017 - Small Talk Is Big Talk with Julie Brown

What happens if we dare to tear off the mask of professionalism and actually risk showing up for real? I'm your host, Myriam Hadnes, and this is Unprofessionalism.

But if you say to me, I think it's unprofessional, For a woman to say shit, I'll be like, I'm not your keynote speaker.

Julie, welcome to the show.

Oh, thanks for having me.

Yeah, very curious. And I just kick it off with the same invitation as always. Could you share a story when you've been, or you've done something that could have been considered unprofessional and it turned out to be actually the best thing you could have done in that moment?

Yeah. I don't know if anybody knows that I did this, so this is a bit of a secret. I've never told this story, or maybe I have, um, to other people over a glass of wine, but definitely not in public. I'm not sure what the rules are of engagement when people are going after jobs now and all over the, the world, but where I live in Massachusetts, it is now against the law to ask Uh, candidate what their existing salary is.

Mm-hmm.

Now, when I was younger in the industry, and, and now I've owned my own company for 10 years, so this hasn't been an issue for me, but I remember when I was changing jobs, I was being poached. I was being asked to leave one company for another. That other company really wanted me to work for them. And when it came to the conversation over salary, they asked me, What are you currently making? Which you are not allowed to ask now, but this was not illegal then. And I remember thinking, if they're going to pay me what I'm worth, I'm just going to demand— I'm going to say what I want to earn as my current salary, because then they'll pay me more. So I remember saying a number and I remember I choked on it a little bit when I said it. Like, this is what I'm currently earning. And it was a complete lie. It was a complete lie, but it was what I deserved and what I— it was what I should have been paid. And that company didn't blink an eye. They offered me more money than I was making, but the— I was making a lot. You know what I mean? And that particular conversation changed the trajectory of my career because I was suddenly in a different echelon of business developers. Like I was one of the highest paid business developers and I was viewed as such because I was doing the job of the highest paid business developer. And it really helped me like every other job offer, 'cause I got poached by a lot of companies after that, every other job offer after that was for more money. And I keep thinking like, I wouldn't have been paid nearly as much money as I was worth if I hadn't in that moment said, I'm just not gonna tell 'em what I'm getting paid. I'm gonna tell 'em what I wanna get paid.

It's, wow. I love that story so much. Mm-hmm.

Yep.

Because I think for There are many levels to unpack. And the first of all is, why is it so difficult for many, especially women, to just stand there and be proud of their, of the value that they bring?

Right. And I don't have an answer for that.

Yeah.

It's really hard even now as a professional speaker. I am negotiating contracts every day. I am I am stating the value I bring to a stage every day, and it is still a difficult conversation to have. And it's hard when I state my speaking fee. My, my speaking fee is set. It is a set fee. It's what you have to pay to get me on your stage. It is still really difficult when people either say that, oh, we weren't expecting you to be that much, or, or we don't have that kind of budget. And I'm, and I wanna, and, and I can't say it back, but I wanted to be like, well, what did you think my value was?

Yeah. And how is it that, or how has it changed your standing in that firm and today when there is a high price suddenly attached to you?

It's interesting. I just made the decision to hire an agent to do all of my negotiating. Because I don't want to do it anymore. And I think it is interesting when someone else states your value versus you stating your value. Like I can say, oh, I, this is my fee all day long. But when someone else says it definitively, I think it lands a little bit differently. You know?

Why is that?

I don't know. I'm not sure. I'm not quite sure. I don't know the psychology behind it, but I was very, very happy to hand that, that role off to somebody else.

Yeah. Yeah. I can see that. And it's easier also to, to negotiate on behalf of someone else or to selling for someone else than, especially in your business, I think the speaking, you're selling yourself. You're on stage, you're speaking. It's not that you're selling a product.

Correct. I am the product.

So it is also very personal.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

And I mean, not only am I selling a performance, I'm selling my history because what I talk about on stage is, is my data and, and the, the lived experiences of somebody who's trying to teach a room of people how to do it correctly, um, or not do it incorrectly. So you're not only selling a performance, but you're actually Selling the value of the data and tools that you'll bring to an audience.

