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Tap Into Your Deep Genius with Executive Coach, Nancy Marmolejo
Jenn DeWall:
Hi everyone. It’s Jenn DeWall. And on this week’s episode of The Leadership Habit podcast, I sat down with Nancy Marmolejo, who is an award-winning Latinx, executive coach, and keynote speaker. She teaches leaders and entrepreneurs how to tap into their deep genius, that one-of-a-kind combination of innate strengths, life experiences, and learn expertise that only YOU can bring to the table. And let me tell you a little bit more about Nancy as the founder of talentandgenius.com. She’s committed over 15 years to uncover what makes us great and putting that into a compelling, authentic message, founder’s stories, leadership, training, communication, skills, development, and personal brands. She’s a popular speaker at leadership conferences and business events. Her work has been featured in Forbes, the Huffington Post, Latina, Univision, Smart Money, Redbook. I could go on, and her clients include leaders in the hospitality, industry, engineering, aerospace, global consulting teams, and so many more. Now I hope you enjoy our conversation as Nancy and I sit down and talk about how you can develop and tap into your deep genius.
Meet Nancy Marmolejo, Founder of Talent and Genius
Jenn DeWall:
Hi everyone, it’s Jenn DeWall. And in this week’s episode of The Leadership Habit podcast, I’m sitting down With Nancy Marmolejo, an executive coach, and keynote speaker. And today, we’re going to talk about how to tap into your deep genius and discover the strengths of your team. Nancy, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. It’s great to have you,
Nancy Marmolejo:
Jenn. I’m really excited to be here. Thank you so much.
Jenn DeWall:
So Nancy, how did this, how do you even start to maybe become interested in this subject of finding a deep genius? I mean, it’s a big conceptual topic, and I know it’s important, but tell us a little bit about yourself and your journey.
Nancy Marmolejo:
Sure. You know, I, I look at the word genius, and if you look it up in the dictionary, it doesn’t just mean that you have a super high IQ or this extraordinary intellectual ability. It also means extraordinary creativity or other natural abilities. And so, I truly believe that we all walk around with extraordinary natural abilities. It’s just a matter of seeing them, finding them, claiming them. In my very first career, I worked as a teacher, and my students were the kids who were falling through the cracks, and the system really wasn’t there to champion their success, unfortunately. And I would look at each one of them just so deeply and look at their life experience, look at their innate strengths, look at the things that I could see they were doing well, and reflect that back to them. And suddenly, there was a whole different way of viewing themselves as students, as just members of society. And I, I, when I started my business, which was a few quite few, well, a few years ago, I’ll just say, I’ll drop that over a decade. You know, I took that concept to work with business owners and professionals and leadership organizations to show people.
Nancy Marmolejo:
We have so many folks just walking around, not understanding their value and, and sort of being gaslit to think that they’re not all that they are. So that’s, that’s my mission. And that’s, that’s what I’m out here, you know, preaching the gospel of deep genius.
What is Deep Genius?
Jenn DeWall:
But it’s such an important gospel. And it’s such an important message. I think about even where I was at earlier in my career. I would have benefited so much from hearing someone say, Hey, you may have gotten some feedback, and you may have really taken that personally and use that to make assumptions about yourself and your capabilities, but guess what? That’s not actually true. It doesn’t have to be true. And let’s maybe challenge that. Like, I think that you know, you don’t realize that when you’re even starting your career or even when you’re starting at a new company, you don’t realize that we can still be malleable, that we don’t have to take on like the pain feedback, whatever that is and use that to dull our light. And that it’s also not “cocky” to like talk about your deep genius. I just think the work that you’re doing is, is so important. What do you see as the biggest problem with work today in terms of understanding deep genius or maybe just getting people to be able to identify their own values?
