23. Heather Monahan: Confidence Creator

Book Thinkers family, welcome to episode number 23 of our brand new podcast, Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books. During each episode, I interview one of the world's top authors, and as a listener, you can expect to discover new books, new mentors, and new resources that you can use to achieve more and to live better. In this episode, I have the pleasure to interview the author Heather Monahan. Heather is a bestselling author, keynote speaker, entrepreneur, and founder of Boss in Heels. Having successfully climbed the corporate ladder for nearly 20 years, Heather is a Glass Ceiling Award winner, named one of the most influential women in radio in 2017, and Thrive Global named her a limit-breaking female founder in 2018. Our conversation today is all about Heather's new book, Confidence Creator, which shot to number 1 on Amazon's business biographies and business motivations lists when it debuted. Heather is a confidence expert and is currently working with Fortune 500 companies and professional sports to develop confidence in the workplace and on the court. So today's conversation is all about confidence. Please enjoy this amazing conversation with Heather Monahan. Heather, thank you so much for joining the Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books Podcast. For those in the audience that don't know who you are, Can you introduce yourself to everybody?

Oh my gosh. Yeah. My background is in sales and sales leadership in corporate America. I got fired 3 years ago and unexpectedly, and I reinvented myself as a bestselling author of Confidence Creator, which trumped Trump for number 1 on the business biography list on Amazon, which was super exciting. And then I started my professional speaking career. I gave my TEDx talk, which got promoted to TED. I launched my podcast. And then the pandemic hit and I reinvented myself as an executive coach and a consultant.

There's definitely a silver lining for you in getting fired, huh?

Yeah, you know, it takes— it took some time to see that silver lining. I would say it definitely— I was not able to verbalize that for a long time. I was really hurt, angry, and somewhat devastated. I had attached a lot of my self-worth self-worth to my income, my paycheck, my title, my responsibilities, you know, my deliverables that I provided in corporate America as an employee. And when that went away, initially it felt devastating. However, what I've since learned is that no one can take your reputation, your network, your unique talents, your abilities, you know, your essence of who you are. And you can actually take those things and go wherever you want and find success. And So now that I've done that, yeah, now it was a blessing.

I love that. And a little bit of background on, on Book Thinkers and this audience. So this audience consists of a lot of people in their 20s and 30s, a lot of people in the United States, and many of us are content creators and we're trying to get out there and be transparent and vulnerable and take the next step. And because of that, I receive a lot of questions about confidence. So I think that the topic of your book is very important for everybody today. And I think a lot of people will be very interested in what you have to say about how to achieve confidence in your life. So can you tell everybody about your book and why you wrote it and maybe what the target audience was?

Yeah. So Confidence Creator is a compilation of my lowest moments in my life and how I was able to leverage those moments to create confidence within me. So it's a really hard look at, you know, what are— and getting fired happens to be one of those low moments, getting divorced. You know, there's so many different ones. I'm 46 years old, so I've had a lot of life experience. And my goal was to create basically an outline, a blueprint that anyone could use to pick what, you know, different tasks and items they wanted to, you know, channel into their life and to try for themselves, but to be able to teach people how to create confidence within themselves without having to go through all of the hardships that I had faced, a lot of wrong decisions that I made, bad decisions. But I wanted to shine a light on those things so that other people can learn from my mistakes and other people can learn how to create confidence that is just rock solid, no matter what is happening around outside of you.

Yeah, your book is a great representation of something that I learned very early on, which is if you want to accelerate your learning, you can read a book that condenses decades of information into days of lessons, and then you can avoid those pitfalls in your own experience. And so I think through the pathway of achieving confidence, this is a great representation of that. And you start off the book with a really fun story about your son and his shoes. I listened to the book, so I listened to you narrate it. And that was a really, I don't know, you could just tell how friendly that story was. And it was a good representation of, I think, kind of the first step. And so I'd love to have you tell the story for everybody.

