IAM1422 – Coach Empowers Leaders by having a Great Reset to their Lives

Clients and Corporations hire me to transform their Diversity, Equity & Inclusion culture and their leaders by empowering them to overcome their fear of vulnerability, and self-limiting beliefs and to strengthen their ability to influence, motivate, and lead.

• CEO Story: When all of us were having trouble during the pandemic, Carl had a different mentality, he saw it as an opportunity. An opportunity to re-evaluate his life both in his career and his personal life. The chance to get to know who you really are and what you really do, rediscovering the talents and gifts that you have within you. For Carl, it was an opportunity to study and learn and discover his strength in empowering leaders. And bring back the essence of family tie culture at home.
• Business Service: Coaching. Assessment and evaluation process through the 4 Step plan vulnerability transformational program.
• Secret Sauce: 1. Embracing vulnerability, 2. Breaking bad habits, 3. Moving forward and celebrating the breakthrough.
• CEO Hack: The Bible – there is no other book that provided Carl with all the answers to his life.
• CEO Nugget: Believe in yourself. Have confidence in yourself. Give grace to yourself. If you run in your own race, you can’t lose.
• CEO Defined: Being the change maker. Bring change in your expertise. Whatever God's gift is given to you, change people with that.

Website: carlshawnwatkins.com

Instagram: carlshawnwatkinaconsulting

Linkedin: carlswatkins1

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Transcription

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00:26 – Intro

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 information you're in search of. This is the I AM CEO Podcast.

00:54 – Gresham Harkless

Hello. Hello. Hello, This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast. I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Carl Shawn Watkins of carlshawnwatkins.com super excited to have you on the show.

01:05 – Carl Shawn Watkins

Hey, it's great to be here man. Great opportunity. Love the things that I AM CEO is doing. Getting it out there for the normal ones and I call it normal even though he's CEO in the title. I just love the opportunity that you're getting for people to be in front of the spotlight talking about some of the wonderful things that they're doing. It's awesome.

01:24 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. Which is why I'm so excited to, you know, to have you on the show. We talked a little bit before we got started about all the awesome things that Carl is doing. But before we jump in, I want to read a little bit more about Carl so you can hear about some of those Awesome. Awesome, things. Clients and corporations hire him to transform their diversity, equity, inclusion, culture, and their leaders by empowering them to overcome their fear of vulnerability, and self-limiting beliefs and to strengthen their ability to influence, motivate, and lead. Carl, excited again to have you on the show, my friend. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

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01:55 – Carl Shawn Watkins

Let's go, man. Let's get it done. Let's get it done.

01:57 – Gresham Harkless

Let's make it happen then. So to kind of kick everything off, I wanted to rewind the clock and hear a little bit more about how you got started, what I call your CEO story.

02:05 – Carl Shawn Watkins

I really didn't have a CEO story, so to speak. As people think about I'm going to be a CEO of a company. I think I started away a lot of Entrepreneurial people start, it's working for somebody else. Punching the Clock said about what goes on, wondering how we can change it. You know, having those feelings of trepidation about going in and out of the office. Yes, I was one of those guys and still was one of those guys up to the point in the pandemic. And I think the pandemic just came to a preface for all of us. It just came to a point in time. Let's reprise, prioritize, let's reevaluate, let's see who we really are. Are we doing what we really love to do?

And are we making an impact in the things that we've been doing? And I kind of sat at the table with those things in a notebook and I was like, okay, it's time to do some X's and O's. And I thought about it. I said, well, what do I do? It's really the first thing I came about saying, what do I do? Yeah, I know what I've been doing for companies that I've been working for, but what do I do? Me personally, Carl Sean Watkins. What do I do? What do I have to offer? And a lot of that came with some soul searching. What are the things that make me happy? What is that? And I think a lot of times we don't go through this because life throws us so many things and we're reactionary.

