Hello and welcome to the travelling introvert. Today I'm going to talk about the fact that you don't need a mentor, you need a champion. And there is a huge difference. Mentors and champions are two important figures in the professional world. Both offer guidance and support, but there are key differences between the two.
 


And so many times I hear people saying they need a mentor and expecting that to come for free, which is a whole other conversation. Mentors are typically more experienced professionals who take on a protégé to help them develop their skills and knowledge. That mentor protégé relationship is built on trust and mutual respect and the mentor provides advice and feedback to help their protégé grow. Champions, on the other hand, are advocates for someone or something within an organization. They use their influence to promote their protégé or project within the company.


 


And they work to ensure that that person has the resources they need to be successful. They already know that you can do the job and so they promote for you and fight for you. While both mentors and champions can be helpful in professional development, it's really important to know which one is right for your needs. So as I mentioned, a champion is someone who can help you accomplish your goals. So usually people have been successful in their field and are willing to share their knowledge with others.


 


But they tend to be people who go and be above and beyond the call of duty to help you succeed. They're the people at work who will always have your back. They're the ones who fight for you when you need it the most. Champions are the ones who make sure you get the credit you deserve and they're also the ones who help promote you within the company. So that's the difference between a mentor and a champion.


 


And we all need a champion in our lives in some way, shape or form. So how do you even go about finding a champion at your workplace or even outside of your workplace? Look for people who are always willing to help you'll find that a champion is someone who is always willing to sort of lend a helping hand, whether it's the project or just offering advice. Look for someone who is a strong advocate for others who are in your position. A champion is someone who will speak up for you when management isn't around.


 


And they'll also be your biggest cheerleader during reviews or promotions. Think about attending events like conferences, meetups or anything sort of work related or not work related, but events related to your field of interest. And start networking with people there. You may be able to find a champion among those attendees. Now, in today's working world, it's more important than ever to have a champion.


 


Maybe also a mentor, but a champion in your corner. A champion is someone who believes in your potential already and is willing to fight for you, whether that means helping you get a promotion or being a standing bo

You don't need a mentor, you need a champion

Hello and welcome to the Travelling Introvert. Today I want to talk about being a manager. Whether you've created this role yourself or you're new to being a manager and how you need to craft and create a peer support system. Now, you may have been a manager before, you may know everyone at your workplace, you may have been promoted to be a manager so you know everyone and you know what's going on, or you might be a new manager in a new role in a new company. Either way, you need to have a support system during the first 90 days of any new role.
 


It's super stressful and having a support system is beneficial in many ways, not just for the first 90 days, but for your ongoing success as a manager and a leader. Now, when you're thinking about setting up your peer support system, the idea is for you to get a system that helps you feel supported and helps you manage stress and is a go-to group of people humans that you can go to about work stuff. So, for example, I was working with someone who has crafted their own position within their job and they're the first person that's done it. They took certification and now, like the other director of Insert Bank here, they've never been director of anything in any other organization, don't have experience in this role in any organization or any other organization. So they don't know what they don't know.


 


While they know the culture of the company, while they know everyone that they work with, they don't know really huge gaps that they might have in their learning just because of the way certifications are made these days. They don't necessarily cover a lot of real world scenarios and nothing gives you more experience in working in different types and sizes of organizations. So this person has gone out to try and create their peer support system of fellow humans that work within her industry as well as outside of her industry, but have the same role or job title, or have had the same role and job title previously because they can help fill in the gaps of what she does and doesn't know. Not only that, having insight into other industries and other verticals and seeing how they do things will help them figure out what might be missing from their work. For example, after getting this group of peers together, she figured out that she needed a better infrastructure and policies within their workplace and also just generally software.


 


The company did not have software to track general things for this particular type of work. Not only that, it gives you people to go and bounce ideas off who aren't part of the work, click or don't know about the drama and aren't involved in those sorts of things. It gives you a space to learn and to grow and see how different people deal with the type of situations that you have or how they've dealt with them in the past. And everyone learns together. And so there's nothing better than having that feeling of nonjudgmental support when you are in the first throws of

Why new managers need to build a peer support system

Hello and welcome to the travelling introvert. Today I want to talk about how you can view your business as a creative project. Now, as an introvert, you may or may not see yourself as a creative person. I definitely have struggled with seeing myself as a creative person only to have creatives look at me like I'm got two heads and don't understand why I don't consider myself to be a creative person. However, you too can view your business as a creative project and this might help you tap into your creative side and help you come up with new and innovative ideas.
 


