The Colonel’s Daughter
As the daughter of a career Air Force officer, Lauren grew up being uprooted and relocated every couple of years. This imbued her with a profound independence and ability to adapt to changing circumstances, continually learning to adapt to new stations and new people. The lessons she learned from her dad, “The Colonel” helped her make smart decisions and overcome adversity with humility and a sense of humor.
Her personal journey has traversed some dark and scary roads that included battles with and recovery from an eating disorder and surviving two personal assaults. The upside of that is she is standing strong on the sunny side of those dark roads in triumph. Lauren’s life journey has brought her to the conclusion that what happens to you in your life is not as important as how you choose to respond to what happens to you in your life.
In her varied career, Lauren has navigated just about every aspect of corporate America – from trucking to achieving top-tier Sales Director status for a global cosmetics firm to managing a non-profit foundation. Since she began building her own company, she has had the privilege to speak in seven countries to associations, organizations, federal, state and local governments, as well as Fortune 500 companies – helping them transcend mere success to achieve true significance, to improve the effectiveness of their communication, increase productivity, increase employee engagement and reduce unnecessary drama.
Lauren leads by example, refusing to place limits on herself. She has shown thousands of people how to expand their comfort zones and dump their own drama. The combination of her personal and professional journeys has brought Lauren to a unique place where she can guide others – women, men, executives, managers, employees and entrepreneurs alike – in their quest for significance, passing through good to grasp great; passing beyond survival into triumph.
Able to relate to and energize everyone from the custodial staff to C-Level executives, Lauren is a master storyteller, delivering insightful, inspirational and relevant content that empowers people to absorb and act upon what they’ve heard – and she does so in an entertaining manner with a dry sense of humor that keeps them chuckling while they’re learning.
And she also makes sure to have some fun along the way— because if you can’t have a little fun along the road, why travel it at all?
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-Transcript-
Brad Burrow (00:00:01):
Welcome to In A World With Real Media. I’m your host, Brad Burrow. In this podcast, we’ll dive into the lives of the most successful people in business. We’ll learn how they overcame adversity, took advantage of opportunities and learned from their experiences. Learn from our experts, get inspired, then go live your story. It’s in a world with real media. Thank you for being on the podcast. Thank you. We’ve been working on this for a while. I know. I’m so glad to have you here.
Lauren Schieffer (00:00:33):
Makes me happy that we finally made it work.
Brad Burrow (00:00:35):
Yeah. So on this podcast, I like to talk about how people get to where they are and kind of … So I want to get into that with you a little bit. Just tell me about growing up. I’m sure you have an amazing story.
Lauren Schieffer (00:00:48):
Everyone has an amazing story growing up. My father was a career Air Force officer and we moved every 18 months to three years. Until I went away to college, I had never lived anywhere longer than three years.
Brad Burrow (00:01:05):
Okay. Wow.
Lauren Schieffer (00:01:07):
So what did that teach me? That taught me how to pack my life into a shoebox when told to do so because military children live their lives like chips on the stream. Yeah. Going where the military tells them to go, when they’re told to go and we do it with a brave little soldier face on. Yeah. So we learned how to pack up quick and move when we were told. I also learned how to adapt to new environments. Every new station, every new city, every new school that I was thrust into, I needed to adapt to. Yeah. I learned how to make friends very, very quickly and adapt my communication style to meet wherever I was. So it could have been construed a hardship, but it was a great growing experience for me.
Brad Burrow (00:02:00):
So you think that set you up for what you’re doing today? I mean, you can probably walk in and meet somebody with no problem at all.
Lauren Schieffer (00:02:07):
Yeah. My husband says there are no strangers to me. And that’s not always a good or a safe thing, but yes, I can pretty much make friends anywhere.
Brad Burrow (00:02:16):
But that’s a great skill to have. My parents, not to make this too much about me, but my parents were divorced when I was young and I kind of ended up going back and forth. I had that same similar thing where I had to go into a new place and meet people. And I think that served me well. I mean, not what you would choose, but you look back on it, it’s like it did give you some skills.
Lauren Schieffer (00:02:38):
Yeah. And I didn’t recognize those to be really valuable skills until after really after I’d started speaking. I didn’t tap into that these are real skills that not everybody has.
Brad Burrow (00:02:55):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:02:56):
So yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:02:57):
So I kind of did a little research here and went back and looked through your history. There’s some interesting things. So your work history, and I want to talk about growing up, your relationship with the Colonel. Maybe let’s talk about that first and then we’ll go through some of the other things I have questions about.
Lauren Schieffer (00:03:12):
But
Brad Burrow (00:03:12):
Tell me what that was like. I mean, you grew up seeing leadership front and center.
Lauren Schieffer (00:03:19):
Yeah. Dad’s relationship with the Air Force was a little bit different than many people ask. When I wrote the first Colonels of Wisdom Book, I handed it to a speaker friend of mine who was a retired Lieutenant Colonel and he said, “I couldn’t possibly endorse this until I know more about your father and his history and why is there no combat in here?” And it was the first time I’d ever considered it because dad wasn’t in combat. The contribution that my father gave to the Air Force was in leadership and engineering. So when I was a little girl in his early career, he was in facility survivability and ordinance effectiveness, which is a big thing for a nine-year-old to get her mouth around. Basically, my father led teams that built ordinances, bombs,
(00:04:25):
That had the maximum effect on the target with minimal collateral damage. And then he built, he and his teams designed structures that could be taken in quickly, put up quickly to protect our people from the bombs we were dropping. The second half of his career he designed aircraft and he and his team, he was the division chief for the flight dynamics laboratory in Wright Patterson, Dayton, Ohio. And he and his team designed the advanced composite materials that absorb radar that the B2 bomber and the F series fighter jets are … So his team did that. Wow. So his contributions to the Air Force meant that our boys, he called them, our boys were safer when they were over there and able to come back home to their families.
Brad Burrow (00:05:28):
Still to this day, that technology’s still pretty cutting edge, isn’t
Lauren Schieffer (00:05:32):
It? Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:05:33):
I mean, I remember we did a video for an air show and they had one of the, I think it was one of the, maybe it was the B2 bomber and we could look at it, but we couldn’t go up and couldn’t touch it or anything like that. It was like even in that situation, I’m surprised they even had it there, honestly, but you couldn’t-
Lauren Schieffer (00:05:53):
Well, because everyone is still so intrigued. Even decades later, everyone is still so intrigued by the concept and it looks so cool in the air. I mean, you can’t get past the … It just looks so cool in the air.
Brad Burrow (00:06:07):
Yeah. It’s really cool that they’re so close to the Kansas City too. Even on the latest things that have been happening, it’s like they take off from Kansas City and go halfway around the world.That’s amazing.
Lauren Schieffer (00:06:20):
Military
Brad Burrow (00:06:20):
Is amazing. All right. So what was it like as … Do you remember as a little girl like, okay, dad came home today, we’re moving to another place where we … Do you remember what that was like emotionally? And that had to be tough.
