IAM463- Founder Helps Millions Get Careers They Deserve

Super Julie Braun is the founder and CEO of Super Purposes™, a company that aims to help millions of people get the careers they deserve through edutainment programs. Tapping into her vast experience in marketing through working in multi-million dollar corporations, SJ and her team are taking the world of career-mentoring by storm.

• CEO Hack: I don't answer my phone, I like texting
• CEO Nugget: Don't ever give up
• CEO Defined: My magnificent obsession

Website: https://superpurposes.com/how-to-get-a-job-in-12-weeks-1-try-before-you-buy/how-to-get-a-job-in-12-weeks-ding/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/super-julie-braun/

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Transcription

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Intro 0:02

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview? If so, you've come to the right place, Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of. This is the I Am CEO podcast.

Gresham Harkless 0:29

Hello, hello, hello, this is Gresh from the I am CEO podcast and I have a very special guest on the show today, super Julie Braun of Super Purposes. Super Julie it's awesome to have you on the show.

Julie Braun 0:38

Thank you so much. Gresh, it's good to see you.

Gresham Harkless 0:41

Good to see you as well, too. And what I wanted to do was just read a little bit more about Julie so you Super Julie so you can hear about all the awesome things that she's doing. Super Julie Braun is the founder and CEO of Super Purposes. A company that aims to help millions of people get the careers they deserve through edutainment programs, tapping into her vast experience and marketing through working in multi-million dollar corporations. SJ and her team are taking the world of career mentoring by storm. SJ, are you ready to speak to the IAMCEO Community?

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Julie Braun 1:09

I sure am.

Gresham Harkless 1:11

Awesome, awesome, awesome, let's do it. So I wanted to hear a little bit more about what I call your CEO story. When did you start your business?

Julie Braun 1:18

Yeah, so um, basically, I owned a company called Super Interns.com. And for 11 years going on 12 years, actually, this December. And every intern that we met with, I would hear the same thing over and over again. I would say “Why are you doing the internship” and they would say, “I'm here for experience. And I wanna learn “how to get a job.” How to get a job, how to get a job, how to get a job, how to get a job, I heard it hundreds of thousands of times, having worked with over 10,000 interns, I just kept hearing it. And I said to myself, we need to help these people learn how to get a job. Because wherever they are in their career, wherever they are in school or coming out of school, or maybe career changing, or maybe they're underemployed. They needed to learn what is the recipe and how to get a job.

And so we started Super Purposes last year. We've been in business now for a little over a year. And we teach people how to get a job in 12 weeks. We work with different groups of people all different demographics. We identify a demographic, we create the program. So we've created a program for military spouses. How to get a job in 12 weeks, we've created a program for trans and gender nonconforming folks. How to get a job in 12 weeks. And right now we're getting ready to launch in January 2020. Our college students and recent grads how to get a job in 12 weeks. The reality is every single group of people that we identify have specific problems that we are ready to solve for them and get a job in 12 weeks or even sooner.

Gresham Harkless 3:17

Nice. Well, I appreciate that. I think one of the seven habits of highly effective people is to always begin with the end in mind, and what you sound like what you were hearing was, what people's goals, what their end aim was. And I think a lot of times, sometimes we can get lost in a lot of these other things. But if you understand just like you said, this is what their their goal is. So let me try to help make sure that happens. It's what we say it kind of begins within a month.

Julie Braun 3:40

I think there are a couple of things that correlate for me on this, and that is everybody is in a different stage in their career.

Gresham Harkless 3:49

Right

Julie Braun 3:49

So we were trying to figure out, what's the most average amount of time, and really, most people can get a job in six weeks in our program. We actually had a woman who's a military spouse, she was out of work for five years. Just imagine this. She's out of work for five years, every time that her husband gets deployed to a new place. They move. So about every 18 months, she was moving. And she was getting really depressed and really sad because nobody wanted to hire her. And she couldn't figure it out. Now Gresh here's what happened. In 22 days she had her first job offer.

Gresham Harkless 4:34

Awesome!

Julie Braun 4:35

And on her 28th day, she had her second job offer

Gresham Harkless 4:39

Nice

Julie Braun 4:40

So for her, she was really… she was very skilled. A programmer, a coder really, really talented. She just needed a little tweak. Other people need a complete overhaul because they don't even know where to start when it comes to finding a job.