Yeah. Yeah. And I wonder, how have you changed or what did it change in your self-worth, in maybe in your behavior, once you knew that someone was willing to pay this higher price for you?

You know, it's interesting. It makes the job harder because you know your value, you know your value, you know how much Your, your data is worth and your performance is worth. And you also know the value of what you will do to an audience, the, the change you will enact in an audience. But when someone signs a check for 5 figures to put you on stage for an hour, you, your job is to serve that client and to serve that audience. And the stakes almost get a little bit higher the more you get paid.

Yeah.

Yeah. And so I take it more personally the more I get paid. Like, this was important before I was getting paid a lot of money for it. Now it's really important because now it's not just what I'm doing. It is the cost that it took that organization to get me there. And I hold organizations and clients really, really close to my heart because they make my job possible. I love what I do. I, I thank every audience for making this my job.

Yeah. And I can also see how the moment, and I know this from the facilitation world, the moment organizations pay a very high fee for a facilitator, they put in the effort to prepare. They put in the effort to be really present and to listen carefully.

Yeah.

They're also, they assume a lot of Value. And hence there might also be a trick to that, that we listen differently. And that's an assumption then on your end. I can imagine that it gives you permission to be fully yourself and not performing someone else.

I couldn't be anybody else but me on stage. And I've said no to clients that I'm like, I don't think I'm the right fit for you. Like my energy, my delivery, I don't think is the right fit for this group.

What made you say that? What was it in the client?

Well, they want something that I can't deliver. Like a lot of people reach out to me because they hear what a great speaker I am and how effective I am on stage. And then they ask me to talk about something that I'm not an expert on only because they want the energy I'll bring to a stage. And I would never profess to speak for an hour on something that I'm not an expert on. So people reach out to me all the time and they're like, well, what else can you talk about? And I'm like, Nothing. Like, I talk about one thing and it makes people, you know, aggravated because they want to have me on their stage. But I'm like, I can't, I can't talk about something I'm not an expert on.

Yeah. What are you speaking of when you're on stage and how did you get there?

So I talk about networking, human connection, relationship building, and I do it because I'm, I've been on stage now for 10 years talking about networking and business development and human connection and relationship building for 10 years, and I wrote a book on it in 2000. Well, it was published in 2020. I started writing it in 2018. I had a podcast on it, which is coming back actually at the end of this year. I spent 17 years in architecture and construction doing relationship building, lead generation, pipeline management, business development, new market penetration for 17 years. And so I have 17 years of experience as a woman in a male-dominated industry, being one of the highest paid and highest producing business developers in that industry in a very, very competitive marketplace. Boston is a very competitive marketplace. So when I started my company, this is a very interesting story. When I started my company, I didn't wanna work in corporate anymore. I didn't wanna work for somebody else anymore. I started my company in 2016 as a fractional business developer. And I said, well, I will be a fractional business developer for firms who can't afford full-time BD people, just like, uh, smaller firms, or, you know, they hire fractional HRs and fractional CFOs. I'll be a fractional business developer. And before I incorporated, I had all of my clients signed on with me for yearly, yearly recurring contracts. Like, it was wonderful. That was the level of expertise and reputation I had in the industry. And then, this is funny, 6 months into owning that consultancy, organizations started reaching out to me and asking if I would come and talk about how I was capable of doing what I was doing. Like, how are you managing pipelines for 5 different companies? How are you generating so much business for the companies that you work for and had worked for in the past? And I sat down and I was like, well, how am I doing this? You know, I hadn't really navel-gazed on it for a while. And that's the trapping. A lot of times we miss, we miss our genius zone because it comes so easily to us.

Mm-hmm.