Lauren Schieffer (00:06:36):
Yeah. I don’t remember being really … I measure my life based on what grade I was in, not by the years. Lots of people go, “Oh, it was 1963.” I don’t even remember how old I was because I was younger in most grades than most people, but we did Albuquerque. No, we did Tempe, Albuquerque, Tempe, Albuquerque, Dayton, Albuquerque. I don’t remember being sad anytime that we were leaving Albuquerque. When we were in Dayton, that was junior high-ish. Now you’re really making friends. Friends, yeah. And before that, we were always living on Air Force bases. So we knew that the friendships were transient and people were leaving while we were living there and that wasn’t such a big deal. But when we were in Ohio, that was junior high school and making that move, that one was … I remember that one being really tough for me and I remember saying my mother saying, “Young lady home is where you hang your heart.” That’s always been that way.
(00:07:59):
It always will be that way so long as we’re in the military, so buck up and pack.
Brad Burrow (00:08:04):
Yeah. Part of the
Lauren Schieffer (00:08:06):
Deal, huh? Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:08:07):
And she was good with that too.
Lauren Schieffer (00:08:12):
Well,
Brad Burrow (00:08:12):
She went along with it, I guess.
Lauren Schieffer (00:08:14):
Well, there was one station that I missed. Dad got tapped to teach engineering at the Air Force Academy. Well, that’s in Colorado
Brad Burrow (00:08:25):
Springs and
Lauren Schieffer (00:08:26):
We thought we’re going to Colorado Springs and he’s going to teach. He’s going to have tenure. We’re going to be there for a long time. In Colorado, my favorite state in the world, oh my heavens. That lasted six months and then he got tapped for the flight dynamics laboratory and we used to say that mom dug irrigation ditches with her heels all the way from Colorado to Ohio, but I don’t know how okay she was with it. I mean, they divorced eventually, but anyway. Yeah,
Brad Burrow (00:08:59):
That would be tough. That’d be a tough life. So one of the things I was doing a little research and one of the quotes that you had about the Colonel is how failure is not necessarily a bad thing. I wanted to get your thoughts on that. We’ve been in business since 97.
Lauren Schieffer (00:09:19):
Yeah, you.
Brad Burrow (00:09:20):
We failed a lot. But
Lauren Schieffer (00:09:23):
You’re still here.
Brad Burrow (00:09:24):
We’re still here and I think the key is, and maybe you can kind of talk about this a little bit and maybe you can learn this from your dad. It’s like failure, I mean, I’m sure they failed a lot when they’re figuring out how to make materials and
Lauren Schieffer (00:09:37):
Runs and all this
Brad Burrow (00:09:38):
Stuff, but the failure is what propels you to success.
Lauren Schieffer (00:09:42):
It’s the
Brad Burrow (00:09:42):
Same in life and business. Do you agree with that?
Lauren Schieffer (00:09:45):
Oh, absolutely. And yeah, that quote did come from dad and it’s so easy to say that, but being the Colonel’s daughter, it comes with some expectations and it took me a long time to realize that failure was not fatal and every time something went wrong from when I was a kid to … Mother was the retribution aside. Dad was always like, “Okay, kid, what’d you learn? What have we learned from this? ” So if you can always take the lessons and he would say, “Failure is not fatal. It’s how we learn.” So if you’re always learning and taking the lessons and not making the same mistakes twice, then failure is an expected part of your success.
Brad Burrow (00:10:49):
Yeah. And you just roll with it, learn from it, move on.
Lauren Schieffer (00:10:54):
Doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt.
Brad Burrow (00:10:56):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:10:56):
But it’s not fatal.
Brad Burrow (00:10:57):
Yeah. We’ve had lots of things we could talk about over 30 years in real media, but in business, I think … Why do you think there’s so much emphasis on you can’t fail? It almost is something that maybe is good in some instances. That sounds bad to say that almost.
Lauren Schieffer (00:11:18):
Well, that’s a really general question about in business, because every business is different. I think in business there’s more money involved, especially if you’ve invested your own money or someone else’s money in your business and it’s a loss, that’s a harder failure to just say, “Oh, what have I learned?” And move on,
(00:11:49):
But it’s necessary. There is a company that shall remain nameless because I don’t have permission to talk about them, but they’re a tech company and they dropped a whole lot of time and money in developing their own smartphone. And at the time, the Apple phones were like two years and Blackberries were still very common and you had Motorola doing … Everybody was getting into the smartphone market and there was a good year and a half of research and time and development and money and they got in and realized that there’s no way they could be competitive with it. Was their smartphone better? They thought so, but they couldn’t be competitive because Apple was making the improvements every blink of an eye. And so they took the time, the effort and the money that they had put into it and let it go and took it as a lesson.
(00:13:08):
Now I was not in the boardroom during these discussions, right? Yeah. But from the efforts that they put in after that, they took it to really focus on what they’re competitive on.
Brad Burrow (00:13:24):
So they had some takeaways for the business
Lauren Schieffer (00:13:26):
From
Brad Burrow (00:13:26):
That,
Lauren Schieffer (00:13:27):
That
Brad Burrow (00:13:27):
They
Lauren Schieffer (00:13:27):
Probably learned some
Brad Burrow (00:13:28):
Things. I remember this is a long time ago, probably 20, 25 years ago, I was part of a group that had this great new idea. It’s like, “We’re going to build this thing that’s a phone and you’re going to be able to take notes on it. You’re going to be able to have all your contacts on it. ” And this was like, everybody’s like, “Oh, there’s just no way.” And this was just a local group of guys that had this idea and I look back on that, I was like, “Wow, look at where we are now.” And at the time that was like, there was nothing like that. I was driving around with the phone in my car and so it was a mobile phone, but
Lauren Schieffer (00:14:08):
I had to be
Brad Burrow (00:14:08):
In my car to
Lauren Schieffer (00:14:09):
Actually
Brad Burrow (00:14:09):
Take a call.
Lauren Schieffer (00:14:10):
My first one was a brick.
Brad Burrow (00:14:11):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:14:12):
I mean quite literally the brick with the antenna and stuff. Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:14:16):
It’s interesting. I want to talk a little bit about your history. I mean, I was looking, it’s really interesting. So you were a sales director for Mary Kay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:14:27):
Yeah, it’s a really diverse history. Yeah. I mean, you really had to dig into the LinkedIn profile to find that. Yeah. I spent 12 years with Mary Kay and worked my way to be the top 2% of the company.
Brad Burrow (00:14:40):
Amazing.
Lauren Schieffer (00:14:41):
And I loved it when I loved it. And then one day and with any network marketing company, for that company to be successful and I think I believe Mary Kay is the best there is to be successful there has to be a little bit of brainwashing involved and I was brainwashed with the best of them and I said things like, “There’s a Mary Kay hole in every woman’s heart. We just have to find it.
