Achieving Peak Performance with Stéphane Joanis

Tim Melanson: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to today’s episode of the work at home rockstar podcast. I’m excited for today’s episode. I’m talking to one of my friends. Uh, he is the principal of SJ performance LLC. And what he does is he helps his clients to become more effective with less stress using peak performance. So I’m very excited to be rocking out today with Stéphane Joanis Hey, Stéphane you ready to rock?

Stéphane Joanis: Ready to rock, Tim.

Tim Melanson: Awesome. So we always start off here on a good note. So tell me a story of success in your business that we can be inspired by.

Stéphane Joanis: Well, I’d say the most recent success is I’m very excited about last week. We just started and launched our book, Achieving a Breakthrough Transformation. So I’m very excited about that. Uh, it actually became a bestseller thanks to my Canadian fans. Um, so very happy to see it as a bestseller in Canada. So this is great.

Tim Melanson: That’s awesome. Right on. So you’ve got a new book out. That’s exciting. So, uh, what was that process like for you then?

Stéphane Joanis: Um, it, it was, it was fun. It was actually fun because, you know, you’re talking about something [00:01:00] that you’re passionate about and you’re putting it in writing. So, you know, you do a little bit every night, uh, here and there or on weekends, uh, over a space of a year, you have to pace yourself. Um, so you just pace yourself and, uh, when you’re in the mood, when you’re inspired, you just go at it and start to write your thoughts.

So it’s been great.

Tim Melanson: Nice. So now along with the good note, though, sometimes there’s things that don’t necessarily go as planned. So I’m wondering, can you, can you share something that didn’t go well and you know, what we can learn from that or how you recovered?

Stéphane Joanis: Well, let’s, let’s talk about the book. I’ve got two examples there, Tim. Uh, if you look at the book, when I first launched it, I launched it as a Kindle book. Um, and I’ve been blessed through my life and again, one more time I’ve been blessed. So I’ve got a friend who calls me, he says, Stéphane you’re doing it all wrong.

I said, what? He says, no, you got to launch it in a certain way. So he talked to me about a strategy towards becoming a bestseller. And, uh, That put a seed in my mind. It’s like, you know what, you should actually start to [00:02:00] focus on becoming a bestseller. And so I moved my date, uh, my launch for the published version.

Uh, and then that was successful. But the first one, I had two orders, one from me and one from my wife. Uh, now I’ve got more orders, but the way it was launched was just. Forward and pitiful. And the lesson learned was to have a plan, uh, and to follow up on the plan. Um, the other example of something that was tough was actually in our first leadership think tank.

We produce a leadership think tank about two, three times a year. Um, and so our first one, we actually had decided to create a webinar for one hour. 54 people signed up for it. I was so excited. They’re all signed up on LinkedIn. And so I’m there, and I’m counting on each and every one of them to be there and present.

Tim, guess how many people showed up?

Tim Melanson: Zero

Stéphane Joanis: No, no, one person showed up, my daughter.

Tim Melanson: person. Okay.

Stéphane Joanis: daughter, which speaks to her character. Uh, she wanted to be there, and she was there, but there was one person out of [00:03:00] 54. My answer to that was actually a follow up thanking everyone who participated. And this is important, you focus, the lesson is focus on the people who are present.

Not the people who are not there and also preparation and follow up, making sure that you follow up. Don’t if somebody tells you they’re going to be there and it’s a week, 2 weeks off, make sure you remind them a day at least or 2 before that the event is going to be coming through.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Those are really good, really good points. And especially the one about focusing on the good parts, focusing on who showed up because, you know, you could have probably gotten upset and sent them a message saying you didn’t show up and all that kind of stuff. But what good would that have done? Right?

Stéphane Joanis: Correct. Now, by promoting the people who are there, then the person who was not there is thinking, it’s like, Oh, what did I miss? Now they’re curious. Maybe they’ll show up next time.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. I, and I like your story about the, the, the book launch too and being strategic about it. Cause I mean, there is, I mean there is the whole field of dreams thing, right? Like you [00:04:00] build it and they will come type thing, you know, but I mean, what are your thoughts on that? Like, is that, is that just garbage or does that actually exist?

