When Mike Ganino moved back to Southern California from Chicago, he was ready to become a TV host in his own travel show. Hoping someone would discover him on Sunset Blvd didn’t work. He ended up going to a wine party, and after a few glasses of wine and a conversation with a business owner, he was asked if he could help their business scale beyond their 10 locations and double in size. Having done it many times before in business, he said yes. And what he learned was he didn’t like consulting. Instead of saying no, he spun the idea of working with them into doing a two day workshop to teach the leadership team, instead of consulting where he’d have to come back every year. And that was the start of Mike’s speaking business. 

When Mike began his speaking business, he combined his theatre and improv background with his business experience. Once, he was asked to give a talk and thought an honorarium was something he would have to pay until he Googled what it meant. He would actually get paid! Eventually, people who had hired him to talk, asked him back. They didn’t want him to talk again, but they did want him to work with their executives on how to become better speakers. So today, Mike’s speaking business is a bit meta. He speaks about speaking. And he got to where he is by using the first rule of improv. Saying “Yes, and…” to opportunities instead of saying no.  

What other lessons did Mike Ganino share? 

• The 3 things Mike realized when he started his speaking business – and the 1 thing he would’ve done sooner
• Speaking for free can be very valuable – if you are speaking in front of the right audience
• Know the industries you’ve worked in and who’ve you worked with – you know how you can help them and they already know you
• There’s no magic number when it comes to what you charge
• How paying for 15 minutes with Dorie Clark provided business insights
• Think of people who can hire you. What publications do they read? What podcasts do they listen to? Start writing and being a guest on those 
• Create opportunities to “Speak for me” 

 

If you have trouble viewing the video, check it out on YouTube. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube Channel and get notified when new shows are added. 

Who is Mike Ganino (in Mike’s words)?

You can with Mike Ganino on Facebook, or where he loves hanging out: Instagram , and check out his website and get his free Story Craft guide . 

•  

Want to receive exclusive content not available on The Business of Speaking Show or blog? Subscribe to our weekly newsletter. 

•  

Below is the full transcript from the show with Mike Ganino. Please note that there may be some errors as it was auto transcribed using Otter.ai. (referral link that provides us with a 1-month Premium Pass

Tim McDonald 0:01
All right. Well welcome everybody to the business of speaking show. I am your host, Tim McDonald. And today, I’m really excited to be joined by my special guest, Mike Ganino, how are you doing?

Mike Ganino 0:13
I’m doing well. Thank you. Thanks for Thanks for having me.

Tim McDonald 0:16
No, and it’s so exciting to have you here. Your baby at home and I got plenty of coffee and everything. So I’m sure we’re ready to rock and roll. Right.

Mike Ganino 0:25
Very new baby at home last night was actually her first night home. So this is this is me unfiltered and exhausted.

Tim McDonald 0:34
Oh, I don’t know about the exhausted part. But I love the unfiltered parts.

Mike Ganino 0:39
We’re gonna do it all. No, nothing. Nothing’s off off limits here today on the business of speaking.

Tim McDonald 0:45
All right, well, for those of you just tuning in for the first time, to let you know the business is speaking show really isn’t to focus on what the speakers talk about onstage. But it’s really to talk about how they got started on their journey to the stage and what they’ve learned along the way since they’ve been on stage. And I always like to say what they wish they would have known when they first started. So if you are a first time speaker, if you’re thinking about getting involved in speaking, or as 2020 has taught us, no matter what you think, you know, life has a way of reminding us that we don’t know shit. So with that being said, um, before we dive into how you started, Mike, can you tell us a little bit about, you know, what your accomplishments are now what you talk about and some of the highlights of you know, your career is in the business of speaking.

Mike Ganino 1:37
I think Yeah, I’m kind of like a meta person at this point. Because I, I speak about speaking, which is a which is like a very meta thing. I these days, I find myself helping people around storytelling around giving presentations around how to show up on camera, that’s a lot of the work these days is how to give better video presentations, or how to deliver really captivating, you know, videos for their websites or something like that. But I work with people around storytelling around how to show up and perform on stage my background was in I was in the business world as a as a restaurateur for a long time. And simultaneously was an actor, I was doing improv I was in Chicago doing commercials doing things like that. And so when I first started speaking, I kind of combined those two things and said, Okay, well, I know business. And I know the you know, how to create an experience whether, you know, on stage for someone, or in I think restaurants are kind of like business theater in a way, you know. And so that is kind of how I ended up in that world. And then slowly people, I would go and speak at a conference for, you know, a hotel chain, or a national restaurant brand or something. And the people would say, Hey, can you We would love to work with you again, this year. We worked with you last year. And I was like, oh, sounds great. What do you want me to speak about, you know, this is you want me to do the same talk? And they’re like, actually, no, we don’t want you to talk. What we want is for you to help our executives, because everybody loves listening to you. And they hate listening to our executive team when they speak at our conference. So can you help them and coach them? And I was like, Oh, yeah. And that’s what I realized. You know, there’s this magic and helping people figure out how to show up and how to communicate and how to actually really deliver a message that that is meaningful, and it does something and so that’s, that’s what I’ve been up to, that’s how I spend my days these days.