And so I want to talk about some tips on how you can go about viewing your business as a creative project. Whether you be a freelancer, sellerpreneur, a small business owner insert word here. So start off by defining your creative vision. And for some people that's their values. For some people it's their mission statement.


 


What is your creative vision? Do you want to help introverts around the world build their careers and get hired? Or do you want to stamp out imposter syndrome? Do you want to make sure that every flower has a shady spot to rest in? Whatever your creative vision is, define that.


 


And then as part of that, develop a plan that supports that plan and that vision. But make sure it also supports your creativity. And keep in mind your time management, your energy management and things that are important to you. For example, maybe you're about anti hustle, maybe you're about five minutes a day is enough. Whatever it might be, make sure that your plan supports this.


 


Then set aside time on a regular cadence to brainstorm new ideas that could be every week, every quarter, every month, or whatever works for you and your lifestyle. And then keep a journal or book or to do list or whatever it might be of your thoughts and ideas. Having a place to dump thoughts and ideas is really helpful. Some people call it second Brain. Just a way to get it out of your head and try and take on new challenges and experiment with new things.


 


Don't be thinking that once you try things that are the be all and end all and that's the way it has to stay, we really get caught up in thinking that once you try a thing, that's the last thing you can do and if it doesn’t work, that's the end of it. It's an experiment, it's a creative project. Another thing that's really important is don't be afraid to delegate or outsource tasks that don't support your creativity. If you are not into writing outsource to delegate it or find a way to do it differently, like voice to text. Find different ways that support your creativity so you're not being sucked into things that drain your creativity.


 


Also be open to feedback from others, of course, constructive feedback. And embrace change and embrace failure. As part of the learning process. Not everything is going to go right, not everything is going to go perfectly and not everything is going to go the way you think it's going to g

How to view your business as a creative project

Hello and welcome to the travelling introvert. Today I'm going to talk about leadership. I was talking with a client the other day and it was a group of managers who were in for some leadership training. And the first question is what makes a leader a leader? And this led to like a 45 minutes discussion and conversation between what makes a leader different from a manager or from an influencer.
  
 Some things that came up right now is that how being a manager is considered to be old school and very rigid, and more about giving people tasks, and how a leader is like the new cool kid on the block. But people really couldn't identify what makes being a leader different. One person was like, well, a leader is someone who gets followed. People follow you if you're a leader. Which led to the conversation about, okay, so there's a bunch of people on Instagram with thousands of followers.
  
 Does that make that influencer a leader? And they were like, well, not necessarily that's an influencer, it's a little different. Okay, so what makes a leader a leader? And they were like, okay, well, people have to trust you, all right? Don't people trust their managers?
  
 Sometimes yes, sometimes no. So there starting to be a degree of separation between what makes a leader a leader and a manager a manager. Then we started to talk about inspiration. Leaders inspire people. That's something that they all agreed on, that they are inspired by leaders, but they themselves did not feel that they were inspiring, yet they consider themselves to be leaders.
  
 And yes, different people will inspire different types of people because not everyone inspires everybody. You will inspire someone who aspires to be like, you right, but it is a form of leadership. And then there was the question, can everyone be a leader? And they were like, huh? So then I flipped it and said, can everyone be a manager?
  
 And they're like, no, no, no. Good. Managers gives tasks in a clear way with timeline, expected turnaround. They answer questions, they give examples of what done looks like.
  
 They explain why it's important managers do a very specific thing. Okay, all right, so very clear definition what a manager is and very specific people can be managers, but not everyone can be a manager. Yet so many people are in management area or roles who shouldn't be there, according to a lot of people. But leaders, anyone can be a leader because anyone can inspire someone else.
  
 And just because they don't know that they're inspiring somebody else doesn't mean that they are not a leader. Every one of us has someone that looks up to us. And it might not be everything that we do, it might be one thing that we did. That person is like, oh, wow, that was awesome. I'm inspired by that.
  