Sure. Yeah, that's so funny. So, because there's a follow-up story that'll be, it's in my second book, which hasn't come out yet, that I want to share with you. Basically, one day my son must have been, I don't know, 8 or 9 years old at the time. He's 13 now. He, you know, in the morning, At my house, it's crazy. My son and I live alone together, and we're running. We're always late. You know, it's chaos, pure chaos. And he walked out with a Sharpie and his basketball sneaker. He loves basketball. He's a great athlete, and he had a game that night. And he said, "Mom, can you write something on this?" And I was like, "Are you freaking kidding me? Like it's six forty-five in the morning. Like why didn't you do this last night?" And ah! And I'm going crazy. And he said, "No, no, no. I really need you to do this." And so I said, "Okay, what is it?" And he said, "Can you write on here?" I can do all things. And I said, well, but why am I writing that? And he explained to me so articulately that, you know, when he takes the court at the beginning of a game, he can feel super confident. And if he has a great, you know, first half, he feels confident. But sometimes you get your confidence rattled, right? It's not static. It doesn't stay super high all the time. There are variables and maybe the other team starts getting momentum and you start, you know, doubting yourself. He said, for those moments, I want to be able to look down and give myself a reminder that I can do all things and that I will. And so he went to his game that night with those notes. And from that day on, I have been writing on my heels, the bottom of my heels, I can and I will ever since. Anytime I'm going to anything big, when I gave my TED Talk, anything, that's always written on the bottom of my shoes to remind myself for when I get nervous and doubt myself. And it really, it helps. Fast forward, after this book came out, I got a DM one day. I was on an airplane from an NBA player on LinkedIn. He had read my book and he wanted to send me a note to let me know that this applies to NBA players too. And so he wrote to me, the one difference factor between LeBron James and someone sitting on the bench is not talent. He said, we're all at this very high talent level if you make it into the NBA. However, confidence is a difference maker and confidence is why the All-Stars are chosen. And he said, I'd like to meet you. Would it be possible for you and I to potentially work together? So anyway, fast forward. I go to New York, I end up meeting with him and with his agent, and we're sitting down talking. And the first thing he wants to talk to me about was that first chapter that you brought up. And so I said, yeah, oh, whoa, because you're a player and that's why. He says, no, that's not why I want to talk to you about this. I said, well, then why? He said, do you know who said I can do all things? I said, Steph Curry? I think my son told me it was Steph Curry. He said, no, it's in the Bible, Heather. And so—

I actually have it tattooed.

Oh my God, I didn't know. Isn't this so interesting? So he taught me that this is actually scripture, right? Like in this modern day and age, we, you know, we think Steph Curry is the first person to say it or what. That's who my son heard it from. And it was just so interesting to me what a profound statement and that not only do the teachings that we're all going through now that are relevant to us now, they've been relevant forever and we're just finding them for the first time.

Yeah, that's a beautiful story. I actually have I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me tattooed on my bicep. And that's For a very similar reason. I mean, the confidence is what takes somebody who's talented to the next level. There's a book written by Tim Askrover called Relentless. And in that book, he talks about how when these athletes get to that extremely competitive level, it takes a couple things to bring them from 99 to 99.5. You know, that's a much harder change than to go from 50 to 60 or 60 to 70. You know, if you're putting it on a numerical scale. And confidence, I feel like, is the difference maker. And you need to constantly be reminded of that. And, you know, I'm a little bit weird with tattoos. I use these tattoos as positive forward affirmations for myself. They're all, you know, in anticipation of things instead of in remembrance of things. But that's why I have that tattooed. That's a really fun story. When I read that, I was kind of shocked. I'm like looking down at my arm. I'm like, wow, how funny is that?

I love that.

Yeah, that's cool. And you talk about something that I think is very important. You say that confidence comes from momentum. What do you mean when you say that?

Most people, a majority of people have a problem getting started. But once you get going, things just start clicking and you keep going. The whole key is to get going. So for me, in just a very basic example, anytime that, you know, when the pandemic hit and I woke up and thought, there's all there is is uncertainty around, right? And everyone was questioning everything. We didn't understand what was happening. We don't understand how long, are we safe? Are we going to live? There's so much chaos everywhere. And so for me in those moments, I now have trained myself. I know, okay, I'm panicking a little bit. I don't feel confident in what I'm doing. I've got to get momentum built. I'm going to go do the laundry. I hate doing the laundry. So when I make myself go do the laundry, which I'm very disciplined, so I do it, I'm building momentum in myself saying, okay, I've been here before. I've seen this routine. Okay, next thing I'm going to go do the dishes. I hate doing the dishes. I go do the dishes. By then I'm saying, okay, I can get back to business now. I can sit down on my computer and I can start strategizing with myself. How am I going to handle this? And I start feeling this momentum that I'm not sitting stuck somewhere. Yes, I might not have all the answers. Maybe I don't feel confident that I know how I'm going to change my business and survive during the pandemic. I didn't. But I started taking small steps and small actions to remind myself that as I get moving, I will figure it out. The key and the answer is in doing something and taking that task on. And taking that chance and making that call. And that all starts with that first small step to build that momentum in yourself.

