Make The First Move: How To Turn Hesitation Into Action

I’m back! As I restart coaching with clients after parental leave, I’m reflecting on how I began in the first place and how the question of “How do I start?” goes beyond me and my coaching business. Many of us want to spearhead internal projects, kickoff the job search, or level up your leadership. Getting what we want requires us to summon the courage to take action. In the spirit of spring and new beginnings, here’s what it took to build my confidence and make the first move.

1. Make The First Move: How To Turn Hesitation Into Action

When it comes to getting what we want, often we stop trying before giving ourselves a fair shot at starting. We pre-negotiate with ourselves by laying out all the reasons our idea won’t work.

It’ll just be too hard. It won’t turn out right. People won’t take it (me) seriously.

Whether we want to start a side hustle, a work initiative, the job search, or the journey to being a more effective leader, the first move can be the most daunting.

When starting Inner Radio, I used a design thinking process from a Stanford Graduate School of Business course called Startup Garage: user interviews. User interviews sound just like what they are. Interviewing your audience allows you to discover their pains and motivations and build a product that solves a pressing problem. The hope is to reduce the chances of spending loads of time building something no one actually wants to buy. But user interviews served another purpose for me. Conducting these interviews was a far less intimidating way to introduce my interest in building a coaching business to others than waking up one day and telling people, “I’m a coach now!” Here is the user interview process that gave me the courage to start Inner Radio. I hope sharing my journey sparks some action that gets you closer to what you want.

1. Identify potential users (or stakeholders)

Want to start an initiative for work? Find out who your internal stakeholders are. Want to start the job search? Find out who your future boss or teammates might be. Want to start a side hustle? Find out who has the need you’re trying to solve for.

If you aren’t sure who your audience is, start with the closest group of people that might fit the bill. Don’t let not knowing for sure stop you, you’ll find out along the way. When I began, I didn’t know exactly who I wanted to be coaching, so I reached out to my classmates at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business — a group of wonderful people who were ambitious, committed, and inspired to make a positive impact — qualities of people I wanted to work with.

2. Craft a note asking for user interviews

I use the word “craft” for a reason. Spend time on this outreach. Sometimes I see “btw I’m launching a coaching business!” sandwiched in between multiple other announcements to launch someone’s practice. If your project isn’t important enough for its own email, why would I pay attention to it? Tailor the outreach to your audience by speaking to a pain that is important, relevant and urgent.

• Important: Why does it matter?

• Relevant: Why does it matter to me?

• Urgent: Why does it matter to me right now?

Here was my initial outreach to my Stanford Graduate School of Business classmates during our final few weeks of classes:

Subject line: New job or no job?

GSBlasteroonies,

As you embark on your next chapter, you are taking on a new role with new responsibilities, having tougher conversations and making bigger decisions. Or, you might not know what’s next...yet!

I am exploring a coaching startup and want to hear what’s exciting and nerve-wracking about the transition for you.

A short chat would be amazing. Reply some form of "Yes" and I’ll find time on our calendars. 

You're the best,

JenO

3. Conduct a high leverage user interview

I organized the interview in two parts:

The first half of the interview I coached the interviewee on whatever topic they wanted. During the last half we debriefed on what the interviewee liked and what they would like more of from coaching. I call this a high leverage interview because it allowed me to do three things at once:

• Identify patterns of need

• Practice coaching

• Receive immediate feedback on what worked and what didn’t

In these interviews I did not sell my coaching service because I did not know what my coaching service was. The intention of these interviews was pure discovery. I asked lots of empty questions to unearth the motivations and fears of the people I wanted to help most.

Similarly, if you are spearheading an internal project, focus the interview on how your audience measures success in your organization, what gets in the way of success, and how this projects relates to success. If you are job searching, interview people who have the role of your boss and peers. Learn what it takes to be an outstanding teammate. If you are leveling up your leadership, seek feedback from the people whose feedback matters to your success at the organization.

4. Run a thank you experiment

Once I had my name, website, LLC, etc. in place, I reached back out to the people who I interviewed with an experiment. Below is my email:

Subject line: First dibs on coaching sessions

Hey X! Thanks again for chatting about coaching. Your feedback was awesome and helped me shape Inner Radio. I’m soft-launching Inner Radio tomorrow and am giving people who did user interviews first dibs on a set of low-cost sessions.

Let me know if you wanna chat more about it. No pressure, let me know what you think :)

Thanks!

Jen

When several of my classmates took me up on my offer, that was my first signal I was onto something. 

Thank you experiments contain 1) a thank you offering value 2) an ask. I offered a discounted package and my ask was for my audience’s time to discuss my coaching service. If you are spearheading an internal project, you might offer a summary of your interview findings and ask for additional stakeholders to join the conversation. If you are job searching, share your interview learnings and ask for an introduction to a person in a similar role. If you are leveling up your leadership, share your growth areas identified from feedback with your manager and ask for budget for coaching 😉.

User interviews, which I have repeated several times with different groups, helped me discover my focus on c-suite cross-functional effectiveness. They are a continuing and critical part of my process to start new projects and learn about the leaders I serve. I hope they make their way into your process, too.

2. Recommendation

They All Saw A Cat by Brendan Wenzel offers a simple concept that is easily forgotten: perspective shapes what we see. A dog, a fish, a bird, a bee and a host of other creatures see a cat walk through the world. They all see the cat differently. It seems so clear in a children’s book. In real life when we can’t believe someone else doesn’t see things our way, let’s remember that sometimes I’m a worm and you’re a bat.

3. The Goings On

Parental leave was fully of wonder — equal parts wondering how in the world we do this and the wonder of watching our baby experience everything for the first time. Even though we take the same house tour and read the same books, something new captures her attention each time. She reminds me that things are always changing. Accepting the change makes life’s moments more uncertain, more thrilling, and definitely more precious.

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Jennifer Ouyang Altman is the CEO and Founder of Inner Radio, a leadership coaching company working with executives hungry to define their leadership style, build effective interpersonal relationships, and harness the power of team. She facilitates communication and leadership courses with Stanford’s Graduate School of Business and is a CEO coach for Berkeley Haas’ CEO program. Her work has been published in the Los Angeles Times and Washington Post. She believes in the rules of radio: clarity, simplicity, and personality. You can’t speak and listen at the same time.