Tim McDonald 3:31
Well, I love it. And I know I just recently connected with you online and get to listen and watch some of the stuff that you put out the content and it just you know, you are really good at what you do. So I can understand how people are gravitated towards you wanting to help them improve their storytelling. So let’s get jump back to how did this all start for you? How did you go from being in restaurants to actually getting up on stages?

Mike Ganino 4:01
Yeah, that’s like a weird, like, how did this How did this occur? It was initially kind of accidental. I had sold a restaurant brand that I was a partner in, in Chicago and so we moved to LA after that because we were like, you know what, let’s get out of Chicago. We’ve been here a long time. Let’s go I’m from Southern California. So we said let’s go back to Southern California. And when I first got here, I thought I would do like a travel show like I would become like a TV show host because again I had been doing I had been at second city and improv Olympic and The Annoyance I’d been on stages performing as a as a as an actor for a long time in addition to working in the restaurant industry. And so when I got here, I was like I’m gonna do like a travel. I want to do like a travel show host I want to be like a travel and foodie show host. And I and I guess I thought like, do you just wander around Sunset Boulevard until someone says you you deserve a show! That’s not how it works, by the way. So I was at a party one night and I There was somebody who owned a retail like a food retail brand. And we’d had glasses of wine. And he was talking about the challenges as they were growing beyond their, you know, 10 locations to doubling in size and going out of state. And I, that was my experience. I was very good at growing brands like that. And so I’d had enough wine that I was like, Well, here’s what you got to do. You got to do this, you got to do that. You got to make sure this and you got to tell these people that. And he’s like, Oh, cool. I’d love to connect with you. Sure. So I gave him my number. He called me and said, Can you come talk to our, to my executive team? I was like, yeah, I’ll come in. And at the end, he said, Okay, so we’d love to work with you. How do you work with people that I was like, Oh, I have no idea. Like, I have no clue, like, what do you want me to do. And so I started consulting. And I pretty quickly realized I didn’t like consulting, I did not like deliverables. I’m horrible at it. If I owe you anything, you’re not going to get it. I’m never gonna send it to you. So that isn’t a positive thing to be if you’re in business, you’re going to be out of business quickly if you don’t deliver what you promised. So I thought, maybe instead of doing these consulting gigs, I can go teach workshops. And so instead of coming in and doing it for you, I can teach your team how to do it. And I so I kind of spun that as why spend the money to have me come back every year versus me teaching your team to do it in a day or two workshop. And that worked. So I started doing workshops, and then somebody who had been in one of the workshops that I lead, she went on to run, she was like the president of an association. And she reached out to have me speak at their event. And I thought, Oh, this is so cool. I thought you had to be famous or an author at the time. I’m an author now, but I wasn’t then. And so I went to speak at this. Actually, the funny thing is, she reached out she said, here’s the honorarium. And I thought, I have to pay them this money to speak, they want me to pay them to speak, I didn’t realize they were going to pay me and I thought, well, I don’t know. Is it worth it? Is it worth? You know, am I gonna get that much money back out of this? I don’t have anything to sell these people, except if they buy a workshop someday. And so I googled it really quick and was like, how does an honorarium work, and I realized, they want to pay me that much money to come talk to them. Sweet. So I did that. And then I thought, great, I’m just gonna do that all the time, I put speaker on my website, speaker on my LinkedIn speaker on my Instagram, and they’re just all gonna show up much like I thought they were going to give me a travel show, if I just walked around Sunset Boulevard. And probably no surprise to anyone listening and watching the show. Putting speaker in my bio everywhere didn’t mean anyone hired me. So I went from having a really great first paid gig to, you know, thinking that that was going to keep happening, and it didn’t. And so I had to get really good at figuring out how do I go and find those gigs? How do I get in front of the right people, and that was in 2015. And that was the start of my speaking career, which led to creating the business I have now, which led to being the author of a book, I wrote one of the books in the dummies series, The for dummies series. I’m the executive producer of TEDx Cambridge. And it all started by me going out there and telling some guy what he needed to do in his business at a wine party. I don’t recommend that as a path to success, but it works for me.

Tim McDonald 8:05
Well, I love that. I think that you didn’t start out with a plan of this is what I’m gonna do. It really just started by having a conversation and probably being lucid enough to be able to say, Yeah, I can do that. So you know, I’m kind of curious. So as you really recognize that you could get paid for actually speaking up on stage on and like you mentioned, it’s not as simple as putting speaker in your bio. What were some of the things that you were learning back then what did you have to, you know, kind of figure out to kind of get people to know that you were a speaker and had something to offer versus just you labeling yourself as one?

