#awinewith Leanne Hughes
MEET Leanne
Leanne is the founder of leannhughes.com
Find Tiffany here:
In this episode Leanne mentioned some awesome books! Here they are:
Jenny Blake
Nick Gray
Jonah Berger
Leanne’s book!
Transcript
Danielle Lewis (00:05):
Leanne, you are here on Spark TV and you have brought a bubbles. I'm so excited.
Leanne Hughes (00:12):
I have cheers to you from one
Danielle Lewis (00:15):
Coastal liner and soda ring today, which is a little off brand, but it's still going to hit the spot, I think.
Leanne Hughes (00:21):
Definitely. I mean, you are in Western Australia, right?
Danielle Lewis (00:24):
Yeah. So I've just hit, it's appropriate for me to have a drink in my hand, 3:00 PM so it's okay.
Leanne Hughes (00:31):
Well, it is five o'clock over here, that famous song, right? Five o'clock somewhere. So there we go.
Danielle Lewis (00:35):
So good. I'm so glad you've made my day. Okay, let's get into it. So who are you and what do you do? Let's start there.
Leanne Hughes (00:45):
Yeah, it's funny, Danielle, because that's the question that I resist the most, which is the easiest question in the world, and I'm sure it's the same when you talk to many of the founders as part of this series as well. And it really depends on what day of the week and what am I into. Really the underpinning theme is I help founders and business leaders get the best out of themselves and their team, but that emerges in so many different ways and in terms of the methodology as well, from consulting behind the scenes to workshops, to coaching, to advising, to even helping companies create private podcasts. So I love the variety. That's why I'm a solopreneur. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (01:22):
That's awesome. That's like you just designed a business that you love. That's so cool.
Leanne Hughes (01:30):
Yeah, I'm getting that. And I think a lot of, I mean, I do have friends that are actually in very influential positions and that, Leanne, I want to refer you for work. What should I tell people? And I'm like, look, just tell them I'm a great person and you like working with me and we'll take it from there. And I definitely find it. There's a great TED talk about being a multipotentialite and it's a blessing and it's a curse. So it's just navigating that. And some days I'm like, I need clarity. And then other days I'm like, actually, it's cool that I'm okay with ambiguity. So that's where I sit.
Danielle Lewis (01:59):
I love that because I think that there's people who are on different sides of the fence. Some people who are like, Nope, you need to niche down and have a focus and have an X, Y, Z. And then there are other people who are like, no, be multi-passionate. What did you call it? What was the TED Talk?
Leanne Hughes (02:16):
Oh,
Danielle Lewis (02:18):
I like that. That's cool.
Leanne Hughes (02:20):
I love it. I
Danielle Lewis (02:21):
Think people are kind of on two different sides of the fence sometimes. It's nice to hear people the same. I'm like, I'll do a little bit of this, a little bit of that.
Leanne Hughes (02:31):
And Danielle, I remember when I first met you, you were speaking, I think it was an entrepreneur house, and I was like, you are such a dynamic speaker, and I love that. I think you were working corporate in Telstra, is that right? Yeah. And then you started this business and then the way you took it in terms the influencer marketing, and then during Covid you're doing this gin,
Danielle Lewis (02:51):
The hand sanitizer.
Leanne Hughes (02:52):
Hand sanitizer. So I love that. I love seeing that. I find it very inspiring. The fact that the reason I left corporate was I didn't want to be in a box or be in a role. And sometimes you're in a team and they think you can't do things like innovation. It's like, well, it's very much a box life. And so yeah, definitely try to play that, but it does have its challenges. Yeah.
Danielle Lewis (03:13):
Oh, totally. Well, speaking of corporate, was there a corporate career before going into your own business? What's your history?
Leanne Hughes (03:21):
Yeah. When I left corporate in 2019, I'd been working for a global mining company in learning and development. And when I kicked it off, actually one of my first gigs was my boss. We were very under-resourced and we had no budget, which was actually great, to be honest. Some story of
Danielle Lewis (03:38):
Corporates everywhere.
Leanne Hughes (03:39):
That's the best thing. Then we're like, okay, who's going to run these leadership programs? And my boss was like, Leanne, you can do it. So he sent me to Canada and I was basically jet lagged. I jump off the plane, I've never run leadership workshops before I get into this group. They're like 30 male mining supervisors. Here's this woman from corporate head office in Brisbane, and there I am teaching 'em about leadership. So that's actually what happened. The reason I started, I've got a podcast all about facilitating workshops, and that's because I had an incident in the Canadian workshop where one of the guys refused to participate in an activity, and then I went on to the next guy and he refused. And I'm like, what the hell do I do to bring this back on track? And so I came back to, I mean, think I sorted it out as best I could in the moment, but I came back to Australia. I rang every facilitator friend and said, what would you have done? And then I thoughts make a good podcast.
Danielle Lewis (04:33):
So what is the advice? What the hell would you do if you were in a workshop and not getting the best out of people?
