Jenny Blake
363: 🌈 Taking a Quiet Sabbatical and ...

As I round the corner into this ninth year of podcasting, after over 700 episodes today, I’m announcing a pause for both shows.

Listen in to hear what factors helped me reach this decision across time, money, energy, depressing industry articles, the pace of both shows’ growth, and mix of additional business factors that make this an important moment to pause and regroup. You might also appreciate the even deeper dive with my longtime friend (and first coach) Adrian Klaphaak in Pivot episode 360: 📦 Unpacking a Big Business Decision and Dissolving Related Doubts.

Jenny Blake
362: Setting Creative Intentions Instead of ...

“Expectations are the enemy to the creative process. Sometimes you have to let go of the known to see the unknown.”

Today I’m speaking with James McCrae, an author, poet, and meme artist based in Austin, Texas. He is the founder of 🌻 Sunflower Club, a global school and community dedicated to conscious creativity.

Jenny Blake
361: On Decision Engineering and Evaluating ...

Good decision-making is not about omniscience or clairvoyance—it's more about resilience, according to today’s guest, decision engineer Michelle Florendo. “Decision-making is harder than ever before, and it's not your fault,” Michelle says. “People feel like they ‘should just know’ how to decide.”

Today we’re talking about a framework more helpful than pro-con lists, tuning into your head, heart and gut; why the quality of your decision is not equal to the outcome—did good or bad things happen; keeping a decision journal to evaluate the quality of your decisions regardless of the outcome; and how to drop the guilt of “bad” past outcomes.

Jenny Blake
360: 📦 Unpacking a Big Business Decision ...

What happens when you make a big decision but still have lingering doubt, fear, and even despair? How do you know when a “download” from the universe is worth following, and what does test-driving a decision look like? What happens on the other side or when a pivot is taking far longer than planned?

We’re unpacking all these topics in today’s twelfth and final (for now) conversation for the Pivot x Career Pathfinder series with Adrian Klaphaak.

Jenny Blake
359: “You can’t give what you don’t have” — ...

“You can’t give what you don’t have.” That’s just one of the powerful lessons that Nataly Kogan learned the hard way seven years ago, after suffering a debilitating phase of burnout. As a former refugee from the former Soviet Union, she began her American journey in the projects and on welfare, then going on to build an impressive career as a finance and tech executive and serial entrepreneur over the next 25 years. Until she crashed at thirty-eight years old and needed to find a new way of moving forward.

As part of her healing process, Nataly began to paint when she was 40 by signing up for a painting retreat in Tuscony (that turned out to be for semi-professional watercolorists), and now her paintings are on the cover of her books—front and center as part of her bold self-expression.

Pivot Podcast

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150: Pivot Insider Preview—Jenny's Favorite Things & Strategic Coach's "80% Approach"

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150: Pivot Insider Preview—Jenny's Favorite Things & Strategic Coach's "80% Approach"

This week’s episode is a special behind-the-scenes preview from my live monthly Pivot Insider community Q&A call. In our December call (last one of the decade!) I shared my favorite things Oprah-style, why I launch everything in an “imperfect,” incomplete state, my go-to workouts from home, and questions submitted from the group on side hustles and staying motivated.

Enjoy more intimate conversations like this one? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider at just $8/mo and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call on Zoom in real-time, and the chance to submit questions in advance even when you can’t make it live.

You’ll also get instant access to over six months of archives and special bonuses, including the two-hour Upgrade Your Energy workshop.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/150 »

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149: Career Homecoming with Laura Simms

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149: Career Homecoming with Laura Simms

Laura Simms and I have been traveling parallel Pivot paths for a while now — nearly a decade of tracking each other’s work, but finally for the first time speaking live, 1:1! Of course we hit it off as fast friends, as we discuss ageism, passion vs. purpose, and working through insecurities when navigating career pivots.

Laura is an expert in meaningful work who challenges conventional wisdom by asking people to ditch their passions and start with purpose. She’s the creator of Your Career Homecoming, a celebrated career change program that helps people discover the meaningful work that’s right for them. 

