I've got to give Alex a huge shout out.
Alex Empolipo has been one of the best leaders I've ever met.
And we, you know, it took him a year of dealing with my audio clips sent to him as a non-podcaster,
kind of bothering him about his leadership and mentorship to where I finally joined PodMatch.
And he was just such a great leader the whole time.
And now I get connected to amazing guests like you because of it.
And you're super on the ball, Lorraine.
And how many people have fun playing with your name the way I just did?
I love puns.
You know what?
They either play with the puns or I get the related to Lucille.
Yeah, no.
And that's a certain demographic.
Younger than that demographic, people have no idea who she is.
But she's my hero.
I do like her.
But here in Indiana, the ball family is a big deal.
They made and you probably have seen them, the ball glass jars.
I mean, they're everywhere.
That very distinctive ball logo.
They have a university named after them.
I assume we're not talking about Lonzo Ball and the basketball playing family that's also
more like the Kardashian family these days.
Yeah.
So I'm not related to any of those people.
That's all right.
You carry your own unique weight and fantastic light.
So we're talking about you've been in the game of podcasting since 2009, officially
2010.
It is so fun to see this industry just explode and expand.
And it's bringing the opportunity for visionaries to come out of the woodworks and masses.
And I'm excited for what's ahead.
What have you seen as what are some of the biggest changes you've seen in podcasting
over the last 14 years?
So I think the biggest changes is when it first started, it was really just internet
radio.
And most of the early podcasters, we were following the format of traditional radio
programs.
We were locked into this 30 minute window.
We had openings and closings and one of the things as the medium has evolved is the freedom.
If you have a 10 minute conversation, it's an episode.
If you have a one minute conversation, it's an episode.
If you want to go on for two and a half hours, go in good health.
Nobody is going to listen, but it makes you feel good.
That's so awesome.
You know what's funny about that though, Lorraine, I will counter on that reality because video
power marketing, we ran that video power marketing is known as the YouTube ad experts of the
world.
Jake Larson is one of my absolute favorite mentors in life.
Super super dad.
And they ran some of the most viral video ad campaigns of all time.
One of our top producing at produced ads ever was the one that we were certain was not going
to perform.
It was a 45 minute conversation as an ad of two talking heads, just like us with almost
no branding and background and they were in the retail arbitrage space.
But what happened is those who are in retail arbitrage, they glued to it and they watched
it and they watched it all the way to the end and they had massive conversion results
on it.
And so we were very close to say, do not run this ad.
This will not work.
That's not how it's going to happen.
You don't make assumptions as a marketer.
No, I totally agree with you.
But one of the things that you're doing is you're looking at podcasting during the frame
of today.
14 years ago, there was not the video element.
It was right.
It was an audio.
I mean, there were a couple of 2014, by the way.
Yeah, we weren't that far off.
We were.
We've been in the game a long time too.
But I guess the greater point is if you're providing value and the audience feels the
value of that conversation and you've got the distribution power to get in front of
enough eyeballs, then the people who like you are going to gravitate towards you.
Oh, absolutely.
You know, when my podcast, the podcast itself runs typically 10 minutes.
It's a one to two minute on Sunday morning, 10 to 12 minute interview.
However, I do training and I do hour long videos and there your apps.
I do not disagree that the right content to the right audience.
But that definitely changed that freedom was one of the first things.
Yes.
Yeah.
Thank you, Opus.
By the way, thank you StreamYard.
Thank you, AI Clipcutters.
You know, all those things are super, super helpful to get people by size chunks.
So speaking of resources, before we move on and talk about releasing your inner child
for life's greatest success and what that means to you, and we'll probably dive into
marketing strategy a bit more too.
What are three resources that you recommend for other visionary leaders out there?
So there are three books.
I'm sorry, folks, you're going to have to read.
You can listen to one of the three.
But the three books that I just think anybody who's going to be a leader is going to be
a business owner should read.
The first is Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point.
And if you're not familiar with it and not familiar with the idea of a tipping point,
it is when an idea begins to catch hold, there is a moment where you go from build, build,
build, and it tips into acceptance.