Leanne Hughes (04:40):
Yeah. Well, I mean it really comes back to preparation and I think at the beginning of the day we talked about getting outside of your comfort zone and the values of the business. So I had these flip charts there. So I kind of brought it back to that and then reinforced it, reinforced the agreements, and then went to the next person. And I was praying to God that I'd just come up do the damn activity and it worked. But a lot of my friends were saying they would've maybe called a break in the moment and had a chat one-on-one with the person just to address it and to be seen, but not to call out the person as well. Yeah, I definitely think the prep, I don't know if that would happen now because maybe I wouldn't have done that activity on the first day. It was actually quite, getting people to step up and do an activity in front of their peers is actually quite a hard thing to do when you haven't really built the trust. So I mean, we all
Danielle Lewis (05:27):
Learn from these. It's quite daunting for participants.
Leanne Hughes (05:29):
Definitely most people
Danielle Lewis (05:30):
For me,
Leanne Hughes (05:31):
Let alone,
Danielle Lewis (05:32):
Well, most people don't want to get up in front of anybody, do they?
Leanne Hughes (05:36):
No. No. And that's why actually I like facilitation. It's actually not about you. It's about what can you get from the group. And so one of the best phrases I heard in my podcast was, if you can stand in service, you can't be nervous. So it's all about just switching that focus onto, I love that I'm in service of the group here and what am I doing to support this and get the best out of them?
Danielle Lewis (05:55):
Yes. Oh my god, that's just a great philosophy for showing up and doing anything inside your business.
Leanne Hughes (06:02):
Very true. I never thought about bringing it back at that level. You're right. But even I was working with a client today. I did something called the red carpet experience. That's why I'm drinking bubbles now. Oh
Danielle Lewis (06:12):
My God. I saw that on your Instagram stories. What is this?
Leanne Hughes (06:16):
Yeah, actually we talk about nicheing, right? So I don't niche at all, but I niche when it comes to an offer. So this was about, I was just brainstorming one day, I think I'd worked with a client that I was just like, that was a terrible experience. We weren't aligned and they weren't getting the best. And what would be a really great experience like, oh, it'd be great to hang out with someone, work on their business, get them some clarity. I can do it for other people and drink champagne on rooftop bars.
Danielle Lewis (06:46):
Oh my god, in,
Leanne Hughes (06:48):
I'm in this sounds amazing. Well, and other people are into, so this lady flew from New Zealand, amazing Joe, and we hung out and did that today. I'm wondering why I brought that up. What was it in relation to? But
Danielle Lewis (07:03):
I think niching down, you said you niche down when it comes to a particular product.
Leanne Hughes (07:08):
That's it. And that's why I keep it. So it is just a wide variety of offerings depending on I guess what I feel like.
Danielle Lewis (07:14):
That's so cool. I love it. I mean, it's interesting you said reflecting on an experience you had that wasn't particularly fabulous and then looking at it and going, okay, well what would a great experience look like? I literally just wrote that down because I am like, wow, actually I feel like sometimes in business we get so focused on delivering for our customer that we kind of wake up one day and go, I don't really like working in my business anymore. But imagine putting that hat on, then that spin on it to actually say, well, what would an amazing experience look like for both of us? And then creating a product around that. I think that's super cool.
Leanne Hughes (07:59):
And just engaging your best talents and strengths. Because even when I reflect on that poor experience, I was being pulled into a space that mainly probably wasn't my expertise. I knew that I could do it, but I didn't really even believe in it. And it was probably more so a quick cash grab to be completely honest. And then when I flipped it, I thought, how do I amalgamate the best talents and service of someone else? And who was that type of person? And buying into that experience of the red carpet, much like this podcast, we're both having a nice drink and having just a chat, having that experience, having that language around it, it really elevates it. And you do get the best out of the people that come along to that party.
Danielle Lewis (08:37):
Totally. And I just think as well, there's so much of the same out there. It doesn't matter what industry you're in, you can look around and have your pick of a handful of people that do the exact same thing no matter what product and service you provide. But I love the idea that if you create an experience, it's innately going to be different than everything else on the market. I think that's a super cool way to look at it.
Leanne Hughes (09:03):
And I mean, I talk about that a lot when it comes to selling your workshops is like, what do you call it? And even when Covid hit, a lot of my work with workshops was flying around the world and delivering in person. And I'm like, okay, that's gone. What the hell do I do now? And I honestly didn't know Daniel. So rather than do market research, which for me and the energy is like, oh, I would hate to do market research, but I went on a listening tour and even reframing it in my own mind and people were like, oh, I'm going to jump in that listening tour. And they felt great. I felt great. It was market research in disguise, but giving it another name again gave it that different type of energy and feel.
Danielle Lewis (09:43):
Yeah. Oh, that's so clever. I love it. I love it. I love it. Okay, so just reflect on that. So obviously you started your business in 2019, you said, and then Covid hits, and you are in a space where it is very face-to-face. What was that all? How did you adapt? What was that experience like and impacted what you do today?
Leanne Hughes (10:08):
I was actually very grateful. I had been jumping on planes delivering. I was pretty exhausted. I didn't realize it until I stopped and I actually loved, I know that sounds terrible. I know there's a lot of tragedy and everything else, but for me personally, I actually really liked having space to just stop and not have to see people, which is strange. I do people sometimes I just need to recharge. We
Danielle Lewis (10:28):
Need a break sometimes, don't we?