Nancy Marmolejo:
Well, the feedback that I get when I deliver workshops or keynotes or any kind of training with, especially in corporate environments, is people always come back to me, and they say nobody’s ever bothered to find out more about me. What people are doing is looking at what’s on paper. You know, the resume is great, but it doesn’t tell everything. And when we find out like we, well, here’s an example, this one is really easy. Like when we find out that somebody is a student-athlete and you know, we see these people in the Olympics, and they’re, you know, they’re winning gold medals, and they’re in medical school, and they’re, you know, valedictorians, it’s like, wow, that person has some amazing capabilities and some amazing leadership and some self-discipline, we can put that all together—just that same way. There are things in our lives where we’re the equivalent of an Olympic gold medalist or, you know, in that school or valedictorians, what are the things that we have done in life? The life experiences that we have had, sometimes it’s not necessarily things that you want, everybody that everybody you know, finds out from your LinkedIn profile, but it has that understanding that we bring life experiences, we bring innate strengths, we might have some different kinds of training. And all of that puts us together into a very unique, valuable bundle, not being able to have the space to expose that and explore that I think is one of the biggest problems that we have.
Jenn DeWall:
Yeah. And it’s that, you know, looking at that resume, it’s, it’s so limiting, right. A resume. How could I possibly put my personality into a resume? I don’t know if I would that make it colorful, maybe have it scented, you know, there is so much that’s missing, right. It’s very flat. I mean, it’s a piece of paper, but it’s very flat. And I also, you know, I’m curious what your thoughts are too. Like one of the problems around not only leaders or organizations taking the time to get to know someone at a human level through their diversity, but also that as individuals, I know for me sometimes if I wasn’t achieving an award, if I wasn’t doing something grand, like being picked to be on a committee or something, oftentimes I also am like, well, I guess if they want someone that’s like that, and I’m not that then I guess I don’t produce value. Right. So I guess I thought of, as you said, and used those examples of the athletes like I’m not winning gold medals, so what value do I have? You know, I think sometimes that’s easy to believe or to start to tell yourself, so let’s dive into what a deep genius is, what is understanding or deep genius. Cause we’re going to help our audience really understand how to tap into that today. So how do we discover a deep genius? And before we get there, what is it?
Deep Genius Starts with Our Innate Strengths
Nancy Marmolejo:
Sure. And let’s just pretend that we’re all in a workshop together. I’m guiding you through one of the deep genius events and exercises because that’s really where it gets fun. So you want to think about a couple of different things. One is that we all have innate strengths. We all have things that come easy to us, and they’re things that we know how to do without knowing how we know how. Does that make sense?
Jenn DeWall:
Yeah. I think that’s strange, like when I think about people are like, oh Jenn, you, you do speaking. And you like that. And that is honestly one of the things for me. Like, I don’t know how I can do it. I’m not trying to be cocky. It’s just something I feel very comfortable in. And I could not tell you how.
Nancy Marmolejo:
Yes, we know people who are naturally good with numbers, naturally good with taking things apart and putting them back together again, naturally good at sensing how others are feeling you can look back at when you were a kid. And these are things that you’ve just always had and always been true for you. Maybe there’s a natural sense of design and aesthetics or a natural sense of engineering and understanding how things work. These are the innate strengths and gifts that we have. And they could be either a skill such as something that you know, how to do. Like I’ve always loved to write, and I’ve always, and I was, I was talking like, my mom told me that when I was little, I just started talking. There was no baby talk. There was no, and it’s like. I went from like, you know, a baby to like, Hey, how are you doing?
Yeah. Yeah. It’s like, and there was just, I just went into that. It was like, I, you know, and she reflected that back to me when I was older. And I thought, oh, you know, that’s, I I’ve felt comfortable teaching and talking in front of others before I even knew what that was. Some people I notice have this amazing sense of empathy. They could just look and sense somebody. Other people have the leadership, you know, they’re not afraid to take charge that Daredevil the adventurer, all of these things. And whether it’s nature or nurture, there are so many sources of it. It just is. So that’s the first piece of it is things that you’re innately great at those things that you know how to do without really knowing how you know how to do them.
Jenn DeWall:
So here’s our message, right. So right now, everyone, like you, have an innate strength. You have an innate strength. Even if you’re driving in your car and you’re thinking or comparing yourself to someone else, you absolutely have an innate strength.
