The Influence Ecology podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives, and entrepreneurs and is followed by ambitious professionals in 80 countries and counting.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is hosted by Co-Founder and CEO John Patterson.
Cory Shepherd – Welcome to Your Brain (Ep. 55)
We all think we know more than we actually do. Do you know how paper is made? How does a toilet work? How about a pen? Our species has produced sophisticated technologies, cities, and accomplishments, but most of us don’t honestly know how these things work. How can we aspire to so much despite understanding so little? Perhaps genius is instead found in the ways we co-opt the intelligence of the social ecology: Our collaborative minds enable us to aspire to great things. In the 2017 book The Knowledge Illusion, cognitive scientists Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach argue that we…
We all think we know more than we actually do.
Do you know how paper is made? How does a toilet work? How about a pen? Our species has produced sophisticated technologies, cities, and accomplishments, but most of us don’t honestly know how these things work. How can we aspire to so much despite understanding so little? Perhaps genius is instead found in the ways we co-opt the intelligence of the social ecology: Our collaborative minds enable us to aspire to great things.
In the 2017 book The Knowledge Illusion, cognitive scientists Steven Sloman and Philip Fernbach argue that we survive—and thrive—despite our mental shortcomings because we live in a vibrant community of knowledge, continually drawing on information and expertise stored in the community with which we transact.
Cory Shepherd, president and financial advisor of Sound Financial Group, is a case study in our mantra: Dreams come true in groups. We can accomplish our loftiest aims when immersed amongst an ecology of resourceful, intelligent, and ambitious mentors and peers. Previously, Cory was convinced that as long as he thought positively and worked hard, everything would turn out. Now, he has moved away from laborious work to harness the knowledge and power of the group.
Below you’ll find a transcript of this podcast episode that has been edited for your reading pleasure. You’ll also see links at the bottom of this post where you can find more information on the people and ideas mentioned in the episode.
by John Patterson
Produced by: John Patterson, Jason Kelley & Tyson Crandall
“Everything you want in life can be found in groups.”
John Patterson: Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening, wherever you are in the world. I’m your host, John Patterson, the Co-Founder and CEO of Influence Ecology, the leading business education in Transactional Competence. Broadcasting from Ventura, California, this podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives and entrepreneurs who found real solutions, real results and real satisfaction, not only with work, career, and money, but in every area of life.
You’ll hear how these ambitious professionals found that those who transact powerfully thrive. We all think we know more than we actually do. Do you know how paper is made? How does a toilet work? How about a pen? Our species has produced sophisticated technologies, cities and accomplishment, but most of us don’t honestly know how these things work. How can we aspire to so much despite understanding so little? Perhaps genius is instead found in the ways that co-opt the intelligence of the social ecology. Our collaborative mind enables us to aspire to great things.
In the 2017 book, The Knowledge Illusion, cognitive scientists, Stephen Sloman and Philip Fernbach argued that we survive and thrive despite our mental shortcomings because we live in a vibrant community of knowledge continually drawing on information and expertise stored in the community with which we transact. Cory Shepherd, president and financial advisor of Sound Financial Group, is a case study in our mantra, Dreams Come True in Groups, that we can accomplish our loftiest aims when immersed amongst an ecology of resourceful, intelligent and ambitious mentors and peers.
Previously, Cory was convinced that as long as he thought positively and worked hard, everything would turn out. Now, he has moved away from laborious work to harness the knowledge and power of the group. Here’s the interview.
Cory Shepherd, welcome to the Influence Ecology Podcasts. It’s great to have you here with us.
Cory Shepherd: Thank you, John. It’s my pleasure.
John: I want to give you the opportunity to first introduce yourself if you would.
Cory: My name is Cory Shepherd. I am the President of Sound Financial Group, and the author of Cape Not Required, and also a student of Influence Ecology for little over a year, year and a half now.
John: Fantastic. You live where?
Cory: I live in– It’s a complicated question to answer. I live in Seattle, Washington for the next four weeks, and then a little bit less than that, and then I moved to the great city of Chicago to support my wife in her residency match to pediatric program at Northwestern University.
John: That’s great because you get the come play with us in Chicago too when we do our workshops locally there.
Cory: Yes, it’ll be fun. It makes a move a lot better when I’m parachuting in with some community already there, which is just fabulous.
John: It is, isn’t it? It’s great to have a community around for those reasons. Say a little bit about what Sound Financial Group does and what your role is in it.
Cory: Sure. If I say we’re a financial planning firm or a financial advising firm, it’s going to be wrong, but it’s going to get people close enough to understand the world that we’re in. I mean it’s going to be wrong because I think their experience would be that we’re quite a bit different than any other financial firm that they’ve met with. We have a client profile that’s actually fairly similar to Influence Ecology.
In general, its clients about 250,000 to 1,000,005 of household income. We do income as our measure of what kind of client would fit not assets under management, which is what most folks are used to for financial firms. Part of that is we know that they’re– Getting to a portfolio is a conversation for on down the road because there’s lots of other things to sort out. Lots of other sources of inefficiency or leaks out of the balance sheet to deal with first. If someone needs help getting their cash flow sorted out, we can help them sort out their cash flow, get them saving appropriately, and they’ll become whatever that asset level would have been otherwise in pretty short order, especially for the physicians that I tend to specialize with in my practice.
Doctors come out of school with a lot of debt and a good income and they need some help turning that into the assets and wealth and just resources to have the rest of their life work out the way that they want. I don’t want to wait around 20 years for them to get some amount of assets that would qualify them for a large investment account when I could have probably helped him get there faster. I’ve just seen so many, not just doctors, any anybody at all have life happen with a little bit of naivete around all the consequences and then there’s some time that we could have taken advantage of that gets wasted. They get a few years down the road and they would rather started earlier.
John: I know what you deal with about saying well, we’re a financial planning company because it doesn’t quite say exactly who you are. I think sometimes it helps to say what you’re not or perhaps what it is that we ought to remove from our thinking when we think of Sound Financial Group. Anything we ought to remove from the way we think about a Financial Planning Organization to get a little closer to what you guys do?
Cory: The walnut walls and giant conference table would be the first one. Paul and I, building a business together, both had things like freedom of location and time with our family and pursuing all the different aims in life as a big goal. We figured that a lot of the clients that we would want to work with, but also want those as well. We’re in a location irrelevant environment, meaning we do all of our meetings online with our clients. Even the ones that I currently live very close to in Seattle, we meet with all online for this very reason.
Whether they have an opportunity to move or be somewhere else for a job, and we don’t want them to have to start over with a financial firm and I have an opportunity in my life to pursue and they don’t have to start over and I don’t have to start over with someone new either. I think that would be the big one. Having to drive across town, get both couple into the same room at the same time during the day for a long meeting, none of that. The other is going straight into that question about, are we asset manager?
We do manage assets for clients, but that’s not at all where we start and for lots of our clients, we don’t. Because we know that we’re not right for every client. For the clients that we are right for, we want to spend a whole lot of time with them and do a whole lot of education. We start every client relationship with a fee up front like a consulting contract so that they know they’re paying us for our advice and our advice only so that at the end of that relationship, we give them a roadmap, a set of instructions for here’s exactly what to do to produce all these things that we talked about you wanting to produce, gain efficiency in your accounts, have better outcomes with what you’re currently doing, or the changes to have the better outcomes that you want.
They can either do it themselves, take it to their friend down the street who works for the large firm with the big glass windows and all that, or some combination of the two. The metaphor we like to draw is like the design build architects firms where you can pay an architect a fee to design your blueprint, and then you can either go to whatever contractor you want, or walk down the hall to use their in house services if you’ve got a great relationship and that feels the most effective and efficient for you.
We can actually engage with a lot wider range of people than many firms can that we previously could. My favorite is the do it yourselfer. The person who’s going to create a portfolio on their online trading account and do everything by themselves. They don’t want a single person touching any buttons that do anything to their money. I love those people now because they often are smart enough to know that there might be something that they’re missing, and they just want that second opinion.
They can consult with us once to get a once over, or they could consult with us on an annual ongoing basis just to make sure that they’re not missing anything. We have clients like that that love us for that part of our business.
John: That’s great. To further distinguish how you guys are distinct from a financial planning services company. I experienced that when the average person starts to think, “Wow, I need some financial planning.” They go look up financial planning, and then they go find that on the web, and then they find someone near them, and then they go call that person.
They’re likely to get a similar service or set of products that are traditional. I think that although you might be able to obtain some of those things through you guys, that isn’t your primary focus. Can you say a little bit about that because I think– There are obviously many people at Influence Ecology who know of Sound Financial Group, many of our customers work with you guys and so forth.
Again, people normally go look for financial planning and get what? What might they instead get with Sound Financial Group?
Cory: Folks normally go look for financial planning, and they get a process where they pile all their documents under the table, push them across the wood to the advisor and say, “It’s too much. It’s crazy. It’s this giant pile. Just tell me what to do.” What they get back is a 50 to 80 page book, usually bound beautifully in leather, looks marvelous on that conference table, and is a very, very expensive paperweight.
The reason I say that is, I actually had the experience of discovering a client of my first firm that I worked throughout to college had used their plan to level their pool table.
[laughter]
It was really a ledge under one of the legs. I thought that is not creating nearly as much value as I thought it was and they certainly have a less expensive solution to that problem, so I need to do something different.
Number one, that giant plan is built on all kinds of assumptions. Averages over time to summarize the vast variability and chaos that is our world. There’s a couple problems. One, life is so random that the only thing I can tell you is whatever that one course is it chartered out on that plan is the one thing that’s guaranteed not to happen. Meaning, it’s going to be something more or less than that line, but I guarantee you it’ll be different because the world is too random to have got it right that first time.
Second, we have got a particular problem with assigning broad averages to individual experience. Meaning, an institution would use numbers about large demographic data to price their products. Say a young doctors looking up on their research portals the likelihood of getting an injury or an illness that would have them out of work. My wife looks those things up all the time in the middle of dinner, et cetera. I know how quickly they can get that information.
The problem would be, whatever decision that they make, that they used that institutional data to make their decision because an insurance company, for instance, doesn’t care who it happens to specifically in that pool, they just care that they got the numbers right over the large group. An individual like I very much care if I get hit by a bus or not today. That matters a lot to me. For things like risk, whether it’s becoming disabled, or the movement of your portfolio in the market, there’s none of this airy 10% chance of 30% drop.
None of that really works for our decision making centers of our brain, which are largely unchanged from what we inherited from our ancestors who were primarily worried about running away from tigers in the jungle. Consequences work much better. For these unknown things in life, it’s either a zero percent chance of it happening, or 100% chance because it just happened. That’s how it works for an individual. We don’t build a plan like that. We come up with a series of conversations and strategies to test the relative strength of action that the client could be in.
We can never predict how everything will end up at the end, but we can measure the relative strength of two strategies, and if one is performing stronger than the other– I say perform but I want to be clear I’m not talking about market performance necessarily, just the outcomes that they produce. If one’s going to be better than the other, whatever the outcome is that one, we can test whether it’s going to always be better to some degree and go with a stronger strategy.
You asked about products and traditional thinking. Number one strategy is going to beat products every day of the week. Meaning there are some products that are traditional, have been around for a long time, but it’s not the product’s fault if it’s not working out well for the client. It’s how it was put in place and how it’s used. Tools are tools that strategy and use of the tool makes all the difference. We look at a lot of traditional planning and we just bring a set of thinking to say, “Everyone says this is how this is, and your friends all say this is a good idea, but god, when someone tells me, “Oh yes, my friend said that was great. I love that. Let’s do that.” I full stop and I say that’s about the most dangerous phrase I can ever imagine hearing because you’re making your decisions based on someone else’s thinking and understanding and you might be missing something that’s important to you. We need to make sure that you understand deeply the implications of this move for your family so that you know it’s the right thing. As much as I could try to care about a client situation, I just never can care as much about their life, their balance sheet as they do because it’s their life and their money.
John: All right. Good. Thank you. You and many of the people around Sound Financial and some of the friends and family and people around Sound Financial are participating in Influence Ecology. Again, many of our customers have become customers of Sound Financial Group. Why do you think these things fit together as well as they do?
Cory: Influence Ecology and Sound Financial Group?
John: Yes.
Cory: I think that it’s not distinct to Sound Financial Group. I think that it’s easier to talk about us interacting with other folks in Influence Ecology. It’s a transaction that pops up in conversation a lot, especially in conferences. We’re dealing with money specifically. It just bubbles up. I think if you did a survey of everyone in Influence Ecology, you would know that everyone in our learning and work prefers working with others that are in our work and it goes smoother because we’ve studied this together about how to be lower cost to each other, about how to work better in that transaction.
Influence Ecology is not about how to push everyone else away and rise up to the top to become King of the Mountain, it’s about how to interact with the humans around you to make more for everyone, and I think that’s key. Also one thing I really appreciate about Influence Ecology is as much the clients I am working with there, but even more the ones that I’m not. Meaning, the ones that declined our offer because we know we’re not high for everyone. Oh my God John, the speed at which a decline can happen, the grace and the definitiveness just to say, “I hear it. Sounds great. Not right for me. We can go back to doing other work together, or we can get on with our lives great.” That has just been a huge gift as well.
John: That’s great. Well, I think the other context that I think is there too is just simply that both of us tend to approach money amongst other conditions of life with some accurate thinking and then build our lives and our transactions accordingly. I think that’s also a framework that I see in both. All right, well, Cory, for your own journey in Influence Ecology for everybody, we want to offer a little bit of a case study. Your own journey is a case study in life before, during and after you found us and what you learned here.
Just in terms of your own experience, what was life like before Influence Ecology, and say a little bit about that.
Cory: I grew up firmly in the middle of the self esteem generation, that everyone gets a trophy for participating, can’t we all sit around and tell each other how wonderful we are generation. Now, thankfully my parents were not helicopter parents, they let me get out there, scrape my knees, supported me just as much in failure as in success. I think that made a huge difference, but I still had the sense that and if I just keep a positive attitude and keep pushing hard, everything will work out.
I was a runner in high school. Some of our mantras from our team, which we were very successful competing on a State level, things like never stop, keep pushing, gut through it, all of those things that served us really well in running melded in my mind with that self esteem generation kind of thinking so when I got to the business world, it was, all right, just keep pushing and think good thoughts and no matter what happens, it’ll all work out in the end. I’ve learned that that’s not so much the case.
John: How did you come to the conclusion that it’s not necessarily the case?
Cory: Part of it was starting my journey of learning how to do the work that I do and realize that lots of folks, the baby boomer generation, especially as a case study, was positive thinking, throwing money at the future hoping that it’ll work out and that didn’t necessarily work out quite as well because there’s a lot of things to consider. Then when I get into influence ecology, start doing this study I realize, yes, there are a lot of, let’s call them technical aspects to producing a good result. Maybe those clients that I called and left very positive messages for five times in a week, maybe that’s now the reason why they don’t want to talk to me, maybe I need to have some better strategy for making an offer, accepting their decline, setting up a structure for how to communicate with people that works well and that is mutually agreeable. Then that’s just one out of many examples of you’ve got to have some planning.
Number one, you’ve got to think very clearly about what we even want to have happen in the future, and then check to see if the actions we’re in are going to produce those results. Again, being part of that self esteem generation with the audio tape gurus. It’s kind of funny that I’m now old enough that I can start dating myself with technology, but the audio tape gurus that you’re driving around listening to the positive affirmations and that will all make it work out really, really well. I thought, this is wonderful, and I want to have a billion dollars a year of income and the five of the cool cars and homes all over the world because that’s what you’re supposed to want. You’re supposed to dream big and want all these things. Then I got to walk through some exercises in influence ecology. That actually happened when I was thinking about what I wanted for the last year, my wife’s schooling and I had a big number, and then I was talking to a dear friend and he said that’s a really big number for results. If it was less than that but you stayed connected with your wife. She felt supported in school. You had good relationships with your friends and family and business colleagues. When you got to eat some good food along the way and maybe take a couple of trips, would you be happy?” I said, “Yes. Actually, I would.”
It took a lot of pressure off of me to say why don’t I build the life and my actions around what I actually want and will actually fulfill me in my life and my family, and then I can just do the things that’ll get me there. The other part about that positive thinking is, you never let up. You never get to stop, you’re always positively pushing forward and he just grows and grows and grows in it and actually be exhausting. I like to give myself the permission to take a day off here and there, and that’s what work around influence ecology could do to say, here are my aims, here’s the actions I need to be in to get there and then once I get those things done, then I can choose to go more if I want or give myself the permission to actually take some time off. That’s a really cool permission to have.
John: That’s great, and you identify as what personality is we talk about it.
Cory: Anyone that’s familiar with those will know that I’m a performer just from the speed and energy with which I’m talking. So yes, performer.
John: Okay. A good intro to our audience and nobody’s ever heard about that and doesn’t know what the heck we’re talking about. What in your own words does that mean?
Cory: A performer of the four personality types and Influence Ecology talks about is about relationship, first and foremost. For me what that means is, you can think of it as the person that always wants everyone around and be having a good time. Like I’m concerned with others’ feelings and thoughts towards me and about the atmosphere that we’re currently in, so I’ll be concerned with the relationship, although I’ve discovered the dark side of performer is the second that it’s clear that relationship has no importance to the other person, like their relationship with me, they’re done, and that’s, that’s a hard thing to fight. It’s the bubbly outgoing everyone have a great time kind of personality.
John: Great. If we take your personality, paid performer personality and the notion that if you just power through it, you could say I just relationship through it. If I just relationship people, I would imagine that some of what’s there and your background to five great and people I take care of them and then it’ll all turn out. Did you find any naivete around that and if so, what’d you find out?
Cory: Sure. Early in my business career, doing financial advising is all that I’ve ever done since college. I started really early, so I got to walk through a lot of personal discovery inside the context of this. I would come home from work. My wife would ask like how was your day and I said great. I talked to three people, had wonderful conversations and she would ask, “Well, do you have a new client?” Well, no. This was the first time I ever talked to them. We’ve got to set up this meeting and maybe we’ll– Misinterpreting a good conversation as any kind of real result is the real trap of a performer. We’ve got to stay grounded in what actually got produced here. Did anyone ever actually leave that conversation thinking that anything was going to happen? My tendency that I discovered was that I was so friendly in making requests that people could miss that a request had even been made.
A week later, I’m sitting here thinking why did they not get back to me with this, and then as I go through my communication with them, especially if it was via email, I could see, maybe they’re sitting there expecting me to call them back or something like that. That was a big lesson for me.
John: That’s really great. All right, so you start off your journey growing up in the self-esteem generation. You begin to confront your thought, to just press through it and all of that. You started to think accurately, start to account for your personality, and then in the latter part of your journeys, you began to develop Transactional Competence. There’s some thinking that in your notes you talked about getting to guide some of your thoughts and skills and so forth. One of those things that you said was welcome to your brain. I love this bed, and I think it’d be great if you could take us back to the moment. I think it was probably in the conference where we had this moment and said something about that. Do you remember when you first heard this bit with Influence Ecology?
Cory: I do. The other part about my generation is that independence that’s pushed it positive thinking. Just go for it and you can do anything. You. It gets really selfish. It gets really me focused.
John: If it’s to be it’s up to me.
Cory: Exactly. When it was Kirkland Tibbels who said in the conference, everything you want in life can be found in groups, and then a little bit later pointed to this whole room of Influence Ecology members and said, “Welcome to your brain.” What that did for me was all of a sudden, my brain expanded to be the whole room. Meaning, I realized that I’m a limited person. We say we only had– each had 24 hours in a day, but it’s really not true. Time is actually an infinite resource if we know how to contract with other people and get the help of other people to use their time towards our aims.
Now, we should also be helping them use their time towards their aims. It only really works if it’s towards both of your goals at the same time, but that’s what I realized was I have access to this amazing pool of talent, if you will, that all of these people that not only have studied the work of Influence Ecology and know a thing or two about interacting with other humans, but then they have all these skills and abilities that I could never have had, and if I get good at making requests for help, which asking for help has traditionally been very difficult for me, but this was part of the breakthrough is that I’m, and I’m fairly useless by myself and I really had to own that. I think we all are and anybody who says,”I can do it all on my own”, it’s like well, are you using a computer today because you probably didn’t make that yourself. Are you driving to work today because you had millions of people contributing to the roads, tires, gas and everything else around you transporting yourself to wherever you are.
