Diana Alt [00:00:04]:
Hey, Diana Alt here. And this is Work Should Feel Good, the podcast where your career growth meets your real life. Each week I share stories, strategies, and mindset shifts to help you build a work life that works for you on your terms. Hello and welcome to Work Should Feel Good, the show where your career growth meets your real life. I'm your host, Diana Alt, and today my guest Ryan Holk and I are going to talk all about how to use your stories to build a brand that creates trust between you and your leads, clients, and potential employers. For those of you that are not in entrepreneur land, where Ryan and I hang out, Ryan is a speaker, author, marketer, and a brand messaging strategist with over 20 years in the marketing game. He specializes in helping brands identify those unique stories, simplify their messaging, and strategically deliver that message online and in person. Welcome to the show, Ryan.

Ryan Holck [00:01:10]:
Thank you so much, Diana.

Diana Alt [00:01:11]:
I'm so glad you could be here.

Ryan Holck [00:01:13]:
So am I. We've chatted so many times that it's nice to, I know, do this kind of in an almost formal way.

Diana Alt [00:01:23]:
I love that because basically you're an easy sell to get on podcast because it's like, what are we going to talk about? Same crap we talk about when we're not being recorded.

Ryan Holck [00:01:32]:
Right.

Diana Alt [00:01:32]:
Only we'll try to make it make more sense for the people that are listening. So I want to start with a place you might not expect me to go.

Ryan Holck [00:01:41]:
Okay.

Diana Alt [00:01:42]:
The tuck shop.

Ryan Holck [00:01:44]:
Wow. Okay.

Diana Alt [00:01:46]:
So your. Your family, is it your family or Deb's family?

Ryan Holck [00:01:49]:
It's Debbie's family.

Diana Alt [00:01:51]:
Yeah. See, wife Debbie's family has had this tuck shop for a million years, through the age of like David's Bridal and all the things. And you recently acquired it from. From the. The older, the elder generation.

Ryan Holck [00:02:07]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:02:07]:
So what I'd love to know is you've worked in marketing for 20 years, but it hits different when it's not an online business or knowledge business that you want anymore. What are a couple of things that you figured out about marketing since you guys bought the tuck shop?

Ryan Holck [00:02:27]:
Okay. So the biggest thing was that while the principles are similar, the application has to adjust a bit. And where I saw it the most was really came down to for the type of business we have are we predominantly serve people that are in a couple life stages. Like they're getting married, there is a death in the family. So they need a suit for a rental, for a service of some sort, or it's like Quince Proms, something that has for students, like a special life. And so what we found was, first of all, it was really hard to outspend the big market guys like Men's Wearhouse, those kind of people, Macy's, you know, who were like doing lots of volume. And so what we really discovered, and this is, this is what I keep taking away with a lot of my clients, is the importance of micro targeting and knowing details about your audience that a someone who's a big box vendor would not even be paying attention to. So thinking about all the intricacies of who you serve and then finding ways to get your ads in front of those micro groups, for instance, we started getting super creative.

Ryan Holck [00:03:55]:
Like if we want high school students to show up and rent prom and formal or even keensay from us, where do those people reside? They reside at baseball games, football games, anything school related. So we, so we went to the local ESPN radio station and said, can we sponsor the two hour show you do for all the local teams every week?

Diana Alt [00:04:24]:
Stop. That is brilliant.

Ryan Holck [00:04:27]:
And so, and to be honest, I didn't come up with that. One of our business partners did. And he's like, I think this is what we need to do. And I'm like, man, I know that's the right audience, but that just feels like a long play. Well, it worked because it repetitively put it in front of those parents who if their kids were playing, it also meant that they were in the income bracket. That.

Diana Alt [00:04:52]:
Right.

Ryan Holck [00:04:52]:
Meant they had expendable.

Diana Alt [00:04:55]:
They were gonna do those activities. They weren't sitting home from prom because there was no prom money.

Ryan Holck [00:05:00]:
Yes, exactly. So, so they, it fit a couple places. But it got me realizing then, okay, how would I put that online and how would I do that with. If I was gonna run ads someplace, if I was gonna run on Google or Facebook or whatever. And really getting super strategic about I gotta know this audience like at a deep level and just ask better questions about who I wanna serve and where I might find them.

Diana Alt [00:05:27]:
It's really nice too. Cause word of mouth is so much for that crowd. So if you get in front of the sports are huge. So if you get in front of the sporty kids and their parents, the sporty kids start telling their non sporty friends that they're doing the thing.

Ryan Holck [00:05:42]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:05:43]:
Or the sporty parents start telling the non sporty parents, oh, like we do not have to go back to David's this year. Like, right. It's so horrible when Johnny went to prom two years ago, like, we need to go to this place instead. So, so very cool.

Ryan Holck [00:05:58]:
And then the other thing was, we Discovered that what the buying timeline was for people, like how long it took them to work through the buying cycle and it is ridiculously small. And so we started making, we started making like kids don't decide sometimes they're going to prom until three weeks before the event.

Diana Alt [00:06:20]:
Right.

Ryan Holck [00:06:20]:
Okay. So some of the schools weren't selling tickets until two weeks before the event. So we started getting super creative of what are offers that we could make creatively to get those people in front of us that were last minute kind of offers. If you do it within seven days you get this kind of pricing. If you do it in the last five days, you get a different kind of pricing. And just getting super creative of. Okay, we found where to talk to you now. Let's figure out what actually gets you to take action.

Diana Alt [00:06:51]:
Yeah. And my favorite thing that you're talking about there that especially when you think about the high schools that don't sell prom tickets till a couple weeks before prom.

Ryan Holck [00:07:01]:
Yeah.

Diana Alt [00:07:01]:
What really get that drives home for me is this principle that our mutual friend Liz Wilcox talks about all the time in her email marketing membership which is people don't buy from you when you're ready to sell. They buy from you when they need to buy. So by organizing things around that boom winning what kind of results have you seen since you added some of these tactics to the shop?

Ryan Holck [00:07:31]:
So the when we took over the store, part of why we took over it was to that that my wife's family was ready to retire. And part of it was that there had been a manager who had not done a great job of managing the previous two years. And so sales were on the decline. And so what it allowed us to do was in year one to immediately within two months stop the decline of sales and begin to build traction back towards hey, we are the place, we do have the service once again that your brothers remember when they came two years ago, your family and. And really restoring some of that trust because honestly in some ways we had lost trust with existing customers who had had great experiences at one time but had poor experiences in the previous couple years.