We don't understand it's something that doesn't come easily to other people. So I thought to myself, well, how am I doing this? And I started putting together a presentation on how I was capable of doing this. And then it all came down to networking. I was like, oh. This is just relationship building. All I've done is build really, really supportive relationships, and I have people in my life who want to see me succeed. And how did I do that? And how do I leverage relationships? And that was when I realized, I was like, oh, I could talk about networking. I hadn't even put a, you know, you know, a framework around what I was doing until somebody asked me to. They were like, you're, you're so amazing at this. I was like, I am? Well, yeah, I guess I am. You know?

Yeah. And before asking more about the networking as such, I would be curious what you've learned as a woman in this male-dominated industry. What made you successful there?

You know, what's very interesting is I worked, so I worked in architecture and construction for 17 years. So the construction industry is 10.2% women. It's even less percentage if you look at field staff versus office staff. So I was office So 10.2% women office, it's even when you get to job sites, it's the percentage is less. And I left that industry and got into professional speaking, not realizing, oh, this is another male-dominated industry. Only 25% of keynote stages are given to women. So, and on any given day, 75% of the keynotes are being delivered by men. I didn't even realize it, that I was going from one male-dominated industry to another. I gotta be honest. I never thought about, oh, I'm a woman in a male-dominated industry when I was in it.

Mm-hmm.

I never thought about it. I never thought it was holding me back. I was so successful. I had the right connections, and maybe I had the right connections because I was so good at relationship building. And I— and women tend to build deeper relationships. So maybe it was an asset to me in a male-dominated industry. When it comes to the speaking industry, I actually think it is a positive for me in the sense of networking, because women keynote speakers are very keen on helping other female keynote speakers get on more stages. So there's this bit of sisterhood that comes with female keynote speakers. So I actually think it hasn't been a hindrance to me, and I've not really thought about it in depth of like, did my gender hold me back? I actually don't think it did at all in either scenario.

Fascinating. I'm curious about the networking because there's professional networking. There are people who love it and people who hate it. What do most people get wrong about professional networking events?

Everything. I mean, seriously. And it comes from like the old, like ideas of what networking was and I had a lot of people in my, in my life before I became the expert on networking where it was, you go to networking events to get something like, oh, what did you get? Like, and you're supposed to, and I think there's these old ideas of like, you go to a networking event, you're supposed to come back with this many business cards and have this many people to follow up with. And it's like this many business cards of the incorrect connections, like you're not, when you're not thinking strategically, well, you're just wasting your time. And I'm not saying there's right and wrong people. I'm saying there's right and wrong rooms.

Mm-hmm.

You have to be really strategic with your networking. You only, you only have so much time, you know? Like, why would not we, why would we not be strategic about it? So many people think of networking as you go to an event, you have an elevator pitch, which I always tell people, throw your elevator pitch away because nobody cares. Like, you're supposed to go into an event, have an elevator pitch, and then suddenly somebody's going, gonna wanna like use your product or, or, or hire your company to do something. Like, that's not the way it works.

Mm-hmm.

Like, networking is a long play, which is why you need to start networking when you're in high school, when you're in college, you need to start building the foundation of relationships really, really early because networking is a long play. I, I was so successful because I had so many people who were invested in my success in the sense of I had clients who wanted to make sure that they could put me on lists. I had people in my network network who wanted to, to help me because they knew I was helping them.

Mm-hmm.

And so I think that there's so many things wrong with the way people are taught networking. One is that it's supposed to happen really quickly. You're supposed to go into an event and think bada bing, bada boom, you got like clients everywhere. That's not how it happens. Another fallacy of it is that it's quid pro quo. Like you're gonna need something at the exact same time I have something to give, and I'm gonna need something at the exact same time you have something to give. That's not the way it works. Like, I'm very really gonna need something at the exact same time that you do so that we could do this, you know, swapsies of information and/or, you know, client or whatever. I mean, it's just such bullshit. I also think people are not connecting on a human level when it comes to networking. You go to networking events, people are like talking about what they do, not who they are. And I think that is the biggest miss that people People are— I mean, if we could just increase the surface area with which we could connect with people and have human-centric conversations in networking events instead of falling back on the 2 hated questions, number one and number 2. Number one hated question is, what do you do? Guess what? It's what every single person asks at a networking event and everybody hates it. Scientifically proven. Second hated question is, how are you? Because how are you isn't even a question anymore. It's a greeting. Hi, how are you? Good. No one cares. Like, Those are the 2 questions that you're asked at every networking event. And it's like, why aren't we just having like real conversations with the people we meet? Why do we have to stick to this surface level conversation? Why have we been told that that's the polite thing to do when nothing is happening at the surface? If we know that people do business with and refer business to people they know, like, and trust, why aren't we teaching people how to get to know, like, and trust?

