How To Focus In An Unfocused World With Erik Qualman

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TSP Erik Qualman | How To Focus

 

Are you easily distracted? Do you wish you know how to focus and get more work done? Erik Qualman, a keynote speaker and the author of The Focus Project, joins John Livesay as he discusses the principal components of staying focused. Erik notes that staying focused is a powerful thing that stretches the possibilities of what you can do at the moment that will also help you in the future. Learning the ways on how you can stay focused gives your mind the power to take control of what’s important and is the key to success.

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How To Focus In An Unfocused World With Erik Qualman

Our guest is Erik Qualman, the author of The Focus Project. He talks about there are three key things we need to do in order to stay focused. We need to know our purpose. We need to have a process and finally, we need to focus on the progress of what we’re doing. He said, “When you make the right decision, money follows. Success is two sides of the same coin, getting focused and staying focused.” Enjoy the episode.

We have a returning guest, Erik Qualman who is a five-time bestselling author and a keynote speaker. Erik has performed in over 55 countries and reached 50 million people. He was voted the second most likable author in the world behind Harry Potter’s JK Rowling. His Socialnomics work has been on 60 Minutes, the Wall Street Journal, and used by the National Guard to NASA. Over 500 universities use his materials. His animation studio wrote and produced the world’s most-watched social media video, Social Media Revolution. He is a former sitting professor at MIT and Harvard’s edX labs, and he received an honorary doctorate for his groundbreaking work. Most importantly, he’s still trying to live up to “The world’s greatest dad coffee mug he received from his wife and two daughters. I had the joy of meeting Ana Maria, his wife. I’m sure that he’s given her “The world’s greatest mom mug. His book is called The Focus Project. It’s about how we can stay focused in an unfocused world. Welcome back to the show.

It’s great to be back. I’m glad you’ve met my better half. Ana Maria does have a much larger mug than I do for two reasons because she’s great and also, she needs a little more coffee to get going.

Let’s go back. For most people, it might be the first time that they’re reading an interview about you. Take us back to your childhood. I know you’re from Michigan. How did you get into this world of digital? I know you had a background at Yahoo. Was there anything in your childhood that led you to go, “This is where I’m going?”

I would say no on the childhood. I was always a curious kid. The first thing I sold was marigold seeds. This is a yellow and orange flower that most of you see if you don’t know what a marigold is. If you break those apart, they break in hundreds of seeds that you can put as a kid into a paper Dixie cup and then go door-to-door and sell them. It’s beneficial to those people because you can plant them and water them, and they’ll grow. That’s the only piece from an entrepreneur standpoint. I was fortunate to grow up in Michigan with two brothers and a great family that’s very active.

I graduated from Michigan State University. During my time in Michigan State, I was an intern at an ad agency that worked with Cadillac. I remember I was an intern when I did this. I had to write down the meeting notes. Think about writing all the meeting notes for the meetings because you’re meeting with the client. What was said, he said, she said. It takes quite a bit of time. I typed them and print them. I have to put them physically on everyone’s chair and then mail it to the client or put it in an interoffice mail. Some of you might not know what that is. When I talk about interoffice mail, it’s surprising that it still exists. People are still looking for these envelopes that are all used. You cross out the name. It’s bringing back memories, probably not good ones for a lot of people.

TSP Erik Qualman | How To Focus

The Focus Project: The Not So Simple Art of Doing Less

One day, I go, “This new thing called email is new for businesses. Can you send an attachment?” There’s no Google, so I had to figure it out. I’m like, “You can.” Instead of printing it and sending it, I did the unthinkable and saved two hours of my time and emailed it. Within a minute, the head of the agency is in my cube. He’s like, “What are you doing?” I go, “It’s better for the environment because I’m printing on paper.” He’s like, “No one cares about the environment at this point.” I go, “It saved an hour of my time. I can tell as an intern that he doesn’t care how I spent an hour of my time. Finally, I go, “I can track this because a lot of times, the client says they didn’t get it. I can track that shows they opened it.” That saved my internship. That was a precursor to me getting into digital items. Later, when I took the full-time position, they go, “There are these things called websites that came out of nowhere. We need Cadillac.com. Can you figure it out?” I loved it and away we go, as they say, and the rest is history.