Leanne Hughes (10:30):
Yeah. But what surprised me then I just jumped on because I wanted connections. I just kept jumping on these Zoom calls and I'm like, actually, these are quite exhausting. But the interesting thing about my podcast was then people were asking me, Hey, our clients, I want us to deliver these remotely. What the hell do we do now? And so I was kind of with the guests that I'd get on my podcast in my Facebook group, we were all sharing ideas and we just, honestly, I think we were just cutting edge in terms of what these virtual workshops were looking like and how we engaged and jumping on virtual happy hours, just testing technology. It became actually awesome for my business because if anyone listens wants to learn about workshops, they'll notice there's a series of 50 episodes, which is purely about the best tech tools, how to engage virtually, how to read virtual body language, all of that. So again, just pivoted with the times and became really responsive to what people were after. So it all moved, but it was actually great. I had all these global clients and working from my spare bedroom, and that's kind of continued as well. So about 60% of my clients are virtual around the world, 40% in person.
Danielle Lewis (11:34):
I love that. Do you think that there's still, do you think we've gone completely back to in person or do you think it's still a bit of virtual, a bit of in person, like a bit of a hybrid? What do you think?
Leanne Hughes (11:45):
Where do
Danielle Lewis (11:45):
We land?
Leanne Hughes (11:46):
I think it really depends on the leader of the organization. If you look at Elon Musk, he was like, right, come on back in. Now the scary thing about that, I don't mind Elon, I think what he's done has been pretty tremendous and people bag him, but what has he done? It's pretty amazing what he's doing anyway. He needs the whole manifesto around bringing the people into the office. And so I know Meta and Google are trying to do the same thing, and a lot of other organizations around the world look to these companies as sources of inspiration, but I really think it reflects the level of trust within an organization and old school leadership is for people to be productive that we need to see them. Absolutely not the case. Whereas you've got, so it's definitely hybrid, but it really reflects the culture of the leader, their level of trust and their belief around what is productive, what is an output, what is a result? I find the companies that are embracing it are actually being, they're able to recruit talented people. They don't really have a problem with that. It's the people that don't are finding it very challenging.
Danielle Lewis (12:51):
I do feel like you've got to almost offer both. It's really interesting. I find that I just reflect on my own working style, and as a business owner coming from corporate, I really struggle not to work nine to five. And of course I've got clients as well, so they're all online, nine to five. But I struggle with the mentality of if I'm not behind my laptop between these working hours, clearly I'm unproductive. And I kind of berate myself, oh, you should be working right now. I'm like, why do I still think that
Leanne Hughes (13:27):
It's so hard to break that? I'm with you. I'm totally with you. And there's a really great activity. My friend Jenny Blake, she wrote the book Pivot. She's former Google career development coach, and she just gets you to sort of plan your ideal day and what that looks like. And honestly, for me, I love working with us client. So tomorrow morning I've got a call with someone at five 30 in the morning. Perfect. I love that. Then by seven, I've won the day already, go do this exercise, come back. I feel like as business owners, most of the great ideas are outside. They don't happen in front of a screen. The screen is for execution, but the creativity that all this red carpet, that idea came from just being at a cafe and just not even on to work. But you're right, presenteeism culture is still raining. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (14:14):
Totally. And it is so funny. There is this literal thing that happens to me at 5:00 PM when I become more productive and I become more, it's like this weight has lifted off my shoulder and it's like, okay, now I can think clearly in control of my own destiny, and I get so much done after in air quotes, after hours because there isn't the stress of you should be doing it right now and productive. It's bizarre.
Leanne Hughes (14:42):
And that's why I do a lot of great work on holidays when everyone else during the Christmas break, everyone's like, come these beautiful holidays because we don't have kids. So we're not going on holidays when there's school holidays. That's ridiculous. We've got holidays when everyone else is back. Yes, good strategy. I like that they're all away. And I'm like, you're right, because there's no temptation of checking your inbox or anything else because nothing's coming through. Everyone else is on break, and I find that same as you with your 5:00 PM rule way of working. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (15:08):
Totally. It's so good. But I think you are right. It is just a hard habit to break. And then I kind of think about, okay, well if I have that instilled in me and I should be innovating and thinking whatever, how hard is it to actually create something within inside an organization where you give that freedom to your employees? That is hard.
Leanne Hughes (15:33):
It is. I've got a friend that works for a massive oil company and she works crazy hours. Her manager is in London, so I caught up with her for brunch the other day, and she was, this is Friday, she's back on a call her at seven 30 at night. I'm like, this is ridiculous. And so something that I did, so I did some coaching in a mining organization a couple of years ago. Now the hard thing, I mean working in corporate is that everyone's got, it's like calendar Tetris, remember that, where you're just trying to get book in meeting times. But then I also know that everyone hates meetings. Honestly, no one wants another meeting in their calendar. So I said, something that I've been doing is it's called Leanne on Demand. So I offer asynchronous voice note coaching. Oh, that's cool. So I could be at the dog park.