Diana Alt [00:08:33]:
Yeah, you talk about this. I think the verbiage I've seen hit my inbox because I'm on your email list is trust recession.

Ryan Holck [00:08:43]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:08:44]:
So let's get into it because you kind of, you kind of open the door.

Ryan Holck [00:08:48]:
Yeah.

Diana Alt [00:08:49]:
So let's hear a little bit about what is the trust recession, why is it happening and what have you seen that's different about it over the last couple years?

Ryan Holck [00:09:00]:
So the trust recession is really the Fact that, I mean, think about your inbox. Think about what happens when you turn on Hulu or Netflix and the volume of content that's coming at you, even scrolling LinkedIn, that does it for me sometimes where I'm like, there is so much to take in. I am. The volume is just overwhelming and, and it's really difficult with the sheer volume. But also if you start actually looking at some of the content, you go, I'm not sure that I actually believe that this person even believes what they're saying. And so there's this kind of disconnect between overlord, believe your own. Yes, exactly.

Diana Alt [00:09:42]:
Yeah.

Ryan Holck [00:09:44]:
So, yeah, so there's this, this disconnect. Like, I don't know if it's what they're saying or what they're not saying, but something feels off here. And as soon as you have that moment happen in the eyes of someone who's. Who you're hopefully engaging with and beginning to build relationship with online, that like becomes a roadblock where they go, I'm not sure that I trust this person. And like, they sound good, they sound like they're doing cool stuff, but I don't know that I want to spend money with them. I'll maybe grab their free resource and check it out. But I mean, how many resources have you downloaded because you thought sounded cool and you looked at them and went, I don't think this person knows what they're doing?

Diana Alt [00:10:30]:
I. Yeah, many.

Ryan Holck [00:10:32]:
Yeah.

Diana Alt [00:10:33]:
And it's even worse like, because there's the things that you actually want for your own stuff. Right. Oh, I'm trying to figure out like how to write a better offer or how to do this or that.

Ryan Holck [00:10:42]:
Right.

Diana Alt [00:10:43]:
So that's one thing. And then there's the times when you're just looking at things just to see different user experiences. And so a lot of times I do that with my own friends, like my peers in coaching, some of whom I know and some of whom I don't know. And I'll get something on the, like, I know this person's making way more money than me. How are they? Yeah, with this. This is ridiculous. So, so anyway. But I think also what people want out of their.

Diana Alt [00:11:15]:
What people want out of their like first touch or their first resource that they get from you has changed a lot in the last two years.

Ryan Holck [00:11:23]:
I think would totally agree because they.

Diana Alt [00:11:27]:
Can get whatever the hell checklist off of chat GPT now. So.

Ryan Holck [00:11:32]:
And with chat being so easy to get answers without implementation, it's even more of a reason why those who of us who want to be seen as an authority need to be filling that gap. Because, I mean, I can get a five point list, but if I don't know how to implement that list or if I'm not great at Reverse Engine, I also reverse engineer content all the time. Like, what are they doing? Why is it working? But not everyone can do that or not everyone has the time to do it. So yeah, if you can, if you can fill that gap with information that helps them go, oh, here's how I would apply it or here's how I would go to the next level, it makes it huge.

Diana Alt [00:12:17]:
It's only, even if it's only small because like my thing is if I tell you how not to do something, which that's one of the most eye catching types of, you know, trainings or freebies or whatever, if I say here are five things to not do on your resume, I'm not just going to give you what not to do. Right. There's going to be a little paragraph that clues you in a little bit on what to do. And I think as I revamp things, I'm going even a little bit farther than I did a few years ago when I initially created a freebie. But that worry that people always have of am I giving away too much content? No.

Ryan Holck [00:12:58]:
Right. And honestly, filling that gap with useful information not only makes you the authority, but it builds reciprocal trust with people. And that's really, that's where I'm seeing is as I've gotten more focused on what I'm talking about and how to help people engage in those checklists, those tasks that need to be done, that all of a sudden people are like, oh, we get it. More like then my DMs are, are getting different conversations in my DMs.

Diana Alt [00:13:29]:
Yeah, that's a really good point. Now I want to rewrite my oldest lead magnet because I haven't refreshed it in a while and this, this, this may happen soon. So we're going to dig a lot more into trust and then the concept of micro stories that you and I were talking about before. But this is a career show and I like to not just pick your brain about what advice you have for people, but I want to also understand a little bit about how you got to where you're going. So can you tell us a little bit about your career trajectory and how you went from where you started, which I'll let you share. Not me.

Ryan Holck [00:14:07]:
Yeah.

Diana Alt [00:14:07]:
Into being this online, this, this brand strategist, knowledge work person that works with both Online brands and with local businesses.

Ryan Holck [00:14:18]:
So I had no intention initially of ending up in marketing. Like I had some interest in graphic design in graphic arts, but I also was a musician and I really decided I had 10 plus years into music already and we're going to go into music. Well, it didn't take long for me to kind of go, what's your instrument?

Diana Alt [00:14:43]:
Are you involved?

Ryan Holck [00:14:44]:
I was piano performance major.

Diana Alt [00:14:47]:
Yeah, I didn't know that. I knew you were a musician, but I didn't know, you know, performance.

Ryan Holck [00:14:53]:
And, and, and really there was this moment right before our oldest was born where I realized, if I'm going to make a transition, now's the time.

Diana Alt [00:15:02]:
Yeah.

Ryan Holck [00:15:02]:
But what happened in that moment was that I kept finding myself in roles and jobs where I ended up with the, hey, can you help us market the next thing? Hey, can you make sure people actually show up to this concert? Can you make sure there's an event? Can you, we're trying to host something and you know, can you make the signs? And all of a sudden I went, okay, I've kind of landed in a marketing role by default rather than intentionality. And so when I left my kind of decided, okay, it's time to move away from music. I jumped into marketing and really jumped in both feet and just decided, I'm going to figure this out. And that led to a part time job at a nonprofit that became a full time job where I eventually ran the marketing communications department. And I was there 10 years, just over 10 years full time. So it really was this kind of back door. But what I learned in the process of serving nonprofits and eventually launching kind of my own thing was the power of telling stories well and telling stories clearly. And there was this light bulb moment where I realized, first of all, I could help more nonprofits.

Ryan Holck [00:16:22]:
But secondly, businesses, 80, 90% of what I do on a daily basis would help businesses tell their story better and it would feel less like sales and more like conversation.

Diana Alt [00:16:35]:
Yeah, that's magic because there's so many parallels between you and Mike Kim, who we both know of from this online marketing world, including the fact that he started in music.

