Using Your Voice and Story for Business Impact with Michelle Massman: Podcast Ep. 419

Podcast Interview – Michelle Massman.mp3: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Podcast Interview – Michelle Massman.mp3: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Diane Diaz:
Do you ever feel like your voice maybe isn’t being heard? Or that maybe you’re stuck telling the same old stories, or you’re not even sure how to tell your own stories in your work or in your message? Well, I’m Diane Diaz, lead speaking coach at Speaking Your Brand. And on today’s episode, it’s going to be all about breaking through those barriers and diving into the power of using your voice, telling your story, and how speaking can be a game changer for your personal brand building, but also building your business. And who better to guide us through this? And someone who’s spent over 30 years solving problems, building businesses, and empowering others to do the same. So get ready for some inspiring insights on entrepreneurship, storytelling, her speaking journey, and finding your voice as we welcome Michelle Mosman to the show. Welcome to the podcast, Michelle.

Michelle Massman:
Thank you Diane. It is so great to be here.

Diane Diaz:
Oh, I’m so excited for our listeners to hear from you. And so we’ll talk a little bit about how you came to working with us. But first, let’s just start by you giving our audience a little bit of insight into who you are and what you do in your business.

Michelle Massman:
Okay. Well, I have owned my business, as you said, for over 30 years, which is kind of crazy to me. But over that time, I’ve done all kinds of things. But in a nutshell, I usually say that I’m an on demand vice president. And so what I mean by that is that I work with a lot of entrepreneur clients, and most of the time it’s smaller businesses. I work with a lot of women entrepreneurs. A lot of times they’re solopreneurs, or they might have a small team, but they’re not really in a position where they have a vice president in their company. And so a lot of my consulting work is working as an on demand vice president. So I will sometimes work with people on a long term basis. Sometimes it’s on a shorter term basis, But the best part about it is that once I get to know their company and them as a person, I can hold that story. And so if they call me three months later or six months later and say, now I’m having this issue, we can pick up where we left off and not have to go through that entire, you know, understanding the business again. And so I love working with my clients. In addition to that, I also co-own and operate two music groups. That’s a whole other story. And I just launched a new business with a new business partner two weeks ago called The Culinary Studio, which is going to be teaching cooking classes in my area. I partnered with a woman who is a chef and a culinary instructor, and so we just launched that as well, which is turning into my next speaking topic, um, which is really about passion to profit and how entrepreneurs build what they want. And sometimes we have to, you know, really be aware of how we’re taking what we want and what the market needs into account.

Diane Diaz:
That is fascinating. So for our listeners, I kind of already knew Michelle was sort of this multi-passionate person, but to hear that you’re now adding another thing, you’re sort of like, what? Like they say, Renaissance man. You’re like a Renaissance woman, like you’re into you’re dabbling in different things. But there’s obviously some connective thread. And so we’ll get to that in a minute. But I’m curious if you can share what, like if we back up in time, what brought you to doing this work as an on demand CEO? Because, I mean, obviously you probably didn’t start out that way, but what brought you to that? And then what brought you to the music group portion of it? I’m so interested to hear what the how that journey happened.

Michelle Massman:
Oh, it’s so interesting. Diane. Um, you know, when I was when I was growing up, I knew early, I think that I was going to have to own my own company because I really wasn’t a good employee and I didn’t like being the boss necessarily. So I didn’t really want to have employees. I didn’t want to be accounting for that. But I also I just wanted to forge my own path. I just don’t, um, I think the best way I can describe it is when I was younger and I would have various jobs as soon as I really got to know and understand the job, and felt like I had done as much as I could to contribute to making it better, I was ready to move on. And so. So that’s how I ended up starting my own business when I was 22. So I would say that how I got into this is I was working full time in a temporary position at a university in their purchasing department. And in 1989 I got married. And when I came back from my honeymoon, they offered me a full time, permanent position. And I went home and told my husband about it, and I said, I don’t want to take it Because if I do, I’m going to be in this job for the rest of my life. Because to move away from the really good salary, the benefits, those kinds of things to do, anything else later on would be really hard. And he said, you know, I agree. At that time he had a full time position as a manager and he said, we don’t own anything. They can’t take anything away. So if you want to start a business, do it now.