(00:15:18):
And this is all I’m going to do for the rest of my life. My blood runs pink.” And I believed those when I said it. And we live in this little pink bubble and we believe that every woman needs to be in the pink bubble. I woke up one morning and I was outside of the pink bubble emotionally and what I discovered was there’s air out here too and I denied it for a good six months because when a director stops working, her unit stops working and that was a bad thing. And so I kept plowing at it and what I discovered was why did I want to be a sales director? Number one, it was because what everybody told me I was supposed to do, right? Move up the career path. That’s what I was supposed to do. And secondly, it’s amazing that I’m wearing pink right now.
Brad Burrow (00:16:15):
I
Lauren Schieffer (00:16:15):
Know.
Brad Burrow (00:16:16):
I was thinking the same thing. I’m like, wow.
Lauren Schieffer (00:16:19):
And secondly, because the directors were the ones in the front of the room teaching, trading, motivating, and inspiring. That’s what I wanted to do. And what I didn’t like about being a director was selling lipstick. I mean, I don’t even like wearing it, honestly. And so I decided that that was not sufficient to keep me going in Mary Kay and I handed my unit over to my senior director and went down to being just a personal use consultant. Is
Brad Burrow (00:16:54):
That right? How did you feel after that? Did
Lauren Schieffer (00:16:56):
You feel
Brad Burrow (00:16:57):
Like a good or was it weight lifted or was it like …
Lauren Schieffer (00:17:02):
I don’t know. There’s a little bit of brainwashing involved. I would duck and cover anytime I saw anyone that I knew from Mary Kay and there was some guilt, but I put 12 years in. In hindsight, I put 12 years in. I didn’t just quit and I still use the product. I think it’s an amazing product, but at the time
Brad Burrow (00:17:27):
There
Lauren Schieffer (00:17:27):
Was some guilt involved.
Brad Burrow (00:17:29):
So do you feel like your experience with Mary Kay has helped you in what you’re doing right now?
Lauren Schieffer (00:17:34):
Totally.
Brad Burrow (00:17:35):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:17:35):
Absolutely. I learned how to recognize people, I want to say women, women’s emotions in a particular situation, whether sales, you can read someone’s face and know whether you’ve got her or not got her and in recruiting, I learned how to tap into the basic drives. I taught personality styling for Mary Kay for years. So I learned a lot and I also- When you say
Brad Burrow (00:18:17):
Personality styling, what do you mean like reading somebody’s personality? Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:18:23):
I got certified in the DISC DISC training, which in any network marketing environment
(00:18:33):
Is crucial for recruiting new team members because you need to know, you need to be able to recognize where they’re sitting on the spectrum of so you know what to tell them. For instance, if they’re a driver dominant personality, you’re going to tell them how much money they can make and how fast they can move up the ladder. If they’re a socializer or an influencer initiator, you’re going to tell them how much fun it can be and what all the prizes are going to be. If they’re a relator or a security focused personality, you’re going to tell them what they can do to help their family, how much more time it’s going to give them with their family if they’re working for themselves. And if they’re a compliance personality like the analyzers, you’re going to tell them, “This is a proven career path that has been marched and all of the wrinkles have been worked out before you start.
(00:19:35):
It’s a proven career path. You will know what’s expected of you and there’s no politics involved in moving up the labor.”
Brad Burrow (00:19:45):
Interesting.
Lauren Schieffer (00:19:49):
It’s helped me a lot.
Brad Burrow (00:19:51):
Was there anybody in the disc profile that you knew was not going to be successful doing that?
Lauren Schieffer (00:19:55):
No.
Brad Burrow (00:19:56):
Everybody, everybody- Everyone is
Lauren Schieffer (00:19:57):
Successful.
Brad Burrow (00:19:57):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:19:58):
Interesting. All of them approach it differently.
Brad Burrow (00:20:02):
Okay. And then you were a presenter for Skillpath, is that right?
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:07):
I was a road warrior for SkillPath for seven years.
Brad Burrow (00:20:11):
I don’t know if that’s still the case with Skillpath, but back in the day they were like, you would travel around and teach classes.
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:18):
I traveled three weeks out of every month.
Brad Burrow (00:20:19):
Is that right?
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:20):
I did. I would fly out on Sunday night and pick up a rental car and then drive from city to city to city to city in whatever route they’d routed. So you’d have a
Brad Burrow (00:20:34):
Different place each day?
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:35):
Different city every day and fly home on Friday night.
Brad Burrow (00:20:38):
Wow.
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:39):
Hopefully I’d get home on Friday night. But if not, I’d get home on Saturday morning, wash my clothes and fly out on Sunday night.
Brad Burrow (00:20:46):
Oh my gosh.
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:47):
Yeah. It’s hard work. Anyone working for the seminar companies, kudos. It’s hard work. For very little pain.
Brad Burrow (00:20:55):
Leadership?
Lauren Schieffer (00:20:57):
I had 57 tracks that I taught for Skillpath.
Brad Burrow (00:21:00):
Is that
Lauren Schieffer (00:21:00):
Right? Oh yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:21:02):
Wow.
Lauren Schieffer (00:21:02):
Oh yeah. But the ones that I was best at were communication, conflict management and leadership.
Brad Burrow (00:21:11):
Okay. Yeah. Man, did you just get worn out?
Lauren Schieffer (00:21:16):
Oh yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:21:16):
I mean, I don’t know how somebody could do that for
Lauren Schieffer (00:21:20):
A couple
Brad Burrow (00:21:20):
Years without just completely losing their mind.
Lauren Schieffer (00:21:23):
So for the last four years that I was there, based on the numbers that they track and send out in an email every month, these are the top people in … Sorry.
Brad Burrow (00:21:36):
You’re good.
Lauren Schieffer (00:21:36):
These are the top people in here. So based on the numbers that they track for consistency, I was the number one trainer for four years. I was the only person that was in the top 10 of all six categories that they track for four years running. That tells me I stayed four years too long. But after a while, yeah, you did get worn out and compared to what I earn now, it’s pennies because the seminar companies serve a very important purpose, but they’re for- profit companiesg so they’re not spending more on their trainers or their trainer’s travel or their trainer’s resources than they absolutely have to.
Brad Burrow (00:22:34):
Right.
Lauren Schieffer (00:22:35):
And who can fault them? Their capitalism, they’re a for- profit company.
Brad Burrow (00:22:39):
Right. So you’re not staying in the greatest places and probably not great expenses and all that stuff.
Lauren Schieffer (00:22:46):
Oh, heavens no. Yeah,
Brad Burrow (00:22:47):
That’d be tough.
Lauren Schieffer (00:22:48):
Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:22:48):
That would be tough. But again, looking where you are now, you learned some skills probably that
Lauren Schieffer (00:22:54):
You’re
Brad Burrow (00:22:54):
Using big time right
Lauren Schieffer (00:22:55):
Now. Absolutely. Yeah. I learned how to put together a well structured comprehensive training program. I learned how to zig when my audience zags.
Brad Burrow (00:23:11):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:12):
So you could
Brad Burrow (00:23:13):
Learn how to read the
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:14):
Audience. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. I learned a lot. Yes, good skills.