Stéphane Joanis: Well, if you don’t build it, then nothing’s going to happen. So you need to build it. And yes, they will come, but they won’t come all by themselves. You need to do some marketing. You need to do some promotion to reach out to people. So they know that you’ve got something to offer. Uh, isn’t that the essence of a business?

You know, we’re working from home. Uh, well, I think everybody in your home is probably in your business. So we need to get out of the home and we need to promote ourselves. Yeah, you need to build it. If you build it, they will tell them. I truly believe in that.

Tim Melanson: Yeah, I believe it too. I think, I think that there’s probably one of the two things need to happen. Either you need to have a really solid strategy, Like what you’d had, or you have to have some really, really consistent behaviors. And, you know, maybe, um, you know, I know for me and my music stuff, you know, when I started doing my first jams, my [00:05:00] first open mics and stuff like that, you know, there wasn’t a whole lot of people there, but I did have the belief of the.

Person who ran the venue that thought that this was going to eventually work out. And so I had the ability to be consistent, right. And, and I think that’s part of it, right. And, you know, showing up every week for. You know, a few months, a few months, and then after several months, then people start to show up and start to grow.

But if you’re not consistent with that, I think that that’s probably the reason why they say that whole, if you build it, they will come because I think that if you just think that, okay, well, I’m just going to build it, they’re just going to show up and then they don’t show up to week number one and you’re like, all right, I’m done.

It didn’t work. Right.

Stéphane Joanis: Yeah, my experience in relational marketing, I’ve done that for over 10 years. Um, when you look at it, there’s always a low in the summer. If you let up, if you let go, you have to restart all over. So you just have to be consistent during the law and just know that things are going to get back. Uh, it’s so important and it’s [00:06:00] mindset, you know, You knew that something would come up.

You had a belief, you had a vision, and you just kept on working on a structure. There’s no strategy without structure. So you build a structure where you were playing regularly, and then now you can actually implement a strategy. Sometimes people try to put a strategy, but they have no structure.

Structure comes first.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s both. And, and, um, yeah, I’ve always found, I don’t know, do you find it? And it’s like, it’s like three months. It seems that there’s, it takes three months for some momentum to build also takes, I found three months for it to fall apart when you stop, you know, doing something about it.

Right. And, and I, I think that’s the bigger lesson right there is that, yeah, it’s okay, you get it that you’re, it’s going to take time to start, but then when you stop working, you think, Oh, things are still rolling three months later. You’ve got nothing. Again, right?

Stéphane Joanis: You’re right. A lot of people, they say a lot of failures happen after having a success. So people have a success and then they stop doing the things that made them [00:07:00] successful. The results are still there. And then when things start to break down, three months later or a few more months later, they haven’t grasped that this is because they stopped doing activities from the past.

And now they’re in a bind because they’ve lost momentum. Um, very hard to get that momentum back once you’ve lost it.

Tim Melanson: It’s another three months. And then at that point, I mean, I think what ends up happening is that people, uh, people sort of settle into this new lifestyle, right? They’re like, okay, I’ll get this all month, this money coming in. Maybe they make some purchases, maybe they start to settle into something else.

And now all of a sudden they’ve got, they’ve got to actually let go of those things that they’ve now purchased, which is, you know, Difficult,

Stéphane Joanis: Yes.

Tim Melanson: right? So, you know, I think that I like what you’re saying about, you know, and I bet you, I know I’ve gone to a coach before and, you know, so what’s going on? And, you know, they’ve sort of pointed out, well, what are you doing now versus what were you doing then?

And you’re [00:08:00] right. It’s the things that you were doing back when you started to build that momentum that you stopped doing that you need to get back to doing again, right?

Stéphane Joanis: Yeah, that’s what a good coach will do. You know, we act as a bouncing board, um, to validate some strategies and sometimes to look at the activities to hold you accountable. Uh, are you doing what you said you would do and also just based on experience to look at your plan and maybe pinpoint a few gaps that allow you to actually accelerate your path towards where you want to what you want to achieve.