Mike Ganino 8:47
I think the three big things I did is that I really quickly I realized that Where could I get the easiest, yes, was a great way to start. And for me, I thought, well, who wants to do what I’ve done, who wants to do what I’ve done? Who wants to hear from me? Well, I’m an award winning restaurateur. I’ve built and sold many companies, I’ve built and sold many companies, for other people and help them make a lot of money. The organizations that I’ve run, have won awards for being great places to work and favorite places to be we’ve won Innovation Awards. And so I thought, well, I could go out there and try to convince all of these people to hire me to come speak about leadership at their tech company or their bank. But that’s going to be a much harder road than going to the restaurant hotel world and saying, Hey, I know where you are. I know where you were, what you want. And I’ve done it. So let me come and help you. And so that was number one was realizing where’s the easier yes for me, where can I you know, it’s always about reducing risk for the buyer. And that includes speaking in workshops and training delivery. And so for me, that was the easiest yes was to go back and work with people in the restaurant, hotel space, even retail where they had a large number of hourly workers, creating an experience for guests. That kind of was my specialty. So that was number one. Number two was recognizing that the that I needed to go where they were. So once I realized that those were the places that the that I wanted to speak to restaurants, hotels, franchisees that I had to think about what do they read? And what kind of conferences do they go to? And that made it really easy for me to start to find like, what are all of the restaurant conferences in the US, and you start to realize, okay, there’s every state has a restaurant association, every state has a Lodging Association, then there are topical ones, the the Asian American Association of hoteliers in the US, there’s all of these different groups, I mean, McDonald’s franchisees have a ton of organizations of their own. So it made it so much easier for me to find them, because I knew who I was looking for. So I could reach out to conferences, I could write guest posts for brands that they would buy from, I went to food distributors who produced you know, blogs, and I said, Hey, can I write a blog for you, and I just was doing all of this, to get my name out, I went on every podcast I could find in the restaurant, hotel retail space, to really start to build a brand that people thought, Oh, I know this guy. And a year ago, they had never heard of me. So that was the second thing. And then the third one. And this is probably the I don’t know that it was a harder lesson learned. But it was the one that when I learned it, like really clicked for me. So there’s this idea that that some people, you know, feel negatively or put shame to people for speaking for free. Speaking for exposure. And I will tell you, I’ve made more money speaking for free in many years than I have made money speaking for a fee. So for me, my speaking fee is is between 10 and $15,000 for a keynote, I’ve done a free gig, which I’ve turned into two or three more keynotes, two or three more workshops. And then those one of those I got a keynote for another association that led to more gigs. And the challenge there the learning for me, because in the beginning, I did a bunch of free gigs and nothing happens because I was like, I went to a conference, I did a breakout session, I showed up like a keynote speaker. My presentation was very much that and I was speaking to people who owned, you know, a chain, a small chain of pizza restaurants, or they owned a bakery in Minnesota or something like that. Those people don’t hire speakers ever. And so I was speaking in front of them, I was in front of big audiences, 500 people 1000 people at the beginning, and no one was hiring me. So I wasn’t I was traveling on the airplane, I was paying my own thing I was speaking for free at these things. And all I had to offer them was me as a keynote speaker. And I realized that you know, the lady who owns the donut shop comes to this conference to learn tips and tricks and check out the latest hardware and software that she could use in her business. But she doesn’t come here to hire someone to lead a workshop for her team. And that was a huge lesson for me was that if you’re going to speak for free, then you need to make sure that the people in the room can can buy the thing that you have. So if you have workshops, if you have programs, if you are a keynote speaker and you’re speaking for free, then you need to be speaking in front of audiences who hire keynote speakers. Otherwise, you’re going to just spend a bunch of money traveling around the country and speaking in, you know, side rooms at the Holiday Inn or something. And so for me, that was a huge, that was the third lesson that I learned very quickly. I got because there was a moment where I thought maybe I suck, because nobody’s booking anything. I’ve done 10 free gigs and nothing, you know, people join my email list. But no one’s booking me for anything. So maybe I’m not good. And you know, and then I realize like, well, that’s not true. I’m pretty good. I know what I’m doing. I’ve been on thousands of stages. I’ve performed thousands of times as an actor. I’ve done thousands of orientations for new employees over the years. And I thought, okay, no, I probably pretty good. I could probably keep working on it. But that’s not the problem. What is the problem? And I realized the same thing that I knew from the restaurant industry, the same thing I realized from producing theater was that you have to go to a willing audience, and those audiences just couldn’t buy. And that was the third lesson and there is no shame in speaking for free. I’ve made hundreds of thousands of dollars speaking for free, because I knew I was in front of an audience who could hire me in the future.

Tim McDonald 14:20
I love that because I you know, one of the things I’m hearing from a lot of different people that are on the show is different philosophies on that, right. Like I always get paid or you know, if you’re gonna do it for free only do it this way. But I think that is great advice for anybody thinking about getting involved in or just starting to understand that. I’m kind of curious, like, you know, you mentioned like what you’re getting for your keynotes. Was it always that way or did you start out smaller and grow? How have you kind of known when has been the right time to raise your rates and what to charge?