And one of my favorite books is The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy, and it talks about those baby steps, how small steps in the right direction can help you create what he calls, I think, Big Mo. He calls it momentum. And momentum works in 2 ways. It can work against you or it can work for you. And so that's why, you know, another one of those popular questions that I get all the time is, Hey, I want to start reading, but every time I pick up a book, I feel like it's very difficult to get the process going. And so I say start with smaller goals, read one page a day, then get up to a couple pages a day, then 15 minutes, 20 minutes, you know, different, different ways to approach it. But I'm a big fan of that lesson, really big fan.

And that's, that's a great point. And to that point around starting reading, right, like you said, let's start with a page first and then we'll go after the goal of a chapter, right? That's so smart. And those are bite-sized pieces that anyone can attain. The other thing is to look at, well, if I don't like reading the book now, I can do it on a Kindle. I can do it on a computer. I can listen through an Audible. I can try different venues, different platforms to see which is the one that resonates with me. And that can help accelerate your progress too.

Absolutely. I love that tip. I love that. Speaking about your book and breaking things down at the very end of your book, you talk about how, okay, it was an overwhelmingly big thing to tackle, but you started to break it down into chunks. Okay. First, I need to do this, then I need to do this. And they're all very small goals. So if somebody thinks, okay, I'm not confident at all, what are some of the steps that they can take to break that down into little microtasks for themselves?

The first thing is evaluate where you are, right? Like, so in business, wherever, whatever you're trying to manage, increase, and grow, you need to know what your baseline is. Where am I today? So maybe your confidence is at a 1. Okay, that's fine. We want to get to 10. We're at 1. Now we know where we're starting. It's like weight loss. You weigh yourself first to know where you're starting from so we can view our progress along the way and we record it. My suggestion is to create a 30-day map, a 30-day blueprint that each day you're going to write down 3 things you're grateful for. We're going to check in on your confidence and see where it's at. We're going to be cognizant and aware that we're working on our confidence. Another step during these 30 days is firing the villains from your life. Negative people have no space in your life. People that are pulling you down, holding you down, are toxic. They've got to go. You got to fire them. When you can't fire them, you've got to create boundaries to protect yourself and put yourself first. So many people have grown up thinking that putting yourself first and going to the gym or putting yourself first and staying in at night instead of going out with friends is negative and you should show up for people more. The reality is the more you put yourself first, the better you feel and the more you have to give to others and help others. So start putting yourself first. Get rid of the negative people. Now make space for positive people to show up that can stretch you to grow, that aren't holding you back, but instead are encouraging you and cheering you on. And for those days they're not there, you cheer you on. You know, be your number one cheerleader. Leave yourself the reminders. Journal as much as you can. Take some notes so that you see where your mind's at and you'll start reflecting and noticing things. Wow, things were going really good back in this space. I wonder what was happening. You can flip back and look in your journal and say, I was around positive people. I was doing things I loved. I was tapping into my Superpower. If you're an accountant and you hate accounting, but you love painting, right now on the weekends and at night, start painting, right? And then start letting people know that you're in the wrong industry and that you want to make a pivot. Maybe you can't leave the paycheck today. That's okay. Sometimes we have to do what we have to do now so we can do what we want to do tomorrow. Start mapping out that plan and path to get you in alignment with, you know, some type of a job or initiative that really resonates and is meaningful to you.

There are a couple of things that I'd like to unpack there. One, you talked a lot in the book about surrounding yourself with like-minded people. And so you just mentioned kind of fire some people out of your life, make sure you open up room for people who will stretch you and make you grow and things like that. Why do you think we find it so difficult to get rid of toxic people in our lives? Because I know that's been a struggle for me and for some of my friends and Really a lot of people out here.