Tim Melanson: Right. Well, this is perfect to talk about practice then. So, what are some of those practices that you have in place right now that keep you successful?

Stéphane Joanis: Um, well, I keep on networking all the time. Uh, as a business owner, you need to network, look for new opportunities. Um, I’ve got two associates that have joined me. You know, if you build it, they will come. I build the website and then I have the person calling me for a virtual coffee and he wanted to join.

Um, let’s talk about practice for a second though. Um, there’s an expression that says [00:09:00] practice makes perfect. I’m going to say that that expression is wrong. Practice makes permanence. If you’re practicing the good things, then you’re going to be permanently doing the good things. If you’re practicing the wrong things, it’s going to be permanently ingrained in your habits and very hard to take out.

So what do you practice? So the first thing is just practicing networking, practicing your message, right? You have a vision, you have a mission, but are you able to convey it within 60 seconds? That elevator speech so that way, when you meet someone, you can actually talk about what you do without taking half an hour.

Um, so 60 seconds or so, you should have your, your speech and I should be able to wake you up at 2 o’clock in the morning. Uh, and ask you what do you do and then you can tell me in 60 seconds. What you do, so that’s practice practice practice. Um. That’s the number 1 thing that I would say I practice. The other thing is just to keep myself.

Uh, on the edge a little bit, um, in terms of interacting with people, uh, [00:10:00] I’m a cantor at my church. So I actually sing at the church, but also I’m involved in that. I have an open forum that we hold. It’s free. We hold it every week, and that’s just to keep me engaged, uh, in terms of interacting with different people who have different challenges.

And we work together to solve these challenges. Uh, so it’s become something that’s a lot of fun. Uh, and also valuable for the people who are present. So. That is the one thing that I do practice very often.

Tim Melanson: That’s awesome. So, my, my, uh, my wife and I just started a dance class. And it’s funny because, uh, after the first lesson, uh, the, the instructor goes, Okay, so I’m going to say something that’s a little different that you might not hear. I’m asking you this week, don’t practice. And she says the reason why is because you haven’t learned enough yet and it’s possible that you might be practicing the wrong thing.

And it’s way harder to get rid of a bad habit than it is to practice a good habit. So I’m asking you don’t do anything this week. I’m back to class next week [00:11:00] and let’s lock this down. And I thought that was really quite smart of her.

Stéphane Joanis: Uh, I agree. You know, there’s nothing more painful than to see somebody going around and around and around, you know, why they’re going around and around and around, but they’re not willing to open their mind to receive advice. Um, and so you have to let them, I guess it’s like a child. You have to let them burn themselves so they can learn not to touch the oven.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. And you know, that that’s really, really difficult too, to watch, to watch somebody that you love doing like learning that lesson the hard way. Right. However, in the end. I mean, that’s how you learn. You learn through the mistakes that you make, right? You don’t really learn a whole lot from success.

Stéphane Joanis: That’s right. There’s an expression in coaching that says, let them figure it out. If you’ve got to, you’ve got to give people enough rope to be able to, to learn the lesson without hurting themselves dangerously. Let’s put it that way.

Tim Melanson: [00:12:00] And you know what? I mean, it’s, it’s one of those things where, uh, the people in that, you know, or the area, if it’s you that are very, very curious, try a whole lot of things. We’re going to burn themselves quite. However, they’re probably going to get further because of the fact that they’re willing to try all these new things instead of, instead of staying in that box, right?

And just doing the things that they know is going to work.

Stéphane Joanis: Yeah, it speaks to, you know, we talked about that before the podcast. So we were talking about perfection, right? Perfection is not of this world. So if you’re always aiming for perfection, it’s like you’re always going to miss the mark and it’s not good on your self belief. You should be aiming for excellence.