What a great story of origin of solving a pain point. Instead of the client saying, “I didn’t get it.” Not only did you get it, but you also opened it at this time and you spent this much time reading it. That’s fascinating. Earth Day was from the ‘70s. I remember that was a big deal in school and yet, the actual focus and implementation on it. That’s the thing that stands out for me in that story. It’s like, “I don’t care that you’re saving paper.” Of course, no one would typically say that now but interestingly, that was on everyone’s radar and yet, not being put into use.

This is Michigan. Keep in mind, Michigan still to this day has $0.10 per can, which is shocking to me. If you ever watched Seinfeld, they’re doing a whole episode on it. Most days, they don’t have a return policy to return your aluminum cans for money. You pay for it upfront, then you return them to get the cash. If you happen to be a lucky kid and find some cans, then that’s free money. It was very progressive. It’s funny to see how some things have progressed. Still, Michigan’s the only one that has $0.10, and not every state has a return policy on aluminum.

You’re also the only speaker and author who, to my knowledge, has an animation studio. Can you tell us how that evolved?

We’re working on a cool project. It’s one of those deals to where when I wrote Socialnomics, that’s my first book for a lot of your readers out there, I go, “I’m talking about social media.” Socialnomics was the four-phase book. MySpace was the biggest thing of the day. The book is about, “This is why social media is not for teenagers. This is why it’s going to change the world and how we communicate because governments are going to use it. Businesses are going to use it. It’s not just for teenagers.” At the time when I wrote it, everyone’s like, “Social media is for teenagers.” I’m screaming from the mountaintops, “No. It’s going to be massive.”

[bctt tweet=”When you make the right decisions, money follows.” username=”John_Livesay”]

I talked to CEOs for an hour and they’re like, “That sounds good. I agree with you,” then they wouldn’t do anything. I’m like, “I got to hit these people over the head.” I did Social Media Revolution which is a lot longer. Now, they’re a lot shorter. It’s a four-minute animated film with all these crazy statistics. They’re like, “If Facebook was a country, it’d be bigger than whatever.” I’m giving context to these data points and it went massively viral. Companies would reach out and say, “Can you do that for us? We want to do this initiative.” I go, “No, I just did that for the book to help explain it.” By the third knock, I’m like, “Wake up.” I’m like, “Yeah, we can do that. We have a whole studio. We will make it happen.” That’s how it all started and that’s what we do. We do only a couple a year because we want them to be super high quality, but we work with the best brands in the world. We’ve done some for Disney, Cartier, Mont Blanc, IBM and Chase. It’s been a fun ride.

A couple of takeaways there for people reading. When someone needs something that you can do and is willing to pay for it, perhaps that’s worth exploring as a business. Sometimes, we think it’s an outlier or one-off request. If you get enough of them, then you start to go, “This might be something.” Of course, that doubles down your brand credibility, uniqueness and memorability, which you have in spades. If you have a relationship with Mont Blanc and they’re looking for a keynote speaker, it’s such an easy introduction from the people who hired you to do the animation studio to say, “Let me put you in touch with so and so who’s hiring our speaker for the annual meeting.” Breaking through the clutter and being memorable and unique.

Speaking of clutter, in your book, The Focus Project, I don’t know if you were able to predict the future. Coming out of this pandemic, many people are complaining about how hard it is for them to focus. There’s an article about there’s something between thriving and depressed, and they’re calling it languishing. People are more tired than normal or Zoom burnout or all these other things. Even the children experienced school remotely. It has been a difficult challenge. What I liked about The Focus Project is this is a broader book than just execs. This is could be for moms, teachers and entrepreneurs. Anybody who feels that they’re overwhelmed and their me-time has gone out the window. My first question around this is, what inspired you to write it?