Yeah. And is it, is it discomfort that people fall back to these two? Because it's so funny. Everyone hates it to be asked, what do you do?

What do you do?

Right?

Everybody hates it. Everybody hates it.

And then everyone does it, does the same and asks everyone back, uh, which doesn't make any sense. And I wonder whether it's just habit or is it insecurity or maybe the fear of revealing ourselves, maybe the fear of being boring.

I think it's all of it. Everything you said. Number one, we've not been given permission to not have boring conversations. We've not been given permission to ask better questions, more curious questions, more leading questions. Nobody has given us permission to do that. And we probably weren't given permission because nobody realized the value of having those conversations because we were always told to Be polite. Like, don't ask too many questions. Don't dig too deep. Why? We gotta dig deep. We gotta build these relationships. And I do also think you hit something on, on the head here. It is an insecurity because people might think, well, why would anybody wanna talk to me about this?

Mm-hmm.

Or will people think I'm too nosy? I also think people are really afraid of rejection. So if we ask a leading question and somebody doesn't, you know, answers with like a no or, or like a halted answer, we're suddenly feeling like, oh, they're rejecting our curiosity and they're rejecting our want to get to know them more. So I—

Like a power game almost. Yeah.

It's a power game in the sense that Nobody wants to feel rejected. So we just end up doing things that feel boring and rote and mechanical instead of things that feel good and getting to know each other and, and having really amazing dopamine-inducing conversations.

Yeah. And what comes to my mind is the You're either rejected immediately or afterwards. So if your question doesn't land, you might be rejected immediately because the other person thinks you're a weirdo. But if you're just asking the boring questions, you will be implicitly rejected afterwards because nobody remembers you.

Correct. Nobody will remember you and you have zero ammunition for follow-up.

Yeah.

People ask me all the time. How do I go to a networking event or a conference and stand out? And I say, well, you don't really stand out in the moment. You stand out after the moment.

Mm-hmm.

So go in there, have great conversations, curiosity-driven conversations, human-centric conversations. Have those. And then if you wanna stand out, you stand out in the follow-up and your follow-up will be so much better and so much more pointed if you have really interesting human-centric conversations. Because now when you follow up, you don't follow up and say, oh, it was great meeting you at last night, the XYZ event. Like, I wanna learn more about your company. Like, like what you have is a follow-up where you can write a really great subject line. Like, I listened to that podcast this morning and then get into the subject. I can be like, thanks so much for suggesting that podcast to me. I listened to it on the way home or on the way to work this morning. These are my 3 takeaways. Were those your takeaways as well? Oh, by the way, I think you should also listen to this podcast. I think it would be a great follow-up to that. I absolutely loved our conversation. I can't wait to continue it in real life. IRL, in real life. And like, then you can get a follow-up meeting on the books, a follow-up coffee or a cocktail or a lunch or a Zoom or whatever. And now that person Wants to meet with you and they are anticipating your next conversation, what you might talk about next. That is the kind of follow-up you get when you don't ask, how are you? What do you do?

Yeah. Yeah. And it makes so much sense.

People overthink the questions all the time. People say, well, how do you ask interesting questions? And I say, stop overthinking it. When you meet somebody and you, like, they say their name and you say your name, and your next thing would be to ask, what do you do? Say, you know what? Most people go to networking events and they ask, how do you do? My go-to question is, what's the first concert you ever went to?