Mike Ganino 14:57
I wish there was like a magical number. You know, there’s there’s things that I hear lots of people say that they say, oh, i, you raise your rates when you’re getting so busy. So you’re so busy. So supply and demand, you can raise your rates? Maybe, possibly. But if if there was a lack of m&ms out there and m&ms decided they were going to charge $20 a bag, we probably wouldn’t pay $20 a bag, we’d move on to something else. So I don’t always agree with that. I think that you have to really be something people want. And there can’t be someone else who’s a funny speaker, a good speaker, an entertaining speaker, who doesn’t $2,000 less than you. So if you are someone who has a brand, where it’s like, No, we got to get that guy, we need that woman, then of course, yes, you can raise your fee. That’s why Simon Sinek can charge you know, $100,000 I think for a keynote, it’s why Brene Brown can charge $100,000 for a keynote because people want that name there. But for the rest of us, there’s something there’s more of a messy mix. So that very first gig that I did, I got paid $2500 to do. And then the next one, I got paid like $5,000 to do so they came to me with those numbers. And I was like, yeah, that’s my fee. And then I did probably 20 gigs for free. I got paid nothing. I traveled around the country on my own dime. Speaking at every state restaurant and Lodging Association, I realized quickly that my topic that worked was culture, like culture and leadership. And so I started reaching out to every state HR Association. So I started doing that I probably did 20 gigs for free, spent my own money doing it. And it was probably towards the end of that, that I realized, hold on, I need to I need to rethink this because no one’s booking me. Something’s up here. And so at that point, towards the end of that, I said, Okay, well, is it 2500? Is it 5000. And so I just decided myself that it was $5,000 that that was my speaking fee. So when people would reach out, that’s what I would quote. I started getting that pretty consistently. I got I started writing in a national like retailer magazine, I had a monthly paid column, I got paid every month to be a writer. In a in a national column. I wrote about culture, whenever I wanted. That raised my status, I did a huge string of podcasts. So people in that world were really knowing me and hearing me. And so then I started getting comfortable just saying $7500. And I got that many, many times. And then in 2018, the book that I wrote Company Culture for Dummies came out. And ahead of that when I knew it was coming out. And when I was doing all of the the information around it, I was getting ready to move from $7500 to $10,000. And so I did that, right. When the book came out, I did the jump to $10,000. And that was easy. People said yes. And so I was like $12,000 let’s see what happens there. And so it’s pretty consistently now between 10 to 15. For for me,

Tim McDonald 17:55
No, well, thank you for sharing that. Because I know it’s not something that a lot of speakers share is what they get paid. And so I know a lot of people, especially starting are really thinking about how that progression looks and works. So I’m, you know, I’m kind of thinking about, you know, a lot of what you’re talking about, and I don’t want to assume anything, it sounds like you just figure it out on your own. Was there any, any resources, any kind of networks that you were involved with that really, you know, you learn from and and kind of picked up on? Or was it truly just kind of you learning by trial and error?

Mike Ganino 18:33
Uh, you know, in the beginning, I definitely, like sought out people that I thought how can this Can I can I learn from this person I did, like, back, back when I very first started in 2015. You could, um, I think they still exist, but there was like a program. I don’t remember what it’s called, but you could buy like 15 minutes with an expert, you know, they had like a thing where you could pay by the minute. And so I did that with Dorie Clark, Dorie Clark’s a best selling multiple time author, reinvent yourself and entrepreneurial you. And so I bought like 15 minutes with her. And I was like, What do I need to do? And she gave me really great advice. It was 15 minutes, it was super powerful. And she gave me really clear advice on like, these are the things that are not worth the time. And these are the things that are worth the time. And so she said, if you’re going to start a podcast, then you should start a podcast and you should go and interview all of the top restauranteurs that you would want to work with all of the top hotel leaders, all of those people don’t interview other authors, because those authors are not going to hire you. Go interview for a business sense, go interview the people that you think should know about you, and the people who might want to hire you. She’s like, so go start doing that. I didn’t end up doing that. But I did my own version of that. She talks she talks about getting a an article like writing in a column for for a national, you know, trade magazine or something, which is much easier than writing for like the New York Times or something. And so that advice was really helpful advice. Like, how do you actually like become a known person. And that advice was really helpful to me. And then outside of that, I started going on so many podcasts and kind of building my own community with people there. I went to several speaker trainings, some are great, some are a waste of time, the content was, but I met people through that. Um, yeah, and those are, those are probably the big things I went to, you know, I went to different events, different trainings, different things like that, and just started meeting people through that world. But it wasn’t, I don’t think I had like a group of speaker friends until I was already pretty well known. I was super focused on becoming friends with people who could hire me.

Tim McDonald 20:40
I love that piece of advice. And I can’t believe how quickly Our time has gone on here. So one last question I have for you, before we wrap up is, you know, knowing what, you know, today, if you went back to, you know, five years ago, when you started this business, what would a piece of advice would you give yourself back when you started,

Mike Ganino 21:00
I think the biggest thing is recognizing that I always say there’s three options for speaking there’s speak for fee, you can get paid money from someone else and give you a check, you speak and move on. There’s speak for free, which is what I was talking about. If if you’re going to speak for free, make sure you know how to get value out of it, maybe you need video, maybe you need photos, maybe there’s people you want to meet at that event, maybe you just want to travel to New Orleans or something that was my case, once they were paying. They didn’t pay me but they paid for my trip and I got to go to New Orleans for the first time. And that was enough for me. Or maybe you’re able to leverage that audience to book you for workshops or services that you do outside of it. And then the third one, I would go back to myself, those two I kind of knew quickly at the beginning, speak for fee speak for free. The third one I would have done much earlier, which I call speak for me. Meaning you create your own events, you create your own opportunities, instead of waiting to get picked, build an audience that really wants to hear from you build an audience that you can help, and then do your own event, do your own offering for them. And I would have and I do that now today when I’m working with speakers, when I’m working with people that want to become speakers, when I’m working with leaders who need to communicate better. I put my own events here in LA I do my own events all over the country. And for me, I wish I had realized I could have done that much earlier. Because while you’re sitting around and waiting for someone to pick you, you can go pick yourself

Tim McDonald 22:24
out this has been absolutely fantastic Mike. So how can people watching learn more about you get in touch with you if they want to start working with you?

