It was Valerie’s first Executive Coaching session of the new year and she was spiritless. She found out the CEO had decided to bypass her for the promotion from VP to Senior VP that she had been counting on. They wanted to bring in someone “fresh and with more experience” from the outside to be her new boss. Ugh!
Valerie got the bad news and then went out on the end of year holiday. It didn’t improve her mood.
“What’s going on?” I asked her.
“It’s hard. It’s hard to come back. It’s hard to look forward to this new year with any optimism. I feel like I’m not being valued. My enthusiasm for what I’m doing is completely drained.”
What was really drained was her ability to communicate effectively. If you look at the above definition of causative, it’s the ability to make what you want happen. And the ONLY way to do that is through the way you communicate.
The only way to persuade is to communicate persuasively. The only way to convince is to communicate convincingly. The only way to shape reality with others is through your communication.
When your ability to communicate is at a superior level, so is your ability to persuade, influence, convince, shape the reality that you want, and get everyone around you fully on board with you.
Valerie had withdrawn and wasn’t communicating with the CEO at all. The more she withdrew, the more she sealed her own career failure.
I listened, of course, and acknowledged that I really understood the frustration and what a blow the bad news had been, because I do understand.
And then we got to work. My job is to move people toward their goal.
Valerie needed to work on every aspect of the Communication Formula because each part has to be perfect if you want to experience the highest stratosphere of success. Her weakest area was intention. She had given up so thoroughly, she was utterly incapable of delivering a powerful message.
Two hours of intensive Coaching later, Valerie was a powerhouse. Her “Before” and “After” videos from just this one session show a completely different person. Just in this session she went from losing to winning.
At the end of the session Valerie said, “This gives me the confidence to go back in and talk to the CEO.”
And talk she did. This time causatively.
Valerie went in there and changed the CEO’s mind about her. Two days later I got an email saying, “Once I started, he was willing to spend a lot of time talking to me. I could see him changing his mind. It was a BIG shift, but I could see it happening. Then we both got excited about the opportunities and the future. He told me I would be perfect for the role.”
Valerie has her dream role, aligned perfectly with her basic purpose that gets her excited about getting out of bed every morning. Her enthusiasm and spark are back in full force and this coming year now looks amazing.
If you’re waiting for something else to shape your future or your reality, you’ll never realize your full potential to succeed.
Valerie learned what causative communicators know: Success does not need to take a long time. It can happen in just a single conversation.
Take a look at your aspirations for 2025. It’s your ability to communicate them persuasively that will make your dreams come true.
Don’t wait. Make your next conversation count.
Be the cause!