Mm.

Immediately you are shifting the energy, everything of meeting that person. You have now, like, they're gonna tell you, oh my God. Like, and the me immediately, like, they're brought back to their first concert and they're like, oh my God, I haven't thought about that in so long. My first concert was this or this or this or this or whatever. And now you are in a human-centric conversation. You are in their memory. You are connecting with them on a different level. So I'm not saying that's my go-to question. I'm not saying what was the first concert you ever went to is my go-to question. Sometimes I'm like, I will say, say somebody asks me, oh, what do you do for a living? I'll be like, you know what? Do you know what I thought I was gonna do for a living? I thought I was gonna be a WWF wrestler. Like, I could not get enough of that when I was a kid. Like, I'm surprised I'm not. Like, and I immediately shift the conversation into something. And we need to stop overthinking our opening questions, and we need to start thinking more about how we pivot questions that we don't wanna answer. Like, what do you do?

I love that because I was actually recently, recently thinking with my partner, how do we get conversations to become more interesting? When we're, because we're traveling for 3 months in Australia. So whoever we met would ask, oh, how have your travels been?

Yeah. Yeah.

And we're just so tired of the same question. So we were thinking, okay, so how can we actually pivot the conversation? And I love it to answer the question differently. Yeah.

Always, I pivot, like when people, I love what I do. I love, I mean, I couldn't imagine doing anything else now. I love what I do. But I don't wanna talk about it cuz guess what? I do it all day long. You know, I love pivoting. I love pivoting, but I also love asking better questions.

What was the best question you've ever been asked by a stranger?

Oh, by a stranger. I don't know if I have a best question I've ever been asked by a stranger. I love compliments. Not because like, oh my God, like you should compliment me, like whatever. I love when people compliment something I'm wearing or Or whatever, like, and because that is such an opening for me because compliments would be like, so say I'm walking down the street and this happens a lot. So I'm saying walking down the street, this happened the other day. I was wearing these like flowered pants because it was finally warm here, but now it's 30 degrees. So like, boo, winter and spring all in one.

Flower and I. I was like, oh, I wish there was 30 degrees. Anyway.

So I was wearing these flowered pants and a woman stopped me on the street and she goes, oh my God, I love those pants. Now, This is the lesson. And this can be walking down the street or it can be at a networking event, 'cause I could have worn those pants to a networking event. I could have said, oh, thank you. But I didn't. I stopped and I looked her in the eye and I said, oh, these pants can be yours too for $19.99 at TJ Maxx. I just bought them. And like, I mean, she was like, are you serious? And immediately we're in this conversation and I'm like, do you live by the TJ Maxx up there? She's like, oh no, I live over there. I was like, oh, there's a TJ Maxx over there too. Like, for international listeners, TJ Maxx is a clothing and store. It's like a catch-all store housing. You can buy coffee and pants at the same place. Like, it's weird. But I could have just said thank you and moved on. But I didn't. I engaged with her. I told her where I got them, how much did they cost, like whatever. So I think any question or any compliment can be a great question if you know how to answer it.

Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. And I can see how then every opportunity to meet another human being is an opportunity to, to practice.

Yes. Practice on people you'll never see again.

Yeah. And, and still this can be frightening. I, I think I grew up believing that everyone's opinions matters and took me 40 years to realize that actually not so much.

Yeah, not so much.

Not so much. So I'm very new to the business not to care what other people think. And then to get this out of our mind, to really open the space to be nice to people. Maybe even, I love complimenting people, but then sometimes I think they believe I'm a weirdo.

I don't think so.

But it is, but if we have the opportunity to make someone's day nice, Oh yeah. And then, yeah, I like the idea of seeing it as an opportunity to practice these skills before we go to the networking event where it's weird.