Mike Ganino 22:32
Nice. Well, I’m super easy once people figure out how to spell my last name. It’s super, it’s super easy to find me. And the last thing by the way is Ga ni no so if you type in Mike Ganino Ga ni no, I’m the one who’s gonna pop up. There’s great SEO and having a name that’s not that common. So you can go to MikeGanino.com/storycraft as well. If you’re thinking of like, I want to be a speaker, I want to tell better stories. I have this free guide that helps you figure out how to weave in stories into your speech over at MikeGanino.com/storycraft, and then you get my email address. And you can ask me questions or hang out with me. I’m also MikeGanino on all the socials. I love Instagram. And so come hang out with me on Instagram and I will happy to answer questions and chat with you over there.

Tim McDonald 23:16
Well, thank you so much, Mike. And thank you for watching. If this is your first time watching at the end of one of our shows. We’re going to end the youtube broadcast. But Mike is agreed to stay on with me for one additional question that I’m going to ask him and the only way that you get this content is if you sign up for our email list over at speaking dot business and just join up for free and you will get the exclusive content once a week. So we are going to sign off here right now and we will see you next week. And Mike I will see you in just a minute.

Mike Ganino 23:50
Bye, everybody.

Other insights in this episode of The Business of Speaking:

• Take clues from experiences you’ve had and build on them. Dr. G was able to use her knowledge of American Sign Language that she had from theatre and have it help with patients. This got other doctors wanting to learn from her and got her speaking as she was in residency. 
• Our brains want detailed advice from those we know and trust, but big ideas come better from someone we don’t know. 
• Never accept a “No” from someone who doesn’t have the power to give you a “Yes.”
• The one thing they don’t teach you in medical school, or theater, is business. Learn how to apply one idea from things your hear and read into your speaking business. 
• When you feel like you’re not landing with your audience, try asking a question. See if it gives you something to make it better than it would have been if you just kept going.
• The first person you should add to your team as a speaker is not marketing, PR or a VA, but someone who negotiates on your behalf. 

If you have trouble viewing the video, check it out on YouTube. Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube Channel and get notified when new shows are added. 

Who is Dr. Deborah Gilboa?

We have been told to “reduce stress” and “avoid stress” so much that experiencing stress feels like its own failure. Deborah Gilboa, MD, aka Dr. G, is a parenting and resilience expert who works with families, organizations, and businesses to identify the mindset and strategies to turn stress to an advantage and create resilience through personal accountability and a completely different approach to adversity..
Renowned for her contagious humor, Dr. G inspires audiences with her illuminating stories and provides no-nonsense prescriptions for character development. She works with groups, businesses, and causes, across multiple generations, to rewire their cultures towards a common objective.

Dr. G is a board certified attending family physician at Pittsburgh’s Squirrel Hill Health Center, caring for diverse patients from 100+ countries who speak 61 different languages. Her fluency in American Sign Language and her work with the Deaf community has received national recognition and was the focus of her service as an Albert Schweitzer Fellow.

A graduate of University of Pittsburgh’s School of Medicine, Carnegie Mellon University, and as an alumna of Chicago’s Second City Improv Theater, Dr. G’s diverse background and experiences add to her credibility and lively storytelling.
She is also a Clinical Associate Professor for the University of Pittsburgh School Of Medicine and has received many awards for clinical excellence in teaching, including the Alpha Omega Alpha Volunteer Clinical Faculty Award.

Dr. G is a leading media personality seen regularly on TODAY, Good Morning America and is the Resilience Expert for The Doctors. She is also a contributor to Washington Post, The New Times, Huffington Post, and countless other digital and print outlets.

Dr. G resides in Pittsburgh with her four boys.
For more information: www.askdoctorg.com

You can connect with Debi on Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook, and of course on her website, AskDrG.com. 

•  

Want to receive exclusive content not available on The Business of Speaking Show or blog? Subscribe to our weekly newsletter. 

•  

Below is the full transcript from the show. Please note that there may be some errors as it was auto transcribed using Otter.ai. (referral link that provides us with a 1-month Premium Pass

Tim McDonald
All right. Well welcome everybody to the business of speaking show. I am your host, Tim McDonald, and today I am joined by Dr. G. How you doing, Debi?

Deborah Gilboa, MD
I’m doing very well. I’m so glad to be here. Oh, no, it’s exciting.

Tim McDonald
I remember we first connected through speak aid 2020 that Dan Pontefract but on and so it’s great to be connected with you and have you as a guest here today. And for those who maybe just tuning in for the first time are watching the business is speaking show really doesn’t focus on what the speakers talk about on the stage. It’s about their journey on how they got to the stage and what they’ve learned since they’ve been on the stage as far as how speaking has turned into a business for them. And so with that being said, if you are thinking about getting started in speaking if you are just starting in speaking, or as 2020 has taught us, no matter how seasoned we are, as speakers, you never know what you have to prepare for. So there’s always something that all of us can learn. But mainly we’re focused on those people in the early stages, or just getting started in speaking and so with that, Dr. G, why don’t you share your story of how you got started speaking.