Brad Burrow (00:23:18):
Yeah. Which is serving you well probably as
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:21):
A
Brad Burrow (00:23:21):
Speaker right now,
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:21):
Huh? Serving me well. Yeah. Do you see
Brad Burrow (00:23:23):
Those things happening when you’re speaking to a
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:25):
Crowd? Absolutely. Oh,
Brad Burrow (00:23:26):
I need to go this direction.
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:26):
Absolutely. And I’ve made so many mistakes, every mistake. And we learn from those. One of the things that I teach, the speakers that I coach is to avoid being offensive. And I say, “That may sound like a no brainer.”
Brad Burrow (00:23:50):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:51):
Right? Yeah,
Brad Burrow (00:23:51):
It does.
Lauren Schieffer (00:23:53):
But there are so many layers to that. No gossip, even if it’s just gossip about sports or celebrities or the safe … Don’t, just don’t. No profanity at all. None. No badmouthing. You don’t badmouth other speakers, you don’t badmouth meeting professionals, don’t badmouth. The AV team don’t. No bad mouthing. Yeah. And no comments that could be racially, sexually motivated any group of people, even if you’re a member of that group of people. And here’s the example that I like to use and this happened to me and just as a … What’s the word I’m looking for? I’m a speaker and I can’t find the word. Backstory.
Brad Burrow (00:25:01):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:25:03):
My grandmother was full blood Hopi Indian. So technically I am a member of the Hopi Nation. I was speaking in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which could be construed as my hometown. I went to high school there.
Brad Burrow (00:25:17):
The place that you were happy to leave though, if I remember
Lauren Schieffer (00:25:19):
You saying- Well, only when I was litle, only when I was little. So I was speaking in Albuquerque and I don’t remember specifically what the track that I was teaching was, but I remember what I said and I said, “Were it not for someone with the initiative of a driver or dominant personality? We may never have crossed the Mississippi and forged a nation all the way to California.” And without missing a beat, one of the audience members said, “Well, that would have been okay for the Native nations they invaded.” Whoa. Okay. The fact that I am a member of the Hopi Nation, I don’t claim it. I don’t claim the benefits or anything like that, but not that there are benefits, but anyway, I don’t claim it. I had misread, I hadn’t taken into account where I was standing. So
Brad Burrow (00:26:21):
That comment coming because you’re in Albuquerque is
Lauren Schieffer (00:26:25):
Basically what
Brad Burrow (00:26:25):
You’re saying.
Lauren Schieffer (00:26:26):
Yeah. There are so many native nations in the state of New Mexico and Arizona all across the country. Oklahoma, all across country. But I took a beat and I said, “You know what? You are absolutely correct in that. ” And I apologized for being insensitive and I moved on, but I had lost the credibility in the room at that point.
Brad Burrow (00:26:53):
But you handled it really well. I don’t know if
Lauren Schieffer (00:26:57):
People would have handled
Brad Burrow (00:26:57):
It very well in that situation. So what’s the funniest thing that ever happened to you speaking in front of a group of people? Any funny stories like that? That one wasn’t funny, but you’ve had to seen a lot of different things, I would imagine, especially in training.
Lauren Schieffer (00:27:16):
I’ve seen a lot of things. I
Brad Burrow (00:27:21):
Kind of threw this on you last minute.
Lauren Schieffer (00:27:23):
Yes. I was speaking in Las Vegas once and it was a ballroom, but it wasn’t a huge ballroom. So it was part of the main ballroom and I think the room held maybe 150, right? And in the middle of my keynote, I had someone wander into the ballroom who had forgotten to put on their pants.
Brad Burrow (00:28:00):
Oh my gosh, seriously.
Lauren Schieffer (00:28:02):
And I saw him and because we were in rounds, I know lots of the audience saw him and I tried to move on and then security saw him and escorted him out and I had to stop and say, “For me to just continue with my keynote without acknowledging our visitor would be weird. That was weird, right?” And they’re all like, “Yeah.” I said, “Okay, we’ve acknowledged the moment. Where was I? ” And then somebody said- Everybody laughed? Yeah. I was in Cedar Rapids, Iowa when the levee broke and the city started flooding. Wow. It was training. It was not a keynote and someone came into the room and said, “We need to evacuate. The city is flooding.” And I said, “Have you all gotten value out of this session?” And they’re like … I said, “Go home.” So you just have to learn how to zi when they zag.
Brad Burrow (00:29:29):
Yeah. Just anything that happens, just roll with it, I guess, huh?
Lauren Schieffer (00:29:33):
Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:29:33):
You can make people laugh. I’ve always thought that one of the things I’ve said is if we can make people laugh that they’re open to ideas more. Do you agree with
Lauren Schieffer (00:29:44):
That? I do. I think humor can diffuse tension in almost every situation, almost, but the type of humor is important. I don’t believe that it’s ever okay to make fun of someone else. The only person I make fun of is me. I can make fun of me. I can be self-deprecating and that can be humorous. We can laugh at a situation, but I don’t think it’s okay to laugh at people. But humor can diffuse.
Brad Burrow (00:30:25):
Yeah. Yeah, I agree. So in SA after that, so you’ve been the president of NSA just recently, right?
Lauren Schieffer (00:30:33):
Not at a national
Brad Burrow (00:30:35):
Level. But on the Kansas
Lauren Schieffer (00:30:36):
City
Brad Burrow (00:30:37):
Chapter.
Lauren Schieffer (00:30:37):
I was the president of the Kansas City chapter. Yes. Yes, I was. And I have sat on a couple of national committees and chaired one of those national committees, but I have never been on the board of directors at a national level.
Brad Burrow (00:30:48):
Okay. So what was that experience like?
Lauren Schieffer (00:30:52):
Which experience?
Brad Burrow (00:30:53):
Well, okay. So yeah, I’d be a little more specific on that, but just kind of the Kansas City area. I know Marquita Miller
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:01):
Really
Brad Burrow (00:31:01):
Well.
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:02):
Miller Joshua.
Brad Burrow (00:31:02):
Oh, that’s correct. Yeah, that’s right. Actually, when her husband passed away, I
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:07):
Knew them
Brad Burrow (00:31:07):
Before that and I did a video for his funeral.
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:11):
You did that video?
Brad Burrow (00:31:14):
Yeah. Marquita, not to get too far on this rabbit trail, but she’s just such an awesome person.
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:20):
She’s amazing.
Brad Burrow (00:31:21):
Yeah. And she’s always helped us. Anytime she asks for help, I’m like, okay, yes, just tell me what you need.
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:30):
I have often said that someday I aspire to be half the human being that she is.
Brad Burrow (00:31:36):
Yeah, she is. So she did a little speaking thing here where we had about an audience of about 50 people and she went trying to build her reel back up and she’s like fire. Oh my gosh.
Lauren Schieffer (00:31:50):
She’s so dynamite. And I have often said she is capable of having more plates spinning at one time without any of them dropping and everything that she commits to gets done and she has a multimillion dollar tax business and she tours with Reverend T.D. Jakes and she’s on the board of directors at a national level for national speakers. I have no idea.