Nancy Marmolejo:
Yeah, think of the things you’re the go-to person for, or they come easily and naturally to you. And what happens more often than not is we overlook these because they come so naturally to us. It’s like, oh, come on. That’s so easy. Well, when I hire a plumber and pay plumber prices, you know, that takes the person two seconds to fix something. I think to myself, oh my gosh. But they have that. They have that gift. You know, it’s easy for them, but not easy for me. So I can say, oh my gosh, you know, you’re so talented. And you just did that. They might not think, well, I just, you know, I, it was nothing or somebody who’s naturally you know, a speaker, a writer or a leader, somebody else might look at them and say, I just don’t know how you do that.
And they said, I just, I just do it. They might think everybody can do that. Well, not everybody can do it. What happens is we can’t always see it in ourselves. You know our eyes are on the inside, looking out. Our eyes aren’t on the outside looking in. The one thing I always tell people is, imagine what it’s like when you’re in a store, and you see yourself on the security camera. So do I look like that? I need to start standing up a little straight.
Jenn DeWall:
Yeah, at Target when I’m checking out. I’m like, is this what I look like?
Nancy Marmolejo:
Yeah. Like, oh, pull that, pull that stomach in. Or it’s like, suddenly we’re aware of ourselves or, oh, look at me. I look pretty good. We, we don’t see ourselves sometimes it’s helpful for somebody else. That’s why, when I do deep genius, you know, any kind of workshops around this, I love having a group and getting people into small groups and breakout sessions and pairing up with somebody and, and just reflecting these things back and forth because we can’t always see it in ourselves.
So, so that’s the first part is the innate, the innate piece. There, there are two other, two other areas where I advise people to look, so I’ll share those, too. Okay. So I also encourage you to look at your life experiences; life experiences teach us things, and whether it’s the highs or the lows. The birth of a child. Falling in love. If we find out about, I never knew I could love so much. I never knew my heart could burst open caring for somebody in the end-of-life stages. The loss of a loved one is that, that deep grief. What did it teach you? What is something that you, maybe you thought I could never go on? And then you found out that you can. You know, where I am in California and, you know, you’re in Colorado, we are just, you know, wildfires happening all around us. There has been loss. There have been catastrophes. And what some people find out is I never knew I could be the support system that I am. Or I never knew I could get through a natural disaster. So many different things, or maybe, you know, traveling or living abroad, having you know, live, move from one country to another being an immigrant. We have life experiences that show us things about ourselves. And I encourage people to take an inventory and look and see what the strengths that were gifted to you as a result of that experience, whether it was something that was difficult or something that was really beautiful and joyful.
To Find Your Deep Genius – Stop Comparing Yourself to Others
Jenn DeWall:
What a great place to start. I think you know, what comes to mind for me is that what you’re saying is that no matter who you are, look for your, you know, your highs, your lows, and the messages that can come out. And I think sometimes people miss out on those life experiences. And I’m curious if you agree, because we often when we look at the lows or the lessons in life, I feel like I sometimes the way I compare myself to someone else. And so then I minimize my experience because it doesn’t seem as difficult, tragic, you know, glorious, amazing as someone else’s. So again, it’s that ugly cycle of not even missing out on that opportunity to learn because I’m somehow saying the life experience wasn’t what someone else’s was. Do you see that a lot with your clients?
Nancy Marmolejo:
Yeah. And I think it’s part of it is sharing the stories and having somebody else, you know, tell me a story about a difficult time in your life, and you know, what came out of it. And you tell that story, and the person who’s listening to you sharing starts spotting other things. It’s like, wow, I see creativity. I see leadership. I see innovation. I see resilience. And they start reflecting back to you, things that you might not have taken inventory. And that’s where we start to build this understanding that there’s more to us than what it says on the performance review or what it says on the resume. And one of the metaphors I like to use is- where I live, I’m near the Redwood forests in Northern California. So I go hiking through the redwoods. And one of the things about Redwood trees is that they’re fire-resistant, which is interesting. And you wonder, I wonder why their bark is fire resistant. You know, trees that if there’s a fire, they actually, it’s hard for, for a Redwood tree to get completely burned down. You will go through the forest, and you’ll see these black scars all over the trees because fire has touched them, but it continues on.