Diane Diaz:
I love that. I can’t take anything away, so now’s the time, you know? That’s so smart because I think sometimes we do and I know I did it and I it’s probably happens less now because you see more and more younger people starting businesses. But, you know, back in the day it was get your college degree, start working, work there for 40 years, retire and then, you know, that’s that. But it’s not like that anymore. So I but I love to see people who are in the more seasoned part of their career doing that, doing multiple things. I do that right. But it but also I love how your story to talk about story, your story of, you know, you liked to do things your own way. You got bored with jobs like you wanted to move on to the next thing. Your story informed where you are now. And so how did the music thing come to be? How did what was the connection there?

Michelle Massman:
Well, interestingly, how that happened, I had already been in business for several years and working mostly with women entrepreneurs, which is kind of my favorite, and I was doing a women’s showcase event at that time. It was an annual event that drew seven or 8 or 9000 people a year to this huge event, and it had all kinds of components to it. But we did a lot of entertainment, and I had hired a music group called Tonic Solfa, which is an a cappella group, to perform at the event, and Shawn Johnson, who is one of the members of the group and one of the owners of the group, called me one day to advance the show, and it just so happened that he was the one doing it that at that time, and we ended up on the phone together for four hours. So we decided from there that we should continue our conversation and have coffee. And as it turned out, he was, as I said, one of the owners of the group and that company, and we just really clicked. We were both in a position at that point where we weren’t really in a burnout phase, but we were getting close to it because we just needed an infusion of new creativity into our companies and ended up being able to do that for each other. And within a year, he asked me if I would come on as vice president for the music group and help him operate the company. And since then, a few years after that, we launched another performance group called the Shawn Johnson Big Band Experience. And I’m co-owner and we’ve been doing that for, gosh, I’ve been working with him now for 20 years.

Diane Diaz:
That is incredible. That is incredible. So, you know, you never know where opportunities come along. And I was just reminded me of a conversation I was just having with some younger women that I was mentoring for a women’s group that I’m in and they’re in college. And so one of the things that I said just sort of trying to give some little nuggets of advice to help them, you know, in their career, throughout their careers. But it was to say yes to things when they come along. Like, don’t be afraid to say yes even if you don’t know how to do it, even if you aren’t sure you can do it, just say yes because you don’t know what that opportunity is going to lead to. It may be the thing, or it may lead to the next thing, right? And so you’ve sort of followed that I have.

Michelle Massman:
And what’s really interesting is that I’ve always really followed my intuition and felt like that’s going to take me in the right place. But what I find fascinating about that as well, is that I even tried to dissuade Sean from wanting me to be vice president of the company, because I didn’t know the music industry, and he was very clear that he’s like, no, that’s why I want you, because you bring a whole different perspective to this. And so I think that that’s really important. And so we’ve done that for each other. We’ve maintained our own companies in addition to operating companies together. Um, and we’ve done that for each other over all of this time in our partnership. And actually, speaking of speaking and storytelling, he and I actually now do speaking together as well. And we talk about our business partnership and how to maintain a really good business partnership. We talk about conflict and how you deal with adversity when it comes up. We had an embezzlement situation in one of the music groups a few years ago. That’s a whole story by itself. So I mean, so we talk, we do speaking together, I do speaking on my own. And we both just really love to share about what we’ve learned.

Diane Diaz:
That’s fantastic. And so let’s let’s take that little speaking nugget. Let’s back up a little where when in your career and where in your career did you if you did, did you first start speaking maybe publicly or just in any form? When did that come about?