Brad Burrow (00:32:25):
She’s on the national board, right?
Lauren Schieffer (00:32:26):
She’s on the national board, yes.
Brad Burrow (00:32:28):
Yeah. Amazing.
Lauren Schieffer (00:32:29):
Yeah. Like I said, thinking about everything she gets done exhausts me. Yeah. Okay. So president of the- What was that
Brad Burrow (00:32:39):
Like? I mean, I know this chapter’s trying, they’re trying to build a chapter up and-
Lauren Schieffer (00:32:43):
When I was president, we were at that point also.
Brad Burrow (00:32:47):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:32:47):
We had had a president or two that had not led well. Yeah. I’ll leave it at that. Our numbers were low and the chapter was struggling. And when I stepped in and I decided, and this was not a good decision in hindsight, I decided that I was going to build it back. It was going to be me. I was going to do it. Yeah. And so I worked my little fanny off doing everything for a year, which is not leadership. Leadership is not accomplishment. I mean, accomplishment is not always leadership. Marquita stepped in behind me and she said, “You were the only president that I’d experienced and I thought that that’s what the president does and I couldn’t do that. ” So she started doing what leaders do, delegating. And by the time … So we had doubled our numbers when I handed over to Mark …
Brad Burrow (00:34:03):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:34:04):
Marquita Miller Joshua Fanclub.
Brad Burrow (00:34:06):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:34:06):
Yeah,
Brad Burrow (00:34:06):
Exactly.
Lauren Schieffer (00:34:08):
Send this to her. She was slated to take the gavel from me. I think it was a week after Tommy died. We were supposed to make that transition. I said, “Key, I got this. Don’t worry about it. I’ll hang on as president until you’re ready. We’ll be fine. I’ll do it. ” And to her credit, a month later, she’s like, “I’m ready.” Wow. And she stepped in and two months after that, she was on the main stage at the National Conference Influence as the number one referral person, referring people to National Speakers Association and telling a little bit about her story.
Brad Burrow (00:35:08):
Wow.
Lauren Schieffer (00:35:09):
Amazing. So we had doubled during my presidency and then Marquita doubled that.
Brad Burrow (00:35:22):
So you started it on the trajectory?
Lauren Schieffer (00:35:24):
But the lesson that I had to remind myself, it’s not like I didn’t know it. It was an ego trip on my part to say, “I’m going to do it. I’m going to fix the chapter.” That was ridiculous, but that was a lesson I had to remind myself after I handed the gavel over. Yeah, that wasn’t leadership That was ego.
Brad Burrow (00:35:46):
So I want to come back to when you decided to start speaking and kind of where you are right now, but I wanted to ask you, like NSA is, I see a lot of people in NSA right now that really don’t have experience yet speaking,
Lauren Schieffer (00:36:04):
But
Brad Burrow (00:36:04):
Have joined to maybe
Lauren Schieffer (00:36:06):
Learn. You see a lot of them in the Kansas City chapter.
Brad Burrow (00:36:09):
Okay. Kansas City chapter, correct. Is that a result of like COVID or something like that? Or why are people deciding, “Hey, I want to be a speaker now.”
Lauren Schieffer (00:36:22):
Having done this for a hot minute, 20 years, it seems to be a trend when the economy goes south and people lose their jobs, they decide they’re going to be a speaker or be a consultant. I think that the plethora that we have right now is probably a result of COVID and the economy that is in truth, still struggling from it in many different areas. There are areas that are booming and there are areas that are still struggling and I think that has a lot to do with it. We saw that same push in 2008 when the housing bubble burst. We saw during the Great Recession I think it’s a byproduct of people losing their jobs.
Brad Burrow (00:37:28):
Yeah. I think you’re right. What advice do you give to … I’m sure you’re talking to people and I know you’re doing coaching now for speakers, but what do you advice you give somebody that says, “Okay, I want to be a speaker.” What do you say to them? Because not everybody can get up and … I mean, we had the event here the other night.
Lauren Schieffer (00:37:47):
Yeah, the last story standing? Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:37:49):
It was fun to see, but you could tell the people that really were not going to be great at that
Lauren Schieffer (00:37:58):
Versus
Brad Burrow (00:37:58):
The people that were really polished and not everybody has the ability to get up in front of a crowd and motivate them. Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:38:05):
Right away. Can that be learned,
Brad Burrow (00:38:07):
I guess? I guess it
Lauren Schieffer (00:38:08):
Can. Yeah. So you said, what’s the first thing I would tell them? Yeah. Don’t quit your job.
Brad Burrow (00:38:13):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:38:14):
Because if you need the income, if you’re just starting out as a speaker, it’s not going to come right away. I know a couple of speakers that have shot to the top financially in 18 months, but they’re one tenth of one tenth of 1%. Yeah. So the second piece of advice is to really dig into … So shameful plug. I’m doing a webinar later on this month on the 27th for emerging speakers. So this is going to be in the webinar. Part of
Brad Burrow (00:38:59):
Your coaching.
Lauren Schieffer (00:39:00):
Part of my coaching. Yeah. So this is going to be in the webinar, but there are three things that you really need to know about yourself as you’re putting together what your message is and perhaps what your brand is. And the first is know what your experience and expertise is because you need to start there. For instance, my degree is in nonprofit public relations through the fine arts department. So it’s a fluffy degree,
Brad Burrow (00:39:40):
Right?
Lauren Schieffer (00:39:41):
Right out of college, I needed a job to pay the bills.
Brad Burrow (00:39:46):
So
Lauren Schieffer (00:39:46):
I got a job. It was just a job until I started my career, which actually never happened, but it was with a moving and storage company. Six and a half years later when I left the van line, I was the customer service manager for the 11 Western States region. Is that
Brad Burrow (00:40:09):
Right? Wow.
Lauren Schieffer (00:40:10):
I was the first woman to ever hold that job. So I can speak all things trucking. Yeah. So that’s who I started speaking to was a trucking industry. Yeah. That led to someone referring me to someone in construction. So then I’m speaking construction and that led to someone referring me to someone in the trades, which so I started with, what is my expertise? Yeah. I have a very, very dear friend who started as a dental hygienist and then she was a practice manager. She knows everything dental. So for her to step into trucking wouldn’t be organically authentic. So know what your experience and your expertise is first. Secondly, know what your natural engagement or speaking style is. It is very normal and natural for people who are stepping into speaking to watch the people that they admire on the stage and start to emulate them without even knowing they’re doing it.
(00:41:27):
You have to know what your natural style is. I am humorous. I have a dry wit. People have often equated me to Rita Rudner. I’ll just drop a little something and then move on and people get it like two beats later. I’m not rolling on the floor funny. I’m just not. Yeah.
