I Opened A Coaching Session With The Worst Line Ever

And he gained 55 subscribers in 9 hours

Have you ever made a bad first impression?

As a strategy coach, and a public speaker, I always put a lot of focus on the first impression. How to start on a high (at whatever you do) and set yourself up for success because a first impression goes a long way and you only have 7 seconds (or less) to make it - or break it.

I have different strategies too:

Start with a fun fact to break the ice.

Share a thought-provoking idea to get people thinking.

Tell a personal story to build a connection.

I never start my session with “I have (massive) imposter syndrome.”

That is, until this week…

A little background story

Last month, I received a notification about a new Founding Member. I had never seen his name before so I checked his profile before sending him a welcome message.

I have to confess, at first, I thought “Charlie” was a troll: multimillion businessman, Founder, CEO, a dedicated section at the financial magazine MarketWatch and…had served Presidents of the US. 6 to be exact.

Of course I fact-checked everything and to my horror, everything was true. I verified his LinkedIn profile too: 31K followers. Featured by all the top magazines you can name in finance and then some.

So yeah, imposter syndrome was in order.

To make things worse, his secretary contacted me to book the session. Definitely not a troll.

The session

Fast forward 3 weeks, I jumped into the strategy session via Zoom. I had prepared as much as I could, but even after doing my homework, I still felt way out of my league. I’m not the type of coach people book through a secretary - not yet in any case.

Charlie Garcia showed up on time and I didn’t have any of my killer openings ready because quite frankly, none of them quite fit the situation.

We said hi and totally out the blue, I threw a,

“Hi Charlie, before we start I muss confess one thing…”

And that’s when I dropped it,

“I have massive imposter syndrome talking to you.”

There it was. The mask came off.

How do you recover from that?

To be honest, I was totally ready for him to walk away after my Grand Opening and I was happy to refund him the money. After all, that’s not what you pay a coach for. Imagine if I were a surgeon in the operating theater!

But he didn’t walk away. Instead he smiled, his body relaxed, and all of a sudden, the atmosphere changed. It felt light, open and clear.

The following 60 minutes flew by. We spent the hour brainstorming, sharing perspectives, exchanging thoughts and collaborating on his project to build his finance community on Substack.

Since the mask had come off anyways, I didn’t have to pretend to be anything or prove something I was not. I could just focus on actively listening and share my honest perspective and constructive feedback, coming from a very different world to his.

In fact, Charlie was already amazing in his field but by focusing on what I could bring to the table, versus obsessing about the table, I didn’t have the pressure to “perform” and that took a huge weight off my shoulders because I was able to be 100% me.

We ended up the session with a clear action plan. No fancy templates but a solid strategy to help him grow his new Substack community, Capital Mischief, by leveraging what he already has: experience, a digital footprint and rock solid business proof. He’s definitely not starting from zero and with a clear plan and some collaboration on steroids with the right partners, his potential is huge.

The aftermath

I left the session feeling good and relieved, knowing that I had given my 200% regardless of the league I was playing in.

And then something happened the blew my mind.

I received an email from Charlie the next morning and I’m not going to paraphrase it so here it is (part of it):

He found the session extremely valuable and started implemented the actions straight away. But what struck him most was precisely my blunt opening: telling him how I honestly felt about being in his league.

I thought it might have made me look amateur or unprofessional, but to my surprise, it did the exact opposite. It helped him relax and trust me and realize he wasn’t talking to someone pretending to be a guru at anything. Where I saw an imposter, he saw honesty, integrity and value ❤️

What’s Charlie up to

In less than 24 hours, Charlie made some changes and put the action plan to motion:

He turned his LinkedIn profile (see below) into a strategic bridge to drive subscribers to his Substack, Capital Mischief and started engaging with the finance community in conversations and debates.

Thanks to a tip I shared during my Live session this week (how to add links smartly), he was able to turn that conversation into a community incubator and he got 55 new subscribers in 9 hours. He had 200+ when we talked. You do the math.

A new lesson and friendship

I’m pretty sure that Charlie will turn Capital Mischief into a Substack Bestseller in Finance within the next 12 months because he has everything going for him, especially the winner’s mindset and attitude.

And I’m really happy he didn’t walk away because I learned a huge lesson.

We live in a world that is constantly requiring us to “perform.” We post our best picture, embellish our figures and profiles, show up as a coach with a proprietary framework, have a perfect how-to and opening for every situation.

But what we we actually don’t need all of that?

The reality is that in no matter how fancy the table is, people crave real and human. And somehow, when we don’t have masks, pretensions or aspirations to be anything other than ourselves, we surprise ourselves by how much value we can bring.

And talking about tables, Charlie invited me to visit him and his wife if I ever go to Florida.

This story has a part 2. Watch this space!

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Lemons and Lemonade 🍋

If you want to get ahead with your finances, check out Capital Mischief, a future Substack Bestseller 😉

And if you want help with your digital strategy, I promise I’ll have a better opening for you in our session:

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