As humans, we’re made to work in community with each other. That’s our advantage over any of the animals out there. We don’t have the ability to jump as higher, use our clause or anything like that, but we can coordinate with each other towards the mutual goals in a really unique way. That’s what Influence Ecology has become for me. Some education, yes, but also this pool of people that we have a privilege of diving in together to try to make our lives work. We have clients from Influence Ecology, but we are also the clients of other people and Influence Ecology because it’s one of the first places we look for who we can gain resources from.
John: That’s really great. I’m remembering my own experience of that moment in the conference, and I suddenly expanded my brain to include everything you know, everything Paul knows, everything Gary Ward knows. I have that available to me, but I also have their experiences, their practical knowledge.
I also have the resources available to me of every person in that room, and it really made me quite limitless in that moment. I felt as if as long as I can transact with competence to satisfy our mutual aims, the sky’s the limit. If it’s to be, it’s up to me completely transformed into what we now say which is all dreams come true in groups.
Cory: It’s the alchemy of community, old alchemists are thought of as crazy now. They weren’t totally off base. They were just using the wrong substance. It’s not gold that thereafter really it’s humans and that’s where we can produce more than was there before.
John: That’s fantastic. You’ve written a book called Cape not required. I love the title of the book by the way.
Cory: Thank you.
John: I’m wondering what you address in that book and how it might be related to some of what we’ve talked about here.
Cory: Sure. Paul Adams had already written a book about the financial experience of our firm, of a client going through our process and what they might learn called Sound Financial Advice. We already had that side covered and as I surveyed the landscape, there were lots of money books out there and frankly with Paul’s book and what we do, I’d rather talk to people about their money because I can customize that conversation rather than write a one size fits all, here’s the next step because that just never really works. I thought well, what am I passionate about as a young financial advisor who also was a leader of a team of 30 plus advisors at one point and then intentionally made the choice to go to a much more nimble footprint of an organization. I had to learn a lot over that period of time about how to interact with humans, how to lead, how to put my life together.
I said I want to write a book about all of the non-financial elements that a client might actually end up gleaning from working with us, because it’s not about money and it’s not just about math. I like to say that money isn’t math, its math plus human behavior, and when that human behavior comes in, it really can make those equations do all kinds of crazy things. That’s what I started to look at and I used the concept of power as the background model for my book because power is really fascinating to me. If you think about golf as an example, weightlifters are not the ones that are going to be able to hit the ball the farthest. A lot of the golfers that have long drives these days are actually fairly slender folks, so it’s not about ROM muscle but it’s about translating energy into the right direction. At the right time, and that coordination and so power also has some negative connotations in our country.
You think about the power hungry politician, and that’s a really negative view of power or the powerful executive cheating the people whatever that background view might be and while there are some bad apples, powers and agnostic resource just like anything, if it’s internal nature is not good or bad but it’s how that is used. Someone can use their power to cheat millions or save millions of lives, just depending on how you use it. That’s the context that I pursued, a few different looks at what we can do in our life to live more powerfully, feel more powerful and more agency in our life and have more of what we want to have happened, better relationships, better connections with people in our lives all through power.
John: All right, very good. Any soapbox rants that you have.
Cory: You gave me the opportunity to talk about my financials soapbox, which is my professional, soapbox. There’s one I’ve been thinking about recently, which is this. I’ve observed this current of orientation in our country, especially in a political sphere that is non functional in my view. This is not going to be a political statement, just to say that all across the spectrum, I see this recurring perspective that that person that thinks differently than me is an idiot. That’s how it all starts, and there’s also this sometimes this view of you can think any way you want. Every view is allowed except an asterix or parentheses, except if it’s different than mine. What I would rather I see in our country is for everyone to pursue the other person’s opinion from the point of view of, this is an intelligent human that cares about something or someone very deeply. Let me understand why they’re coming from that view and I might disagree with them afterward, but I can at least understand more about what they’re thinking.
I’ve found that in Influence Ecology, by the way, this is what it made me realize it, is that, we have a wide range of religious, political, social views and influence ecology. I think every single part of the spectrum is available and yet I’ve never found a community where people are more willing to engage with those ideas and respectfully disagree, and that’ That’s old school, that’s something our country used to do really well and I’m hoping that we can do it well again. Otherwise, we’re just going to be torn further and farther apart.
John: It’s very well said. All right, of course, Shepherd, it’s been an absolute pleasure to spend time with you on the Influence Ecology podcast.
Cory: Thank you, John. I appreciate the opportunity. This has been a lot of fun.
John: This episode ends this season of the Influence Ecology Podcast. We’ll be back again soon with more case studies, stories and lessons from our most ambitious members. My special thanks to our guest, Corey Shepherd, and I will show notes, you’ll find links to connect with him and all the links to websites, books or downloads mentioned in this podcast. Some episodes included transcript and support material. The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was produced by me, John Patterson, and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world.
We’re grateful for co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30 plus years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence. This episode includes contributions by Carol Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelly. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled Fast Train to everywhere.
You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple podcasts, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email@podcastsatinfluenceecology.com. I want to thank you for offering a rating or review. This helps us more than you know.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology, LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded April 8th, 2018 and was produced by John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world. We’re grateful for Co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30+ years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karal Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelley. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled ‘Fast Train to Everywhere.’ You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating or review, I ask that you take a moment go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
Influence Ecology is the leading business education specializing in Transactional Competence, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline of transactional competence and is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Influence Ecology’s curriculum includes conferences, webinars, online tools, podcasts, and mentorship utilized by men and women in over seventy countries around the world. Our membership includes an international assembly of accomplished professionals, faculty, and peers from a variety of countries, industries, and cultures.
John Severson – Some Possibilities Are Dangerous (Ep. 54)
Swimming in possibilities and excitement might be more detrimental than we think. As a biological ‘exchange animal,’ our moods and transactions are inextricably linked. We read or mimic the moods of others faster than we recognize their words. We've all learned the hard way that a text or email can't include the wordless cues like mood, body language, appearance, inflection, and more. Might we sometimes produce moods that are inappropriate for transacting? John Severson, of Severson Compass & Associates, a Los Angeles-based travel and venue company, offers a case study in the dangers of being oriented around too many possibilities.…
Swimming in possibilities and excitement might be more detrimental than we think. As a biological ‘exchange animal,’ our moods and transactions are inextricably linked. We read or mimic the moods of others faster than we recognize their words. We’ve all learned the hard way that a text or email can’t include the wordless cues like mood, body language, appearance, inflection, and more. Might we sometimes produce moods that are inappropriate for transacting?
John Severson, of Severson Compass & Associates, a Los Angeles-based travel and venue company, offers a case study in the dangers of being oriented around too many possibilities.
In today’s talk, you’ll hear Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels discuss how appropriate moods are not always positive moods—and how a little too much excitement might be dangerous.
Below you’ll find a transcript of this podcast episode that has been edited for your reading pleasure. You’ll also see links at the bottom of this post where you can find more information on the people and ideas mentioned in the episode.
by John Patterson
Produced by: John Patterson, Jason Kelley & Tyson Crandall
“Some possibilities are dangerous. I used to think there was no such thing as a bad idea.”
Helping people build ambitious and satisfying careers businesses and lives. This is the Influence Ecology podcast. Now, here is your host: John Patterson.
John Patterson: Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you are in the world. I’m your host, John Patterson, the co-founder and CEO of Influence Ecology, the leading business education in Transactional Competence. Broadcasting from Ventura, California, this podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives and entrepreneurs who found real solutions real results and real satisfaction, not only with work career and money, but in every area of life. You’ll hear how these ambitious professionals found that those who transact powerfully, thrive.
Swimming in possibilities and excitement might be more detrimental than we think. As a biological ‘exchange animal’, our moods and transactions are inextricably linked. We read or mimic the moods of others faster than we recognize their words. We’ve all learned the hard way that a text or email can’t include the wordless cues like mood, body language, appearance, inflection, and more. Might we sometimes produce moods that are inappropriate for transacting?
John Severson, of Severson Compass and Associates, a Los Angeles based travel and venue company, offers a case study in the dangers of being oriented around too many possibilities.
In today’s podcast episode, you’ll hear co-founder Kirkland Tibbles discuss how appropriate moods are not always positive moods, and that a little too much excitement might be dangerous.
Here’s the interview. Welcome to the Influence Ecology podcast, Mr. John Severson. Take a second and introduce yourself, if you would.
John Severson: My name is John Severson. I have a company called Severson Compass and associates, and I’ve been studying with Influence Ecology for about three and a half years now. We plan meetings and events. We’ve been in business for 29 years. We’ve done probably close to 300 conference type events in the last 29 years. It’s been a wild ride.
John Patterson: You live where?
John Severson: I live in Altadena, California. My office is in Pasadena, just down the street.
John Patterson: I speak to you quite often. You do work with Influence Ecology, also working with us on our events?
John Severson: Yes, I do.
John Patterson: You’ve helped us find some really spectacular venues for events around the world’s last annual conference. January, we were at a fantastic venue in Cabo. I’ve been now twice. Can’t wait to go back again for all kinds of reasons. Love it there. Thank you for that.
You often are traveling too. You and I speak every now and then, and I always start off with, “Where are you at this moment?” and sometimes it’ll be Hawaii, sometimes it’ll be somewhere in Europe, sometimes it’s someplace perhaps in Australia, New Zealand or the likes. You do travel quite a bit.
John Severson: I do. Partly I think I come from a travel background family. My dad has been a pilot all his life and my mom is actually in the travel business as well. She has a big travel empire, I’ll say. I’m a travel baby, so to speak, of that world.
John Patterson: It’s fantastic. Life for you before Influence Ecology wasn’t bad. Sounds like it was pretty great.
John Severson: Actually, pretty good. Yes, I mean, I made decent money. I could take care of myself, but I did struggle in many ways.
John Patterson: Sometimes people do our programs because there is a pretty substantial breakdown in some place. Maybe someone’s not making the money they know they’d like to. Maybe they’d like to be a lot more influential in certain circles. Maybe they are rather stressed out because of the kind of work they do or how much work they do.
So, sometimes people find us because they have a pretty substantial breakdown. It doesn’t sound like that you began your study with us and continued your study with us because you have tried to resolve some big problem. It sounds like there are some other things that are driving your participation here. Yes?
John Severson: Actually, how I got into Influence Ecology was I knew a bunch of other people were doing it so I’m like, “I’ll do it too.” It was kind of like that.
John Patterson: Yes.
John Severson: But then, of course, there was more I discovered as I studied. It was like I got into it and then found out really how valuable it was, I should say.
John Patterson: Are you one of those people that really love the exploration? I watch you sometimes. You’re one of my favorite people to look out into an audience and watch many people to look out and they’re going- and their face looks crunched up. But you’re almost always nodding, you’re almost always a yes. Your body your face goes, “Bring it, bring it more and more.”
You seem to be somebody that loves developing themselves, training themselves, exploration, expedition if you will. Is that one of the things that drives your participation?
John Severson: Yes. Of course, there’s a part of me that thinks I know it all, right? But when I get fascinated over a subject- yes, I’m just like all in. So that drew me in. Also, the part that I love mostly studying with you guys is that it’s not like one or two concepts that once you get down you’re like, “Okay, I’m I’m good for the day.” There’s quite a bit of stuff with Influence Ecology. You really have books to read. You have a lot of subtle distinctions that in one day you know you need to master. So, I love the challenging aspect of that study.
John Patterson: As we’ve come to know our customers, we’re going to be celebrating our 10th anniversary next year. As we’ve grown, as we’ve explored the kind of people who respond to what we do, the majority of people that come here and study with us, they’re typically a business professional of some kind, maybe they work in an enterprise maybe they work for themselves, maybe they’re a small business owner and the like. But they seem to all share a love for bettering themselves, improving themselves, being engaged and involved in their continued development.
It might be very useful for you and I to talk a little bit about that, because there are people that are listening who may go, “You know, I just love this kind of stuff. I’d like to be challenged with new ways to think about things, and grab little nuggets of wisdom that perhaps reshape my day or improve things just incrementally enough that adds up to a whole bunch of good.”
John Severson: I almost want to compare Influence Ecology like a master’s program, if you really were going to do an MBA or something. It’s that kind of rigor, probably more relevant than the stuff you’d learn on an MBA program, I would say, because it’s very applicable in the moment you hear it. But my experience is you’re building a foundation with studying that you do instead of one idea you grasp onto and then build your whole enterprise around that idea. It’s not like that.
You’re building your foundation and then you’re building how you want to set up your teams and how you want to think about the commitments you want to take, and then how simple or complex you want things. It’s that level of thinking that inspires me to stay in what you guys do, that education.
John Patterson: That’s really great. Then taking that, I’ve watched your journey through our programs as a business owner, and tell me if I’m wrong, but I think I watched you at first start to deal with that you had a single client and you may have realized it wasn’t really good for you because then you would be, of course, then beholden to a single client. That’s never good for a business because that client can go away or make demands, or whatnot. That’s one thing that you began to see. So that’s the first thing. Anything you want to say about that?
John Severson: Yes. Even before Influence Ecology, I knew that but there was no way to change that. It seemed like I was on this train and I couldn’t get off– like bring anyone else on. It was like it was just going that way. That is very accurate. That’s the way it was heading before I did Influence Ecology.
John Patterson: Then, I think I observed you start to realize that with a single client then you didn’t have as much freedom or say as you might like in certain contracts or situations, and I don’t think that you moved away from that client. I think some things happened intermittently, but I think you just began to see that you could perhaps transact with them in some new ways. Is that correct?
John Severson: Absolutely. Yes. A lot of it was– you set up your own environment, right? I trained my clients to be that way and to rely on me that way, and it’s no accident that they’re there doing the things that they do.
John Patterson: Or you may like training them to relate to you like you’re at their back-end call.
John Severson: I’m available 24/7 and I have unlimited resources and stamina and all of that good stuff.
John Patterson: Yes. Thus you train them in that so that they, of course, call you whenever and okay.
John Severson: Yes, absolutely. Yes. Then I complain about it. [laughs]
John Patterson: Exactly. You started to see that you could train them in some other things. What does that look like?
John Severson: Again, I want to say accurate thinking stepping back and saying, “Hold on a minute. What is my aim?” Because I think that gets lost so easily in our everyday transactions doing things that we forget. We think, “Oh, this is all about making the customer happy or all about making it through the day making sure that I don’t screw up whatever that is,” but you forget really what your aim is. Like what are you here for? “What the heck do I have clients for in the first place?”
That was the centering moment of Influence Ecology where I could say, “Okay, if that’s the case, then I can say no and I can say yes, but I get to see the parts that really work and then the part that isn’t working.”
John Patterson: When you begin to accept or decline requests made of you more in accordance with your aims as you began to do that, did that scare you a little bit since it was your single client that they might go, “Well, listen Boggo.” Or did you just take little baby steps and found it safe to stick more than a toe into the water?
John Severson: It was actually fun, that whole journey, because before you say whatever you say, you already have your idea what people are going to think. But most of the time people received that well. They were like, “Good for you. Why don’t we do it that way?”
People actually came around and very rarely did people say, “We can’t work together because you’re unreasonable.” But it was this fun exploration with them where they got to see, “Oh, you know what? I like your idea better.”
John Patterson: In that situation, the development or the growth that you had was realizing that you can train people by accepting or declining in particular ways, and then you’re left with the environment that you produce for yourself, and before you have been left for the environment that you produced yourself, which is an environment in which anybody can call you anytime you jump and so forth.
John Severson: Yes. You think that your value is being available 24/7, but that’s not really what your value is. That, “Hey I’m really good at this and let’s focus on that instead of trying to do all that other stuff.”
John Patterson: All right. Good. Then I watched you began to consider the name of your company and the way that you were known– which I won’t say because I know you have a new identity that you want to produce. So the name that you had produced and the way that you were known in the past, you began to confront “Well, that is not a fit for the identity that I want to produce in the marketplace.”
Then you began to produce– first I think you’d began to ask, “Well, what is it that I, in fact, offer? What is the solution that I am to what breakdowns and for whom?” That process, in my experience, started to reorient you from where you had been known to something else. Can you say a little bit about that process?
John Severson: I used to do John lots and lots of stuff on cruise ships like that was the way I started. I had a business name that was a lot about that. But as I started to look at what do I really want to do. I realize I don’t want to do that stuff I don’t want to do all that work on cruise ships so that’s when I saw, “Okay I need to create an identity for what I want to be known for and known as.”
John Patterson: Which was what?
John Severson: Which was to give people the expertise to navigate, having a successful conference that is not only successful but their aims.
John Patterson: Very good. You move through all of that and you now no longer have a single client. You have many clients many different kinds of clients. What’s that been like then now getting away from just simply having a single client having many clients and what have you learned in that part of your journey?
John Severson: Well, one thing I realized was I had this naive notion before that to be a really good vendor let’s say you want to adapt with your client let’s say that if your client says we’re going to this mountain will we better get you up to speed to how to climb that one. I was all up for that. I’m like, “Okay, if we’re going to that mountain let me learn how to do that climbing.”
But what I started to see was that’s not my journey my journey is look. Here’s what I’m offering and if you want to climb that mountain there’s somebody else I can help you there but I want to help you climb the mountain that we’ve been climbing. Okay because I’m good at climbing this one and I don’t want to learn how to climb a whole new mountain over there.
John Patterson: With all of us. If we are serving customers our customers sometimes will want to take us on journeys that aren’t aligned with the help we offer. So, therefore, we start to accept things we probably ought to decline. what all of this labor and maintenance we didn’t plan for.
John Severson: I’ll tell you the popular notion is just do whatever the customer wants but that’s a lot of work. And actually you probably aren’t going to be that good climbing that mountain because never done it before and we forget sometimes that it’s not just about adapting but really being known for the thing that you’re good at. Sometimes you have to say look I’ll find somebody that’s really good at climbing down for you. But I’ve never done it and I don’t want to mess up on the way and then blame you because I decided to go along that journey with you.
John Patterson: Yes. Listening to much of your journey now and different facts of it I’m much more aware of the condition of life work and how that’s played a major role in some of what you’ve attended to. So what we mean by that here at Influence Ecology is work is 1 of 15 conditions of life. A condition of life is unavoidable area or situation that you have to confront. Work is the doing of your mind and body, what are you doing. So what do you do every day?
Often times, when you start to talk about work with people, there’s all the stuff I know I don’t want to do. There are certainly the things that I enjoy doing and what are the things that I know I don’t want to do.
From the beginning of this conversation, you talked a little bit about some of the little aimlessness in the beginning where you go off and do this or that. Then there was the one client and the work that they demanded of you and starting to decline something so you could work in a way that you wanted to, and moving away from work on cruise ships to now work in a different way. I’m just present to the way in which satisfying that condition of life has impacted your journey and some of the ways that you go about transacting for meaning your own names and life. Is there anything else that you want to comment on about that?
John Severson: The one thing I noticed is there is a tendency to do a lot of stuff in any endeavor that you do like any work. Like just do a lot of stuff and stay busy and then eventually you’ll reap the rewards. There’s something like that going on right and I am starting to see for standing with you guys that you don’t have to go that way. You don’t have to do a bunch of stuff just because someone else is doing it. You don’t have to do it because that might not be right for you.
I would go around doing as much as I could because my mom always said, “How you get ahead is you work hard.” I did all that stuff, but now I’m looking at it that’s more of a coincidence than an actual fact that my success came out of doing all that hard work. I’m not against hard work.
I think that’s important but I saw so much of the stuff that I did was unnecessary. When you really get clear about that your aims and the approach to do it a lot of the other stuff falls away. In fact it distracts people from getting to know you because it’s like well I know you’re good at this but then you’re good at this and you man you’re so good at everything. What are you about? I think that’s been my challenges. I get so good at things, people get confused. They’re like, “John, we really don’t know what you’re here to offer us.”
John Patterson: Understood, it’s a great way to say that.
John Severson: Then you think the way to a customer’s heart is by doing more, but it’s actually the reverse. It’s sometimes doing less has them remember you better.
John Patterson: Doing something rather specific.
John Severson: Exactly.
John Patterson: That’s really great. Even I studied with us long enough to begin to observe a lot of other people and the way that they’re transacting in the world. What do you observe about people generally, and perhaps how they may be naive about the way they’re transacting and how some of what they do may be counter to their aims?
