CVC Succcess Group coaches Jerry & Sheryl Isenhour
In today’s episode of the Chimney and Fireplace Network we talk about stepping back and analyzing ourselves and our businesses. It’s all about taking that long hard look in the mirror from time to time. When you can do that honestly with yourself it becomes easier to stay on the path you want to follow. We discuss the process it takes to really see yourself clearly. Being able to open yourself up to a self-assessment helps keep life in balance. We will discuss how to assess who you are, what you are doing and how you are doing it. And just as important, we will discuss how to assess the culture that you are exhibiting to others.
The Chimney and Fireplace Success Network is a weekly podcast brought to you by the CVC Success Group and hosted by industry expert, Jerry Isenhour. Each week you will find new presentations to assist business owners and managers in turning their business dreams into their business realities.
Transcript
Jerry I.: Self-assessment, it is a required part of life if you are going to find success and travel to your dreams. But even more so is what I’m going to classify as critical self-assessment. Because when you do a critical self-assessment, you’re digging deep into your psychology, and what you appear to be to others. Self-assessment, it helps you to understand yourself.
And again, how do you appear to others? Do they like you? Do they listen to you? Do your opinions matter? You know self-assessment, if you’re going to see success and be a true leader, it’s a required part of life. So, stick with me we will be right back, and we will go deep into this subject.
There are 3 Cs for a successful path to your dreams, Creative, Crusade & Critic
You know it has been said by many leading coaches and consultants, that there are three C’s for success in a business, but it is also the same in life. And these three C’s, you have got to have a creative side, you got to be a crusader for your beliefs. But you also must be a critic and look at yourself critically.
Now a lot of people, the word criticize, the word critic just makes their nerves go up, it just raises the hair on the back of their necks. So I’m going to transfer this and use the word assessment, the word assessments. Do we take a look at how our opinions are accepted by others? One of the things that one of my friends and mentors, Larry Winget, shared with me, was the ability to speak in what he called sound bites. He even offered this was one of the reasons why Fox news liked him to be a commentator on there because he could speak in a sound bite.
Sound Bites are speaking in a profound manner that makes others think
And what is a sound bite? Sound bites are when you say a paragraph, and the words that you’re saying are words that make people think. And what’s even better if you can make them deep think. And you know in my life and in my career, I’m able to spend time with people and I’m going to tell you about some of them in this segment, that cause you to do deep thinking when they speak. Let me ask you this, do we look at how our opinions are accepted by others?
Or do we really don’t care? We just got to spit out how we feel, how we think and we really don’t care if others accept what we’re saying. Earlier today, a real good friend of mine, a guy by the name of Taylor Hill, and his company does my website. He posted a question on Facebook that I even contacted them and said tell me what caused you to say this and ask this question. And the question involved, if a person’s culture helped you to accept their opinions, and what was more important to you?
What impresses you more about a person, their opinions or their culture?
This person’s culture or the opinions that they express? And Taylor and I had a really good conversation about that right before I started this because I told him I said you know I’m going to be talking about self-assessment today in my podcast, and I think that this is part of what I want to include in here. Over the last week, I have been extremely fortunate to engage in some fantastic conversations with well-known people. People I greatly respect and learn from.
Now some of these people, you may know who they are, you may not know their names. One of them is Scott McCain, another person that I was able to participate in a group call with was Larry Winget. And another gentleman was Joe Calloway. And one of the most remarkable guys that I have had the pleasure of recent meeting and listening to is a gentleman by the name of Glenn Morshower, who is an actor and has been a phenomenally successful actor on television in many television series.
Glenn Morshower speaks in incredible words of wisdom, deep thinking
In fact, right now he is working in a show called the Resident. And I’ve watched him in a show called 24, and Glenn has phenomenal words of wisdom. In fact, I sent him a note last night, told him so, Glenn, I am so glad to get to know you, because of the wisdom that you express so often in your words. And Glenn sent me a reply said Jerry, I really appreciate your words. But I’m just trying to help my fellow man. And another guy, a guy by the name of Ken Walls and that’s a guy I’m relying on to help me build our ability to live stream right now.
But I’ve also had the opportunity to have numerous conversations with other people who are not widely known. But so many of them offer a tremendous insight, clear thinking like my friend Taylor here who I mentioned earlier. Taylor and I do not agree on many things, but I think we have a personal respect for each other and even when our opinions differ, we can have a conversation.