Michelle Massman:
That started when I was 15. Oh, tell me about that. I yes, as I said, I have this weird kind of career of jobs. And so when I was about 14, I decided that I did not like babysitting. I don’t know why, I just didn’t like it. And that was one of the only options for us right when we were young. So I decided to sell Avon, and I had to get my mother’s permission to sell Avon at 14 years old. So I did that for a couple of years. But when I was 15, I was also introduced to another company called Sarah Coventry Jewelry. Only people my age or older will have any idea what that is. Um, but I know what that is. Yes, if you remember Sarah Coventry Jewelry, it was a home party kind of sales situation, and I jumped in with both feet and set up all kinds of home parties, went and did speaking and talked about the jewelry, talked about all kinds of other things, and loved it. But now here’s the interesting twist. I started that when I was 15. Now, when I was a freshman in high school, I was supposed to take freshman speech class. I pushed it off until I was a senior. It was in my last semester as a senior in high school that I finally took freshman speech. Because I did not want to do it. I was terrified, I was anxiety ridden over the idea of doing that, but I had no problem on evenings and weekends going out and speaking to make money. And so I learned really, really early that my confidence as a speaker is completely tied to my message and my audience hundred percent.

Diane Diaz:
What a great lesson, and I’m glad you shared that, because I think, you know, I know there’s people listening to this that are thinking, I could never be a speaker. Maybe they’re listening because they have aspirations to be a speaker or in some capacity they need to speak, but they’re really not jazzed about it because it it can be very, very scary. But here’s the thing. Like you just said, Michelle, when you are passionate about the topic and you care and you’re connected to it, it’s your story, it’s your passion. That’s where it helps to sort of eliminate or at least mitigate some of those some of those fears and anxieties that we have around speaking, because you can go out and speak about jewelry all night long and you loved it, that then put you in a class where maybe you’re going to speak on a topic that you have no connection to, right? Yeah, that can be scary when you don’t feel that the topic even resonates with you. How are you going to make it resonate with the audience? So to that point, your story becomes part of that, right?

Michelle Massman:
Absolutely. And I think that I was became very aware of it at that point. And so after that, what I realized was that I if I was nervous about speaking, if I had to do something for one of my jobs, or if there was something where it really wasn’t my passion, but I had to get up and speak anyway, I learned early that part of the trick for me is figuring out how to make that message, something I am excited to share and somehow find my connection to the audience, even if it isn’t my usual audience and figure out how I can really build that confidence in that selection.

Diane Diaz:
Oh, that’s such a great point. That is an excellent point. Because, you know, I think too, even if we’re passionate about what we’re speaking on, sometimes it can feel like, oh, if we have to speak on that, that topic we’re passionate about, it can come across as kind of rote and a little bit like mechanical and just facts. But finding that emotional connection, why? You know, why you resonate with it. What is that thread and then helping to bring that out in the audience. So through your story, a personal connection, sharing that personal connection with the audience, that’s where you can you’ll have more confidence as the speaker, but then the audience picks up on that. So do you find that that resonates?

Michelle Massman:
Yeah, yeah. No, absolutely. And I think one of the things that’s interesting is the thread, I think that goes through everything that I’ve done in my, in my career is that I, I just I love people, I love connecting with people and I. I want people to really reach for their dreams and to meet their goals. And so most of the women entrepreneurs and others that I’ve worked with over the years, a lot of times they come to me when they’re stuck or somebody refers them to me because they’re stuck or, you know, and that might mean, you know, a number of things. It might mean they don’t have the right resources to move forward, or they need to learn some things, or it might mean that they just don’t have the confidence level. And so I have worked with people for years in that capacity, and that is really what feeds me. I love to see people get unstuck and take action and move forward and achieve the things that they really want to achieve. And so when I’m speaking to people, I’ve also become more and more over the years very vulnerable. I am so okay with telling every embarrassing story that has ever happened to me, because that’s one of the ways I found that I’m really able to connect with people in a very quick time frame and usually speaking engagements. You don’t have a long time frame, so if I’m willing to be vulnerable and share what’s happened in my world, that helps me create that kind of heart to heart connection very quickly. And I’ve had so many people who come up to me afterwards and say, oh my gosh, thank you so much for sharing XYZ because I feel the same way or I’ve gone through that and and it just really helps me help them.