Ryan Holck [00:16:49]:
Music.

Diana Alt [00:16:50]:
He was a church musician, but he talks a lot about marketing being the opening of a conversation. Yes. Not anything. It's not the start of a sales cycle. It's the start of a conversation that could go any number of different places. Did you start when you first started in marketing? Did you start out doing the strategy type storytelling work or were there other aspects of marketing that you were in first before you wandered into stories.

Ryan Holck [00:17:23]:
I very much started on the design and deliverables piece. I was the guy creating all the, creating the social posts, the images, building, building the websites. We were a. The non profit I was in was heavy into print media and I mean we spent hundred thousand plus a year just in print costs. And so we had a lot of. There was this, this generation of content all the time that had to go out. And then we got hit with the hey, world is becoming digital and our budget has been reduced and we got to start getting really creative of how do we do this and how do we continue to tell. We had writers who helped us write and do the storytelling.

Ryan Holck [00:18:15]:
But I kept getting in the midst of it going, I don't feel like this story is clear enough. Is there something we could do to help emphasize this? My dad was really, was a storyteller and spent some time learning even from one of the original ladies who worked at Pixar. And so some of what I learned from him by default was him coming back from events and going, hey, I heard these cool principles about story. How could we even use these in the nonprofit space? You know, how could we use these?

Diana Alt [00:18:49]:
I think it's really important because like, I think I've always done a fairly natural job of communicating through story. Like back when I was in corporate, one of the things that I would get pulled into a lot all throughout my career, but particularly in my last role at my last corporate job when I was in product management was doing trainings or explanations of new features, new products that were going to come out. I worked at an ed tech company focused on nursing education and I worked in data analytics, which if you don't do it right, is boring.

Ryan Holck [00:19:25]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:19:26]:
But if you know how to do it right, it's exciting because it makes people's lives easier. And I would get pulled in whenever it was like a few weeks or so before some product feature was going to go live that was significant enough that sales was going to have to talk about it or like the client care teams were going to have to know about it. Yeah, I would get on these calls and I would attend them just randomly too, where people were discussing stuff. And most people just had like, here's the bullet points of the feature. And I'm like, there's not a really, like, I can't explain. These people don't understand what the hell a predictive model is. Like, I can't talk about. And this was eight years ago.

Diana Alt [00:20:11]:
Like there was no chat gbt. Most people didn't think About AI was science fiction. Machine learning only happened in the IT department. Like nobody was using these terms in their day to day. But I had a product that was a predictive model on whether somebody was going to pass the nursing board exam that I was in charge of.

Ryan Holck [00:20:32]:
Wow.

Diana Alt [00:20:32]:
Right. And then I had some other things that were assessment reporting and stuff like that that just if you do it wrong does not sound sexy at all. Yep. And if you do it right, sounds like the reason to buy the thing because it was market differentiators for the company. Everybody else would come in with like their bullet points of the whatever and I would come in with like a Yoda meme. So I deliberately did my presentations mostly centered around memes. So I'd pop a meme up and then I would talk about what it was and like, are there the. And I would focus to benefits.

Diana Alt [00:21:10]:
Instead of, you know, and we're going to have pulse and it's going to do this, I would say instead, like this is going to give you this much more visibility into who's the teach. The students that are struggling. So message around that when you're selling or when you're implementing. So yeah, I think the big mistake people try to do is they try to be clever, you know, And I say that in the same. In the next breath after I said. And I put up cute memes and stuff. But I was trying to grab attention in a corporate training.

Ryan Holck [00:21:41]:
Right.

Diana Alt [00:21:42]:
A different setting. When we're talking to people that are scrolling through Facebook or they're searching five websites of the. The whatever they searched on LinkedIn to try to find you or on Google to try to find you. It's a whole different ball of wax. Look at me. Hang on. With my. Didn't do do not disturb.

Diana Alt [00:22:03]:
So I'm just gonna do that real quick. We don't need any phone calls during this. Okay. We're recording. Will I edit that out? We're good. Not even a little bit.

Ryan Holck [00:22:14]:
My dogs are losing their mind, so I keep muting myself. So yeah, fire engine rolled by. They're like, hey, if a dog is.

Diana Alt [00:22:22]:
Gonna bark and interrupt the podcast, they have to come on the podcast.

Ryan Holck [00:22:27]:
Oh, well, they're outside, so that would be a challenge.

Diana Alt [00:22:29]:
Oh, well, we don't have to worry about that. I don't bring in the lawnmower whenever the lawn mowing guy is mowing outside either. So that's not something. But yeah. So I, I think that a message that I talk to people about a lot in the, like the career, the, the personal branding and Job search for the career minded as opposed to the business owner is stop trying to be clever. Stop trying to pull out the $3 words. If I could just get every single person to not use the word utilize whenever you don't. Like, utilize has a specific definition.

Ryan Holck [00:23:07]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:23:07]:
And it is when you are using something for something different than the initial, like the original intended purpose, I.e. when you use utilize. If it's just like, I'm going to use my stove to cook food, don't say, I'm utilizing my stove to cook food.

Ryan Holck [00:23:25]:
Right.

Diana Alt [00:23:25]:
So there's a whole lot of like, let's drive out the ridiculous nonsense words. Let's drive out trying to be clever. Let's get clear on what you're even talking about. And then if you come up with something that sounds cool and still is clear, awesome.

Ryan Holck [00:23:40]:
Even better. Yeah, yeah. Like, work should feel good. Okay. It's clear and it works. And I honestly have come back to that, that statement a couple times recently. Like, that is so concise, but it makes it very obvious, very evident to the reader. And that's really what we got to.

Diana Alt [00:24:01]:
Be going to think about it too. When I first came up with that, the, the origin of that was I put my first Facebook page up for my business in like 2019. And then I was like, I need a co, I need a cover. And I'm. I don't have branding. I didn't have any of my, like typography, logos, any of that stuff that I have right now. But I went and I figured out Canva on the free thing for the first time and I found a background and then I put white letters on it that said work should feel good. And I had that.

Diana Alt [00:24:34]:
And some people said it was cool, but I couldn't even explain what I meant yet. At the time, I had so much to do because at the time I wasn't really. I hadn't really. I had coached for a long time, but I hadn't built a business yet. And I was at the start of building a business. And if I had been clear on it, this might have just been the business brand. Now it's a podcast, but right over time. And I remember when our friend Terry Weaver, who were in his mastermind together, he said, no one's ever going to buy that.

