i will tell you that it is inspiring to me it really does it pushes me to want to share more and also i think you truly have a personal brand and i think that a lot of people try to get that these days but you have one which is this real human being behind all these books you write and all this stuff so i like watching your journey because it teaches me about how to do my journey so you are amazing for being here where should everybody find you follow you connect with you buy your book what do they do how do they.

Get involved with you just this podcast there is no reason to be on any other podcast and do this not that with jay now you yes you can find me i'm not hard all my books are on every bookstore in the world and every digital platform you can visit me at scottjeffrey miller dot com i'm on tiktok i'm on instagram facebook youtube linkedin about five times a day to my wife's horror my children have named it sharing i never heard of this term i call it parenting they call it sharing and so we post a lot we have some fun there's a guard with a gun out front in case you try to stalk me you know she'll take you down.

I got you well you are amazing thank you for being here thanks for being on do this not that everyone go follow scott jeffrey miller he rocks see you later you did it you made it to the end nice but the party's not over subscribe to make sure you get the latest episode each week for more actionable tips and a little chaos from today's top marketers and hook us up with a five star review if this wasn't the worst podcast of all time last lastly if you want access to the best virtual marketing events that are also one hundred percent free visit guruevents dot com so you can hear from the world's top marketers like daymond john martha stewart and me guruevents dot com check it out.