And so one thing I look at it, and I think, well, that is resilience. I’m going to go hiking through the redwoods to remind myself of any trauma or pain I’ve experienced. And I’m looking at this tree standing tall and mighty and think to myself, okay, I can rise too. What are the strengths I brought along? And interestingly enough, with Redwood trees, their little seed cones, the only way those seeds can get released is through intense heat. So it’s like they have to experience that fire, that, that, that would, could be like that hardship in order to even go on. There are so many. There are so many lessons that you can get. That’s why people love hiking in the Redwood forest is; you just like, feel the wisdom of the earth all around you.
Jenn DeWall:
Wow. I had no idea. And that makes me think of a diamond. I know that a diamond comes to be if your pressure, but I had no idea that Redwood seeds needed that heat to be able to grow. Wow, beautiful stories about resilience and growth and overcoming adversity.
Nancy Marmolejo:
I think about that in our own life stories, like where have we had to go through that? Do you know? And then, and then the last piece that I ask people to look at is, okay, well, let’s look at some of your formal training and how has that meshed with your innate gifts? How has that mesh with your life experience? And I think, well, people have probably heard the story of this college dropout who had this beautiful sense of aesthetics but was also very strong-willed, some people might say kind of a jerk, but a visionary and strong-willed, and the sense of aesthetics who had the life experiences of traveling and going on a spiritual journey and then had the training in electronics and in calligraphy, oddly enough. And then this person dropped out of college and ended up partnering with another person to start a computer company that introduced us to beautiful fonts and a minimalist aesthetic. And the sense of design that prior to that, you did not equate computers with beautiful lettering and a sense of design, or even the shape and size of the computer or the various devices that this company came out with and their aesthetic. So do you know who it is that I’m talking about?
Jenn DeWall:
I mean, that’s gotta be Steve jobs.
Nancy Marmolejo:
It’s Steve Jobs. Yeah. He had a background in calligraphy. He took calligraphy in college. He was like a total, like in college, he was just like, you know, I’m just going to take calligraphy, you know, but it, he fell in love with fonts. So what, so what happened when, when Apple computers started, as we started exploring beautiful lettering, we can you know, thank him for that.
How Your Life Experiences Can Help You Tap Into Deep Genius
Nancy Marmolejo:
And, and so we look at these different life experiences, I think about Malala, who at the age of 14 was shot in the face for being a proponent of education for girls in her country. And, and now she is, you know, an international spokesperson for education for girls women’s rights. I mean, there are so, you know, her life experience and all the things that came out of her presented us with this leader, and she couldn’t be where she was now if she didn’t have this natural curiosity and leadership capability if she wasn’t, you know, mentored her father was a teacher and created a school for girls and her life experience of this horrific, horrific act of violence that then made her become just the symbol of, of a movement worldwide. So we have so many different things that place us where we are now as, as geniuses, without really we didn’t set out and say, okay, I’m gonna be this. It’s, it’s just following the trajectory of life and paying attention to how these three components are all acting together.
Jenn DeWall:
I love that. Okay. So deep genius for those that are still wondering is the combination or the, you know, the combination of our natural abilities, our life experiences, and then maybe our education and skills development, or just development in that way. And so that combination brings us to where we are today, and it leads us on our path for where we can go tomorrow or how we can continue to evolve. Why don’t people connect with it? Like, what do you see? Why, why don’t people connect with it? Or how did we get lost from being able to see our deep genius?
Nancy Marmolejo:
I just don’t think we have enough opportunities to even have the conversation or do the exploration. And w and then also what I said before is like, we don’t always see it in ourselves, but then again, what you just mentioned, like the resume and the education, we look at the school, we look at the, you know, like, oh, they went to that school. We better hire them. That means they’re good. Not necessarily. There are people who, you know, if you look at somebody who didn’t come from the right school, but they have this life experience that is far more valuable than the institution or the degree they received, or they have this inmate combination of gifts that you think, well, that is, you don’t see that often. So if we’re only going by what’s on paper, that’s something I, I gave a workshop to a large aerospace organization that they send people, you know, to outer space. We should know who they are, four letters, anyhow, they and at the end of this, we were giving feedback, and somebody had said, I wish this was part of our onboarding process. I wish that when we stepped foot into this company, somebody would just find base things out about us because there is, they think, oh, we don’t have the talent for that. We have to keep seeking. We have to find all these people. And the talent is right under our noses. We just need to take a moment. I think it saves a lot of money to just find out what are the assets and then the gems that we have right here. Dig a little deeper into who is currently here right now, as opposed to saying, oh, we, we, we lack this. Let’s go on this big expensive quest to find that position when meanwhile it was right there, and that person is sitting next to you, you just didn’t have the opportunity or the structure to find it out. You may not have asked to be that simple. You just never asked.