We don't always go through the. We always go through the bounds of planning and really essentially seeing if is this where I want to be. Such and such time and such and such time in the pandemic. A lot of me of that I'm third year, going into my third year of law school, I went back to school. It gave me an opportunity to work from home to kind of open up a following online. And it allowed me to talk about what I love to talk about, which is vulnerability and leadership.

03:42 – Gresham Harkless

Nice. I absolutely love that. And I appreciate you sharing your story and your journey especially the. I don't know if there's a general phrase that people talk about related to the pandemic, but I always usually hear it. I've heard and I always say the great pause.

03:56 – Carl Shawn Watkins

And I was spoken to yesterday with a potential client and he was like, I just want everything to go back to normal. And I'm saying to myself, was normal in 2019 were you working 80 hours a week, never spending time with your family, going here with the cares of life and the busyness of you thinking that you're busy accomplishing things that you really weren't accomplishing doing things that you really didn't love and motivate you. Did you want to go back to that or was you in tune with the opportunity that was given to you for you to say, okay, maybe I've been doing a lot of things wrong? Let me check this out. Let me see where I'm at.

Not only that, it gave us the opportunity to get in touch with our households. I mean of us as not has, you know, mom and dad with the soccer practice and eating in the car and going from meeting to meeting. How many of us have really sat at a dinner table and really engaged? If we have a family with our children, how was their day at school? That kind of thing that I grew up with. We had to be at the table, all of us. Three of us is three of us. I have a brother and a sister.

We had to be at the table dinnertime. Dinnertime was a place of conversation where mom said, you know, what went on in her day and dad and vice versa. And we had lost that we were letting the opportunity for iPads and PlayStations to raise our children. And I think that reset that gave us an identity again. Back to focus. What are some of the things that I need to be doing not only for me and for my well-being, but the well-being of those who maybe I serve, the communities of which I'm in, and the services which I provide? So it just gave you a great opportunity to do that.

05:24 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. And I think so many times, you know, we could be so caught in the grass is greener on the other side or the grass is greener yesterday or the day before or the year before, you know, pre-pandemic, whatever it might be. But I think that sometimes we can lose sight of the appreciation that we have right in front of us. The opportunities as you outlined, I wanted to drill down a little bit more on how you work with clients. I know you touched on a little bit. Could you take us through how you're serving the clients and how you're making that impact?

05:50 – Carl Shawn Watkins

Yes, I have a four-step plan and that's what it is. And it's a four-step. It's not the, not the six steps to make seven figures as you so see on Instagram and Facebook. That's a pet peeve amount when they tell you those steps and there's so much that's enthralled in there. But I just have a four-step plan that I do and it's called the Vulnerability Transformation Program. And what it does is step one is just embracing your vulnerability. That in essence is a nutshell of what you do. We take you through some goal clarifications, we take you through some goal settings and we really nail down who you are, your core values, and what makes you.

And you have to be vulnerable enough and touch bases with that and embrace that so you can be truthful about that. So a lot of times we say things and do things or bad things because mom taught us that, dad taught us that, work taught us that, and relationships taught us that. So this must be my core value. And that's, that's so far from the truth. There are things that move you as an individual and that's why vulnerability is individual. It allows you individually to see what I need to work on, what kind of person I need to be, and what I expect those to get from me in interactions with me.

So I take you through that and once we do that, we do an assessment and we also do a 360 as well on that and see where you are with that. And then we start from that point, placing the emphasis on that. And we go to step two, start breaking the bad habits. Those things that you did continue this downfall or this spiral of how you feel or how you think that you are as a person. And we start moving those things, we start stopping doing those we evaluate, are those really necessary to do? Am I getting anything from this? If anybody get an impact from me from doing this? So we go to that part and then we go to step three, which is just moving forward.

08:29 – Carl Shawn Watkins

A bad Habit, you have to replace it with a good habit. And that's what moving forward really is. Start picking up those things that make us confident. Start being self-aware about the kind of person that we want to be. Start being able to be confident in who we already are, accepting those things of our past, whether they be accomplishments or failures. A lot of times we attack those accomplishments on everybody on LinkedIn Facebook or Instagram, but we won't tag those failures.

