Jacqueline Hutchinson 0:00 I am so excited to have you here with me on the lounge podcast. Thank you so much for joining me. Would you take a moment and let the audience know who you are, what you do, and specifically what your connection with lnd is. My name is Mike Simmons, Mike Simmons 0:13 I'm the founder of catalyst sale could don't really know what I do. I'm still trying to figure it out. Someday, someday I'll figure out what I want to do when I grow up. And, and and i don't know when that's going to be but I still I aspire Jacqueline Hutchinson 0:30 me to. Mike Simmons 0:32 Yeah, my, my my background or my connection with l&d is I've sold into lmd. That's where I first kind of cut my teeth in. In ed tech was with a company called Smart force. I was a learning consultant. Back then we were called Learning. We were called Learning consultants and then at some point became a learning strategist and and then there, the roles changed over time. And actually, I think the first role was learning manager. But in that role I was responsible for helping to make sure that the implementations that we did with our customers were successful. And that was from the business side, not from the technical side, we worked with a technical folks called application engineers. And they brought the they took care of the technology side, I would take care of the implementation business strategy side. This was with a lot of accounts, there wasn't a lot of strategy. It was more I call it an inside Customer Success role back then. And then the other member of the team was the sales professional. So we had an account executive learning manager and an application engineer working together to ensure success with their clients. And I was with smart force through the skillsoft acquisition, I took on different roles I when I move from the implementation side of things into the sales side of things I was presenting Four or five largest accounts on the west coast, myself moved into a more strategic role. Then I got involved in sales found that actually really enjoyed it I realized that sales wasn't this ugly thing where you're pushing stuff down people's throats and saying by this by now, would you like fries with that? Can I bumper floor mats, all that kind of stuff I realized sales is really about helping people solve problems and connecting the solution whether they know that the solution exists or not to a problem that they have, whether they know that problem exists or not. And then a couple years ago started a company called catalyst sale and we work with organizations to help them improve sales capability and capacity by assessing current state discussing what their future state might look like and then creating a path or a program that helps get them from current state to desired state. Jacqueline Hutchinson 2:59 That's awesome. It's so important. I think that that strategy. Now you, you mentioned, you know, helping helping Connect clients to solutions to problems they know or don't know they already have. So do you think we could take a second and talk about kind of analyzing or analysis and kind of where that sort of fits in to both what you do from a sales perspective in helping, helping kind of sell a learning solution down the road within your organization, and I don't mean like, sell it for money. I mean, get buy in, and how we can analyze the solution we're supposed to be solving to ensure that when we sell that solution down the road is the right solution for our organization. Unknown Speaker 3:53 Yeah, you know, and I, and getting money is not a not a not a bad thing. And then Using the word cell is not a not a bad thing either. And I just I think it's important to reinforce that purely because some people are like, well, I don't really want to be salesy. I don't really want to, I don't want to do that. It doesn't feel comfortable, it feels awkward. It makes me feel like I'm not really helping somebody, it makes me feel like I'm driving my own agenda. And I think one of the things that is, and as I continue, continue to use the word thing over and over again, but one of the things that's important here is realizing that we, whether in learning, or in the library space, which I've been involved with before as well or in the sales space, if you do it the way that that I think you should do it. We're we take a service oriented approach to helping others a service oriented approach to our role. So the way that I would tie that together as I say, I would say you As or as learning professionals who are well schooled and understanding learning technologies, understanding instructional design, understanding how learning works and how behavior changes over time. That's your expertise, what you want to do what you if you can apply that expertise in the context of helping others do the thing that they want to do, then it the the decision process, the buy in the agreement to move forward with something should be clear, and it shouldn't be in the Glen. Glengarry Glen Ross terms always be closing or shouldn't, it shouldn't feel like you've got you're constantly asking people to move forward. Now you still have to get commitment as you go through. And we can get into details around that too. But if you operate from the perspective of I am here to serve and as part of that service, I am going to help you you accomplish what you want to do and the better I understand what you're trying to do, the better I can achieve that goal, then things tend to work out, or at least they've worked out. Well for me, now that it takes longer. It's it's not as not as direct as, as some of the by now approaches. But ultimately, the outcomes are better. Well, it's Jacqueline Hutchinson 6:19 different, right? Because although we're, we're selling a product, we're not really selling a product. Right? I mean, learning, learning could be a product, but I think it's it's more than that. Yeah. So you know, to have that by now demeanor is maybe not the best approach to take. But how would we analyze the problem that we're going to go in and help solve? What advice do you have for the analysis piece of figuring out what the actual problem is, and then coming in with a solution and selling our solution? Mike Simmons 6:52 Yeah, so this one's This one's kind of tough in it, and it's very personal, at least for me, it's personal. But what I try to do I