Season 6 – Episode 7 with Iggy Perillo12 min read

Bryan Hyde
Welcome to the Janine Bolon show, where we share tips from around the globe. As we guide practical people with their finances using money tips, increase their incomes through side businesses, and maintain their sanity by staying in their creative zone.

Janine Bolon
Hi, Janine Bolon with you here. Coming to you live from Colorado and I have with me today, Iggy, who is this amazing not only content creator, we found each other through podcasting, didn’t we?

Iggy Perillo
Yes, absolutely.

Janine Bolon
Right, and so for the thriving solopreneur show, we have a little bit of a tree, we’re going video instead of just podcasting today, because it was important that you hear the content, and you get to see Iggy, because what she wants to share with you is that emotional intelligence that a lot of course creators, solopreneurs, workshop people have. And it’s one of those things that with 2020, in the huge reboot, the entire industry has received. There are now educational leaders, and he is one of those who is coming out and saying and sharing. Look, I know it’s a two-dimensional platform, but we need to be very three dimensional and how we’re presenting our content to people. So if you don’t mind, I’d love you to pick up where we left off in the greenroom afterwards, first of all, your full name. And then talk to us about emotional intelligence because that gets left by the wayside a lot of times.

Iggy Perillo
It so does well, I’m Iggy Perillo, and my business is WSL leadership, and I’m really committed to making people more emotionally intelligent in their work, sport and life. That’s the WS, and L. And there are so many folks out there. My background is in education, there’s only folks out there that are educators because they’re an expert in their field. And they’re really know their stuff. And then they go to create a course, create a training, create something, and there are beautiful, emotionally intelligent people, but when they move into the educator space, it all goes to the wayside. And it’s, it’s, I know, we’ve all sat through a webinar or training or anything and been like, ugh, I’m just getting like blasted out, like all the information is just getting dumped on me. So I would love to help more of those expert course creators, educators, people in that space, just bring that emotional intelligence that they already have back to their educational practice. Because when it gets lost, it’s so sad and boring and it’s like oppressive as an educator, when people show up and just try to dump knowledge on you. It’s not very fun. And platforms don’t always help that and platforms sometimes do. But sometimes they just become bells and whistles and not as emotionally intelligent either, which is a bummer.

Janine Bolon
So how about you walk us through by the hand, talk to us a little bit about what it means to have emotional intelligence from the perspective of a solopreneur, content creator or workshop runner, you know, because there’s so many different ways that it has been defined. I’d like your definition, personally.

Iggy Perillo
Sure, sure. Well, I go with the sort of four classic pieces of emotional intelligence. So self-awareness, self-management, other awareness, which is actually cognitive empathy, and relationship management. And I think a lot of folks, solopreneurs, are good at the self-awareness, like, oh, I know how I operate. I know, when I need my performances, I know how I need to structure my day, blah, blah. And then they get they’re good at self-management. But that’s like, I know how to structure my day, I know how to manage my energy levels over time. But then as the on the educator side, they lose this sort of relational piece. Cognitive empathy means understanding how other people are feeling. So being able to name their feelings and not like I feel with you sort of empathy, but like, I’m thinking about how you’re feeling so I can identify that. And then the next part is how do I manage this relationship? So relationship management means a lot of times it gets skewed towards like, oh, conflict management, how do we, you know, we’re freaking out, we need to solve this. But I think there’s also relationship nurturing, and relationship connecting. These types of things that are part of relationship management, that as a solopreneur, people have to do really well, but then they step as an educator, that’s just gone sometimes.

Janine Bolon
I totally agree. One of the things that I remember reading a lot about in the early 90s, as the computers started taking over, blah, blah, blah, the workplace. And one of the things that they talked about was high tech, high touch. And I find it’s interesting that that kind of phraseology has shifted and we’re now talking about relationship management and being able to understand the emotions of where somebody is coming from. And now they talk about how to take your customer on a journey, you know, the customer journey and all that. Talk to us a little bit about how the tech can get in the way of you being empathetic to your people and not even realize it. See, I think a lot of entrepreneurs are naturally gifted in emotion in the sense of they’re naturally gifted empaths. They may not call themselves that, they may like that’s too woowoo back off, Janine, that’s not where I want to talk about, but I know you know of systems and solutions to make sure that comes through the screen.

