00:00:00 Thanks for joining us on episode 706 of the inspired stewardship podcast. I'm Shannon miles from ballet. I challenged you to discover your calling and find your third option. So you can be empowered to live every day to the fullest. One way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the inspired stewardship podcast with my friend and Scott Mader. You can talk yourself out of it because you're afraid of what other people will think,
00:00:37 or you invalidate your own ideas. But the truth is what you have to say and what you've experienced matters. And you cannot inspire people unless you share that Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast.
00:01:08 We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world. This is a special rebroadcast of episode, 111, an interview I did with Shannon mills in today's interview with Shannon miles from belay. I asked Shannon about her definition of leadership, what things she feels are the most important to focus on. If you're trying to grow your influence,
00:01:45 we talk about the power of story and lots more. One reason I like to bring you great interviews. Like the one you're going to hear today is because of the power in learning from others. Another great way to learn from others is through reading books. But if you're like most people today, you find it hard to find the time to sit down and read.
00:02:07 And that's why today's podcast is brought to you by audible. Go to inspired stewardship.com/audible to sign up and you can get a 30 day free trial. There's over 180,000 titles to choose from. And instead of reading, you can listen to your way to learn from some of the greatest minds out there. That's inspired stewardship.com/audible to get your free trial and listen to great books.
00:02:36 The same way you're listening to this podcast. Shannon miles is the CEO of belay, inc. A inc 500 fastest growing company and winner of culture, IQ and entrepreneurs. Number one, company, culture awards. Since 2010, the company has grown to nearly 700 team members and serves nearly 1000 on a daily basis. Whether through team development or balanced mentoring,
00:03:04 Shannon is passionate about serving others and inspiring them to live life more fully while firmly remaining her own worst critic. While on Necker Island with Richard Branson, she learned that if your dreams don't scare you, they simply aren't big enough. Shannon lives in Atlanta with her family. Shannon, thanks so much for coming on the show. Thank you so much for having me.
00:03:33 So Shannon, one thing that people often think of as developing their influence is being a leader. You mentioned that last week in the earlier interview. So how would you define leadership For me? Leadership is serving those you lead. We're all about servant leadership. Servant as leader is one of the required readings in our company. So I think that if you're not serving your team and your clients and the people that God has entrusted to you,
00:04:11 then you're not leading them well. So for me, as my company has evolved, and my role has changed. Leading is not being in every meeting, making every decision, being involved in every hire, telling everybody what to do. It never was. It's empowering those who report to me to be successful in what they do. And in a lot of that,
00:04:35 at this point in the businesses, me just serving them When someone really wants to grow in influence what's one or two things that you would suggest they focus on doing or learning, Sharing stories is incredibly powerful. So many people just want to be heard and known that the more stories you can share to your perspective, clients, to the team that you're leading,
00:05:05 the more you can grow in your influence. That's quite frankly, one of my favorite things about the third option is the ability to capture stories of what the third option looks for for people that's way different than my third option. And I think that just creating a community and a tribe around that has impacted influence, That's a great lead in, because it's clear from reading the book that you believe in the power of story like you just talked about.
00:05:39 So how can people actually use their story? Especially I think sometimes people worry because their story is maybe not so great. It's a little bad, but how can they use story good or bad to help develop their influence? I completely identify with that of does my story matter. It took me about four years to write this book, not because I was writing for four years,
00:06:04 but because I resisted for three of those, you know, I thought, okay, you know, I didn't invent virtual working. I didn't invent part time working like who cares? There's no new idea under the sun, but this nagging feeling would not go away that, that this book needed to be written. And I was at a conference and shared the struggle with somebody.
00:06:26 And for whatever reason, God just kept impressing on me during this conference. Like every speaker went back to me needing to write this book, regardless of the topic, right. And I was talking to a coach and she said, yes, but the world hasn't heard your story and it matters. They need to hear your voice. And that just shook me because I think as,
00:06:50 as leaders or somebody who, you know, want to take a risk or make a bold move, you can talk yourself out of it because you're afraid of what other people will think, or you invalidate your own ideas. But the truth is what you have to say and what you've experienced matters. And you cannot inspire people unless you share that. We had a consultant that worked with our leadership team in 2017.
00:07:18 It was a, we had merged five companies into one. So the leadership team that formed as a result of that was a group of individuals who had worked together, but not in this capacity, not to this level. So we invested in a consultant and one of the things that he coached, Brian and I on specifically is because he, Brian and I own and run the company together with co CEOs.
00:07:40 And then we have a team of six people in addition to us that serve on that leadership team. So what we found is oftentimes we would set the tone for the meeting, or, you know, we would, if we were the first to answer a question or try to give ideas, to solve a problem, whatever, everybody would just kind of go along with it,
00:07:58 but just not what you want. Right? And so what he coached us on was we should lead the way in vulnerability, but be the last to answer and in chime in when we're working on a business challenge. And so he encouraged us to set the tone for vulnerability and how deep we wanted those connections to go with those team members. And that really made it more comfortable for them to share their stories.
00:08:29 And they're the real true selves because we led the way with them. Shannon is someone who's had an opportunity to do some public speaking. Do you have any tips for how people can develop their influence through speaking, write a book? I honestly, it was not until the book came out and my husband wrote one as well called virtual culture that came out this year,
00:09:00 that we started to get some of those speaking opportunities. Prior to that, it was the random podcast or speaking to our team at company meetings, which they had to listen to us, right. It's our company. So that really has been a catalyst for more influence, I think, sort of running in the circles of people that you respect and who speak into the topics that you are passionate about as a way to do it.
00:09:28 When we first started belay, we were specifically serving the church and we developed the virtual assistant service and bookkeeping service to serve pastors and churches. And so we would have opportunity to speak to, you know, organizations affiliated with the church because of that. We were so specific in what we're doing that was almost eight years ago. And we've had the fortune to serve for profit businesses as well.
00:09:55 But all that to say, when you kind of hang around the people that you're passionate about, I think there's opportunities develop as well. You can connect with Shannon by following her on Instagram. She's at Shannon K miles. And of course there'll be links in the show notes or connect with her via the third option on Instagram as well at my third option,
00:10:22 be sure to check out the info from Shannon's book over@mythirdoptiondotcomorcheckoutbelaysolutions.com to find out more about working with their company belay. They're actually looking to hire great people now as virtual assistants. So if you're interested in maybe pursuing that as your third option, go there and apply to join the team. Shannon, is there anything you'd like to add? I'm very grateful for the opportunity to be honest interview,
00:10:53 and I hope that it helps them. Somebody who's feeling a little stuck, a little uneasy maybe. And what they're doing to, to just make a change in life is really short. And it's such a cliche to say it, but it's true. I would say to the listener and get your ducks in a row and go for it. Thanks so much for being on the show.
00:11:14 Thank you. Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode, please, please do us a favor. Go over to inspired stewardship.com/itunes rate. All one word iTunes rate.
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