095 - UnLearning

Marisa Huston  0:03  
Welcome to Episode 95 on the Live Blissed Out podcast. Did you know that if you improve an aspect of your business by 1% every day, that aspect will be 37 times better after one year? Hello, action taker! Welcome to Live Blissed Out. A podcast where I have inspirational informational conversations with business owners and subject matter experts to help you get the scoop on a variety of topics. Tired of hesitating or making decisions without having the big picture? Wanna be in the know? Then this is the place to go. I'm your host Marisa Huston, helping you achieve bliss through awareness and action. So let's get to it. In this episode, Amanda harness shares why change in business is so challenging and provides techniques to be more successful with fostering lasting outcomes. Amanda is founder and CEO of Kinetic Spark, a business consulting firm focused on developing strategic operations for service based businesses. The firm's purpose is to help businesses create a foundation so they can operate and grow with confidence. The goal is to increase customer satisfaction, create a fulfilling work environment and regain lost revenue. She helps to solve people and process problems in order to ignite business growth. To learn more, visit www.kinetic-spark.com. The information opinions and recommendations presented in this podcast are for general information only and any reliance on the information provided in this podcast is done at your own risk. This podcast should not be considered professional advice. Amanda, welcome to the show!

AmandaHarNess  1:40  
Marisa, thank you for having me.

Marisa Huston  1:42  
Oh, I'm so glad you're here. I am looking forward to having a chat with you today. So tell us what exactly are we covering and why does it matter to our listeners?

AmandaHarNess  1:52  
I would love to present a concept for why when we make changes in our business, it can be so challenging. And then I'd like to present some techniques that will help listeners be more successful with fostering more lasting outcomes. 

Marisa Huston  2:08  
As business owners, we always tend to think about just do it. Go out there and get habits and do things over and over and eventually things are going to click. But unlearning information or doing things from a different perspective can be a huge challenge for a lot of us.

AmandaHarNess  2:27  
Absolutely. I think one of the things that I try to listen for when I'm starting to work with a client is when I asked them why they might be doing something a certain way. If their answer is something in the realm of, this is the way we've always done it then I know that's a moment where we need to talk about unlearning. That we need to talk about how we can transform things in their business and have the most success while we do it.

Marisa Huston  2:53  
And I'm sure you've heard it more than I have, being that you are in this business of helping other business people. The one I hear a lot is, well everybody else is doing it and it's working for them, right?

AmandaHarNess  3:05  
Totally. And I like to tell clients right off the bat that I don't cookie cutter anything. I want to ask a lot of questions. I want them to feel like they can be in an environment where they're comfortable being candid with me. I want to know why their business exists and what they want from it. Because when we are gonna make changes and address any of their strengths and obstacles and figure out what opportunities are for them, it's exactly that. It's for them and them only and there isn't one way that's right for everybody. So when someone wants to just copycat someone else, and it's not working for them, then that simply is the reason why. Because it's just not their way of doing it. 

Marisa Huston 3:45
Exactly. And we're looking at it from a very macro level, instead of really understanding how it applies to our particular situation. And that's where you come in. 

AmandaHarNess 3:54
Absolutely. I try to present them with that 30,000 foot view, where sometimes you just need someone who's not too close to the challenge, to be able to present you with other ideas. And that's really where this process of unlearning can come into play. More businesses these days are trying to exercise a culture of continuous transformation and improvement.  Less businesses are focused on just doing things one way all the time. And as you and I discussed, we love being lifelong learners ourselves. But with this constant transformation, we're presented with a lot of challenges that are associated with that constant change. So with that change, we're consistently learning and one of the greatest obstacles of learning is unlearning something. It's more complex than just forgetting something, right? It's about the ability to elect an alternative mindset on something. When we're learning something, it's about adding new knowledge to what we already know. But when we unlearn something, we have to cross out our previous set of knowledge and adapt a whole new one, which is where the hard part comes in. But I actually think it's just really, really fun and interesting. Just from a personal example, I, a couple years ago was into mountain biking and I had hurt my right hand a little bit. Nothing major. But being a right hander, I couldn't use my hand for a couple days, and I had to unlearn using my right hand to brush my teeth and learn how to brush my teeth with my left hand. It sounds like something little, but it was actually really weird.

Marisa Huston  5:33  
Yeah, it's so uncomfortable because you're doing something you're not used to doing, right?