try to think about, well, how do I solve problems in general? Well from in order for me to solve a problem properly, I've got to first gather all the data. I've got to understand what my boundaries are, what are my parameters? Where are the lines that I need to color within or with that or organize thoughts within, and I'm not a big fan of boundaries. So I try to push those boundaries as far out as I can, because it gives me an opportunity to be a little bit more creative. But the thing I would suggest to you as you're listening out there is think about how you solve problems in your life. You might use a whiteboard and write down information. The WHO THE What the Why the where the one the how of the people who are impacted by that problem. You might simply just put some pure data down numbers down that show. Good The problem is I need to reduce cost or the problem is I need to increase the number of people who are using something or I need to reduce the amount of time that it takes. But for me the processes first write it down. And as I start writing down all of this data that I just don't information onto a whiteboard, or onto a note card or into one note that my next step is to try to figure out what my gaps are in the information, and what questions do I need to answer. So net? Then I start listing just a whole list of questions. And these questions could be, who cares about this? Why do they care about it? What are they doing about it today? What would they do differently? Who cares about the people who care about it? And again, just listing out all of these questions I need to answer to because that's where I can start to conduct the research and that research can either be through public sources or through public information on a website or might be direct interviews with people, but these questions will help me make a Really good use of time of those with those discussions that I have with others. So to get back to the original question about solving problems for me, it starts with gathering data first to assess the boundaries for which I'm operating in the parameters I'm operating in, getting an understanding of what the objective is, what good is when this problem is solved, what ideal is, and then figuring out based on all of the data I have, what are some of the questions that I need to answer in order to ensure that I'm moving along the right path? Jacqueline Hutchinson 9:32 And how do you how do you know what the questions are? How do you come up with those questions? And then how do you validate that they're the right questions to ask Mike Simmons 9:40 another great question. And if that's the thing, I'm here Jacqueline Hutchinson 9:43 for the mic. Mike Simmons 9:44 Yeah. Well, it's it's tough. There's not a simple, there's not a simple answer. Yeah. Some of it is 25 some odd years of experience, and I realized that I say 25 years and I keep forgetting to add years as I get older, so I'm just going to have to have I'm gonna have to remember to do that at some point in time, but you had these it's years of experience, right? So you are a professional in the work that you do you have an area of expertise that you've developed over the time that you've conducted the work that you do leverage that experience. That's where some of those questions are gonna come from. Now, the next thing that I do is I look at, I try to keep the questions simple. And I said it a little bit earlier. And I'll probably say it a couple of times as we talk through this, but it's who what, why, where when, how put yourself in that journalist, mindset channel, your inner Lois Lane and figure out how do I get how do I get to the story and I think that the thing the thing, it the other thing to realize is there's not a way, there's your way, and over time, you're going to iterate on that. Now. You can't just be a two year old and turn around and say Why, why why why ad nauseum? You're going to get yourself in trouble. Yeah, you and you know, Jackie laugh because you've, you've seen it and you get, you can get frustrated in those kind of that environment. So then you start to turn it into You say, Well, okay, why is this or why is that? Or why does this or why does that so I'm kind of a country bumpkin I grew up grew up in New York, High School in Southern California, I live out here in Arizona, I try to speak in simple language, I try to make my questions, be simple questions. Jacqueline Hutchinson 11:36 That makes sense. I mean, the easier the question is or the more simple The question is, or maybe a better way to put it as the less complicated a question is, the easier it is to get even a broad answer so that we can start narrowing down to what is really the crux that we're like the problem that we're solving. Mike Simmons 11:57 Yeah, you're Your question, the more you add your question, the more complexity you create. And you get into those questions where you ask three questions in a question. And then I do Jacqueline Hutchinson 12:10 that all the time. Mike Simmons 12:13 I'm still working on this, like I will, at some point, I will get better. And usually nowadays, what I'll do is if I do that, I'll say, I'm sorry, I just asked you three questions in one question. But I'd really like to know the answer to all of those. And sometimes I do it intentionally, just because what I want to do is I want to, I want to, I want to create some of those boundaries, right? And I want to create a little some open space to, for the person to respond. But if I lead the witness, if I lead the SME, if I lead the person who's deciding whether or not they're going to maybe not necessarily buy the training, but they're going to agree that they're going to trade their employees time for the training, because if there is going through this stuff, they're not doing the work that they're supposed to be doing. But if they're going to be these trades, I've got to be really careful about being too assumptive in the questions that I ask and providing too much information and getting myself to a point where I create objections or I create challenges that really weren't intended. So if you take things away from those questions, you start to simplify the question. And then the next thing and this is the hardest thing for a lot of us because we really want to help like we want to help and we got all this information bent up inside our