Laura’s colorful career history includes a history degree, an MFA in acting, getting fired from a dream project, quitting multiple jobs (including one after the first day), teaching at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and a successful career as an actor where she worked on network television, performed in every state on the Eastern seaboard, received multiple callbacks from Cirque du Soleil, and shared a sound booth with Sandra Oh. She lives in Atlanta with her husband and son, where she loves walking in the woods and trying to find the best whiskey cocktail in town.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/149.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything!

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148: Penney & Jenny Show—Pivoting From Toxic Situations Toward Self-Entertainment

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148: Penney & Jenny Show—Pivoting From Toxic Situations Toward Self-Entertainment

The Penney & Jenny Show is back! The latest installment (PJ Show #11!) answers a listener Q&A about pivoting out of toxic situations at work. Penny and I discuss how we evaluate when to stay vs. go, discerning normal ups and downs from true toxicity, and the highest emotional state that acts as a tuning fork and compass to pull you forward into a new direction and a new lease on life.

Enjoying the podcast and want to support the show? Become a Pivot Insider for as little as $8 each month and get access to a live monthly Q&A call—you’ll get six months of archived calls, a slew of bonus resources, including a two-hour Upgrade Your Energy workshop. Our next call is Wednesday, January 8—join now as a powerful way to kick-off this next decade!

Have a question related to this episode, or any in our Penney & Jenny series? Ask us here in a quick voice note. We look forward to rolling all of your questions together and creating a listener Q&A show soon :)

View full show notes from this episode at http://pivotmethod.com/148.

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147: Set Your 2020 Pivot Strategy

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147: Set Your 2020 Pivot Strategy

To help you kick-off the new year in style and soul-aligned next steps, I’m back with my annual Set Your Pivot Strategy episode—new and improved with the best resources and reflection questions to help you craft a compelling vision for 2020. 

I encourage you to get out a pen and paper for this one—yes, analog-style—and pause frequently to journal for as long as you’d like on each prompt. Go big! Go for quantity, not quality, and don’t censor yourself or worry yet about whether or not what you’re envisioning is possible—the time for that will come later. 

When you think you’re done writing, keep going! That just means you’ve gotten your most obvious ideas down. Pushing through the pauses is where you create breakthroughs, and every time you sit with a question you’ve never heard before, you are creating new neural pathways in the brain. 

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146: How to Rapid-Prototype a Course

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146: How to Rapid-Prototype a Course

Creating online courses does not require huge investment in time or money. Although they certainly can cost tens of thousands of dollars to produce, with professional video editing and branding, they don't have to. In fact, my favorite way to create and launch a course is with my future students!

This follows agile design principles (check out the agile manifesto here). The goal is developing rapidly, with frequent input from key stakeholders, not building so much behind-the-scenes that what you’re working on becomes out-of-date or out of touch with what your audience and potential future students actually need.

I this episode, I break down all the details on how I love launching and creating courses. You can also read a summary of the steps on this page of the Pivot website.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/146.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything, and discuss the latest books, tools and topics I’ve shared in recent episodes.

Our last call of the year is coming right up on Friday, December 6!

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145: The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur with John Jantsch

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145: The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur with John Jantsch

If you’re attempting any creative or business endeavor, you know that it’s one of the great personal development journeys a person can undertake. Dips, mood drops, discouragement, disillusionment — these are all natural byproducts of forging new territory and taking on the vulnerability and uncertainty that come with creating anything new in the world.

John Jantsch is one of my longtime business mentors-from-afar, someone I’m now lucky to call a friend. In his latest book, The Self-Reliant Entrepreneur: 366 Daily Meditations to Feed Your Soul and Grow Your Business, he combines timeless transcendentalist wisdom with his three decades of entrepreneurial time-in-the-trenches. I hope you enjoy this conversation on luck, pivoting, and the spiritual side of business-building.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/145.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything, and discuss the latest books, tools and topics I’ve shared in recent episodes.

Our last call of the year is coming right up on Friday, December 6!