Count on mentors who may not agree with your personal opinion
In my life, I count on mentors who I do not agree with their personal opinion on politics, world events, or other things. We don’t vote the same, we have different political viewpoints. But you know something I’ve learned, I value their opinions very heavily, right? Now in my personal life, I’ve got a plateau that I’m getting ready to meet that I set for myself in the year 2020, and that was releasing a new book entitled ”step up to success” how to turn a novice into a top performer.
And in doing this book, I had to dig really deep. I had to get the opinions of those on different sides of political spectrum from people who ran large businesses and those with small business. And all this was done to produce a book that has the processes to take a person through the recruitment process, the interviewing process, the assessment process. The onboarding, the training, and then how do you continue the ongoing training.
I had to research all these different minds
I had to research all these different minds that I could, relying on my wife Sheryl for her unique perspective from the training that she has, and the skills she has developed. And then as we went through this book writing, what did we do? We sent this draft out to numerous people. People that I respected their opinions. Again, with differing viewpoints on the world. And one of these was the editor that I contracted, her name is Sarah Shippee.
And she did an excellent job, she devoted countless hours even on all the changes. And yes, as the author, she challenged my words. Why did we do this? To turn out a document, to turn out a book that had true value to the people that read it, because our goal is to give people a process, to conquer the leading challenge that they face in small business today and in large business. So, here is the question for you, do you ever consider a look at others and how they look at you?
Do you ever listen to the opinions you express?
Do you ever listen to your own opinions? Your point of views? How you speak them? The words that you use. Because here’s the question, when you speak, people listen. No matter if they like you or not, they realize the value you provide to them. You know I’ve appeared on stages of my time as a speaker in front of groups of people, knowing full well that there were people in the audience that really didn’t like me for whatever number of reasons. But did that affect what I wanted to say that day? No.
Because no matter if they liked me or not, I wanted my words to have an effect on them. I wanted them to come out of that room thinking and having value from the time they had just spent in the room with me. See this is what self-assessment is all about, but here’s the problem. We usually do not self-assess when we’re on top. We engage in self-assessment when our butt’s been kicked. When things start falling apart. I can tell you from personal experience, I did not really start doing the self-assessment until the year 2010.
I wrote my first book at that point, Chaos To Reinvention
This happened when I crashed dramatically. I had to take a strong look at myself, and I wrote my first book at that point called chaos to reinvention. But you know for the previous 55 years of my life, I had been writing the crest of a wave. You see, what happened here was, in order for me personally to do this self-examination, this self-assessment, it took pain, tremendous pain. The pain that I was undergoing, to take this hard look in the mirror because that’s what self-assessment is. It’s a really hard look at that guy or that girl in the mirror.
Because see that guy or that gal that’s in the mirror, they’re the ones that other people see. You got to remember, change can be painful. And each of us to decide, if we prefer to undergo the pain of change, or do we want to continue to live in the pain that we’re in. You see if you stop and do the self-assessment of yourself. If you take this hard look in the mirror, and you look at where you are failing and where you are succeeding, this can be a gold nugget for you in your life.
I call it the Magic Moment of your life
This can be what I call the magic moment of your life. Where all of a sudden, you start to figure out, how do I do better? How do I speak in such a way that my opinions are valued more highly? How do I speak in such a way that people respect my words? Even though they may not like me. You see because there’s this thing out here called this, I call it the 2020-60 rule and it’s what each of us has to undergo and live through in life.
And what’s the 2020-60 rule, here it is. 20% of the people in your life will love and respect you no matter what you do, they’re going to love and respect you. And 20% of the people in this world will never care for you. They may not like you. And in between that point is 60% of the human race. So, what you have got to do is you have got to form your thoughts, your words where they reach out with power, with wisdom, with insight in such a way that it makes people think.
Assess what you are, what you are doing, how you are doing it
And you can only do this if you assess what you are, what you are doing, how you are doing it. And you assess the culture that you’re exhibiting to others. Are you going to make everybody happy? No way, that’ll never happen. You’ll never see a person running for election, for the president of the United States that’s going to have 100% approval rate, it’s impossible. They just got to get the majority, and what they’ve got to do is change their opinions, their words, how they’re speaking them, and the perceived value that they present to others. And that is what you got to do in this self-assessment because you have got to ask yourself, what is the value of me?