You've made them, others have made them. So it's a part of who you are and it's actually your growth. I love failing. Now some people will say, Carl, that's something really dangerous to say. That's a slippery slope. I love failure because it's always the opportunity to be better. Because when we get to so much of accomplishment, we think we have arrived. And I'd never want to be in an arriving state. Even in my mind, I want to know that there's always something someone can show me, someone can teach me or I can learn from. And once you do that, you're just celebrating the breakthrough, which is step four, set four simple steps. You celebrate the breakthrough, you celebrate the accomplishments of the things that you work for and then you continue to do that.

09:31 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, I absolutely love that. And that might even touch on a little bit of your secret sauce. The thing you feel kind of sets you apart and makes it unique. So 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, a book, or a habit that you have. But what's something that makes you more effective and efficient?

09:49 – Carl Shawn Watkins

I know this is probably going to sound corny and I tell everybody when they ask me, what's your go-to? My go-to is the Bible. And I know a lot of people say that you know, they read, they read different ones and they read. And I do too. I do a lot of reading. I have been ever since I was a little kid from the Sesame Street and Dr. Seuss books. I've done the reading, but there is no book. And this is no knock on any author. There's no book that I have not gone to repeatedly and has not provided me with answers. And I say that, and I say that with a surety. There's been no book that I've read, no stories that I've encompassed. Nobody that's told me any tales, even with Grandma Wisdom has not given me the fortitude to go through life that the Bible has.

And that's not a public service announcement. That's my life announcement. , I can't be the person I am without the words that are written in that book that I live by. And I abide by that. And I don't tend to look at it any other way. That is my secret sauce. If I had something to share with you or something I would put on the shelf, I would highly put that on the shelf to sell if I could, or to give, not even to sell. Because there's power and there's power in your life through your tongue. And a lot of things we don't realize that we say and we put on ourselves simply by voicing it by saying it and having others run with it.

And I say that with standing on 10 feet, on all 10 toes. As my son told me the Bible has been the one, the one exclusive that I've always gone through. And regardless of whatever the situation has been, I found the solution. Now, whether I liked it or not is based on the reader. But what I have found is that the solutions are in there and it's up to you. Just like this value that we provide, it's like these networks that are out, these communities that have been formed, they're up to you. Chew up the meat, spit out the bones, things in them that you can grow from, and there are things in them that could be cancer to you. You have to be the wiser with discernment and understand that that makes so much sense.

11:47 – Gresham Harkless

And I think the beauty of the good book, so to speak, is that as much as you get the opportunity to read it sometimes and often, it's also reading you as well. So I wanted to ask you now for what I call a CEO nugget. So this is a little bit more of a word of wisdom or piece of advice. It might be a grandma is, but it's something you might tell your favorite client, or if you hopped into a time machine, you tell your younger business self.

12:08 – Carl Shawn Watkins

It's simple. Believe in yourself. I can't get any deeper than that. When there is a belief in who you are, when there's confidence in who you want to be, when there's a measure of stamina in just the person that you are. A lot of times we are our own downfall simply for the fact that we can't forgive ourselves. We don't show ourselves grace trying to live up to the expectations or standards that others have set for us. When we believe in us, you yourself, when you believe in who we are. And that comes with the Love factor. That comes with appreciating who you are. That comes with appreciating the value you bring.

Sometimes we don't even appreciate the value we bring to these companies, to these organizations, to corporations, to relationships, to communities, and to people in general. We don't believe in the value we bring. And it becomes a competitive process where I have to outdo the Joneses. I never have to outdo anybody but me. And I take my work ethic like that. I take my thinking like that, and I take my presence like that. If I am 100 satisfied with what I give you, I am satisfied. Now, are you satisfied with the outcome? No, it's. We're not made to satisfy everybody. That's why we're different. But what we can say is that we gave it 100 and that's the athlete in me. I'm gonna give it 100 and I'm gonna leave it all out on the floor. And after that, I'm okay with the consequences. Believe in yourself.