It happened before the pandemic. The book was complete right when the pandemic hits. What inspired me was that I was wrestling with it. I was sitting here going, “I’m the owner of my destiny supposedly but why is my hair on fire every day?” I’m like, “I’m not going to do that again tomorrow.” It was rinse, wash and repeat. I’m like, “This is crazy. If I’m struggling with this, let me go ask around.” I started asking school teachers, entrepreneurs, nonprofits, CEOs and small businesses. You got it. Everyone’s wresting with focus and how to focus in this unfocused world. The pandemic hit and it’s also throwing gasoline on it. Ironically enough, once the pandemic came out, the world’s first thought is, “Oh my gosh for the world,” then the second thought is, “I’ve got this new book. This is terrible. How am I going to launch a new book during a pandemic?” You’ve seen a lot of the movies. They’ve moved an entire year to launch Despicable Me 4. I started getting DMs and emails, “I need this book now. Don’t set due in the fall. We need it now.”

We did the unthinkable and moved it forward. We pretty much just published the book. It’s almost impossible to move a publishing date for a lot of reasons. I won’t bore you guys with that. Fortunately, we got to help these people. I don’t care if it impacts the sales negatively. If people are physically okay but mentally struggling, let’s get it out the door. It’s been rewarding for me to see that it’s helped people during these difficult times. It was the gasoline on the fire and it’s allowing people to focus in this unfocused world.

TSP Erik Qualman | How To Focus

How To Focus: Focus is really hard but it can be learned and it can become a habit, but you need a purpose to help you drive that.

 

That’s such a great example. We might have heard the concept of, “If you have a problem, maybe other people have a problem,” as a source of creating something, whether it’s a book or a product or even a topic for a talk. What you do that I also want to underline for everybody reading is make sure it is a problem. Don’t just think, “If I have, then everybody does.” You did some research to confirm in the startup world that product-market fit was there. Ironically, it’s another great story that it was needed more than ever as opposed to being pushed back. The word unprecedented is a little overused with a pandemic, but your story about a book being moved up as opposed to being pushed back like movies and other things is unprecedented. I’ve never heard of a book even being able to get pushed forward, let alone because of a need. That must feel great.

That goes to a bigger picture about a certain point in our lives and in our career where we’re doing something way beyond, “This is going to make me a lot of money.” If you’re being hired as a speaker, people are looking to you for some leadership and some thoughts that they can implement. One of the subheads of your book that you talk about is The Not So Simple Art of Doing Less. You even have something in there about pretend like you’re in school again and go on recess. Can you talk a little bit about that?

It’s crazy. To dovetail on your point there, there are a lot of conversations about if we move the book forward, it might make less money because books are generally launched in the fall. I go, “Let’s do what’s right for the reader. If it loses us money, I’m okay with that.” Ironically enough, everyone knows that when you do that, you make more money more times than not. It’s not always rainbows and unicorns as my daughters would say but it’s true. When you make the right decision, it’s ironic how much the money follows after you do that. That’s been the case.

I can’t thank them enough for reading the book, all the positive reviews, and making it a commercial success. It’s been great to see that it’s helping people on an individual level. It’s a book that I wrote. It’s called a project because I undertook it. I was struggling with it. John, I also started to ask in one of the last events I did. It was funny as I opened the book. I’m at a cocktail reception. I was one of the keynote speakers. I’m in this VIP room and I’m like, “I can’t believe I was in this room.” Businesses have been in place for hundreds of years in America. They’ve got last names like Mars, and they live on streets like Hershey and Cadbury.

I’m like, “What an advantage. I can just sit here and listen.” I’m asking these icons, “How are you so successful?” They’re like, “We’re a little better at focusing the most.” I go, “What do you struggle with on a day-to-day level as the leader?” They go, “Staying focused.” I’m like, “It’s the same coin. Just two different sides.” That’s when I go, “They’re doing it.” That’s why I started asking everyone that I’d run into, “If I could have more time,” then I realized, “You don’t need more time.” If you woke up two hours early, that doesn’t mean you get more done. You might get less done. If I gave you six more hours in the week, we’d all be super excited like, “You should give me a bonus of six hours.” You wouldn’t get everything done that’s on your to-do list. There’s more to do. That’s the fallacy we tell ourselves or I told myself. That was one of the biggest a-ha moments from the book.