(16:16):
It's answering a question, but I said to my friend, why don't you and your manager have a voice note set up to work asynchronously, and then you can pick it up at your own time. You're still getting the verbal cue. I mean, Danielle, you have a podcast. People really, audio is very intimate. You can really build up relationships just through audio, and you're also responding when you're in a good mood, you're moving around, you've got the time to respond, as opposed to, I've got to be at this meeting, we've got to fill the 30 minutes. It's just, yeah,
Danielle Lewis (16:45):
It's so true. And it's really interesting. I had a meeting with someone with a client yesterday and they're like, oh, should we have X, Y, and Z on this call? And I was like, no, absolutely not. Because they'll just sit there for 30 minutes to an hour and listen, and then I'll end up writing out what we're doing anyway. But it is interesting. You are so right. People don't want to be on meetings. There is just this old school mentality of how we did things, and I absolutely love the voice note idea of being able to go back and forth. I mean, I guess we have chat slack and teams and those types of things, but you're right, when you hear somebody speak, you kind of get the sense of urgency or clarity. And sometimes when you dunno how to explain something, actually writing it in a sentence is like, I don't even know what to tell this person to do. But if you're in a voice note, you can kind of go kind of like this. You can articulate it a lot better. I think that's genius.
Leanne Hughes (17:47):
It's honestly the best. I remember working with this maintenance manager and everyone's like, oh, this guy's so busy and he'll never have time. And of course he didn't, but then we became, I feel like he felt it like a walkie talkie. So we were just doing this for six weeks. I couldn't fly up because of Covid. Then by the time I got to site, we were hugging, we were just best mates. Oh, that the power of a voice note, oh my God,
Danielle Lewis (18:08):
It's cool. I just love it. It's like think outside the box in terms of how you get work done rather than and how you deliver outcomes. I know we kind of started with that idea of time versus outcomes. Yeah. Thinking about, I guess not the delivery method first, think about what you're trying to do. Are you trying to connect with someone? Are you trying to get a result? And then think about the delivery method you can wrap around it.
Leanne Hughes (18:36):
Yeah, exactly. And so the second 2019, I was calling myself a facilitator. So anytime someone came to me, I default to the methodology of a workshop. And that was a real problem because hang on, what is the result that we need to create? What's the experience needed here? And then you design from there. And I think it's kind of good strategy is that rather than projecting where we are right now into the future, actually just pause. Think about what is the ideal future? What do we need to do to shift here to get there? So yes, there's a few elements in that.
Danielle Lewis (19:07):
Okay, well, I've just redesigned all of my businesses while we've been sitting here, so thank you so much for that.
Leanne Hughes (19:13):
Anytime, totally happy to help.
Danielle Lewis (19:18):
No, but I think it is. It's very cool. So talk to me then. So taking the leap from corporate career to starting your own business, what was that?
Leanne Hughes (19:28):
I was definitely ready when I was working internally. I actually started a podcast, the podcast, when I was working in the business. So I was kind of building an audience in the time, and I gave myself a 12 month type of runway. Actually, it wasn't that. It was more like if I can deliver a leadership session in Mongolia, once I get Mongolia, I'm out. I've been to Canada,
Danielle Lewis (19:47):
Why Mongolia?
Leanne Hughes (19:49):
I just love the people that I was working with. I thought it was such an exotic place. And then my boss sent me that. Obviously she didn't know. That was my goal to
Danielle Lewis (19:59):
Awesome.
Leanne Hughes (20:00):
Yeah. So I got back, but through the podcast, I developed a lot of very strategic relationships. I wouldn't call 'em that, they're just actual friends, but they became very helpful in providing guidance and partnering. I mentioned Jenny before. One of the best gigs I got. So I basically read a book pivot when I was working internally, I was basically, I accepted this job. I felt like I wasn't even contributing. I felt like a very small fish in a big pond. I read this book and I realized it wasn't the organization, it was me. I wasn't seeking out opportunities and stepping up. So this book changed my life. I connected with the author Jenny in New York. So one of the coolest things out of leaving my job was she's like, oh, Leanne, I'm running a pivot workshop for Chanel in Paris. Would you like to come along and co-facilitate? Stop it.
Danielle Lewis (20:45):
Stop it.
Leanne Hughes (20:46):
She flew me Paris, and there I am. I'm like, what the hell is, it was so bizarre. Here I am with my hero. It was like, tick, tick, tick. The best. You can't even imagine how amazing that was.
Danielle Lewis (21:01):
And this is from you having a podcast, you reading a book and you taking the leap and reaching out to the author.
Leanne Hughes (21:09):
Yes.
Danielle Lewis (21:10):
Holy expletive. It's not a sign to take action and kind of leap, take a leap of faith. I don't know what it is. That is so cool. What was that? Oh my god. What was it like?
Leanne Hughes (21:24):
Honestly, what it was like was, even as I'm sitting at the airport in Brisbane, I'm like, something's going to happen. This is not going to, this is just, this can't
Danielle Lewis (21:31):
Be real.