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Understanding Your Deep Genius
Jenn DeWall:
How do you start to begin this journey to tackle understanding your own deep genius? Like, how do you, you know, figure out like, okay, now that I’m looking at this, like, especially if you’re still stuck with maybe the limitation believing that your education or your degrees or your something makes you qualified. How do you start to maybe peel back to be able to see this more inclusive sense of value that represents the three components?
Nancy Marmolejo:
Well, some people can do it on their own, and there’s a self-awareness that it allows them to say, oh, look at that. I see this about myself. Boom. There I go. Other people you really need to, you know, whether it’s with a partner or a coach or a group of people, there’s something the thing about being seen by somebody else, having that space of being able to be, have somebody reflect back to you, what it is that they’re seeing and hearing, that’s very valuable. Or if a person just can commit to doing some self-reflection and understanding that, that, that little voice it’s going to pop up every now and then saying you have no right to claim that. No, that’s not valuable. Everybody can do that. You’re not the one; you’re a fake, all of that imposter talk, all of that. I’m a fake talk. I understand that that might come up, and just keep doing it. Yeah, know, just, just for fun. I would tell my clients, it’s like, just humor me, just humor me and write it down. Okay. Let’s just pretend that we could put that inner critic in the other room for a moment and, and you know, what can we do to just honestly get an assessment? And so once we, I tell people just, just write it in three columns, here are your innate gifts and here’s your life experience and here’s your education and start looking, add it. And the fun part and this is, this is the part that I liked the most is when you, you start looking for unusual combinations. Where are the unusual combinations, and what does that say about you?
So a few years back, I was at a leadership conference for women in engineering, and I had them pair up. This was when we were in person. We, I had them pair up, and it was so interesting because, before the conference, somebody said to me, oh, they won’t like this. This is engineers. They’re going to want you to just be straightforward. Tell them what to do, let them go out. They don’t want to think they don’t want it. And I said, oh, you’re kind of generalizing, but let’s, I don’t know. Let’s see, because they accepted my proposal for the conference. So maybe they’ll like it. Well, first of all, it was standing room only. There were so many people that just filled this room. And then, once they got into pairs. We found out there was somebody who was trained as an opera singer and a chemical engineer. And I mean, and she had kind of a mish-mash educational background. There was somebody who was into like crystals or somebody who just had a breakup. I mean, there were all these different life experiences and combinations. So rather than looking at this room and saying, okay, they’re all engineers. I can make all these assumptions about them. I now have these levels of depth and nuances about who they are. And the great thing is, is that at the end of that workshop, there were people pairing up and going into the hallway, and they were like, we’re going to start an app. Or we’re having a meeting. It was it just like it created these connections for people where they didn’t realize that that person sitting over there was exactly that kind of combination of skills and strengths and innate gifts that they needed to be in contact with. So you just have to. You just have to put it out in the open. We can’t just read minds and assume that we know.
A Simple Exercise to Start Tapping Into Deep Genius
Jenn DeWall:
Okay. So here’s the assignment for all of The Leadership Habit guests. This is where you’re going to take your piece of paper. This is coming from Nancy. You are going to write down what your natural abilities are and put your self-doubt to the side because we all have that. Or I love when people say they don’t have self-doubt, Nancy. And the second thing. So put your columns, right? So first column, what are your natural strengths? Second column? What are the life experiences that are unique to you? And you don’t even have to find a meaning to that. Like, think about the ones that stand out. You don’t have to attach it because you had said, and then do your third, which is your skills, education, or background, and then combine them all together and look for your own themes. Don’t try to make them into something to say, well, they’re not, you’re enough. Just be curious about it. That’s the first assignment. I hope that everyone does that—those who are listening to this podcast.