What is the value you present to others
What is the value that I present to others? What’s the value I provide to the human race? There’s an interesting thought process on how to go about this, and this one sounds slightly morbid. It sounds kind of bad to say this. But if someone was to write your obituary, the things they would say about you. What would they say? Would they say you’re a person that made a difference?
Would they say you’re a person that changed the world or changed the life around you? Are you a person that did that value? Think about that. What would be the obituary that people, both your friends and your foes, would write about you? Think on that, this is the message of this week. Do the self-assessments, look inside yourself. Take a really hard look in the mirror, and make sure that you see what others are seeing. And with that, I am going to turn the mic over to Sheryl.
Sheryl bringing her personal words of wisdom
Because each week, she brings her personal words of wisdom to this microphone. And every week when she comes up to it, to be honest with you, I’ll be back after she gets done. And I actually form the words that I’m going to say at the end of each and every one of these podcasts based on what I learned from this very wise lady. Just like you’re getting ready to learn in the next few minutes. So, stay with us, Sheryl will be right with you.
Sheryl Isenhour: Hello, and I am Sheryl Isenhour. And I want to begin by wishing you a wonderful day. I’m hoping to bring you some thoughts today to inspire you, thoughts to make you think. Every day we get up and we assess our surroundings. We go to work, we assess our business. And if you’re not working, you assess your day. Do you ever take the time to assess yourself? Or is there a fear of finding something that you might not like? Many times, you will find the part of you that you really do like by assessing yourself. As many of our listeners know, I’m a certified disk assessor. You may be asking what a disk assessor is? It is a personality asset tool used by more than one million people every year to help improve their team.
Their teamwork, their communication, and their productivity in the workplace
Their teamwork, their communication, and the productivity in the workplace. But to me, personally, the best purpose of it is to improve oneself. You must know you before you can truly know others. I took my first disk assessment years ago, and for me, it told my story better than I could. Even though I knew myself well, there were areas that I did not understand.
Why was I the way I was, why did I make the decisions I made
Why was I the way I was? Why did I make many decisions that I made? Why did I always choose the path of most resistance? I learned that I did this because it was my core and my inner beliefs. Even though until I understood that I would often second-guess myself. I rarely second-guess myself anymore. Actually, I really didn’t do it a lot before, but now it’s even less. Life alters us, it alters us all as we move through it. What we were as a child gets covered up with life.
What would it be like to see through the eyes of a child again? We may never totally know that, but we can get a glimpse of that through knowing yourself. Assessing who you really are, and what made you alter. There are two times when you’re involuntarily moved back to your core. Those are when you’re angry, and the other times when you’re afraid. We have all heard the term fight or flight, what is your core when it comes to fight or flight?
Does not matter what core you possess
Hey, I will openly tell you that mine is fight, not with my fist, but with my knowledge and my tenacity. Many times flight would have been much better. I would have shut my mouth much sooner, and I’d been able just to walk away a lot faster. But needless to say, that wasn’t me. Doesn’t matter which core you possess, it does matter if you know and understand it.
Another area that made my DISC show me why I was so engrossed in the program, Star Trek, that is the old Star Trek. Mom hated the show, but I was determined to watch every episode. Now I know what it was that impressed me so much. Part of it was the fact that Captain Kirk’s crew would follow his orders without question. The fact that the mild manner doctor could hold his own, but most of all it was Spock.
He analyzed the problems and he expressed it in a way that I could understand, it was black or white, there was no gray. And I began to see why I was a loner many of the times, it was because I had no gray. I was who I was and I didn’t want or I didn’t need to alter myself to be someone else. His statement of the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one as Kirk added remains with me today. I’m sure by now everyone’s wondering why I told you that, it was to let you know that you are who you are. You can alter what others see, but your core is intact. The thing you need to do is to assess yourself and see who and why you are and what you are.
You may think that DISC or any other assessment is just not for you
You may think that DISC or any other assessment is just not for you. But for me, it was like the petals of an artichoke were being pulled back, not tore off, as those were the petals that had protected me for many years. But just pull back, and I could see the inner core. The who I am, and then I could answer the question of why I am as I am. Even though I have always been a fairly good judge of people, I see them in a different light now.
Now I know who and why I am
Now that I know who and why I am, I can begin to see the why in people, and I can understand how to communicate with them in a language that they can understand, and that they will listen to. But first, I had to understand myself, and I had to be able to open my eyes wider to see the feelings and the reactions of others. Assessing the world is great, but the assessing must be done of yourselves and it must be done personally before you can understand the who and why of anyone.