[bctt tweet=”Success is both getting focused and staying focused.” username=”John_Livesay”]

I was glad I went through the project marrying the institutional research looking, “What does the brain do? What does the body do? What does sleep do? What does the food do?” Also, “Here are some tips and tricks when you’re in an office,” and then testing it myself to see what worked and didn’t work to tell the story. Everyone’s different. I say, “This didn’t work for me but it works for a lot of people,” or “Even if it doesn’t work for most people, this worked for me.” I want to make sure everyone took it at a personal level. I’ve never written a book on a personal level before. We almost pulled that as well. I was at a book club meeting and they said, “That’s our favorite part. That’s why we write it.” It’s a larger female audience. Most readers are females, 30% are female. It’s been amazing. We’ve been lucky.

Two big things there again. You are constantly full of nuggets. I love it. The first one is getting focused is a competitive advantage. The other one is talking to somebody who’s at the peak of their career, whether they’re an actor or a director or executive. How do you get to the top? The next challenge is how do you stay at the top. How does somebody have a relevant career? The same thing is true about, “I’m more focused on somebody else but I also stay more focused on someone else.” The second part of what you said that I’ve learned also is when we speak, write and talk to people, the more vulnerable we are and the more they connect with us. As opposed to pretending that we always have it all together all the time in terms of confidence or whatever the topic is. People like to hear our struggles and journeys. That shocked me because you shared that you played basketball in school because you happen to be tall and it’s the law.

I happen to be super-fast and quick. I’m kidding.

When someone sees somebody that’s tall, fit and in shape, they assume they’ve been like that their whole life. They don’t have to worry about it or think about it like us mere mortals.” You talk about you’re in Sweden and suddenly, you’re getting this little funny jab from your dad saying, “Those pants look a little tight there.” You reframed something about, “Instead of indulging in all this wonderful chocolate, when I’m in this country, I’m going to do something differently.” Can you share that shift?

It relates to neuroscience. For all your readers out there, you have sets of friends to where you’re a certain character, for lack of a better term. You have different subsets of friends. For some subsets, you’re the healthy person. When you’re around those people, since they are deeming you the healthy person mentally in your mind, you’re like, “A healthy person doesn’t eat this.” You would have peer pressure in a good way. You wouldn’t eat something unhealthy because then people say, “I’ve never seen you eat something like that,” or conversely, it could be, “You’re the one that’s always out there doing the crazy thing. You’re the one that’s willing to go talk and get this figured out.” We can’t get a table at the restaurant. Jill is the one that always gets it done. Jill’s the one that doesn’t matter. She can go. She’s not afraid to go talk to that stranger at the hostess stand. She’s going to make it happen.

TSP Erik Qualman | How To Focus

How To Focus: There is a superhero in all of us; we just need the courage to put on the cape.

 

We have different personas depending on the subset of friends that were with, so you got to take advantage of that. If you want to quit smoking, for example. It’s not like, “I’m going to quit smoking.” Neuroscience shows that if you say, “I’m not a smoker,” that changes everything. A smoker wouldn’t do that or a healthy person wouldn’t eat that. I told you that story because we do that with our friends. That’s how it works. There’s that peer pressure and also your mind takes on the persona. It’s interesting. When I went to Sweden, I was getting fitted in Boston, which is a progressive city. It’s European. I kept going to the guy, “No, this suit needs to be tighter. I’m going to Europe. They wear everything super tight, especially in Sweden.” They go, “This is crazy tight.” I go, “It needs to be tighter. This is frumpy.” Fortunately, there’s a lady. He was the boss but she had the guts to come around and she goes, “He’s right. It needs to be tighter. That’s how they wear it because I was just in Europe.”