John Severson: One of the things that I’ve observed is, some possibilities are dangerous. I used to think there was no such thing as a bad idea. If you get enough people that believe in it, you can do it. That’s what I’m noticing. That’s the most costly in some of the people that haven’t done the Influence Ecology work, versus the people that are starting to do it is they get to sit down and go, “Maybe that’s not a great way to go.” Start building all the other stuff before jumping out and launching themselves into that direction. I want to say it’s kind of human nature. I think we all love great ideas and doing them, but it’s sometimes better to just not do it.
John Patterson: That’s really great. Some possibilities are dangerous.
John Severson: I was in Hawaii with my mom, and she wanted to remodel this vacation home she had. She had brought in contractors and people to redo this whole house. She says, “All right, I want you to go with me to Home Depot and we’re going to pick everything out.”
Here I was going with her down the aisles of Home Depot as she goes, “I want that shower. I want that washer, dryer.” I finally had to stop her and go, “I can’t do this with you anymore. This is so agitating. I have to just stop this and I have to leave. I can’t do this thing with you.” She’s like, “What do you mean? I thought you’re here to help me.”
Well, then finally, I said, “You throw all this stuff in that room, but you’re probably going have to rip it all out again later because you don’t have a plan, you don’t have somebody come in and design in it. You’re going to probably spend $50,000 doing this, and you’ll get it done fast, but it’ll look like crap.”
I think it took her maybe like, 10 minutes to think about it. She goes, “Yes, but I don’t have time to do all that.” I’m like, “Well, that doesn’t mean throw in there.” That was a perfect example of how I observed. I see that everywhere now.
John Patterson: Yes, I know. I do, too. I watch sometimes people addicted to the rush of a new idea. They’re now excited about a new idea often running and then have not taken the time to examine whether or not that idea, that new possibility, that new strategy, that new approach is in any way, shape, or form good for them, or is going to produce the kind of mess you pointed out to your mother. I watch that all the time. Amazing.
John Severson: One of the philosophers we study is John Dewey. There’s a whole thing where he says that one of the hardest things for a human being to do is to not jump and act right away. We have this almost impulse to want to run out and fix that immediately. When I read that, I said, “That’s me.” Once something bothers me, I’ll run out, and within minutes, I’m started working on it. It’s not always such a good thing.
John Patterson: Yes, absolutely.
John Severson: Nine times out of ten, it’s probably not the right thing.
John Patterson: Well, that is funny, because I don’t know that you know but maybe you do. You’ve heard little stories Kirkland and I talking about the early days. My personality wants to go for it, to do it, to grab it and go for it and all of that. His personality is not the opposite, but he’s had enough training and enough observation of cautionary tales, enough study in philosophy and everything else to say, “Well, hold on just a minute, just hold on.” A lot of the experience in our early days was the want for me to go for it. His was going in to pour a little cold water on it. He was always pouring cold water on it in the beginning.
Now, there are parts of it, that he appreciates that I went for because we wouldn’t have a company without it. At the same time, where we balanced one another is I don’t jump as much and he gets to pour a little cold water on that. The beauty in all of that I found is, I can get caught up in what occurs like a good fix, a good solution, a good way to mitigate a problem without any examination of whether or not that’s a good solution for me, or that’s a good solution for my aims, or that’s a good solution for what I’m working on, or whether or not that solution is going to produce some set of breakdowns or maintenance or labor I had never considered.
I’m now more in consideration of the whole thing before I act than I was before. I have stopped myself and thought, “Yes, that’s going produce a whole bunch of maintenance. Yes, that’s going produce a whole bunch of labor. Yes, I’m going to have to–”
As an example, we’ve had many, many people say, “You guys should do this in corporations.” Really? Okay. Do you know what labor that’s going to cost us? Do know what maintenance that– Is that going to get us quicker to our aims? Do you know that for a fact? I appreciate your good advice, but do you know my aims well enough to tell me that and so forth? It’s a very fascinating thing to think accurately about the kind of work I do and don’t want to do.
John Severson: Nike had a saying, “Just do it,” and that would characterize a lot of the way I launched into things before Influence Ecology. Now it’s like, stop and think about it before you do it. Maybe it’s just a fundamental thing being human being that we just want to run out and fix it, and then deal with the mess later, right? Like, “Oh, yes, there’s a few things we messed up.” Like my mom would have done, but it’s just so much more difficult to do it after you’ve laid all the appliances.
John Patterson: You got to rip out all the tile now. Now, where are you in this journey? What do you– We talked a little bit about some of the stages of development of your own business endeavors. Where are you now in your business development?
John Severson: I was just having this conversation with Kirkland. I think right now, this is satisfying my aim. It’s great. I’m thinking three years down the road, I want to position myself for a bigger role, bigger game somewhere down the road. Again, you see how I want to rush in and do it, but I’m going to give myself three years to prepare myself for that. It’s a different way to do something where I’d want to say, “Okay, I’m going to tell everybody, I’m going to do this whole new project.” In fact, I’m not even telling you what it is because part of me is like, “I got all this studying to do, and finding out about things and thinking accurately before I make it public.”
It’s a great question because I love what I’m doing but I think the thing that’s next for me is, three years down the road, I got something else cooking that one day, I’ll be happy to share with you.
John Patterson: That’s really great. That’s just a fantastic sign of maturity, rather than announce it.
John Severson: I don’t want to say it’s like jinxing it. It’s not. It’s just what you do is you create all this stuff out there and then it affects your identity if it doesn’t happen, right? So I’m like, “Let’s not even go there. Let’s do some careful study, see what my aims are, what their aims are, and then-“
John Patterson: We’ll see.
John Severson: Yes, “We’ll see.” Exactly. Yes.
John Patterson: If there’s anything else you’d like to say, any sub box, a thing that you would love to have addressed, I want to give you the floor now, if there’s anything else.
John Severson: I just want to say I’ve gotten just as much value from is measuring. This the thing a lot of times this is where a lot of companies will go. Is they measure results. Where they’re going to be measuring how many sales you’re going to promise this week, or what are you going to do for all these results that obviously matter? I love that in Influence Ecology, we back it up a step and go, “Wait a second, we want to measure the action, what it is that you’re actually going to do rather than the result.” That’s always got me in trouble. Always promising these big promises of, “Hey, I’m going to have 10 new clients.”
Then they’ll be like, “Well, it didn’t happen.” I go, “Yes, because I was all a declaration kind of a thing.” Now I know, okay, this is what I’m going to promise to do, is I’m going to get on the phone and I’m going to call five new people that I don’t know today. That I can promise, but I can’t promise 10 new clients today. That’s something that I think we go wrong sometimes is it’s all about the result. We forget that to get to the results, there’s something else you have to think accurately about first. That’s so valuable. I don’t think anyone else talks about that.
John Patterson: This has certainly been a very valuable conversation today and I look forward to sharing it with other people. Thank you for being a guest on the Influence Ecology podcast.
John Severson: Well, thank you, John. I had a fun time.
Why Excitement Isn’t Always an Appropriate Mood
John Patterson: Now we’ll listen in on a Fundamentals of Transaction program webinar, where Co-founder Kirkland Tibbles and I talk about producing a mood and why excitement isn’t always an appropriate mood.
Here’s the talk:
Appropriate mood. What do they mean by appropriate moods? Well, Kirkland, what do we mean by that? What do we mean by an inappropriate mood? Appropriate for what?
Kirkland: Let’s start with the definition or characterization of a mood. What is a mood? To hold a particular kind of set of feelings or states of mind, you’ve got to have some sort of narrative in place. So a mood is nothing more than a narrative or a story that you have about an outcome in some condition of life. Could be short-term could be long-term.
But all a mood is is some story that you have about some outcome in a condition of life, and I can prove it to you. If you’ve ever had the experience of being in a mood, and most of the time it’s in a weird mood or a bad mood, and you’ve forgotten why, you’ve had to stop and go, “Now, wait a second, I know I’m upset about something,” and you can’t remember what it is, you have just recognize your still looking for the story in order to justify the mood.
Human beings think in terms of narrative. They think in terms of narrative. We think in terms of story. We have a story about an outcome, and that is a mood. When we talk about moving around inappropriate moods, when we’re talking about moving transactionally where you can begin to look at moods as narratives is what are the moods that are appropriate in a given spot in the transaction cycle? An appropriate mood is a mood that is produced through a narrative at a particular point in the transaction cycle.
John Patterson: One of the main reasons we want to distinguish this in the way we do is because most people approach mood in one of a couple of ways I’m familiar with. One is people have moods as if there’s something uncontrollable about having a mood. “I have a mood. I’m in a bad mood. I’m in a good mood. I’m whatever mood.” That’s one way that people relate to moods.
Then the other way that I find that people tend to relate to moods is something like, “Well, a positive mood is good and a negative mood is bad,” something like that. Or finally a third approach which is that some people tend to have the same mood or produce the same mood in all kinds of situations.
The first thing that we like to say is is that there are moods that are appropriate to certain and moves M-O-V-E-S in a transaction. If I’m inventing or in the invention of a transaction then the appropriate mood is imaginative, optimistic. However if I’m in the producer or fulfillment part of a transaction then there’s a different kind of mood that’s appropriate. Something more rigorous something determined. Knowing where I am in a transaction at any given time can tell me the appropriate mood. As an example, it’s not uncommon for us to sit down for a meeting here at Influence Ecology. Darryl will say something like, “Well, let’s get the optimism and sociability out of the way so we can get to work.”
Kirkland: As in this morning for example with the exact line being, Can we get all that happy horseshit out of the way that we get to that. That is a typical thing you will hear from someone who’s trained in Mood’s attitude and state of mind. They are acknowledging a quick run around the transaction cycle to give everyone a chance because this is where we’re headed in this particular meeting and. My favorite moments are when John will stop and go. Well hey hang on a second.
This meeting needs to begin in a particular way because I want to produce a mood here. Now what John is going to have to do in that situation and very good at it if he is going to have to tell a story that we accept. That’s what we mean when we say or do lose your job in transacting with another human being. Yes first and foremost to determine if the mood is appropriate over there for you to engage an invitation to transact. That begins the whole thing right there.
John: Let’s address the very popular– it’s got more and more popular. I see so much evidence for it? The the popular notion that you ought to be in a good mood you ought to be positive that negativism is a bad thing that you ought not be skeptical that you need to be open-minded and positive at all times and in all situations we say that’s not only wrong incorrect that just simply isn’t responsible for where things are in a transaction. I love the example Kirkland of the factory floor factory floor which mood is best for factory floor where work is getting fulfilled. Well, it’s rigor, it’s determination.
It isn’t the kind of life’s gregarious optimistic approach to things when perhaps safety is concerned or productivity is concerned or systems or processes or structures are concerned. Likewise was invited to a meeting in Tucson some time ago. I knew the meeting was an opportunity to invent nothing more nothing more. It was quite difficult to keep the mood in invent because people wanted to take the mood into a different transaction into a transaction for somehow getting something done or decided or completed. Knowing where you are in the transaction is important so that you can bring the appropriate mood to the transaction.
Kirkland: That’s right. There is a very clean guy that’s available to you through this program called the narratives of the transaction cycle. The narratives are the story that correspond to the appropriate mood.
John: In our next episode we interview Corey Shepherd of Sound Financial group. He talks about the benefits of being immersed in a resource of knowledge and talent.
Corey Shepherd: The other part about my generation is that independence. That’s right. Positive thinking. Just go for it and you can do anything in you. It gets really selfish it gets really me focused. There was Kirkland Tibbles who said in conference, “Everything you want in life can be found in groups.” Then a little bit later pointed to this whole room of influence that college members and said Welcome to your brain. What that did for me was all of a sudden my brain expanded to be the whole room.
John: My special thanks to our guest John Severson and in our show notes you will find links to connect with him and all the links to websites books or downloads mentioned in this podcast. Some episodes include a transcript and support material. The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology LLC in Ventura California.
This episode was produced by me, John Patterson, and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty mentors and students around the world. We’re grateful for co-founder Kirkland Tibbles and his 30 plus years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karol Gregory and Tyson Crandell for this episode the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelly. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and is titled Fast Train to Everywhere. You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology podcast on Apple podcasts, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating a review, I ask that you take a moment, go to iTunes or your podcast app, and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology, LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded April 8th, 2018 and was produced by John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world. We’re grateful for Co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30+ years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karal Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelley. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled ‘Fast Train to Everywhere.’ You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating or review, I ask that you take a moment go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
Podcast Bonuses:
Influence Ecology is the leading business education specializing in Transactional Competence, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline of transactional competence and is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Influence Ecology’s curriculum includes conferences, webinars, online tools, podcasts, and mentorship utilized by men and women in over seventy countries around the world. Our membership includes an international assembly of accomplished professionals, faculty, and peers from a variety of countries, industries, and cultures.
Jenn Oliver – Put Your Oxygen Mask On First (Ep. 53)
Jenn Oliver, Senior Director of Service for the Academic Division at the University of Virginia, has learned a valuable lesson about what we refer to as "putting the mask on first." Before her study with Influence Ecology, primarily, other people's needs informed her plans. Her work was oriented only around doing for others, leaving her overwhelmed and aimless. Like many people, she was waiting for others to notice her value and reward her accordingly. She now takes care of herself and her aims first before assisting others. She's learned to decline requests, respect her own aims, and spend time on…
Jenn Oliver, Senior Director of Service for the Academic Division at the University of Virginia, has learned a valuable lesson about what we refer to as “putting the mask on first.” Before her study with Influence Ecology, primarily, other people’s needs informed her plans. Her work was oriented only around doing for others, leaving her overwhelmed and aimless. Like many people, she was waiting for others to notice her value and reward her accordingly. She now takes care of herself and her aims first before assisting others. She’s learned to decline requests, respect her own aims, and spend time on what matters to her personally and professionally. Her interview demonstrates how she has expanded her value while gaining more time, more money, and more focus.
Later in our episode, Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels teaches about the willingness to decline and how doing so produces more authority—and freedom.
Below you’ll find a transcript of this podcast episode that has been edited for your reading pleasure. You’ll also see links at the bottom of this post where you can find more information on the people and ideas mentioned in the episode.
by John Patterson
Produced by: John Patterson, Jason Kelley & Tyson Crandall
“Early on in my career, I did everything for everyone except for myself.”
Helping people build ambitious and satisfying careers, businesses and lives. This is the Influence Ecology Podcast. Now here’s your host, John Patterson.
John Patterson: Good morning, good afternoon, good evening wherever you are in the world. I’m your host, John Patterson, the co-founder and CEO of Influence Ecology, the leading business education in Transactional Competence. Broadcasting from Ventura, California, this podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives and entrepreneurs who found real solutions, real results and real satisfaction not only with work, career, and money, but in every area of life. You’ll hear how these ambitious professionals found that those who transact powerfully thrive.
If you’ve been on an airplane, the flight attendant tells you to put your mask on if the cabin loses pressure. They repeatedly instruct you do it first before helping others, but why? Surely, you should help children first. Destin Sandlin, who explores the world using science is a U.S. engineer and aspiring astronaut, had created a video to show the exact science behind this rule. We’ve included the video in our show notes. He enters this special chamber to find out what happens if you don’t put on your mask. After a few minutes, he starts to lose brain function, cannot identify basic shapes and can’t even speak or put his mask on. Someone must step in and put it on for him to prevent him from dying.
Are you all about others to your own detriment? By the time you’ve helped someone else, you may not know how to help yourself. Sound like you? What do you do to act or think in another way? Jenn Oliver is a senior director of Service academic division at the University of Virginia who has learned a valuable lesson about putting the mask on first. Before her study with Influence Ecology, primarily other people’s needs informed her plans. Her work was only oriented around doing for others, which left her overwhelmed and sometimes aimless. Like many people, she was waiting for others to notice her value and reward her accordingly.
She now takes care of herself and her aims before assisting others. She’s learned to decline requests, respect her own aims, and spend that time on what matters to her personally and professionally. Her interview demonstrates how she’s gained more time, more money, and more focus. In today’s episode, co-founder Kirkland Tibbels teaches about the willingness to decline and how doing so produces more authority and freedom. Here’s the interview. Well, Jenn Oliver, welcome to the Influence Ecology podcast. Great to have you with us.
Jenn: It’s great to be here.
John: Take a second and introduce yourself.
Jenn: My name is Jenn Oliver, and I am the senior director of service for academic division at the University of Virginia, human resources department.
John Patterson: Very good. In the way that we teach it, you identify as which personality?
Jenn: I identify as a producer.
John: Describe that personality from what you understand about it.
Jenn: Producers do a lot of things and struggle declining to do a lot of things, and many others in the environment with us often come to us for things because they know that we’ll do them for them-
John: [laughs]
Jenn: -whether we should be doing them or not.
John: Good. Well, I think that leads us to what I suspect from your notes and from observation and working with you for how long we’ve been working together now?
Jenn: Just over five years now.
John: Goodness gracious. We have said in many different ways throughout our study, put the oxygen mask on yourself first before you put it on others, because many times people don’t do that. Especially our producer personalities, they tend to put the oxygen mask on others first. It sounds like you’ve had some important lessons about that throughout the years, yes?
Jenn: Yes, I definitely have. I have been very successful in my career, but I will say that it came with a cost. Early on in my career, I did everything for everyone except for myself. I was that person that everyone came to, and I would always find a solution to whatever breakdown they had, every issue they had, even if it wasn’t in the domain that I should have been dealing with. I didn’t take care of myself and I suffered pretty greatly in certain areas of my life because of that. So, yes, I didn’t put the oxygen mask on first. I will say that has completely changed, and I’m doing that today.
John: How is life now?
Jenn: Life now is much better. I take care of myself and I concentrate on what is important for where I need to head, and I am comfortable in declining requests that people make of me, but in a very respectful way. That was really hard for me in the past, even if it was just my kids. Not even just in my career, it was throughout everything. I was on every board, I was on every PTO, I was the coordinator for this, that and the other thing, I was on every committee at work. It took hold of my life and who I was, it defined me.
John: What was all that like for you? It sounds exhausting. [laughs]
Jenn: It’s funny you ask that, because I look back on a regular basis now and say, “How did I handle that?” I think because I was just on autopilot constantly, I didn’t know any different, and so I often didn’t know what I was missing until it was missed. That was a huge “a-ha” for me. I also felt value by doing, that’s just in my personality, but I was spending time on that doing in the wrong places in my life. I wasn’t focusing on areas that were important. Marriage, kids, things that made me happy. I just thought by taking care of everyone else was what I was meant to do.
John: There are different personalities, of course. As we teach it, there’s the inventor, the performer, the producer and the judge. The producer tends to be the doer in all transactions. Oftentimes, when people come study with Influence Ecology and come to understand transactions, the way they work, where they’re best suited in transactions, they learn to be responsible for both the asset and the liability of their personality in transaction. There is an asset to your personality in transaction, and it’s obvious. You can hear it, you can hear, how needed, how useful, how helpful, how included you are in all of it.
Yet, there there’s the liability of it, which is what you’ve been describing. Where am I in this transaction? I’m thinking about people who might be hearing about this for the first time and wondering if I identify with Jenn and the way you described yourself before. What are some of the things that you began to do or see that started to change life for you? What would you advise someone?
Jenn: A very first thing that I noticed, first and foremost, when I started studying with Influence Ecology was not only was I doing everything, but I was also so in this mind frame of everyone must do it as well as I. That was really becoming a problem for me in career as well as some other areas of my life. That was the first thing that I focused on. Once I started learning those personalities, I really started focusing on what was important to those individuals and how I needed to move differently with them, and that it wasn’t about everyone being the same as I. That was actually a really bad approach for me to have taken for so long.
John: You mean like people didn’t have to do it with the same perfection as you?
Jenn: The same rigor, right. The same rigor, perfection. I really started accepting people for who they were and where they were at at the time that I had those transactions with them. That’s the first time that at least people in the office started saying to me, “What are you doing? Something’s different.”
John: Was that because you began to see the other personalities would move in different ways than you or be concerned for different things than you?
Jenn: Yes. I was really focusing on what I saw was causing relationships to break down for me in that area. When I’d get a call from a senior leader that says, “Jenn, you pissed that person off,” [laughs] I was starting to take note that it was all embedded in my personality and how I was moving. I was not moving correctly with others that had other personalities. I just expected that everyone should see me as who I am, and if I set a deadline for something, everyone should turn it in on time, and that wasn’t the case. That was the first thing that I really started focusing on.