And by looking at his examples of what creates a tipping point, how you built to that tipping
point, I think there are lessons for every business owner, every leader as you're trying
to build that momentum around your idea.
You know, you've got something, but how do you construct the elements all to work in
that same direction?
I loved that book.
The second one is one that, yes, you can listen to.
And I actually really recommend the audio version of the second book.
I've done it both ways and I love the audio.
The book is Made to Stick.
It's written by Chip and Dan Heath.
And it is about packaging an idea in a way that is memorable, that makes an emotional
connection with your audience.
And much like Malcolm Gladwell, there are stories.
It is not a textbook.
It is a story.
And at the end of the story, you either get the lesson or you don't because it's just
screaming off the page.
But because they are such good storytellers trying to teach you how to be a storyteller,
it is a delight to listen to and to see these examples again of ideas that caught on and
how people were able to present the things that they were passionate about and how you
as a leader can do that.
And then the third one is a little bit more tied to my passions around business ownership
and being a successful entrepreneur.
And the book is Get a Grip, an entrepreneurial fable.
And it's by Mike Patton and Geno Wickman.
And I had an opportunity to hear Mike Patton speak in a small group and so really talk
to him about the ideas behind the book.
And I think that's part of what fired me up about it.
But he and Geno Wickman wrote a book originally called Traction, where they introduced the
entrepreneurial operating system, which is a fabulous model for businesses of all shapes
and sizes.
But it really looks at sort of every piece of the structure and from how do you organize
the company to what kind of meetings you run, how you resolve problems.
But to be perfectly honest with you, traction is duller than dirt.
And so they came along with Get a Grip, an entrepreneurial fable, which is a quick read.
I don't think it's more than 100 pages.
But in it, it tells the story of a fictionalized company implementing the EOS process.
And so you can see in real examples, oh, that's how you do that.
Oh, that's where the the oh, absolutely.
That's where your obstruction is going to be.
That's where you're going to run into roadblocks with your team.
So those are my those are my three.
I'm so glad you picked three books that I've never read.
Oh, I'm excited about that.
That gets out of my heart.
And I've read Talking with Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell.
That is a that is a deep, dark book.
I thought it was all about sales and marketing.
And no, no, no, no, no.
That's about influence and realities at a whole nother level.
So I can't wait to get back into the tipping point.
I really like that book by Malcolm Gladwell.
Then I haven't heard of the second one made to stick.
So I got to look at that.
It sounds better to me than Purple Cow.
Not a huge kind of.
Yeah, yeah.
No, I mean, I mean, I love Seth Godin.
Let me give a big, big shout out, though, to I don't want I don't hurt him anyway.
I think that's awesome, too.
And there's just it sounds like there's more depth to Chip's story there.
The Gina Wickman I read Rocketfuel.
I didn't read the Traction one.
Yeah, I'm glad I read what he based that book on first, the E-Myth.
That was that was my big like, you got me thinking I want to find out who the OG of
writing these fable stories is because Ken Blanchard wrote two phenomenal books and well,
several of the two that I read were the one minute manager and Raven Vance.
Then the.
Patrick Lynch, only one of the five dysfunctions of the team and five temptations of a CEO.
Like those you listen right now, we're we're not this is about one up.
This is about filling in the gaps.
This is about you guys.
Like, I hope you read all these books very soon because they literally made life changes
for me.
I hear you say that Lorraine with the you know, the decades of wisdom that you have
to.
I'm like, I've I've heard the I can't believe I haven't heard of these three books.
Where have I been?
What planet have I been on?
You know what?
There are there are so many good books and you kind of get into this niche where you
start following certain people and then you read the books they are reading.
And so that I think that's one of the fun pieces of being on a podcast conversation
like this and meeting people who are coming at it differently.
Yes.
Right.
OK.
So can I can I tell you a data?
All right.
I'm just what I'm pointing out is pain free.
Right.
These are not niche books.
Oh, I'm very well like diverse with what I consume.
And you still know three books I've never paid attention to.
Like this is this is an alignment point.
Wow.
Thank you.
I have to tell you a funny story about Peter Drucker when you hold up that book.
This is what this is my mouse pad.
For a reason.
OK.
No business owners read it.
I'm like, you got to read this thing.