 We might not know it. Most of the time we don't know because it's very rare someone comes up to and goes, you inspire me. And to be honest, if they did, I'm not sure how our reactions would be right. Bu

Everyone can be a leader not everyone can be a manager

How to know if you are micromanaging yourself

Do you struggle to be heard at work? Many introverts do. Maybe you are compromising your authenticity. Maybe you feel it affecting your health, happiness & family time. I help introverts find their voice while being true to themselves. Visit the latest podcasts (an oldie but goodie - rerun from November 2020, and download the worksheet to explore where you are on the journey to being heard.    

How to work with Extroverts

I'm grabbing another one from the archives for you this week, and this is a classic one to talk about how you can make your work visible, as well as doing sort of a mini skills assessment to see your areas of strength and your areas of growth so you can access this free four part mini assessment. And let's start by making you the star you deserve to be seen.
 https://janicechaka.activehosted.com/f/83 (Grab the free assessment here)
 Hello and welcome to the travelling introvert, or the not so travelling introvert. Today I'm going to talk about why you need to regularly assess your skills. I think something that happens as we go through life and we come across a problem, we deal with it, we move on to the next problem or move on to the next thing. And there's a kind of time of year where people are planning for the next year and looking back from the previous year and we tend to look at what we've done, what we've accomplished. And one thing that really needs to happen is to regularly assess what skills you have and what you've learned or what you need to change or what isn't useful anymore.
  
 And we don't do this enough. Anyone who wants to improve and prosper, even your professional or your personal lives, you need to make time to assess your skills. And this can be, I don't know, every quarter is a good way of doing it. I mean, when you're an employer, you know often employers will have a yearly assessment, feedback and so on and so forth to make sure that their employees are learning and growing with the new company. This is because it benefits the company as a whole.
  
 If you improve your team, the company improves and the bottom line improves. And so, whether you're an employee or an employer or just entrepreneur, regularly assessing your skills is really important. And so think about these things. When you are assessing your skills, what can you do to improve your quality and speed? Productivity is a crucial attribute for successful people.
  
 And to do this, you must improve your quality. And by doing so, you'll take less time doing things. After all, getting more done isn't good enough if it's not done well.
  
 Also, when you're regularly assessing your skills, use it as a time to self-reflect. Self-reflection is vital for successful career business life in general. It provides time to look within yourself and see where you can improve and what you've accomplished. So putting this in your calendar on a regular basis and making it a non-negotiable is a way of doing this. Now, when you are thinking about assessing your skills, also think about your strengths and how you can maximize those and all lead to new ones.
  
 Repeating daily life stuff can make things easy to ignore what you are truly good at. So reflecting and testing your skills and reassessing your abilities will allow you to focus even more on areas that you are great at and allowing you to perfect that skill even more. And on the flip side, of course, is also unders

How to make yourself visible at work

This is a great one for the archives and it's currently what I'm doing right now. I would love to know how you prioritize yourself. What things do you put in place to put yourself first? Be it your needs for recharging, be it your needs for creativity, be it your needs for just being able to get 8 hours of sleep. So how do you prioritize yourself first? And please go ahead and let me know in the poll. Do you, number one, engage in self-awareness and development through digital content? Kind of like this? Number two, do you work with a coach or mastermind group like myself? Do you three have a gratitude and mindfulness practice that you engage in? And number four, do you never really prioritize yourself? Let me know and enjoy listening to this episode. Bye.
  
  
 Hello, and welcome to the not so travelling introvert. Today I want to talk about prioritizing yourself. I'm guilty very much of not doing this. I don't want to say I'm a regular basis frequently enough and one of the worst things you could ever do is pile on the guilt of wanting to have some time to yourself and putting yourself first. In fact, putting yourself first is really the reverse of being selfish.
  
 Because of that fact, there is no reason to feel guilty. I want to talk about some of the ways that you can be helped by prioritizing yourself. People who care about you will respond healthily to you finding time to put yourself first, especially when it comes to your health and happiness. Because they want you to be happy. If you tell them that these 15 minutes, an hour, a day, a particular activity that you do alone is important to you and why they truly care about you, they'll respect it.
  