Diane Diaz:
Yes, the vulnerability is a great point, Michelle. I was just having that conversation this morning with someone that when you’re in that setting as a speaker, you know, in the audience, I mean, they’re there to hear you, of course, but to the extent that you’re able to open up and share your personal stories and show that vulnerability, then you make it okay for the audience to also have vulnerable, vulnerable moments and to feel like it’s a safe space, right? Because we’re all kind of in this together. It builds rapport. It builds trust. It does make people want to be connected to you and want to work with you. So how have you. And so for the audience listening, Michelle graduated from our Thought Leader Academy back in February of 2022. So it’s been a while, but it has. How has. Well, let’s start first with how did you come to want to be part of Thought Leader Academy? What brought you into that? Did you have a certain goal? What was your what was your thought process and goals for that?

Michelle Massman:
Honestly, a couple of interesting things. One, obviously the pandemic, because during the pandemic, I mean, prior to that, I a big part of what I was doing was working with the music group. So in 2020, we canceled 90 concerts. So it was it was a huge shift. And so during that time, I did start taking a couple different classes. I started learning about creating online courses. I started learning about a variety of things, but one of the things I came across, Carole Cox and I came across all of your wonderful work, and it really struck me that this was a time for me to kind of get deeper into some of that, because I was being asked to do a lot of virtual speaking at that time, and I was being asked to talk to groups of business owners and trying to help them adapt and figure out where to go next. In this whole process of how do we get through all of this? And so that’s how I jumped in and it was a fantastic experience. I wanted to hone my message a little bit more. I wanted to I really also wanted to get a little deeper into what I really wanted to say, what what was really important for me to tell people and to help people with, because there are so many topics that people have asked me to speak about, and I can talk about quite a few things.

Michelle Massman:
I actually love to talk, but I really wanted to get a little deeper into what I wanted to share, what my message was, because I’m also not a spring chicken anymore. Um, you know, so I found that I love working with women who are in their 40s, 50s and beyond who are maybe adapting from one business to another business or, you know, building something new in their in their career or learning how to go out and present. But I love working with people that are in that age group because I’m I’m in that age group and I’m launching new businesses. I’m 58, so we’ve got a lot to accomplish. And so I think that the The Thought Leader Academy really helped me focus in on the topics and the points that were so important to me, and then gave me some great new techniques and tips on how to do that better. So I’m forever grateful to you and Carol and everybody who was in my cohort of that course to really, you know, help me figure that out.

Diane Diaz:
Oh, well, thank you for the kind words, Michelle, and I’m so glad that you found it valuable, because I think probably the biggest thing that I feel comes from, well, maybe two things that are the biggest things that come from the Thought Leader Academy, or at least what we hear from from the graduates is that, number one, the clarity of the message which you you touched on because we know what our topic is and we generally we know what we want to speak about, and we know there’s something there, but we’re not quite sure how to make it resonate with the audience and how to get really clear on how to say it right. And so I love that about that. Like the clarity element that comes through after working in the group, working on your talk, creating your talk, and then getting feedback and all of that, you get so much more clarity, but also the confidence of knowing that that message is going to resonate with the audience and that the audience does care about your story. Your story has to be part of that message. It’s not enough to just share some tips or something with them that’s great, but they need to know your personal connection to the. Why are you telling them this? What is your personal connection to it? What things have you experienced, have happened to you? Have happened for you? All of that. What is your personal tie to that message? Why does it matter to you that resonates with the audience too? So I loved hearing that you were able to get that out of thought Leader Academy and then incorporate that into your speaking.