Yeah, for sure. And it was a hard thing for me. I was in a working environment that was very toxic. I had been there for so long, I didn't even notice it was toxic anymore. And I believe for a lot of people, that's the slippery slope we fall into, right? We're around it for so long, we're just like, ah, that's just that person. We make excuses because we know that as familiar instead of saying, wow, when I go to work, I don't feel good about myself. I feel down. Something— that's a disconnect, right? So it really starts with checking in with yourself. How do I feel when I'm around this person? And notice. And just because it was okay yesterday doesn't mean it needs to be okay today. You can start noticing things and getting real with yourself. That's the most important person to get real with first. And even maybe it's just journaling about how you feel because you're not in a place where you feel confident enough to address it. But start somewhere. Start noticing and start noticing the kind of people you do feel excited to be around and positive around and better about yourself. And when, as you start noticing these things, they will become glaringly apparent. And that's actually when I was in this toxic situation in corporate America, I started my own ad campaign to elevate my own confidence, speaking to myself in a positive way, rewriting the narrative, and start overriding the negativity I was hearing, whether it was someone ignoring me, someone saying I couldn't do it, I'm not capable enough. You know, you hear things like that a lot. They start seeping into your mind and you don't notice it. You just know you don't feel great, but you think, well, I guess it's work. I guess this is how it is in corporate America. No, that is not how it is. You're in the wrong place. You're in the wrong company, in the wrong room with the wrong people. It's our job to notice it first and then take action to remove those people from our life.

I agree with you that journaling is such a great way to gain awareness, I think, in almost every area of your life, but specifically around people. You know, if you're journaling about interactions or events that you attended and the people that were there, and that's how it made you feel, and then you go back and you revisit those, it becomes very obvious. to you. And when you mentioned journaling and sort of revisiting some of your older notes in the book, I went back and read some of the notes from my journals last year, and it was a lot of fun to go back through those. I'm very happy that I started journaling, and I actually started journaling because of the gratefulness benefits. I journal about things I was grateful for. That's how I started. And you said that you, you, you pay attention to gratefulness, right?

Yeah, gratitude is part of the practice I believe in, and what helped me to establish confidence within me, because The minute you start noticing what the good things are in your life, the things that you like, the things that you're drawn to, you're just going to want more of that in your life. And the more we can surround ourselves with things like work that we like, like people that we like, the more we start to get real with ourselves. And the more real we get with ourselves, the more confident we become, the more we show up as who we really are instead of who people tell us we should be, right?

Mm-hmm.

So it's— all of this is momentum. All of this builds on itself. So the more I can be the real me, the more I can attract the right people to me, which makes me feel better, which makes them feel better, which makes me shine my light more. And all of those steps help us to achieve confidence.

Do you have any tips for people who— okay, we've identified that our friend group isn't great. They're not supporting our goals. They're not going to push us to the next level. But it's so difficult and intimidating to find the right mentor. What are some things that somebody can do to find a mentor or to identify an opportunity for mentorship? And then, like, what can they do to be a good mentor I think that's a good second part of that question.

First of all, I have a mentoring program so you can sign up for my mentoring program. It's at heathermonahan.com. I also have a free 30-day accountability program. You need to hold yourself accountable, right? Like have a goal. And even if it's like I'm going to upgrade my friends, that's your goal. Let's get clear on it. Let's write it down and let's put it in your calendar. And for 30 days you're getting clear. This is what you're doing. Sign up for my free email program and I'll help you do it through the emails. Or tell a friend. You do have one good friend, or you do have one individual that's interested in supporting you. Let them know, here's what I'm struggling with. Here's what I'm working on. I'd love it if you check in with me weekly and help hold me accountable to actually deal with this and address this, right? So to find an actual mentor in regards to traditional way, when I was in corporate America, I knew there was this man that I really admired. He was super busy, had no time. And I thought, what value can I bring him? Right? Because if we make it about the other person, we're going to be able to get them to engage with us. So I started showing up. I knew he went to the office at like 7 in the morning and I knew no one else would be there then. So I would go to the office at 7 in the morning with coffee for him. And I would start, hey, I just want to drop by and let you know how much I'm impressed with the work that you do and appreciate all the support that you give me. Well, when you're nice to someone, you give genuine compliments and you're trying to add value to them, it's kind of hard to just say peace out, you know, get out of here. He says, all right, I'll give you 5 minutes. Tell me what you want. And I'd start with, okay, here's what I'm working on. I'm struggling with, do you have any suggestions on how I can handle it? Right away he'd fire back. And then slowly, and then it's 5 minutes, go, that's it. And then slowly over time, I would just keep coming and I'd show up and I'd show up. And then over time, he started saying to me, hey, I've got a bunch of other young employees around your age. Tell me how you'd follow feedback. Give me feedback to this. How would you handle this? So then it started, I was adding value to him to relate to his employees better. I was giving him ideas on how, and we really developed this great relationship over, you know, a decade of working together where we had a mutual respect for one another. I had someone that I could get advice and direction from. He had someone that could help him understand people on his team in a way that he hadn't previously. So add value, be consistent, and show up and ask for what you want. The worst that happens is they say no.