Iggy Perillo
Absolutely. I think to be a good entrepreneur, you need to understand the problems that your potential clients are facing, right? And that’s actually cognitive empathy. Like I understand that this is hard for them. Holy cow, I have a solution. Here you go. But the holy cow I have a solution sounds great to you and to them it might sound like okay, like another one with a holy cow solution. Great. And I think that when folks move to a platform that’s hosting my mantra is your platform is not your pedagogy and pedagogy is the art and science of teaching, right? So your platform is not actually the art and science of teaching. Your platform is a way to amplify it a way to get it out there, a way to make it accessible. That’s what like a platform is. And that’s videos, you know, YouTube learning management systems, all these different things are just platforms. And if you don’t approach your platform, like we’re managing a relationship through this platform, that’s where it gets really tough And it becomes an information download, because so many of us have a habit of recreating what we’ve seen before. What we’ve seen before often in a traditional educational system, I was a product of the, you know, public school system, college system in the US here, a lot of it is lecture, and a lot of worksheets and the pop quiz, oh, no! And the, you know, the test at the end, great. I’ve learned it. And people, I love it when people try to reframe the test as a celebration of learning, like cool, this test has now been rebranded. But it’s still I’m not connecting with that person on a personal level and building a relationship with them through the educational content that I’m delivering. And so I think that’s where I’d like to work with folks, in terms of like, what’s that relationship like, and if your relationship is based on the part where I’m an expert, and you’re an empty headed, blank tablet, it’s not like people are not people are not empty handed blank tablets when you go to bring them information. So you have to approach that as a relationship and manage that relationship through the educational expertise that you’re trying to deliver folks.

Janine Bolon
And a lot of times those platforms will offer that for you. And one of the things that I liked when you and I were talking on previous podcast, was these are the steps that you can take so that you can be more yourself. And I think what happens is because the tech is all new and you maybe are teaching people how to play guitar, and all of a sudden, you’re having cameras, you’ve got ring lights facing you, you’re thrown into a situation that normally your teaching skills have not prepared you for. So you hear this all the time, I’d love your perspective on what just be authentic, just be you, right? And people are like, well, I can be when I don’t have three sets of ring lights, and I have a zoom camera on me, you know, this is an unusual place for me to be. So kind of walk us through how you can help us bring up our emotional quotient, then when it comes to a workshop that we’re trying to deliver, and we are an expert, and we have help for our people, but our people need, you know, we’re in that two dimensional space.

Iggy Perillo
Yeah, I love it how you describe the two-dimensional space because that’s really true. Like, I’m delivering something, there’s content that I’m creating it and then I just send it out there. Good luck world, like they’ll absorb it through their ears or their eyes, and they’ll read it like it’s, we’re done. That’s it. I think there’s this beautiful part of emotional intelligence, like way back to being self-aware, that is being self-aware, not just of your emotional state, which I think is a lot of times what emotional intelligence sort of gravitates towards is the word. And so being able to understand my own emotional state is great. But also being able to understand my personal values is what is the foundation of my authenticity. So if I know what I value as a person, I know that I’m, I value you as a person I’m connecting with as a human, that’s going to inform and educate all these other pieces of how I present and operate in the world. If I know that for myself, a personal value is, for example, some people really value generativity in the sense of bringing up the next generation, right, so they see themselves as someone who needs to bring the next generation up to where they are, because they’ve achieved, you know, expertise in a certain area. That idea, that value, is going to inform and educate how you deliver your content in a way that builds that relationship with those people like, oh, I’m being nurtured into this space, like, oh, I’m being lifted into this space versus oh, I’m being, you know, like, forced into this space and get it because it’s hard, you know, like, whatever it is, you know. I think there’s those parts of emotional intelligence around self-awareness of your personal values, I think are really critical foundational pieces to this.

Janine Bolon
And so is there any other tip or any other thing that you would like to share with our listeners today? Regarding emotional intelligence. It’s such a vast topic. So you’re right. I mean, literally, you can talk for hours on this. So kind of give us what is a golden nugget you can leave us with and then we need to know how to get a hold of you.

Iggy Perillo
Beautiful, I think the most important thing is to break that two-dimensional space into a human space. And knowing where you who you are and how you present yourself in that space is important self-awareness, but thinking of that as a relationship with your learners, with your people you’re reaching out to, with those people on the other end. I think just remember that that is a relationship you’re building. Maybe that’s about it, which is so simple, yet nuanced, so nuanced, in terms of who you are as a person, your medium, your content, all these different things, but building that relationship through that is, is so crucial.

Janine Bolon
Okay, so let’s have some contact information for you so that we can run to your place to figure out how to do that.

Iggy Perillo
For sure. For sure. I’m [email protected] like email is really the best way to reach me. My website, WSL leadership.com, has a host of many, many things there so you can learn more about me and everything there. But email is really the best way to connect with me.

Janine Bolon
Thank you so much for your time today on the Thriving Solopreneurs Show.

Iggy Perillo
Thanks for having me, I’ve had fun.

Janine Bolon
All right, and this is Janine Bolon signing off with The Thriving Solopreneur show where we try to help you with your business and bringing about more money, cash on the barrelhead through workshops, content creation, course creation, online books and a variety of other products and services. Have a great day today.

Bryan Hyde
Thank you for listening to the Janine Bolon show. Be sure to subscribe to our show notes by going to www.theJanineBolonshow.com, where you’ll find additional resources as well as the opportunity to sign up to receive our program in your email each week. Be sure to visit our sponsor at www.the8gates.com.