Leanne Hughes (21:31):
This is not real. Then I'm in Paris. I'm like, okay, the workshop won't happen. What was it like? Incredible. And we get along so well. So she's my new book. We're very good friends now working. Well, the actual workshop was interesting because I've never worked with French people before, but they're very Jenny's American. I'm Australian. When you start a workshop at nine o'clock, you start at nine o'clock over there, it's more like, okay, it starts at nine o'clock, but we'll saunter in at nine 30. We'll have some coffee, we'll have a smoke. Everyone looks so well. Honestly, the first question was, what the hell do I wear to this workshop? Right?
Danielle Lewis (22:10):
Yeah. Oh my God.
Leanne Hughes (22:12):
Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (22:13):
For Chanel. Hello. Oh my
Leanne Hughes (22:14):
God, I know. And yeah,
Danielle Lewis (22:16):
Picturing a room full of fabulous people, like, oh, I would freak
Leanne Hughes (22:20):
Out. Oh my gosh. And then we went the catering. I've never seen catering like this before.
Danielle Lewis (22:24):
Oh, wow.
Leanne Hughes (22:26):
Yeah, so the whole experience was amazing. And being in Paris and then being with Jen. Yeah, so that was pretty amazing. That was what, September of 2019. And I was very fortunate to have gigs that year, India, Hong Kong, Singapore, just through connections. So I kind of leapt out of the gate, and then Covid kind of halted me. I learned how to pivot Now in year four, it's really funny because I get opportunities now and I think, oh, I don't want to do that. And whereas I know in 2019 I would've leapt at the opportunity to do that. So there's growth there. At the same time, I don't feel like I've grown. How do you feel about that?
Danielle Lewis (23:01):
It is really interesting, actually, that idea of in the early days, yes, you do, right? You're like, I've, I've got to say yes to everything. And I actually don't think that's a bad thing. So I think now for me, saying yes to everything is a bad thing, but that's only because I've said yes to bad things and experienced it and taken the time to figure out what I like doing, what I don't like doing, but also what works and what doesn't work even. It's interesting, I'm actually going through this right now. I've got somebody who we are pitching, and I know I'm kind of on the fence about whether we should take them on as a client because I don't think they value the space as much as one should value the space. And I'm like, am I really setting myself up for failure? Is anything we deliver actually going to be good enough because they already don't value it?
(23:56):
So I'm in that moment of just coaching them and educating them and getting to that point of will we or won't we? But the only reason I feel like that is because I've delivered two really crap clients. I've had campaigns fail and gone, why did that happen? And learn from that experience and kind of gone said yes to everything, had the good and bad, and then taken the time to reflect on why things happened. But I think you have to go through that. I actually don't think it's a bad thing. I think you have to go through that to figure it out, because there are other people that would be better suited in our industry to serve some clients. So I'm like, there's never a, and also, I think sometimes in the beginning, you don't quite have the abundant mindset yet, so you go, oh my God, this could be the last client that ever asked me to work for them.
(24:53):
When you do realize that it's unlimited, there is unlimited potential for my WOOWOO people while I'm dialing in, then it's like it is okay to say no to things that I know are not best for me, best for the business, best for my team. That is okay, because I've gone through all of those learnings and now know what we stand for and what we're good at, and there will always be enough clients, revenue, blah, blah, blah. So yeah, I do agree with you, but I think you have to go through it first to get to the point where you're like push back on some things.
Leanne Hughes (25:33):
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. And our biggest learnings are in the biggest struggles as well, and there's multiple, it's so funny when you reflect and try and dissect something, and even I was thinking about this client the other day, it's like, what would I have done differently? And in hindsight you're like, oh, these are the things I would've pulled up. But that's great in service of future opportunities. So you're absolutely right. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (25:56):
Totally. And it is interesting. I like that you said that the growth is in the struggle, the challenges. It is interesting. Someone was talking to me about problems the other day and I was like, well, if you don't have problems, you're probably not doing anything interesting. You're probably not innovating, you're probably not growing. You're probably not breaking boundaries or whatever. If you have no problems, you're probably just living a fairly ordinary life.
Leanne Hughes (26:25):
Actually, my business, I
Danielle Lewis (26:26):
Seek out problems people.
Leanne Hughes (26:28):
I agree. And it's just a different grade of problem. But my friend, I shouldn't say my friend, but he is, I guess, I dunno if he'd called me his friend, my business coach, Alan Weiss
Danielle Lewis (26:37):
Now officially a friend.
Leanne Hughes (26:39):
Yeah, he's like gold. Yeah, it's official now. He's the rock star, the godfather of consulting written 60 books on it. But he says, the only way that you're coasting is if you're going downhill.
Danielle Lewis (26:50):
Yeah. Wow. I
Leanne Hughes (26:51):
Love that.
Danielle Lewis (26:52):
That is so true. And I mean, I think there's the difference between, I know I don't like the hustle culture mentality, but I also work my ass off. I will go above and beyond and probably work too much, but also, it's a really funny balance because I also talk to myself around, this is easy, this is easy work, this is easy money. This is like flow. I love this, but I'll still work till midnight to get a deadline done or whatever. I think there's an interesting, yeah, we've got all this language that I think is just in competition with each other and it's, I feel like you've all got to just figure out what works for you and what values you have and what makes you feel good and yeah, it's interesting.