Um, so you, you’re trying stuff and I’ve failed. I’ve failed at so many things, Tim. It’s unbelievable. But I’ve, in the process of failing, I’ve also succeeded in many things, uh, and acquired a lot of experience. Um, and that’s how you acquire that experience is through failures. Um, you just have a vision, have a goal and go [00:13:00] for it.

Don’t expect perfection. Go try it out, make it happen, uh, and see how it goes. That would be my advice. creating an habit, an habit of trying new stuff. That’s an habit that I have. Yeah.

Tim Melanson: I agree. So let’s talk a little bit about the instruments and the tools that we use to gain success in our business and our lives. So what are some of those tools and instruments that you use? Absolutely.

Stéphane Joanis: Uh, myself, I do a lot of, um, so I’m doing some consulting also, uh, as a product manager for a company. Uh, when you talk about keeping money at the table, taking care of your business, making sure it’s rolling. Uh, the one thing I did is make sure that I actually had enough work that sustains my family, and then I don’t have to worry after that baseline, and then I can build other things.

In terms of tools, I use, I use OpenAI quite a bit. It’s kind of funny. How do you use OpenAI for business? It helps accelerate writing. Uh, it helps accelerating. Sometimes there’s a message I want to do, or I do research. [00:14:00] Let’s say I want to do an email, uh, a general email. I can ask OpenAI. It’s like, okay, act as a Act as a consultant, um, write an email that has this message and it really starts to produce things for you.

And then after that, I can just go into it and make some modifications quickly. So OpenAI has been very useful. It’s allowed me also to identify markets for our client. Uh, so I’ve actually been able to ask it questions. Now we tried to predict, so you need to have a validation method after. But if it got 80 percent of the stuff right, and then I create a programmatic method to actually remove the outliers, um, it was, it’s been wonderful for that.

So open AI, uh, we’ve got my CRM allows me to have, can I talk about my CRM a second, Tim? I use a CRM called agent CRM. It has been designed for people who are in the insurance industry. Um, I use it because it actually has a lot of automation behind it. It allowed me to do my website. It [00:15:00] allows me to do funnels.

It’s integrated to LinkedIn to Facebook, so I can actually do marketing. Um, it’s got the calendar. I can actually actually have multiple calendars. Um, it’s been a very good tool for me in terms of automation. And just automate everything that’s repetitive. Uh, so I think a lot of times you start a business to, you have a goal of doing certain certain things, and then the business is actually taking some of your time on the stuff that you really want, didn’t want to do, but you just have to take care of it.

And I think a good CRM is helpful. Uh, I started with HubSpot, uh, that was the one that I started with and moved on to Agent CRM, which has been very, uh, helpful. I would recommend it for somebody who’s got steady business. Um, you know, because you will have a monthly plan on this. But having said that, it is a good tool.

Um, of course, the Microsoft tools are very useful. Um, but those, the open AI has really saved a lot of time for me. Um,

Tim Melanson: Yeah. Like I don’t even know which between the open [00:16:00] AI those are massive, massive game changers. I think for anybody in a business, right. Um, yeah, for, for me, open AI has been, and I just keep on every day finding new ways to use it. It’s, it’s incredible. I don’t even know how to explain it.

Stéphane Joanis: well, in writing my book, the images, I was, I was worried about copyrights, right? So you’re taking images, and I did ask for copyrights from certain people. I was not getting answers, so I just said, okay, I’m going to create your AI. All the images in my book are pretty much AI or generated by myself.

Um, so that’s been useful, uh, for me.

Tim Melanson: Wow. That’s amazing. So let’s go to the CRM for a quick second. Cause I think that that’s probably something that Okay, so when it comes to open AI, it’s my impression anyway, that people are either Going for it. ’cause they know that it’s a great tool to be using or they’re afraid of it. And, you know, it’s one of those [00:17:00] things.

So I, I don’t want to convince anybody of anything right now, but for the CRM, let, let’s talk a little bit about that. So, why would somebody want to use A CRM and where in their business would they need to be before it’s time for them to go to A CRM? And what is a CRM

Stéphane Joanis: Well, CRM is a customer customer relation, uh, management system essentially. Um, so it allows you to actually collect information on your customers or potential customers. Uh, it is very useful for communication. So when I looked at my emails, if you’re sending me an email, my CRM is actually capturing that email and it’s placing it, uh, into a, uh, I’m not sure what the term is, but let’s say like a story line.