That whole trip was funny because I didn’t consider myself in shape. I was backstage and I said to the group that I was with, “How do you stay in such good shape?” I was about to grab that jelly doughnut back there in the green room. I’ve stayed out of like, “I like to do this,” and all sudden I go, “I got to stay out.” The suit was ridiculously tight. Getting out of cars, I had to be careful. That was the most dangerous. Be slow and lean in, especially since I’m so tall. I’m trying to lean in without ripping the pants. Funny enough, I’m thinking these are trained professionals. The Swedish guys that I’m with, their suits are just as tight, and both of them split their pants during the week. I’m like, “I thought you guys knew how to do this but apparently not.”

That’s a risk they’re willing to take. Another big part of your brand is your name and this embodiment of a superhero. You have this quote from Superman and I love it. It’s like, “There is a superhero in all of us. We just need the courage to put on the cape.” When we’re talking about clothes and pants, I thought that would be a good transition into, “Is there a superhero in all of us?” Certainly, women I know feel like that’s true with Wonder Woman movies. Children are big on that for Halloween and tapping into that. I don’t think you usually have to convince children that they can put on this persona. They don’t have to feel like, “I’m not good enough.” We don’t have that ingrained in us quite yet. Would you share a little bit about your name, email and all that stuff, and then what you’re talking about with being a superhero?

I won’t go into the full length of the story because we did that last time. My name is Erik Qualman, so my first initial and last name is EQualman. For many years, especially the first fifteen years, I did not like it because there’s some good-natured ribbing, whether it was at Yahoo back in the ‘90s or Travelzoo. It’s like, “We need a coffee. Equalman, super-fast, so go get the coffee.” It’s like, “We need to crunch these numbers over the weekend because we’re going public. Equalman is super strong. He can crunch the numbers over the weekend.” I thought all this time that is happening to me, and then the story I told last time is I realized, “This is happening for me. What a blessing. I can’t believe I’m Equalman. Let’s step into it.”

That Superman quote resonates. I have the courage to wear the cape. For those that have ever seen me, I wear these crazy bright green glasses. Being from the Midwest, it’s uncomfortable for me to wear these and step into it, to put on these glasses and put on that cape, but I know that it gets the brand out there and it’s good financially. I had a tough time wearing them at first before I went all in because I felt like, “Look at me,” and then people are looking at you. I know that sounds weird because I’m on stage a lot, but a lot of us are introverted-extroverted. It depends on the moment.

[bctt tweet=”It is up to you to unleash your superpower.” username=”John_Livesay”]

I realized that the glasses could help one person. I’ve seen people come up to me because they can recognize me. It’s great because if I was taking them off, no one’s going to recognize me. When people come up, I realized that if I can help one kid out there, just one other person, it can be a kid at heart even 18 or 80, it doesn’t matter, then it’s worth stepping in that discomfort. It’s worth putting on the cape or in my instance, it’s worth putting on these green glasses. That’s why our podcast is called Super U. It’s all designed to give you tips to unlock and unleash the inner superpower that’s in all of us. That’s what we’re trying to do. Give you that moment that we can unlock it, but you need to unleash it. We can give you the key to help you unlock it, but you’re the one that needs to unleash it. That’s what we always try to do. Entertain, educate and empower people to achieve their best life. That’s our whole mantra and that’s what we’re trying to do.

The willingness to be a little different and pull a little attention gives other people the willingness to realize, “I don’t have to be someone who fits in. I can maybe take a risk and be myself.” That’s the real gift and why I wanted to bring it up again because there are so many layers to it. The other thing you talk about especially as it relates to focus and making it a project is this concept of selective attention. We’ve experienced it but I would love to have you define what it is and how we can use it to be more focused.

One example of selective attention would be if you’re in the market and you need a new car. There are three cars you’ve figured out you want out there. All of a sudden, you start looking at them, you see them everywhere. Let’s say you decide, “I want this GMC SUV because I got two kids.” All of a sudden, you’re trying to figure out the color, and all you see are these GMC SUVs. That’s selective attention. That’s one example. The way you can use that is trying to write down what are you focused on and then use that selective attention to your advantage because then you put that in your brain. A lot of times, it got to go across your lips, so verbalize it out loud to people, and then to the pencil tips, so write it down. Lips and pencil tips, and then that helps to train your brain, and then that increases your selective attention around those things.