(00:41:50):
So I don’t try to be a standup comedian I’m humorous. Also, my speaking style is very empathetic and I could never stomp the … And I don’t mean that in a negative way. I could never stomp the stage like a revival preacher. It’s not who I am. So it would come off as disingenuous. So know your natural engagement style and the third one’s the most important one. Know the specific results that you’re going to bring. And the best way to do that is to play a game that I hate, but it’s important. It’s called the so what game. Have you ever heard of this?
Brad Burrow (00:42:44):
No.
Lauren Schieffer (00:42:49):
You have to get so answer the so what five times down. Okay. So what do you speak on?
Brad Burrow (00:42:59):
So what? So what?
Lauren Schieffer (00:43:01):
Why does that matter to me? Well, because … Oh, okay. So what? You have to get to the so what so that you know specifically what problem you’re solving, what pain you’re helping eliminate or get through, what your specific results are. Because when you start marketing yourself on a subject that undoubtedly tens of thousands of other speakers are also speaking on, you need to know why you. So it’s those three things that they have to get very clear on before they can expect to be successful as a speaker.
Brad Burrow (00:43:38):
So that’s a really good transition to one of my questions for you because I was reading it in so that there’s the nine essentials for leadership, but it’s not just leadership, it’s significant leadership and the word significant. Talk about that a little bit because that’s a big differentiator. I mean, you can be a good leader, but are you significant leader?
Lauren Schieffer (00:43:59):
Well, let’s talk first about the difference between significance and success.
Brad Burrow (00:44:03):
Yes.
Lauren Schieffer (00:44:04):
Most of us are programmed to chase success. Success is about me. It’s about how much money I make and what my title is, where my parking spot is, what my accolades are, what trophies I have on my shelves. It’s all about me. I’m very successful. Significance is different. Significance has nothing whatsoever to do with any of that. Significance is about we. It’s about how many lives I touch and the manner in which I choose to impact them because how you impact others is a choice. And so the Colonel used to say, kid, anyone can be successful. Making money, losing it, making it back, that’s easy. Choose to be significant. So significant leadership puts people over profit and focuses on helping others grow first. Now, when you focus on that, part of my marketing for the nine essentials is when all of the day-to-day deliverables of leadership, increased profitability, increased productivity, increased market share, customer satisfaction, employee retention, all of those will fall into line naturally if the leader focuses all of their efforts through the lens of the nine essentials of significant leadership.
(00:45:57):
And when that happens, they Help Others Grow First. That’s the entire focus. I coined the phrase myself. I don’t know if there’s anybody else out there using it. Significant leadership takes servant leadership
(00:46:18):
One step further.
Brad Burrow (00:46:19):
I just wrote that down. Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:46:21):
One step further. Servant leadership is an admirable model. Servant leadership asks nothing in return for what I am breathing into you as a leader. Significant leadership, on the other hand, expects that that which I’m breathing into you, you will breathe into someone else and create ripples of significant leaders. That’s how we help others
Brad Burrow (00:46:51):
Grow.That’s awesome. That’s great. So it’s taking it another step, but it’s like passing it on,
Lauren Schieffer (00:46:58):
Passing
Brad Burrow (00:46:58):
It on. So you pass it on, you pass it on,
Lauren Schieffer (00:47:00):
And
Brad Burrow (00:47:01):
That’s how we impact.
Lauren Schieffer (00:47:03):
Essential number nine of the nine essentials is work for your replacement.
Brad Burrow (00:47:10):
Boy, that’s so against our me mentality is like, you want me to help this person that’s going to replace
Lauren Schieffer (00:47:17):
Me? Our number one job as leaders is to replace ourselves as many times as we can.
Brad Burrow (00:47:23):
So it reminds me of a story. My dad was director of HR for Ewing Kaufman.
Lauren Schieffer (00:47:29):
Oh, okay.
Brad Burrow (00:47:30):
And I remember him telling me a story one time of a guy that he hired and he had to help this guy get better who was eventually going to take his job. And that’s a scary thought for somebody. I mean, he was director of HR. He worked with Mr. Kay, not every day, but a lot. And to have this guy come in that now your job is to help him really take your job.
Lauren Schieffer (00:48:01):
And if you’re a significant leader, you’re going to do everything that you can to make sure that he is more successful in that job than you were.
Brad Burrow (00:48:08):
Yeah. And think of the fear of overcoming the fear of like, “Oh, I might lose my job over this deal for somebody like that. ”
Lauren Schieffer (00:48:17):
But
Brad Burrow (00:48:17):
I just thought that was interesting. So you probably hear those objections sometimes I
Lauren Schieffer (00:48:21):
Bet. Oh, all the time.
Brad Burrow (00:48:22):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:48:22):
All the time. I have one client that I worked with and his department had developed over time and we had been working together for some time. It’s not because of me, I just watched it happen. His department had the highest rate of attrition of any department, but that’s because they kept working through him as a leader to take leadership positions in the company. So he was just spitting out leaders.
Brad Burrow (00:49:03):
He was training
Lauren Schieffer (00:49:04):
Them up. And bringing others in. Did the
Brad Burrow (00:49:07):
Management realize that was happening?
Lauren Schieffer (00:49:09):
Oh yeah. He’s very highly regarded in the company. Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:49:12):
That’s amazing. Did he know that was happening? Did he realize what was
Lauren Schieffer (00:49:17):
Happening? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. So that was part
Brad Burrow (00:49:18):
Of his MO then.
Lauren Schieffer (00:49:20):
He’s one of the easiest people I’ve ever coached because he has that giving mentality already.
Brad Burrow (00:49:31):
So it’s natural.
Lauren Schieffer (00:49:32):
Yeah. It’s a lot harder to convince someone with a me mentality that they need to give it up for a we mentality.
Brad Burrow (00:49:38):
Yes.
Lauren Schieffer (00:49:39):
And that’s one reason I focus on emerging leaders because I believe it’s my belief. Other people believe differently and that’s their right. I believe that the C-suite right now pretty universally is lost. I think they’re lost to greed and position and power and fear and convenience and they’re definitely lost to my message of helping others grow first.
Brad Burrow (00:50:05):
Yeah. Interesting. So
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:06):
You’ve
Brad Burrow (00:50:07):
Got to get them when they’re-
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:08):
Got to get them before they have bad habits.
Brad Burrow (00:50:10):
Yeah, exactly. Sounds like a baseball coach. So one of the questions I had, and I have just a few more questions. Oh,
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:16):
Sure.
Brad Burrow (00:50:17):
Colonel’s daughter.
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:18):
Yeah.
Brad Burrow (00:50:19):
So when did you like, “Oh, this is the idea right here.”
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:24):
Okay. So when I started speaking, when I stepped away from the seminar company and stepped out on my own platform I saw all of colleagues coming up with brands that I thought were just stupid, Mr. Lifestyle
Brad Burrow (00:50:47):
That
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:48):
Was
Brad Burrow (00:50:48):
Humorous by the way.
Lauren Schieffer (00:50:50):
So I created one that I thought was serious and it was high road solutions and people kept going, “What is high road solutions?” And then I’d have to explain it to them and blah, blah, blah. Yeah. And then unbeknownst to me, there was another speaker in NSA, but we didn’t know each other that had the High Road Institute and unbeknownst to me, he trademarked the term high road.