I would say the second thing that I started focusing on was, as a doer, I am very involved with many different charities and I love taking care of people, and certain missions and areas of my life where– And it shifts all the time, but those that have less than me. So, I really focused on how could I bring that humility that’s in my personality into the workplace and the office and in my career, and really tend to that more often. It really started to show itself in ways where I was recognizing people more. I would say thank you to people privately, but I never thanked them publicly, in front of people, when they did something great. I completely recognized that. I just started to change the way and let people be where they are, and found that they followed and performed better when I stopped being in their business and really telling them how they should do their work.
John: How did that impact things and the family life?
Jenn: Well, it definitely impacted my relationship with my spouse, because he is a judge and he is an introvert, and he is always right first. So, I learned how to provide feedback. I wanted an immediate answer right away, and I’ve learned that if I want to have a conversation, I have to give him 24 to 48 hours for him to think about it. That’s made such a difference. I mean, just some basic things like we have to talk about what camps the kids were going to go to over the summer and I wanted to have it all blocked out and fixed in an hour at 7:00 o’clock on a Wednesday night, and he didn’t want any part of that. He was like, “I just need to think about this for a minute,” and I didn’t understand why. I didn’t want to understand why.
John: I think this is really good. What I love about this is, one of the things that I personally find extraordinarily valuable about understanding personality and Transactional behavior is not just the things about myself, but all the things about how I might speak the language of the other personalities. How do I speak that language? How do I talk to them in a way that works for them? One thing that we’ve seen for sure is that a producer’s mind is like a file cabinet. It’s very much organized where things are objective in certain places. It’s a very black or white, yes or no, on or off kind of world. Then, for the other personalities, they don’t see that way, don’t live that way, don’t think, can’t think that way. It sounds like you gave a lot of room for people to think or see in other ways. Anything else you want to say about all that?
Jenn: Well, yes. I gave them room to think, and then in return, I was able to actually receive from them so much more. All the different possibilities that people who are either on my teams or on workgroups with me at work. I sometimes was quick to shut people down. Not intentionally or to be rude, but I started to recognize how I was moving that way and just really started to see the possibility. I really talk about living in the gray these days. Even with my team here, I say, “We have a lot of process oriented work, and that is our job. We are a service organization, and we provide a very high level of service, but it doesn’t always have to be within the rules. Be able to find the grey within the black and white.”
I was not there seven, eight years ago. It was black or white. I very much live in the, “Well, let’s call this person and see what they think about that.” It brings such a level of collaboration and respect for people, because you’re asking their opinion. It basically is, I’m taking some relationships and I’m building up my favors, right? Any time I ask someone for their opinion on something, usually it’s very well received, especially in higher ed. We’re very collaborative, and it was very hard for me to be in that environment. I’ve adjusted to it very well, but it’s been really great for my personality. I go to my favorite bucket and sometimes I’ll call them up and ask them for a favor when I need to. It’s been very helpful.
John: That’s fantastic. I can only imagine what it’s like for you. As I imagine a character in a movie, if you will, who’s always trying to get everyone to be, and do, and think, and act in a way that’s precise and blah-blah-blah. As in someone else, someone in another character who’s got a lot of room, got a lot of gray areas, et cetera, but both get stuff done. One is certainly more likable. [laughs] One is certainly more enjoyable to be with, and to hang out with, and so forth. What’s happened for you over the course of these five years in terms of your sense of being liked by others, being appreciated by others, being included in new ways? Can you say anything about all that?
Jenn: Well, I would say I’m probably liked a little bit more by my family. [laughs] Not that they didn’t like. My teens think I’m the cool mom, so that is a good thing, but my relationships with people here at this institution have really changed. People will come to me not out of request, but just to say hi. That didn’t used to happen years ago, when I started, 16 years ago with this institution. I think sometimes I was that intimidation factor. I was that one that they only called if you had to call that HR director. [laughs] Now, people will just call, “Hey, hi.” I’m invited to go to coffee and I’m invited to be on workgroups because I’m viewed as valuable now, not just because I can do the work, I may not be the one that’s doing the work.
It’s also lended itself to my ability to really work with others in a way where I see what their needs are and I’m responding to their needs, kind of forecasting it. So, we’ve had a lot of transformation here over the course of many years here at the university. I’ve been able to move myself into positions that I’ve wanted, into committees that I want to be a part of, not that I’m asked and must be a part of. That has been a huge change and benefit to my identity here. Not just at this institution, but at our peer institutions even nationally. When you’re asked to speak at a national conference that’s a big deal.
John: Certainly is. You’ve been participating for five years, and you’re still active and participating today at Influence Ecology, in this study. Why for you is this a valued study?
Jenn: Well, when I started, I did not realize that this is a constant inquiry, and that is something that I’ve definitely learned in the last couple of years. I just did the programs, and to be honest, in the beginning I didn’t get value out of them like I should have, and that’s because I was being my producer self and not doing it for myself but doing it for the program. Especially in these last few years, practicing on a regular basis in this ecology, makes me stronger every day, every month, every year. I’m in a fabulous study group and we have very different opinions, and we really push upon one another.
I said to myself this year, “Do I really have time? Should I continue membership?” If I didn’t continue, I wouldn’t be practicing on a regular basis. This study is not one that you can just stop. Even if I wasn’t participating, I would have to make sure that I had enough rigor to be able to study on my own, but I wouldn’t have that additional education that’s brought from Influence Ecology every single day, every month. There’s always something new and I don’t want to miss out on that. [chuckles] I don’t want to miss out on it.
John: Understood.
Jenn: It’s fascinating.
John: It is. [laughs] It keeps evolving for me and all of us here. Your inclusion and other people’s inclusion, as you know, we’re continuing to grow and evolve in all kinds of wonderful ways, simply because we have so many people from all over the world that are valuable assets to us all, valuable resources to us all, valuable new thinking to us all. It’s been a remarkable journey. Many people often have something they would love to say. So, is there anything else that we should know about anything?
Jenn: I would say that early in my studies, I was slightly intimidated by the fact that there were many individuals that were entrepreneurs that were part of this study. I kept questioning myself, do I need to become that? Do I need to do that as well? Over the course of the time, I think it took me probably a good two and a half years for me to accept the fact that I need to be comfortable with the offer that I have, whatever that may be and whatever specialized knowledge I’m providing to the world.
That was a tough thing for me to do, but I will say that by doing that and focusing on that has really made it tremendously valuable, not just for myself but for this institution. Many people these days don’t stay in one organization for more than 7 to 10 years at most, these days. I’ve been at this institution for 16 years, and in the last five have just found so many opportunities because of the study. It has helped me be able to present the value that I am rather than me sitting back and waiting for someone to recognize me.
John: Yay. [laughs] I’m going to stop. That’s good.
Jenn: I would just sit back and wait. I would do really great work, and I’m not someone that needs accolades, but I would just, “Oh, yes, they’ll promote me because I feel like I deserve it.” Or if it didn’t happen, I wasn’t really upset about it. I was like, “Well, that’s not the right attitude to take. Where do I want to be and how do I position myself to be there?” I will say from a career standpoint, and the deliberateness of the study, and the eye-opening information and education that you provide that makes some of us go, “Oh, wow,” or “Oh, crap” on that [laughs] really is phenomenal. It’s just been a really great place for me in my life, both personally and professionally.
John: Truly great. Well, Jenn, it’s been a pleasure. I loved working with you at one of the conferences recently, where we had you on a panel and you did a fantastic job, by the way, if you haven’t been told enough. You did a really extraordinary job. Always a pleasure to work with you. So, anything else you wanted to say?
Jenn: This has been a great opportunity, and I thank you, and thank you for your continued drive to provide additional education to us. I value it more than I can say in words.
John: Thank you so much, back at you. Jenn Oliver, thank you for being here today for the Influence Ecology podcast.
Jenn: Thank you very much, John Patterson.
How the Willingness to Decline Produces More Authority—and Freedom
John: Now we listen in on the Fundamentals of Transaction program where Vice President Drew Knowles and co-founder Kirkland Tibbels talk about the willingness to decline and how doing so produces more authority and more freedom. Here’s the talk:
Drew Knowles: Staying present to your aims in each condition of life and being informed by the commitments, promises, and obligations already in place will be your greatest guide for what invitations, offers, and requests will or will not offer you the best use of your time, energy, talent, and concerns. There is something to develop in this program as a habit and a practice, willing to decline. Are you willing to decline? We are defined as much, if not more, about what we decline as we are by what we accept. So, I’ll open the floor to you, Kirkland, to expand on this a little.
Kirkland Tibbels: All right. When you were speaking, Drew, I was reminded of a conference session I was in this weekend. There were a group of people there who were making offers to the general conference population, and it just happened to be one of those situations where they were putting on a pretty good pressure. They put up pretty good high-pressure moment, and when they approached me on the third time, I knew that I was going to need to do something a little extra for them to understand that I’m a no, I’m a decline.
I used this language. I said, “Listen, I need you to accept my decline.” That language is meant to get folks’ attention, and I strongly recommend that through the duration of this program, at least that you practice with some language like that. You’ve got to be willing to decline invitations, offers and requests that are coming at you. If it hasn’t already started, you can bet it is going to happen. That the more you move powerfully in the marketplace, the better you are at transacting, the more invitations, offers and requests you are going to get.
I love letting people in on that one early on in the program, and then having them be on a focus lecture or be at one of our live events. Here, the folks who’ve been around for a long time say, “I remember when they told us back in the early days of SOT that you better get good at declining.” That’s why we talk about it early in the program, because the better you are at transacting, the more invitations, offers and requests you’re going to get. Now, the question, of course, is, how do you know what to accept, and how do you know what to decline? This goes back to step number one of the 13 steps, that depends on your aims. The more focused and concentrated you are, the more that you are able to articulate your aims in each condition of life, the faster and cleaner you’ll be able to move around accepting or declining invitations, offers and requests.
It is not uncommon to hear people say that they have an inordinate amount of respect for people who can say no and do it powerfully. People who know how to decline invitations properly do it with some grace, they do it with some class, they do it with some gratitude and humility, but they do it and they do it all the time. The most successful people I know are in a near constant state of decline of invitations, offers and requests. Chances are, you don’t even recognize the number of invitations, offers and requests that you are getting on a day-to-day basis. Ambitious adults are inundated with invitations, offers and requests in so many forms and in so many ways that sometimes they’re unrecognizable.
I would ask you to consider if you’re any good at declines. I even go so far as to say that you are more defined by what you decline than by what you accept. We as human beings are regularly attracted to people who are so crystal clear about where they’re going and what it is that they know that they need to produce, that they will gravitate toward those who decline and do it openly, and do it publicly, and do it graciously, and do it with ethics. On a regular basis, you will need to be able to accept the declines of those who are not responding to you and your own invitations, offers and requests. You’ll need to get good at it many times.
I don’t know how many times you’ve done it this week, but I’ve done it three times already this week where someone said they would get back to me with something, someone will get back to me with a contract or get back with me with a proposal, or get back to me with some intellectual property that was due on a deadline, and I’m pretty quick to let them know that something along the lines of, “Hey, listen, we had an agreement. I checked in with you, I haven’t heard from you. It looks like that you are no longer interested, and I want you to know that while I appreciate the opportunity, I accept your decline.”
What happens on a regular basis when you recognize and respect your own offer enough that you offer people the clarity about where you hold your offers, people will respond. I’ll tell you a story how I– Years ago, when I first got to Hollywood, I was very lucky and got a meeting with Ron Howard’s company within the first few months of actually being in business with my production company in Los Angeles. This particular company is known for their rigor, they’re known to move pretty effectively. We went in with my writing partners and my producing partners. We went in and we pitched this thing, and it doesn’t happen very often anymore, but we actually sold the project in the room that day. That means that they made us an offer.
They took us down to the legal department and we met with the head of legal, and they told us at that time, they said, “Now, let me be crystal clear. When we close this door, the jurisdiction for this project changes hands.” The creatives who were all in these really good moods had turned everything over to the legal department, and they made it really clear, they couldn’t have been any clearer that whatever they say goes in this department. Now, the lawyer was a very nice guy, very congenial, very gregarious guy. We had a nice time, we drew up a deal memo, and there were steps that we needed to take to get back to him. He said, “I’ll expect it by Friday. Do you agree?” We agreed and everybody was on the same page.
Friday rolled around and we were working on the project, but like everyone in Hollywood, we were somewhat indifferent to the deadline. At 5:00 o’clock, a fax came over the machine and they had accepted our decline of a project that we were absolutely working on and fully expecting that we would deliver. Now, that fax got my attention. Basically, they said, “Listen, it’s a pleasure to do business with you. We had an agreement that 5:00 o’clock by Friday. We understand if this project is not in your interest, and we’re moving on.” That was the language that they used. “We’re moving on.”
Well, it wasn’t two minutes, Drew, before I was on the phone and call that lawyer on the phone. They made it perfectly clear that that was the way they’re going to do business. The words that he used ring in my ear today, and it was, “We would appreciate your respect of our offer.” They made us an offer, and it was a good one. I ask you, do you respect your offer enough to do the same? When people don’t get back with you, you know as well as I do, they’re probably just not paying attention. They’re probably indifferent, they’re probably busy, they’ve probably got some things going on, and they will run around they take as much advantage and use as much space as you give them.
John: In our next episode, we interview John Severson, an event and venue specialist who’s helped us find amazing venues for our global conferences.
John Severson: Some possibilities are dangerous. I used to think there was no such thing as a bad idea. If you get enough people to believe in it, you can do it. That’s what I’m noticing that’s the most costly in some of the people that haven’t done the Influence Ecology work versus the people that are starting to do it. They get to sit down and go, “Maybe that’s not a great way to go.”
John Patterson: My special thanks to our guest, Jenn Oliver. In our show notes, you’ll find links to connect with her and all the links to websites, books or downloads mentioned in this podcast. Some episodes include a transcript and support material. The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded on May 4th, 2018, and was produced by me, John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors and students around the world.
We’re grateful for co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30-plus years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence. This episode includes contributions by Karol Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelly. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring, entitled Fast Train to Everywhere. You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or via email at podcast@influenceechology.com. If you haven’t yet offered a rating or a review I ask that you take a moment. Go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology, LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded April 8th, 2018 and was produced by John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world. We’re grateful for Co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30+ years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karal Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelley. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled ‘Fast Train to Everywhere.’ You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating or review, I ask that you take a moment go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
Influence Ecology is the leading business education specializing in Transactional Competence, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline of transactional competence and is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Influence Ecology’s curriculum includes conferences, webinars, online tools, podcasts, and mentorship utilized by men and women in over seventy countries around the world. Our membership includes an international assembly of accomplished professionals, faculty, and peers from a variety of countries, industries, and cultures.
Simon Chesney – From Talented Generalist to Agile Specialist (Ep. 52)
Simon Chesney's journey is a case study in the benefits of evolving from a talented generalist to a unique specialist. He's learned that specialization and differentiation can help him build a valued identity and that it’s possible to incorporate and combine his past experiences and expertise with his newly acquired specialized knowledge. Simon Chesney is an Enterprise Agile Coach for Western Digital, an American Fortune 200 data storage company headquartered in San Jose, California. Agile Development refers to a group of software development methodologies based on iterative development, where requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organizing cross-functional teams. Subscribe to Podcast…
Simon Chesney’s journey is a case study in the benefits of evolving from a talented generalist to a unique specialist. He’s learned that specialization and differentiation can help him build a valued identity and that it’s possible to incorporate and combine his past experiences and expertise with his newly acquired specialized knowledge.
Simon Chesney is an Enterprise Agile Coach for Western Digital, an American Fortune 200 data storage company headquartered in San Jose, California. Agile Development refers to a group of software development methodologies based on iterative development, where requirements and solutions evolve through collaboration between self-organizing cross-functional teams.
Matthew Jackson – Slow Down to Speed Up (Ep. 51)
Ever found inspiration in the William H. Murray quote: "Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it! Boldness has genius, magic, and power in it”? How about this one by Daniel Burnham: "Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood and probably themselves will not be realized"? While these statements do seem to inspire action, perhaps boldness for its own sake is overrated . . . or a bit too, well, magical. Maybe there are other ways to stir men's blood. Perhaps there is a balance of dreaming and pragmatism that in fact speeds…
Ever found inspiration in the William H. Murray quote: “Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it! Boldness has genius, magic, and power in it”? How about this one by Daniel Burnham: “Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized”?
While these statements do seem to inspire action, perhaps boldness for its own sake is overrated . . . or a bit too, well, magical. Maybe there are other ways to stir men’s blood. Perhaps there is a balance of dreaming and pragmatism that in fact speeds up results by first slowing down to think accurately about our aims, our resources, and our plans.
Matthew Jackson is an Auckland entrepreneur and investor who makes no little plans. He’s created a wellness solution for corporate New Zealand to increase their wellness ROI with Telehealth, making GP consultations available online through Doctor2Go as an extension of their corporate wellness strategy. Matthew is one of those innovative entrepreneurs offering unique solutions to some of our most significant challenges in the healthcare sector. His study here taught him that boldness isn’t always magical.
Below you’ll find a transcript of this podcast episode that has been edited for your reading pleasure. You’ll also see links at the bottom of this post where you can find more information on the people and ideas mentioned in the episode.
by John Patterson
Produced by: John Patterson, Jason Kelley & Tyson Crandall
“Five years ago, I would have […] been doing a ton of work without really understanding what’s the objective.”
John Patterson: Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you are in the world. I’m your host, John Patterson; the co-founder and CEO of Influence Ecology, the leading business education in transactional competence. Broadcasting from Ventura, California. This podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives and entrepreneurs who found real solutions, real results and real satisfaction. Not only with work, career, and money, but in every area of life.
You’ll hear how these ambitious professionals found that those who transact powerfully, thrive. Ever found inspiration in the William H. Murray quote, “Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.” How about the quote by Daniel Burnham, “Make no little plans, they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized.” While these statements do seem to inspire action, perhaps boldness for its own sake is overrated or a bit too well, magical.
Maybe there are other ways to stir men’s blood. Perhaps there is a balance of dreaming and pragmatism that in fact speeds up results by first slowing down to think accurately about our aims, our resources, and our plans. Matthew Jackson is an Auckland entrepreneur and investor who makes no little plans. He’s created a wellness solution for corporate New Zealand to increase their wellness ROI, making health consultations available online through Doctor2Go as an extension of their corporate wellness strategy.
Matthew is one of those innovative entrepreneurs offering unique solutions to some of our most significant challenges in the healthcare sector. His study at Influence Ecology taught him that boldness isn’t always magical. Here’s the interview. Welcome to the Influence Ecology podcast, pleasure to have you here.
Mathew: It’s an honor John, I’m looking forward to having this conversation with you.
John: Me too. Introduce yourself.
Mathew: My name is Matthew Jackson. I live in Auckland, New Zealand. I had a company called Doctor2Go that helps people get access to a medical team on their mobile phone. I am the co-founder of one of the co-founders of that company. We work with HR teams to enhance the employment brand of an organization.
John: Well said. What are some of the big results that have happened since you started participating?
Mathew: The first thing was I was employed. Now, I’m an entrepreneur and investor. I had a relationship or marriage that was breaking down and now I’m in a really positive, engaging, exciting relationship with a woman that I’m really enjoying. A really close relationship with my brothers and my daughter. I get to spend time with her that I choose to spend, rather than being restricted to a 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM job.
With the type of things that I’ve been able to achieve since I started Influence Ecology, I’ve been invited to speak at events around the world, in India and in Europe and had a significant impact on the amount of wealth that I had. Because of the fact that I don’t have a job anymore, I own startup companies.
John: That’s fantastic. One of the things I love about your notes is, you began your journey, talking a little bit about the thing that Kirkland says which is slow down to speed up. If there were anything that I love about what’s in your notes, it’s this whole notion of slow down to speed up. Because one of the things that you did and demonstrated throughout your journey was to think accurately about all of it. Think accurately about the job you had, or the kind of things you might want to do, or how you might want to put a company together or what that might look like.
There’s slow down to speed up throughout your entire journey, as far as I can tell. It just marks of somebody who’s really smart, really thoughtful, strategic, doesn’t just jump or leap, but in fact, rather meticulously and carefully crafts a well-structured life. Anything you’d like to say about that notion, slow down to speed up and that is a thread throughout your journey.
Mathew: When I first looked and first began started studying with the Fundamentals of Transaction program and working with Influence Ecology. I sat down with a group of people and we decided to start a company. The first thing I would have done without the study is, I would have just jumped in without a consideration, but I asked the question, hey, what’s in it for me and then how do we take care of the money.