What a great soundbite, lips and pencil tips. I love that. That’s visual. It’s clever. Any last thoughts you want to leave us with on how we can be more comfortable doing less or realize that we need to give ourselves a little recess?

There are three things I learned from the entire project. Number one, focus is really hard but focus can be learned and it can become a habit. You need to have a purpose to help you drive that. There are three things that I learned that I call the three Ps. The first one’s purpose. For example, let’s say you want to eat healthier or stop smoking. If you rely on willpower, that’s not a purpose. The purpose is, “I want to live longer.” That’s okay but what’s better is, “I want to live longer because I want to spend more time with my grandkids. I want 5 or 6 more years with my grandkids.” It’s getting to that purpose. It helps you form that habit of focus on that certain thing.

TSP Erik Qualman | How To Focus

How To Focus: We need to know our purpose. We need to have a process and we need to focus on the progress of what we’re doing.

 

The second thing is the process. The great people that we interviewed are not born with the DNA that allows them to focus better. What they’ve learned is they need systems and processes in place, not willpower. Willpower will fail you almost every time. Most of those systems or processes are around saying no. If it’s not an emphatic yes, it should be an emphatic no. If someone asks you, “Do you want to do this?” In your mind, you’re like, “I should probably do that for XYZ reason. I should probably do that because I’m a good friend. I should probably do that because maybe it’s okay for my career.” That’s a no.

The reason you’re saying no is that you can say yes to the big things in the future. You think you have unlimited inventory the further out it is. Your inventory is set to respect the capacity. Put those systems and processes in place. Most of us are people pleasers, including myself. Having a system where I can just copy and paste an email and tailor it for that person. That makes it easier. Understanding that a quick no is better for that person as well than a long-drawn-out no. It’s not an emphatic yes. It should be an emphatic no. We don’t have time to get into all the processes you can set up but that’s one.

Last but not least, this is the most important. It’s about progress, not perfection. If you’re like me, January 1st, if I’ve set up a New Year’s resolution or name your favorite time you set your goals. Also, you’re like, “New me tomorrow. I’m going to get up at 5:00. I’m going to meditate for ten minutes. I’m going to journal for ten minutes. I’m not going to eat any sugar. I’m not going to eat any gluten. I’m not doing this.” You’re going for perfection, so you’ve doomed yourself for failure. When if you just said, “From now on, I’m cutting out processed sugar.” Start small and then stack it from there. It’s about progress, not perfection.

I talk to people all the time about letting go of being a perfectionist and replacing it with the word I created, progressionist, because we’re wired for progress.

That’s great.

Thank you. You have to tell people, “Don’t think of yourself as a perfectionist.” I’m always like, “What should I think of myself then?” I made up this word progressionist. I’m a progressionist. I celebrate my progress, and I start my meetings with my team like that. What progress did we make? Let’s celebrate that. As you know, the brain is wired to celebrate it. Fitbit, video games, you’re at the new level. Purpose, process and progress. I love it.

I love what you brought up about languishing, John. My kids are in elementary school, so I’m going to give the school principal credit for this. Whatever you’re doing, put a comma during the pandemic like, “I did a podcast, during a pandemic.” “I did a virtual keynote, during a pandemic.” Give yourself a break. I love your term there. It’s awesome.

Thanks. If people want to reach out to you, they can go to Equalman.com to find out more about your book or hire you as a speaker. Erik, thanks again for coming back on. Thanks again for writing this important book. It’s a perfect time.

Big hugs, John and thanks for everything that you’re doing to make the world better. It’s so good. It’s such a blessing to have you in my orbit.

Likewise. I’m so grateful we’re living in the same wonderful city at the same time in Austin. Thanks for sharing your passion with the world. Everyone always feels better after interacting with you. I’m certainly on that team.

Right back at you.

 

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The Long Game With Dorie Clark
Bust Your Limiting Beliefs With Christopher Burns
Tags: EQualman, Feeling Overwhelmed, Habit Of Focus, How To Stay Focused, Selective Attention, Tips On Focusing