 And even if they don't first and you explain why, they see the benefits of you getting that time to do what you need to do and prioritize yourself. Then they will understand. Don't get me wrong, even your best friend at times might take advantage of you if you let them. But it's not that they don't care about you or they even mean to take advantage, it's the fact that if you just say yes, they assume you wanted to say yes. Try saying no or not right now or let me check my calendar.
  
 Or actually I'd prefer to do blah blah blah set boundaries. So you help yourself to prioritize yourself. When you have some downtime, that's just for you to do whatever it is that you love doing, whether it's reading, painting, walking, meditating, coloring, all of those things. If you put aside downtime for you to do these things, you will be a happier person because you get to do things that you enjoy. So you will enjoy life more.
  
 And let's be honest, prioritizing yourself is a requirement, not an option. The fact is you shouldn't feel guilty for doing something that is a requirement in your life. It is not optional for you to take care of yourself. If you don't take care of yourself in the way that you know best, you won't be productive or happy and you can't blame other people for that. And the

Put yourself first

I said no this month. When's the last time you said what you really wanted to say? No. I said no this month and yes to myself. I'm doing a little bit reworking on my programming and so using this time to bring back some of the most popular episodes from the archive. Now, this particular one is about saying no. You might need to say no to request for your time, to borrow your work, to borrow your materials, or even just wanting someone invading your personal or office space with an in person meeting. Here's the thing. No is a complete sentence, but sometimes that doesn't feel just right. So to help you to prepare for the inevitable, grab the https://thecareerintrovert.com/index.php/no/ (download) and get your best no face on. No is a complete sentence.
 
 Hello, and welcome to the travelling introvert. Today I want to talk about, and I've talked about this before, but saying no and how to do it the right way it's super easy to feel guilty and want to avoid conflict or simply want to make other people feel good. However, if you don't say no, it can consume your whole life on how other people react and you might get stressed because of other people's happiness. Your happiness is kind of more important. So, in fact, saying no more often is crucial to come to your goals and aspirations.
  
 And actually, it's something that I've struggled with the past couple of weeks where I wanted to say no and I wanted to set boundaries. I found it incredibly hard and so this has been helpful to me. No is not always a negative. Behind every no, there's also a yes. So what I mean is, when you say no, you're also saying yes to another opportunity that can better serve you in your life.
  
 Just because you're saying no doesn't mean like no right now and no forever. Saying no means that you're committed to your values and goals and your boundaries. And you can always say yes without considering everybody. It's fine. The sad truth is, you will always need to think about yourself first.
  
 Establish and stick to your boundaries. The only person you are responsible for is yourself and you can't expect others to know what you need. If you don't speak up, say something practice, assertive communication. Always speak up about your boundaries. And don't be afraid to let others know if they can't respect your boundaries, you don't need them, they're only going to hold you back.
  
 You're only going to feel guilty and resentful on a whole bunch of other things which will just get you down and have you feeling overwhelmed. And I know it's not that easy. So finding the right words is hugely important. You don't just say no. There are other ways to let people know why you can't do it.
  
 Suggest an alternative or provide a reason why you can't do it. Let them know that it doesn't work with your schedule or your timing is wrong. The more you can communicate and the more information you can give them. As far as I'm not doing this because of X, Y and Z, we'll stop them askin

Ways to say NO

Stop feeling guilty about self care

Things to do for your staycation

Speaking up is hard do

The lies we tell ourselves

Being sick as an introvert

How much approval is too much
  
 People pleasing doesn’t have to be a life sentence.  But, it can be common problem. This can be normal as we are part of a social and professional system that requires a very wide range of inter-relational skills for us to be happy, appreciated and successful. So, you might be wondering:  what makes a people pleaser? How people-pleasing shows up in your work, social life and more. In fact, every area of your life. And what you can do about it.
  
 I will cover the following on this episode.
  Red flags that someone is a people pleaser.
 Dealing with people pleasers.
 How to overcome people pleasing and approval seeking tendencies.
 
  
 Hello and welcome to the not so Travelling Introvert. Today, I want to talk about being a people pleaser or some people might see it as having a need, a deep need for approval, almost like an addiction.
  
