Navigating the Fine Line: Cultivating Confidence, Service-First Mindsets, and Appreciation in Business Success

Ever find yourself teetering on the tightrope between confidence and arrogance? Join me, Corey Berrier, on a journey where we uncover the secrets to building true self-assurance that fuels your climb to success. We'll be peeling back the layers of the stories we tell ourselves, focusing on how to shift from self-sabotaging narratives to empowering affirmations that celebrate our efforts and aspirations. I'll be sharing personal accounts that highlight the profound effects of daily choices on our future, and how these decisions shape our health, happiness, and professional triumphs. It's all about recognizing the power of personal discipline and commitment—your future self is counting on you to make promises you can actually keep.

This episode isn't just about introspection—it's a call to action for all business owners seeking to shift their mindset from a revenue-first to a service-first perspective. With authenticity at the helm, we navigate away from the proverbial 'sales suit of armor' towards genuine connections with both employees and customers. You'll gain insights into leveraging gratitude to cultivate resilience and empathy, and the practical steps you can take to infuse positivity into each day. We'll also discuss the critical role of appreciation in the business world, emphasizing how valuing employees and engaging with listeners can turn the gears of success. Tune in for a heartfelt blend of business wisdom and personal growth strategies that promise to redefine your path to achievement.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:56

Welcome to the Successful Life Podcast. I'm your host, corey Barrier. In today's episode, we're going to dive into the vital. The end of the day, there's a big difference between confidence and ego. So we're talking about confidence today. So this episode is going to talk about you know, how you can be more confident in your life and, in some ways that you can mitigate the lack of confidence.

Speaker 1: 1:45

And so if you think about or I want you to think about what internal narratives or stories are you telling yourself and I mean when I ask you that question, I mean both in your professional life and your personal life it could be that you're telling yourself the story of I'm a victim, everybody, nobody, can do anything right. Or my wife sucks, or she can't do anything right, or my kids are driving me up the wall, they can't do anything right. Or my kids are driving me up the wall, they can't do anything right. Or you could be telling yourself a more empowering story about how people are trying, how people are trying to get better, how your wife is doing everything that she can do with everything that's on her plate, and those are just a few examples of the both professional and personal stories that we tell ourselves. You know if you think about, if you tell yourself that you're going to be a success at this thing, likely you're right and I talk about this a lot because I do believe that your belief, your mindset, is paramount to where you're headed in life. And you know if you think about the recurring thoughts in your mind that don't serve you or your goals. It shapes the future, it shapes how you see yourself, and if you're always looking at yourself in a positive light, you're likely going to be a good person. If you always see yourself in a negative light, it's going to be kind of a challenge.

Speaker 1: 3:42

And so if you think about today's choices, am I going to eat a biscuit or a donut this morning and expect to feel good today? Am I going to eat healthy today and make healthy choices? Look, your choices today are tomorrow's successes or lack thereof. So, whatever choices that you make today, when you think about should I eat that ice cream or should I have that beer, or should I do fill in the blank? Or should I have that beer or should I do fill in the blank, just fast forward 24 hours and ask yourself would your 24-hour self thank you for making that decision? Now, look, I'm not suggesting that you're always going to make the right decision. Sometimes that donut would be pretty good, sometimes that ice cream would be pretty good, sometimes that beer would be pretty good, sometimes that ice cream would be pretty good, sometimes that beer would be pretty good.

Speaker 1: 4:45

But if this is a recurring instance in your life, this is a recurring situation. Your future self is not going to appreciate that and it's going to compound into a negative issue Like, look, sugar is a nightmare, as you all well know. I'm in recovery, so you know alcohol is, you know, tears, people's lives apart. That good time that you think you're going to have tonight is going to result in a less successful Saturday, and that's just all there is to it. Today's Friday. That's why I said Saturday.

Speaker 1: 5:23

So you know, and this is the same way in business the decisions you make today are going to determine how your business runs tomorrow, and lots of times our decisions don't necessarily reflect immediately. Again, they compound into either a greater success or potentially a greater failure, and that's just the fact of how life goes. So I would suggest today, make a commitment that tomorrow you'll thank yourself for and I don't know what that is for you, because I'm not you, but I'll give you a quick example. You know, sometimes I like to eat skinny cow ice cream sandwiches. Sometimes I get into a constant habit of eating them every day. But I have to ask myself is this going to be the best thing for me tomorrow? Am I going to get to my health goals by eating one, two, five ice cream sandwiches today? Well, the answer is probably not. Today, well, the answer is probably not. The answer is I'm probably not going to get to my health goals if I keep eating things that aren't beneficial for my body.