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144: Listener Q&A—Keepers and Strategies for Too Much Sitting

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144: Listener Q&A—Keepers and Strategies for Too Much Sitting

We’re back with the latest listener Q&A! This round is on a podcast listener success story (and mentors-from-afar), as well as a great question from Mark on how to deal with so much sitting throughout the work day. As always, if you’d like to submit for a future round, leave me a brief voice note at PivotMethod.com/ask.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at http://PivotMethod.com/144.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything, and discuss the latest books, tools and topics I’ve shared in recent episodes.

Our last call of the year is coming right up on Friday, December 6!

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143: Transmogrify with Neil Pasricha

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143: Transmogrify with Neil Pasricha

“I don’t even care if we talk about the new book,” Neil said as we started our Skype call, while I thumbed through dog-eared, underlined, and marked-up pages of the You Are Awesome galley. Ooh, fun!

Knowing I have a tendency to focus too much on the paper artifact in front of me while interviewing authors, rather than what’s True and present in the moment, I decided to chuck all my potential questions and just shoot the breeze with a longtime blog-friend (February marks our ten year friendiversary!).

Neil was on the Pivot Podcast in the early days (check out 44: Want Nothing, Have Everything: The Happiness Equation with Neil Pasricha), and that episode has been a long-time listener favorite. I think you’re going to love this unfiltered, unplanned conversation every bit as much!

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/143.

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142: Creative Economy Lessons from “The Great Race to Rule Streaming TV”

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142: Creative Economy Lessons from “The Great Race to Rule Streaming TV”

Given the “mutation of television’s DNA” that reporter Jonah Weiner describes in his fantastic New York Times Magazine article, The Great Race to Rule Streaming TV, there is much we can learn about where the creative economy is heading, how to stand out, and how to Pivot your own creative projects.

This article is so juicy—so jam-packed with insights into where TV is heading that parallels publishing, podcasting and product creation—that I couldn’t resist jumping on the mic to do a point-by-point analysis of how they might apply to our own creative projects in this experimental episode.

The article—and what we’re going to dive into together—spans a fascinating swath of topics that I’ll help unpack. Everything from prestige content versus quick bites, hyper-abundance and the atmosphere of plentitude, infinite possibilities, unpredictability, celebrating fringe, “great-ish” and the golden age of good enough, quiet time meetings, licensing versus original content, hoarding, the great reclamation of content, perceived barriers to entry, and preserving storytelling.

If it goes well, and you’re interested in these topics, I can even invite Jonah to a follow-up interview for the Pivot podcast. :)

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141: Be a Free Range Human—Busting Business Myths with Marianne Cantwell

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141: Be a Free Range Human—Busting Business Myths with Marianne Cantwell

I’ve been a big fan of Marianne’s writing, Be a Free Range Human, since my earliest days as a solopreneur; and in fact, she crossed my radar when my blog was just a budding baby side-hustle, but we hadn’t connected in real-time until this conversation.

A longtime advocate for going your own way in life and work, Marianne shares where many solopreneurs go wrong: leaving a suffocating, one-size-fits-all corporate environment just to feel equally penned in by a box of their own making with shoulds from the self-employment space.

In this episode, you’ll learn how to identify your Free Range Style, and why it is a big blind spot for many entrepreneurs. In fact, it’s one of the biggest detriments to the health and success of your business to go against your Free Range Style, even though many best practices would have you inadvertently doing just that!

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/141.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call with Jenny. Our next call is on November 13!

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140: What Horse Whispering and Entrepreneurship Have in Common with Eileen Kenney

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140: What Horse Whispering and Entrepreneurship Have in Common with Eileen Kenney

What does horse whispering have in common with entrepreneurship? More than you might think; unless you are already running your own show and know exactly how fickle taming a wild new business can be!

I loved this conversation with Elaine Kenney on her trials as a single mom building a business, her resilience in the face of dips and defeat, her obsession with horses, and how she navigates every next phase with joy, grace, and perseverance.

If you enjoy this conversation, check out another one of my all time favorite Pivot podcasts, The Soul of an Octopus—Exploring Animal Consciousness with Sy Montgomery.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/140.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything, and discuss the latest books, tools and topics I’ve shared in recent episodes.