 Receiving validation from other people feels good for a lot of people. So, good that some people kind of develop almost an addiction for receiving that outside approval and take more weight in getting that outside approval instead of being motivated intrinsically. And therefore, they can't motivate themselves without somebody else's approval. It could manifest as if you're obsessed with people going to express interest in you.
  
 Maybe you like being on social media, dating sites, or any situation where you can attract people and get their attention by having them express an interest in you. It might even be hard for you to settle down with like one human because you enjoy having people express an interest with you rather than just having that interest from one person. Maybe you need constant reassurance to make sure that your friends and family are not mad or upset with you.
  
 Maybe you're often overthinking little confrontations and so you often ask for reassurance about how somebody feels about you. You might like to talk about how awesome you are and this can be weird, like, especially if you lack confidence. But some people who aren't confident will talk about all the impressive things they've done to appear worthier than they think they are, in the hopes that people hearing all the things that they've done will agree and validate their thoughts about said awesomeness, even though they might not believe it themselves.
  
 You might find someone who is that really craves attention, loves to name drop. Do you find someone like name drops people who you may know who they have worked with or know a friend of a friend in order to make themselves look more important? This is a sign can be a sign of insecurity, especially when it's not done within context. So, that can be an issue.
  
 Some people will go ahead and make friends with folks based on their wealth or their reputation. So, they look around at their close friends group and they might think, well, this person's rich, this person is a doctor, this person X, Y, and Z. But they might not know a lot about the

How much approval is too much

Hello and welcome to the not so the travelling introvert. Today, I want to talk about people or client facing jobs. A lot of the time, the assumption is as introverts, we can't do client facing or public facing or high touch jobs. And that is not the case. I know I've spoken about how I used to work in casinos, and that is very much a people skills job, but I want to just talk about some ways that could help you through when you're thinking about jobs or you're in a job that is a people facing job.
  
 So one of the things that I talked about was the fact that even though the casino job was very people facing, we got brakes on a regular basis. So that was one of the reasons why that job was a really good fit for me was because I got a lot of downtime in between the people facing time. And most jobs have that cadence. There are very few jobs where you are facing and dealing with people all the time. And even if that is the case, there are ways of finding those moments of solitude within that that help you recharge.
  
 For example, if you have a job where you're on the road a lot and you're going to sales meetings or client meetings and going to different offices, that time in between when you're not at the client's site where you are planning the trip, sending emails or just travelling to said site is your gift of downtime. That's when you can go ahead and recharge and think things through and gain second wind or third wind. So you might have five meetings a day, but in between and that might just be like a busy period of the month. A lot of people have a cadence with their jobs where the start of the month is really busy or the end of the month is really busy. But the middle two weeks are not as busy.
  
 Use those middle weeks as and block out time to do focused work and recharge work. Every type of job has a cadence, and it is for you to find that cadence and make it work for you.
  
 And that's like one of the things that you need to think about when you're thinking, oh, no, it's a people facing job. I can't do that. That's not necessarily true. It's just finding a way that works for you. Now, say you're in a sales role, and a lot of people, when they think about sales roles, are like, you have to talk all the time and you have to go ahead and smooth.
  
 And that's not necessarily the case. A lot of the times, it's a lot of emails, a lot of the time, it's just listening to the other person, figuring out what their specific wants are, what their pain points are, because they could be talking about one thing, but really what they need help with is something else. So one thing that you can do to help you get through that or figure out what works for you is to role play do it on a regular basis in different ways that people could react to you and figure out what you would say and what you would do just like you would practice for an interview to make sure that you feel comfortable do the same thing for that role and you know, if you're more

How to survive public facing roles

Quick Networking Tips
  
 Networking lets you connect to a variety of helpful people — everyone from potential business partners to new customers — and promote yourself. It doesn’t come easily on learning how to network and build relationships with smart, successful people. But when done right, networking is genuine, comfortable, and extremely valuable for both parties. But how do you get started? And how to do it effectively.
  
 I’m sharing the following insights on this episode.
  How can get the most out of networking events.
 Ways to connect with speakers and audience.
 Things to consider before starting.
 