With that, with a product that was really disruptive, it cost us between two and three cents to operate the underlying technology, but the value that it created for the market was a huge point of difference. It really was a game-changing product. If we had have priced it based on the cost to deliver versus the value that incurred, we wouldn’t have got through the first year because we wouldn’t have made enough money from it. Fast forward five years looking at what I want to do for 2018, rather than jumping into 2018 and undertaking lots of work in action, I entered into an inquiry to speak to the market about what is the current environment look like.
It was an amazing interaction that I was able to undertake and spoke with innovators in New Zealand and globally about where the breakdowns exist in the society at the moment. I’m still on an inquiry as to what it looks like to undertake and what type of work that will be because I don’t have an aim yet for that. Now, five years ago, I would have already created a company, I would have registered brand name, I would have built a team and we would have been doing a ton of work without really understanding what’s the objective.
What’s my objective, what are the aims of the people that I’m working with? Have we got the same philosophy for work? Are we working on something that we all believe will help me down into 2018 as well as those in the future? How does that represent us in the market and are we paid correctly so that we can be most effective?
John: It sounds like you discovered a lot of things in the last five years inquiry about your own personality, your role in the transactions that you’re constructing, perhaps the kinds of people that you may need in certain transactions, the kinds of teams that you need. What have you learned about you and your own strengths and liabilities in thinking about these transactions?
Mathew: I guess it starts with recognizing that you have a perspective and that you have bought an aspect of any transaction. When I first started this journey, I felt that I had a ceiling on income and I place blame on other people for not achieving my goals. I was looking around at other people saying, “How come you don’t recognize what I’m capable of doing?”
Whereas now, what I have is quite– I have a peace of mind about what it looks like to create a new transaction and recognizing that when you have a meeting of the minds that you are benefiting those people in that transaction and creating something that’s new. I tend not to go into a conversation with a predetermined outcome in mind. I look to figure out what is this person’s aims and what are my aims and is there something that we can do to work together and if there’s not, then that’s okay.
The opposite of that as if I’m not conscious and I’m really relying on my biology, that I walk into a meeting and I will kill the relationship because my ego comes out and I live in a space where I’m always thinking about what’s happening in the future. I just can’t understand why you don’t live there as well. Why do you not get what I can see is obvious but being a transactionist and being conscious of that core ship and now we’re talking about this last week it’s, “Hey look, it’s our responsibility to take you on that journey.”
John: That’s got to seem like a slow down to speed up thing. Most people want to just power through, bully their way through. “Come on, let’s get this thing done.” For anybody that has an ego, they have to check. Obviously, things are speeding up dramatically but do you feel like you sometimes have to manage your own, want to go faster even though you know that if you do you’re probably going to break things or start fires, or waste time. Anything you want to say about all that?
Mathew: Yes, I absolutely had to because if it wasn’t my idea then it wasn’t right. What I learned from that was that you’d put two of me in a room together, we both want to have the idea, we don’t end up either reaching what idea we’re going to work on let alone putting together a plan to undertake work or making an assessment about whether or not that’s the right work we should have been doing.
Yes, I still absolutely have to hold back on my biology, but to do that, what I find is more effective is to work with people where they can leverage their biology and mutually reach and create a transaction which means that it’s so much easier and then I can do what I do, use my ego to my advantage. For example, if I’m working with a performer in a sales role then we can use their relationship skills to our advantage and that’s a far more effective way of working and collaboration.
My mindset now is to, the sooner that I can give up the ego, the sooner that I recognize that mine is not the only perspective, the faster I can reach my personal goals and the sooner than I can understand a way of working with you that’s more aligned for us both moving forward.
John: I just love about that listening to you in the context of slowing down to speed up, for example, is that it’s so popular now to be concerned for one’s authentic self-expression. That I can say what I want to say in the moment as if I’m unfiltered as if I’m transparent. There’s some utility in that but at the same time, having to check that again knowing that that won’t speed up the transaction. Although it may speed up my expression, it may speed up my desire to go, “You’re an idiot.” [laughs]
It doesn’t speed up the transaction. It tends to halt it and now we got to go talk about our, do we still like each other because I’ve done something to the relationships or I’ve done something to the transaction to take it off course or back it up or something like that. That’s one of the things that comes to mind when I think about it in that context. Any comment about that?
Mathew: Yes, you can spend a lot of time trying to clean up a mess and time is one of our most valuable resources. I don’t know about you but it’s the one thing I don’t have enough of. I know we have exactly the same amount but I would do anything to get more of it. When you sit in a breakdown, because you haven’t aligned philosophies, you haven’t articulated clearly what your aims are, or would you just have a personality breakdown, you spend hours focused on resolving that versus in co-creation where you’re creating something new. It’s incredibly ineffective to work in that way.
John: You said that very, very well. It takes hours to clean up a mess. It takes a long time. During your journey, in the middle of your journey, geared influence colleges, all the kinds of things that you have learned, you’re now at work on a new project and the project is called Doctor2Go.
Mathew: That’s right.
John: Tell us about Doctor2Go and what’s happening with this and tell us about it.
Mathew: I guess my specialized knowledge is the ability to predict how an industry is going to be disrupted, and then put together a team to create a new market and capitalize on that change. One of the things that I recognized was that people aren’t taking care of their health because of barriers to time and travel. We live in this world where we have huge commitments to the work that we do, to our families. As a result, because you have to go and sit in the doctor’s waiting room and you can’t get in to see the doctor you want for a couple of days.
You go and sit there and it takes another hour and then you have to go to the pharmacist work and put together a team of commissions and technologists to build Doctor2Go. We provide a service which people can click via the internet and get immediate access to a medical team that’s nurses, doctors, psychiatrists, psychologists and they can do that wherever they are where they have an internet connection.
We will then send them a script to their location, whether that will be the office or home and the whole process can take just a few minutes, rather than taking half of the day.
John: Wow, is this available now?
Mathew: Sure is.
John: That’s great.
Mathew: Yes, what I recognized was that the disruption of an industry usually occurs to the industry rather than from within. Because you’ve got a lot of existing incumbent processes which have been created in order to drive efficiencies. The internet kind of shifted the game because it allowed us to organize resources more efficiently. Really simply, if you think about a traditional doctors surgery, it’s based in a physical location, and I will go and see the doctor where I live, but where I live has changed.
I have an office in my house and I have an office in the city and then on occasion, I’m in a different country. If my medical records are based in that physical location, why am I restricted to only working with that expert, that general practitioner based on where I live rather than what my philosophy is and what their background is in medicine. What I’m looking to do is be able to deliver this personalized medicine service to people so that they can manage themselves data.
We’re using things like biometrics to measure people’s blood pressure and by doing that we can proactively determine whether or not the actions that are taken, are helping them keep on trying to stay healthy.
John: In the construction of this offer, I would imagine that you dealt with an enormous amount of complexity in the industry and had to find ways around some of that complexity or connect resources to resources. Did you run into some overwhelming complexities that you had to mere through or are you still doing that? [laughs] Looks like you may.
Mathew: For those of you who that are listening, John and I are on a video conference, and I’m smiling and just laughing to myself and they occur daily. For example, I had a meeting with some people yesterday who are experts in their field and I said, “Look, we think your niche is this place and that you’re creating a new way of thinking and this is how you interact with this level of people.” It’s not something that I hadn’t uncovered but I had to be open to having that conversation. To look at whether we reshape our strategy and so we’re constantly learning.
The reason I smiled was that in the profession that I chose, and the personality and biology that I have, we’re constantly inventing a new way of doing things. While I can’t really avoid that situation of inventing because it’s just built into who I am. Ana Athanasiu who is within our group, she put it most elegantly. She said, “Look, Matthew, you live in the margin.”
When you are looking to create something new that truly is a deep change in the way things are done, you’re always on the discovery and you will pivot constantly based on understanding how this new way of thinking is perceived relative to those people you’re trying to work with. I have the privilege and the experience to be one of the first people in the country to have access to this type of technology.
When I show people what we’ve got they’re amazed. Often the first time they’ve either had a video conference with a physician online and they kind of go, “I can see how that can make my life easier.” We are in a space where we are looking to transition to using digital technology to help people take care of themselves because we have an overwhelming epidemic of obesity. We lock in patient information to clinicians systems rather than utilizing the data that sits on our mobile phones to be able to keep us healthy and then putting in place an accountability. Building those characteristics into an offer so that it can meet the needs of the customers that we’re working with.
John: That’s just fantastic. I was already impressed. I’m now more impressed with you. There are so many things that you’re saying that demonstrate what we teach and hope that people gain and embody by studying here. One of them is certainly that you are slowing down to speed up. You are dealing with the monster of complexity daily. When something comes along that’s innovative, that changes the game, that alters the way in which we do things; on the backside, hindsight, it always looks like such a simple and elegant solution.
People don’t often have the understanding of the kind of work, the kind of complexity that must be tackled to allow somebody to experience something that seems so elegant and effortless. I, first of all, acknowledge you for the work that you do and continue to do and the willingness, the adventure– you’re smiling again, the daily adventure of complexity, the daily adventure of that puzzle. Inventors, we just love that puzzle like, “Oh, how are we going to figure that one out?”
It’s fun for us, never stop thinking about it, but it really is something to acknowledge. I think if there’s a lesson here, a big, big lesson here, there are so many people who began ventures, businesses, offers, franchises, whatever the thing is, and they don’t want to deal with the complexity on the front end. They really do just want to go and then they spend a lifetime cleaning up mess after mess after mess. Never getting it to market, never providing the kind of solution that’s elegant and simple and the like. I really do congratulate you on that great work.
Mathew: Thanks, John. I haven’t always been successful. There are times where I have had some pretty big failures and some significant financial loss as a result of that by not thinking accurately. I tell people that I’ve probably shut down more businesses than they thought of starting. I would be presented with a new invitation or offer at least two or three times a month if not two or three times a week based on my identity in New Zealand as being somebody that creates innovative technology companies.
If I wasn’t able to decline those and think accurately about the maintenance that’s required in order to have an offer in the market then I would have been overwhelmed with the amount of work that I would need to do. Being in situations like that before where because I haven’t thought accurately about the kind of team we put together or the amount of work that’s involved because we haven’t done an accurate assessment. Because we haven’t had a judge involved or producer involved.
It really has been a difficult and costly project. Even now, when I look at our teams we are missing a couple of key personalities. We’ve got them but just in different roles. The next steps for those projects have the right personalities in the right places so that I can naturally move and we can move the company forward faster. One of the things that I think in the current is that we have taken on these buzzwords like digital transformation and innovation. I really like what you said before about what it looks like.
One of the most interesting people I’ve met on this journey because of Influence Ecology is a gentleman called Paul Berryman who is quite well-known in the technology sector. He invented engineer television. We were sitting there having a wine he said to me, “You can read the Harvard business issue.” I said, “Paul, why would I do that? I want to talk to you about what you did,” I said, “How did you create it?”
He goes, “Look, we flew to China. We took a DVD player and we plugged an ethernet cord in the back. We plugged it in and created a software fountain.” He was one of the first guys that figured out how to deliver content over the internet and now everybody uses Netflix. The very first company I started was literally three guys in a coffee shop going, “Can we make some money out of something because we know somebody that’s going to buy something and we can show them a prototype.” It does require you to think a little bit differently.
Today’s the current that we operate in, it leaves very little time for people to take a step back to think accurate about their aims. The thing I really like about Influence Ecology is it provides a structure to do that.
John: For our listeners, say what the current is. Because you’ve used the term waited and define it here. What is it, the current?
Mathew: The current is really the way that the market is operating. It’s the way people think and act.
John: At the moment, like the common popular idea of the moment or the current trend or whatever the case may be. All right, good.[unintelligible 00:23:59]
Mathew: I guess what I want to help people with is the fact that no matter who I talked to, the sooner that I can understand somebody else’s aims, the faster that it is that we can have a meeting of the minds. I encourage people to look at where they are engaging with others, and looking at whether they truly understand what their objective is and what the other person is and whether they’re aligned ethically.
That’s so important, but one of the things that I’m really conscious on at the moment is that when you start to utilize your resources and think accurately about your financial resources, you have tangible and intangible resources, slow down and take that assessment before you jump into action. You can speed up a transaction so significantly. I use a really simple example. I recently bought a new car and I asked the salesperson at the end of the process, how long it usually takes somebody to buy a car and he said three months.
I was able to purchase a car by starting the decision at nine o’clock in the morning and purchasing one by 4:30 PM. I took under a business day. It was because I started with an assessment of my resources. How much cash do I have available, and who are my experts that can help me with this decision. Fortunately, my brother is in the industry. He knows my personality, he was able to tell me the type of car I could purchase. I shortcut that decision pretty quickly.
I have a relationship with a great European car mechanic, Gallan and they were able to help me with assessing each car. I was able to use an agile methodology that I’ve learned from in work in a conference previously to really clearly articulate what are the important things in making a decision about that car. I was able to take 90 cars and whittle it down to four by twelve o’clock. At twelve o’clock, I went in cross them off and ended up purchasing the third one.
It’s a really simple example. You can see by getting clear about my aims, understanding what resources I have available both tangible and intangible and then undertaking the work and action that I created an outcome that I am very satisfied with. I have no post-purchase dissonance, really happy about the car that I’ve got and I hardly spent any time getting it. This is just a simple example of slowing down, looking at what resources you have available before taking action. I really encourage people to do that. To take a step back before they move forward, think accurately and then move into the transaction.
John: Well, Matthew, it’s been a pleasure to speak with you. This was wonderful. Thank you so much for being a guest on the Influence Ecology podcast today.
Mathew: It was my pleasure. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
John: In today’s guru talk, we’ll listen in on a fundamentalist of transaction program webinar where I candidly share my own journey to satisfy all the conditions of life and how slowing down to confront my dissatisfaction helped me speed up everything.
“If you’re going to construct the transactions, the primary transactions that satisfy your aims, you wouldn’t want to construct something that would be detrimental to your health. It would need to support your current health aims or your current health ethics. You wouldn’t want what you’re doing to threaten it.
You wouldn’t want what you’re doing to produce more stress, chronic stress. You wouldn’t want it to produce an inability to maintain your fitness or perhaps to threaten you in some other way. This is the big deal I want to make about this. A decade has gone by since this journey began for me. I used to weigh 70 pounds more than I did now. I used to be working under extreme stress. I used to not eat well. I did not have time for any kind of activity other than work and so for health, I was quite threatened but I wouldn’t have said so.
I would have just simply said, “Well, I don’t have time for any of that. Got a busy life, this is a big deal. It’s important.” But I wouldn’t have related to any of that as a threat. To think about what would satisfy my aims for health, wasn’t necessarily a conversation I wanted to have. It was something I didn’t want to deal with. I’ll say it that way. In terms of work, I was working typically 10-14 hours a day, 5-6 days a week. I was working in ways I didn’t want to work.
It wasn’t that I was doing enjoyable work, although there were parts of it that were extraordinarily fulfilling. I was also working way too much. I was working so many hours that I wasn’t able to balance out other things like relationship and perhaps some of the higher conditions of life. Where I might enjoy the aesthetics of a beautiful environment, or perhaps certain spiritual endeavors or ways in which I might travel or spend my time and leisure. In the domain of career, I didn’t even know what that was just simply meant my job, not my identity.
I was completely and utterly naive to the need to produce a consistent, coherent and focused identity in the mind of other people. In terms of money, my money was okay. It was okay. I certainly didn’t have any surplus, so the future was threatened. My present state wasn’t threatened. My future was threatened. There was a need to alter a great number of things and it was rather uncomfortable. Hence, I wanted to have this conversation with you, because some of you are working on or dealing with or struggling with certain parts of this part of the study.
I must say that going through this journey a decade ago was uncomfortable, but extraordinarily transformative. Again, I now weigh 70 pounds less. I work out daily. I eat well, healthy, healthy foods. I’m in excellent physical condition. If I go do my blood work, I just did my bloodwork recently. Everything is in normal levels. I’m very healthy. In terms of my work, I only work four days a week typically. I have three days off. I work from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM. I don’t work outside of that. I go home at 5:00 routinely and religiously.
My identity, I have a very focused and specialized identity known in many, many places, known all over the world for transactional competence and what I do as a CEO and co-founder and faculty member of Influence Ecology. My money is fantastic. The world is a different world. What I had to deal with to move from where I was to where I am, took some courage. It took some willingness to alter certain things that were uncomfortable.
I didn’t know how it was going to turn out but because of this education and because of the people here, because of all the structures and support they are, I had the opportunity to utilize this structure to make sure that I’d lived a very satisfying life. I would like for you to consider that it is possible to construct a transaction that actually supports your health aims, that allows you to know how to organize some of the actions to support the aims that you’ve got, that allows you to participate in the activities that suit your skills and your ability.
The activity that you want and like to do, that it produces the income that you need to live as you want until you die. That it produces the identity that you seek to be known for amongst other people. That it allows you to move in line with your standards, your ethics, your own morals, and conduct. That it supports your aims for the people in your life, your spouse, your kids, your family, your friends. That it offers an opportunity to learn or expand your specialized knowledge. Finally, that it impacts your ability to function with other people in ways that are beneficial to you.
With all of that being said, what are you working on or dealing with about any of these particular conditions? I shared some of my own journey because I’m not some superhuman that’s had it all together my whole life. I went through stuff.”
In our next episode we interview Simon Chesney, an enterprise agile specialist working at Western Digital, with some lessons about moving from a talented generalist to an agile specialist.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology, LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded April 8th, 2018 and was produced by John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world. We’re grateful for Co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30+ years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of transactional competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karal Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelley. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled ‘Fast Train to Everywhere.’ You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating or review, I ask that you take a moment go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
Here’s where you can learn more about the people and ideas in this episode:
Sources
Matthew Jackson on LinkedIn
Doctor2Go
Doctor2Go on LinkedIn
Bypass Network Services
Bypass Network Services on LinkedIn
Extras
Influence Ecology is considered the leader in the field of Transactional Competence, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline of transactional competence and is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Influence Ecology’s curriculum includes conferences, webinars, online tools, podcasts, and mentorship utilized by men and women in over seventy countries around the world. Our membership includes an international assembly of accomplished professionals, faculty, and peers from a variety of countries, industries, and cultures.
Kirkland Tibbels – Founding Transactionalism (Ep. 50)
Influence Ecology launched its first podcast episode in August of 2016 and saw our listener base grow to 70 countries and counting. This episode is our 50th, and my special guest is Influence Ecology's very own Kirkland Tibbels. You often hear him on the closing talk that underscores the primary point of each episode. Today, we get to learn about his own journey, the founding of this philosophy, and why transactional competence matters—especially now. Kirkland Tibbels is co-founder and chairman of Influence Ecology—an international education company specializing in the field of transactional competence. Kirkland and his colleagues comprise an international collective…
Influence Ecology launched its first podcast episode in August of 2016 and saw our listener base grow to 70 countries and counting. This episode is our 50th, and my special guest is Influence Ecology’s very own Kirkland Tibbels. You often hear him on the closing talk that underscores the primary point of each episode. Today, we get to learn about his own journey, the founding of this philosophy, and why transactional competence matters—especially now.
Kirkland Tibbels is co-founder and chairman of Influence Ecology—an international education company specializing in the field of transactional competence. Kirkland and his colleagues comprise an international collective of professionals who are active in the development of the philosophy of Transactionalism and the discipline of transactional competence. He is considered a leading philosopher and authority in the field, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historical and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips, and he has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline. He is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Below you’ll find a transcript of this podcast episode that has been edited for your reading pleasure. You’ll also see links at the bottom of this post where you can find more information on the people and ideas mentioned in the episode.
by John Patterson
Produced by: John Patterson, Jason Kelley & Tyson Crandall
“I’d like for people to consider waking up to the notion that they can live a much better life if they address their indifference to certain things.”
John Peterson: Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening wherever you are in the world. I’m your host John Patterson, the co-founder and CEO of Influence Ecology, the leading business education in Transactional Competence. Broadcasting from Ventura, California this podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives and entrepreneurs who found real solutions, real results and real satisfaction not only with work, career and money, but in every area of life, you’ll hear how these ambitious professionals found that those who transact powerfully thrive. Influence Ecology launched its first podcast episode in August 2016 and saw our listener base grow to 70 countries and counting. This episode is our 50th and my special guest is Influence Ecology very own Kirkland Tibbels, you often hear him on the closing talk that underscores the primary point of each episode. Today we get to learn a little bit about his journey, the founding of this philosophy and why Transactional Competence matters especially now. Kirkland welcome to the Influence Ecology Podcast.