Do it all the time. The next time you're checking out at the grocery store or at the, like, whatever, don't do self-checkout. Go where you actually have a person who checks you out and just start a conversation with that person. Don't say, how's your day? Like blah, blah, blah. Like say, oh, I really love that color on you. That's all you have to say. Even if it's black, like, oh, look, I love wearing black. I'm wearing black right now for the people. I know this is an audio, but I love that color on you. Or, um, even if there's like a little accent, like, oh, I love your accent. Like anything, anything. If they're wearing earrings, I love your earrings. Like, just practice. Just practice. And I don't wanna call it small talk because I don't think there is any small talk. I think small talk is big talk.

So what differentiates small talk from big talk? Because—

I don't think there's a difference. If you look at the studies of minor interactions between strangers, uh, there's been a lot of studies on just these, you know, people we'll never see again where somebody compliments you or somebody says, oh, I like your sweater, or like whatever minor interactions between strangers. There's been a lot of studies on how it It literally makes us happier.

Minor.

And like, so I don't think, I don't think there ever is small talk. I think it's all big talk because if we know the science behind it and we know the, the spikes in dopamine and serotonin and everything in our brain when we have these interactions, we realize that they're not, they're not small, they're not insignificant. They feel it in the moment, but they add up and they add to our, you know, our everyday experience.

Yeah. It's an interesting distinction actually, that the small or big talk is not about the content as much as it is about the energy it leaves us with.

Correct. So, correct.

I, I can, I would've said that I feel drained by small talk. Mm-hmm. But actually it's not necessarily the talk that doesn't go deep, but maybe it's a talk that is predictable. The questions that are not interesting or that Correct. Flat because they don't feel authentic and curious.

Yeah. So if we're having boring conversations, serotonin's not happening, dopamine's not happening. Like we're, it's actually crashing. Dopamine is like, I gotta get outta here cuz this place sucks, you know? But when we have moments of dopamine spikes, which happen, can happen all the time based on little interactions. That is when we won't tire of small talk or big talk either.

Yeah.

Huh.

I love this distinction. I will practice. Very good. On the, um, on the to-do list to look forward to the next stranger that I meet. And I wonder actually to what extent it's a form of self-censorship that I have Maybe labeled the, ah, small talk. I don't do that. I don't like that. It has to be deep. So not to give myself permission to actually even interact with that, enjoy it, or experiment with it.

What may seem small to you might be actually really deep and really, you know, effective in somebody else. You know, even just You don't know if somebody's having a bad day, you don't know whatever. And just your minor interaction with them, your minor, your minor question of them might be exactly what they need.

Yeah.

So, I mean, it's funny cuz like I'll do this thing, like even like we drive here, I don't know if you're in a pedestrian-heavy location, but when I drive and I pull up to another car and like say the windows are down, now we're getting into the weather where we can put the windows down. Like, I will like compliment them on the song they're listening to or something like that, you know? I'm like, oh, I love that song. You know, like things like little, just, I love, I literally just love human connection and interaction so much that I, I know it, maybe it's, I'm, I'm, I'm hoping that I don't come off to somebody like, well, she loves it, so that's why she does it. You know, I love it because I know what it does to other people.

Mm-hmm.

And so it's not so much like I'm doing it for me. I know the science behind it and what it does to other people.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think people can also sense when it's genuine. Correct. Correct. And, and I'm just thinking that sometimes to come back to what you said, that we don't know the impact of our small talk or what we consider small talk. And I remember that. A candid, how are you, with a pause, can go a very long way to someone to feel heard and to actually have the impression that they have time to answer.

But I would suggest changing the wording because they're going to hear, how are you, all the time. And so just changing the wording a little bit, how is your day going, or How are you feeling today? Because it's not what they constantly hear. So it's the same question posed differently, and that will register differently in their brain. Because if you say, how are you? People are going to say, good. If you say, how are you feeling today? That elicits a different response.

Yeah. Yeah. There's one topic that I would love to hear your experience on, and that's how I found you on LinkedIn. You posted something that you cursed on stage.

I curse everywhere, not just on stage. I curse everywhere.

I love it. And I, I would be curious, I, it's an assumption that you cursed also in the previous job in Oh yeah. In construction.