Tim Melanson: heard? Oh

Stéphane Joanis: Um, any activity that I would do if I’m sending you a text message through phone, it goes in my CRM. Uh, if I’m sending a message by email, it goes in the CRM. So when I next time I have a contact with you, let’s say in the well, what you Tim is gonna be before that, but let’s say with someone who was in 2 months, 3 months from now, [00:18:00] I can go back to the CRM and I can actually look at what were my latest conversations with that person.

What are their goals? I can actually take notes and it’s all attached to that contact. You can actually create automation. So if you wanted to do a follow up email, you can actually automate that and say, okay, we’re going to send an automatic email in 3 months from now, um, to schedule a meeting. Uh, the other thing my CRM does is if somebody calls me, I can have my CRM automatically answer for me if I’m not there and even take an appointment for with you based on my open calendar.

So it’s all integrated. So actually I don’t have to be there. I’ve got my automatic. Uh, uh, a I bought, you know, so a little robot that is there and saying, it’s like, Hey, Tim, uh, how about we get together a Thursday at two o’clock and I also have Friday at four and it’s going to take that meeting for me, uh, without me having to be there.

Um, now I do prefer personal and I, I like to take private. I [00:19:00] usually answer my phone pretty quickly if you call me, but these are all tools that save you time. I would not get into a CRM until I start to have some money coming into the business. You’ve got some options that are free. HubSpot is one that’s free.

You have also Salesforce. com. That is another CRM that has marketing attached to it and artificial intelligence. But a CRM, a good CRM, will help you combine your calendar, your messaging, all of your communication all together and tie it to a customer. Thanks for your time. And opportunities as well, you can define an opportunity and then it’s going to define that opportunity and you can follow that opportunity along.

So it keeps you on track in terms of follow up as you interact with people. I hope I answered the question, uh, Tim,

Tim Melanson: was very, very good. Yeah. Uh, a that’s a very good explanation of what it is. I think that, uh, like, uh, so if you’re just getting started in your business, uh, and, and maybe you take pride in, like, really knowing people and [00:20:00] having a great memory on, okay, you know, I know you from here. I remember your name. I remember what we talked about last time.

And that’s great. Right? Uh, you know, and maybe you’re keeping notes in a book. Or on a, on a calendar or something like that, which is what I used to do, right? And then maybe you’ve moved it to a, to a spreadsheet, and now you’ve got all your contacts in the spreadsheet, and you’re keeping the notes in the spreadsheet.

You know, all that’s great, but, uh, you know, at some point, you know, it’s going to get overwhelming, and you’re going to have too many contacts to cut to keep in mind. And also, Uh, you, you may not, I mean, on a piece of paper or on a spreadsheet, it’s not going to pop up and tell you, hey, it’s been six months since you talked to this person.

This person told you to get back to them in six months, right? Like, a CRM is going to be able to just automate some of those things. Think also, it doesn’t necessarily need to be as, like, robotic as it can be, right? It can just be, it’s, it’s just a way for you to set reminders for yourself. [00:21:00] And to keep track of clients in a nice, easy way so that if someone, you know, you run into somebody, uh, you can, you can keep that track of that.

And when they say, get in touch with me next year, we’ll be able to get in touch with them next year. Right? I think that it’s just a simpler way to keep track of all that stuff. Right?

Stéphane Joanis: Here’s another example, like, you know, you’re talking about building relationships, so you can actually have a automation around birthdays. And so you have a person’s birthday, when it hits a birthday, it sends a personalized email to that person. And. Here’s the best practice. Make sure it sends you a copy.

So that way, you know that you sent an email. That’s probably more important.