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139: Rich Dad, Real Estate Investing, and Podcast Pro Tips with Erik Cabral

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139: Rich Dad, Real Estate Investing, and Podcast Pro Tips with Erik Cabral

Quick reminder! Doors close for Momentum Enrollment on Tuesday, October 15 — learn more and enroll at PivotMethod.com/Momentum if you’re looking for super smart systems and strategies to design your ideal six-figure business in 2020 and beyond :)

This week’s episode is another fun Podcast Row conversation, and this time I got to geek out on two topics I haven’t talked much about publicly: one of the first personal development books I read in my early twenties that changed the trajectory of my life, business, and finances—and real estate!

With a brother in commercial real estate, I’m often having walk-and-talks on these topics with him whenever we’re in the same city, so I think you’ll enjoy this conversation with Erik Cabral. Listen closely, as he also shares a fantastic podcast pro tip for those of you who have your own shows!

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/139.

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138: How Can You Earn Twice as Much in Half the Time with Joy and Ease? Momentum Doors Open!

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138: How Can You Earn Twice as Much in Half the Time with Joy and Ease? Momentum Doors Open!

If you are a heart-based business owner, and you want to learn how to earn twice as in half the time, with ease and joy while serving the highest good, then I invite you to join us as an official Momentum Member! Visit http://PivotMethod.com/Momentum to learn more about my private community for side-hustlers and solopreneurs, and how we can support you with systems and strategies to build your ideal six- (or seven!) figure business in 2020 and beyond.

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137: What's Your Brand Archetype? Unlock Your Innate Advantage with Kaye Putnam

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137: What's Your Brand Archetype? Unlock Your Innate Advantage with Kaye Putnam

Do you ever experience “design block” or personal branding BLEGH when you think about how to present yourself and your business online? If so, you are not alone! That makes at least two of us :)

You are going to love this episode with brand strategist Kaye Putnam on authentic expression, the 12 brand archetypes, and why sometimes understanding our own brand is like reading a label from the inside of a jar—and what to do about it.

Kaye believes that when you have a clear brand, your clients love, respect, and are willing to pay premium prices for your work—which gives you the clarity and confidence to scale your impact and income.

Speaking of which! If you haven’t yet signed up for my free upcoming 90-minute Masterclass on 10 Scalable Streams of Solopreneur Income on 10/10 at 10am ET, you can do that here »

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/137.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything—our next one is coming right up! On my birthday, 10/9 :) Shout-out to my fellow Libras!

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136: Start Finishing—Pricing, Projects, and Momentum Planning with Charlie Gilkey

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136: Start Finishing—Pricing, Projects, and Momentum Planning with Charlie Gilkey

Sometimes the Audio Gods just do not shine upon you, and that’s what happened during this super fun experimental interview with my brilliant friend Charlie Gilkey! My mic is “hot” (aka way too loud), but I hope you’ll forgive me and listen anyway, as Charlie shares SO. MUCH. GOLD!! We even go into “extreme coaching” mode together at the end, as we discuss topics from his new book, Start Finishing: How to Go From Idea to Done.

A bit more backstory: we piloted a book club within Momentum for the first time this month, where MoMo’ers were on the podcast interview live with us on mute, then after my interview we opened it up for Q&A and coaching with Charlie. We cover all kinds of topics ranging from his Five Projects Rule, The Project Pyramid, comparisitis, creative constipation (LOL!), his awesome Momentum planning strategy, and pricing our services as a small business owner.

Speaking of which! If you haven’t yet signed up for my free upcoming 90-minute Masterclass on 10 Scalable Streams of Solopreneur Income on 10/10 at 10am ET, you can enroll at http://pivot.love/10streams.

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/136.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything—our next one is coming right up! On my birthday, 10/9 Shout-out to my fellow Libras :)

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135: The Bliss Engine with Jim Blake (aka Daddy-O!)

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135: The Bliss Engine with Jim Blake (aka Daddy-O!)

We have a verrrry special guest this week in honor of his big birthday month, and that’s my dad—Jim Blake!

He happened to be in town visiting on a day that I was participating in Podcast Row, an all-day podcasting extravaganza at Stand-up New York. My first guest had a last-minute emergency and had to bow out, so with no notice I pulled my dad onto the main stage and interviewed him about his books, his music, his creative process, and what he calls “mouth management.” We had so much fun!