Do you know who you are?
Do you know who you are? Or do you think you are who you are because others have told you? So my suggestion is to pull back the petals of life and look at your core. Understand yourself, then every now and then let people see that part of you, the real you. The part that life has not altered yet. Hey, you may be surprised at what you find, and then you can use it to your benefit.
It may show you that others you’re having a problem with may be shielding you with their pedals. Hey, assess them before you judge them, listen before you speak. And you never know, you may see or hear something that you just don’t know. Each of us resides in our own vessel, and before you can reach inside others, reach inside yourself. Life has altered us, but it has not changed us. Many have made bad choices and are having to pay for them.
But each of us was a child at one time
But each of us was a child at one time, and I personally do not think any child is born bad. Some were altered, and some just made the wrong choices. Assess yourself, and you may begin to understand why you made a certain choice. But you may also begin to understand why you should alter yourself to help you move forward to a more productive and a more enjoyable life.
With these thoughts, the old raving woman, let’s just say just make your choices in a way that you can always say I’m glad I did, instead of I wish I had. Now I am going to turn this back over to Jerry to wrap up this episode and send you forward into your future.
Jerry Isenhour.: Well, I hope you enjoyed your time with Sheryl. Like I said, she’s one of those people that can make you do deep thinking with her words, and I hope that’s what happened with you today. You know this podcast ends up 2020 for us because you will be receiving this, this will go online right before the end of the year.
Every year I go through an exercise with my clients
So, every year, I go through an exercise with my clients, and this exercise what do we do? We do self-appraisal of the previous year. We look at what we accomplished, and one of the questions that I always ask every client at the end of every year is the following. When we talk a year from now, what do we want to be talking about?
What are going to be the victories that we’re going to celebrate? What are going to be the challenges of the coming year? We do this annually? I’ve done it every year. And here’s my offer to you if you’re out there, I would love to share with you my thought processes of how to do this business self-assessment at the end of the year. If you like a copy of this, all you have to do is reach out to me at Jerry@cvcsuccessgroup.com.
And just say Jerry, I would love to get a copy of your self-assessment form for the coming year. Because in this, you’ll be able to ask yourself a whole lot of questions. And it’s going to be illustrated using a wheel. Yes, we took the Ziglar wheel of life and we have converted it into a self-assessment form, for the wheel that is out of round. And as you look at this wheel, as you go through this, it will tell you where you are out of balance.
When your life is out of balance, it is going to give you a rough ride
You see and just like a wheel when your life is out of balance. It’s going to give you a really rough ride, it’s going to give you a lot of bumps. So it’s what we’ve been talking about here, what we want to urge each of you to do, that have given us the pleasure of listening to us today, to go through, self-assess yourself, self-assess your business. Self-assess where you’re at in life, and where do you want to go. It’s like I was talking to a lady yesterday. And it was somewhat of a coaching call even though she was not a client, she was in the coaching group I was in.
You got to look at your life as a set of steps leading to the destination you have chosen
And she had contacted me and wanted some information and as we discussed. And it was clear to me that she just didn’t have her destination thoroughly decided. She had actually been in a lot of coaching groups. But when I said where do you want to actually go, she really did not know. And this is what I shared for her, you got to look at your life as a set of steps, and at the top of those steps, that’s your destination that you’re aiming for.
And what you’ve got to do is set these steps of what it’s going to take to get you to that final destination, where you can sit there and enjoy the fruits of the labor, because you have accomplished what you set out to do. That’s what each of us have to do in this world, in order to move, to take those dreams that you have. And we all got those dreams, and what you got to do is do the hard work, that is right, the hard work that is going to be involved to turn them all into your realities.
We got a New Year coming up
So, we are going to end this episode today, again we got a new year coming up, and I want to wish each and every one of you a happy, less chaotic, prosperous, fruitful 2021. We have no idea what’s ahead, we have no crystal balls. We don’t know what challenges life will throw at us. Think back a year ago, did any of us have any imagination, any idea what we were going to go through in the worlds of today?
So again, thanks for joining us. My name is Jerry Isenhour, my company is CVC success group. This is a team of subject matter experts, and we are committed to working with every client we have to help every single one of them reach their dreams. If we can help you, reach out to us here, our team is ready to help you turn those dreams into your realities.