Tim Melanson: Good call. Good call. Yeah, I love that. And, you know, I think, like you said, um, there are a few options that are either free or very low cost to get started on something like that. And it’s probably a good idea to Get that practice going because then the next part of it, which, um, we talk about quite often on the [00:22:00] show is the delegation aspect of it because you may say, okay, well, no, I don’t want a robot answering for me, you know, uh, but you may actually end up hiring an assistant at some point and now what?

You know, you’ve got an assistant taking appointments for you. Everything’s in your head or everything’s on your complicated spreadsheet. How are they going to be able to know your clients if you’ve got no way for you to get them up to speed? Otherwise, other than sitting in front of them and explaining every single person that you’ve ever talked to, right?

Having a CRM will be a good way to do that.

Stéphane Joanis: And to your point, you know, the goal as a business owner should be to pull yourself out of the business, right? So the CRM allows you to pull yourself out so you can actually delegate in the future and give the responsibility to somebody else. Anything that I can do to remove the responsibility on myself, free myself to think about strategy, to think about structure, think about my vision.

That’s a good thing. So I want, I want to be focused on strategy. I want to [00:23:00] be focused on the long term. You know, without a vision, you know, you go, it’s like driving a car, you’re going to drive on the car without having a goal in mind and looking far ahead. You’re going to be distracted by the pebbles on the side of the street or a grass or the cows that are chewing the grass down the field.

Uh, you need to look forward to where you’re going. Um, the CRM allows you to do that. It frees your time, it frees your resources, so you can actually do the things that help your business grow.

Tim Melanson: Yeah. And you know what’s funny that I’ve found over the years, you know, there have been times when I, I sort of like, you know, you, you have a, a podcast interview, someone says, oh, you need to delegate, you need to get an assistant. And so I start working on, okay, well now I have to create a system in order for me to be able to delegate this to somebody else.

So I, I go and I create a system, something like getting a CRM or, or maybe creating a standard operating procedure for a certain aspect of my business. And then what ends up happening is I’m like, wow, this just like simplified my [00:24:00] process quite a bit. I guess I don’t really need to delegate this right now because I’ve just like saved myself time by even just creating it in the first

Stéphane Joanis: Correct.

Tim Melanson: So you end up like restructuring your business over and over again to delegate it to somebody else. So, you know, when you’re ready, you can do it, but it actually does save you time. Right.

Stéphane Joanis: Yep. Yeah. If it’s simple for you, it’s going to be simple for the next person. You know, what do you do at the beginning? So when I started the business, the first thing I did was to pace myself. You know, I left corporate America. It’s like, okay, perfect. Uh, I made a decision. It’s like, okay, I’m not going back for another job.

I got some job offers. I said, no, I’ve got a greater vision. But what I had to do during that time is to take care of the basics. So I actually tried site gigs and I did the Instacart. Not for me, forget it, but it is for some people, not for me. I went with the DoorDash. I had a lot of fun with DoorDash.

Actually. My wife came with me a few times. It was like a date night and we were bringing food here and there, left and right. Then I did Uber. I did Uber [00:25:00] for about five months, but that placed me in position where I was not under stress. I was not, I was not going to take just any customer, uh, for the sake of taking a customer.

I wanted to choose a customer that I want, that I wanted. And it allowed me to do that. And once I got a good customer, a good base, then after that, I was set during that time, you know, I would not do Uber for the whole day during that time. I I’m doing Uber to cover the basis. And then after that, I’m working on structure and you pace yourself in building those structures so you can simplify your life.

So when you do have that customer, you’re ready for it. So that’s, that would be my advice at the beginning in terms of starting, uh, the business. Does that make

Tim Melanson: I love that. I love that. So where did you, I mean, we talk about learning from the best. Did you have mentors? Did you, you know, hire coaches, any of that?

Stéphane Joanis: I did. Uh, I was very fortunate. I’ve been blessed in my life. Well, I’ve been fortunate. I lost my father. I was 23 years old and he had a mentor. And so [00:26:00] his mentor took me in and really transformed my life. So he helped me in terms of mindset. Uh, he was an expert in relational marketing, uh, and then he just helped and guided me.