brain and we want to do good work. Yeah, when you ask a question, be quiet and listen. Jacqueline Hutchinson 13:36 Absolutely. Absolutely. I know. That's, that is a skill, especially for instructional designers working with SMEs. It's so important for us to give them the chance to answer the questions we might want to ask another question right away once they start talking. But you know, I've got my sticky notes or I've got a notepad I got a whiteboard or parking lot Where I can post those or I can put them out documented while they're talking. But I'm still listening. And, you know, you set the expectation that I might document some things while you're talking. It's, it's important to the process, right? So we got to give them the chance to talk and and letting them talk, we might actually hear something we weren't expecting. And we might actually get to a different problem than we thought we were there to solve. Mike Simmons 14:26 Yeah, well, and one that they didn't even realize existed, either, just because they start talking through it, and then you hear that thing. And this is why listening is so important. You hear that reading? And then you ask a question for to clarify what you heard, and or go deeper into the discussion. So you might have this list of 20 questions that you have, and I am for anybody out there who's ever purchased a learning technology or had someone tried to sell to them. They've gone through the 20 the gauntlet of 20 qualification questions where it's like, okay, what's your role? How many employees do you have? Do you have purchasing authority, like all this stuff, and it's not personal, it's not about you. So if you're working with an SME, and you're going through your list of 20 questions, and you're not personalizing them for the SME, or giving yourself some room to ask questions based on their responses, you're doing yourself and that SME a disservice. Jacqueline Hutchinson 15:28 Exactly. So, you know, I mean, we're talking about having to, to chat through, you know, analyze, get information, because we need all this information in order to provide a solution or even a recommendation for a solution. But what if we run up against someone who really doesn't support the analysis phase? How do we sell the analysis phase, so that we can get The important information like maybe we've got that person here I am with those three questions, right, Mike? Yep. Just shut up and listen now. *Laughing so hard* Because it happens all the time. So how about that? Why don't we talk about that? And I'll ask my next question in a minute. And you're gonna have Mike Simmons 16:15 to keep me on track in case I forget the question or missed the question, because I think we could do this all day jack. So so. So you run into this person who's really skeptical now, like, you know what, I don't need you to do all this analysis. We already know what's going I just need you to come in and fix it. We just need training and you are the training hammer and I've got a nail. So start hammering away and let's get this thing. Let's get this thing done. Really, the best thing that can happen for that kind of person is that they've struggled with this over a period of time. Like they tried the training solution and they've not been it it hasn't worked. If there are new manager, new to the team. They've got this Hi ego, they are certain The training is the issue and they just haven't found the right training, then then it's going to be a challenge. And what I will usually do is I'll ask them to reflect on how they've attempted to address this in the past. And, and sometimes that's really tough. Like, we run into it with organizations we work with many times when I talk about how important this analysis phase is the gathering the data, it is, I immediate feedback is we just need a couple of good sales reps. If we had some good sales reps out there, and they were selling the product, we'd be everything, everything would be great. Sometimes, depending on the tone that I'm in, or the mood that I'm in or what might have happened today before I might turn around and ask, so how's that working out for you? Yeah, you know, and, and, again, I can be a little bit direct. So that might be some of the New York in May and I've kind of kept, you know, calm down a little bit which might be the Beach High School. in me, but yeah, it's it's through those questions like you're not going to convince someone to change their. Their will think about how many times have someone really been able to convince you to change your mindset or change your perspective on something, or they've controlled you literally controlled you and said, No, jack, that color is blue, it's not red, right? Or you say it's red, and I say that it's blue. And I just continue to hammer home that it's blue, it's blue, it's blue, I'm going to get myself into a situation where either I'm going to just kind of beat you down to the point where you just don't even want to deal with the conversation anymore and you just want to move on or something else is going to happen right and then in the on the other on the other side though, it's well have you compared it to other Have you compared it to other objects that are blue, like this objects blue, let's see how close these shades align with each other and and get them to make the go through The journey or the decision making process on their own. And the best way that I found to do that is by asking questions. And some people, my wife, one of them, thinks I'm a jerk, sometimes when I'm asking those questions, so I gotta work on my tone again, I'm still I'm learning, but it's, it is this. Yeah, it's those questions that will help to reveal things help to reveal and be respectful of people's time. Like, if you when you go through this piece, it's, hey, I'm going to set expectations. I would like to conduct a 10 minute or 15 minute or 30 minute discovery discussion, just so that I completely understand the things that are going on and what's happened in the past. So that I reduce the number of blind spots that I have on my side based on biases that I have on how we've addressed things like this or whatever. I mean, you got to come up with your own language. But yeah, when I've been able to set expectations and execute on those expectations, things tend to work out okay. Jacqueline Hutchinson 20:00 That's an awesome