Michelle Massman:
Well, you know that that was it was such a great experience. And I’ve continued to go back to my binder. I have a binder of all of my notes and things like that. I’ve continued to go back to that multiple times, and if you don’t mind, I’ll share with you really quickly the three themes that I have really found that I’ve been working on most lately in my speaking and in my consulting work. One is from Stuck to Unstoppable, and that is the process I’ve been using with my clients for years, and that I use myself for how I get unstuck when I get in that mode. And believe me, it still happens all the time. I sometimes deal with imposter syndrome or More perfectionism or all the different things, right? I just did I just created an ebook for From Stuck to Unstoppable, because my clients had asked me if I would do that so that they would have something they could kind of go through. So I created that and I decided, okay, I’m putting it out there for anybody who wants to use it. I literally priced it at $4.99, which a bunch of my friends said, are you crazy? I said, no, I just want people to be able to get help. And so I deal with those things myself, and I’ve got lots of stories there. And then the second one is called It’s All in the Approach, and this one came about a couple of years ago. I say it to people all the time.

Michelle Massman:
It’s all in the approach, and we have to think about what our approach is. And the very first example that I give to people is in the music group. Um, we use a lot of musicians. And so we had hired a musician to work at a show, and he one day contacted Sean and I by text and said, hey, just wanted to let you know that I got offered to perform with another group on the same day as your show a week later, and it’s a group I’ve always wanted to work with, so I’m going to do that gig. Sorry I can’t be there. And little did he know that obviously that means sorry. Big X goes next to your name and we’re never going to hire you again. And like I told Sean, if he had approached it slightly differently, all he would have had to do is come to us and say, I have this great opportunity. I’d love to take advantage of it if I can, but you’re my first priority. If we can find a sub for me, then would it be okay if I take this other gig 95% of the time? We can always find a sub. But he didn’t approach it that way, and that means that he’ll never have another opportunity with us. So I like to talk to people about our approach, how we approach things, how we communicate. And then the third one is passion to profit. And I mentioned that before with the culinary studio.

Michelle Massman:
I was trying to find cooking classes for two years. Could not find any in my area. Couldn’t get into any even 90 miles away because they were full all the time. So finally one day I woke up and thought, this is crazy, I’m an event producer. I’m just going to do it myself. So I started looking around and discovered that there’s a woman who teaches culinary at our local high school and has taken the culinary team there to nationals 18 years in a row, and she’s a great chef. So I contacted her out of the blue, said, would you be interested in teaching a couple of private classes? She said, yes, we did them. They were fantastic. Everybody wanted more. As I got to know her a little better, I found out she was planning to retire from teaching and wanted to keep doing cooking classes. And so we kept a conversation going and boom, here we are now we’re launching a new company. But the key to that was that it was me as an entrepreneur building what I wanted. But then I also went out and did all of the market research to make sure that this was a good idea. And so that’s one of the things that I’m talking to people about now as well is, yes, entrepreneurs build what we want. You want to do something you’re passionate about, but you also want to make sure that there’s a market fit before you jump in.

Diane Diaz:
Oh my God, Michelle, I love all of this so much. First of all, just to the point of how you’ve named each of those things, it’s sort of like you’re what we would call your framework or, you know, the way you think about the thing that you do, right? And so you are packaging it up with a name. Such clarity also makes it easy to talk about. And in telling me that you’ve shared your personal connection to why you did the thing right. And so I think audiences are really going to resonate with that, because there’s going to have been a time when they experienced something where it’s like, well, I could just solve this problem myself because I had xyz happen to me, right? Like, let me just find the solution. So I think they’ll really resonate. I also love, I can see from all the stories that you’ve shared, you are the type of person that Is not. You’re not only going to just figure out the solution and create the solution on your own, but you’re also going to partner with the right people, right? Because you partnered with the musician, you’ve partnered with the the culinary expert, you’ve partnered with people and then taken that and now building upon it to get to that next level. But based on your personal story. So that is fantastic. So I think all of these things make for incredible talks. So I’d love to see that you’re you’re giving talks. And so what is what is your speaking been like since your time in the Thought Leader Academy. Have you been speaking a lot like on what topics. What has that? How has that gone?