He wrote one surviving thriving on chaos.
And he wrote and he was doing an interview and this interview had to be.
Maybe 1992, 1993.
And I'm sitting at my desk and I'm listening to it on on the radio.
And I hear this interview and halfway through the interview, he's talking about the fact
that companies need to hire crazy people, not just people with interesting resumes,
but people who are out and out.
Wackadoodle.
And I jump up and I go running down the hall to my boss's office.
And I'm like, have you heard of this book?
Have you heard of this man?
This is what he said.
And Frank looked at me and completely deadpan and says, why do you think we hired you?
I know my role in the organization.
The one mistake I made is I didn't listen to the rest of the interview.
It was years before I actually read the whole book only to discover that companies hire
these crazy people.
And the first thing they try to do is cut the corners off so they fit in the round holes
in the traditional organization.
Which is why when I left corporate, my company, which I now sold, but my company was called
Round Peg.
Oh, that's cool.
That's so awesome.
I love that.
My when we before we named first class business, my secondary thought, the one that I was really
pondering before realizing we're more than a marketing company was overwhelming marketing
dot com.
Overwhelming marketing.
I was like, no, we're not we're not going the flow of all this cheap and easy tricks
that no, that's not how it works.
So yes, Dan, if any of you're chiming in, this is evident and obvious from the way you
authentically present yourself.
Authenticity to me and marketing go hand in hand.
I cannot stand the phrase.
Well, that's just marketing.
No, if it's a manipulation of coercion, it's lying and unethical and illegal.
Like we've got things right.
So I'm super excited to dive into your vision on releasing the inner child.
We're going to be right back.
We're going to dive into the vision.
We're going to get to what we can.
I have a feeling if you're at Fort Lorraine, I'm going to want you back on the show to
dive much deeper into these topics.
So without further ado, we'll see you guys on the other side as we dive in and talk about
why it's so valuable.
Be your inner child.
All right.
Welcome in to Vision Pros Live with Jackson Callum.
I'm your show host.
We'll be doing interviews for visionary entrepreneurs and guest leaders who are building fantastic
visions out there.
Hey, hey, what's up?
Welcome in to another episode of Vision Pros Live.
I'm your show host, Jackson Callum, founder and CEO of First Class Business.
And I am so happy today to have Lorraine Ball on the show.
She is a phenomenal ball of energy.
If you don't like puns, this may not be a show for you because I do.
And I'm just going to have fun with her name.
Lorraine is a marketing strategist.
And as we talk about releasing your inner child for life's great success as well, I'm
a big fan of that concept.
The idea that we all have childlike realities within us, curiosity, wonder, awe that often
get buried with growing up and being an adult.
I'm a big fan of that movie Hook where Robin Williams kind of rediscovers his childhood
memories and who he was.
I never really lost it thanks to movies like that.
So with that said, I'll bring on stage in just a minute.
We're going to talk about a few of these sponsors and resources for you.
So the first one is the Law Spot with Melissa Gray.
Because she's an attorney, I almost canceled our show before me.
I was like, man, I don't want somebody coming on as pretentious and condescending.
No, I found somebody who's a super nurture who happens to have the full skill set of
an attorney.
So having been through a $20,000 trademark lawsuit for my own brand name as the co-founder
of Restaurant Connect, we learned some hard lessons about preparing yourself for situations
like that before you're in the middle of them.
So if you don't have somebody that you can trust related to legal, I highly recommend
checking out what she's built.
Then there's Pramila Parham with the Healing Institute.
The Healing Institute is an excuse me, it's a institute for wellness professionals.
And what Pramila has created with her decades and decades of wisdom is the ability to attract
practitioners into a cohort, if you will, or a network of professionals so that those
people who are looking for help can go and filter and see who could help them in their
process of healing.
We're talking about healing coaches, therapists, natural healers.
I'm trying to remember all the different categories that she has.
But her ability to pull people together, to me, doesn't come from a point of AI.
It doesn't come from a leadership position of like, hey, I'm new and young and I'm going
to figure this out.
Pramila is past her 60s.
I'm not going to name her exact age.
That wouldn't be fair or appropriate.