Diana Alt [00:25:09]:
It doesn't mean anything. Like, it sounds cool as a phrase, but this has no legs because you don't even know how the heck to talk about it. And then a few years later, after we'd worked together, he's like, I really Think you need to bring that back in. I think that that's the thing. Like, he started throwing those words at me whenever we would be working on stuff, so. And now it's the podcast name.

Ryan Holck [00:25:32]:
So the. The interesting part of that, though, is, and this is something I think for your listeners to think through is in the process of finding clarity about what you do and how you want to talk about it, that sometimes there is a cyclical process where you will. You'll have an idea and you feel like, I don't feel like I can articulate this yet.

Diana Alt [00:25:57]:
Yes.

Ryan Holck [00:25:58]:
And. But six months, a year later, all of a sudden you go, oh, I was fiddling around with this idea before. Let's go find the Google notes. Let's go find the. Yes, I went back. Go ahead. I went back recently to find something in a search on my computer, and I found notes from nine years ago that almost was the exact same outline I had just written for something. I'm like, the title was different, the context, but I was like, the idea hasn't changed.

Ryan Holck [00:26:29]:
Like, the only thing that has is how much clearer I am now to articulate the gaps, to help explain someone.

Diana Alt [00:26:36]:
There's a thing in that cycle that I think is really important, and for the people that are, you know, for the listener here, that is not a marketer. They don't consider themselves a marketer, even though I think to a degree, every human on earth is a marketer. Yep. But they are not thinking about that because they're like, I don't have a business. I don't want a business. I want to. I like being on a team. I like being in a company.

Diana Alt [00:27:00]:
Like, how the hell does this apply to me? One of the biggest mistakes I see with people that are either trying to make a career pivot or they are in a job search is that they want to wait until they have the message perfect to talk to anybody about it. And so, y', all, I'm going to tell you how to deal with this. If you have ever felt that way. So, number one, the most important thing to realize is that you can't do, like, cast a wide net. Like, that doesn't work at all. See also the part that Ryan said about, like, micro niching and understanding the people. However, you don't have to have everything perfect either. So if all, you know, whenever you're planning, say, a career pivot is, I used to be a project manager for software projects in a SaaS company, and I like some of the skills, but I'm getting bored with constantly Working on releases of, you know, software releases.

Diana Alt [00:28:01]:
I want to do something else you can easily distill down. What am I great at in that process? I'm great at managing organizational change and I'm great at talking cross functionally. Awesome. I'm great at getting people that don't want to talk to each other to talk to each other. Awesome. If you have things like that, which you never search indeed for the skill. Like, no, no recruiter is ever going to search on LinkedIn for who can get people to talk to each other that don't want to talk to each other. But you can, you can talk to the people that are closer to you.

Diana Alt [00:28:34]:
So the boss that you had a few years ago and say, look, here's where. Here's where I'm thinking of going. Here's where I feel like I was good. Number one, agree or disagree. Yes, you agree. What are some other options? And you can use the basics of the information to go talk to people and crystallize your thoughts. And that's how you get to something that sounds as clear as work should feel good, or whatever your tuck shop is doing. So cool.

Diana Alt [00:29:03]:
Anyway, I had to do a diatribe there for a minute. It's important.

Ryan Holck [00:29:06]:
No, but I think, I think that is so much part of the process. And it's. There is this, at least with the businesses that I have served, there is this sense that this should be easy and we should just like, in 15 minutes together have this figured out. And that is. That's just not how any of us work. No, I mean, there, there's a reason why Chick Fil A doesn't say you're welcome. Okay. But it took them years to get their entire team across all their stores to know what the new language was, to be able, you know, articulate it.

Ryan Holck [00:29:49]:
So when you said thank you, they had their little phrase that at this moment is blanking my mind. But my pleasure. Thank you.

Diana Alt [00:29:55]:
My pleasure.

Ryan Holck [00:29:56]:
So. But it, like they were intentional, but so sometimes don't be afraid of the fact that it's going to take process. Like, just it's okay. And it may take you articulation and you may have to find a friend that you can go. Is this clear? Does this make sense?

Diana Alt [00:30:12]:
Yeah. Also go find the friend that'll actually tell you, because a lot of people, a lot of people put this in front of people and their friends will say it's great when it's not great. And there's two reasons that happens. Number one, they don't want to hurt your feelings. Number two, they are not qualified to tell you if it's great or not. So that's really important. Speaking of that, go into. I love this question and I'm going to read it exactly how I wrote it down this morning when I was making the kind of outline for this.

Diana Alt [00:30:49]:
What do people get terribly, terribly wrong about branding their business or themselves? If it's more of a personal brand situation or an employee leader type situation.

Ryan Holck [00:31:07]:
The more I talk, the more they'll understand and like me.

Diana Alt [00:31:11]:
That's really like the opposite.

Ryan Holck [00:31:13]:
Isn't is. It is the opposite, but that is we have such an ingrained sense that the way I make sure people know about me is to put myself out there at volume. But volume tends to bring fog to the conversation.

Diana Alt [00:31:37]:
Tell me more about volume because, like, I may be thinking about it of a different way. So when you say they're, they're out there at volume and it isn't working, what exactly does that mean? So there's another way that I think about it that I think is effective. So I want to hear yours.

Ryan Holck [00:31:54]:
And that's great because volume is, is definitely has multiple explanations. When I'm saying volume, I'm thinking there is this. As long as I keep talking, people will keep caring. Like, I'm just, I'm just churning lots and lots as opposed to a, a loud pitch of something very specific. It's.

Diana Alt [00:32:17]:
It's frequent. That's how I think of volume is frequency. Because like there's when the thing that I, A lot of people that I work with struggle with, especially if they're trying to start building a personal brand, which is pretty much mandatory in a lot of knowledge work. If you're a VP in tech and you don't have an LLC at this point, it's weird that you wouldn't be able to do micro consulting on the side, which means you have a personal brand or you have to be building a personal brand. So the thing that I see is that people constantly think that they're. The words that they're saying have to be completely novel. Like if they aren't innovating and changing the industry, that somehow they shouldn't be speaking at all. Now if you're trying to build a SaaS platform that you want to turn into a unicorn that needs to innovate, like, don't just build Salesforce.

Diana Alt [00:33:16]:
Again, literally, no one wants that. No one wants that. But if you're a marketing services person, you know, if you're a, like, I know a lot of people that are in L and D Consulting, learning and development consulting. The world needs a lot of those people, so you don't have to be innovating perfectly. The other thing is they think they always have to say something new. So even if they've accepted that I don't need to be in an innovative space, they feel like they have to say something new every time they speak. And I like to go back to elementary school. When I was in fourth, third grade, they made me learn my times tables, ones through 12s.