response. And I, you know, there's nothing wrong with asking questions. You're right. It's about it's about tone, delivery, and waiting for the response. And being thoughtful when you do respond back or ask another additional question. Mike Simmons 20:19 What can one of the other things is, is being very intentional when you ask those questions like if if the intention of the question is to get someone to answer in a specific way, and you're trying to manipulate the situation with that question, or you act like you already have the answer, and you're just trying to get them there. It can come across as being disingenuous and it can come across as not being there to help provide a solution and it can come across as being manipulative, manipulative. So just be really careful about what the intention is behind the questions. And, you know, I think where people fall short This area is they list out the questions, they might list out the questions the way you would ask them jack or they list out the questions the way I would ask them and they don't ask them in their own voice. Remember, your voice is important. Your experience is important. You gain that experience over time, convey that experience in the way that you communicate to others. Jacqueline Hutchinson 21:20 Well, it's part of it's part of you being unique and being you and being authentic. Yep. Yeah, I think that's important. So I want to I want to ask you now, Mike, when analysis isn't done, or isn't done correctly, it can be disastrous. It truly can. I mean, there might be that one lucky dog that gets through without a scratch after not performing an analysis or not doing it correctly, and then all of a sudden, there's like a Skittles rainbow. But that doesn't happen normally. Do you have any examples or stories you could share with us about when an analysis went wrong or wasn't done and And what happened? Yeah, so Mike Simmons 22:02 this one happened just recently some I've got a 16 year old who's driving a truck now. Jeep, not my jeep. No, that was, that's an example of where analysis went well. So originally we thought, Okay, sounds good turn 16 I'll give him the Jeep, I'll go get a different one. I'll go get a new one and I'll build up, build up a new Jeep and what two jeeps in the house and I get to check two things off the box, which is one we've got a number of people in town we can both we can take both of the jeeps out instead of everybody just trying to fit mine and us trying to get a razor or some other kind of thing. But anyhow, so I thought, best laid plans all have the 16 year old drive the jeep. Then I did some analysis by the my sitting in the passenger seat while he was driving around and I thought there's no way this kid is driving this thing around town he will do so much damage. So there's there's an example of where analysis I think work on the other side. This happened just a couple of weeks ago he was he decided that he was gonna take his truck off road and the dude was used truck the wheels that are on there are not meant for going off road they're meant for driving on the street they and anyhow he 16 year old kid doing whatever 16 year old kids do out in the desert, and you know he's got a flat, but he doesn't really remember how the flap happened. You know, it could have happened this way. I could have happened that way. Even though I'm asking all the questions and I'm starting to sound like a jerk because I'm just keep asking questions. But that's beside the point we get. He gets to his friend's house his friend's dad gorrik he says that the tire splats his friends that add some air into it. gets him home. Well, it keeps the air in there. Oh, so he dropped his driving around. Everything's fine. Well, about a week later. The tires flat at the school parking lot. He drove home on the flat tire. Yeah, right. And I know Why you're why would you do it? Well part of it was we didn't really do the analysis well enough all of the Act finding and then the information sharing that said and I thought I would think you just don't drive on a flat tire you yep yeah that's what the spirits for. So so that turned into a really expensive learning experience and I expensive and you're talking 100 and something dollars but it's just it's a so now he's got a new tire on that on that wheel. So you by not asking the tying this back by not asking the right questions as we went through this process by not going through and thinking of all of the different scenarios that might have come up by not anticipating the day to day challenges that you run into. We did not properly coach him on what to do if this scenario happens. Now, again, I Look at that thinking, Wow, it's a flat tire. Sure, let's go ahead and drive, like, just pick up the phone and ask a question. But it just that's it. That would be an example. Just a personal example where I'm not doing the analysis properly and then conveying the information lead to a failure downstream. And I think we can all think of those situations in work, it work. This comes in designing onboarding solutions. It, you know, by not anticipating, how does new technology impact the onboarding experience for new employee, not anticipating the difference between how a new employee gets onboard in the organization if they're, if they work from home or the remote? Yeah, versus being inside an office, not anticipating how the onboarding situation changes if they're, they've traditionally used Windows machines. And now, inside the organization, everybody's using Apple, right? So they're all these things that that And I don't know, jack, did that hit the mark on? Jacqueline Hutchinson 26:02 Absolutely, yeah. I mean, even I've had some experiences where I know I could have done a better job on the analysis, when I look at the fact that something that I've implemented, didn't yield the results I was expecting. It didn't, didn't change the behavior. One, one specific example is no wonder to rapid solution for a customer service training. And so, you know, without, without doing a full analysis, and there were a number of things that play here, there are a number of reasons why a beginning to end analysis didn't didn't happen, doesn't just on my end, but I I take the majority of the responsibility for that because I should have done it I should have, I should have just said no, we need this and let's just