Speaker 1: 6:49

So you want to commit, or you want a commitment in action. You want to be able to commit to taking action on the right thing for you. And look, lots of times there's a gap in saying you're going to do something and actually doing that thing. And I can tell you from my own past experience, when I say I'm going to do something, you, from my own past experience, when I say I'm going to do something, then I don't do it. I've essentially lied to myself, not to mention anybody else that's involved. And you know, we got to think about other people. We've got to think about ourselves. We also have to think about other people. If you say you're going to do something, you should just do that thing, because we live in a world of people who say they're going to do something and then they don't do it. And you know that's a perpetual cycle that you don't want to be in. You don't want to be in a constant firefighting mode because you can't keep your promises to yourself.

Speaker 1: 8:03

And it's important to follow through with your commitments, not just say you're committed, but actually be committed. So here's a question you know are you committed to your business's success? Are you committed to, are you as committed as you need to be to win, to win as many sales as you possibly can win? And what I mean by commitment is are you doing the things that make you better in life, to make your career better? These personal and business goals, these personal and business commitments, are the same. If you have terrible personal commitments, you probably have terrible business commitments, and it's a vicious cycle that seems like it never ends. And I just have to ask yourself you know you should maybe rethink that strategy if it's not working and likely it's not if you're truly committed, I mean, you're all in you leave it all on the field when you go into that house to sell the product or service that you sell. If you are fully committed to the result, then you're going to do the work behind the scenes to make sure. And that includes your health, that includes your mental health, that includes learning, that includes improving, that includes getting better every day. You've got to get a little bit better every single day if you want to win.

Speaker 1: 10:03

So you know, I've talked to literally hundreds of business owners that have gotten themselves in these perpetual cycles of negativity or perpetual cycles of firefighting, and they had to shift their mindset. They had to change their intentions on why they're in business. You're not in business just to make a bunch of money. If that's the case, you're going to be constantly chasing the money and it's going to be miserable, and I don't want that for you. I've been there. I was focused on just the money and it just doesn't work. Some people get lucky and it works, but most of the time it doesn't work. Service works, being of service, if you're a business owner, to your employees first. Your employees are to be in service of your customers, but you've got to make sure that you keep those in order, because if you don't have great employees, you're not going to have great customers. If you don't have great customers, that money goal is not going to happen. Customers, that money goal is not going to happen.

Speaker 1: 11:30

You know, I was talking to one of my employees earlier this week which was in a slump and I just reframed how he was presenting in the home and it was as simple as this like. And I say as simple as this, simple as this like, and I say as simple as this, when he would get to the home he would change his personality, he would change how he was on a regular basis and he's a good, good guy. He's a good, easy, laid back guy in his demeanor. Outside of the house is very welcoming. Outside of the house is very welcoming. But when you put it on that sales suit of armor and you show up like a car salesman by you know, thinking that you're doing the right thing, because maybe there's pressure on you or maybe you haven't sold anything, it puts off a negative vibe because you're transforming into someone that you're not and it's really hard to be someone that you're not.

Speaker 1: 12:34

So some things that you can do to change these things that I've discussed is develop goals. You know you want to have certain goals in your business and in your personal life and strive for those things. So I understand that. You know, sometimes we get busy, sometimes we get bogged down with a lot of things that feel like it takes us away from what we're focused on. And look, focus is important. I struggle or have in the past for sure struggled with focus, but when I keep present in the moment, when I focus on what's important, I focus on the people that I'm trying to help. The rest of it seems to fall into place. If I'm just focused on my goals, if I'm just focused on what I'm getting, it doesn't really work out, because then I cut everybody else out in my life. If I'm just looking at what I can do for me, I don't get very far. I got to be honest and I don't know if it's the same way for you, but it is for me and likely. I would say that is for you as much as it is for me.

Speaker 1: 14:05

There's a lot of risk and there's a lot of uncertainty in business. There's a lot of risk and uncertainty in life, in marriage, in kids. Our brains want us to try to predict the outcome of how things are going to go, but that's impossible. You can't really predict the outcome. You can try, but life happens, things happen, and you know you really want to try to navigate these things with confidence and not with ego. I mentioned that earlier. Look, confidence is not ego. Confidence just means that you have done the work, that you know, you believe in yourself and you believe in your abilities. Not that you're a superhero because you're likely not a superhero because you're likely not.

