TCC Podcast: #178: Start Finishing with Charlie Gilkey

Productivity Expert and Coach, Charlie Gilkey, is our guest for the 178th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. We've admitted our struggles with getting things done on the podcast before—and neither one of us is a fan of traditional time management tactics like setting SMART goals...  so it made sense to have Charlie on to talk through how we can start finishing and get more done. We asked Charlie about: •  how he accidentally became a speaker, author and coach •  exactly what he does as a coach and how he helps his clients •  why coaches ask so many questions (and don’t always share the answers) •  an example of how Charlie works with his clients to help them find the real issues •  why so many people shy away from the work that could help them level up •  why accountability helps anyone who wants achieve more •  why time management isn’t the answer (but you still need it) •  focus blocks and how to use them to get more done •  how to stop what you’re doing that’s keeping you from getting what you want •  how to figure out if you’re a lark, an owl, or an emu •  his advice for figuring out what you really want •  the hardest question Charlie asks people (and why) •  why he doesn’t believe anyone is inherently a procrastinator •  the tools we can use to create a better vision for our lives •  the difference between those who make it and those who give up •  what his book is about and what you’ll get out of it •  what he does to grow his skills and be a better coach for his clients If you struggle with getting things done, or finishing the thing you start... or you just want to quit and watch Netflix for a few weeks, you don't want to miss this episode. To hear it, click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Better still, subscribe on iTunes so you never miss an episode.   The people and stuff we mentioned on the show: The Coaching Habit The Advice Trap Joanna Wiebe Val Geisler The Spice Girls Double Double Start Finishing (Charlie’s book) Deep Work by Cal Newport Finish by John Acuff Charlie’s website Kira’s website Rob’s website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob:   This episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Club In Real Life, our live event in San Diego March 12th through 14th. Get your tickets now at thecopywriterclub.com/tccirl. Kira:  What if you could hang with seriously talented copywriters and other experts, ask them about their successes and failures, their work processes, and their habits, then steal an idea or two to inspire your own work? That's what Rob and I do every week at The Copywriter Club Podcast. Rob:   You're invited to join the club for episode 178 as we chat with author and business coach Charlie Gilkey about how to take an idea from start to finish, what it takes to level up your business, how to effectively use time to get more done, and what it takes to do your best work. Kira:  Charlie, welcome! Rob:   Hey, Charlie. Charlie:        Thanks so much for having me, guys. I'm pumped to be here. Kira:  Yeah. We're pumped! I have been looking forward to this for a while. So let's just start, Charlie, with your story. For anyone who doesn't know you as well, how did you end up as an executive coach, speaker, an author, and a philosopher? Charlie:        Well, when it comes to the executive coach, speaker, and author bit, all of that was super accidental. I fell into this backassward, in the sense where I had come back. So let's roll back to 2006, 2007. I had recently come back from being a deployed soldier for Operation Iraqi Freedom, and I still had my career as an Army officer. I was a logistics officer. And I was also pursuing my PhD in philosophy. So I'm a social philosopher and an ethicist. And it seems so sophomoric now, looking back as a 40-year-old, looking back at my 26-year-old self. But my 26-year-old self was like, ‘I've got to get my stuff together. I'm just not making it happen. I'm just not getting stuff done.’ What I would say now is, ‘You've got two careers, dummy. Chill!’ Right? But at the time, I was just like, ‘Ah! I'm not making it happen.’ So I did what any good scholar and any good officer would do. I was just like, ‘Look. I'm not the only person that has had this problem. Someone else has figured this out.’ So I started doing the research, and I found that I was having to do a lot of synthesis and translation of what I was reading from the productivity literature, which tended to be really granular, and really focused on tasks. And it just really focused on lower-level stuff in the personal development literature, which tended to be pretty lofty. But my problem was this messy world in the middle of projects. I had all these projects that just wasn't getting done. And so I did what any good scholar and philosopher would do, is I started teaching other people about this sort of stuff. And it seems really funny that here I was already overwhelmed, but then I decided to start a business right on top of everything else I was doing, teaching people how to do this. And it's just kind of grown organically since then. Were it not for Naomi Dunford, who is a brilliant marketer and copywriter, basically putting me on the spot and almost damn near making me put my coaching page up, I wouldn't have been a coach. Because again, that wasn't in my career trajectory. I didn't grow up around entrepreneurs and business people. People like me didn't seem to start businesses like this. And so it's been just this huge blessing, and great fun ride. And it's still growing. It's still changing as we're talking. Rob:   So I'm really curious. Can you tell us a little bit more what you do as a coach? And we know a few people who have worked with you one-on-one. So I'm curious: What does that engagement look like? And what are the typical things that at least somebody starts out wanting to work on when they hire you? Charlie:        You know, this is going to be one of those harder questions to answer, but I'll try to be succinct on it. Really, what I do is I help people work on the root cause strategic issues in their business. I'm a strategy execution specialist. And so typically, they'll come to me and they'll be like, ‘Hey, Charlie. I'm stuck!’ Or, ‘My business isn't making money.’ Or, ‘I can't figure out why this offer isn't working.’ Or sometimes it's, ‘Hey. My team, we're just not getting it done.’ And so we really go in and figure out what's going on. And what an engagement typically looks like, and what makes me sometimes a terrible coach, is that there are plenty of times where I don't think my clients have the answers. Right? Especially from the coaching industry... And we're not going to get too much into insider baseball... But there's a part of the shtick that the client owns the answers. But when you start talking about it in a business context and in an executive concept, sometimes you just don't know what you don't know. And you can't see what you can't see. And so we focus on the three to five things that are going to make the biggest difference in the business. And then every other week, we come together and just work until we fix it. And along the way, if you're in business for any amount of time, what you figure out is you solve one problem and create three others. And so it's job security for me in a sense, where we're creating new challenges as we go. But it's not the same damn challenge over and over and over again. So we might go from a solo printer business that's stuck at the owner executive's capacity, and then break through that by either changing markets or adding team capacity to it. But then they've got managerial challenges, and then you have to forecast cash flow a little bit differently. So the reason it's super tricky for me to say what it is I do is if I were a marketing strategist, I would say, ‘Yo, I help them build their funnel,’ and blah, blah, blah. I'd have three or four things that I work on. But I'm that really well-versed generalist that can walk into a situation, figure out what's going on, and start righting the ship as we go. Kira:  All right. I want to talk about the insider baseball piece of it, because a lot of copywriters in our community are developing their own programs and communities, and are getting into coaching. Rob and I do some of that in our groups. And it has been a struggle, too, for me, because of what you said. I feel like what I have been told to do is to ask provocative questions that help the person you're mentoring figure out the answer. And half the time I just want to tell them the answer. And so I feel like I have this inner conflict all of the time that it seems like you've worked through. So I think my question is more generic, around how can we become better coaches if that is a part of our business model? How can we think about it in a way that helps us better serve the people who are hiring us, working with us? Charlie:        That was a great question, Kira. And I don't want to disparage the value of being able to ask really good questions. And the reason why coaching as a profession, and as that modality, focuses on questions is because it centers the client's experiences. It centers the client's expertise and their strengths, and shows them that they have a way to go forward. And it doesn't make the coach the expert; it makes the client the expert. And there's a lot of value in that. And, Kira, you've probably been on those conversations to where you've asked all the provocative questions for 30, 45 minutes. And then it can just get super exasperating. The client knows that you have a certain something going on, and they just don't know how to answer the questions. Kira:  You start drawing pictures and playing Pictionary. Charlie:        You start drawing pictures, and playing Pictionaries and Charades...