do it and let's take the hour to it's going to take to do it and Customer service calls didn't improve with that solution. So, you know, it's it's really important that if, especially with what I do if I'm designing a solution for someone it needs to answer or respond to what their problem is just like just like you were talking about. So Mike Simmons 27:19 yeah, and I think another thing that's really important to cover, because I'm sure that there are other there are folks out there who are listening to this, and they're saying, Well, you know, what, if I just don't have time to do the analysis. It happens times important times one of those boundary parameters that we talked about a little bit earlier. Time is, so you, you want to establish the time, the timeline that you're going to work within, in order to successfully deliver this thing. And the quote that I like to lean back on is an Abraham Lincoln quote, where he said, If I have got eight hours to cut down a tree, I'm going to take six hours to sharpen, sharpen the axe. Well, in that instance, he knew how much time he had to cut down the tree. And he knew how much time and attention he was going to put together to get the tool ready to do the job. This is where your expertise really comes into play. If someone says I need to have this, I need this training to be completed in the next three hours because the OSHA group is going to come in and they're going to ding us for not having properly chain trained all of our employees in forklift safety inside the operation. You don't have six weeks to figure do a needs analysis to figure out the best way to deliver your OSHA training. Like you've got it or the forklift training. You've got it. You've got to work within the parameters that you're given. So ask that question from a timing perspective. So that you can start creating that plan on your side and anticipate where those boundaries are and where you can gain a little bit more flex and, and remove some. Now the other thing that setting timelines does for me is it helps me avoid analysis paralysis. There was no way I couldn't get. Yeah, there's no way I'm going to get all the information I'm just not have nothing is it's not ever going to be perfect. It is just it just isn't, it isn't gonna be so good enough is important. Good enough here is is critical, good enough leverage is your experience. So go through that and say, Okay, well, you know, I've gotten through enough where we will for the amount of time that I'm going to invest in further analysis, there's going to be diminishing returns here. So why don't I just take what I have and start moving things forward. And that's where I will set clear deadlines for myself. I'll say I will give myself yet until such in such a period to do all the research and analysis I'm doing on a given organization or on a given scenario or on a given In a given project that I'm working on, and then from that point forward, I move forward with actual execution. I'm no longer in information gathering mode, the switch flips. Jacqueline Hutchinson 30:12 Well, it does, right. All of a sudden, the, you say, Okay, I've got enough. This is, this is enough, I can get started. And if you've got a good process in place, you can come back and be iterating. Today, lose you, Mike. Mike Simmons 30:25 Nope, I'm still I'm still I'm still here. I was just I was being thoughtful. I was I was listening. I didn't know if you were gonna add some more. Yeah, I'm working on that listening piece, jack. Oh, my God. I need to do a better job. This is awesome. Jacqueline Hutchinson 30:43 *Laughing* Because I laugh so much, Unknown Speaker 30:45 just because I'm silly. It's just a great conversation. Jacqueline Hutchinson 30:48 It is a good conversation. I love chatting with you. So this is great. So we've talked about why it's important to analyze. We've talked about the benefits of analyzing sort of the metal Analyzing me kind of at a high level? We've talked about how we can persuade or sell the analysis phase, and, and help our stakeholders understand why it's important to have an analysis and to to be as complete as possible. Yep. And we've talked about, you know, what can go wrong when we don't perform an analysis or don't do an adequate job of performing an analysis? Is there anything that you wanted to add, or any tips that you want to share about, you know, putting yourself into the analysis framework or, or mindset, Mike Simmons 31:38 yet a tool that I've started using a lot lately is my node. I've really gotten into mind mapping and not my mapping, probably in the way that it was intended to be used. But hey, just because a tool was set up for one thing, doesn't mean I can apply it in this other in this other context. Mind Mapping has really helped me as more A digital whiteboard tool, what I try to do is I get those main nodes up on on the board and say, Okay, here's kind of, here are all the players in this scenario, here's what I'm trying to accomplish, here's what, you know, here's the, here's the skill that needs to be, that needs to be improved. Here's the outcome, but I get all I get the major notes out there. And then I start to draw the sub nodes on that. And I'm going to use the wrong technical terms here, just because I just end up using the tool and I don't really worry about what they call each of these things. But I use these little spaghetti lines, right? And I take those spaghetti lines and I say, Okay, here's what makes that whatever it needs to be. Here's how I make that thing successful. And then over time, I start to continue to build those out and then connect the dots between each of the either the individual ends of the spaghetti component, the wires, or to the major nodes. And then before you know it, you start to see this picture where you say Wow, here's a plan that I can actually execute on. And here's the here's the process that I need to follow in order to execute on that. And crucial ole was at a conference that jack to both you and I attended the to the C 19. Conference. And she talked about the importance of deconstruction in in the context of a number of different number of different items, one of the instances where the black cabs in in London and the disruption of the thing that is created the disruption there, and some people would say, Uber actually, I think the bigger one and I don't know