Leanne Hughes (27:44):
Yeah, and I think often we go to experts be like, oh, what's their, I know Tim Ferriss, he always shares morning routines. You think, oh, if I do that, but I think it is actually just getting clarity on the way that you work. It was funny, there's a podcaster in the Netherlands. She flew over to Brisbane. She stayed with me the other week and she was like, oh yeah, it looks like you work so hard. And she was hanging out with me. I'm like, no, I really don't. I don't feel like I do. I think I'm fast and efficient, but basically I'm thinking about something for so long and then I get to the computer and I can work very fast, but I don't feel like I'm burning the midnight, or maybe I really enjoy what I do so it doesn't feel like work. But same as you. I use language. Let it be easy. Let it be fun. How do I fall in love with this process? Really call, actually, I know we're talking about, I was just saying about we follow experts and see what they do. There's a guy called Ali Abdel on YouTube. I dunno if you follow him. I don't. But
(28:40):
He's amazing. One of his time management hacks was he'll start a day by asking, what adventure am I going on today? And
Danielle Lewis (28:48):
I love that.
Leanne Hughes (28:49):
And then he'll just play the Harry Potter in music in the background as he goes on this adventure. And
Danielle Lewis (28:53):
I'm like, oh my God, that's so cool. It's
Leanne Hughes (28:54):
Really fun. I've tried a couple, I'm not going to do it every day, but when I'm like, okay, I really need to focus on this, what's the adventure?
Danielle Lewis (29:02):
That's awesome. It's funny how it's just a reframe.
Leanne Hughes (29:06):
Yes.
Danielle Lewis (29:07):
It's literally we have the power to reframe almost any situation
Leanne Hughes (29:13):
We do. Yeah. It's all perception.
Danielle Lewis (29:16):
Yeah. And setting yourself up for a great day or a great week or a great project or a great whatever, just that kind of how you talk to yourself and how you frame it. I think it's so powerful.
Leanne Hughes (29:31):
It is. It is. And it's funny. I love practical things and hacks and tactics, and then you go do any online course or go to any conference and it's all mindset and you're like, come on man, just give me the intro. But you're right, it actually is here and what you're saying and how you're talking to yourself. And it's funny when I hear people's language sometimes on the way that they describe what they're doing or I'm like, I'm not creative. It's like, I just want to, you go over there and not shake them. Like, Hey, it doesn't have to be that way. It does sound a bit, but it's true.
Danielle Lewis (30:05):
Well, it's really interesting. I literally had a conversation with someone yesterday and they were saying the thing, whether you're getting things done or not, it's literally 80% mindset, 20% productivity. You say, what is the hack? Or what is, I've got a time box or I've got to do the Pomodoro technical Half the time it's just like you procrastinating in your head because for some reason you don't think you want to do the task. Actually, when you do it, like you say, sometimes it's that thinking about, okay, how's it all going to come together? And then when you do sit down and smash it out or, yeah, it is funny. I know we're woo wooing a bit today, but it is so true. Your mindset does I think, account for so much in business or in life,
Leanne Hughes (30:52):
But on the same token, actually just doing stuff, getting reinforced by taking action builds in that confidence, which reinforces the evidence. You know what I mean? You
Danielle Lewis (31:02):
Totally
Leanne Hughes (31:03):
Have to. Yeah,
Danielle Lewis (31:04):
There's a good one. Do you know Jenna Kutcher? Yes. Yeah. So she personally,
Leanne Hughes (31:09):
Yeah, we wish.
Danielle Lewis (31:12):
She says it's when you marry the Woo and the work. And I'm like, yeah, you've got to set the intention, but you've actually got to sit down and do the job.
Leanne Hughes (31:22):
Yeah, I'm reading. That's fantastic. Jonah Berger, he's got a book, it's called Magic Words. So he is a researcher at Wharton Business School. He's written contagious and invisible influence. A lot of his work really influences the work that I do, but he says, rather than seeing things as a verb, see it as a noun. So there's a difference between, and I think James Clear talks about this as well, rather than saying, I am writing today, it's like think of the identity as I'm a writer. So rather than I need to wait my bed every morning, the identity is how am I being a tidy person? Same thing with, and I mean his whole research is about the power of words and how they can really shift our behaviors. So I mean, while we're saying it's some research to back up what we're saying,
Danielle Lewis (32:05):
Oh, totally. Oh, this is scientific. This is very scientific.
Leanne Hughes (32:08):
This is totally scientific,
Danielle Lewis (32:09):
Scientific. But I mean, it's interesting. You see the Instagram quote tiles with, stop calling it your little business and start owning it because I think women do that a little bit as well. We kind of downplay things, and that's Australian too, not wanting to promote yourself too much, but you've got to think about that language that you're associating with things and how it makes you feel.
Leanne Hughes (32:34):
That's right. And yeah, I think so. And I think even starting sentences off with just the whole minimizing thing, but even when people say that you can see their body language kind of cascade in and kind of cave in as opposed to the shoulders back. I mean, they even say your physiology and how you stand move. My friend again, all these people, my friend, but this guy Nick Gray, he read the book Two Hour Cocktail. Have you read the Two Hour Cocktail Party?
