Break the Mold (ft. Heather McGowan)

Mic Drop

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2y ago 33:54

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Break the Mold (ft. Heather McGowan)

Sometimes the best advice is to ignore the advice.

OPENING QUOTE:

“In the past two weeks, it was diamonds, hairdressers, biopharmaceuticals, education, quality control. Next week, it's education. So it's all over the place. And how do you take that same insights or series of insights or decide which ones are important to which audiences so you can scale it?”

- Heather McGowan

GUEST BIO:

One of the most successful speakers today, Heather McGowan is a leading voice on the future of work and the fourth industrial revolution. She’s helped lead organizations around the world in the quest to balance performance and wellbeing, and her latest book The Adaptation Advantage was named one of the Top 30 business books of 2021. It delivers a groundbreaking model for helping leaders let go, learn fast, and thrive.

Links:

CORE TOPICS + DETAILS:

[6:28] - Uniquely Authentic, Uniquely Successful

Breaking the mold & making careers

People are always telling Heather how authentic she is. But the truth is that she begins from a very simple truth— people want to have a conversation. When Heather steps onstage, she has an idea she wants to convey and she’s out to do it in the most authentic, straightforward, and memorable way. Sometimes, it’s as simple as that— though it’s certainly never easy.

[12:29] - Adapting Your Message

Same mission, different audience

How do you deliver the same message to a group of 5,000 people for 12 minutes as you do a group of 100 people for 75 minutes? The answer is adaptability. You have to be able to identify the core truths and value in your message, then build the rest of your message around them based on the audience, setting, time limit, and other factors. It’s a skill, and like any skill it can be practiced and perfected.

[9:25] - The Future of Work & The Future of Keynotes

The world is changing. Are you changing with it?

The future of keynote speaking has a lot in common with the future of work— it’s becoming more connected, less rigid in its formulas, and more open to unique perspectives and ways of doing things. That can only be a good thing, and it will allow for a new group of speakers to come up and continue changing the game for generations to come.

[22:13] - Bringing Diversity to the Stage

Equity and inclusion are #1

Heather’s goal? To see a time when all of the things about her that are currently selling points relating to her uniqueness— such as her orientation— are simply background to her message. But for now, she’s proud to be a driving force helping more diverse voices reach keynote stages. It’s something we should all aspire to do in our own ways.

RESOURCES:

[2:37] The Adaptation Advantage
[4:18] About Amplify Festival

Follow Heather McGowan:

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ABOUT MIC DROP:

Brought to you by eSpeakers, hear from the world’s top thought leaders and experts, sharing tipping point moments, strategies, and approaches that led to their speaking career success. Throughout each episode, host Josh Linkner, #1 Innovation keynote speaker in the world, deconstructs guests’ Mic Drop moments and provides tactical tools and takeaways that can be applied to any speaking business, no matter it’s starting point. You'll enjoy hearing from some of the top keynote speakers in the industry including: Ryan Estis, Alison Levine, Peter Sheahan, Seth Mattison, Cassandra Worthy, and many more. Mic Drop is produced and presented by eSpeakers; sponsored by ImpactEleven.

Learn more at: MicDropPodcast.com

ABOUT THE HOST:

Josh Linkner is a Creative Troublemaker. He believes passionately that all human beings have incredible creative capacity, and he’s on a mission to unlock inventive thinking and creative problem solving to help leaders, individuals, and communities soar.

Josh has been the founder and CEO of five tech companies, which sold for a combined value of over $200 million and is the author of four books including the New York Times Bestsellers, Disciplined Dreaming and The Road to Reinvention. He has invested in and/or mentored over 100 startups and is the Founding Partner of Detroit Venture Partners.

Today, Josh serves as Chairman and Co-founder of Platypus Labs, an innovation research, training, and consulting firm. He has twice been named the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year and is the recipient of the United States Presidential Champion of Change Award.

Josh is also a passionate Detroiter, the father of four, is a professional-level jazz guitarist, and has a slightly odd obsession with greasy pizza.

Learn more about Josh: JoshLinkner.com

ABOUT eSPEAKERS:

When the perfect speaker is in front of the right audience, a kind of magic happens where organizations and individuals improve in substantial, long-term ways. eSpeakers exists to make this happen more often.

eSpeakers is where the speaking industry does business on the web. Speakers, speaker managers, associations, and bureaus use our tools to organize, promote and grow successful businesses. Event organizers think of eSpeakers first when they want to hire speakers for their meetings or events.

The eSpeakers Marketplace technology lets us and our partner directories help meeting professionals all over the world connect directly with speakers for great engagements.

Thousands of successful speakers, trainers, and coaches use eSpeakers to build their businesses and manage their calendars. Thousands of event organizers use our directories every day to find and hire speakers. Our tools are built for speakers, by speakers, to do things that only purpose-built systems can.

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