Michelle Massman:
You know, it’s been great actually. I have done more speaking, and I’ve just recently spoke at a women’s entrepreneurship conference that I just loved. And so I’m, I’m making more time in my schedule to do speaking. That has been an issue for a while, so I’m actually making more time to do that. And I’m also really enjoying going out and speaking with Sean, my business partner in the music industry, because we’ve also been talking about partnership. And as you mentioned, yes, partnership is huge to me. Finding the right people to connect with and to bring into your world is so crucial to our success, no matter what you do. And so I feel like when I found Sean, when we found each other, it was kindred spirits. And we’ve worked well together for 20 years now. That’s not to say that it’s, you know, all Disney with like, you know, the happy little animals. Um, you know, we’ve had our problems too and figured out how to deal with them. And so I really enjoy speaking with him as well about business partnerships and whether it’s a formal partnership like ours or it’s the people you’re connecting with, how do you maintain those relationships and how do you work through those things? Because that’s really important. And now that we’re speaking about that, we have a lot of people coming to us after our presentation saying that was helpful. I’ve been having problems with my business partner. We’ve had some stumbling blocks. Now I think I have a better idea of how to make this work.

Diane Diaz:
Yes. Well that’s great. So when you. So to our audience and Michelle’s example, when you’re getting feedback from your audience saying, oh my gosh, that was so helpful. Oh my gosh, I’ve been dealing with the same thing. Thank you for speaking on this topic. I now I have some solutions. Now you know that your message is resonating and that means get out there and start giving that message more to more groups of people, because it’s definitely hitting a hot button issue that people care about. But you can’t get that feedback until you put the talk out there. Right? And start telling those stories and start getting the feedback from the audience so that you can know how it’s landing. So I love that. I also would say to anybody in the audience of this podcast, listening, thinking that you necessarily have to just speak on your own. You don’t. Obviously, you could partner up with someone and then turn that into a talk that you then bring that message and stories from both of you that can resonate with the audience. So maybe that would help anybody who’s struggling with sort of that fear of public speaking is to partner up with someone. Obviously, they have to be a good fit in some sort of a, you know, the ideas have to kind of mesh together. But I think that that could help some people get over that hump of the speaking. Right. The fear of speaking.

Michelle Massman:
Absolutely, absolutely. I think and and it’s nice to have somebody to play off of when you’re, you know, when you’re doing that. And so I definitely encourage people to do that. And I’ve also partnered on presentations with other people, especially when we’re doing virtual presentations now. It’s great to be able to pull a couple of other people in and be able to play off each other while you’re doing that. So I absolutely agree.

Diane Diaz:
Yes. And Michelle, how how tell me a little bit about like the story, the stories that you share in your talks. Are they personal? Like what what sort of form do they take. What is the storytelling like when you’re giving these talks, you know, newer ones or ones that you’ve given in the past. How how much of your story do you share?

Michelle Massman:
Uh, I would say a lot. I like I.

Diane Diaz:
Said, I want to hear.

Michelle Massman:
I have become more and more vulnerable over the years, more willing to talk about things. And so, just to give you an idea, as I mentioned before in the music group, when Sean and I talk to people, we talk about going through the embezzlement issue with with his former partner in the music group, and it was a three year trial. I mean, it was it was insane. So so we talk about all the different things that happened in that and we answer people’s questions. For myself, I talk I definitely give the example of three years being into my business and going through massive anxiety attacks, panic attacks, depression. And this was back in the early 90s when people didn’t talk about that. And so I share about that. I share about the fact that I shared about that back then in a newspaper article, uh, that a friend was writing. And because I was made the front page of the paper talking about anxiety when it wasn’t a normal topic. Um, I had one of the the strangest things in my life happen to me because I had a woman who was a sponsor for one of our events, and she left a voicemail for me one day, but she didn’t hang up the phone when she was done with her message.