But what she has done to uncover depths of leadership was so evident on my podcast.
And I was like, you know what?
I really want to put her as a resource on here because if more therapists, coaches, and
healers were to connect with her and what she's building, then what she could provide
in terms of a legacy for the rest of us is just absolutely phenomenal.
So I hope you take the time to check that out as well.
Lastly, before I bring Lorraine on, we're going to talk about the water project.
The water project is something that, you know, it's never something I've had to resonate
with.
I've never been without water.
So when it came across my attention that there's millions of people who do not have access
to clean drinking water, I chose to take a deep dive into it and take a look and see
what is this all about.
I found out that children have to leave schools and walk three to five miles to find a potential
source of water that could be unsafe for that community.
I found out that parents and grandparents have to leave work.
And instead of providing for their kids, they're going out and looking for water.
How would that affect my life?
You know, as a provider for my children, what would it be like if my kids celebrated water
the way that my kids celebrate Christmas Day?
And through the painful reality of thinking through that, I was like, you know what, we
can do more.
I mean, why don't we do more?
The water project is doing just that.
They're the ones who are doing the hard work.
They're going and actually helping in these remote areas.
When you click on and select the community that you want to help and you contribute even
just $5 to that, what's really special is they show you the outcome of where your money
went to coming to fruition.
And you get to think about the generational impact that that particular contribution has.
So if COVID economics has hit kind of hard on you and your family and you're not in a
position to do anything as far as financially contribute, you can share this with people
that came to mind.
My hope is that you will share the water project with others that you may know.
The ripple effect of that may bless more lives than you could even count.
And my hope too is that because there's 8 billion people in this world that we can come
together to support and help.
If you know of another cause that means just as much to you, if you could just drop that
in the comments, we'd be super grateful to learn about those causes.
We would like to contribute as well, maybe even host that particular cause on our show
and talk about it.
So without further ado though, we're going to dive right in and hear about Lorraine's
vision.
Lorraine Ball, welcome to Vision Pros Live.
Thanks so much for having me, Jackson.
It's fun to be here.
Absolutely.
And you make it fun.
That's what's really great about you is you have that natural energy to bring fun to the
equation.
Lorraine, what's your vision for the people that you serve?
So I believe that everyone is creative.
I think that there are different creative styles.
And so what I want to do is I want to help people find how they approach creativity,
get comfortable with it and learn how to use it in their businesses and use it, which is
my other passion, strategically.
I do not think that good marketing happens by accident.
I do not think that like mad men, you walk into a room, throw around a bunch of ideas
and out comes an award-winning commercial.
No, well, maybe out comes an award-winning commercial, but it may or may not sell product.
And so it is creativity and strategy and finding a way to blend those two is really kind of
my happy place.
I love that.
I love that image of the left brain, right brain, one where it's artsy and colorful
and one where it's the logic and arithmetic and all that stuff.
And I looked at that too and I was like, oh, I have both.
I'm creative enough to have both.
And aren't we all?
Like all of us have both of those within us.
The pieces are all there.
And there are some people that are amazing artists or get on a dance floor and just creativity
through their toes.
And then there are some people that are like, I'm not really creative, but you give them
a problem and they are what's called on that.
It's Curtin's Innovator Adapter Index.
They are adapters.
They refine and refine and refine.
And if I can give you a kind of an example of the two worlds, Benjamin Franklin outside
in a lightning storm with a kite and a key.
You've never seen anybody else do it.
It was kind of risky, but there he was.
And in doing so, he uncovered the conductivity of electricity.
It took a hundred years and several different people trying and failing and trying and failing.
And I know Edison gets the credit, but a lot of people say it was really Tesla that invented
the light bulb.
But it was an adaptive creative who ultimately took that discovery and made it something
that was usable.
And so part of it is finding out what is your creative style?
Where do you fit on the spectrum?
And then if you're really smart, finding someone who is on the opposite end of the spectrum,
they will make you crazy.
They will absolutely drive you nuts.
But together as you push and pull and push and pull, that ultimate solution is magic.
It's huge.
That's that back to that rocket fuel, right?
Visionary and the integrator relationship.