That would be a correct assumption.

Did you ever have the impression that you needed to censor yourself as you moved on in with your career and then moved into speaking?

If I did feel that way, it was very short-lived. It was very short-lived. Here's the thing, for what I do and for the information I share and the stories that I tell, and the way I want to be on stage. I want to bring the most authentic experience I can give to an audience. And the most authentic experience I can give to an audience is to talk to them like they are my best friend.

Mm-hmm.

Like to give them advice in a way that I would give my best friend advice. And the only way I can do that usually is colorfully. And I will tell you, There was a difference in someone being offended that I swore on stage. I mean, for, for, for the listeners, my book is called This Shit Works. So if you're going to introduce me on stage, there's going to be a swear, you know. So somebody being offended on stage because of their belief that a woman shouldn't swear or that it's unprofessional, which has been You know, plenty of studies show that people who swear are more trustworthy, that teams that have jocular language and swear together actually solve problems faster and are tighter knit. There's tons of studies behind this, but there's also a difference. I just contracted with a huge client and they are not based in the United States, and they asked— they're based in Japan— and they said to me, we can't use the word shit, like the phrase this shit works, because it does not translate. Like it— there is no this shit works in Japan. It doesn't work. It doesn't translate. And so we went back and forth on, okay, so let's take the shit out because shit isn't a word they would use. So every time I say it, it wouldn't translate on stage. They wouldn't understand it. There's a difference between this doesn't translate, they won't understand you, Versus my belief is that a woman shouldn't swear. Completely different.

Yeah.

So when a client comes to me and says, this is not gonna translate, I will bend over backwards to change every slide and make sure nothing says the word shit. But if you say to me, I think it's unprofessional for a woman to say shit, I'll be like, I'm not your keynote speaker.

Yeah.

It's just the truth.

Yeah. Wonderful. And I totally get that. If, If the audience then believes you're talking about poop.

Yes.

It's maybe—

She talked about poop a lot. Yeah, exactly. That's exactly it.

Yeah. Do you remember the first time that you realized, oh, I can actually do that?

Do what?

Swear on stage.

No, because I started swearing like from the go. I mean, my presentation was always called This Shit Works.

Yeah.

So cool.

And did you get the comment, this is unprofessional?

I have had a handful of comments. Um, this is what happens when I speak. So I speak to anywhere between, depending on what, what keynote I'm giving, it's between 100 people or 5,000 people. Like, I don't, the size changes every, you know, every week. Last week I was in front of 500 people. This week again, I'll be in front of 500 people. My next one will be in front of like 2,000 people. This is what happens. I have a QR code at the end of my presentation, and I encourage the audience to tell me how this keynote made them feel. What was their number one takeaway? If they had to describe my keynote to their best friend, what would they say? And I have 4,400 testimonials on my keynote, 4,395 of them Are 5-star, I wanna see her again, she is my person, she helped me, I wish I could take her everywhere with me. And 5 are like, she was unprofessional. So in my opinion, those 5 people are not my people.

Yeah.

Okay. I can't please everybody. And if I changed my keynote so that 5 people out of 5,000 or more were—

You would be out of business.

I would be out of business. 'Cause guess what?

Yeah.

The keynote that I get booked 50 times a year or more to give is because it is so real and honest and it resonates with people.

Yeah.

So I have to stick to myself, stay true to myself, and I have to stay true to the client I serve. And the client I serve wants to see a woman on stage owning all of her power. And if I start, you know, censoring myself, I'm not owning my power anymore and I'm not teaching other people how to do it either.

Yeah. I love that. And I can hear the power and the passion. And I love it because it's not, it's not the swear word. It's not what you say, but how you say it and that you own it. And this is the way you own it and thereby People listen to you. Mm-hmm. And if then someone would think, oh, she's successful swearing on stage, I'll start swearing a little bit.

It's not gonna work so much.

Right. So there's the authenticity piece again. Yeah.