Kirkland: Well thank you John, very happy to be here.
John: That’s a privilege to have you here with us today. I’ve known you for almost 30 years, you are a very rare combination of ambitious professional, studied philosopher, distinguished Toastmaster, practiced comedian, and there’s a through line through all of that you’re often working on the trajectory and an aim, a goal in mind that weaves those bits together, can you say anything to let us know a little bit about how all that came together or the through line for those bits?
Kirkland: That’s a big question, and it’s a question I’ve thought about, how did come together, this thing being me as a character I guess, a combination of events that occurred in my life, environment where I grew up, the joy and happiness and privilege of having some of the family members I had who influenced my life in the situations that occurred, all fit early on as this personality that wanted to perform, to present and I was just very fortunate to have the family I did at that time willing to leave me alone and let me do what I wanted to do because my mother by the time I started growing up John my mother already had three kids out of the way, seven years later I came a long and she and I had a deal, while she was very strict with the first three, and she and I struck a deal early on when it was essentially just me and my little sister and my mom, and it was, stay out trouble and I’ll leave you alone.
She didn’t make me make A’s in school, she didn’t really care as long as I passed. Its more along those lines and that really left me open to pursue what I most wanted to do which was performance in all the varied ways that came together, and that led me into early on when I was 18, that’s into my first Toastmasters and I found a real joy in working with business professionals at that time, and I continued to do that as went to college in Austin, I continued to hangout and learn, and was so fortunate to have the opportunity to learn from some various dudes and very successful people in Austin and then in St. Antonio, and ultimately it was an introduction that was made to me through Toastmasters that led me to a group of people that were starting a business and it’s– I’ll have to take you through a very complex round about way of how it got there, but essentially it got there and I had the opportunity to be on the ground floor of a company that ultimately went public, and you’ve heard me say over and over, it wasn’t because I knew that’s where we were going, in fact, I didn’t know any better, but I just knew that I trusted the people that started that company and I trusted the ethic and their mission, the people that they were.
They were a lot smarter than I was, and if I was going to be successful in any way I needed to figure out how to make money and they figured out that I was best suited for being in front of people and fortunately they knew that and I knew that and put me in the right spot and surrounded me with highly capable people and John that’s how it all came together. While I also was practicing in public speaking in many different forms from standup to academia speeches to professional presentations. I was also fortunate to study with a group of young business professionals in Austin and St. Antonio in the mid 80’s, late 80’s as all of that was going on, and then was able to go from there to take my winnings and I went to film school, and so that’s completely different path after having some success and was fortunate enough to land again in the right spot at the right time for what I was up to.
Actually moved to Los Angeles, started producing film, all along I was still fascinated with the study that had begun in St. Antonio on the dynamic of human exchange, that’s the fancy way of saying it now, back then I wasn’t sure exactly what it was, but it became that over time and I became more and more fascinated with it, found my inner student late in my development as a young adult. I became hungry for, and had a real passion for philosophy, but I didn’t have any formal education I just started finding it and the more research I did and the work that I would do kept leading me in a direction of what I now know is process philosophy. I didn’t know that’s what it was, I didn’t know that’s how it’s organized or categorized, but that’s where I ended up in the study of process and transaction. So John that’s how I’ have arrived here.
John: Do you not had many conversations around what I’ll call story, story arc, storytelling, but also human behavior, and those things that drive human behavior we’ve had conversations around stories that end in the hero’s transformation and the like, there seems to be at least in my observation some through line about your fascination with human behavior, storytelling and as a Toastmaster, a comedian and so forth there’s the storytelling and the art, is that all part of the recipe here, is that play a small role, tell me about that?
Kirkland: I’d say it’s plays a large role and the continuing development of how human beings engage one another, the notion that anything we do as human beings to achieve our needs and wants is done in concert with other human beings. I’ve been fascinated with that relationship, how human beings couple up, how we gather up in order to satisfy those areas of our lives that are most important to our happiness. How human beings arrive at a happy life is something that drives me and its compelled me, and what is included in that is this notion that human beings think in terms of narrative.
John: That’s actually the word that I most hear you express; narrative, I said story arc, or story-line or the like, but it’s a narrative. You got tell us about that?
Kirkland: I don’t remember the first time I heard it, it was probably back in one of the early Toastmasters clubs where great speakers understand that if you want to a point make you make the point and then you tell a story. You tell a story then you make a point, people hear themselves living in their day to day push and pull of their life in narrative and in story, and in fact people think in story. How we think about our life is story, we talk about influence of policy, we talk about mood being a narrative. One of the ways that we demonstrate that narrative, that mood is a constructed narrative is we ask people to consider the time when they forgot why they were supposed to be upset.
I know I’m supposed to be upset about something, I cannot for the life of me remember what it was, and then you start to think about it. This just happened to me the other day and I was laughing about it, I knew I was supposed to be upset about something John, there was something obviously in the background I knew and until I figured out what the story was I couldn’t remember why I was supposed to be upset, and I also noticed my biology at the time I wasn’t upset until I remembered what it was, and then I got really upset. Yes that’s right, sorry though. It just gives more evidence to this claim that human beings even feel by virtue of the story that they hold about a certain thing, that’s part of that fascination. However, it got there I’m sure if I thought about I could have remembered the day that someone said, “You got to learn that,” but it’s all part of this weaving of my own narrative that got me to investigate and study myth and then a cinematic narrative. How those things get constructed and in film school I got to take a deeper dive in those areas. That was what I concentrated on for the most part in film school was how to negotiate the stories that turn out to be told in film or in pictures and in a dialogue. That craft became something that was very fascinating me and is still is, and why I think I keep up pretty strong hand in the entertainment industry, in the relationships that I have in that world because there is probably in our age right now no greater way to convey our thinking, to convey our philosophy except through cinematic narrative, television, video, large screen or small. That is a powerful way to have a story told and to have people recognize it in a very short amount of time.
John: Absolutely, probably one of the most mass transformative bits of media that we have. Whether or not it’s television or motion picture for people to wake up and to think differently about life because of that series that they watched, or that film that they are all talking about this year. It does tend to alter things for us is that one of the reasons for that study, is it drive you to understand how to craft story that perhaps impacts us that way?
Kirkland: Yes, absolutely. There’s nothing like the feeling of hearing from a total stranger that something that you conveyed a narrative like a movie for example changed their life in some dramatic way. They chose to take an action because they related to a story. I’ve had people contact me through movies, John. They changed their mind about how they felt in particular subjects. Yet the notion that someone can walk into a building, sit in the dark watch a 90-minute film and come out with a changed mind is a pretty powerful notion.
I think we ought to take it very seriously when we think about what goes in, what we listen to and what we are willing to consider because it’s powerful. There are people who understand how to influence mood and emotion through that technique, through those tactics that people need to be aware of. But for the most part that was how it all continued to weave together. I began to listen not just to how people accept narrative and liked it and buy it. I began to listen to how human beings simply talk to each other.Over time and through studying with the help of an awful lot of really smart people who had figured this stuff out long before I had, I came to this transactional discourse that human beings engage in exchange, what they’re exchanging essentially is narrative. With your help over the last nine-plus years, we’ve realized where those narratives are located in a series of exchanges that culminate or disappear in a process of getting what people need and want to satisfy their life. That has become the fundamental work of Influence Ecology now is to teach people how those exchanges are constructed.
What we keep finding over and over is as people begin to understand the narrative of exchange. They can have some facility with it. Locate themselves in a cycle of transaction, understand what the narratives are in that particular spot, in that transaction and move confidently with it, hopefully ethically and hopefully morally and hopefully with a reciprocal co-constitutive orientation to have our environment in a better place than we leave it. But also to defend themselves from the unethical, immoral influence that is right also in our environment.
John: For anyone unfamiliar with Influence Ecology. We are the leading business education in Transactional Competence. Having launched in Los Angeles in October of 2009. We’re in our ninth year and our student population has grown to the size of a small college. With webinar participants and podcast listeners in 70 plus countries. Our curriculum is a combination of online learning supplemented by live webinars, workshops and global conferences held in both North America and Australia and New Zealand.
As we’ve been talking about our curriculum is grounded in the philosophy of transactionalism which is a philosophical approach that addresses the fundamental nature of social exchange or human transaction. That all human exchange is best understood as a set of transactions within our reciprocal and co-constitutive whole. Now, Kirkland, you’ve authored more than 500 papers on the subject, the study, the discipline, the philosophy of transactionalism and Transactional Competence, and you’re a sought-after speaker, universities, corporations, civic organizations and the like.
From time to time I will say that you’re such a philosophy nerd. [laughs] Because you certainly in the way that somebody might nerd out about computers or biology or gardening or whatever they do. This is a subject you’re quite fascinated with and astute discussing and the like. What has you so fascinated with the philosophy of transactionalism compared with other philosophy?
Kirkland: First I’ll say I’ve tried all the other philosophies as a dart. I looked seriously at philosophy from the ground-up. What I came to was that human beings and our human condition we’re much better off when we work together. We’re much better off when we engage one another in a reciprocal co-constitutive relational way. My personal experience has been when human beings work together. When we are willing to listen and we’re willing to take other people’s needs, wants and loftiest ambitions in consideration, we are much better off, we’re much better off as an open society.
We’re much better off if we allow some sense of freedom. We’re much better off if we work together than we are, that we try to do it all on our own. Through philosophy, I began to learn how this, and I am learning how all of this got constructed. How we moved through the scientific age where we began separating everything. The moment that Copernicus looked up and said that we’re not the center of the universe, and it changed everything. We began to recognize that we’re an aspect of the universe, we’re an aspect of our environment. That the whole world actually doesn’t revolve around us. But then that took a turn in the 20th century where we begin to look at how to capture, how to use, how to turn nature into something that is for us, it’s a utility. I think we lost track of our relationship to the entire environment and we lost track along the way to our own responsibility as a species through what we’ve endeavored to create to make our lives better, and we are coming to terms with that. In many ways, we’re coming to terms with that now as a species that we may want to reconsider it.
I think the proper and the right philosophy for that is a relational philosophy, its a process philosophy. There are great thinkers who we can rely on for that. John Dewey’s later works aimed toward a transactional approach, and I’ve subscribed to that approach wholly. That we as human beings are co-constitutive, we are relational. We together constitute our environments and John we do it through our relationship and story. We do it through the actions that we take, the decisions that we make with each other, for and against great causes. In terms of a philosophy, Alfred North Whitehead, Unruh Bergson, John Dewey, Hanna Hanna Ern and many others who have attempted to articulate that. Is a journey that I would like to contribute to in any way that I can.
What is it about this philosophy that I see as hope? Is the notion that human beings do much better when we work together. We do much better when we do the thing that our environment or our nurture whatever that is that came together, that wired me up to do the thing that I do best. We’re better off if in this environment I’m doing that, and John you’re doing the thing that you’re most suited for and most enjoy doing. Together just fundamentally it just makes more sense to me that we couple up and do it together. That we seek out those who have the same ethics and the same morals and the same ambitions and the same wants in life to seek human beings, live good lives.
We’re much better off if we get together and we do it together. We’re much better off if we consider the needs and wants and aims and hurts and wishes and wins of populations around the world, and we are walling ourselves off in some isolation. If there has ever been a time where a philosophy is needed, it’s now. Have a commitment and a passion to see human beings live good lives. As far as I can tell, based on my homework and studies so far, a philosophy that is deep in process and relationship and specifically in our case, one that is transactional, that is reciprocal. Co-constitutive where we engage with one another, and the exchanges we do live a better life is the proper philosophy.
John: In the book Transactionalism and Historical and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips, there’s the history of what you could say came before this and the philosophies that gave us self-action, or interaction, or cause and effect, you’ve addressed in conversations. We’ve heard some things about science and perhaps some of the ways in which we’ve compartmentalized, segmented, separated, classified things, so much so that we now perhaps don’t consider them wholly, relationally and the like. How do we get to be this way?
Kirkland: Well, again this points to the fundamental philosophy of process. We worked our way through the process, as human beings. As we figured out that there were other ways to live comfortably, we found technology, you could say that fire is a technology. Some people point to what started the problem in the first place. We figured that out which changed the way that we were able to eat, which changed the physical structure of how we’ve evolved, and there are also people that point to language as the culprit or the gift, the greatest gift.
We continued to invent technologies that are all part and parcel of our attempt to live good lives and got carried away I think. We got away from understanding our relationship through the environment. We got away from the respect and the dignity that I think we ought to hold in what commonly we called nature, and we turned nature into a source of utility. If we could chop it down and use it, then we should do that. We began to move in that direction, and I think in a lot of ways, that’s how we got where we are is we lost touch with the very soul of the universe in some way.
We lost touch with how much we need our environment, how much we depend on our environment. We’re seeing things going on in the environment that are a cautionary tale of the influence that human beings have because we got a hold of technology and we continue to stay in that. I’m in a bit of a debate with myself right now about whether or not we’ve gone too far. I’m certainly in the inquiry with a whole bunch of people who are a lot smarter than I am, about what there’s to do about it, and how we ought to engage. I think scientists have depended on it for the reasons that are right and just and we ought to be listening to that.
At the same time, we also need to take into account the thoughts and the feelings of those who are dealing with other sides of those arguments. That we are much better off again in the process of dialogue and understanding each other’s aims, needs, wants, desires and hopes. Then we are putting ourselves in camps and fighting with each other. We got here through a process and we will continue to get whatever it is that we’re going through a process of transaction. Both Dewey and Whitehead talk about the bifurcation of nature. How we continue to separate ourselves from our environment.
Personally, that’s the direction that I intend to go. That I want to take us in a direction and we’ll continue to press toward an understanding of our relationship to the entire environment. Not just to each other, but even the non-human species and entities on which we rely. I’ll reach out and tell you, John, I think there’s probably more reliance on what is non-human then we realize. Do you remember who it was at conference this last year who reminded us that we’re more non-human?
John: Yes. Daphne Thompson.
Kirkland: The number of times people have walked at me. They said things at our conferences and through our study papers. I just read a study paper when I met these students and you are seeing they are going, “My God, this is fantastic.” What she said was, “You do realize that we have more non-human DNA in us than we have human DNA through the instincts that are dependent upon us and we depend on them.” I went and did a little homework and I have found that if we start removing all of the non-human DNA-driven stuff that lives in and on us, we can’t live. We are in a co-constitutive. We co-create each other as an actual living being.
John: Was it you that said at the conference something about, we’re all water and bugs?
Kirkland: [laughs] I don’t remember. That’s what’s so great about it. [laughs] It’s shocking, it’s entertaining and it ought to scare the living dickens out of us. We hold ourselves in such high esteem that we’re willing to be in the best case, indifferent, in the worst case, evil in how we move with the rest of our environment. I’ve a friend who says, “God is fighting back,” and we’re seeing it. We’re seeing what happens when we screw around with the ecosystem. People like Phyllis are out there doing the work on farms and people like Daphne who are building technologies and science around Eastern and Western medicine in concert with Western positions, and in concert with people who are doing things John, and I’m still looking and have no idea what the heck’s going on over there.
People who are teaching us that the birth process, for example, is a process that we’re finding many of the problems that children and women are having later on in life has something to do with this notion of going through the birth process, while in technology more and more birth process is turning into a C-section rather than the entire labor that the child and the mother must go through in that process. There’s something to look at. It’s all I’m saying, is that an inquiry is worth it. An unexamined life is not a life worth living and that means the life of the species as well in a holistic, all-encompassing environmental dialogue. As long as we stay in that dialogue, even if we butt-heads and disagree all the way through the process, as long as we stay in the process, and we can listen to each other and we’re willing to seriously listen, we’re better off.
John: How does this pertain to business?
Kirkland: What we’re finding is that in business, in commerce, in economic exchange, when people take the transactional approach, they’re taking an approach that is a relational concern for being an aspect of the environment rather than playing some flawed notion that we’re in a zero-sum game. Where John the notion that if you’ve got it, I can’t have it. It just simply isn’t my experience. Our job here is to engage the environment, engage one another in a process at exchange that has our lives be better and if you bring again, you bring to the marketplace the thing that you have to offer that I need and I bring what I have to offer to the marketplace, the things that I need and I want, we end up in an enterprise of exchange.
When we start screwing around with that, when we start making the pieces of that more important than others, when we start to be selfish or greedy, and we begin to look for ways to take advantage of situations, then we start to put ourselves in a process that I think is dangerous and in many ways has us dealing with the problems that we’re dealing with in the West right now. Look, it’s a tough question, John. Should we get together in terms of politics and government and tell you how much you are allowed to earn? Do we put ceilings on it? If that’s the case, then should we also put some floors in place? Then you start to get into a pretty slippery slope that I don’t think we figured out how to do that yet.
In fact in the scheme of things, in the broad holistic view, we have just begun in the process in terms of the amount of time that human beings have began to organize. We’ve just scratched the surface. We haven’t figured out how all this stuff works yet. We haven’t even come close to figuring out how economic exchange ought to work. How many countries have we seen end up in depressions and then dealing with recessions? It’s because we’re in there doing what human beings are prone to do, which is to try to control everything. We’re trying to manipulate everything rather than engaging in a process of help, in a process of value and recognizing that human beings got here as a species. However, we got started. We got to this point because we got very good at avoiding threat and danger. Which makes us a walking assessment, evaluating constantly on the alert critter. We’re a critter that while at the same time we’re always looking for opportunity. We are absolutely more concerned with the threat of the environment. Mostly the threat comes from other human beings today. This biology was constructed as a valuing of continual assessment and evaluation machine. Piece of our brain that has kept our species around as long as it is, is a highly threatened, always on alert, ready to strike biology. Over time through our development we’ve become more rational, we’ve become more thoughtful, we’ve become more future thinking. The thing that is always in the background always in play is valuing, evaluating every single step and move we make has some notion of evaluation in it. That leads us to this construct of technology called money. Now, the first thing we want people to recognize when they start our study is that money is a condition of our current existence and you better pay attention to it.
It is a very tough life to try to live without money, very difficult. Money is not something that if I get it you can’t have it. That’s the way we tend to relate to enterprise. When you talk about transactionalism being a philosophy that is not a tit-for-tat game. It’s not a game of so opportunistic, Fredrick talks about that one person suffers because another one has. It doesn’t have to be that way, if what we are doing as a valuing and assessment critter. We’re also taking into account that other people have needs and wants and other people need to be cared for. When we lose sight of that when we lose sight of caring for our environment.
That means the other folks involved in it, all the other folks, all the other critters. We lose sight of that then we revert back to an interactional causing factor even worse, and animalistic, it’s all about me. That informs a whole bunch of this dialogue that we’re after. That we were much better off if we recognize the resource that we are, and rather than take advantage of the resource of other human beings why don’t we look to see if we can work together to satisfy our mutual concerns? That’s what transactionalism in my mind teaches, and in business, that if I bring my goods and services to a marketplace that helps enough other people and they are able to utilize my goods and services in a fortuitous way, in a beneficial, opportunistic way for themselves to take advantage of their own opportunities and provide services back to me and we continue in that relational mode will be much better shape.
John: Couldn’t agree more. Is there anything that you haven’t addressed here that you think you’d really love said about anything?
Kirkland: I would like to ask people to consider indifference for a minute. Maybe the place to start is we get so wrapped up in our day-to-day push and pull or habits and practices that are constructed and we buy into certain ways of doing things that we lose a sense of our own creativity, we lose a sense of our relationship to everything around us and get into our own little rafts, and we lose sight of what’s possible. Because of this indifference that is so pervasive in society. I’d like for people to consider waking up to the notion that they can live a much better life if they address their indifference to certain things.
Their indifference to their relationship and their family. Their indifference to their relationship to their local community. Their difference to the ecology, to the environment. Wake people up to that there’s something going on and you have access to it. As an aspect of this environment, you play a role in this environment. You have something to say and ought to be saying it, that we’re all better off if you do, if you’re willing to do what you must to study, to learn and to practice with people who are of the same ethic and to challenge those who are not to get in the game.
But wake up, there’s something going on, and you can play the game. John if that’s what people got out of this enterprise called Influence Ecology that they woke up to their own power as an aspect in the environment we’d be much better off. If we resigned to we make no difference. If we’re resigned or we feel that the system is against us or that we can’t impact in some way make a difference to our community, our culture to our environment. We become indifferent to it. It’s only one vote, what difference does that make John? It’s only a few dollars, what difference does that make? It’s only this fuel, it’s only this thinking, it’s only this behavior. Besides, I don’t have a real say in it.
