IAM1952 – CEO Offers Training Course Materials

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Dr Valeria Lo Iacono Teaser 00:00

And then I keep an eye on what the trends people are most interested in. Also I'm happy to get feedback from my clients to see what kind of training courses materials they would like, and then if it's something that I think it's good, then I will develop it.

Intro 00:22

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 Harkness values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the valuable info you are in search of.

This is the I AM CEO podcast.

Gresham Harkless 00:48

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast and I appreciate you listening to this episode. If you've been listening this year, you know that we hit 1600 episodes at the beginning of this year. We're doing something a little bit different where we're repurposing our favorite episodes around certain categories, topics, or as I like to call them, the business pillars that we think are going to be extremely impactful for CEOs, entrepreneurs, business owners, and what I like to call CB nation architects who are looking to level up their organizations.

This month, we are focusing on finishing it out, fighting the good fight and closing out the job. I think just as important as it is to start something, it's even more important in how you conclude it or finish it out. So if you think of the different things that you can finish out, it'd be everything from a project, it could be from a day, it could also be from a business in and of itself, and it could also of course be for the year. So when you think of finishing out, I want you to really think of these episodes because what we're going to really focus on is the last question that we really ask, which is defining what it means to be a CEO.

All the creative, innovative, and I think truly insightful questions that we received from this question is really what we want to highlight during the show. But of course, we want you to enjoy the entire episode and think about how you're going to finish things out and how you're going to finish things out strongly. So sit back and enjoy this special episode of the I AM CEO podcast.

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast, and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Dr. Valeria Lo Lacono Symond of Symond Training. Dr. Valeria, it's great to have you on the show.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 02:24

Hello. Hi. Great to be here. Thank you.

Gresham Harkless 02:28

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Before we jump in, I want to read a little bit more about Dr Valeria so you can hear about all the awesome things that she's doing.

Dr Valeria is the CEO of Symond Training, a company that offers training course materials to trainers and HR departments worldwide. Started 2 years ago, Dr Valeria's company now sells her products worldwide. Dr. Valeria started this business while she finished a PhD in the UK, and after a stint of teaching at the University of Bath in England.

Dr. Valeria, are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 03:00

Yes, I need to start.

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Gresham Harkless 03:02

Let's do it then. So to kick everything off, I wanted to hear a little bit more on how you got started. Could you take us through what I call your CEO story?

We'll let you get started with your business.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 03:11

Yes, okay, it's a long story. I started before doing a PhD. I was working in admin in university and I thought that I wasn't feeling challenged enough. I needed to do something more with my life. So I decided to start a PhD and then a PhD in dance as a form of cultural heritage and sociology. Then after the PhD I started working as an academic teaching in University of Bath.

I was teaching sociology and as a researcher in University of Exeter. But I thought that I wanted to be more independent and do my own thing and be in charge of my own destiny. So I thought of the skills that I've accumulated throughout my life and put them to use for my own business. I wanted to be independent and took courage because when you always work for somebody else and then you start being your own boss it may be scary, but at the same time I took the plunge and now I'm happy to be doing what I'm doing.

Gresham Harkless 04:16

Yeah, absolutely. Sometimes you have to take that plunge and it gives you that opportunity to really provide value sometimes playing and working in our zones of genius.

So it's great to hear obviously that you have a tremendous amount of knowledge and information, but then you're able to do that to help, work and serve the clients you're working with.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 04:34

Yes, so because education became my passion, was my passion, I taught in Korea and then in a university in England. I also particularly like the idea of researching stuff and creating and teaching. So that's why I came up with the idea of Symond's research and training, whereby I researched topics that can be taught to corporate people by corporate trainers.

So I do all the research and then I design the lesson with the lesson plan and all the teaching materials. This is something I really enjoy. It takes time, but I think that this is one of my strengths to be patient and the attention to detail. But at the same time, I wanted to be creative with my skills.

Gresham Harkless 05:30

Yeah, absolutely. And I feel like you get that opportunity to really make an impact because once the course is created, it really has that opportunity to live and breathe on its own so to speak, and you get to imagine, improve it. But at the same time, people get to take the course at their own speed and time.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 05:44

And they can edit it because the course is there for trainers to buy the package, and then they train their own participants so they will edit it to suit their own needs.

But at least I give them a lot of material to use to make their life easier.

Gresham Harkless 06:02

Yeah, absolutely. Get that kind of easy button, especially with all the experience and expertise and education that you have.

I know you touched a little bit upon what we can find, when we go to Symond training, could you take us through a little bit more and drill down and let us know some of the training materials and course materials you have there?

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 06:22

I've got some training materials on leadership some on equality and diversity. And some on soft skills in general, a few materials on online marketing as well, but the core business is about soft skills. For example, I've got courses about how to start your own business, time management psychological safety that's for managers who want to make sure that their team feel comfortable to speak up and express their own ideas and then other training such as the mental health awareness which is to raise awareness of mental issues in the workplace.

So mainly the materials are aimed at corporate settings, but they can be also be adapted for any person that the trainer wants to teach. So other training courses, because  I've done a lot of conflict management, dealing with difficult people. So it's basically all these soft skills that may seem generic, but they're not. They're very important in a workplace to make sure that people get along and they can work together as best as they can.

So at the moment, I have created quite a few products, but I keep creating new products all the time. Then I keep an eye on what the trends people are most interested in. Also, I'm happy to get feedback from my clients to see what kind of training courses materials they would like. And then if it's something that I think it's good, then I will develop it.