Deborah Gilboa, MD
So I went to undergrad for theater. And when I finished that experience, I went out and I worked in professional theater as a performer and as a stage manager, and I did that for about six years. And then at some point, I decided this was fun, but I wanted to do something entirely different. And I applied to medical school. And one of the reasons that I mentioned my theater background is because when I got to medical school, I discovered two things. One, most physicians are not great speakers. So we would have lectures 150 people and a professor would get up in front and for us senseless and make really even interesting information seem painful and dreadful very quickly. And the other thing I discovered is that whenever we had small groups or opportunities to present something to the class, I was about the only person who wanted to you know, I come In this world, where people would throw their grandmother under a bus to speak in front of 10 people, and here it was in a world where people would rather have a root canal than get up in front of 150 people. And so those two experiences sort of coalesced for me into a larger worldview, where public speaking is not something everyone enjoys or does decently. And then I just finished medical school, I went to residency, I had a particular interest in residency because my life in theater had partially been in the world of Deaf theater. I picked up American Sign Language, and then I trained as an interpreter. So I had this other gig that informed my work as a doctor i was i was the doctor for a bunch of Deaf and Hard of Hearing folks. And that’s something that not a lot of doctors knew how to handle. So people would ask me to come and speak. And again, I discovered that it was a pretty low bar, or coherent at all entertaining public speaking in the medical world. So when I finished residency and I came back to my home area, I got hired at a new health center, meaning brand new the day we opened our doors. And so we had this opportunity, but also this challenge to let people know that we existed as a health center. The CEO of our health center said to me, Well, you don’t have that many patients yet, would you go out and give talks in the community? And so I did, you know, I would get invited to come and speak about high blood pressure and why you should take care of it or smoking and why it was bad. I mean, basically, these were like 40 minute public service announcements, and I thought I would be really bored sitting through a 40 minute public service announcement. So I started to dive into material and understand better how to talk to people. And what I discovered, then was that this was a great way to reach groups of people and get them to just see something that they already felt pretty expert in their own health and see it a little differently. So here I was in a position where I was speaking. And afterwards people would say, Oh, hey, I really enjoyed that. Is there someplace that I can read more about your work or see you speak again? And I would say, Make an appointment, which is not really the answer that they were looking for or that I meant the gift. So that led me to the stage and reminded me that just because I had decided not to work professionally in theater, didn’t mean I had to give up that relationship, that medium for distributing information. And then I had a couple of formative experiences in my medical practice where I realized what it was I want it to be talking about. So that experience of getting back to the stage and then realizing the message that I really wanted to be out there speaking about coalesce to the great time.

Tim McDonald
Yeah, and so and I know I, I kind of prefaced an intro of the show by saying we don’t talk about what you talk about on the stage. But I think this is so important for somebody getting involved in speaking to understand is how did you kind of know that this is what you needed to be focusing on and sharing with your your audiences?

Deborah Gilboa, MD
The thing that I’ve always really loved about the power of speaking is not just, you know, there’s one of you and you get to reach a lot of people. It’s Can you help people start to see something differently? There’s some research that shows that, you know, Tim, if you wanted advice about where I got my car detailed, you know, you’re my neighbor, my car always looks really nice. This is, by the way, not at all true. It’s just an example. My car always looks really nice. And you’re like, oh, there’s somebody doing a good job. I wonder if she’s spending a lot of money on that or what it is, you would ask me for my, for my suggestion for you, you would want my advice about where to go for that because you know, me and you trust me. And that’s how our brains work. If we want detailed advice about something really specific. We only want to go to someone we already trust, but for our brains to accepting new big idea that we think we already understand and are knowledgeable about we have to hear about that someone we don’t know that our brain pathways, our neural pathways actually open differently. When we’re hearing something from someone who is a stranger to us, we can know their reputation. That’s okay. We can have heard of them, but we can’t know them. So for people who are just starting out there, and they might have tried, you know, people say, well go to people, you know, and see if your people at your kids school or at your church or at your Lions Club want you to speak there. Those never go very well. Because those people feel that they already know you. And so their brains don’t give you an opportunity to teach them about a topic they already feel knowledgeable about. That idea of how do you take something that makes you see something fundamentally differently even if it just turns the lens 13 degrees? That’s always been to me the real magic of that stage two audience relationship. So I had a moment in my work. That was really reinforced again and again and again because I don’t do subtlety well, so I had to learn this lesson a bunch of times. And that lesson was helping me see something about people’s sense of well being and health and success in life slightly differently. And then I realized this is it, this is something I want to research more about and lend my credibility to and gain more credibility in and get out there. And really magnify.

Tim McDonald
Hey, this is I just love hearing this. And you sharing this? Um, you know, I’m thinking it sounds like you had the, you know, the theater background to give you the kind of the confidence of being up on stage you had the medical or the people around.

Deborah Gilboa, MD
Yeah.

Tim McDonald
And the medical training of understanding what you were talking about the subject matter of what you’re talking about, what I’m kind of curious about, was there something about when you really focused on becoming a speaker and not just a doctor?