Diana Alt [00:34:00]:
And then I got in fourth grade and those bastards turned right back around and made me learn the times tables again, 1 through 12. And there's arguments about rote memorization. Is it good or bad? Like, I'm not a teacher. I don't know what school is doing right now, but I know the repetition helps people learn. It's the reason why, like, everyone knows, everyone in America, I think, at least knows about Coca Cola. It's cola flavored, it's cold, it's refreshing. They still pump zillions of dollars a year into advertising so that people remember that Coke is it. Yep.

Diana Alt [00:34:41]:
So anyhow, so they just, I see people be quiet. So they just don't say anything because they're afraid they're not innovative enough.

Ryan Holck [00:34:54]:
So, and, and part of that, part of that, I think, is an internal challenge for people because I, I would agree you don't have to be innovative, but you do need to find what helps you stand out. Like, what is it like your, your memes in meetings for me is like a great representation of that. Like, a lot of your day is done doing tasks that other people do. But what makes, what you recognize was the way I can stand out and get people to remember this dang information is if I deliver it creatively.

Diana Alt [00:35:35]:
Yep.

Ryan Holck [00:35:36]:
And so it's not just clear, you know, and we aren't getting overly clever. We're actually being creative and presenting it in a way that it's going to make people go, oh, after the meeting, I remember we saw a funny meme. Oh, I actually remember that point because it was connected to a funny meme. And so sometimes even as we're trying to figure out our, our own story and how we going to talk about branding ourselves as an individual or how do we make ourselves sound different than the other IT professional who was just interviewed right before us is just coming up with, you know, what is it that I stand out? You know, how do I stand out? How do I just make myself be known? It isn't that I do 150 different things. This Isn't the circus where I've got to, you know, juggle while doing a job? Like, but how do I stand out? How do I make sure I get seen?

Diana Alt [00:36:29]:
Yeah. I think standing out and visibility are the new name of all games.

Ryan Holck [00:36:34]:
Yep.

Diana Alt [00:36:34]:
And another thing that occurs to me that is a mistake people don't. People make a lot in my realm. I don't know if you see it as often when you're working with business owners is they are deathly afraid of being rejected. Like, they don't understand that the purpose of a brand or the purpose of targeting in a job search. Like, however, we're saying this thing is that you pull in the right people while you are repelling the wrong people. And there's nothing good or bad about any of that. But it's like, why am I wasting my time on the yahoos that have the job that I don't want? Like, let's make it clear that we're not for each other so that I can pay more attention to the opportunities I do want.

Ryan Holck [00:37:23]:
Yep.

Diana Alt [00:37:24]:
And do you see that as much? Do you see the same problem when you're working with business owners on branding stories?

Ryan Holck [00:37:31]:
Yes. Because there is the sense that we can serve everyone, we can do everything for all people, and we want to talk to everyone. And so we end up spending a lot of time and resources creating content, creating ad campaigns, creating information deliverables for people that are so far on the margins that the chances of them ever making a buying decision with us or are really minimal rather than, you know, on a bell curve. We're aiming on the outside rather than the middle, where the majority of people lie. And so part of that, you know, I helped somebody in the solar industry for a while, and they were all about help figuring out, how are we going to talk to these people in the margins. And I'm like, just talk better to the people in the center. And you would fix your problems.

Diana Alt [00:38:22]:
Right.

Ryan Holck [00:38:23]:
But it was really hard because they're like, we want to help everyone. Which, I mean, I came out of nonprofit space. I understand you want to help as many people as possible, but you also are uniquely designed to be able to best help a specific group of people. So figure out who they are and what they need and do that at scale.

Diana Alt [00:38:44]:
Yeah. One of the things I found really useful, and I had two different people that knew some personal branding and marketing stuff say it about the same time that didn't know each other. So I'm like, okay, this is clear. The universe needs me to know this. And that Is just because you pick a niche, like I'm gonna handle your life events with formal wear like your tech shop does, doesn't mean that if there's something weird, you can't do it. So if someone comes to you and says, okay, well I need a, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna be Jesse Cole for Halloween. So I need you to figure out an orange tuxedo for me. Yep.

Diana Alt [00:39:29]:
Okay, I got that. Like you're not gonna advertise on Facebook that you will find yellow, yellow tuxedos for people. It's yellow. But you can serve different people. Especially when your methods are the same. Like I have methods that will work for a 16 year old that wants to get their first job at Taco bell. And for CEOs, the dosages of certain things are different. Of course there are steps you can skip depending on the situation that you're dealing with.

Diana Alt [00:40:04]:
But fundamentally you got to figure out what you want to do. You got to figure out why they believe that you should do it. You've got to connect with people so you can find the opportunities. You got to put your hat in the ring and you've got to follow up. That's job search. No matter what level you're at, where you put your hat in the ring is how you put your hat in the ring. When you go to Taco Bell is different than when you're the CEO, but you still have to put your hat in the ring. So.

Ryan Holck [00:40:31]:
So it's interesting that in with businesses, coaches, consultants, the place I see those, the it breaking down is those last.

Diana Alt [00:40:39]:
Two items say more about that.

Ryan Holck [00:40:43]:
The amount at which they put their, their hat in the game or the, the, the intentionality of which they do. You know, it's like, all right, I'm gonna try. Ah, that didn't work. We're done. Yeah, well, it's probably going to take more than one tie try. And, and really it, it comes down to are, are we going to do follow up when we get begin to get people interested, how are we going to build that relationship? We come back to the idea of trust. Like people will only trust you. They're going to, they're going to learn to trust you through clarity of your message, through repetition of your message, and through how many times you make intentional connections with them and follow up.

Ryan Holck [00:41:33]:
That isn't creepy. You know, that actually feels relational is really important.

Diana Alt [00:41:38]:
Yeah, really important. Let me ask you this man. My brain is going in a few different directions today. So when you think about connecting in a non creepy way how does that look to you? Because I'm of the opinion that we've got a lot of people who are automating the wrong things. Like right now they're automating things that should be human and they're humaning things that should be automated. And it feels like that plays a role in here. What are your thoughts on that?