Brad Burrow (00:51:35):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:51:36):
Now I had asked about it and my lawyer had said, “You’ll never get a trademark through on it because it’s too common a phrase.”
Brad Burrow (00:51:42):
Right.
Lauren Schieffer (00:51:43):
Well, he had a better lawyer than I did and we were speaking side by side. Well, not sideby. We were both speaking at the same conference. We didn’t know each other and the session that I was teaching was called Before It Comes to Blows: Managing Conflict from the High Road I came home to a cease and desist letter from his lawyer. Is
Brad Burrow (00:52:05):
That
Lauren Schieffer (00:52:06):
Right? Saying that I could no longer use the term high road in any of my marketing, my print material, my website, anything. My first thought was, well, that wasn’t very high road of him, was it?
Brad Burrow (00:52:16):
Exactly.
Lauren Schieffer (00:52:17):
But he was 100% within his rights. He had trademarked the term. So then I curled up in a corner and I sucked my thumb for three days because I was certain my speaking career was over. And then the Colonel always said, “Use what you’ve got, kid, and just show up. All right, let’s salvage what I’ve got. What do I have? Do I have to change my message?” No, I have to change how I word it. So instead of taking the high road, we now take higher ground.
Brad Burrow (00:52:53):
Awesome.
Lauren Schieffer (00:52:56):
That turned in- Fits in
Brad Burrow (00:52:56):
With the Colonel’s message too, doesn’t it?
Lauren Schieffer (00:52:59):
But I had to rebrand.
Brad Burrow (00:53:00):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:53:01):
I needed a brand new brand. So I had a friend who was creative and she’d done some brands for some other people, offered to help me with this free of charge. She was incredibly gracious. And when we got together, she said, “So I’ve read your book.” Now this was the very first book that I’d ever written. I don’t even sell it today. It’s called Road Signs on the High Road of Life. And it was my father’s eulogy in book form. She said, “So I read your book. I actually read it four times.” And I said, “Becky, I wrote it. I haven’t read it four times.” She goes, “No.” So you talk about respectful communication. Yeah. Where’d you get that? I said, “Oh, dad always said, you don’t have to respect everyone, young lady. You have no right to disrespect anyone, Lauren Ann.” She says, “Oh, so you got that from your dad?” “You talk on conflict management.
(00:54:08):
Where’d that come from? “I said,” Well, if you ever met the Colonel, he was six feet, six and a half inches and 285 pounds on his very leanest day. When he lost his temper, people got hurt. So he had to find a different way to manage conflict and he taught that to his daughters and that’s what I teach.
(00:54:25):
“Okay. There are 14 chapters in your book, 11 of which you attribute to your father. What are you not seeing? I said,” I don’t know. “You didn’t
Brad Burrow (00:54:38):
See it at that
Lauren Schieffer (00:54:38):
Time? No. I said,” I don’t know. What am I not seeing? “She goes,” Lauren, you’re the Colonel’s daughter. “I said,” Well, yes, I am the Colonel’s daughter, but …
Brad Burrow (00:54:47):
“Ding, ding, ding.
Lauren Schieffer (00:54:48):
I am the Colonel’s daughter. She goes,” Now that’s a sticky brand. “And it is.
Brad Burrow (00:54:54):
Yeah. I
Lauren Schieffer (00:54:54):
Agree. I designed the logo myself
(00:54:58):
And interesting about that. I don’t know if … Did I send it to you? Well, it’s a silhouette of an Air Force officer in full salute and within his body is a silhouette of a little girl. That silhouette of a little girl is actually me. Back in the 60s, parents used to do silhouettes of their kids and hang them over the couch or whatever. That is the silhouette of me. And so I designed the logo and of course the colors, the brand colors came easily. It’s Air Force blue and gold. Those are the two official colors of the Air Force. The whole thing came together in a week. Six months later, my business had tripled. And the reason is because it was the first time that the message, the brand and the human being were 100% in alignment.
Brad Burrow (00:55:58):
Powerful.
Lauren Schieffer (00:55:58):
So I am the Colonel’s daughter.
Brad Burrow (00:56:00):
Yeah. That’s amazing. That’s a great story. So you have a couple of books. Tell me about … And maybe you have more than a couple books. Tell me about what would
Lauren Schieffer (00:56:08):
You have? I have four total.
Brad Burrow (00:56:10):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:56:11):
One is not in print. I mean, I can order them if I want to. That was road signs. And that
Brad Burrow (00:56:18):
Has high road in it too. You probably can’t even …
Lauren Schieffer (00:56:20):
Oh yeah. No. If it’s a book title, it doesn’t matter.
Brad Burrow (00:56:23):
Oh, okay. All right.
Lauren Schieffer (00:56:29):
But I have three that are currently on the market and that I sell. Two of them are volume one and volume two. Okay. They’re quotes from my dad and I call them Colonels of Wisdom. I don’t know if you know, but every day on social media I post Colonel of Wisdom for the day and it’s spelled like Air Force Colonel.
Brad Burrow (00:56:52):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (00:56:54):
That’s
Brad Burrow (00:56:54):
Where I saw the failure quote.
Lauren Schieffer (00:56:56):
Oh yeah. So volume one, Kernels of Wisdom is a daughter’s reflection on leadership and in both of them there are 52 quotes. It’s dad’s quote and then I flesh it out. What’s the story behind the quote? When did it happen? What did it mean to me at the time? What might it mean to you? And I chose 52 for each book so that you could, if you chose, use it one week as a book study.
Brad Burrow (00:57:33):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:57:35):
One year you’ve got the book covered. Volume two is a daughter’s reflection on significance. I’ve got my two primaries there.
Brad Burrow (00:57:43):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (00:57:45):
Somewhere in my head is a volume three, a daughter’s reflection on personal ownership and accountability. That’s less of a warm and fuzzy subject. I have it in outline form. We’ll see. And then my third book that I have out is basically the nine essentials in a book form. And that is the title is Help Others Grow First: How Smart Leaders Attract and Retain Great Employees.
Brad Burrow (00:58:13):
Yeah, that’s awesome. So are you going to build that into like a curriculum at some point, do you think?
Lauren Schieffer (00:58:17):
It’s your
Brad Burrow (00:58:18):
Coaching?
Lauren Schieffer (00:58:18):
I do have a leadership curriculum. Yeah, I have it. It’s online right now.
Brad Burrow (00:58:22):
I mean, who would be better at that than you? I mean, I can’t imagine anybody having more experience doing that than you.
Lauren Schieffer (00:58:27):
Yeah. So I do have an online curriculum. It’s available and it’s set up so that you can pick one of the essentials and just study that essential or you can do a package that’s all nine of them and that one comes with a copy of the book. Do you feel like
Brad Burrow (00:58:48):
Going through that?
Lauren Schieffer (00:58:50):
Not yet. Well, it’s
Brad Burrow (00:58:52):
Coming.