Come from a place of understanding and making sure that value is at the core of what you're offering. I love that. And so transitioning back to some of the individual problems that I think some of us face, I've noticed there's a lot of self-deprecating humor out there. And you address this in the book. It was a problem that you faced and you started to rewire your brain, I think, with more positive self-talk. And so for somebody who knows that they're struggling with self-deprecating humor, what are some of the steps that they can take to help resolve that?

It's shocking to me. It's not even self-deprecating humor. And I'm going to give you a specific example. I occasionally will take mentoring calls from alumni. I went to Clark University in Worcester. And so they'll— graduating seniors will message us, you know, hey, I saw you went to my school. Can I ask 15 minutes of your time, whatever. And whenever I have the time, I jump on the call to help out. I did this a week ago. And this young woman who was, I think, the valedictorian, I mean, she was so successful, obviously had so much going for her, gets on the phone with me. And within 2 minutes in the call says, I know you think I'm an idiot. But here's what I want to tell you. And does that sound so stupid? I know I'm blowing it, right? Am I totally blowing it? And I just said, listen, stop right now for the love. I cannot believe how you're speaking about yourself. I said, let me ask you this. Would you like me to speak about you like this when I hang up? Oh, she's such an idiot. She totally blew it. And I don't know what that girl was thinking. And she said, no, that sounds awful. I said, well, I just want you to know you just said that about you. So think to yourself this, if you would like people to talk about you the way you are, then keep going. And she said, well, I don't want to do that anymore. I said, okay, let's try this. How would you like people, me for example, to speak about you when I hang up? She said, well, I'd like you to say she's smart, she's talented, she's nice. I said, okay, why don't you say it to me then? Right? Like, let's role play and try it. And so she was saying, okay, Heather, I appreciate your time today. I'm a young, talented, smart woman. who is doing A, B, C, and D. And I said, okay, how does that feel? And she's like, that feels better. Okay, well, now we have to start practicing it because you need to start doing this without thinking. Stand in front of the mirror and say it, right? Like rewrite that script that you were just running because somehow you started running it and you didn't even know you were doing it. Now you need to rewrite that script, practice it, and own it until it feels real. It will eventually feel real. But I learned the hard way in corporate America, the more that I would say, Blonde joke, blonde moment. I'm being an idiot. Everyone would say that about me. I was selling them that I was an idiot instead of selling them I'm a talented person and a force to be reckoned with. And people will treat you in regards to how they see you and how you sell yourself. So as soon as I rewrote that narrative, people treated me much better.

A prior guest on the show, Jim Kwik, he said, I am. He said those 2 words are the most powerful words in the English language because your labels, I am something, become your limits. if they're negative, but you can become limitless if they're positive. And so I really love that lesson. And I try to, you know, I don't try to point it out in every situation I see it, but I try to recommend advice sometimes to people who are open to it and who are asking for it. You know, those positive affirmations and the positive self-talk is so important. And in your TED Talk, you talked a little bit about, I think it was 5 cylinders or something like that, that they were positive affirmations that you were repeating. Does the word affirmation resonate with you? Do you call them affirmations? Do you have affirmations that you use daily?

Yeah, there's actually a part of my book where I wrote about this. I don't do them anymore because I've done them so long. They happen subconsciously. For example, today I was running on the track and all of a sudden I could hear in my head, I can, I will, I can, I will, I can, I will. And I didn't run that tape. It just ran on its own. As soon as I started pounding on the track, it started running and that's all I could hear for my entire run. But that didn't happen by accident. That happened by design. And that happened going back years ago. I rewrote what I was going to say to myself and I would practice it. I would read it 7 times a day because frequency sells and you have to stay committed to things if you want these things to be ingrained in you. If you want to be able to just go for a run and be totally talking yourself up without even thinking about it, you've got to do this for a while. But it starts with one day and it starts with today and it starts with getting it done today and writing what it is that you want to say. And seeing what sticks and resonates with you and what doesn't.

Yeah, repetition, you know, leads to retention. And when I first started doing my gratefulness journaling, I would journal about 3 things I was grateful for every day. And when you live through that process so many times, it does become part of your subconscious, and then you'll identify opportunities to talk about your grateful activities or your grateful moments with other people. So that's really important.

That's so true. Then gratitude is such a powerful practice.