Nancy Marmolejo:
That’s the starting off point. That is the starting off point. And I think there’s something that when we realize that we do have a very unique combination. I mean, that’s not the ending point. That’s the starting point. And people will sometimes contact me and say, Nancy, tell me what my deep genius is. And I’m saying. I’m not— I don’t do readings. I can see you. I can work with you. I can reflect back to you. What I see together. We can identify these pieces, but then the next question comes up. What do I do with this? What am I here to create? What am I here to lead? What am I here to innovate in? What do I need to communicate to the world? Like, okay, I got this thing, now what?
Personal Branding and Explaining Your Deep Genius to Others
Jenn DeWall:
Yeah. You have the self-awareness, but what do you, where do you even begin to apply it? Okay. So what do you do?
Nancy Marmolejo:
Well, everybody’s going to be different. It depends. So for some people, it’s around, like a lot of the work I do is around personal branding, but the personal branding work that I do, it’s not like a cute little tagline. And you know, let’s find a gimmicky title for you or, or, or create some kind of a persona it’s like, let’s just honestly, authentically and accurately explain you. I always tell my clients they have to control the narrative because if you don’t control the narrative, somebody else will, and they might not get it.
Jenn DeWall:
Right. Perception is reality.
Nancy Marmolejo:
So you have these, this one opportunity is around just being able to say, oh my gosh, there are these things about me. And I don’t know how to tell the world. I said, okay, well, let’s do that through personal branding. And then from my leadership clients, they’ll say, okay, well, I understand this about myself, and I have this, you know, personal brand. How do I communicate that as a leader? How do I use this as a leader? And so, you know, what is the vision that you have for your company? What is the vision that you have for your team? How can you call upon these unique strengths and innate gifts to show up fully as a leader that people will say is the person who I am following. Because if you come up there and you’re just strictly technical and giving out instructions and step-by-steps, that’s not necessarily leadership. That’s more just, here’s a list of things. Say you’re a taskmaster. So are you a visionary leader, or are you a taskmaster? And having this understanding of your deep genius elevates yourself as a leader. So you’re not just, you know, barking out orders, you get people enrolled in your vision, and you know, everything seems to happen a lot easier, a lot faster, and a lot smoother when everybody buys into the vision.
Jenn DeWall:
What happens Nancy, when, and maybe, you know, this is kind of our conversation that started, you know, during our pre-call, when you do this reflection, you think about what are my natural gifts, what as my life experience, what as my background in education, and you kind of come up with this belief, right? Awareness around who you are and how you can provide value. But then you recognize that in some area of your life, you’re actually working counter to those things. So you’re maybe not leveraging a strength. You’re maybe doing something that you’re not qualified to do, or maybe from a life experience, doing something that you don’t want to do. So, cause I feel like that’s kind of the reason choice that I made to make that resignation from that board. It isn’t because I don’t love that board. It’s just that doing an assessment around like this actually doesn’t work for me anymore, but what do you, what do you do? Like what would your advice be to someone when they look at that? And you’re like, and you make you connect it back to your life. And you’re like, I’m really not leveraging my deep genius. Like how do you then start to move into that trajectory?
Identify Your Values to Tap Into Deep Genius
Nancy Marmolejo:
Well, you need to make some decisions. And I never push anybody out into the deep end of the pool and say, all right here, go figure it out. I’m a firm believer in having a foundation underneath you before you do any of this. So when I start working with people through this process, we actually will look at core values. What are the things that you stand for? What are the things that are important to you? What are the things that, when they are dishonored, get you angry? Because sometimes people say, oh yeah, these are my top values. And I said, okay, well, tell me about the last few times you’ve gotten mad at anything. And then we’re going to pull out what was the, what was the boundary, the value that was, that was crossed. And so then you realize, well, I was disrespected, so I got angry, so, okay. So respect is one of your core values. Did you name it? Well, no. Well, it’s showing up. This is how it’s showing up. And so we look at, you know, making sure that we have that understanding, making sure that we have the right words that describe who we are in our genius. Some people are geniuses at simplifying complex processes.