 Hello and welcome to the not so Travelling Introvert. Today, I'm going to talk about events online or otherwise. A lot of the times there are certain things that you can do in advance of an event and after an event to make networking easier.
  
 So, the first thing is start networking before you even get to the event. Normally, when you are told about an event, there will be a list of speakers or a website with a landing page that has information about who's running the event, what organizations are involved and you can go and look and do some research on these people.
  
 Say you're going to an event and there's twelve speakers. Go on LinkedIn, take a look at the speakers. Normally, you'll be able to find them and maybe their contact information or connect with them on LinkedIn, send them a message like, “Hello, I've seen that you are going to be speaking at this event that I'm attending. I'm very excited to hear your talk on [insert topic here] really looking forward to it’. Let them know that you are looking forward to hearing from them.
  
 If you don't want to connect on LinkedIn, most speakers, when they're at an event or advertising for an event will have their contact details, how they prefer to be contacted. So, if they don't have their Twitter profile up there, don't go and stoke them on Twitter. Contact them the way they wish to be contacted and let them know.
  
 Now, feel free to also email or contact the producers of the show and let them know that you're excited about the show and that sort of a thing. Review the schedule or the program before the events start, make a list of the talks that you want to hear and then put those in your calendar so you're not going to miss them. And then make sure that you have time to attend.
  
 Also, give yourself time before and after to prepare any questions that you might want to ask or do further research. Afterwards, because a lot of the time these things run over, they'll leave time for questions and you just might need to refresh or just recharge after that event. So, those are a couple of things that you should do where you don't have to network just at the event.
  
 Now when you're at the event, for example, if it is a Zoom event, normally you would see people's names or their organization names and their names in their Zoom window. If there's someone who's ta

Quick networking tips

Why constructive criticism is important?
  
 Have you ever wanted to give constructive criticism on something, but held back from doing so because you did not know how to convey your ideas across? Let’s face it, it can be hard to give or receive criticism no matter how it is delivered. But getting comfortable with offering and receiving practical, constructive criticism is helpful to deliver better results, find motivation, and strengthen relationships.
  
 In this episode, I will discuss the following:
  What is constructive criticism and its importance.
 Practical strategies to give and receive it well, and what to avoid.
 Benefit of accepting constructive criticism.
 
 Hello and welcome to the not so Travelling Introvert. Today, I want to talk about why introspection, retrospection, and criticism can be the key to success. Constructive criticism -- That's feedback that you get from others, intending to help build you up and provide you with more information and data or tools to help you improve in some way. It's not meant to harm you, it's not meant to be personal, it's not meant to feel like an attack.
  
 And, a lot of people aren't very good at giving constructive criticism, but also in general, accepting criticism. Proper criticism can open-up doors and opportunities that you might not have been aware of before, leading you to more success and happiness closer towards your goals as long as it is provided respectfully. And I want to talk about reasons why accepting constructive criticism can lead to more success. It tends to improve your awareness and your focus. When others provide criticism, it unlocks key bits of information that you might have otherwise overlooked and over time, in doing retrospectives and reviewing, it can help you notice patterns and vital details on your own, and therefore improving your skills and understanding of what to do next time to be more successful, the more information and data you have that you actually review and take action on, the more that you can improve.
  
 And by improvement, I mean it inspires personal growth. When you know that others will provide a valuable feedback, it motivates you to do better before the information is even given. In addition, consistent feedback improves your awareness, which fuels your determination to keep improving and growing. And, this is why, lots of companies should have regular reviews, not just once a year. If you want to provide someone with valuable feedback, the more often you do it and the more constructive you do it, the more the better you're going to get out of that human.
  
 Because at the end of the day, it's helping somebody understand themselves. So, when you're thinking about constructive criticism and accepting it, this helps you increase your understanding of yourself.  Within constructive criticism, of course, there are likely to be variables that detail who you are as a person as opposed to something else. For example, your boss may have not

Why constructive criticism is important

You are not alone in your introvert struggles
  
 In today’s world, it can be hard to be an introvert. Introverts face many struggles, as we navigate extrovert-biased workplaces and social situations. Often, introverts feel exhausted and overwhelmed by the sheer pressure to be more extroverted and like to have ample alone time to recharge and feel at our best. Unfortunately, not everyone understands this.
  