Deborah Gilboa, MD
Right. I mean, it’s it’s part and parcel. What other things did you have to learn that the theater and medical school didn’t teach you? business? Right medical school, by the way, anybody out there who thinks medical school teaches you the business of medicine is sadly mistaken. People go and get masters in that, or they hire people good at that. But it’s, it’s considered sort of, I don’t know, poisonous to be worried about dollars and cents and business relationships and HR, it shouldn’t be. But it’s not at all taught. And also similarly getting my bachelor’s in theater. It was about the art. It was not about and it is now but it was not at the time at all about spreadsheets and organizational charts and all that. So I had to figure out not only how I might set up a business, but how other businesses worked, so that I could even figure out who to talk to I heard this great business speech years ago where they said, never accept a no from someone who doesn’t have the power to give you a Yes. And I would love to pass that along to everyone who’s listening. never accept no as an answer from someone in an organization who doesn’t have the power to say yes. Because then you’re not talking to the decision maker, you’re just talking to someone who wants to get you off their to do list. And that right there made me realize both something very valuable and also more about what I didn’t know. Because I didn’t, I was like, Well, how am I supposed to know if this person could say yes, and if they can’t, how am I supposed to figure out who could and how do I get to them and all of those things. And that’s been a lot of the learning that I’ve done in the last nine years.

Tim McDonald
And what resources have you found outside of that one, you know, one piece of advice that you got, what resources as far as organizations, books, people that have really helped you on this business aspect.

Deborah Gilboa, MD
Part of it is being a lateral thinker. Part of it is every podcast, every video, every radio story, news story that you hear magazine article that you pick up having that part of your brain that says, How could this help me be successful, open for business and applying that thing that you heard on a news story about a new lemonade stand, and figuring out what the lesson is there for you in your business relationships. And I think that I have a lot of these one liners that stuck out to me from a talk I went to or a thing I heard or a conversation I was involved in, you know, another one that really has helped me a lot in my business is knowing that every time you say yes to something, and my theater background, in improv, in particular, and improvisation means that I want to say yes to everything. There’s this ethic of Yes. And how else can we work together, and that’s often valuable to me. It led me to speak aid. It’s led me to a lot of the opportunities I had where someone said, here’s an opportunity You want it? And I say, Yeah, absolutely. But remembering that every time you say yes to something, you’re saying no to something else, and making sure that your yeses match your priorities. That’s been really important for me. Because when I say yes to something, sometimes what I’m saying no to is just, you know, sleep, or exercise or watching Netflix with my kids. But if health is one of my priorities than sleep, maybe I shouldn’t say no to it all the time. And if my family is one of my priorities, then Netflix with my kids isn’t something I should say no to all the time to making sure that I recognize the cost of my yeses. And in a, in an authentic way. Nothing. Nothing is without some cost, just making sure that I pay attention to it. And that in general, my yeses, match my priorities. That’s been really helpful. So taking these one idea here, one idea there and recognizing that every zoom coffee you might have with someone Or porch the porch conversation or news story you listen to on the radio can be valuable. I can’t say that there’s one resource that I can point to that’s been a huge wealth of information. There are a few people and Dan Pontefract is one of them. And so is a guy named Michael Roderick, who has a great podcast called Access to Anyone. and a bunch of other resources as well. There are some people where I find wisdom there repeatedly. And so I’ll read that daily email like actually read it, not even just delete it, save it until I have a chance to read it, even though it comes every day. Because so often there’s something there that I can take away.

Tim McDonald
Now, that’s great. And I just love how small Our world is when you mentioned somebody else that we have in common. Michael Roderick. I knew him when I was in New York. So it was he’s just a wonderful connector and sharer of information and his network. So I’m just, you know, I’m really curious in your nine years, I think You said you’ve been speaking.

Deborah Gilboa, MD
Yeah, I joke all the time. I’m one year away from the 10 years necessary to become an overnight sensation.

Tim McDonald
What you know, has there been any times where you’ve been up on stage and just felt like you just didn’t deliver and you just missed your you screwed up or, you know, any types of failures that you felt along the way. And I’m kind of processing this because I kind of feel like you’re the person that doesn’t look at anything as a failure, that you can always learn from it and move on.