Ryan Holck [00:42:17]:
It very much does. And I haven't actually thought about how it connects immediately there. But let's just take LinkedIn. LinkedIn bots can be amazing when they help you figure out who you should talk to. You know, like, oh, it's identified. There's some people that I did not think I should reach out to, I should reach out to. But the generic fill in the blank kind of answers that come into the dms, the. I don't know if you've ever looked at a feed and seen 5 comments in a row that are almost word for word identical because the same bot just kept plunking in.

Ryan Holck [00:42:57]:
You know, all of a sudden I'm like, you. There's no. I would never reach out to one of these people. It just doesn't feel. It doesn't feel organic, it doesn't feel comfortable. Like something feels off. And I immediately go, you've broken trust. Not because you didn't reach out, but because of how you reached out.

Diana Alt [00:43:16]:
You know, one of my favorite things that people sometimes do is now, like, it's not. The LinkedIn comments box is like a whole different story, but also because that's all against terms of services anyway. But LinkedIn doesn't do anything about it. But I really like when I go to someone's site and they have a chat and they just say, like, this is Ryan's bot. Like, they just say up front, yeah, this is a chatbot. Don't get bent out of shape. It's a chatbot because I need to sleep.

Ryan Holck [00:43:49]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:43:51]:
So you have that transparency of who you're dealing with. So I could wander around this all day, but we promised people earlier that we were going to talk about micro stories.

Ryan Holck [00:44:01]:
Yeah.

Diana Alt [00:44:02]:
And I think this is actually critical for people. I run across so many people who are the most terrified of how do I explain myself in a networking situation and that kind of thing. So tell us what a micro story is and what do you think is the top micro story that every professional, whether they own a business or not, needs to have in their back pocket.

Ryan Holck [00:44:29]:
So a micro story for me is taking all the complex things that you do and that you could talk about and figuring out if I Had two sentences or less to explain a little snippet of me. How could I do it in a way that is memorable and repeatable?

Diana Alt [00:44:50]:
Okay.

Ryan Holck [00:44:51]:
And so it's, I don't need to tell you my life story. You know, there's, there's a moment for a five minute introduction, there's a moment for a 15 second introduction. And I think so many of us, when we go to a meet and greet especially, or we're, you know, standing at the water cooler getting something to drink at work and you have that introduction to the new person. You know, I want something a little more than my name, but not so long that people are like, peace out, I'm done here.

Diana Alt [00:45:23]:
Yeah. And I wanted to have real words that people use that come out of their mouth. Not mumbo jumbo.

Ryan Holck [00:45:30]:
Not mumbo jumbo.

Diana Alt [00:45:32]:
Somebody told you as the fancy buzzword of the day.

Ryan Holck [00:45:36]:
Right, exactly. So I've really, I've been trying to figure out how do we essentially introduce ourselves in a way that helps us do that? And, and I, I know I've tried so many times. I'm staring at the blank page going, I don. How I write about myself. Like, how do I explain it in a way that someone outside of the bubble of marketing would get it? And I really came down to sometimes it's just easier with a mad Lib kind of format where I can think about blocks of information and I can drop them in. And at least initially, it may not be pretty or it may not even be grammatically correct, but it at least gets me something on a piece of paper where I go, oh, that's at least bullets I could introduce myself off of.

Diana Alt [00:46:28]:
Yeah, I like that. And it's like when I first started, like, and I was trying to figure out how to talk about myself five plus years ago when I left corporate, the formula I was first given was something like, I help whoever do whatever. So that whatever. Which is honestly a lot like a user story in Agile software development, if you really think about it. And I don't explain myself that way anymore, but I did for a long time as I was developing my voice. So that's fine. And it won't sound sexy and sometimes it sounds long until you have to say it like 50 times before you start figuring out how to shorten it. And now I'm like, I'm the no BS Career growth strategist for leaders in tech.

Diana Alt [00:47:18]:
That says a lot.

Ryan Holck [00:47:20]:
It does say a lot. And you just highlighted there at the end the piece that the, the, the piece you talked about is part of how I think about this. But the piece you included that is not, is you identified who you serve you in tech. And so often the piece that I'm finding that people miss is tell me who you serve best. Now, I don't need the specific niche down to the nitty gritty, but you know, in tech, okay, that at least tells me if I'm outside of tech. Maybe this isn't for me. There may be some things to learn, but I'm not Diana's target market.

Diana Alt [00:48:00]:
Yeah. And you also, when I think about mine, like there's a lot that's tech adjacent. So when people ask me, what does tech mean? So for a lot of people, if it isn't like venture funded Silicon Valley and you're not like a cybersecurity engineer, like architect or something like that, like it's not tech. I don't look at it that way. I look at it as tech roles or in a tech business. So if you're an L and D, if you're an L and D leader at a tech company, clearly that fits in that category.

Ryan Holck [00:48:31]:
Right.

Diana Alt [00:48:32]:
If you are, you know, an HR business partner working at a fintech SaaS company, you fit in that. It's not like my main lane, but because there's culture around tech, there's culture around organizations that are selling technology as their primary product and then there's also culture and problems to be solved around what you actually do. So a software engineer anywhere has certain things that they do. So cool. So it sounds like that intro, that water cooler intro is the top thing that you would suggest. What's yours? I know, I like that I bastardized your bios, so that's why I'm asking you to say it so I could put my own spin on it. But when you're at the water cooler or at the networking event, how are you introducing yourself?

Ryan Holck [00:49:28]:
So mine really is essentially I meet a lot of business owners who are struggling to land consistent clients and I help them figure out how to tell their story clearly and build marketing that helps drive sales and revenue.

Diana Alt [00:49:44]:
Dude. And there's nothing fancy pants like lingo name dropping. It's like, tell a story, get money. Yes, clearly tell a story, get money. Which is pretty compelling. So. Yeah, so, so that, that I don't have.

Ryan Holck [00:50:02]:
I've got the. So that. But I also, and this is something, this is where I am so close to my own story. And I know that you and I have talked some about in, in your messaging that that was a struggle for you. Like you're so close to it. It's hard sometimes to think through it that I'm like, who do I serve? And I've described that businesses and all sorts of attributes. And I finally had someone say, all right, what do they don't just tell me what's their problem? They're who? They're businesses that need leads and clients. Okay, yes.

Ryan Holck [00:50:39]:
Like in an intro. Don't give me the 52 variations on, on that. Just tell me, business owner who needs leads and clients. Okay, got it? Yeah, got it. And so for me, I mean, I, I do this all the time and I still wrestle with it. And sometimes I think for your listeners, you know, ask somebody who do you think I best serve?

Diana Alt [00:51:06]:
Ask.