AmandaHarNess  5:37  
Totally! Absolutely! It took days. I don't think I ever actually got used to it. But I can kind of watch this change and I was really trying to pay attention to how I was doing it before, what was my other hand doing, how does my other hand need to do it differently? And it was just unlearning something relearning it a different way and trying to be successful at this new thing.

Marisa Huston  5:59  
And you know, what's funny is that, let's say you learned how to use your left hand to brush your teeth. You still want to revert back to using your right hand any chance you get, because that's what you've been doing your whole life?

AmandaHarNess  6:11  
Absolutely. Yeah, it is a process for sure. There's multiple steps to the process. And it can be applied into our businesses, not just our personal lives. An example I guess I could give about my business is that when I stepped out of that corporate world and into the role of an entrepreneur running my own business, I had to unlearn asking permission for everything, right? Is this a good idea? Is it okay if I take this in this direction? Because I wasn't the decision maker. And I've had to learn to trust myself as a business owner and make my own decisions. And so when I'm going through process like that, I have to think about that unlearning. And there's three primary steps of the unlearning process. And it's important to recognize what they are so that we can be successful with our outcomes. The first step is that we just have to recognize that what we were doing doesn't work anymore. That our old model is not applicable. It's not effective for where we want to go. Just admitting that you have a problem is step one, right?

Marisa Huston  7:11  
Absolutely. Because if you don't recognize that there's areas of opportunity, then you're definitely not going to attempt to unlearn anything.

AmandaHarNess  7:19  
Exactly. And like you were talking about earlier, how we just have a habit of doing things a certain way. It's relevant when you're transforming your systems in your business. You and your team, you have many ways or old ways of doing things. So in order to adopt a new workflow, your team has to unlearn the old way and put in real conscious on purpose effort to learn the new way, until that one becomes habit. So unlearning and relearning is really just re establishing habits. And so once we've done that part where we recognize we need to make the change, the business then needs to create that new, better model. Where are we going? What improvement are we making to achieve our new set goals? So having that 30,000 foot view that I was talking about is how you can really notice where are your inefficiencies or your gaps? Where are errors happening? And if you can just put a strong emphasis on creating an environment where you can feel comfortable being candid, as I was mentioning, then you can figure out how the business is currently operating, and enable productive conversations that move you toward your optimal solutions. So step one, we figure out that we need to change and step two, we figure out what we need to change. 

Marisa Huston  8:33  
You know, Amanda, I'm so glad you said that, I find that in the second phase here that you're describing, when we're being asked to share our ideas. Before you can even say anything, people will say, that's not great. That's not a good idea. Just knock that off. And what I've always said in these meetings is there are no bad ideas. We need to allow the flow of information to come through first, and then we can start to filter it. But oftentimes, we filter before we even have the opportunity to have the conversation. And I think that can be difficult because people feel uncomfortable, and then they don't want to participate.

AmandaHarNess  9:11  
Absolutely. I think that you know, since the business world is having a little bit of that transformation toward, you know, we want to constantly evolve and change, they're also being more open to having those kinds of conversations as a collaborative team within a business. And so typically, I try to tell clients, when I say clients, I really work directly with the business owner, as the decision maker and then I collaborate with their team. But I remind the owner that that's exactly what it is. You can foster a culture where you show that you value the thoughts and opinions of your team. But whether or not you choose to execute on them or implement them is still your choices as the decision maker, as the owner. So you can use that collective brain power of everyone around you.  Why not optimize on the collective thoughts of everyone around you that might have great ideas. And then you can decide what to actually action upon. And that's where you've gone through that second step. You're soliciting feedback from everybody around how else can we do this?

Marisa Huston  10:12  
Yes. And that open exchange of information. Because what happens is if we stop them from sharing those ideas, and they feel stifled from the beginning, you're missing out on a lot of potential ideas that you would never have considered. So it's just being open minded first, and then you know that you ultimately have the decision to decide what direction the company and your organization is going to take.

AmandaHarNess  10:36  
And not only are you missing out on potential ideas, you're actually missing out on the potential for the business itself, because someone could have this really great idea that you want to act upon, or they have an idea that springs to mind, something to really be aware of, and protect against. And so you're actually just stalling the progress of your business if you don't solicit that information from people. Which actually brings us to the last step of this unlearning process, where we need to work with the team to ingrain, that new model. So we've figured out that we need to change, we've worked together collaboratively figuring out what we're going to do next. And then we have to take time and give patients to the team in order to ingrain this new model and establish those new habits. It's really from a leader leading by example, where they can really help the employees hold themselves accountable. They have to put an effort to learn the new way. And the leaders need to be responsible for supporting that and fostering their movement forward and the on purpose, relearning that they're doing. Have you read the book Atomic Habits by James Clear? It's pretty popular right now.