Lauren Schieffer (00:58:53):
Yes. Well, as I mentioned, I just came off of a one year sabbatical and during that sabbatical, in addition to taking daily care of my brand new grandson.
Brad Burrow (00:59:05):
I know, that’s awesome.
Lauren Schieffer (00:59:06):
I know. He’s so amazing.
Brad Burrow (00:59:07):
We have a grand baby coming June 1st.
Lauren Schieffer (00:59:09):
Oh, congratulations. So we’re very excited. Oh, you love it so much. Especially when they start doing something. You know when they’re in the brand new potato phase, but when they actually start looking at you and googling it, oh my goodness. Anyway, he’s 15 months right now. During that year is when I wrote that course and worked with an organization to get it up and online and her clients also have access to it. So she’s got a couple of people going through it and then we have a profit share on it.
Brad Burrow (00:59:53):
Awesome.
Lauren Schieffer (00:59:55):
So yeah, it’s there and it’s good. I’m very proud of it. So
Brad Burrow (00:59:58):
Is there going to be a Colonel’s Is daughter certification coming soon?
Lauren Schieffer (01:00:03):
I don’t know. Like I said, as I approach the end of the game, speaking wise, not live. We all are approaching the end of that game, but I’m still trying to figure out what that legacy is going to be. I certainly could certify the material.
Brad Burrow (01:00:27):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (01:00:29):
Again,
Brad Burrow (01:00:30):
You would know it better than anybody.
Lauren Schieffer (01:00:33):
Yeah. My fear, my challenge is will I be watching those who certify closely enough to know that it doesn’t change?
Brad Burrow (01:00:45):
Doing it right.
Lauren Schieffer (01:00:46):
Yeah. As it comes out of their mouth.
Brad Burrow (01:00:48):
Yeah. Yeah,
Lauren Schieffer (01:00:49):
That
Brad Burrow (01:00:49):
Makes sense. It’s like you have it in your mind and how this needs to happen.
Lauren Schieffer (01:00:53):
You’re not the first person that’s asked me about that and I’m putting off that decision.
Brad Burrow (01:01:00):
So how would somebody get ahold of you? Well, who are you looking for to help with coaching? What would your target audience be?
Lauren Schieffer (01:01:07):
So are we talking leadership or speakers?
Brad Burrow (01:01:09):
Well, probably both actually, but I was probably thinking more on the speaker side because
Lauren Schieffer (01:01:16):
You’d mentioned
Brad Burrow (01:01:17):
That that’s something you’re starting to do more of.
Lauren Schieffer (01:01:19):
Yeah. So I’ve been speaking professionally for coming on 20 years and certainly over the last decade. I can’t tell you how many emerging speakers have asked to buy me a cup of coffee and pick my brain. Sometimes we get tired of that term, but it’s all well-meaning. And my thought has always been, I will always sit down for a cup of coffee. Yeah. And I have a couple of emerging speakers that I am mentoring coaching right now, one of which I practically rewrote a keynote. Is that right? All the material was there. It just wasn’t in the right order and there were some things that were superfluous and I wanted her to flesh a couple other things out. But anyway, I’ve decided that this brings me great joy and it could pay a bill or two. Most emerging speakers cannot afford the 10 to $20,000 packages that are floating around NSA.
Brad Burrow (01:02:35):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (01:02:38):
So I put together a six hour intensive. It’s two hours on three consecutive Monday nights. It’s called Find Your Voice Command the Room. And it’s an intensive. And in addition to those six hours as a group, and I’m limiting it to 10 spots so I can really-
Brad Burrow (01:03:03):
Work with people. Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (01:03:05):
In addition to that, they’ll get an hour and a half one-on-one session with me, but it’s all at one time, not 30 minutes, an hour and a half. I believe I’m really coming in very reasonable at 14.97. So it’s approachable for emerging speakers, right? Yeah,
Brad Burrow (01:03:30):
Right.
Lauren Schieffer (01:03:32):
I am focusing all of my efforts on the performance side. No marketing, no branding. There are people who can help you better than I can with that.
Brad Burrow (01:03:48):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (01:03:50):
But I’m pretty good at coaching you on stage.
Brad Burrow (01:03:53):
If you can’t speak on stage, that other stuff doesn’t matter, right?
Lauren Schieffer (01:03:56):
And your very best marketing tool is being outstanding on stage.
Brad Burrow (01:04:01):
Yes.
Lauren Schieffer (01:04:01):
Because if you’re not outstanding on stage, you’re not going to get asked back or referred to anyone. And if you can get those two things going for you, then it all starts to click.
Brad Burrow (01:04:11):
Yeah.
Lauren Schieffer (01:04:12):
Yeah. And I’m willing to work with people on an hourly basis also, and I have rates for that.
Brad Burrow (01:04:19):
So tell me where we would find you online, website, LinkedIn. How would you like people to connect with you?
Lauren Schieffer (01:04:25):
The website is Laurenschiefer.com. That’s real easy.
Brad Burrow (01:04:28):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (01:04:29):
The email is Lauren@LaurenScheffer.com. Okay. Also very easy. You can find me on LinkedIn. It’s Lauren Scheifer, the Colonel’s daughter.
Brad Burrow (01:04:42):
Okay.
Lauren Schieffer (01:04:43):
I’m the only Colonel’s daughter on LinkedIn, I think. I also have a presence on Facebook and Instagram. Okay. So I’m not hard to find. If they know how to spell the last name, S-C-H-I-E-F-F-E-R.
Brad Burrow (01:05:03):
Yeah. Yeah. You nailed it because I wrote it down. I’m like, “I’m going to get this right.” You’ve had to do that a few times.
Lauren Schieffer (01:05:11):
Yeah.
Brad Burrow (01:05:12):
Well, this is awesome. Thank you so much for being on the podcast. We’ve been talking about doing this for so long and I’ve really enjoyed getting to know you and I love having people here and in the space and stuff and helping the speakers that are so doing things. So I really appreciate you doing this.
Lauren Schieffer (01:05:29):
Well, thank you for inviting me and thank you for being patient as we tried to work through our true schedules to get here and this and all sincerity. This has been the most fun podcast I’ve ever spoken on.
Brad Burrow (01:05:43):
Oh, awesome. Awesome.
Lauren Schieffer (01:05:45):
I’ll
Brad Burrow (01:05:45):
Take that as an endorsement then.
Lauren Schieffer (01:05:47):
Yes, absolutely.
Brad Burrow (01:05:48):
Well, thank you very much and everybody, thank you for joining us on the podcast. Be sure to share this. You got somebody that wants to become a speaker or wants leadership training or anything like that. Share this podcast. This is really cool and be sure to go to Lauren’s website and if you’re interested in doing this, go to the website, tell other people about what we’re doing here. We really appreciate you watching and we’ll see you on the next In a World with Real Media. This has been In A World with Real Media. Thanks for joining us and be sure to subscribe on iTunes and follow Real Media on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn so you never miss an episode.