Mm-hmm. So for content creators or people in the audience who are thinking, okay, I need to become more confident, I have the momentum, let me break outside of my shell, and they get on an interview or they get on an Instagram Live or they go to answer a question and then they kind of tense up and they're scared. You said that— well, in the book you said that you would channel a different persona and you would think about, okay, who's really good at interviews? Donald Trump is really good at interviews. If somebody asks him a question he doesn't know the answer to, he'll just blow right by it and keep going. And he is the most confident guy. So love him or hate him, I thought that was a really cool example. Could you expand on that?

Yeah, that was actually— I was going on my first international news program in New York City as a guest, and right before I was going on, I got a phone call saying, this woman is going to try to set you up and crush you. She is brutal. And I said, well, I don't know anything about international business. I know everything. I feel very confident on domestic. I just don't have experience. You know, I'm not well traveled. And she said, well, I don't know what you're gonna do, but you better think about it. So I had the elevator ride to go up to say to myself, okay, I do not want to get crushed. So who is someone that I know that can handle really hard questions thrown at them and basically steamroll them and keep going? And I thought of Donald Trump, not in regards to his answers, but in his approach. If he didn't like the question, He doesn't acknowledge a question. So I thought, if he can get away with it, why can't I? Right? So I was ready. I put that in my mind that if this happens, pull lever A, right? Like I've got a solution. That makes you feel confident. Like I've got a way to handle this. I didn't know how it would go, but it went great. And she did try— she, at first, she was asking me domestic business questions. And then finally she said, well, yes, Heather, but what is the gender gap on pay internationally, not in the US? I didn't know the answer. So I, I just Donald Trumped her. I said, that's a good question. But you know what a great question is? Follow-up to your last one, which is what are we going to do about it in the US? And she's like, oh, what would you do about it in the US? I said, let me tell you what I would do. And I was fine talking about that, right? So it took the conversation a totally different direction. And the interview wrapped and she was super appreciative and said, you did a great job. And now whenever I need a laugh, I watch that clip back.

I love that. I'm starting to get interviewed personally for other people's shows now that I'm kind of out there and pushing this podcast. And every once in a while, I come up to a question that totally throws me for a loop. And I'm so happy that I read that because it really resonated. I could picture situations where now I can use that. You know what, that's a great question. Thank you for asking it. But here's a better question. So let's—

Yeah, or let's follow up actually on your prior question. And another thing you can do when you're in Situations like that is you can put the question back on them, right? So if someone asks you a really weird, difficult question, you have no idea, you can say, huh, I'm at a loss. I don't understand that. Can you elaborate a bit more on that? Right? You can try to put that back on them for them to— whatever it is they're trying to accomplish, now the monkey's back on their back. They've got to dig into it instead of just firing at you. And then you get a little more time to think and buy yourself, you know, a moment to reflect.

I love that. For people, again, trying to get this first step in the momentum, right? They're trying, they're pushing the snowball down the hill, but it's their first push. You have a line in the book where you say you will only get what you have the courage to ask for. And that's something that my girlfriend actually says to me all the time. She's like, I have no problem asking because if you don't ask, then you're not going to get it in the first place. So how has that lesson resonated with you?

Oh my gosh. So let me give you another story on this one. So I knew that after I wrote and self-published my first book, that the next time I wanted to go with a publishing house because I didn't have that experience yet. And I know it's hard to sell a self-published book. So I Googled, you know, trying to learn all about it, and you need to get an agent. So I said, okay, well, I want to go for the best agent out there. So I Googled the genre of nonfiction female writers, and Rachel Hollis had the biggest book that year. So I found her agent. So I Googled the agent's name, searched the agent, went to the agent's website, finally got her email address. Sent her this email. I made it all about her because it's Sales 101, right? So I talked about how I loved the books that she had that were coming out recently. I was so impressed with all of her work and her high caliber of, you know, commitment to creating great books and everything that she had accomplished in her life. And then I said, I think I would be a great addition to your author list. And here's why. And I told her why I thought I could add value. She wrote me back and said, While, thank you very much, and she's very kind, she said, I don't lean so much on the business side. However, my partner does, and you might be a great fit for my partner. So I thought, okay, great. So she introduced me to the partner and crickets, nothing. So I'm sending emails back, trying to get on Twitter every different way I can. I'm trying to ask for this lady's business any and every way possible. Nothing. Finally, she gets back to me and says, okay, let's jump on a call. We get on a call. She said, where's the book proposal? I don't know what a book proposal is. I said, I don't know what you're talking about. So she explains to me, she's very generous and explains, you know, it's basically a document that talks about why you the author, what is the, you know, the overview of the book. It talks about marketing and advertising, sales, audience, competition. Like it's a very lengthy document. So I said, oh, it sounds like writing another book. This is awful. She said, well, basically until you have that, don't call me again. So I said, do you know anyone that can help me? She connects me to a guy that I end up hiring. We do the book proposal together. I come back to her, got the book proposal done, so excited. She said, okay, great, send it to me. She sends back to me, Heather, it's not good enough yet. No. I redo the proposal 15 times. I redid this book proposal 15 times. I asked for this woman's business 15 times. I asked for her to represent me. On the 15th time, she finally said yes. And the point in that story is, yes, is it easy to ask someone for something once in hopes that you get it? But the reality is sales is a numbers game. And whether you're selling a book or a book proposal or an ad or a bottle of water, it's all in a numbers game. You can, you know, relook at your approach. You can take a look at and make sure that you're asking for the right things and that you're, you know, providing and showcasing your value. There's so many things you can do around that, but it's not always just going to be a one-ass close. You just need to keep going for it and not walk away if something really means a lot to you.