Marisa Huston  11:51  
No, I have not.

AmandaHarNess  11:53  
I would recommend you read that. And anyone who's listening, it's fascinating. There's lots of science behind methods for creating new habits that can be carried over into how we work, how we run our business. It's very applicable to our personal lives. But there's so much in there that you can just tweak that concept a little bit, and really see how you can be the best leader if you do a little bit of tweaking and adjusting to your habits, as well as fostering your team members to really join you on the ride and be your shipmates and embrace their ownership and the part that they play in the growth of the business as well.

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Marisa Huston  13:18  
Thanks for the recommendation. Because I believe this is an ongoing process. And I think what happens as business owners is we think it's one and done. Alright, I've applied the first, second and third stage and now I'm good to go. But really, it's continual. We have to keep reassessing what's working, what's not working, how do we keep adjusting? And even if you do achieve whatever it is you're after, you can't just rest at that point. Because that's how business works. It's continuously evolving. You always have to be asking the questions, making the adjustments, and working as a team to get to where you wanna go.

AmandaHarNess  13:51  
Absolutely. Because when you've hopefully, as a business owner, you've created kind of that long term vision that you have for your business. And if it is, in fact, long term, a lot of things are going to happen between now and then. And so you create your shorter term goals and priorities that will hopefully get you there. But you do have to be flexible, like you're saying. You have to figure out what trends are changing or if you're seeing any obstacles that are continuously coming up. And that's when you would make these adjustments of deciding, okay, well, step one, the old way we're doing it's not working because of XYZ. Okay, so what are we going to do differently and that's where you said, you can kind of play with it, you know? Do some trial and error. Test things out. See what else you need to adjust and modify. And then once you've settled on something, then put in the effort and do it on purpose to learn this new way. It really is that living breathing entity like you're talking about and I actually if you can't tell, I just totally nerd out about it.

Marisa Huston  14:53  
I love it. It's so important. We need to be aware that these are things that we all have to be consciously doing on a consistent basis. And going back to what you said, change is a very scary word for most of us. And sometimes change we equated it to permanence. Like, I have to say goodbye to the old and start something new. And that's scary, because you're going into unfamiliar territory. And we tend to want to draw back to what we know. And so the thing that I always think about when it comes to this is, change doesn't have to be scary, because you can try things out. And if you find that it actually turned out worse, then all you have to do is make another change. So change is actually something that you can strive towards, that will help you and should not be considered something that's going to hinder you or be scary. You wake up in the morning and you say you want to try something and it's scary. And then you put it off. And then one day you wake up and ask yourself the question, what will happen if I don't do it, and that outcome is even scarier. So then you end up going after it to begin with. And then you say to yourself, why did I wait so long?

AmandaHarNess  16:02  
Yes. Just having this awareness is huge. It is hard to put into practice. You know, you're speaking of the effort that it takes to face something that is kind of a challenge. I like to try to use the word transform versus change, because there is that negative connotation. And I like the way you sort of rephrase the context of change into, it's just something that you're transforming. It's an evolution. Versus this one time stagnant, start and stop.

Marisa Huston  16:34  
Yes! And we define change in such a scary way. And the way I look at it as...You and I are not the same person we were yesterday. We're different in many ways. Maybe some things we can't see and some things we can. But we are evolving every day. And maybe even every few hours!  It's part of who we are and it's part of what makes life so exciting and even running a business exciting. Because you know that you have the power to improve, to get better, to learn to grow. Even if you're a solopreneur, an entrepreneur, you work with other people in some capacity. Whether it's your suppliers, or the people that you consult with. And so how are those systems working for you? And if they're not working, then how do you enhance that so that it becomes better. And then you get so excited, because after you do it, you're like, Oh, my gosh, this is so much easier. Why didn't I do this before?

AmandaHarNess  17:27  
That's my favorite thing to hear from a client is, I wish I'd hired you years ago you know? The best news about this process of unlearning is that if we're just aware of the need for it, and we can put it into practice, then we'll actually see easier and quicker shifts. as we evolve and grow in the business. We're going to get to our end goals and outcomes faster, with greater success. So that worry of the feeling that we get when we're changing, and it feels uneasy and scary. If we can be aware that we need to put into place these extra steps and this patience for the process, then with that awareness, we actually just get to the other side of the rainbow quicker. And so we don't have to drag out those feelings any longer. We can actually succeed with more ease, and at a faster pace.