Like, think about Gary Vaynerchuk. Gary Vaynerchuk, you know, when he, I don't, I don't know if he keynotes as much as he used to, but he used to keynote a ton. I mean, he's a $150,000, $200,000 keynoter, like that's Per stage. Yeah, per stage. That's what he gets paid. And I have never seen a keynote that he delivered where he did not say fuck or shit multiple times.

Yeah.

But no one's telling Gary that he's unprofessional and that he shouldn't be swearing. It was actually his signature. Or maybe they are, but he's—

It was his signature.

Yeah, maybe they are, but he's, he has, he's like, this is how I talk.

Yeah. And I think there's a big difference between men and women. So for him it was—

Oh, 100%.

It was so cool.

Yeah.

Or is it Mark Manson, the, um, about giving less fucks? The— Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. The higher art of giving less fucks. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um, yeah. And hence it's, uh, even more, um, inspiring. To, to see a woman who hasn't even thought of that it could be inappropriate, but because this is what you get. You hire me, this is what you get. Either take it or leave it.

Yeah.

Love it.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Unless it doesn't translate.

Yes.

And then I will, I will, I will figure out how to be just as effective without that word. 'Cause like, I don't want you to think I'm shitting all over you, you know?

Yeah. And that's then also interesting because then you realize whether it's just for the provocation or because of the meaning, because how do you then translate it? Do you find another curse word? No, it's not about the curse word, but it's about the meaning. Correct.

Correct. So now I, I, it's so funny. It's like a great challenge for me. I'm like, oh, how am I going to never say that word when it is my title of my keynote? But I think it's a great challenge.

Yeah. Yeah. And how much it says also about, uh, um, about the culture.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Because I think even if it would translate, uh, maybe in Japan, the, um, the audience would react very differently.

Correct.

Right?

Correct.

What is something unprofessional that you would still recommend others to do?

Swear. 100%. I mean, if you look at, if No, I take that back. Swear if it is your proclivity to swear. Don't self-censor yourself. Don't start swearing and just dropping F-bombs in meetings because you heard that people who swear are more trustworthy. 'Cause it's gonna sound weird. You know what I mean?

Yeah. And, and I believe that if it's, if it comes natural, then it signals to the others that they can also communicate naturally. Yeah. And then it just creates this, oh, this collective sigh of, oh, I can be me here.

I can be me. This is, this is a, an environment in which I feel comfortable being myself. Yeah. 100%.

Yeah. To more swearing then.

To more swearing.

Yeah.

I mean, do, do the research on it, but again, if you're, if you're like, oh, I don't feel comfortable swearing, that's not the way, that's not the way I communicate. Then don't.

Yeah. And just a final, just a reflection. I think, at least for me personally, I realized that I really need to, to unpeel because in my private life, I love swearing. Swear all the time. I'm the queen of the swears.

Queen.

But then when I'm on a podcast or when I'm in an air quotes professional context, I have unlearned to swear. It's just not in my vocabulary. So I think to, and this is how I notice whether I'm fully relaxed or whether I'm still, despite the fact that I'm hosting a podcast on unprofessionalism, that I still notice in myself that there is the context switching here.

Well, let me just tell you that post that I, that I wrote on LinkedIn, which was how you found me.

Mm-hmm.

I don't know what it's up to now, but it was around 700 comments on that post and thousands and thousands and thousands of impressions. And I had so many men send me DM LinkedIn messages that said, I'm a girl dad and my wish is that she takes up as much space as you do. And like most of them were like, Keep writing about this. Keep writing about the gender inequity of men swearing versus women swearing, or just men taking up space versus women taking up space. And I was so— I was so happy. I was so happy, literally, because I don't have— I don't have a father. My father passed away a long, long, long time ago, and he wasn't part of my life anyways. But to have the girl dads reach out to me was really, really special. And I knew at that moment that I needed to continue having these kinds of conversations.

Yeah. So thank you for having it here.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, of course.

This was a conversation without the script. Now it's your turn. I'm Myriam Hadnes, and this has been Unprofessionalism.