if we ended up getting to this or Trish said it this way, but the bigger one was a GPS and Google Maps and now you had access to this information. Well, if you can take success, begin with the end in mind which channels your inner copy, you get, begin with the end in mind, take that success and work backwards, each of the steps backward that follow their journey that will lead to success for your learner's Or the organizations you're working with, then you can create a process or a plan or approach that will help you ensure that you're moving toward that success and reduce the number of the risks associated with blind spots that are created as a function of biases that you have. And lack of perspective. So you know, that's a lot to dump in. And last comment, but that's the, that's the process that I go through, which is I start with the the, either my whiteboard or starting to play with things in my node. And the reason why my node works for me, it's because then I can share it with others and I can move things around and, and I don't have to erase things on the whiteboard and then rewrite them I can actually leverage some of the digital technology that's there and I can use it on my back. I can use it on my iPad, I can use it across my devices. Jacqueline Hutchinson 34:50 Exactly. I love mind mapping. I've been using mind mapping since. Oh, gosh, I would say well, it started on paper for me. So way before digital mapping out my very first course, on a piece of paper and mind mapping what you know what was important, what wasn't, and then working through that with my stakeholders, I love mind mapping, but I never thought of doing it from kind of a deconstructing perspective. Why not? I don't know, I just I never, I never thought about it in that in that way. I guess. I don't know. It's a new, it's a new thing for me. So I'm going to have to process this now and figure out how I can throw that into what I'm doing today. Mike Simmons 35:32 I think it's a really important point. So think of the cool tools that you use in different places. And how can you apply them in different in new contexts? And you can name what's the Marie Antoinette quote, good. There's nothing new but what we've forgotten. So you like all these things? It's not. It's not new, like mind mapping is a tool. I would do the same thing on a piece of paper and I would say, Okay, well now I've got all this stuff. Now here's how I can connect the dots between those things. And then I saw them talking on TL DC about mind mapping. Oh, crap. That's the thing I've been doing on paper. I had no idea that there were tools out there that I could use. And these tools have existed for a period of that conversation happened literally 12 to 18 months ago, and these tools about their much longer. So. Yeah, I Jacqueline Hutchinson 36:24 mean, actually, my first Mind Map software was mind manager. And that was way back in like 2006 or Mike Simmons 36:33 something like that. And how insane is that? 2006. So I don't remember this specific date, but I don't think the iPad existed in 2006. Jacqueline Hutchinson 36:42 No, I don't think it did either. I don't remember when the ad came out, because I never had one. Oh, lucky enough. There you go. But I do know that I had an iPod. Mike Simmons 36:54 See, Jacqueline Hutchinson 36:55 around the same time I had like a little like a second generation now. I think but, but, you know, you mentioned one note off the top of the show. I don't know if anybody will remember that. But Mike mentioned one note, which is the Microsoft product and its fan tactic. And one note is one of the things that I have used consistently for mind mapping, but not I didn't really use it as a deconstruction tool. I use it more as a planning tool. And I use it for capturing all of the information for the different projects that I'm working on. Each one of them has its own notebook. And you know, it's so easy to put everything in one place for me using one note, so yeah, I love it. Mike Simmons 37:40 Yeah, it's an amazing tool. It is it I've used it and I went from one note to Evernote and then back to one note. Unknown Speaker 37:50 Because just fit Mike Simmons 37:52 yet well and there were some really cool things that I could do with Evernote and that Evernote would Could I would actually, let me search my handwriting if I took pictures of index cards that had handwriting on it or notes, and now one note has improved its capability around that significantly over the last couple of years. So I use one note all the time. And I use it for multiple things. I use it both for personal stuff, and I use it for business stuff. It is it's another one of those tools that just works across platforms. So I can see it on my Mac, or I can see it on my machine. I can see it on my phone, I can see it on my, my iPad. And I've just recently kind of moved over to Apple just because it's easier to all be in that in that ecosystem for me. But if we were talking about this, even eight months ago, for me, it was Android for the phone, it was Microsoft for on my main work machine. It was Android tablets, and an iPad. But the cool thing about where technology is going right now is it's all really platform agnostic. Yeah And you have no reason to lose things yet I still the other technology that I use on a daily basis, and people laugh about it, but no cards, I have a stack of note cards Jacqueline Hutchinson 39:11 and a pencil to frame in front of me. Mike Simmons 39:15 And they're awesome. Like it just it helps keep me focused, it helps. It helps me be able to reorganize things around kind of like that my node would allow me to do with the major nodes and you know, when I'm dealing with or struggling with tough problems, I will organize information related to those problems on cards and usually start with some of those major questions that we talked about which were the WHO THE What the Why the where the one ideal so it all just depends on workflow and where my where my headspace is on whether or not I want to use my whiteboard, I want to use by note, I want to use the note cards but note cards can really help with that focus. Jacqueline Hutchinson 39:57 Yeah, no, I agree. And I think That's amazing. I have no cards to be in Mike, we're in the note card crowd. Because what I was going to say earlier is, I, I take a lot of pictures of whiteboards when I'm