It's an amazing lesson. I mean, we both come from a sales background and persistence is king. I mean, persistence really, really, really matters. I was just talking to a colleague recently who was asking me for some cold calling tips. And I, one of my first questions in the discovery process was, how many times do you typically reach out to somebody? And how many different avenues do you attempt before you sort of give up? Because you need to try. I mean, and I do this for the podcast too. You need to try LinkedIn. You need to try contact forms on websites. You need to go through friends. You need to go through every social media that you can find. You need to be calling people, asking questions, just trying to discover as much as you can about that person because sometimes it might take 20 impressions or 15 impressions in your case.

That's so true. I wanted to get Gary Vee as a guest on my podcast and I had reached out to him thousands of times and maybe he had responded twice, but just like one word or one line, you know, nothing engaging. And finally I said, I'm getting this guy. And so I took a Google alert out on him and it shows up that he had just bought a wine company with a partner of his from New England. So I Googled the partner, found the partner on LinkedIn, sent the partner a note on LinkedIn and said, I used to be in the wine business. I certainly can help you avoid the pitfalls that I fell into and share with you the insights that actually worked really well so that you can get your business up and running faster. Do you want to jump on a quick call? Of course he wanted to. I helped him for half an hour on the call. At the end of the call, I said, if I can ever do anything to help you, Heather, let me know. And the rest is history. I got Gary on, on my show. So it just goes to your point. Like there's always another venue, avenue, platform, way you can go. If you are serious about something, you just have to keep going.

Yeah. I've found people are very curious about this podcast in particular. And another one of those questions that I get all the time is like, how did you get this guest? Where did you meet that person? Did you pay this person? I said, no, I just come from a place of value. I have an audience. We're doing a million impressions a week on Instagram. These authors want to sell their books or spread their mission or whatever the case is. And for me, I'm just looking to have cool conversations and learn, and I'll kind of record it for everybody else, right? Like, I want, I want to ask these authors questions and learn more about what made them successful. And I mean, some of the authors, yeah, just like you're saying, like with Gary Vee. Now I met Gary Vee, I actually went to a wine tasting event that he was showing up at and he walked in the door and I ran over and took him up, took a picture with him. And I had planned to ask a couple of questions, but then he just got swarmed. So I was like the first picture in the chaotic roll of pictures that ended up happening. But he's an amazing dude.

He is an interesting guy, that is for sure.

Last question that I have for you. So you have some rules for networking like an all-star that you laid out in the book. I thought that was very interesting. Could you highlight a couple of those for everybody? Hey, Book Thinkers family, it is time for a quick word about our brand new mobile application, Book Thinkers Smart Retention. Now, we built this application because after polling our audience, we found that an astounding 94% of readers want to retain and implement more information from the books they love. Simply stated, many people are reading amazing books but are often failing to remember their biggest takeaways. It's a problem that I used to face, and our technology helps to bridge that gap. BookThinker's Smart Retention is one location that consolidates all of your biggest takeaways from the physical books, digital books, and audiobooks that you're reading. You could even throw your biggest takeaways from this podcast episode if you wanted to retain them. Once your information is in the app, you can access that information whenever you see fit. And for amazing books like the one that we're discussing today, you can actually turn on systematic reminders. And this is where it gets cool. Reminders reintroduce key information at specific time intervals that will help you maximize your retention of that information. This is called spaced repetition, and it's a technique that's used by the world's most effective learners. BookThinker Smart Retention is available today on both Android and iOS for $5 a month or We are committed to helping you retain and implement more information from the books you love. And so to find more information about the app, simply search it on the App Store or Google Play Store, or you can go to www.bookthinkers.com and you'll see our mobile app tab. We display a ton of cool information there. Now back to the episode.