Michelle Massman:
And I got to listen to the next five minutes of her conversation with the person in her office. And it was all about me. It was all about what I had said about going through depression and anxiety, and how she thought that was going to hurt my business and how, I mean, it was very, very negative. It was it was brutal. And so I talk about that experience and what I did about it and how what the lessons I learned. And it’s interesting because as kind of an aside, I’ve also discovered in talking to people who are booking speakers and when they’re thinking about booking me, I start to tell them the beginning of one of the stories that I use in my presentation, but I stop and don’t tell them the end and say, yeah, so I, I talk about the rest of this and how it turned out in my presentation. You’d be surprised how many of those people have said, if I book you, will you tell me the end of the story?

Diane Diaz:
They really want to know, like, how did this come? How did it end? What happened? Yeah. No, I remember that story. And, you know, that’s the type of thing that you’re right. I mean, back in that time, we didn’t talk about anxiety or mental health issues. We just did not talk about those things. So sharing it is very vulnerable. But whatever happened with her not hanging up the phone and you hearing that, that’s terrible. But the audience that hears that story, I think even if they don’t say it out loud inside, they’re thinking, oh gosh, thank God I’m not the only person struggling with this, right? Thank God I’m not the only person who, because I’m sure so many business owners are sitting at home at some point in their business ownership feeling scared, you know, not heard. They can’t say anything to anybody. They’re panicked. They’re anxious, they don’t. They don’t know where to turn. And so you’re sort of giving permission by sharing that story to them, to then feel that way and feel like you’re not alone and you’re not crazy. Right? This is normal and it’s okay. So you’re you’re sort of helping so many people by sharing that story.

Michelle Massman:
Well, and, and it’s part of what I want to do when I’m talking to people, especially when I’m talking to entrepreneurs, when I’m talking to women, like I said, who are in their 40s, 50s kind of unsure or thinking about what they want to do next or, or they know what they want to do next and they’re just trying to, you know, kind of get the confidence to take the leap. And I, I want to be there to support those people, and I want them to feel like they’re not alone, because if we feel like we’ve got support, we’re much more likely to take action. And that’s what I’m all about. I want people to take action, and I want to try to support them. And so I do love it when they come up to me afterward and say, oh my gosh, I for a while I thought I was the only person feeling that way. And it might be that I’m the first person that they feel comfortable saying that out loud to, because we don’t know each other. We’re not friends. But I’ve become friends with a lot of those people, and I’ve worked with a lot of them, and that just makes me so happy.

Diane Diaz:
Oh, I’m sure you know. And I say this to clients and I’ve said this to groups as well. Is that as scared as you might be to share a vulnerable story, think about what happens by not telling that story and how other people stay stuck, stay scared, you know, maybe. And especially women, right? Play small because it’s not okay to feel that way. It’s not that’s not very business like or whatever we say about that. So when we don’t tell our personal stories, we’re actually we’re actually sort of holding back and not helping the whatever it is that we want to champion the cause or the issue or the problem or this whatever, we aren’t helping. Right. And so I think we’re actually doing a disservice when we hold that stuff back, because other people then can’t sort of get something to kind of latch onto and say, oh, thank goodness, not just me or oh, now I have the answer to that question that I had because she shared her story. Right. So I think we actually we actually sort of have collective struggle when we all stay closed up and don’t share our stories, whereas if we open up, we can all collectively work through things. And so it’s so beneficial and it can be vulnerable. So I you know, Carol talks about that idea of the vulnerability hangover where you share something. Then the next day you’re like, oh, should I have shared that much? Maybe that was too much. But I really think and as she says, just like a real hangover, it will pass, right? That feeling will pass. But I think there really is so much, uh, healing and growth in us sharing our stories. And to anyone listening, if you have an idea for a talk or if you’re working on a talk or and you’re wondering, I don’t really want to share my story. Or should my story be part of that? Please, please, please consider being vulnerable and sharing that story because you have no idea the amount of impact that that’s going to have. And I will tell you, it is tremendous for sure.