Ryan Holck [00:51:07]:
Ask the person above you. Ask, especially if you're up for a promotion and it's internal, you know, ask, ask one of those leaders who's going to give you actual feedback, not just pat you on the back, you know, in your opinion, who, who do I best serve in this? Because you're going to learn two things. First of all, what you're best at, but also you're immediately going to see where your gap is and you may need to start leaning into. Because if you're going into another leadership role, you may need to fill that gap as well.

Diana Alt [00:51:36]:
That's a really good point. I like it too. I like to separate. I like how you talk about who do I serve best, because so often people focus on what do I do. So in, in corporate America, people focus first on what do I do. To the point it sounds like a laundry list of tasks. Like the average resume that I get reads like someone tried to copy paste a job description and maybe add like some company specific names in it. So they think about that.

Diana Alt [00:52:08]:
And then when they think about who they're afraid to narrow down. And then when you ask them about results, they're like, I don't know what results I got. And a large part of the reason they don't know that is because they are afraid to actually go talk to people. So one of the things that I do with people a lot is I have a superpowers exercise. So it sits inside a course I have. It's called Job Search Essentials, which will be in the show notes. So if people want to go grab that, they can. But the thing that I like people to do and this I stole, I don't know, I stole it from Terry, but I don't know if Terry stole it from somebody.

Diana Alt [00:52:51]:
We all steal these exercises, but I have them ask like 10 to 15 people from different walks of life. The very specific thing of what do you think my superpower is? What do I do better than almost anyone else? You know? And I have them put them both together because superpower ends up wandering into weird spaces, right? And then the other piece of guidance I give them is if they name back a technology so someone says, oh, you're amazing at Python, ask them to dig deeper. Because what would you have been good at 25 years ago when Python didn't exist? The programming language, you know, like, try to, try to decouple from like whatever the trendy skill is that you have so you can understand. Because really, if you're good at a programming language that works on data, you probably understand data and you're analytical and detail oriented.

Ryan Holck [00:53:59]:
Right?

Diana Alt [00:54:00]:
So that's what you really need to know.

Ryan Holck [00:54:01]:
And the unique, the interesting thing about that is that people, employers don't pay you for the tasks, they're paying you for the outcome.

Diana Alt [00:54:10]:
Correct.

Ryan Holck [00:54:10]:
And so if you can figure out, okay, I know how to do these tasks, as a graphic designer, I knew how to do all the tasks, but what they paid me for was, and this is why people kept coming back to me and why I ended up in strategy, what they paid me for was that when I put that piece of paper in front of someone, it either raised money or raised the interest level and the knowledge about what we were doing. And so that's actually, that's much why I became strategy was like, okay, I can create stuff, but creating that's just a task, like the outcome of what happens when it gets in someone's hand. So if you can think about, I think the Python example is fantastic, is what is the outcome that I help provide the win or the benefit for the in person? Because I know how to do that task in that coding that way.

Diana Alt [00:55:07]:
I gotta tell you, almost always, like, I love it's one of my favorite things. And I've gotten to the point where for certain types of, you know, if people are just booking a single call with me, like I'm going to talk to them once, that's all they have the budget for. A lot of times I have them do that worksheet in advance. If they book several days in advance, they have time to go get it. Because if I don't know that, I can't direct them. A lot of times what they're asking me for is resume feedback and I'm like, well, I kind of need to know what you're great at. So if we're gonna sit down for an hour and go over your resume to see if it's, you know, how well it matches the target role that you've identified. We also need to know your secret sauce in that, so I'll have them do that.

Ryan Holck [00:55:56]:
I love that.

Diana Alt [00:55:57]:
Cool. So that's like my main things. Okay. I really appreciate that. I do have what I call the lightning round. That's never quite a lightning round.

Ryan Holck [00:56:11]:
Okay.

Diana Alt [00:56:11]:
And then we'll hit some of how people find Ryan and what kind of offers you have to help them. So my first one is my favorite question. Someday I'm going to get around to making a playlist of these shorts on YouTube. And that is what is the worst piece of career advice you've ever received?

Ryan Holck [00:56:31]:
Do what you love and it will all work out.

Diana Alt [00:56:34]:
Oh, why do you think that's bad?

Ryan Holck [00:56:40]:
Because I. I think you have to do something that you are passionate about and enjoy, but it takes work and you're not going to get out of the work of it.

Diana Alt [00:56:49]:
I think that's a really good point. Like, even the best jobs. What a lot of people are surprised to find out how little of the time if you. If you're a solo coach, like I am not an employee of a large coaching company. If you're a solo coach, like I am, how little of the time is actually spent on coaching.

Ryan Holck [00:57:10]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [00:57:11]:
Because number one, you can't. You just like only have so much stamina for other people's needs during a given day. And I have a whole ass business to run. So. Cool. What is a personal habit that you have that has helped you be successful?

Ryan Holck [00:57:35]:
In the last year, I've started getting on the exercise bike not because I enjoy exercise, but because my body needs the exercise. But it is 30 minutes where I can listen to something or read something at some level in an undistracted way. You and I have talked about this. That I have ADHD and I tend to. I'm all over the place and sitting still is problematic. And getting on the bike and pedaling begins enough action that my brain doesn't wander nearly as much. And so it's just a way that. And really prayer and focus has.

Ryan Holck [00:58:24]:
Is. Is a big thing too. Just like, what are we coming back to? Where's. Where's our. Where. Where are we going to put our focus? Just helps mentally too.

Diana Alt [00:58:37]:
Cool. I love that. And I'm like, my life's been a little bit an upheaval, so I've fallen off some of that. But yeah, the. The focus. And I think any. Everybody can benefit from some form of meditation or devotional or journaling, no matter like what your faith tradition is like. I have studied multiple things at the same time, but the main thing that keeps sticking is a stoic journal that I have.

Diana Alt [00:59:09]:
So which is funny because it's all principles from thousands of years ago that are keeping me seen in 2025. What is something that you have changed your mind about recently.

Ryan Holck [00:59:23]:
Other than LinkedIn?

Diana Alt [00:59:27]:
So honestly hearing about that might help some of the people on this call or on this that listen to this podcast.

Ryan Holck [00:59:35]:
So I will say I am a lover and hater of social in general. But like I understand the benefit of it. I hate much of the shallow garbage that happens on all social channels. And so one of the biggest things for me in the last year has been I have to figure out how to LinkedIn is going to work for my life and business and listening to people and the way they do things has not been enough. It's taken me getting in the midst of it and going what is a pattern that works for my life and business and will help me, will help serve the needs that I have. And so for years, I mean if you looked at my LinkedIn, it's like it's been garbage for years. I mean I've worked for myself for 12 years, 1112 years. And until the last year and a half, my LinkedIn was garbage.