Gresham Harkless 4:58

Right that makes sense and that's what I definitely love about this system is just because it allows that, not necessarily perfectly, but it can be molded to wherever somebody is, like you said in their their career, but also their expertise, their certain circumstances. I think a lot of times, especially if you're going through like five years of not being able to have a job, I'm sure a lot of like, the mindset part probably plays a part in it where you don't think you're going to be able to get a job. But I think being able to be able to go through like a program like that helps you to understand that, Hey, okay, well, these things I can do. If I follow this, then I'll be able to get what I'm ultimately hoping for.

Julie Braun 5:32

Right? We actually equate it to baking cupcakes. We love the cupcake analogy because it's really simple for everyone to understand, and who doesn't love cupcakes?

Gresham Harkless 5:42

I love cupcakes! Exactly!

Julie Braun 5:45

But you know, there's a very specific order that the ingredients have to be put in, mixing your dry, and then your wet and then putting them together and putting the oven, putting the oven at the right temperature and making sure that you let your cupcakes rest after they come out of the oven. And so there's a real distinct formula or recipe. And a job search is exactly like that. There's a real step-by-step process, of what you need to do, especially in today's world, where lots of people fill out online applications. And what they don't know is that is the worst way to look for a job.

So yeah, we teach them the antithesis of the other side, the counterintuitive way of getting a job is first figuring out what matters to you. And then aligning yourself with a company that has the same values, the same understanding, and bringing both of you together. So when people come to us, sometimes they'll say something like, “Well, I wanna work for Microsoft, because, they're, so great at technology. They treat their employees well”. And, they'll they'll give lots of reasons.

And, if somebody says they want to work for Microsoft, who am I to say, oh, okay, sure, well, we'll get you a job at Microsoft. And in 12 weeks or less, they'll have a job at Microsoft. And they're like, “I can't believe you did this!” So if people have the skills, Microsoft is easy. Anybody can get a job there. If they have the skills. It's how do they package themselves into baking that Microsoft cupcake? Yeah.

Gresham Harkless 7:40

Exactly

Julie Braun 7:40

But basically, what do we do?

Gresham Harkless 7:42

Nice, I definitely appreciate that. And, understanding exactly what's in that secret batter, so to speak, or the steps in which you put that secret batter, and so that you can reach that success is what you know, a lot of people sometimes struggle with, because a lot of times we're great, we do great things. But if you're not able to communicate that and communicate that to be understood by whoever you're trying to communicate with, it doesn't make too much of a difference.

So I definitely appreciate that. And, I know you touched on it already, did you have anything additional that you do to help support the clients you work with? And I also wanted to hear about your personal or your business, what I call a secret sauce, and what you feel sets you apart.

Julie Braun 8:15

Yeah. So we do have additional help because we have a private LinkedIn membership community. So when people come to our program, not only do they get, entertainment, we call it edutainment. So we're educating and entertaining at the same time. But we do these really fun and funny episodes. So you get to watch some videos, you get to go through the materials, and there are action steps. So it's very step-by-step. So step number one, do this. Step number two, do that. It's really simple. I, have dyslexia and an auditory processing disorder.

And so I'm very sensitive to people understanding the steps of how to do things. So we make that easy. And then our community is there to chime in when people are feeling maybe like “Oh my gosh, I'm struggling.” Or, “Hey, I got my job interview. It was awesome.” We can cheerlead with them so we give them that additional help on the community piece. But when it comes to the secret sauce, I think what we have is very, very unique. It's very special. And it is our secret sauce. And that is empathy and understanding. We can look at any group of people. When we did our program for transgender and gender-nonconforming folks. I knew enough to be incredibly dangerous.

So I've got a lot of friends and the LGBTQ community and the person who we created the program with Is a transman. His name is Mack McGregor, and I got a great education. So I knew enough to be dangerous, but he took me much further into the community and understanding what their problems are. And when you understand the core of people's pain, their fears, and their frustrations, I think that is when you can create amazing, amazing products and services. And for the trans community, and the gender non-conforming community, the number one thing that I did not know this. So this is me being somewhat proficient in the community of understanding, I did not know this.