That’s wholly untrue, we’re an aspect of something that’s going on right now. If you’re indifferent to it and you’re being taken advantage of, well there you go. I would like people to wake up to the notion that they are an important aspect, element and concern in their current existence. Whatever it takes to have people wake up to the fact that they are an aspect, an element and an important piece of what’s going on here. Is the job I say that philosophers must engage. We’re better off when we do that. When we are willing to take up our own ethics, our own philosophy. When we write, when we speak, when we listen.
John: All right, good. Is there anything else?
Kirkland: I’m trying to imagine my friends back in Texas listen to this going, “What? What the hell is this?” I think this particular conversation is a serious one because people’s lives are at stake, people’s children are at stake, whether they have a place to live and enjoy their life. My seriousness really comes from a commitment that people live good lives and I think we’re in serious times. Right now I’m in a serious mood about it. That’s just where I am about it. People want to get a whole bunch of grandma on them they need to come hang out with us at Influence Ecology, come to conference. In fact, I’ve been handed more than one card or two going, “Hey, can we get to business now?” If they want some of that there’s plenty of that, what I’d like to do here in this particular session is to just let people know that we take this very seriously. This is a serious endeavor for me personally.
John: Very good. We’ve had conversations about the future, many. One of the things that’s included in that is from the time I’ve met you and we’ve spoken imagined some institute for transactionlists studies where local students can immerse themselves in this approach. Tell a little bit about that vision for us.
Kirkland: For me the thought that through writing and presentation that ultimately with help of a lot of other people in a concerted effort through academia and business and other discourse especially in media that we’re able to construct some institute, some academy or even school where people can learn not only the philosophy of transactionalism, more process philosophies in general work. But how to actually apply them in their day-to-day life. How do we get to a place where we can study together and practice? Study together and practice. Find out what we’ve learned bring it back to this institute, bring it back into this establishment. Convey what we’ve learned, inquire into it, at least there is Dewey and Whitehead and others have suggested that we learn from each other and we take it back down into our lives.
That to me is what we talk about when we talk about forming a particular establishment. Now, right now Influence Ecology is that, we’re a for-profit enterprise, we’re a business no question about it. We’re in the business of education but there is this notion that in the future from what we have been able to learn and from what we’ve been able to develop. There’s an opportunity to take what we are doing here into other discourses, into other areas, perhaps schools and the prisons or in communities that need desperately to understand the game afoot if you will. What’s going on? How to get in the game of living a good life and play it well. This is just part of the thinking and we’ve been talking to universities about what that might look like. Actually, been approached by some people with some resources, buildings, and money and said, “Look, when you start to head in that direction, I would be in.” Again, the process is beginning to take hold. The environment is going to do it if we don’t do it. Somewhere along the way, someone walks in the door with the idea and the resources to do it. That may be exactly the direction we go. That’s how some of these things work and it wouldn’t surprise me, John, if the actual folks who study with us in this ecology don’t do it themselves. They team up, walk in the door here. The folks who’ve been studying with us for six, seven, going on eight, nine years, who’ve actually put themselves in a position where they have lots and lots of surplus and resources. It won’t surprise me a bit if that’s actually where it comes to fruition.
Whatever that is, my dream and hope long after we’re gone, is that we have made an impact and we made a difference in helping people live better lives. If that happens because it looks like something else other than Influence Ecology, great. If Influence Ecology is here forever and this is the instrument and the technology and the way that we’re able to help the common woman on the street, common man on the street, live a better life then you know what? Great. We’ll do it that way, and that gives me hope, John. It gets me up in the morning and it has me continually looking at ways to move that along. I’ll just end this by coming back at you and saying, “The day that you pointed to the sky and said it’s called Influence Ecology and we start in January, so you better get to writing.”
I think I’d only had only four papers and three- were they three guinea pig classes that had run through the curriculum at that point? You’ve done everything you said you were going to do, but it is that thing that you have done your life where you were involved in a tiny little arts festival that turned into one of the biggest engagements in media and technology in the country. It’s been your pointing to the sky and helping people realize their own self-worth and value and what they contribute as an aspect to the whole that has helped change lives for many years.
Its certainly is the case with me and my experience with you, that you were the one who turned around and said, “Look, all this is great, but we got to go now.” I think I probably would’ve just kept studying if the inspiration and the motivation for you to finally quit putting up with my nonsense to walk in and say, “We’re throwing our head over the wall, we’re going, so you better get ready,” is worth acknowledging in this conversation. I couldn’t do it without you, couldn’t do it without Darrell, can’t do without Drew. I’ve started going down the list of names of everyone involved in this enterprise, including every single person who has walked in and done even a little bit of study with us. It’s all part of what makes this my favorite things to do every day is to get up and come to this job. I love it and if it weren’t for you, wouldn’t be here. Back at you.
John: Kirkland Tibbels. Thank you so very, very much for being a guest on the Influence Ecology Podcast. Great to have you with us. Very grateful as always for all of the work that you’ve done over these many years to help us all live the way that we are. Thanks.
Kirkland: Thanks, John. I appreciate it.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology, LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded April 8th, 2018 and was produced by John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world. We’re grateful for Co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30+ years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karal Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelley. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled ‘Fast Train to Everywhere.’ You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating or review, I ask that you take a moment go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
Podcast Bonuses:
Transactionalism: An Historical and Interpretive Study by Trevor J Phillips
Transactionalism on Wikipedia
Influence Ecology is considered the leader in the field of Transactional Competence, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline of transactional competence and is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Influence Ecology’s curriculum includes conferences, webinars, online tools, podcasts, and mentorship utilized by men and women in over seventy countries around the world. Our membership includes an international assembly of accomplished professionals, faculty, and peers from a variety of countries, industries, and cultures.
Sarah Shepherd – Always an Aspect, Never an Entity (Ep. 49)
Is it better to be more selfless or more selfish? If you're like most people, you probably treat one of these behaviors as the more preferred way to act. But have you ever considered that in either case, someone gets reciprocally dismissed? Those too selfless can leave others enabled while devaluing themselves; those too selfish can leave others neglected while isolating themselves. Is there a healthy balance . . . perhaps a middle ground? Like many people, Sarah Shepherd discovered that her desire to lead a good and virtuous life eventually proved too selfless to meet her aims for health, work,…
Is it better to be more selfless or more selfish? If you’re like most people, you probably treat one of these behaviors as the more preferred way to act. But have you ever considered that in either case, someone gets reciprocally dismissed? Those too selfless can leave others enabled while devaluing themselves; those too selfish can leave others neglected while isolating themselves. Is there a healthy balance . . . perhaps a middle ground?
Like many people, Sarah Shepherd discovered that her desire to lead a good and virtuous life eventually proved too selfless to meet her aims for health, work, and money. And like many people, her selflessness is often contrasted against a standard that this is a better state than selfishness.
However, perhaps both selflessness and selfishness carry the same ailment and cure—that you are always an aspect, never an entity.
In this episode, we’ll find out more about what this means and how considering oneself ‘always an aspect, never an entity’ is a fundamental precept of transactionalism: We are never separate from the environments (or transactions or processes) that we occupy.
Our talk today includes a segment from our 2018 Annual Member Conference in Los Cabos, Mexico which presents a deeper dive into the philosophy that guides this thinking as well as some revelations from the too-selfish end of the selfless-selfish spectrum.
For the past 12 years, Sarah Shepherd’s company, Circuit Rider of Colorado, has served dozens of local special districts, governments, and non-profits, specializing in natural resource conservation with a team-building approach of “Shared Leadership for Local Governments.”
Motivated by the vision of non-violent communities through individual empowerment, Sarah co-founded IMPACT Personal Safety of Colorado (2010) and served as Executive Director until 2016. Sarah remains a board advisor to IMPACT. She has served as President (2014-2016), legislative policy advocate, and member of Board of the Colorado Coalition Against Sexual Assault since 2013.
Sarah is an Ariel Fellow with a degree in “The Great Books,” Philosophy and History of Mathematics, from St. John’s College in Santa Fe and post-grad work in Philosophy of Aesthetics from the Marchutz School in Aix-en-Provence, France.
It’s been Sarah’s privilege to study with Influence Ecology since 2012.
Below you’ll find a transcript of this podcast episode that has been edited for your reading pleasure. You’ll also see links at the bottom of this post where you can find more information on the people and ideas mentioned in the episode.
by John Patterson
Produced by: John Patterson, Jason Kelley & Tyson Crandall
“I would get swept up in over-committing […] and found myself without my own health and my own aims or goals involved in what I was doing.”
John: Do you have an opinion about whether it is better to be more “selfless” or more “selfish”? If you’re like most people, you’ll probably treat one of these behaviors as the more preferred way to act. But, have you ever considered that in either case someone gets reciprocally dismissed. Those too “selfless” can leave others enabled while devaluing themselves, and those too “selfish” can leave others neglected while isolating themselves.
Is there a healthy balance, perhaps a middle ground? Like many of our students, Sara Shepherd discovered that her preference towards selfless behavior and her desire to lead, what in her view, was a good and virtuous life, ultimately proved too one-sided to meet her own aims for career, work and money.
Sara: I wanted to be of service so much and had in my mind a lot to offer. People recognized and mirrored that back to me and I would get swept up in over-committing and commit through the long haul, through the arc of what I saw in the future to complete, or get an offer, or transaction from start to finish, and found myself without my own health and my own aims or goals involved in what I was doing.
That can take you down a path really quickly and last me a long, long time. You suddenly you realize, “Oh my gosh, look at where I am, have I been doing all this work in service of me to continue my ability to do that. Or has that really depleted my ability to be of service in the future to myself and others.
John: She found that her beliefs were biased towards the standard that selfless is better than selfish.
Sara: I look at people who are only in it for themselves and may not care a speck for another. It may be profitable or more of that zero-sum philosophy, where I can get what is out there and I can’t share it.
John: In this episode, we demonstrate how both selfless and selfish are two sides of the same ailment, and therefore can be addressed with a similar cure. What do we mean by that? Find out today, in this episode of Influence Ecology podcast.
John Patterson: Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening where ever you are in the world. My name is John Patterson. I’m the Co-founder and CEO of Influence Ecology, the leaning business education in Transactional Competence. Broadcasting from Ventura, California, this podcast features case studies, stories and lessons from business owners, executives, and entrepreneurs, how found real solutions, real results, and real satisfaction, not only with work, career and money but in every area of life.
You’ll hear how these ambitious professionals found that those who transact powerfully thrive. You’re always an aspect and never and entity, or stated another way, you are inseparable from the whole. Not separate and distinct, today we’ll address, how considering one’s self and the aspect of any transaction is a fundamental precept of Transactionalism. In other words, we’re never separate or distinct from the environment, or transactions, or processes that we occupy.
After the break, we’ll hear a segment from our 2018 annual member conference in Los Cabos, Mexico and take a deeper dive into the philosophy that guides this thinking. We’ll also hear some revelations from the too selfish and of the selfless selfish spectrum. Sara Shepherd has a Degree in Philosophy and Mathematics from Saint John’s College, in Santa Fe and Postgraduate work in Philosophy of Aesthetics at the Marchutz School in Aix-en-Provence, France. She currently works with her father in Denver, Colorado to provide management and other services to local governments, especially special districts. Take a second and just introduce yourself.
Sara: My name is Sara Shepherd, and I’ve been studying with Influence Ecology for quite a few years now and really excited to be here today, really appreciate the opportunity.
John: Wonderful. Say where you live and what you do.
Sara: I live in Denver and in Salt Lake city. I am the Principal of a Special District Management Consulting Company, called Circuit Rider of Colorado. We manage local governments in the Denver metro area but all across Colorado. We are the equivalent of a town manager for very small municipalities.
John: How did you come across this role, this occupation?
Sara: Well, I tell everyone that, it really started with my study in philosophy at my undergrad, actually not at all. When I moved back from college to Colorado, which is my home state, I started a business with my father in 2006. He had a lot of history in politics and community management and was going out on his own, he’s very much a performer in our vernacular.
I came home and thought, “This might be a disaster, I really love my dad, I want to help out. I’ll help him for a year or so.” 13 years later here I am, now he’s retired and I’ve been managing the company on my own with a team and it’s worked out really well. It’s really been a fun process to start out, begrudgingly dive in, learn the ropes and now be in a place where I’m pioneering in some ways with a lot of the projects that we provide for our clients.
John: You jokingly said it started with philosophy. I do know that you’re a big fan of philosophy. Tell me about that. Why do you love philosophy so much?
Sara: Well, I studied that in my undergrad and I also studied the philosophy of aesthetics in masters work. To me, understanding the big picture of who I am, why the world works the way it works, and asking questions and being willing to understand, or try to understand anything that comes my way is just part of my character. I’ve always been interested in asking questions and figuring out why things are the way they are. To me, it really drives who I am and my values and what I want to give back to the world.
John: Tell me a little bit about that.
Sara: Coming out of school, I’ve always been really kind of a young person in terms of age groups and people I work with. I have always really wanted to make an impact on the world, and naively thought that I could just think my way through that and the world would be open arms, going, “Oh, thanks for showing up Sara, we’re really excited to have you. Come and change us.” [laughs]
Little did I understand how thousands of years of philosophy and having some cursory understanding and learning about those was just the foot in the door to opening my understanding of myself, communities, other individuals and how our society, socially, politically works and tries to meet the individuals needs also survive for its own purposes.
John: Everybody has a journey throughout their life and throughout this education, we find that many people have a journey. We can use your journey to illuminate some of the lessons, the things you’ve learned, so that we can let other people know those things and perhaps they can learn from those, and they can perhaps better themselves, use some of what we talk about to improve their own situations and the like. You have a throughline to your journey. There’s before, during and after.
One of the things I find that I just really love that I can hear in some of your notes, you really did sometimes leave yourself out in the transactions. That’s the best way I could say it. You could say you care a great deal. So you often would, in the beginning, leave yourself out, but take care of you in the transaction. You certainly were committed to taking care of other people, or taking care of situations or making the world a better place and the like, but didn’t exactly include yourself in the transaction as we teach it. I’ve loved to know your thoughts in all that.
Sara: I love that and the distinction that we started diving into a conference about, “Wake up inventors, you are not the king playing chess with all the pieces of everyone else in the transaction, you are part of this deal, you’re getting our hands dirty, you’re diving in with everyone else, but for me it even hit deeper because of what you just said. That I wanted to be of service so much and had in my mind a lot to offer and people recognized and mirrored that back to me.
I would get swept up in over committing and commit through the long haul, through the arc of what I saw in the future to complete, or get an offer, or transaction from start to finish, and found myself without my own health and my own aims or goals involved in what I was doing. That can take you down a path really quickly and last a long, long time. You suddenly realize, “Oh my gosh, look at where I am? Have I been doing all this work in service of me to continue my ability to do that? Or has that really depleted my ability to be of service in the future to myself and others?” It really turned that back on me to say, it’s not an exercise of selfishness to know your own aims. It’s actually in service of everything else you do to get in touch with what your aims are, at the base level and if you’re going to achieve anything in the higher tiers of aims, which in my mind was where I wanted to start.
I confuse that with, “Oh no, these are higher aims, more important,” but you have to get down to basics and worrying yourself that you’re a person. You need to eat. You need to sleep. You’re going to age. You only have a short time on this earth, relatively speaking. If you want to reach all those big, high aims, goals, work with others, make a difference. It’s in service of that to reflect on yourself and serve yourself too.
John: That’s well said. I didn’t plan on this. I’m going to grab the quote that you’re referring to, because it’s relevant. I have the quote, “Frames”, because it’s one of those things that we point to quite frequently. As I was reading through your notes, this is perfect. So I want to read this, if you don’t mind. This is from the book Transactionalism: An historical and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips.
In it, this is a quote that says, “Transaction denotes a reciprocal relationship, both become united for the moment in a mutual transition or transaction. It is a process in which both are reciprocally transformed. The nature of the change each undergoes is affected by the presence and influence of the other. A transaction then is a creative act engaged in by one who by virtue of his participation in the act of which he is always an aspect, never an entity. Together with the other participants, be they human or otherwise environmental becomes in the process modified.” Any comment about that?
Sara: I love that quote. It really harkens back the aspect that was illuminated at the conference as well this past January. You are a part of things. You are a human. You are in this earth doing things with other people. The visual to me, which I am a very visual person in many ways, is you become this binary. You aren’t one little person bouncing around, who bumps into another little person.
You are joined in some way with them when you are transacting, or a group of you are transacting with others, you become this new entity. If one person is part A and the other person is part B, you are not A and B. You are C now. You are not just existing and holding that out, you are acting together. You were doing the function of this new entity which hasn’t been done before. It’s almost like it becomes a verbal new entity, seeing things and that’s wonderful to me to encapsulate what that quote means.
John: Absolutely. I’d love to get your thoughts on a few things, because it’s my experience. As we work with people to come to understand the Transactionalism, one of the first things that people often think when they think of transacting, is a kind of tit for tat approach to getting what I want. Sometimes, people think of transaction as the cold, contractual aspect of the, “Here’s my money. Give me the coffee. Here’s my contract, now it’s signed.” It’s very– people say transactional.
However, the word and the philosophy both point to something much, much broader. That is simply that transaction denotes a whole. W-H-O-L-E. A whole. I have to say that carefully for all the different languages throughout the world. When you say in your own notes that you didn’t have much thought or concern for yourself in transaction, we can all observe people who perhaps don’t take care of their own aims in a transaction. But we can also observe others who only care for themselves in a transaction.
In both cases, whether or not they leave themselves out, or they could care less about you. [laughs] In both cases, they’re not responsible for the transactional whole. I was wondering what your thoughts are on that or if you’ve ever had any thoughts about that. Because I just think that’s a fascinating thing to consider, that transactional does in fact allow people to go, “Wait a second. I’m not thinking of the whole thing.” Any thoughts about all that?
Sara: Yes, I think both sides of the coin are incredibly important. I look at people who are only in it for themselves and make not care a speck for another. It may be profitable or more of that zero-sum philosophy, where I can get what is out there and I can’t share it. We aren’t going to rise with all tides, but they don’t recognize that they’re part of this whole. That they’re actually damaging and not being aware of that fact.
If I damage the others who I need and we’ll need some day and need right now, but I’m not aware of it, I also haven’t done the work in identifying my aims. I may only be in touch with one aim in particular. It might be money, which is often the one we talk about that money overrides everything. It may damage your legacy, it may damage your social status or a number of other things. It also may damage your health, because you’re not thinking of yourself in a holistic perspective with the W-H-O-L-E. That you have limited scope and span.
Then on my side, where I was working myself to the bone for causes that I loved and not thinking that it might perhaps be useful not only to me, but to the transactions that I’m building. If I don’t leave them in a rut, if I were to fall over because I just overdid it with my health or have no time and I’m stressed and frustrated and not fun to work with or what if some day, which is the reality, I’m not around anymore. I don’t want this to go away because we in the group or the offer do see that it’s valuable for the world. We want to design it with the expectation we will not be around someday, and we think it’s worth keeping.
John: It’s a little bit like whether or not you are self-less or self-ish, not the whole. In other words, where you’re only selfish or only selfless in both cases, there’s damage being done. There are conditions of life not being satisfied and both are unsustainable, wholly unsustainable.
So I just think it’s a beautiful thing to point out, because it struck me in some of your notes that it is likely, there are people listening who recognize themselves and can identify with, “I’m selfless, gosh, therefore I don’t take care of my own aims.” Or for those listening and thinking, “I’m selfish. I’m also not taking care of my aims.” We can all think of people who are self-less or self-ish, who may suffer in similar or different ways but certainly again, both unsustainable.
Sara: I just love that because on an arc journey in studying and practicing with this, there’s always more to dive into, where you see those moments where, “I just was really high cost.” It used to always be that way, but now I’m realizing a very nuanced place, where I could make an improvement and I could benefit myself and the other people I’m working with right now.Whatever it might be, but you just get to peel away over and over again, more nuanced pieces. One of the phrases I love is that we’re in a journey of successive approximation. We’re aiming for something on this arc but then we realize there’s a new layer to peel away and more small pieces to make it better and do better and become better for myself and others.
John: Well said. What else should we know about your journey here over the last many years? What else have you learned that you think is of note?
Sara: In terms of aims that’s been so clear because in getting expert help after realizing the not so– Well, it’s a very obvious fact that as a young person I didn’t have a grasp on. That I needed a lot of help and I wasn’t an expert in everything that I will come across as I get older and have more needs and some surplus and conditions I never thought I would.