Ryan Holck [01:00:35]:
I mean, just hot mess. And it's really been me going, I can't continue to ignore this. I have to figure out how to use this tool in a way that I don't hate every moment I spend in it.

Diana Alt [01:00:52]:
How's it going?

Ryan Holck [01:00:53]:
We're getting better. Consistency is still a challenge on the, on the platform for me and that is largely because I'm in my own head about it. And conversations like this actually help me because we talked earlier about sometimes just talking stuff out, processing it through helps you get clarity about how you're going to talk about a concept. And I oftentimes do better voicing ideas rather than sitting and typing because I will self correct the post 80 times. And so but if I say it then I can get it out and at least it's, it's some concept of a draft that that is there for me. So it's really been this, this tension for me of that and still along the social lines. But for years the rule was don't post the same content to all your channels. They're like people, people.

Ryan Holck [01:01:50]:
You're going to bore people. Well, what I've realized is they studied.

Diana Alt [01:01:55]:
Their times tables in third grade and fourth grade.

Ryan Holck [01:01:58]:
Right. Right. And that 80, 90% of what I'm saying on LinkedIn I could say on Facebook with a little tweaking, I don't have to keep starting from scratch. And I kept for years I did this when I was writing content for other businesses. Everything I would like start over. I'm like, why do I keep starting over? Like they're going to remember me. If I'm clear, the goal is clarity here. So stop reinventing the wheel.

Diana Alt [01:02:30]:
The goal is that someone that you've never met that reads your content can then go and tell someone else you've never met correctly what your value prop is.

Ryan Holck [01:02:43]:
Yes.

Diana Alt [01:02:44]:
So when I have someone come to me that is like, well, my friend Mike follows you on LinkedIn and says you're an obs career coach. And then I looked at your LinkedIn and it seems that seems to track work is done for people that are more in that corporate space. They don't create as much content as business owners tend to create. You can accomplish that from your profile.

Ryan Holck [01:03:09]:
Yep.

Diana Alt [01:03:09]:
And from one to, from like two to four posts a month for a period of time. So it doesn't take a year to make it happen. It takes a commitment to actually saying I'm going to, I'm going to say this thing. So thank you so much Ryan. I really appreciate it. It's been great now like tell the people what you're working on, how they can connect with you if you have any sort of resource that they should come gr the good stuff.

Ryan Holck [01:03:42]:
Yeah. So right now I am working on some website clarity messaging stuff for a couple businesses trying to help them figure out one who's been around for. I think I built their first, their current version of a website seven, eight years ago and it was, it was. We've, we've changed a lot and nothing has changed in our messaging and, and how are we going to get clear about what's next and how people can actually meet with us? So that, that's one piece. There's, there's a nonprofit and a for profit. I'm actually doing very similar services for and that's kind of an extended messaging focus in terms of today's conversation. I have a kind of a four or five question process that I've put together to help people figure out how could I start with a mad lib style getting something in your micro story. My micro story in, in there started, you know where you've at least got something that if you email me there is no fancy back end built.

Ryan Holck [01:04:52]:
It is it is literally a Google Doc I'll send you a PDF of and it's a few, it's a few questions that you could sit and begin to mull through and then some mad lib style. How could you actually work on it, you know, actually verbalize it. And I recently taught the ideas at a conference actually that Diana and I usually are at together. But because of her health stuff, she wasn't able to join us. But, and what I challenged the people to do there was to answer the questions, get a rough draft and go find somebody they trust who they could say it out loud to and ask them, what did you hear me say? Not what did I actually say, but what did you hear me say? Like what did you take away from what I just said? Because it was more important. Because if you're in an interview, if you're in a, you know, a job moment, it isn't even just the words you say, it's what did they. What do you think?

Diana Alt [01:05:53]:
That's really critical. And I, I when this comes to first off, for people that want to get this, it's ryan distill your story.com is the email. So Ryan distillyourstory.com it'll be in the show notes for this so you can grab it. I have been through like Ryan has refined this presentation over time and I have been through it and it's helped me a lot with clarity. And he's a messaging genius. So if you also need that website clarity stuff, I ended up doubling my conversion rate for people to book sales calls because he helped me redesign my website. So definitely a good person to help you with that. And I was able to take that and have my VA team in the Philippines actually implement it.

Diana Alt [01:06:42]:
So I was able to do it in a economical way. But yeah, so one of the things that comes to mind for me about this whole like what did you hear me say? Is right at the end of June, like from mid June to the end of June, when I was wrapping up some client projects before a surgery that I had planned that got deferred, I was working with two data engineering leaders. So if you just say, oh, I'm a data engineering leader, you would think what differentiates? And I actually know these two people pretty well. They're both Kansas City area people. You know, it would be very easy for that to sound the same. But I did resumes for both of them within this two week period and one of them came from like a business analyst, project and program management background and work their way up into technical leadership. And the other one, like lives for the code nerdery. So they come at like one comes at it from this very, very technical perspective, like he could talk about AI all day, like that kind of stuff.

Diana Alt [01:07:48]:
And the other one wants to talk about how do I get the teams to be empowered to do all the things? And we went through that branding and superpower stuff with both of them and they had entirely different value props. You know, like one could conceivably hire the other as a consultant if the opportunity ever came up because they have differences in their skill set. And what too many people try to do is say, well, I'm just, I'm a data engineer and like I should be at the director level. Okay, great. So should 500 other people in your state. So anyhow, thanks for the rambling. Let me walk around that scenario. I appreciate you coming on the show and helping people out with this.

Diana Alt [01:08:35]:
I can't wait to see some people go and get that Mad Libs and get much more confident on their micro introduction story or elevator pitch, which is terminology neither neither Ryan or I like. But if you like that terminology, you can use it. Thanks so much everybody and we'll see you next time. Time on Work should feel good. Hey, are you sabotaging your job search without even realizing it? You might be. I break down the most common job search mistakes and how to fix them in my free [email protected] so go grab it today. And that's it for this episode of Work Should Feel Good if something made if you laugh, think, cry, or just want to yell yes at your phone, send it to a friend, hit, follow, hit, subscribe, do all the things and even better, leave a review if you've got a sec. I'm not going to tell you to give it five stars.

Diana Alt [01:09:36]:
You get to decide if I earned them. Work should feel good. Let's make that your reality.