13:25 – Gresham Harkless

I love that. And, you know, you might appreciate, I often say so many times, if you run your own race, you can't lose. And so now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're hoping to have different, quote, unquote, CEOs on this show. So, Carl, what does being a CEO mean to you?

13:41 – Carl Shawn Watkins

The definition of being a CEO of me is being a change maker. A CEO is not a duplicate. And that's how I look at what I did. I could say, do I have a duplicate job? Yes. When I started out, I started coaching. I coached in corporate before I did the entrepreneur hat myself, but I coached in corporate, and I saw how coaches did. I came on LinkedIn when they have million plus coaches, and I said, okay, well, what defines a coach? The difference? What makes me different than those that I see that are coaching? The Tony Roberts, the Les Browns, those kind of ones that have kind of set their own trailblazers. It's not for me to mimic them because I'm not them.

The best way that you could do as a CEO is to bring change in your expertise. Whatever God's gift is to you, change people with that. Don't let people adapt to that, to be that, but make a change in that. And that's why I say vulnerability is so strong. It's not the work that I put in that creates the awareness of someone being vulnerable. It's the opportunity for them to grow into something that they've never been. Can you imagine how it would be if the cocoon stayed closed and the butterfly never emerged? It would be. That's the tragedy that we live in. When we said, oh, I got to guard myself. I use this as an analogy when I talk to really when I talk to CC people because they really have this problem.

I tell them, I said, I give you the key to the closet and I lock you in the closet. Now there are a couple of things that go on in it. You have access to everything in that closet. Needed a notch. You have access to it because you're locked in it. So therefore no one can come into the closet and disturb the things that you have in there. And you can't come out of the closet to grow with the things you need to grow. But imagine that if you took the opportunity which be vulnerable enough to open up and say, you know what, I'm going to throw away the key me to the closet and I'm going to invite others in and I'm going to go out.

The world changes, and your perspective changes because now you have an inclusiveness that says, okay, there are things in this closet that's not doing me any good, but it's going to do some good for somebody out there. And there's somebody out there who just has some things that I'm not available to be able to get while I'm locked in the closet. So this is where vulnerability wins. And this to me is worth the threat, worth the risk, worth the downfall, worth the exposure. All of those terms that they demonstrate put with that topic. It's worth all of that if it gives me an opportunity to grow. So make a change. That's what a CEO is to me.

15:58 – Gresham Harkless

Absolutely appreciate that, Carl. And of course, I appreciate your time even more. So what I wanted to do now was pass you the mic, so to speak, just to see if there's anything additional that you can let our readers and listeners know and of course how best people can get a hold of you to find about all the awesome things that you're working on.

16:12 – Carl Shawn Watkins

You can reach me at my LinkedIn also on my website, carlshawalkins.com I also have my signature program which is the Vulnerability Transformation Program. It is a four-week intensive where we go through those four steps, the ones that I laid out and just check out the website. I also love doing blogs. I have two newsletters on LinkedIn as well, the Vulnerability Toolkit and Vulnerability in Leadership, and both of them are on there. He talks about the different ways in which vulnerability plays a part in being a leader.

Not only in the household but all the way up to the corporateness. All the way up to you being an entrepreneur CEO. Also, find me on Instagram. I always forget about that at Carl Shawakis consultant where I drop nuggets and dimes. On there, you might even see a few scriptures and hear a few church songs as well. It's all about part of who I am, so I want you to know you get the full package when you work with me. Thank you guys. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk to you and your audience.

17:04 – Gresham Harkless

Yeah, absolutely. I appreciate you for obviously taking some time out and of course, the work that you do as well too. We're going to have the links and information as well in the show notes so that everybody can get a hold and connect with you as well. And I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

17:16 – Carl Shawn Watkins

Thank you. You as well, Gresham. Thank you and I appreciate you having me on.

17:19 – Outro

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 for listening.

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