Yeah, networking is really important no matter what business you're in. You don't have to just be in sales, right? And for me, when I got fired, My network is really what lifted me up and helped me out. So you want to expand your network. And there's so many different ways now in the world that we live in because of social media. You know, you can reach out like you were saying, just DMing people and creating banter and conversation, sending someone a video of yourself right now that we're in this virtual world. You know, when I wrote the book, I was writing it more from a standpoint of in-person type of, you know, opportunities and making conversations about the other person, Googling and researching them before you get to an event, you know, making sure that you put your phone away at an event. But while we're in this world where you're not really in, you know, a space with somebody, you still have the opportunity to network with them. You still can have conversations. People are more lonely and isolated now than ever. So I actually found it easier to get guests on shows. I found it easier to network because people are happy They're sitting at home most of the time and working from home and they're, oh, who's this person? And you send them a nice note and they engage with you and they have a conversation and a follow-up. So right now what I would suggest to people is what is the worst that can happen if you send someone a note on Twitter or on LinkedIn and talk about, you know, some of the great things they're doing and how you recognize that nothing bad can come out of that, but bad can happen by doing nothing, right? So if you have that free time and you put that intention out there, I want to expand my network. I want to, I'm going to join some new online groups. I'm going to join some new online programs, whatever it is. Any of those opportunities are an opportunity to network. I launched my group coaching program when the pandemic hit, and I didn't know how much networking opportunity that would be. Right? So you can look at these different Facebook groups, LinkedIn groups. There's so much out there and you can go to what, you know, you're drawn to, but jump in and start having a conversation. It can even happen just in the comments on a post on LinkedIn or on Instagram, right? Start to get to know people and go to spaces with like-minded people like here. You know, if you like reading books or, you know, something different around business on LinkedIn, jump into those conversations. Know that if you show up as yourself and you share your opinions and your feedback, that's unique and adds value. And people who are like-minded will start interacting with you. And that's a great place to start right now to start growing your network.

It's incredible advice. And I'll, I'll go back and listen to that again and again, because that's a skill that I'll forever need to get better at is networking. Yeah.

But you're already working on it in your work with landing podcast guests. It's really not any different. It's just keeping that conversation going, not just with people who you want on the show, but just with people who could be great contacts.

Yeah, it's a— this has been such an amazing opportunity for me. And a lot of people go into podcasting looking for a networking opportunity, like I need an excuse to ask people questions. And I didn't think about it that way at first, but now I almost do. And it's a— it is a beautiful way to interact and communicate with different people. And I'm so forever grateful that I decided to do it. Oh yeah.

And the thing is, it's so much easier than people think. You know, it's just recording a conversation. You can even just record yourself talking or you and your friend talking. And it is a great vehicle to reach more people, put yourself in a new pool. Then you can join a podcasting group, a podcast host group, right? These are all networking opportunities that just spill out of you doing something new.

As Gary Vee would say, you know, put yourself in a situation where you can just document Instead of having to create intentionally, but just document your life. If it's interesting enough and these conversations are interesting, then there will be value for other people and they'll tune in.

But here's the thing is like there's different niches, right? Someone will say, well, I'm not interesting enough, or I never got fired and that's a great story to tell and I don't have a story like that. People will have all these excuses, but it's really just about showing who you are because then those right people will show up to support you. They'll find you.

I love that. I love that. Well, for people who want to learn a little bit more about you, where should they go? What should they do?

My website is heathermonahan.com. My book is Confidence Creator, and you can find that online, Amazon, Audible, anywhere that you're going to find your books. And my TED Talk is, um, you just type in Heather Monahan at the TED site and it will show up. It's 10 minutes. You're going to love it. And I'm on all social media @heathermonahan.

Fantastic. And then last, last, last question. When is the next book coming out?

Yeah, so I signed a deal with HarperCollins Leadership the first month of the pandemic, so I'm working on the book right now and it'll be out in 2021.

All right, well, I look forward to our next conversation then. That is a wrap. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this week's episode of Book Thinkers: Life-Changing Books. To discover more books more mentors, and more resources that you can use to achieve more and live better, make sure you check out our website at www.bookthinkers.com. There you'll find links to our mobile application, more podcast episodes, our shop so you can get some Book Thinkers swag, and our socials. With that, I'm signing off and I'll see you for next week's episode of Book Thinkers Life-Changing Books.