I'm a big fan of expanding it far beyond that with, you know, there's it's like perspectives,
you know, it's your perspective or my, no, there's perspective across time.
There's different points of view from different angles.
There's I call it the four dimensional four dimensions of perspectives.
So there's there is an amazing opportunity to join forces with others and also to discover
this within yourself.
So shift gears from the typical path.
I like to dive right into releasing that inner child.
What does that what does that mean to you to release the inner child?
And how do you do it?
So the first thing that you have to understand is for most of us, they well, OK, most of
us have been taught not to be creative and it happens in stages.
And I'm going to give you a couple of stories.
So just roll with me.
First one, I'm in a restaurant with my nephew, Stephen.
He's three and a half years old.
He's now a father with a three and a half year old.
So it's been a while.
OK, but I'm in the restaurant with him and my sister-in-law, Karen, and into the restaurant
comes a bald man, not receding hairline.
We're talking shaved head today.
This is very common, but 20 plus years ago, that was not a fashion statement.
So what does Stephen do at the top of his little lungs?
He says, look, mommy, that man has no hair.
Everybody in the restaurant turns and looks at Stephen, turns and looks at the bald man,
and then looks at my sister-in-law, Karen, who is trying to make herself as small as
she possibly can.
As she says, don't say that.
What do you learn?
Keep good ideas to yourself.
So let's go a little forward.
I'm in first grade, and the assignment is to draw a picture of snow.
And as I'm drawing my little picture of snow, I knock over, because I'm clumsy, the glue
that's on the side of my desk.
And as I start to wipe it off, I realize that it's got this great texture, and it looks
like snow.
And so instead of wiping it off, I put more of it on.
And I go up to the teacher at the end, and I'm like, look, I used glue to make snow.
That wasn't the assignment.
Yeah, but it's cool, right?
F. F?
What did I learn?
Do not experiment with new materials and new ideas.
And then I grow up, and I go to corporate, and first real job, we're in a meeting, and
everybody's stressing about this problem.
And I throw my hand up, I'm like, you know, if we made this change, everything you're
talking about would not be a problem.
That is not how we do things here.
Okay.
Keep good ideas to yourself.
And everybody, if you think about it over and over and over again, you have these experiences
that just pound the creativity out of you.
And so creativity is like a muscle.
It is a muscle.
It is a muscle, and you've got to exercise it, and you've got to use it, and you've got
to deliberately cultivate it.
And so the first thing you have to do is go back and figure out where were those moments?
Where were those instances where your creativity was just wham, slapped out of you, and you
pulled back?
And you have to face those moments.
Absolutely.
And as soon as you do, then you're like, okay, now I'm ready to start working out.
So things that I recommend are...
You've inspired me to try one.
You ready?
Yeah.
So my step-siblings and I had a difficult time because of the way our parents treated
each one of us.
My kids are better than your kids because of X, Y, and Z. So we had a challenge there.
My step-sister is quite a bit older than me.
And one day she is trying to convince me to admit that I like Barney.
And I'm six or seven at the time, and I knew my step-brother was going to...
He was up to something with the situation, but there's no way she was.
So I admit, she's talking about episodes.
I'm like, yeah, I really like that one.
I got really into it.
And she's like, ha, he really likes Barney.
And they started relentlessly making fun of me.
So I learned you will get made fun of if you share your true feelings.
And then what do you do with that?
So I read it for you.
So then, no, I didn't like Teletubbies.
I don't like Power Rangers anymore.
I like anything that had to do with touchy-feely, feel-good creativity.
I was like, that's not me.
That's not who I am.
30 years of burying that, well, 25 at least.
Huge. How do we release that?
Well, several things.
And thank you for sharing that because that is such a valid point that
things happen to us as children from other children.
They happen to us from adults and we carry them with us.
And sometimes we don't even realize that we're carrying that.
So the first thing that you need to do is recognize that if you've ever
watched a child learn to ride a bicycle, OK, forward, fall, forward,
fall, forward, forward, forward, you can't go forward if you don't fall down.
And so you just got to try things.
And you've got to go, OK, I'm going to put on my bike helmet now
and I'm going to try this and it might not work, but that's OK.
I'll get up. I'll dust myself off and I'll go.