Danielle Lewis (33:04):
No, but that sounds awesome. Tell me
Leanne Hughes (33:06):
About it. Yeah, it's an inspiration for my book, the two Hour Workshop, I saw this guy on Twitter and he basically wrote a book. It's basically how to adults make friends to our cocktail party. So it gives you, it's like a 250 page book. I'm telling you how to host a cocktail party, so how to invite friends with the invites and everything else. So I ran one and I want to run another one for my Peloton friends, but Oh, cool. It's another idea if you move cities or it's just a really great way, low key way of meeting people and introducing other people. But he talks about main character energy.
Danielle Lewis (33:42):
Oh, cool.
Leanne Hughes (33:43):
Isn't that cool? You know what I mean? And you kind of know what that means, moves with purpose. And I feel like, so physiology is also important relating to the self-talk that we have as well.
Danielle Lewis (33:52):
Oh, absolutely. And that's even, it's a very Tony Robbins esque to talk about. So when you are in a funk, one of the quickest and most powerful ways to fix it is to change your state. So it's like if I've been hunched at the laptop all day and I'm frustrated and I'm not being productive and I can't do it, get up, get up and run around the house, or do star jumps or that physiology. It is all connected to our energy.
Leanne Hughes (34:20):
Yeah, I mean sometimes you're right, I'll just be on a Google doc and I'm just scrolling around and then I'm opening browser tabs. I'm like, what the, you not
Danielle Lewis (34:28):
Doing anything right now.
Leanne Hughes (34:30):
Maybe it might take me an hour to be like, what the hell have I been doing? I've just been mindlessly, and you've got to just pick yourself up out of that. I think that's a challenge sometimes is actually just breaking it yourself.
Danielle Lewis (34:41):
Yeah, you do have to be a little bit, I think. Talk to me about your book. You've mentioned it twice, and I'm obsessed with our business owners writing books. Talk to me about what it's about and how is the process of writing your own book?
Leanne Hughes (34:56):
Okay, so this is version one.
Danielle Lewis (34:58):
Oh, that's so cool. It looks awesome. I
Leanne Hughes (35:00):
Love, yeah, it's called a two hour Workshop blueprint. So honestly, Danielle, when I was reflecting on last year, I got very frustrated. I wanted to be an author last year and didn't happen. And honestly, there was anger. I was really angry at myself, but that was good. I channeled the frustration into doing it. So I was speaking at a conference in California this year in February. I said to myself, I'm not going to this conference without a book. It's just not a thing. And on the 1st of January, I started writing it and then what date was it? In 23rd of February, it got delivered to the hotel in California.
Danielle Lewis (35:36):
Holy shit. Did you self publish on Amazon or
Leanne Hughes (35:42):
You talk about the process? I'm doing a very co-creation process, so I've released version one and I've put it out for early feedback. I've had 500 comments and version one. So this version one is early draft. It's still very valuable, but I've had things like Leanne, too many metaphors. Typical,
Danielle Lewis (36:00):
Thank you.
Leanne Hughes (36:02):
So I've had incredible feedback, so now I'm working through the feedback to launch it through Amazon.
Danielle Lewis (36:06):
Awesome. That's so cool. That is an awesome process.
Leanne Hughes (36:11):
Well, because you marketing it as you do it and getting validation, that was the most
Danielle Lewis (36:15):
Important thing. People are now into your process. People will be following this process.
Leanne Hughes (36:21):
Yes. So I called it then the workshop Wingmates, and we have a WhatsApp group, alliteration I love and so on there, sharing behind the scenes of what's going on. And at the conference it was pretty incredible. People are running up to me trying to grab books, and someone actually said to me, Leanne, I'm running a two hour workshop in two weeks. This is the perfect book and I want to help her. So yeah, actually the framework I use is the Spark framework, so very similar to the work that you do.
Danielle Lewis (36:48):
Cool. I love that.
Leanne Hughes (36:49):
The word. Yeah, it is.
Danielle Lewis (36:50):
It just goes with so many things. I now have to stop saying things like, let's bring a little spark to your business. I'm obsessed
Leanne Hughes (36:57):
Now. It's such a great word. I mean, look. Yes, wearing the sparkles, drinking the sparkles.
Danielle Lewis (37:02):
Oh my God, you are so on brand. I'm so happy. How did you find the writing process? Did you find that you were just, this is happening or was it difficult or?
Leanne Hughes (37:15):
There was a point where I hit the cave, so I've been talking about facilitation for 200 episodes. So I've refined the key things and I've taught clients, people how to run workshops. The hard part was picking it. The hard part was scoping it down and being very narrow. Everyone was saying, Leanne, write the workshop playbook. I'm like, it's too generic. I want it very specific. I can actually then really help people. But I did hit a wall. I sent my first version to my dad to review, and he's like, I can't even read the first chapter. That's just waffle. Oh
Danielle Lewis (37:45):
God. I love people who are honest, like honest. It is so good.