Deborah Gilboa, MD
There have been times, I would say, a dozen times at least where I’ve been on stage, and I wasn’t, you know, the feeling when you reach out to someone you’ve just met for a good handshake. Now, I understand this is very 2019 example, but go with me, that feeling of reaching out for a good handshake and they clap your hand, and it feels soft. You know, you don’t know where the relationship is going. But that handshake went well. Well, I think a lot of speakers can understand the feeling of standing in front of a group, whether it’s hands or in person feeling the handshake go? Well, you don’t know if they’re gonna take the information that you’re giving and use it or what they’ll think about you afterwards but you know, you reach they reached out back in you connected? Well, I’ve certainly had the experience on stage at least a dozen times of knowing that I missed their hand, or we scratched each other I got a weak grasp or something like it was not solidly connecting. And at earlier in my career, I would just, I would just keep muddling powering through however you want to put it and get off stage going like, won’t want one. Didn’t it didn’t go. And one of the things that I learned to do is the same thing that I do in the office when I’m seeing a patient. And I can tell that our conversation or communication is not landing, that either not asking the right questions with the suggestions I’m giving don’t make sense or the diagnosis that I’m leaning towards. doesn’t come true for this person, I have learned to say, Hey, I feel like this isn’t landing well for you. What could I be hearing or saying or doing better that would help you? And then I wait for an answer. And I realized I could do that same thing on stage. I could say, hey, this isn’t landing well. Or I feel like, you know, I so appreciate the attention everyone’s giving me. I feel like I’m not really connecting with you tonight. Does anybody have any suggestions for me in ways that would make our time the rest of our time together? Go more fruitfully. And one time in particular, someone stood up and took the audience microphone and said, you know, Dr. G, we just all as we were coming in, found out that there’s been a death in our community. And so, and she kind of teared up and sat back down. And I said, Excuse me, just one second, and I went I got a stool from off stage. And I sat down on the stool and mind you, I’m still what, eight feet above people physically. But I sat down and I said, so sorry for your loss. And I just sat there quietly for a minute. And then I said, it can feel so impossible to take that in. And I said, I don’t need to know who this person was. And I don’t need to know who they are to you or to your family, you know. And really, that’s what we’re here talking about tonight. Because what I talked about is resilience. We’re here talking about how you’re an expert in your experience. I’ve just got some strategies that you might try when you hit obstacles. And so I don’t think I you know, tried to profit off that loss in any way. I just tried to bring it as real moment. And so sometimes when you really feel like you’re not landing, if you can ask a question, get back what you need to make it better than it would have been if it had been going well in the first place. But I think that the most frustrating thing for me is to feel like it’s like a, you know, like a B plus. kind of experience for everybody, but you’re not really knocking it out of the park.

Tim McDonald
Well, thank you for sharing that. I think that’s a great, great story. And a great lesson that all of us can learn is actually reading our audience and understanding that,

Deborah Gilboa, MD
I should say, there’s a disclaimer, you can say that and then get just met with a really uncomfortable silence. And then I usually just say, Well, I’m sure that this uncomfortable silence has made it all much better. Let me try this in a different way. And then I just am what I’m doing. I say so instead of giving you the prepared remarks that I had, what I’d like to do right now is ask you to think of three words that and that’s where improv experience improvisation really does help.

Tim McDonald
Yes. Um, so, you know, I know you mentioned you still see patients and you do speak. Can you kind of share how those two things work? As far as the business model goes? Are they two separate things? Does one help the other do they both help each other? You’re entirely separate logistically. 

Deborah Gilboa, MD
I would say that for sure. In my bio and when people are thinking about bringing me in to speak, and I do a lot of media, that it is really helpful to people, they will sometimes say, you know, are you still practicing? And when I say yes, that gives them that gives them more of a sense of credibility, even though as it happens, my topic is not medical at all. But in general I, I see patient Sundays and Mondays and although I have called weeks that I’m on call him and I’m seeing patients in the hospital in general, I see patients in person Sundays and Mondays and I work on my business, you know, nine days a week around that.

Tim McDonald
Well, my final question to you is looking back on your almost 10 year, overnight success, if you could go back to when you started in the speaking business, is there one piece of advice that you would give your younger self that you know now that you didn’t know back then

Deborah Gilboa, MD
This is not me searching for one. This is me searching on among dozens for one that I think is most, most generalizable. I would say that if you are, if you are able to have anyone else on your team, anyone, but one person I would pick is not a marketing person. It’s not a PR person. It’s not even although it’s amazing, a wonderful VA. It is someone who will negotiate on your behalf. Because other people who believe in the work that you do, can ask for an amount of money, a schedule, a thing that you just couldn’t bring yourself to ask for for yourself. And along with that, that person isn’t as emotionally tied to your work as you are, and so they can see the value of speaking somewhere that you’ve never considered speaking, or bartering. One of the things I tell new speakers all the time is you should get compensated for your work, but it’s very beginning you may not get compensated much in money. So can this person offer you the physical you know, pictures and video professional pictures and video of the work that you do for them testimonials for the work that you do for them warm handoff introductions to other people who are decision makers in their field, not at their company they already brought you in, or their organization but in their field. So what how can you be compensated? Sometimes that’s a paycheck, but it doesn’t have to start off being a paycheck and having that other person to associate for you and ask for more things usually, then you’re willing to when you’re creating that new speaker to client relationship?

Tim McDonald
No, fantastic. Thank you so much for sharing that and being our guest today, Dr. G. And for those of you watching, if you haven’t seen one of these before, what happens is Oh, before I do this, I forgot to ask you this is me. My first screw up at the end of the show. But can you tell everybody how they can find you how they can get in touch with you if they’re interested in learning more about your work? Dr. G?

Deborah Gilboa, MD
Absolutely. Easiest way is through my website, it’s askdrg.com.

Tim McDonald
Well, thank you so much. And for those of you who are watching for the first time, what we do is we cut off the YouTube channel right now, but we are going to go and stay recording and I’m going to ask Dr. G one more question that is only going to be available exclusively to our email subscribers. So if you head over to speaking.business, and sign up for our weekly email list, you will be able to get exclusive content that will only be shared there. So thank you for watching and thank you again for joining us today.