 In this episode, I will share with you the following:
  Understanding the struggles that introverts might be facing.
 Some of the most successful introverts in the world.
 Providing a perspective that you are not alone.
 
  
 Hello and welcome to the not so travelling introvert. Today, I want to talk about some struggles that introverts might have, but also the fact that you are not alone. So, by understanding why you might struggle with certain types of communication or certain things, it means you can better explain yourself to other people. For example, extroverts in your life, and for example, conversation, due to some perfectionist tendencies and just also not wanting to interrupt or various other things. A lot of introverts don't speak up or interrupting a conversation because they're listening and absorbing.
  
 Even when you have something to say that you might not feel it's going to be insightful enough, or you're just listening and you want to have deeper conversations. So, just letting people know that oh hey, how's the weather isn't the best conversation starter for you. You might neglect phone calls. You probably much prefer text or email or asynchronous types of communication because you can skip the small talk because that's socially acceptable in those forms of communication. But phone calls, it's a little different.
  
 You might even find yourself procrastinating and making important phone calls or return calls even to those that you care about. Or for example, just to get your dentist. You must feel energized enough to be an enthusiastic participant in the conversation, which can cause you to put off making calls even if they are vital. You also might find it difficult to think in groups because you need to think before you speak and because you might need silence while you ponder. You might find it challenging to participate in a conversation where there are comments and ideas flying everywhere.
  
 You may feel that you can't gather your thoughts well enough to contribute to the conversation because you're still processing and because of this, big groups might exhaust you. When you have to be around a lot of people, especially when you don't know them, you might feel exhausted fast, and one reason is because it involves a lot of meaningless small talk which we talked about before, which doesn't come naturally to us. Introverts and putting in that much effort can wear you out along with the pace of the conversation and you wanting to think and then sort of feeling left behind almost because the conversation has mo

You are not alone in your introvert struggles.

Hello and welcome to the not so travelling introvert. Today I want to talk about client Privacy. So many times there are Facebook groups, popup Facebook groups or posts on social media celebrating that this person and that person and the other person has joined this particular coaching group or coaching program. Or there is a group in Facebook and people join and there's a welcome to the group and listing all the names on that particular post. So here's the thing.
  
 A lot of people who reach for coaching services, no matter what kind of coaching services they are, are doing so expecting a certain level of confidentiality and Privacy. And I know that a lot of coaches use their hey, join my group and hey, these people have joined. Look how popular this group is to make that fear of missing out thing that much more palatable. But at the same time, what they are doing is destroying their credibility, destroying their clients trust in them because of the lack of confidentiality and Privacy. So many times I get asked, hey, why don't we see a bunch of testimonials on your website?
  
 Or hey, let me know the people that you have worked with. Or why don't we see you posting about all the successes that your clients have? And the simple fact is, my clients come to me because they want help in their career. More than likely they don't want their boss or their LinkedIn friends or their Facebook friends knowing that they are seeking help and support to maybe change careers, maybe start their own business, maybe just do better or get a promotion. They don't need people to know that and they don't want people to know that.
  
 So those of you who are out there looking for your next coach or mentor or insert word here, keep in mind that you want them to keep your information private. You want them to keep your information confidential. Not everything is made to be splashed around on social media. It's fine if they get your permission. That's also the reason why I don't run a Facebook group for my clients that I coach.
  
 Because putting them all into a group means that then things pop up like, oh you might know such and such because you know the Facebook algorithm, right? Oh, you might know such and such. You should ask them to join this group. Oh, such and such is in a group that's similar to yours. No matter how private you make that group, people can still take screenshots of things you say in that group and post them to other places.
  
 Nothing is truly, truly private if it is in a Facebook group.
  
 So when you are thinking about who to work with, take a look and see how they treat their clients. Are all their clients splashed all over their social media, with or without permission? Or do they just give examples that are anonymous because then they're more likely to keep your information private and confidential. That's also one of the reasons that clients work with me is because they don't have to be on video with me. I respect their Privacy.

The Traveling Introvert

The Traveling Introvert

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