Leanne Hughes (37:51):
Yeah, he was right. And I couple up with my friend Jade. She's a visual illustrator and just very good at simplifying things. So I tell her the intention over a coffee, we workshopped it, and from that moment on, I actually went to handwriting it because when I get on a computer, I get very distracted by, even with the apps, I want to open YouTube and just read the news. But I just talked myself to a cafe every day and just wrote the chapters, and then my editing process was jumping onto the computer and drafting it.
Danielle Lewis (38:19):
Oh, that's a great idea. I've never heard of anybody do that before.
Leanne Hughes (38:21):
Yeah, my friend Brendan actually recommended, well, back to that question, how do I fall in love with the process? I was not falling in love with it by sitting in front of this screen. I was falling in love with it by going to cafes, eating cool breakfasts. That's awesome. Awesome.
Danielle Lewis (38:35):
The experience, oh my God. Back to the experience.
Leanne Hughes (38:41):
I've got this, my philosophy a lot about workshops. People think you about the content. It's the experience that matters.
Danielle Lewis (38:46):
Yes.
Leanne Hughes (38:47):
Everyone's like content doesn't matter anymore. You can get all the content online. So why would someone come to your workshop for the experience?
Danielle Lewis (38:54):
Oh my God, I love that. That's just again, good metaphor for every business ever, though you are right. If you want to do anything, you can Google it and watch a YouTube video, read a blog article, take a short course, whatever. Everything exists. But the experience or your way of working is the secret to attracting customers, I
Leanne Hughes (39:17):
Think. Exactly. Yes.
Danielle Lewis (39:20):
That's
Leanne Hughes (39:20):
So cool. And so how you run your business is also you talk about being on brand. How you deliver things is just showing that, right? That you're just demonstrating in the way that you are, but that you show up. Yeah.
Danielle Lewis (39:31):
That's so cool. I love it so much. I'm literally thinking through all the things I do and how can I just make it more amazing so that it's unfor unforgettable? I
Leanne Hughes (39:41):
Think you do that already. I honestly feel like you do that already. That's why you are where you are. I think you've had that. I think maybe you've done it already. We're just servicing it and making it. I think you run your life that way. It seems
Danielle Lewis (39:54):
That way. But it's interesting. I am a strong believer in you should always be improving and always be optimizing. And I subscribe to the philosophy that it's never going to be perfect, but I can show up every day and make it a little bit more perfecter than I was yesterday. Yeah,
Leanne Hughes (40:16):
Design workshops, I get into that trap as well of tweaking things endlessly. And sometimes it comes a point where it's like success not perfection. Yeah, I hear you.
Danielle Lewis (40:25):
I love that. Well, on that note, I feel like we could sit here and talk forever. So I'm going to ask you one last question to leave some wisdom with our Spark community. What has been your biggest lesson? So moving from corporate to running your own business. You've been in it for four years now. Has there been a learning that you would pass on to a future business owner?
Leanne Hughes (40:52):
I think the biggest thing is when I think on anything that I do is no one actually cares what you do. And I know you can see that two ways. So the one way is, oh, no one cares, poor me. Or it's like, actually no one cares. I'm going to be refreshing and do whatever the hell I want. And the reason I was having a rant about LinkedIn today, because I go on there and it's super vanilla, and I think it's based on what you were talking about at the beginning of this conversation is we've been corporate indoctrinated and we feel like to belong, we've got to be like everyone else now.
(41:24):
Yeah. What I do. And people go like, oh, how do you do this stuff? Because LinkedIn seems like, I don't know, people will feel like it's like a weaponized social platform or it would be professional, but no one actually cares. People scroll on and move on with the day. Everyone is so self-absorbed, and I know that sounds terrible, but honestly, we all are. We all care about what we're doing. No one actually cares. Just go out there, have fun, give it your best shot. Yeah. Any offer that I hand out, there's no ego attached. I do things to validate the market and I move on if it doesn't work. So I know that.
Danielle Lewis (41:56):
I love that. I love that so much. I think it's just so important to underscore, because I just think about, it's obviously Spark. I often have the sales lens, right? I'm always, I'm trying to teach people how to sell themselves and their businesses so that they can grow. And I just feel like the thing that works is exactly what you just said. Just go out there and do it. Just give it a go and bring your own personality to it and stop worrying about, because you're right, nobody does care. And so the more you show up as yourself and the more you put yourself out there, the people who are going to be your people will come and find you. But you're so right. I think there's this innate fear that people do care and are judging us. That holds so many people back from putting themselves out there.
Leanne Hughes (42:45):
The amount of overthinking, and we are not our own market. We don't know. So just throw it out, see what sticks and move on. It's pretty much all digital, the work that we do. So edit the sales page. Try again.
Danielle Lewis (43:00):
I love it. You are incredible. Leanne, cheers to you. Thank you for coming on Spark tv. Thanks for the interview. Absolutely incredible. I literally couldn't have, I just filled a page of trying to secretly take notes while you are writing, so that was awesome. I appreciate your enthusiasm and honesty with the Spark community. So good.
Leanne Hughes (43:22):
Oh, thank you. You are awesome, Danielle. I'm so impressed with what you're creating. So well done to you. Cheers to you.
Danielle Lewis (43:27):
Thank you. Cheers.
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