When my intern said to me back in 2009, you know, Lorraine,
you should start a podcast, I went, a what?
If I had been afraid to try, this is going to be
I would not still be podcasting today.
Now, not everything we did on that podcast was great success.
They were live call in show.
This is not a good mom.
We had a troll do that to us once.
Yeah, no, no, it's no, it's not a good.
But I got up, I dusted myself off.
I said, OK, we're not going to do call ins anymore.
But this part of the show is working and let's build on that.
So the first thing is you can't be afraid to fail.
The second thing is if you think about children.
You watch a young child get out of bed,
they jump out of bed, right?
And they get ready to face the day.
And they do that because they know there's something new
there that they haven't seen yet.
Yeah. You know, you lay in bed, the blanket over your head.
God, the alarm goes off. You hit snooze, you hit snooze.
And so you've got to deliberately look for the new.
It's so nice to have children, too.
I will say that it helps, right?
Because my three year old wakes up and say, Daddy, daddy, let's go.
Daddy, I'm like, oh, cool.
She's already waking up with that exact thing as you do.
Something you can relate to when you have that.
Speaking Megan Ellison that dove in here, I think she's got some valid comments
that I find that people like to water down their creativity
and other people when they can't find the creativity in themselves.
Oh, Megan, that is such a valid point.
And it is one that I'm going to jump to it now.
Ben, and then we can circle back around to the things you do to find
this something new. You have to have somebody in your life
that will allow you to be a child.
You have to have you have to have an agreement with that person
that I'm going to have crazy ideas and don't tell me they won't work.
Don't tell me why they won't work.
Don't don't throw up all the red flags.
Just let me get the idea out.
And I had a friend when I started my business
and a lot of times we would brainstorm back and forth
and we would critique each other's ideas.
But if I came into a conversation and I said, Tony,
I got a crazy idea that was code for shut up and just listen.
And if he said it to me, I did the same thing and just get the idea out.
And then once it's out, then talk about the possibilities.
And that's the first part of it.
But then the second part of it is.
I'm at the other point in my life
where I am now not the youngest person in the room
and I have an obligation to feed
and nurture the inner child of everyone I'm associated with.
So when somebody comes, would come into my office with an idea
and in my head, I'm screaming, don't do that.
It's never going to work. It can't work.
I would smile and I'd be like, OK, let's talk about this.
Because part of it is I did it. It didn't work.
Maybe the person sitting opposite me is smarter than I am.
Maybe they have an approach that I didn't consider.
Maybe something has changed.
Maybe they have more passion.
Instead of pouring cold water and watering down that idea,
your job, and if you're going to be a visionary leader,
I'm going to bring that back.
If you're going to lead people,
you need to create an environment
where crazy ideas come up all the time, all the time.
And you have to give them a chance to come up,
see the light of day and then begin going, OK,
we're going to step out of brainstorming now.
Now we're going to do this.
We're going to move into more of a research phase
where we're evaluating the ideas.
But you never jump to that in the first conversation.
Not if you want truly creative ideas in your world.
I love everything about what you're saying.
And the recipes of what you're saying are so super important.
I, too, have gained some years of wisdom and experience
on the reality of ideas and whether they're dumb or not
and what to do with them.
And we've got to keep that creativity.
I love that you talk about the rules that you set, right?
That you set some, you know, even though people are like,
I don't like rules. No, you just I have a crazy idea, right?
And they know to respect that.
You got healthy boundaries that exist for that to be facilitated.
I also got to look at it from the other.
I'm still on the protection side, though, of like, well, wait a second.
In a world, Lorraine, where 96 percent of businesses are failing
within 10 years in a world where four percent we think are succeeding,
they're not. Most of them are in bigger debt.
Most of them are just better at dealing with the challenges and the problems.
They're still struggling.
Very few entrepreneurs ever figure out how to rinse and repeat
and make it happen over and over and over again.
People's families are they are on the line.
Their livelihoods are on the line.
I don't think that means we have to kill creativity at all.
In fact, the opposite. I think we still need to be creative.
But we also live in a world with AI.
We live in a world where I've had clients I fired because there are
500000 Instagram followers that they are lying to,
and they're not actually providing the services they're going to provide.