John: Imagine living until you are 45 or 50. Then realizing that. [laughs]
Sara: Yes, that’s great.
John: It’s not a young person’s thing by the way. It’s a disease of all ages. [laughs] Just so you know.
Sara: We keep peeling away at it and the more help we get, the more we realize we need. I really enjoyed getting great help and being valuable to others. One other things I’m really trying to work on is becoming more valuable. How can I hone in on that more and more. Then with my aims I realized that they’re a snapshot in time. When I do them, I look, “Did I achieve them, did I not? What practices worked, what didn’t?”
Now it begins again. It’s not like I get to say, “Well, look at that great successful thing I did. I’ll put that on the shelf and it will just stay there. It now will require maintenance and a new snapshot to review and revisit and go out and keep moving. Then I get the excitement of another team. More work and that’s actually fed into some of that ego I talked about in my notes where as an inventor you think you have it all figured out but then you get bored in the practice of it.
If you have an eye to your aim being the reinvention and the way you can activate your creativity and your insightfulness, you will always have new things to do, even if you’re sticking with a business, working on your business, working with the team. Their aims change, your aims change. It’s a moving target and that’s what really makes it fun. Knowing what all your actions are leading to, or you’re attempting them to have them lead to becomes really inspiring work.
John: I’m curious about your soapbox moment. You say, in terms of your own soapbox, talk about it in experience and practice. I could say a great deal about experience and practice, because it’s quite easy to get off by a mere understanding. What about that is a soapbox for you?
Sara: Well, experience is not something you can sit down and read about and think about. It’s something you do and that’s that embodiment. Today I was writing some notes, where I was thinking about aims as the embodiment activity. Because when you create aims and you actively practice the actions to meet those aims, mindfulness is a really big phrase today. Mindfulness is watching your brain and your body do what you do and assessing that in the moment.
If you have done the work which it’s a lot of work to really go through and assess your aims and articulate them, write them down. Look at them and then say, “Here’s how I’m going to get there. I don’t know how many get there, I need some help.” I’ll start by this bar or this activity or this short goal. Then I’ll move to the big goals that I have laid out. You are able to watch yourself doing that and if you aren’t experiencing and doing it you don’t have the opportunity to be in communication or mirroring to yourself.
Then when you add other people and invite them in they will invite you in and then reflect back to you who you are and what you’re doing, and is it working or is it not working. To me those are what brings us up to higher points, in terms of we’re now catalyzing different practices, different people working together and you can’t just do that on your own, you can’t think your way through that.
John: I was thinking about during the last conference one of the little phrases we said often are people started to say, they would say, “Don’t be an ass hat.” They used that word in replace of some others. “They’ll be an ass hat be an aspect,” referring of course to the quote that I read a little earlier.
Do you have any thoughts about how one might practice the recognition– and this is just you and I perhaps noodling on this. Thoughts about how someone might practice the recognition of being an aspect of the transaction instead of overlord of the transaction, or a victim of the transaction. You know that I am a part of an integral part of this transaction. Any thoughts about how one might embody or practice or experience that?
Sara: Yes, while working in a team is critical, having people who are honest and ethically engaging with you as well, and thinking on that have they assessed their aims, can they be working with me? Have I assessed my aims, can I work with them? In some of the work I did at the non-profit that I was running before and moved and whittled it down to one offer, which is huge part of my journey with Influence Ecology is focus and stop diluting myself.
We talked about what an influence ecology uses as accepts decline or counter. How can you expect decline or counter something if you don’t know if it aligns with your aims authentically? Authentically if you assess that someone else in a complex transaction, likely if you’re buying the burger it’s probably okay if they don’t have their aims totally lined out. If you’re engaging with them in a commercial offer, or something more deep and complex ethically speaking, usually it’s probably in no way that I could assess for them if they’re in overwhelm or despair.
It’s my job. Thank goodness having done this work to say it’s probably a no for you and I’m going to say that and that’s actually a gift to both of us. Because we would get knocked up for who knows how long if we didn’t have that information. When you have people who have done that work together you can achieve so much, because you can have that authentic dialogue together and say yes, say no, or say the maybe, which really is going to get us to clarify and then say yes or no.
When you truly have a choice to say yes or no, then it makes sense and you are ethically engaging with people. If there is no option then saying yes doesn’t necessarily mean yes it might mean maybe it might mean no or I don’t know. That’s a really empowering moment for people when they get to experience that level and to me that’s been a huge part of the journey. That’s my soapboxes. Studying with Influence Ecology. The people who really engage with it and the leadership will guide you through to become empowered in that way to really know if you can say yes or no to something. Sounds so simple. [chuckles]
John: [laughs] It is. I just had a conversation with a judge, we came up with a new term that we’re going to refer to as a “Forensic witch hunt for ones aims.” Because sometimes when I’m asking someone something, I’m trying to just ascertain what their aims are and it’s a little bit like a forensic witch hunt. Well, and oftentimes I find I don’t know. I’m on a witch hunt for their aims but they don’t have any or they haven’t actually concluded that to begin with.
As you said it’s quite ethical to say, “Look, I don’t think you know your aims here. Let’s just stop where we are. Let’s not move forward in this transaction,” which is great. It’s also a beautiful thing, when like you said when two parties actually are quite clear of their aims to be able to say, “Hey, what’s your aim here? Mine is this. What’s your aim here? Mines that,” great. “Given our aims then let’s not do this,” or, “Given our aims, it sounds like we have some ways in which we might be able to construct something here together.” It’s an amazing, amazing opportunity.
Sara: It opens up the world to you to say, “That’s a positive boundary or a positive offer I want to create.” Or, “That’s a negative one, where I would like to complete or conclude or not engage.” A lot of the discussions out there regarding just intimate relationships and sexual harassment and things like that in the news. A lot of that ethical ability to say yes and no hasn’t been out there. To me it’s an indicator of a lot of those dichotomies of power.
Also, because when I get to that spot where I don’t know my yes or no answer, it’s an indicator and that’s that mindfulness practice again where, “Oh, I don’t know. I’m not clear on my aims, so I can’t say yes or no.” Well, that means I need to do work, yes. That’s an embodiment piece that’s huge when you slow down and say, “Because I don’t know I can do some assessment and do some work, then I’ll get back to you.”
John: I’ll tell you, one of the things that’s really helped me over the course of many, many years in my Transactional Competence. Where I experienced the embodiment of myself as an aspect is listening. Listening carefully, listening keenly. Taking the time to understand both sides. Oftentimes, when I observe people listening, they listen until what the other person says registers in some way.
The person listening goes, “Yes, I get what you’re trying to tell me. Yes, I understand what you mean,” often wrongly assuming that they’ve heard anything at all. “I get what you’re trying to tell me. Yes, yes, yes,” and then they think or assume that they’ve listened when in fact, they haven’t heard much at all. To practice the ability to listen until I can empathize with the other person’s experience, their journey.
That they see and view the world in wholly different ways than I do. That they have aims that I don’t have and they’re as valid as mine, that they have beliefs, I would never consider for myself to be valid or true yet, they are for them. I can’t argue with the nature of belief for another person. It is what it is until it isn’t. So I’ll just say too as a practice for the embodiment and the experience of being an aspect rather than an ass hat [chuckles] all off for listening.
Sara: That reminds me so much of in David Rock’s book, Your Brain at Work. Those higher levels of reframing where it doesn’t do any good, especially for us subjective head in the clouds thinkers, to assume and know what the outcome or consequence will be even if we’re right sometimes. Getting there is the big part of the journey in your transactional group or binary or coupling. Just like you said, you don’t know how that person can or wants to get there.
So when David Rock says, “Ask the question of the person with the problem and it keeps them in a toward experience versus an away experience.” You have much more opportunity to understand them and even if you do have opposing ideas, you can usually peel down again to a layer of, “Well, we have a common value there.” It could be a common aim, or need whether it’s biological, or financial, or some type of security and we’re just meeting it in different way.
But that’s fine as long as they aren’t conflicting or hurting each other. To me, that’s where the work of Influence Ecology with these teams and discovering that you’re an aspect and you can’t take yourself out of the world and out of these moments. Kirkland and I were talking about that. I think the work here is highly progressive technology. We also think of technology in terms of my computer and software and phones and gadgets, but technology is the application of science and reasoning.
This is an amazing opportunity for people to dig down and get things done, raise each other up, and do it in a way that moves away from a lot of the baser means and methods that we have. It’s almost a technology of Transactionalism. I love it. I see the huge opportunity for the more people who become competent practitioners and value it, the better off the world will be.
John: I couldn’t agree more. All right, well with that, Sara Shepherd, it’s been a pleasure to have you on the podcast. Thank you so much for being here.
Sara: Thanks John. I really appreciate being here as well.
A Discussion of Selfish vs Selfless
John: Today’s talk includes a segment from our 2018 annual member conference in Los Cabos Mexico. Kirkland Tibbels is working with London student, Suzanne Poole to study this fundamental precept. They are reading a segment of our book, Transactionalism: An Historical and Interpretative Study, by Trevor Jay Phillips. Kirkland helps bring some additional understanding to the philosophy that guides this thinking. We’ll then here Salida, Colorado’s student, David Cottrell who identifies with our inventor personality, and his revelations from the too selfish and of the selfless-selfish spectrum.
Suzanne Poole: Any attempt to define transaction in philosophical terms must include implications provided in the development of science and the scientific method.
Kirkland Tibbels: Stop. Any attempt to deal with transaction or Transactionalism must include any work and progress in science and the scientific method. We don’t remove that. It is critical, important, foundational. We accept it. We love it.
Suzanne: The self-actional, interactional, and transactional concepts were indeed guideposts discovered it along the lengthy and oftentimes, tortuous journey made by science through the annals of history.
Kirkland: We found our way in this torturous journey to what Plato was pretty much pointing to all along, a relational perspective. It’s taken us a very long time and whole lot of stuff through history and we’re still going.
Suzanne: Transaction denotes a reciprocal relationship between that which acts and that which is acted upon.
Kirkland: Stop. Say that again.
Suzanne: Transaction denotes a reciprocal relationship between that which acts and that which is acted upon.
Kirkland: A reciprocal relationship between that which acts and that which is acted upon. “That which relational”.
Suzanne: In this relationship, both become united for the moment in a mutual transition or transaction.
Kirkland: Perfect. Say that again.
Suzanne: In this relationship, both become united for the moment in a mutual transition or transaction.
Kirkland: A moment in transaction, a moment Whitehead would call an event for those of you who are Whiteheadians. An event hard to grasp, almost impossible to see until it’s well gone, a moment, the mutual transition, or dare I say, transformation, it matters. In a moment, something happens in a transaction where we emerge as something else. There’s the act, the acted upon, and then that other thing.
That’s what we’re pointing to, right there. Not to make too big a deal of it, but that thing that just happened, that transition or that ‘transaction’ is everything. It’s determinant. It matters. You’re always transacting and something is emerging, what? I want you just to say that one more time. That was so good.
Suzanne: Transaction denotes a reciprocal relationship between that which acts and that which is acted upon. In this relationship, both become united for the moment in a mutual transition or transaction.
Kirkland: What happens next?
Suzanne: It is a process in which both are reciprocally transformed. That is to say the nature of the change each undergoes is affected by the presence and influence of the other. The relationship forms a bond of unity which contradicts any absolute separation or isolation which to anticipate the succeeding chapter.
Kirkland: An account.
Suzanne: An account of how phenomena came to be viewed less as the behaviorist static entities and mutual isolates, and more as aspects of events in the process of becoming.
Kirkland: Hang on a sec. An account of how phenomena, read it again. Listen carefully.
Suzanne: An account of how phenomena came to be viewed less as the behavior of static entities and mutual isolates and more as aspects of events in the process of becoming.
Kirkland: It’s the process of becoming. We take a transactional approach. It’s not so much the characteristics of the entities, but what is the process in becoming.
Suzanne: A transaction then is a creative act engaged in by one who by virtue of his participation in the act, of which he is always an aspect, never an entity.
Kirkland: That’s good. Okay. You hear that? Say that again.
Suzanne: A transaction then is a creative act.
Kirkland: Stop right there. Do you hear that? It’s a creative act. All kinds of ‘possibilities’, a possibility emerged in a creative act. Go ahead.
Suzanne: Engaged in by one who by virtue of his participation in the act of which he is always an aspect, never an entity.
Kirkland: You’re an aspect, not an entity. You’re a participant. It’s going to take something to reorient some things in a room full of people who are self-acting and interactional. To be able to move effectively might mean you got to know those narratives so well that you, in a participatory co-constitutive way, invite them to consider something else. Would you be open to this approach? I have this offer.
If need be, I have a list of things I can use to help me characterize the value of that scarcity to further get yourself acting and interacting attention if need be. Now that we’ve made this decision to commit, let’s commit and let’s define those terms which is why we don’t throw away the scientific method or the mechanistic apparatus that has us engaged in routines and conduct.
Suzanne: Together with the other participants, be they human or otherwise environmental, becomes in the process modified.
Kirkland: To become in a process modified. Read that one more time.
Suzanne: An account of how phenomena came to be viewed less as the behavior of static entities and mutual isolates and more as aspects of events in the process of becoming. A transaction then is a creative act, engaged in by one who by virtue of his participation in the act, in which he is always an aspect, never an entity, together with the other participants, be they human or otherwise environmental becomes in the process modified.
Kirkland: We become in the process modified. This ought to point to if you haven’t thought about it, it might matter the other entities you’re hanging around, the other aspects of the environment of which you have chosen to group in which you have coupled. Pretty good stuff, huh?
David Cottrell: David, Inventor from Salida Colorado, there was a distinction yesterday between ‘asshole’ and ‘aspect’.
What I really realized is that I spend most of my time not in the aspect portion of that distinction but being an aspect, how often I, as an inventor, are beating my head against the environment and trying to extract from or wrestle with the people that I’m transacting with and how fruitless that effort is often frustrating. In getting the value of being an aspect yesterday, I am not the center of this transaction. I’m not the center of the universe.
I am but an aspect of this transaction and then suddenly, when I take myself out of it then I can function within them. I start to become conscious and concern for your thing. Are you meeting your aims and is that going to have me meet mine? This starts to become this beautiful kind of ballet. I’m just a part of it. Even in that becoming a good aspect of a transaction, that is where the individual gets defined.
Yesterday, we had this and it just didn’t– I’m an inventor, so I had to go brood on it a little while, all right, and then illuminate a little. Then this morning, I got up and it just kind of hit me like a truck. It was like, “Oh my God, that’s the keys to the kingdom.” It’s about the group and me being an aspect in it, not trying to just wrestle with it.
Kirland: Its concept that we distinguished is grounded in the philosophy of Transactionalismwhich asserts a process. It asserts a relational phenomenon that we are not able, by our own individual will and power, to dictate or cause, versus the way to get anything done. The way that we do currently get things done right now is through other people. We’re an aspect of the environment we’re a part of, we’re participant in.
I’ve had several people walk up to me and go, “I’ve understood that at a surface level, but there was something about covering the philosophy that opened up more of an aspect and it might be this wonderful word that has hit the table already this morning called, “asshole.” Now, I know that’s a bit edgy and we’re a family show, so we had to be careful with that. There’s something we will distinguish in this conference what that means, but that has opened up for quite a few people inventors that are saying–
They say, “Wait, what? Hang on, there’s something there.” I’m beginning to recognize the participatory, relational, processual, co-constitutive aspect of this stuff that we’re doing here. If you’ll continue that inquiry David, here’s what I predict you will find, you’ll start to find more help, you’ll start to notice people noticing your value. That has certainly been my experience.
David: As being an aspect, I have to be concerned for other people. In that being concern for others, it starts this reciprocal snowball.
Kirkland: That’s exactly right.
David: Then you can’t avoid it. don’t even have language. We’re so used to saying ‘create’ and ’cause’, and “What are you up to,” and all this kind of stuff. I don’t have language for this type of thing.
Kirkland: That’s great. Exactly.
John: Next time on the Influence Ecology podcast, we celebrate our 50th episode with the co-founders talk between myself and Kirkland Tibbles.
Kirkland: My seriousness really comes from a commitment that people live good lives. We’re in serious times. Right now, I’m kind of in a serious mood about it. People want to get a whole bunch of grammar on them then they need come hang out with us Influence Ecology, come to the conference. I’ve been handed more than one card or two going, “Hey, can we get to business now?” If they want some of that, there’s plenty of that. What I’d like to do here in this particular session is to just let people know that we take this very seriously.
John: My special thanks to our guest Sara Shepherd. In our show notes, you’ll find links to connect with her and all the links to website, books, or downloads mentioned in this podcast. Some episodes include a transcript and support material. The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology LLC in Ventura California. This episode was produced and edited by Jason Kelly. We’re supported by the ambitious work of the Influence Ecology faculty mentors and students around the world.
We’re grateful for co-founder Kirkland Tibbles and his 30-plus years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism, and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence. This episode includes contributions by Suzanne Poole, David Cotrell, Carol Gregory, and Tyson Crandall. For this series, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelly. The podcast theme is by Chris Standry entitled, Fast Train to Everywhere.
You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology podcast on Apple podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you’ve got your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, or via email at podcasts@influenceecology.com. If you haven’t yet offered of rating or review, I ask that you take a moment to go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
The Influence Ecology Podcast is produced by Influence Ecology, LLC in Ventura, California. This episode was recorded April 8th, 2018 and was produced by John Patterson and Jason Kelly. This program is made possible through the assistance of the Influence Ecology faculty, mentors, and students around the world. We’re grateful for Co-founder Kirkland Tibbels and his 30+ years of specialized study in the philosophy of Transactionalism and the fundamentals of Transactional Competence.
This episode includes contributions by Karal Gregory and Tyson Crandall. For this episode, the sound design and editing are by Jason Kelley. The podcast theme is by Chris Standring and titled ‘Fast Train to Everywhere.’ You can subscribe to the Influence Ecology Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can also find us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn or via email at podcast@influenceecology.com.
If you haven’t yet offered a rating or review, I ask that you take a moment go to iTunes or your podcast app and let us know what you think. This helps us more than you know.
Podcast Bonuses:
IMPACT Personal Safety of Colorado
Sarah Shepherd on LinkedIn
Suzanne Pool on LinkedIn
David Cottrell on LinkedIn
Transactionalism: An Historical and Interpretive Study by Trevor J Phillips
Transactionalism on Wikipedia
Influence Ecology is considered the leader in the field of Transactional Competence, having published and contributed to the only comprehensive text on the subject, Transactionalism: An Historic and Interpretive Study by Trevor J. Phillips. Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels has authored more than 500 papers on the subject, study, and discipline of transactional competence and is a sought-after lecturer at universities, major corporations, and civic organizations around the world.
Influence Ecology’s curriculum includes conferences, webinars, online tools, podcasts, and mentorship utilized by men and women in over seventy countries around the world. Our membership includes an international assembly of accomplished professionals, faculty, and peers from a variety of countries, industries, and cultures.
Karl Strand – The Guardian of Standards (Ep. 48)
Who keeps us from falling off the proverbial cliff? While some are naturally inclined to dream new ideas and others can't help but build new relationships, there is a segment of society whose entire focus and role are to protect us from our poorly constructed shortcuts. This typically skeptical personality recognizes that nothing around us is a coincidence; things are either poorly designed or built to exacting standards. Often shamed for not seeing the world as ‘glass-half-full,’ this transactional personality plays the vital role in offering the evidence required to lay claim to facts. Karl Strand founded his consultancy by…
Who keeps us from falling off the proverbial cliff?
While some are naturally inclined to dream new ideas and others can’t help but build new relationships, there is a segment of society whose entire focus and role are to protect us from our poorly constructed shortcuts. This typically skeptical personality recognizes that nothing around us is a coincidence; things are either poorly designed or built to exacting standards.
Often shamed for not seeing the world as ‘glass-half-full,’ this transactional personality plays the vital role in offering the evidence required to lay claim to facts. Karl Strand founded his consultancy by making the most of his skepticism and guarding the standards for commercial architectural exteriors.
Karl and his wife, Randee, live in Dallas, Texas. They have been students of Influence Ecology since June 2015.
In this episode’s talk, we’ll hear Co-Founder Kirkland Tibbels talk about the asset and liability of the Judge personality and how each personality can work together.
Podcast Bonuses:
Cape Not Required by Cory Shepherd
Drew Knowles – Embrace Your Naïveté (Ep. 47)
We all can