Michelle Massman:
And I think that the other thing that’s really important for me, and I think for others, is that one of the things that takes anxiety and depression and all of those kinds of negative things away, the thing that destroys those things is when you tell your story because I, you know, and I grew up in a way where I didn’t I didn’t tell my personal, vulnerable stories, my most intimate feelings. I did not do that. And when I got older and was dealing with the depression and anxiety, I learned that the more I shared my story, the more I said out loud how I felt, the less that the anxiety and things like that had any power. And I think that that is one of the things that I think is super important about us telling our stories as well, is that it helps ourselves. I mean, the more I tell my stories and I’m vulnerable, the more it kind of reconnects me with who I am and what’s important to me and what’s not important to me. And I think that that’s another benefit to telling our stories.

Michelle Massman:
So I definitely also encourage people to tell their stories, and especially now in a time frame where it feels like our society is very polarized. And I know a lot of people who feel like they’re even afraid to talk about how they feel because of how people are going to perceive them. And I’m what I always tell people is think about the story, think about how you feel about something, and decide which layer it’s okay to share when, because there might be a layer to that story that you do only tell to your very best friends and the people that you trust. But as you kind of back it out, there are layers of that story that you can tell to anybody in the grocery store. And it’s okay. And that’s good for us to be able to identify. And that’s another thing I think that’s great about the Thought Leadership Academy is that it helps you kind of look at not only how to tell your story, but how to decide what part of your story you’re telling.

Diane Diaz:
Oh, that’s such a great point, Michelle. It’s such a good point because you’re so right. It’s that idea of, as Carol says, it’s in service to the audience, right? So what portion of that story is going to help the audience doesn’t have to be every single detail, right? So knowing what portions of it will help the audience and will sort of move the needle for them and when you’re comfortable to do it. So it’s such a great point. So thank you for sharing that. And thank you for being vulnerable and sharing your stories here today. I appreciate that and modeling what we’re talking about. Right. Um, but tell the audience what is next for you on your speaking journey. Anything coming up exciting?

Michelle Massman:
Oh, actually.

Michelle Massman:
A few things I’m already looking at speaking at a number of women’s entrepreneur conferences next year, I’d love to do even more. I have a virtual presentation tomorrow that I’m doing for a group of entrepreneurs in North Dakota on my From Stuck to Unstoppable workshop, and I love doing that. Whether I do it one on one with people or I’m doing it in small groups. Um, it’s just it’s so gratifying to see people really see where they’re going with that. So I’m I’m excited to do more speaking with Sean. And so we’re really pushing that out there as much as possible.

Diane Diaz:
Oh that’s so fun. I’d love to hear that. Good good good. Yeah. And I hope you speak at lots and lots of women’s things and inspire others to do what you’ve done, which is just say yes to things, tell their story, get their message out there. So yay for that. So tell our audience where can they connect with you online? Is there a website or you’re on certain social media?

Michelle Massman:
Yeah, absolutely. My website is my name. It’s Michelle massman.com. And if you want to learn more about from Stuck to Unstoppable it’s Michelle. Michel masson.com/unstoppable. And so it’s pretty easy. Um I love talking to people. So if anybody’s interested, they can also just email me directly at Michelle. Michelle.com and I get back to everybody. So I just hope that the audience really has found something beneficial in our conversation. And I would be happy to chat.

Diane Diaz:
Oh well, thank you so much, Michelle, and thank you for coming on the podcast. I truly appreciate it. And if you are listening to this podcast and you also want to work on digging deeper into your message, refining it, identifying those stories that you can share and then creating a talk, we can help you with that. So you can visit our website and check out the Thought Leader Academy as speaking your brand.com/academy that’s speaking your brand.com/academy. Until next time. Thanks for listening.

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