So how do we protect both the person that's creating the ideas
or the creative ideas with us and protect the people that are
affected by those ideas and whether they come to fruition or not?
So I think that creativity is a round process.
That's the other reason my company was called Round Peg.
And the first piece and then there are five pieces in it.
The first piece is research.
And this is where you just go out into the world and collect experiences
and ideas and you see something and you write it down
and you don't even know where you're going to use it or why you're going to use it.
But you should always have a notebook or a notepad or a camera with you to just capture it.
So I come back to you, typical entrepreneur, and I say, OK, I did my research.
I asked three people what kind of ice cream they like.
And I'm going to go, Lorraine. I don't want it.
You know, I don't know. Isn't it?
No. OK. And again, read the five step process.
And you got to do all five before you're ready to launch, because five is do it. OK.
And number one is not the little research of I asked three people.
The research is the bigger world view, really getting out and tasting 100 flavors of ice cream
and and shopping in stores that you'd never shop in and having experiences
that you wouldn't have and then reflecting on them.
The second phase is originate.
This is where you sit down and you put yourself in a room with five of the smartest people
that you know. Who may or may not know anything about your business.
They're just smart people and you brainstorm, you ask them questions
and get feedback and ideas and a couple ideas bubble up.
And then you let it go for a period of time.
Give it some again, give it give it that.
Hey, I have this crazy idea. OK, put it out there.
And that idea is out there. It's on the wall. It's on.
It's in the notes. Then you come back.
And it is not until you get to that third phase
that you are allowed to have any critical, constructive, tough conversations.
Here you start to bring things together.
You start to unite from your brainstorming session.
You start to unite some of those disparate ideas and how do they work together?
And then you also in this uniting phase, some things fall by the wayside.
You make some tough calls.
We were going to have 10 flavors of ice cream, but you know what?
There isn't enough market for the pistachio peanut butter combination.
So we're letting it go. You know what I mean?
I agree. Yeah. I mean, I like it.
Yeah. OK, no, not happening. So.
And then. You have your idea, you have this, OK, this is viable.
We've kind of kicked the tires on it.
We've done some supplemental research. We put the pieces together.
Now you've got to have a plan. How are we going to go from this idea to real action?
And somewhere in that originating and nurturing phase, you need to look at the three things.
It's not a great idea if nobody wants it.
And so who are the who are the customers?
Who are they really? What's going on in the environment?
Who else is playing in this space?
Who am I going to be competing with? Who solves the problem differently?
And then what are my real objectives? What do I want from this at the end?
When you've done all of that and you have your your timeline and you know what's going to happen
and you know what it's going to take, now you're allowed to do it.
Now you're allowed to go forward.
And then you immediately go back to the beginning and start looking for new experiences and new ideas.
And start the circle again.
I love that.
That's there's so much depth to your processes.
And I can see the decades of practice that exist and knowing, OK, these are the directions we're going to go.
These are the things that exist to make this a wonderful experience.
It's something that I'm going to be meditating and pondering a lot myself because I love feedback.
And I really like critical feedback.
And sometimes I can be over the top with it, though, and very quickly.
And it doesn't get received the way I wanted it to.
So that's a that's a really, really helpful set of ingredients that can be added to our recipes for anybody out there listening on trying to figure out how do you prepare to expand your vision out there?
Make sure those five people you're masterminding with are people who are supportive in nature.
I would share that as well.
Not necessarily. I'm not talking about yes men who are going to just rah rah.
You along and not contribute, but people who are not going to attack you and negative Ned, you or negative Nancy, you and to submission that your ideas down.
That's not the helpful environment.
What can I say?
One thing on that, the people in the origination phase may or may not be the people you have at the table during the nurture phase.
You know, the people that you want to be originating ideas with are big thinkers.
Again, they are the Benjamin Franklin's of the world.
Okay, when you get to that point that you're really putting down plans that you're thinking nuts and bolts.
And if you want to use the EOS model, you want visionaries up front.
But when you're getting ready to pedal to the metal, you want input.
You want the Thomas Edison's of the world who are going to protect you from too much risk, who are going to pull you back just a little bit to make sure you don't fall off the edge.