Marisa Huston  18:25  
Oh, yeah. It's about being creative. And creative is fun! When you're thinking about I'm creating, I'm going to try something new, it should be fun. And I think that sometimes we think of unlearning as scary. And it's really changing that viewpoint, changing your mindset and looking at it from a positive perspective. And then when we get there, we're just going, I don't know what took me so long.

AmandaHarNess  18:48  
I like to keep quotes that are inspiring or make me laugh. I actually like to have a book of them. And there's this one that I wrote down by good ole' Albert Einstein. He said, "We can't solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them." That's that whole I've just done it the same way I've always done it or I'm going to copycat someone else. If you're trying to solve a problem, then you have to be creative, like you're saying. You have to move past the original concept that you used when you started and get to a whole new concept in order to actually get to that resolution.

Marisa Huston  19:28  
I think a good visual that people can relate to is like, let's say you get a car. And then you upgrade it, then your car becomes even better. So you just want to look at it as you're not losing the car. You're just making it work better for you and doing things that are going to get you where you want to go faster and easier.

AmandaHarNess  19:47  
Absolutely. I actually really like that analogy.

Marisa Huston  19:50  
You're just making it better for yourself, your customers, your business, all of it. Now that we know these three things that we need to be doing. What is a quick activity that our listeners can do to help them get there? 

AmandaHarNess  20:04  
Oh, yeah, good question. So I kind of mentioned before, one of my favorite things about evolution in business culture is that there's more value from the leaders being put on the collaboration with their employees. And so one thing that I love to suggest is that you want to actively involve the team in creating these new processes or the new way of doing something. So as you're brainstorming the new transformation you're making in the business, solicit feedback from your team. Instead of just asking, do you have any questions at the end of a meeting or a stand up. Ask the team...Are there other questions I should be asking? So you as the leader are soliciting direct feedback from the team. Not just do you have any questions, everybody? But should I have other questions? Because the employees, after all they're the primary people, that are going to carry out the new way of doing something. And so this allows them to be more invested in the process, more likely to put in the work to unlearn and relearn. And then they can own the outcomes and the changes that are made, and then you end up seeing greater success in the end. 

Marisa Huston  21:17  
And it's just a play in words. It's a little bit of a switch in the question, but it makes all the difference, doesn't it? 

AmandaHarNess  21:22  
Yes, absolutely. I've seen some really big changes in conversation, and what types of ideas come up with that small change in the question.

Marisa Huston  21:31  
Amanda, this is amazing stuff. Who is your ideal client? And how do they learn more about how you can help them?

AmandaHarNess  21:39  
Well, I love working with service based businesses, specifically. I love a business that's there to give back to people and to give something to someone that needs it. So service based business owners who feel like maybe they're in a little bit of a plateau, or maybe they feel like there's a little bit of room for some more consistency and standardization. If they have any questions about how those modifications can really change how they feel about their daily business, then that's an absolutely great time for them to give me a call. Someone can reach me easily on LinkedIn just under my name, Amanda HarNess. And they can reach out directly to me with a message or send me an email. My email is Amanda at www.kinetic-spark.com. You can also go to my website and see some resources there just to help you get started. I have lots of blogs and videos that I post up all the time as well. So if you go to www.kinetic-spark.com. You can get all those resources and also fill out a contact me page so I'll know that you want me to give you a call or send you an email. One other really great opportunity is that I want to try and just celebrate summer by offering a discount for a discovery evaluation, where we really try to hone in on the strengths of a business and root out the causes of their challenges and obstacles so we can really just transform everything into opportunity. So if someone's interested in potentially learning more about that, they can reach out to me in any of those ways, and we can discuss what it might look like to get started.

Marisa Huston  23:13  
Just being aware of how to address this is so helpful. So thank you for being here, Amanda. 

AmandaHarNess  23:19  
Absolutely. It's my pleasure. Thanks for having me on. 

Marisa Huston  23:22  
That's a wrap for this episode of Live Blissed Out. Thanks for listening, and thanks to Amanda HarNess for joining us on the show. If you have a question or comment for a future episode, all you have to do is go to ww.speakpipe.com/lbovm, or click the link in the show notes to leave a brief audio message. If you find value in our show, please visit www.livenlissedout.com to reach out, subscribe and share on social media. This show is made possible through listeners like you. Thank you. So long for now and remember to keep moving forward!