So I saw him regularly, uh, and therefore that helped me to advance in terms of building relations. Uh, at one point around 2006, I decided that I would start to focus on the career. So I enjoyed relational marketing, but I wanted something more intellectually. Uh, something that would just help me to grow to a different level.

Uh, so I hired a coach, a personal coach, and, uh, he had been coaching athletes. He had been coaching people for years, uh, and he was a chemical engineer like myself. So, he helped me in my transition, and then I would, I would contact him every now and then. Uh, when I moved to the U. S., from Canada to the U. S.,

there was an opportunity. I consulted with my coach. If I had a challenging situation. Well, when I left corporate America, [00:27:00] it was not, um, it didn’t go. It was not a beautiful ending. Let’s put it that way. Um, and his advice to me, the best advice I could have had from from anyone, uh, was to actually write a thank you letter.

I’d worked 23 years for a company, dedicated my myself to that company. And in that process, they have paid for my MBA. They moved me to the US. They paid for the green card for me, my wife, my children. They, I’ve had a great life, traveled the world, made some friends and relationships. There’s so much to be grateful for.

And so I could go and look at the last moments and be upset that the two people or so, Or I can focus on the 23 years of having friends, great relationships and a good life. And so writing a thank you letter allowed my mind to actually focus on the things that I was grateful for. And it allowed me to actually start to focus on what do I want to do next and start my [00:28:00] business.

If not for him, I would have probably dwelled into self pity for a month or two. And gotten distracted. I would not have been at the same place. So having a coach is really important, mostly in the times that are tough. And so, yeah, he’s been a great coach. His name is Ben O’Para. Um, and he actually became an associate.

He saw what I was doing. We want to help people rediscover their heart centered leadership. And he just thought that the mission division was so great that he said, you know, he wants to be part of it. And that’s, that’s how he became my associate. And I, I still, he’s still a great reference for me in terms of growing.

So it’s great.

Tim Melanson: That’s so cool. Isn’t it? Isn’t it so crazy that it actually takes like work to think about the good stuff that you’re grateful for. And just the stuff that’s like, this is you off just comes naturally. Isn’t that crazy? How the, how the brain works.

Stéphane Joanis: That is correct. You have to work at the positive. Absolutely. [00:29:00] We do affirmations. Yeah. To that point, we actually, you know, the 1 thing is when you start a business is, you know, you have a vision, but the self belief you need to nourish that self belief and affirmations. You know, they need to be positive, personal, and present.

It’s in my book. But when you put your affirmations in the right way, positive, present, and personal, they help you to instill that self belief in your mind. They help you to actually keep your mind on the right, on the positives, so you can actually reach your vision.

Tim Melanson: yeah, you know what, like, it’s, um, there is self talk. There’s also, uh, you know, uh, societal talk that say that, oh, that’s just garbage and that doesn’t work and all this and that, but it keeps coming up. from successful people. So come on, you know,

Stéphane Joanis: Well, Tim.

Tim Melanson: on Saturday Night Live or not?

Stéphane Joanis: I wrote about it. There’s a study by Harvard, uh, that showed that 95 percent of the decision making is coming from the subconscious [00:30:00] mind because we are lazy. So when you look for, I don’t know, pasta and you recognize a brand, you’re going to go to the brand because you recognize that quality.

That’s your subconscious working for you, right? So because your subconscious is going to take care of all this stuff that our mind is lazy. We don’t, we don’t want to be thinking and companies are investing billions of dollars. into influencing your mind. They know it works.

Tim Melanson: Yeah,

Stéphane Joanis: The Super Bowl, they pay millions of dollars for 30 seconds to influence you.

They know it works. If you haven’t figured it out for yourself and you still don’t believe it, whether you believe it or not, it’s being used on you every single day. So why not use it positively to actually align your subconscious with your conscious, and then you can actually reach your goals more effectively.

Tim Melanson: I would argue that that’s the work. The work is literally convincing yourself that doing an affirmation is better than [00:31:00] not, right?

Stéphane Joanis: It’s an inside job.