Yeah, absolutely.
We, for the sake of time, are going to be shelving our rest.
The rest.
I hope you come back, Lorraine.
We have so many great questions that I want to dive into.
And this is one of those scenarios for you visionaries out there, podcast hosts too, that may feel like you're learning along the way.
Audible's. Audible's are key.
Being able to be flexible and make adjustments for what is, Lorraine, you're just full of a ton of wisdom that I know a lot of these visionaries and leaders need to explore, need to be willing to look at.
And you deliver it with such grace that I'm like, man, I just got to take advantage of this opportunity.
So we tied releasing the inner child to getting results or I said for life's great success.
All right.
Why is it so empowering?
What do we miss out on by not releasing the inner child?
And what do we gain?
So I started my business when I left corporate.
I had three phrases, creativity, collaboration and positive energy.
That was the business model that I wanted to bring to the world.
That is how I live my life.
And to some extent, I am biased because I think that that's how everybody should be.
I think that creative soul gives you a little bit of joy, gives you some excitement.
I think the collaborative elements, when you bring positive energy, people want to be around you.
They want to share in your vision.
And there's too many things going on in the world that are just sucky and a little positive energy helps.
So I think it helps you get out of bed every day.
I think it inspires you.
I think it inspires the people around you.
And the solutions that we need for tomorrow don't exist yet.
And if you're not willing to be creative and you're not willing to look beyond some of that,
I don't think you're going to be professionally or personally very successful.
There's just an emptiness that can kind of come with that.
I can only speak from my own experience or what I've heard from other people who feel like they missed out on their opportunities.
But I was watching JP Sears, the comedian, and I always really liked his episodes and how he kind of made fun of different niche individuals.
And just playfully, and his TED talk is so awesome where he talks about how he didn't have the ability to live within his own skin
and appreciate who he was until he finally decided, you know what, I'm just going to be me.
I was watching that at 33 years old, I think, 32, 33, and saying, I think I'm going to be brave enough to start following that more.
I think I'm going to finally just try to be completely me, regardless of how people are going to feel about it, because I want to feel fully me.
There is a huge liberation that comes with that.
You know, that to me is my definition of success.
If I am able to be my best self and able to work on it openly, that's the type of success that I want.
And the rest is a bonus. Anything that comes beyond that is just a bonus to the puzzle.
So we hope that if that aligns with you and you aren't doing that, I look forward to seeing the shift and transformation that you have in your life.
I'm glad we get to be part of your journey. We will bring, oh, here we go. Megan's back with another comment.
Let's see, my open-minded experiences within a collaborating environment I find the most rewarding.
Everyone's ideas can feed and nurture the bigger picture in different ways that maybe we didn't think about all about finding that support.
Megan, we appreciate your insight as well. We hope you apply to be on the show and share your vision as well.
Those of you listening in, we do have a button in the top right corner that says, Be Our Guest.
We'd be happy to host you. If you've got a vision to serve others and to lift other people up,
whether you're Bill Gates or Jane Doe, it's all about service and helping others across.
Lorraine, is there any final word of wisdom you'd like to share as we wrap up?
I think that if you do one thing today, go out for a walk.
You're only allowed to bring your phone to take pictures. You're not allowed to look at texts.
You're not allowed to be on the phone talking to anybody.
But go out and walk for 20 minutes and find something you have never seen before.
You'd be amazed at how that will change and domino through your day.
We will. Me and my kiddos will be doing that this afternoon.
So I appreciate the challenge. Absolutely. Let's do that, guys.
And then below the episode, we'll have the action steps so you can connect with Lorraine as well.
Again, we'll bring her back for a second episode. We'll be diving deeper into her vision, leadership opportunities and beyond.
Lorraine, this is fantastic. Thanks for being here and Vision Pros.
We'll see you all on the next episode.
Thank you for being here today. I'm really happy that you tuned in to Vision Pros Live.
I'm looking forward to seeing your reactions as these episodes continue to move forward.
This is going to get more and more fun. We'll have more and more engagement as well.
We'll invite people to participate in the show. And thank you for giving us your time and attention.
Have an excellent time building out your vision.