If you've enjoyed either of my two books it's in large part thanks to his expert editing, content discussions, and ongoing inspiration—so I can’t wait for you to get to know him better through this week’s episode :)

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/135.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider becoming a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything—the next one is on my birthday, October 9—shout-out to my fellow Libras!

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134: East Forest on Infinite Existence and The Guru Within

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134: East Forest on Infinite Existence and The Guru Within

“When you witness a dark thought – you witness it, and love it. You love your dark thoughts. The witness is part of the soul, and the soul loves everything.” —Ram Dass from “Dark Thoughts”

In this episode, East Forest joins us to discuss his latest album, Ram Dass, and his time in Maui to record these exclusive new teachings from an enlightened master. After capturing Dass’ words of wisdom, East Forest returned to his studio to compose this incredible soundtrack to beautifully support each songs’ subject. Together we explore themes like balancing guru worship with finding wisdom within, music as soul medicine, infinite existence, and creative expression. You know, the good stuff :)

Check out full show notes from this episode with links to resources mentioned at PivotMethod.com/134.

Enjoying the show? Pivot Podcast is listener supported—consider donating to become a Pivot Insider and you’ll get access to a private monthly Q&A call where you can ask me anything, and discuss the latest books, tools and topics I’ve shared in recent episodes.

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133: Free-up Founder Time Preview — Time Blocking and Content Batching

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133: Free-up Founder Time Preview — Time Blocking and Content Batching

How can I earn twice as much in half the time, with joy and ease, while serving the highest good for all involved? This is one of the central questions in my solo+preneur-based business, one that builds a habit (okay, okay, obsession) of looking for simple systems and strategies to help free our time, mind, and money.

This episode is preview lesson from my new—totally free!—mini-course, Free-up Founder Time. I cover strategies for time blocking and content batching, and walk you through exactly how I set-up my schedule each week (knowing that life and work never go perfectly to plan). I define Founder Time as time that you dedicate to working on your business, as the owner of the whole operation. Ideally, you schedule it for your most creative windows—when you feel energized to do your best work.  

After you listen, register for the course here to kick-off your fall with more time and energy! In 15 short actionable lessons, I cover topics like content batching, time blocking, getting ready for your big break, courage cookies, luck trucks, and a whole lot more. Each lesson as a combination of helpful tools, templates, podcast episodes, and book recommendations. I also recorded each lesson (most are 5-10 minutes long) as audio for learning on the go. My goal: every lesson will free up two to five hours of your time each week!

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132: The Making of a Manager with Julie Zhuo

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132: The Making of a Manager with Julie Zhuo

In her book, The Making of a Manager: What To Do When Everyone Looks To You, author Julie Zhuo takes us back to the childhood lemonade stand in a way that flipped a major “aha” lightbulb switch for me.

As the founder of a budding business, you might be the best at making lemonade, or at least think you are, even as you hire helpers to (wo)man the stand. But if you only ever make lemonade you’ll only be serving an additive role in your business. Instead, if you hire a small team and teach them how to make the lemonade, even if they’re not quite as skilled as you at first, you’ll be serving a multiplicative role.

You serving as a multiplier in your business means exponential returns are possible (including exponentially reducing your time). But most of us aren’t handed a manual on how to become an effective manager of other people—we learn by fumbling through the job. In this conversation, Julie and I dig into the three P’s of people management: people, process, and purpose—and it’s a good idea to create a user guide to . . . you!

Download a copy of Julie’s sample user guide below (or if you’re viewing this in a podcast player view full show notes at http://pivotmethod.com/132).

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131: Indistractable with Nir Eyal

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131: Indistractable with Nir Eyal

What’s the difference between distraction and traction? Why don’t we do the things that we know we should do? And how can we learn from techniques that tech companies use to hook us into their products in order to redirect our attention toward what we really want to be, do, and create in the world?

Nir Eyal and I discuss these topics and more in this week’s podcast conversation based on his new book, Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life. He also outlines the four steps of the Indistractable model: master internal triggers, make time for traction, hack back external triggers, and prevent distraction with pacts.