Do you say the word simplify when you describe yourself? Do you let people know that simplifying things is one of your jams? No, you don’t? You need to start doing that. Are you a person who optimizes, you know, things you’re always, you’re like that process improvement ninja everywhere you look around, you’re always looking at like, this could be better. And like, let me tell you how. There are people that just seriously walk around like that. Are you that person who really senses others, and you realize that that’s a deep gift of yours? So empathy and emotional intelligence. Are you letting people know that? So that’s part of it. It’s like you first have to, under, you have to understand those core values. They have to understand those. I call them your power words. And are, are you just kind of keeping that to yourself or letting the world know? So that’s important. And that’s, that’s one of the pieces of where we start.
Jenn DeWall:
So how do you find those words? I mean, so I get being able to maybe do that assessment of yourself, but I know one of the challenges is to truly embody that because we are still marginalized, maybe what those things mean. So how do we begin to maybe embrace it in a way that’s confident and positive and connecting with who we truly are instead of being like, I don’t know, I don’t want to come off as cocky because you’re not, you’re supposed to, you know, just do what, think of the messages that we’ve all been told? Like, oh, like it’s everyone has strengths. Don’t talk about yours. How do you, like, what are those barriers that will naturally come up? I think I picture just fighting off those messages. Like Jenn, like, you’re not that great. Like everyone can do it. Don’t worry. I say all of that stuff all the time. I’m just a total jerk to myself, and just like some people listening might resonate with. And if you don’t, I’m jealous of you because I hate inner-critic talk. But what do you like, how do you find those words? How do you start to actually like to live it, breathe it, own it?
Nancy Marmolejo:
Well, I mean, I provide my clients with like lists and lists of words. I mean, if you want to find the words, there are lists of words I have. I don’t know if you want to go search them, like, you know, strong verbs. I mean, whatever it is, you don’t always have to say them because it might sound kind of weird. You don’t walk up and conversation and say, I maximize productivity. That would sound kind of weird. But if you know, in the back of your head, that’s what you do. There’s something about the knowing, you know, when somebody has swagger, they don’t tell you how cool they are. You see it, you feel it, they embody it.
So you just have to let it sink into your bones and let people know that about you without you having to necessarily pronounce it. I think that’s one of the reasons why I do a lot of work in personal branding. Because I always dislike the way people are taught to communicate because it’s, it never sounds natural. It never sounds like it’s in the flow. And I think it comes on a little strong and you can say, well, that person’s sure full of themselves. And they don’t really mean to come across that way. That’s just how they were taught. I’d rather somebody feel so comfortable in their own skin, that the language that comes out when you’re, when you’re talking about yourself when you’re, you’re in your deep genius, you want to communicate that, it’s natural and authentic. It doesn’t feel like you just had to suddenly, you know, pull out a script and start reciting something that somebody taught you how to do. But there are simple ways of doing this, that you, you know, if there are words that we can latch onto that really energize our conversations and help people get a mental picture of you in your deep genius.
Forget the Elevator Pitch and Really Connect with Others
Jenn DeWall:
But we have to find those words. And so one of the things you just touched on is that you do. So once you find your deep genius understanding of the three areas that you know of you that combine together to create a unique value, then it comes down to how do you brand it? How do you give voice to that? And so your work is also, you know, obviously, you’re a keynote speaker, you’re an executive coach and helping people find that deep genius, but then it’s how do you brand it? So what’s the starting point. And I know that there’s a tool that you can share with our listeners, too, that maybe are on this journey of thinking about how do I brand myself? What does that look like once you find your deep genius? What happens after that?