Speaker 1: 15:18

So one of the things that I've implemented recently is a gratitude list. Every morning I sit down and I write out what I'm grateful for, and sometimes those things are the same and sometimes they're different. But what it does is it puts me into a position to have success that day, opposed to waking up and thinking about all the negative things that may happen. And being grateful has been look, this has been studied Like. There's been studies after studies done. This reduces heart attack. It lowers blood pressure because you come from a place of empathy, you are willing to be grateful for what you have and not worried about what you don't, and you're not thinking about what you're going to get. You're thinking about what you have and it impacts you physically, it impacts you mentally and it gives you a mindset to be thankful, and what comes along with that is resilience. Gives you a mindset to be thankful, and what comes along with that is resilience. And you can handle anything that comes your way with resilience. If you don't project the outcome, you can handle anything that comes your way if you look at it from a place of gratitude and empathy. And empathy is how would the other person feel Better? Yet if you want to be selfish about it, look at it like well, how would I feel if this person did this to me? How would I feel, put yourself in the customer's shoes if this person did this to me? How would I feel? Put yourself in the customer's shoes If you are selling home services meaning HVAC, plumbing or electrical you got to think about that.

Speaker 1: 17:15

Customer is stressed out. They don't know how much it's going to cost. This is an unexpected expense that they didn't anticipate, and maybe they don't have the funds to cover it. Maybe they don't have $15,000 or $20,000 to drop on a new system. But that's all they're thinking about is how am I going to keep my family cool and I don't have $15,000 or $20,000. So you've got to provide them with an opportunity to use financing. That's how you solve that problem and if you think about if you can put yourself in that customer's shoes, that's what you would want.

Speaker 1: 17:56

If you didn't have $15,000 or $20,000 and your family was burning up in 95-degree weather, didn't have $15,000 or $20,000 and your family was burning up in 95-degree weather, you would want that field supervisor or that salesperson to give you options of how you can keep your family cool. And that's all we're here to do. We're just here to provide options for the customer's benefit. You're not there to sell a product or a service. You're not there to, you know, run the bill up as high as you can. You're there to provide value, and value in this situation means that you're giving them options to finance. You're not.

Speaker 1: 18:40

You know you don't pay their credit card payment, so don't think about oh, I don't want to run their credit up. That's none of your business. You provide them options and allow them to come to their own conclusions. Allow them to make the decision of what's best for their family. You can't make that decision. It's none of your business how they spend their money. It's none of your business how they spend their money. It's none of your business how much money is in their bank account. You don't know that anyway.

Speaker 1: 19:08

So when you go into a house and you think, well, this guy lives in a $125,000 house with the grass up to my knees when I walk up to the house, he has no money. Maybe he just hates mowing grass, maybe he's single and he's allergic to grass, and maybe he just doesn't care about mowing his grass. All of those things could be the case, but you don't know that. And so you know you don't want to judge a book by its cover. Lots of times it may fit the narrative that you're thinking, but some of the times, or a lot of times, that it does not. And so you want to go into the home fresh. You want to go into the home with gratitude. You should be grateful that they called you out to provide an estimate. Not, oh man, I'm probably the third or fourth estimate. I saw that other guy leave. They're probably going to provide an estimate. Not, oh man, I'm probably the third or fourth estimate. I saw that other guy leave. They're probably going to buy from him.

Speaker 1: 20:07

Stop all those stories in your mind because they're not serving you. You're going down a road that's a dead end, and look if you show up differently. If you show up, not like a salesperson, you're going to be more successful. Your goal is to serve the customer first and you will make money. But if your goal is just to make money, you will continue to hit zeros and that's just all there is to it. It is a statistical fact that if your goal is to go in and sell, sell, sell, you're going to fail, fail, fail.

Speaker 1: 20:52

I appreciate you guys. Do me a favor If you enjoyed this episode, share it on social media. I'll post it later on today. Social media. I'll post it later on today. Also, if you could leave me a five-star review if you enjoyed this, if you got some value out of today and that was my whole goal is to give you value in this podcast I want you to take this information and use it in your life. Use it in your business, because I do want you to be successful.

Speaker 1: 21:26

At the end of the day, there's a ton of business out there. You don't need it all. I don't need it all, but I'm going to work damn hard to get my part of it by showing up differently, by being grateful, by doing what I say I'm going to do and by providing a product and a service that's better than everybody else with options. And business owners listen your employees are the most important thing that you've got. Without those employees, you can't be successful. You cannot run a business, a successful business, without employees, especially in the trades. So I appreciate you guys listening, I appreciate you guys giving me feedback. It really does mean a lot. So have a killer week, have a killer weekend and we'll see you next Friday.