with clients. And I stick them into my OneNote notebooks for my clients. But it's really hard for me myself to be I can plan on a on a whiteboard, and I have a whiteboard for tracking tasks and different things. But it's really hard for me to continually use the whiteboard where it's a lot easier for me to use the one note for keeping everything organized and helping complete my analysis. Mike Simmons 40:42 Yeah, for me, the reason why I have my and I have my whiteboards just to the left of me and my office setup and I can I can quickly look over to the left and I can see what are my major objectives for the week are what are my major priorities could give for the year or and there are Many times where I commit whiteboard bankruptcy, and I just wipe the slate clean. Now still take a picture. Jacqueline Hutchinson 41:09 I just did that. Mike Simmons 41:11 And it's it's amazing how freeing it is right? Really white space I could I can I can start again. And and one of the other cool things about one note is there's a app called Office Lens. And if you use Office Lens to take pictures of whiteboards or take pictures of documents, it actually will. It is absolutely amazing how the technology works in that you're able to even at an angle, take a picture of a whiteboard and have it it'll flatten out the image for you. And technically I have no idea how that kind of stuff works, but I just know that it's really cool. And I can add that information into my one note and then I can add additional notes on it. So Office Lens with one note is magical. Jacqueline Hutchinson 41:54 I have it too. So we have just given the audience some fabulous tools to help capture what happens in their analysis meetings with their clients or their customers or themselves. Mike, is there anything else that you want to share with the listeners about the importance of analyzing or deconstructing analysis, getting to the heart of the problem or solving a problem for our clients? Mike Simmons 42:21 This is going to be a little bit repetitive, but I'll say it just to reinforce it. You will, things will never be perfect. Yeah. Okay. With with that. There's a there's a quote that I was introduced to towards the end of last year. And it's from Admiral pain. And the quote is, do your best and forgive yourself. So when you're going through the analysis, do your best gather the information, play loose? Yo, set expectations? document, ask questions. Don't make assumptions. Anytime you try to skip steps, accelerate yourself through the process. Move things too fast. Your what you're doing is you're increasing risk. And some of us have a higher risk tolerance than others. But as you skip those steps, just know that there's something on the other end that may get lost as a result. And if you can set expectations with your customers, the folks that you support inside your organization or outside of your organization, depending on the kind of work you do. And anybody who works with you really, as a customer, they're there. And in some cases, you're their customers well, depending on what the relationship is, as you work with your customers set expectations, because I've not found a lot of customers out there who really like surprises, surprises from the standpoint, you know, and I'm not talking about surprise parties where some people are like, this is great and If I I'm if anybody has any kind of influence, I do not want or need or would care for a surprise party with you on that I have no, I have no interest in it. So no one ever said something like that out for me. But it's, you know, we don't like these we the surprises can get in the way they. So by setting expectations, and one of the things I really liked that you said earlier, jack is you said, You You sit, you said that you're you let the customer know that you're taking notes. One of the things that I do in the beginning of just about any meeting after we do some of the rapport building type things where we just kind of realized, hey, we're human beings and we're all on this rock trying to accomplish something and have an impact. And, you know, let's not all take ourselves too seriously. Once we're all through that kind of stuff. Then I will ask a question. I said, Do you mind if I take some notes? Yeah. And I have never had someone say Jacqueline Hutchinson 44:54 no, you're not allowed. Mike. Mike Simmons 44:55 You're not allowed to take notes, right? You're not allowed to take notes and And, and I take notes on my on my iPad or I take notes on in a notebook. Depending on the relationship you have and how people might respond to it, either of those are going to be are going to be okay. And more, more and more people are comfortable with that with the technology. But just ask, you know, ask the questions be okay with asking the questions. And if someone gives you a lot that is like, why'd you ask that question? Then clarify why you asked that question. Jacqueline Hutchinson 45:26 Exactly. You know, I've only been told no, one time when I wanted to take a picture of what we had on the whiteboard. And it's because I didn't realize it was to whiteboard side by side. We were using one whiteboard. The other whiteboard actually had some formulas on it that another team had been working on and it said do not remove. Yeah, so the clients like, Well, you know what we'll take, we'll take this down for you, and we'll send it to you later today. Mike Simmons 45:53 Yep. And that's going to happen, right? So you're going to have instances and this is why I ask you don't just pick up the camera. Exactly. First, like we were out in, in in Oregon, a couple weeks ago, and I was looking at this really cool, I don't even know what you call it, but this cool cement container that you would ferment wine in. And I asked the person if I could take a picture because I didn't know if it was proprietary. I didn't know. And then I thought, wow, I never had anybody asked, but just just ask the question, ask the question. Be respectful of others don't assume things. Yeah, yeah, don't assume that you can drive on a flat tire and it's not going to create some damage. Jacqueline Hutchinson 46:35 Well, you know, you saying that don't don't make assumptions. And you know, to me, assumptions are the fastest way to have the door slammed in my face. Yep. Mike Simmons 46:45 So normally,.... have you had a door slammed