Nancy Marmolejo:
It’s so much fun! I mean, you there, one of the things I tell people to just have as many different ways of communicating or, or being confident in your deep genius to be able to have this conversation. So don’t just rely on the one elevator pitch that you learned at some networking event or whatever it is. And that can serve its purpose sometimes. But, but don’t just rely on that. I always tell people, like they say, well, we need the 32nd elevator pitch. And I said, well, if you’re pitching like pitching for funding, going to an actual pitch-fest. Yeah. You have to say it a certain way because you are hardcore selling an idea right there. But if really I’m in the elevator with you and I just want to meet another human being. I don’t want to be pitched. I don’t know. Cool. You know, I know that there’s that urban legend of somebody who was in the elevator, and they had the right thing that they said. And the next thing you know, they’ve made the billion-dollar deals, and everybody lived happily ever after. You know, sometimes I just want to. I just don’t want all that broadcasting in my face. I really truly want to know you as a person. And, and so what are some different ways we can do that?
And you’ve asked me a couple of times about words. I want to throw a couple of words out. These are some of the most common ones that I watch people use and feel really comfortable with. But for example, I use the word simplify. There are some people who are very good at simplifying a complex process. If you do that and it comes easily and naturally to you. Use that language, simplify, let people associate you with the word simplify or streamline or demystify. Or for me, I was. I started my life off as a teacher. The word teach, I mean the word, teach. That is me! That’s what I do. I teach. And I reflect somebody talks to me. It doesn’t matter who you are. I mean, it could be the person putting the cable in. It could be somebody coming over and, you know, dropping off a package. I could like immediately reflect back to somebody what I see as their strength. It’s I can’t live my life without doing that. That’s part of my deep genius. So when people know me as, when, who teaches, and who reflects, I use that language, they know that about me. There are people who make connections, just authentic connections with people. So just think about that and put, put words to it.
Jenn DeWall:
Yes. Oh my gosh. So Nancy, how does our audience get, get in touch with you? How can they potentially work with you to maybe help discover their deep genius?
Find Out More About Talent and Genius
Nancy Marmolejo:
Well, I have, if you can come to my website, talentandgenius.com and there, you know, a few different ways you can contact me there if you want me, you know, for speaking, for coaching, for training, that is a really easy thing to do is just go to talentandgenius.com. There’s a free resource there that I call ten message starters. And this one has been so much fun. I have used this with entrepreneurs. I’ve used this with aerospace engineers. I’ve used this with CEOs. I’ve used this with, oh my gosh. People in health and wellness, I mean just every kind of industry, and it’s ten sentence-starters. It’s like these ten little frameworks, almost like Madlibs, you could fill in the blanks. But they range from everything to, you know, more of the formal, you know, I simplify complex processes. So companies can make more money to have a cross between Mr. T and Mr. Rogers to I’m a geek whisper. What do you do with all of those different things? And so I show people how they can create these interesting little message starters, and then like the next level piece of it is how you can even piece them together and create a new bio for yourself or a new way to introduce yourself or a new way to be identified.
It’s really fun. And the people that I’ve taught this to, as I said, from a wide range of fields, everybody always has some kind of an aha moment, and they’ll take it and apply it. Like LinkedIn profiles start getting changed, or some of the things, you know, talking in a different way about themselves when they’re introducing themselves around the table. It’s, it’s been pretty life-changing for a lot of people.
Jenn DeWall:
Yeah. I imagine it also just gives a different boat of confidence to truly appreciate ourselves and the contributions that we offer to a team, an organization, the community, our friends. I love that. So if you want to get the ten message starters, or just, you know, get to know more about Nancy’s work, they can head on over to talented genius.com. Is that right? That is correct. Nancy, thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you so much for your insights on how we can tap into our deep genius. It’s an important topic, and I hope that people walk away with seeing their own unique gifts. Thank you for helping them find that.
Nancy Marmolejo:
Thank you for having me here. It’s been a pleasure
Jenn DeWall:
So much for listening to this week’s episode of the leadership have a podcast. I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Nancy. If you want to get her tips on how to talk about yourself in 10 message starters, you can head on over to talentandgenius.com there. There you can also book Nancy for speaking, coaching, training. You name it. If you enjoy this week’s episode, please leave us a review wherever you get your podcasts. And most importantly, if you thought of someone that could benefit from this, don’t forget to share this with them. Thank you so much for your attention. Your organization is looking for leadership development training, looking to develop your managers into leaders, head on over to Crestcom.com. There you can sign up for a complimentary to our leadership skills workshop to help your team succeed! Until next time.