Gresham Harkless 08:16

Nice I absolutely love that. I think that we forget a human interaction. In any aspect in your life, you have to sometimes deal with conflict resolution, whether you're in the workplace or you're not. I often feel like when people try to learn about some of these aspects, I almost feel like we're never really taught it. You just learn it by osmosis it feels like.

So I love that you created that material because I think it helps to structure a lot of those things that are essential. Those soft skills to be successful and to really prosper and grow in that workplace and be successful.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 08:51

Yes, I've always been passionate even before I even thought about teaching and developing training myself. When I used to work in admin for universities, always wanted to do training so I signed up for any training that my company, the university could offer all the time, because I really enjoyed taking part to the trainings as a participant not only because I've always loved to learn as much as possible, but I also was fascinated by the trainer and how they taught. But back then, I didn't even think that I myself would be involved in this field, but I was always fascinated by being a trainer and what it involves.

So now I'm actually designing materials for trainers. So I've been able to see the reality of training from both sides as a participant and now as a training professional. I think it's one of those things that you have a passion throughout your life. Then it comes a moment in life when you think, oh, how can I use my passions as a job to become my job rather than doing something that I'm not really passionate about. So that every morning now I'm happy to start working as opposed to thinking, Oh, no, I have to go to work, go to the office. I wish I could be doing something else.

So I think, yes training and development and learning has always been a passion of any life.

Gresham Harkless 10:25

Nice.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 10:25

Yeah, and the soft skills, as I said, there are things that you pick up throughout life that as you grow and as you grow older, you learn more and more, but it's good if somebody can actually also help you along the way. That's where the trainers come in. So I think that work as a trainer is very good and also helping the trainers it's something I really enjoy.

Gresham Harkless 10:52

Yeah, I absolutely love that. You're teaching the people that are training and helping the people and it's so interesting and funny.

Would you consider that to be your secret sauce, or the thing you feel sets you or your organization apart? Is it that ability to be able to see from different vantage points, whether it be somebody that's being trained or the trainer or somebody who's helping the trainers to be able to understand so that they get the best possible course that's available to them.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 11:19

Yes, I think so, because yes, I've been in the position of the person who was taught and also the experience of teaching in university. So I had training myself as a lecturer. But basically the principles of teaching adults are the same whether you're teaching university students or corporate people. So the way you have to engage them and the way you have to structure the lesson with all this knowledge that I've built throughout my life. So I think one other thing that makes us unique is the passion.

Onother thing that I learned in life is especially that the PhD was very useful, doing a PhD was very useful for this, is to be very resilient. Never give up when you think that something's not going the way you wanted, so you become adaptable and you don't give up. You may change the course, your course of action, but you never give up because this solution will always be found if you're willing to be persistent, but also flexible. I think that's one of the things. Definitely doing a PhD helped me in this, at least to develop this part of me, and now I'm using it for my own business.

So, I never give up. So even when I think, oh, this is not going so well, so how can I adjust? What else can I do to make things improve? And if it doesn't work at the first attempt, it'll work at the second or the third, but eventually it'll work.

Gresham Harkless 12:59

Yeah, absolutely. I wanted to switch gears a little bit and ask you for what I call a CEO hack. So this could be like an app, a book, or a habit that you have, but what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 13:11

Yeah, one thing is actually never give up that became a habit of mine if you can call it. But also almost like when I start working being focused and being in the zone, because before I was easily distracted when I was trying to focus or concentrate on something.

Now I'm not saying that it doesn't happen. Sometimes it does, but I'm much better able to concentrate and remove or ignore distractions.

Gresham Harkless 13:45

Nice. That's perfect segue way because I was going to ask you for what I call a CEO nugget, which can be a word of wisdom or a piece of advice, or it might be something if you have to do a time machine, you might tell your younger business self.

Is it that you would have adopted or maybe even sharpened the saw, so to speak a little bit more and learned and trained and just learned even more about different aspects of business and entrepreneurship, including mindfulness.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 14:09

Yeah, because what I lacked when I was younger, say, I lacked focus and I lacked belief in myself. And it's something that partially, yes, you do develop with age, but also if there's somebody who can actually teach these things to you or give you advice that's very helpful. So maybe I would have thought this advice much earlier but now I'm happy that at least I'm doing it now.

Gresham Harkless 14:37

I wanted to ask you now my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're hoping to have different quote and quote CEOs on the show.

So, Dr Valeria, what does being a CEO mean to you?

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 14:49

To me, it means independence and freedom to do the things that I believe in, the things that I'm passionate about.

Gresham Harkless 15:01

And for people that might want to get a hold of you, what's the best way for them to find out about all the awesome things you're doing? And if there's anything additional you want to let our readers and listeners know.

Dr Valeria Lo Iacono 15:10

Theres my website symondssymondsresearch.com. We also have the LinkedIn profile, that they can contact me on, and there is a contact page on the website. We've got a Facebook page as well.

So there are different ways that people can reach me on or through my email and my email address is on the website valeria@symondsresearch.com.

Gresham Harkless 15:40

Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Dr. Valeria I truly appreciate that. We will have the links and information in the show notes as well too, so that everybody can follow up with you and connect with you. But I appreciate you for all the work you're doing. I appreciate you for the time and the reminders that you gave us to us today and the words of wisdom.

I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Outro 15:57

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co. I AM CEO 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 I AM CEO podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you listening.

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