Jeff: Hey Julien, thank you so much for hopping on to do a case study call with me. First off, who are you and what do you do?

Julien: Well, my name is Julien and I'm a tech guy. You know, I've done math my whole life, my program. I have a lot of different interests inside and out of the work that I do. I'm a bit entrepreneurial as well. And I live in New York.

Jeff: What was the biggest reason you wanted coaching? What did you hope to learn?

Julien: Well, initially, before this, I mentioned already that I'm in tech. And when you're in tech, you spend a lot of your time in the books, in the work, in the analysis. You don't spend a lot of time on the communication.
And even if you're a natural like me, I was always, especially in high school, when I went away to college and I spent all that time slaving away at trying to get really good at programming and work, I kind of left communication as an afterthought. It's not something that I thought was important.

And it's actually something that I thought I could just kind of get, you know, I could get by with it rather than something that you strive towards and work towards.

And I just started noticing that as time goes on, and I'm so good at the work that I do, and I'm so intelligent and so great, but then why am I not getting promoted? Why is it when I pitch a great startup or entrepreneurial idea, why don't people seem to understand or resonate?

And it kept going deeper. It was like, why is it when I'm even just talking with friends sometimes they can find me a bit incomprehensible? And I figured that maybe my thoughts are just a little bit too dense and especially learning as much as I have, but without trying to better communicate the things that I know.

Maybe I've created this gap between the things that I understand and the way that I can actually explain them. And that's why I came here because I'm just a little bit sick and tired of that I don't know how to speak to people in a way that resonates.

Jeff: Yeah, absolutely. What would you say is the most important thing you learned with coaching?

Julien: I think the most important thing that I've learned is that communication is not an afterthought and that it's actually maybe even the most important element to you as a person.
And it goes well beyond just the work that you do. It is affecting every waking moment of how you talk with anybody for anything. And it's something that you need to have as your lifestyle. It's not something that you get to handle it.

And that's especially true for people like me who are in tech. Maybe we have a little bit of an ego to us. Maybe we're like, oh, we're so great in this world. We can program our way through all our problems. It doesn't work that way.

You have to have the ability to let people understand what it is that you are inside. And so the most important thing that I've really learned is that you can't take this thing for granted.

You have to work at it and you have to appreciate it and introduce it as something that is part of your lifestyle and something that you're striving and working towards.

Jeff: Yeah, absolutely. Could not agree more. Looking back, how is life different after coaching now? What sort of wins can you share with us?

Julien: So the biggest win, and I think maybe the best selling point that I'm going to give you guys for why you should, if you're on the fence with working with Jeff, maybe this will win you over, is that before I couldn't get promotions, I couldn't even really make sense of why.
And all of a sudden, now I'm magically talking more in my meetings. I'm all of a sudden doing more to really advocate for myself. When the review comes around, I'm just naturally inclined to spell out the work that I've done and to make it as transparent as possible and to make it as numeric as possible.

And all of a sudden, I'm getting not only compliments from my manager for the work and for the energy that I'm putting towards advocating for myself, but it's actually translating into real money.

This year, I actually got a 10% salary bonus and an increase as well, which is just unheard of.

And furthermore, we now have an open dialogue towards a promotion, towards actually moving up and into work that is actually more interesting and is more conducive with what I'm capable of doing.

I wouldn't be doing this. I wouldn't be here without Jeff.

And so if you're on the fence, you're looking at this, wow, that's a lot of money to invest. It pays for itself and it continues to because what you learn with Jeff, it's something that you carry with you for the rest of time and that you get better and better at with the rest of time so that you can keep moving where you want to be in this life and what you want to do in this life.

Jeff: Well, you know that I am so happy to hear all that and I've loved working with you as a client and you kind of answered the last question, but is there anything like what would you tell someone who is considering getting private coaching from me? I mean, you did a really good job outlining key points in your last answer, but is there anything else that comes to mind?

Julien: There is. There's maybe one more important element that you should know is that Jeff is a very understanding and knowledgeable man when it comes to this domain.
So I have full faith that whatever your problem is, he probably has a genuine answer and a genuine path and solution for you to achieve an outcome that you want.

I think he thinks things through with a first principle in mind and I think also he really does his best to tell you all the things and all the misconceptions that you may have, which again is just a great way to sort of streamline and get to the heart of what your problem is.

I have full faith that whatever problem you're facing with your communication, you're probably going to get something great out of this and the most important thing is you're going to have the correct understanding, which is that you have a charisma to you.

You have something interesting to tell and you just don't know how to do it yet. You haven't put the time and the energy to unlocking that and I think you might not get there in six months, but man at that six month mark you're going to be well on your way towards unlocking it.

Jeff: Well I couldn't have said it any better than myself. Now, I'm feeling like I got a little bit of an ego! I just need to play this on loop!

Julien: That's awesome.

Jeff: Well I loved having you as a client and I appreciate you hopping on this case study very much Julien. It's been a pleasure working with you.

Julien: Likewise.