Gresham Harkless 10:50

Right

Julie Braun 10:50

Their Number one concern is safety. They're afraid! They're afraid of being ridiculed, physically harmed, losing their job, and losing their livelihood, which then trickles into all aspects of their lives. And so when we discovered that we were like, Oh, my gosh, we have to create a super safe zone for this community to, get their job. And we did that we created something, that is amazing, we created a private laboratory on LinkedIn.

So that people can go and create their personas there, if they're transitioning between male and female, or, wherever they are, wherever they are, whatever they're doing, they can create this private space where they can play with their persona, before they release it to the world. And that has a lot of protection and safety around it. So our secret sauce is putting ourselves in the shoes of our intended audience, and feeling what they feel, having that empathy.

Gresham Harkless 12:08

That makes perfect sense. Now, I definitely appreciate that. I wanted to switch gears a little bit. And I want to ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app or book or a habit that you have. But what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

Julie Braun 12:21

So one of the things is I don't answer my phone. Don't answer my phone. My recording says I don't I don't answer my phone. But please text me. And so I know if it's a really legit person, I'll get a text, which I liked that a lot. So that's one of my favorite hacks.

Gresham Harkless 12:47

I appreciate those hacks. And now when it asks you for what I call a CEO nugget. So this could be like a word of wisdom or a piece of advice. Or if you can hop into a time machine, what would you tell your younger business self?

Julie Braun 12:57

I like, don't ever give up. I'm kind of, I'm kind of a bulldog. You know, the only time that I ever loosened my bite was to get a better grip. And I think that if you're going to be a CEO if you are an entrepreneur, if you are starting a business, or maybe you've been around the block for 20 or 30 years, the reason why people get success is that they just don't ever give up.

Gresham Harkless 13:25

Appreciate you for being one of them. So I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is a definition of what it means to be a CEO. And we're hoping to have different quote unquote, CEOs on this show. So SJ What does being a CEO mean to you?

Julie Braun 13:37

Oh, my goodness. All right. The tenacity piece is, I think, what's wonderful about being, being a CEO, I mean, it's got exciting high highs and low lows. It's a rollercoaster ride, for sure. It's not for the faint of heart. But it can be so incredibly rewarding. I call being a CEO, my magnificent obsession. Yeah.

Gresham Harkless 14:10

I love that. I love that perspective. And I think a lot of times when people do especially founding CEOs, people that create businesses or create organizations, it usually or sometimes is an obsession, and we have a vision that we want, and we will do whatever we need to do to make sure that happens. Of course, legal. And when you have that kind of mentality, I love the Magnificent Obsession because you have such a magnificent vision for what you wanna see, what you wanna make happen. And you roll up your sleeves and you make those things happen as well.

Julie Braun 14:43

Yep.

Gresham Harkless 14:44

Awesome. Well, SJ, I appreciate your time so much and appreciate all the awesome things that you're doing. What I wanted to do was pass you the mic so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional you can let our readers and listeners know and then of course, how best they can get a hold of you to find out about the course and all the awesome things you're working on. Sure.

Julie Braun 14:59

Sure so, anybody can connect with me on LinkedIn. I am a LinkedIn rabid fan. I'm Super Julie Braun on LinkedIn. So just connect with me and I'm happy to connect back and, help other CEOs and network with them. I love that. If you go to superpurposes.com, you can get into our program, you can watch a video, and come to a free webinar, we're always on social media, doing free webinars where people can come and learn. Because we wanna get people started in different ways.

And, I just, I've wanted to thank you for your masterful creation. I think you are giving some fantastic information out to folks and wonderful content. And you're gonna be on our social media in the next few weeks. So yeah, we're directing a lot of people to you as well. Gresh because we believe in your vision as well. So thank you so much.

Gresham Harkless 16:05

No problem. Thank you. And like I said, just having awesome people doing awesome things, and I just tried to capture it as much as possible. So I appreciate you for doing awesome things, and I appreciate your time, obviously even more. We will have the links and information in the show notes so everybody can follow up with you. But I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Outro 16:21

Thank you for listening to the IAMCEO podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co, IAMCEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, Google Play and everywhere you listen to podcasts. Subscribe and leave us a five-star rating. Grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co This has been the IAMCEO podcast with Gresham Harkless Thank you for listening

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