Tim Melanson: it is, it is an inside job. So, I mean, I, this has been awesome. I could keep talking forever, but it’s, it’s your, uh, guest solo now. So I want to know what’s exciting in your business.

Stéphane Joanis: Oh, what’s exciting is our leadership think tank in the book. Well, the book is the foundation to our leadership think tank. So everything in the book is about instilling and nurturing the mindset for peak performance. We define peak performance, you know, the person who wins the race is not the person who’s the fastest all the time during a race.

It’s the person who negotiates the curves. It’s the person who negotiates those places that you need to slow down sometimes to be able to accelerate. Otherwise, you’ll end up in the ditch. And the world suffers from a disease right now, which is called urgentitis. Everything is urgent, everything needs to be done now, quickly, etc.

And people are going at a pace where they’re getting burnt out, they’re getting sick, mentally and physically. And the thing is, [00:32:00] you need to slow down sometimes to reflect and to be able to enjoy the time with those loved ones that are around you. And so the leadership think tank that we’re doing is about that.

It’s, it’s about taking a space and a time to think, to reflect on our heart centered leadership. So when you come out of there, you have a breakthrough transformation towards inspiring people around you. You can be a Lone Ranger and go at the fastest pace that you want. You’re never going to outpace the person who is heart centered and who inspires 10, 50, hundreds of people to join him in his mission and in his vision. So that’s what I’m excited about because we are bringing people back to heart centered leadership. This, this pandemic. Has gotten people out of offices and when they came back, they’re still in pandemic mode. There’s no more side chats around the coffee. People are just going back to their office. and doing [00:33:00] their work and then going back home as if the pandemic was still there.

We need those heart centered leaders to come back in those discussions around this coffee pot that inspire people to be the best of themselves.

Tim Melanson: So how do we find out more?

Stéphane Joanis: You find out more, you can go to my website sjperformancecoach. com and on there you can actually, you can reach me at stephanJoanis com. If you want to set a time with me, uh, virtual coffee chat, I’m always happy for conversations. Uh, that’s my calendar and you can select, uh, you know, meet and greet. Uh, it’s a free chat for 32nd and I’d be happy to talk to anybody who’s looking to become more effective and to rediscover their heart centered leadership.

Tim Melanson: So tell me who would be the type of person that would get the most out of like working with you.

Stéphane Joanis: People want to achieve more, uh, people, you can be an individual contributor or a leader, but people who want to [00:34:00] advance, uh, to become more effective, um, it’s not everybody that wants to be the top of a company. Not everyone. Wants to advance, uh, and has that ambition, but people who want to have more influence on people around them, uh, who want to understand some of the gaps that they may have and to overcome them.

Uh, those are the people that should reach out

Tim Melanson: So would this be mainly people that have their own business or are we talking people that may be even corporate America as well?

Stéphane Joanis: both. Uh, so I’ve got my own business, but I’ve been corporate America for 23 years. Uh, so I work at all levels of corporate America. Uh, but also with individual, uh, business owners being in relational marketing. I’ve built a network of 250 people in six months to relations. It’s a skill that I have, and it’s a skill that I can teach and coach other people to do in building their business.

Tim Melanson: Right on. And so you think that those skills are like very transferable, [00:35:00] whether you have your own business or whether you’re in a corporation.

Stéphane Joanis: Absolutely. It’s about mindset, right? We talked about that a little bit earlier. Everything, everything comes out to being mindset at the end of the day. It’s about self belief. It’s about, and I believe in gratitude, having an attitude of gratitude and seeking for excellence, not perfection. excellence, which I define excellence as being the best of you.

Tim Melanson: Love it. I love it. What a great interview. Thank you so much for rocking out with me today, Stéphane

Stéphane Joanis: Thank you, Tim. It’s always a pleasure to talk to you, my friend.

Tim Melanson: Awesome.

Stéphane Joanis: That’s

Tim Melanson: Thanks a lot again. And to the listeners, make sure you subscribe, rate, comment, and we’ll see you next time on the Work at Home Rockstar podcast.