in your face? Jacqueline Hutchinson 46:47 I try to walk away once or twice. Usually, it's like my other half. Unknown Speaker 46:59 House, keep us on it. Jacqueline Hutchinson 47:00 I know I know. We're so lucky. So, Mike, you are a co host on a podcast, right? I am. Yeah. Are you are you main host? Are you your co host? Usually, when I Mike Simmons 47:16 like life for me, I'm still trying to figure it out. So, yeah, I co host with Jody Mayberry. Jody is the reason that we were able to get the podcast up and going and able to get it to the point that it is and and he's just, he's an awesome partner. In our business, the catalyst sale podcast, we publish episodes weekly. On Monday night, about 10 o'clock, nine o'clock Pacific, midnight eastern and they're available for everybody on on Tuesday morning when they when they re sync up their devices and our audience is combination of founders technical founders who really don't sales kind of seems like a black box. So we're trying to demystify sales for that group, learning professionals just because this happens to be an audience that done a lot of work with and, and I am, I'm very focused on trying to help people accomplish the things they want to accomplish. And one of the best ways to do that is through learning and through, there's that tie in with learning. And then the third group is our early stage sales professionals. So people who they are just getting into sales, and they're trying to figure out what works and what I'm trying to do is give them information that helps them see the signal through the noise of all of the BS that's out there about do this, do this, do this. And here are the three tips that will help you get to your number faster, and there's no shortcuts in any of the work that we do. There are no silver bullets. If there were we probably wouldn't be doing that work, whether it's on the instructional design side of things, or it's the sales side, right. Yeah. So Yeah, yeah, we published a catalyst SEO podcast on a weekly on a weekly basis. And Jacqueline Hutchinson 49:04 I love your podcast. Thank you just for this audience. There are a couple of episodes that I think even as learning and development professionals, I mean, I own my own business. So I have another area where I need to look after building my business and what I want to do from a business perspective. But as a learning professional, forget that I have a business as a learning professional, being able to sell my ideas and being able to persuade the client or customer. Those are some of the skills that you talked about. And you have a couple of episodes that I'm going to link to in the show notes. Two of them specifically on sales for non sales professionals, which I know this audience listening will get something out of and be able to apply right away. So I'll link to a couple of episodes that you've got. It's a fantastic podcast and I love listening to it. Not just because I actually got to meet you Finally in person, but because it is a really great podcast, Unknown Speaker 50:03 and did I bite you? *Jac - NO* good see, so salespeople don't fight? Don't worry. Don't let this nasty thing is there are some really bad actors, like, think of all the bad instructional designers out there. Have you ever gone and watched participate in the course where there's been bad instructional designer? And do you ever think Unknown Speaker 50:26 designers are a bunch of jerks? Jacqueline Hutchinson 50:28 Well, you know what, though, I was that bad instructional designer once when I was first starting out, and you know, not sure. And occasionally, I think even if we're a good instructional designer, we have bad moments. Unknown Speaker 50:41 Yes, we do. Jacqueline Hutchinson 50:42 Yep. There's I don't think any of us are perfect. And if we say we are we're full of Unknown Speaker 50:47 BS. Yes. Jacqueline Hutchinson 50:50 So I'm glad you didn't bite me, Mike. Good Unknown Speaker 50:55 question. Mike Simmons 50:57 See, so there's, there's the That we talked about questions just be direct, ask questions. And you know you, if you're directing, you're sincere and you're intentional. You get people to smile on the other end. And everybody kind of realizes, you know what we're all trying to. We're all trying to make things good. Like there's not many people who wake up in the morning and say, I want to see how bad I can make the world today. Unknown Speaker 51:19 Well, I think one Jacqueline Hutchinson 51:21 of my friends wouldn't do that. But okay. Oh my goodness, like this has been such a fantastic conversation. I love chatting with you. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me. If somebody in the audience wanted to reach out to you to find out more about catalyst sale the business what you do, and how you help organizations or if they wanted to reach out to you on social media follow you, etc. Where would you suggest they reach out to you and how would they find you on social? Mike Simmons 51:49 So three key places one is catalyst sale.com, and that's singular catalyst sale.com and I'm sure there'll be a link in the in the show notes that terming website and there's a chat there and that chat is integrated into our slack instance. So you can chat there and chat directly with me or member of the team. If you go to catalyst sell calm, the place that I'm most active from a social perspective where you hear me talk about Jeeps, and sales and learning and the jets and the New York Jets, not the winter penguins are is in Twitter, and that's Simmons underscore m on Twitter. And then from a professional standpoint, if you heard this and you'd like to connect on LinkedIn, send me a connection request on LinkedIn. And please reference the that you heard me on Jack's podcast on the lounge, because then I'll know I'll have the context. So many people send LinkedIn requests with no context. And it's really hard to say yeah, do I really want to be connected with you? And why would we be connected and what how would that how is that going to help either of us so The website, Twitter and LinkedIn. Jacqueline Hutchinson 53:03 Awesome. Mike, I cannot thank you enough for being here with me today on the lounge podcast. Thank you so very much. Mike Simmons 53:10 It was absolutely my pleasure and I enjoyed the conversation and the last and jack. Thank you Transcribed by https://otter.ai