355 | Doug Lawrence, founder of TalentC on Positive Talk Radio!

Unknown Speaker  0:03  
Welcome to positive talk radio. Our goal is simple to explore evolving ideas, one conversation at a time. So stay with us. And right now, we present. And welcome to another edition of positive talk radio. And we've got a great one for you today. Very talented man, who is going to talk to us about what he does to help people live their life and get the career that they want and live their lives a little bit happier. And he does that through something that he calls mentorship. And his name is Doug Lawrence. And he is sitting right over there. How are you doing there, sir?

Unknown Speaker  0:44  
Doing great. Thank you very much. And thank you for having me. All, thank

Unknown Speaker  0:48  
you so much for coming in. See, it's, you know, these shows are not worth a darn unless I get great guests. And so having somebody that can really have an imprint on people's lives makes makes the show really a lot of fun to do. And it makes it real positive for people that that need to need to get some of this stuff so that they understand what they can do. So tell us about the company that you have, which is called Talent See, making you successful at what matters. I love that I love the subtitle of that.

Unknown Speaker  1:23  
Yeah, so talent. See, I've started that in 2009. And it, it was the start of me realizing what this thing we call mentoring is what is was all about. And what sort of what had happened was that I was job coaching University College students and the relationship I had with them morphed itself into a mentoring relationship. But I didn't really know that that's what it was that I was actually doing. And so I did some market research and stuff. And I found that Oh, my goodness, there is a place for, obviously, the providing training to mentors. But there was also a place for the certification of mentors. And so to make a really super long story short, I ended up I partnered with an organization in the United States to create a certification for mentors. And we started that in 2009 2010. And it progressed along for a number of years before the mentoring community said, you know, we appreciate all that you've done. But what we want is, we want to be certified not so much from the the education or the knowledge part of being a mentor, but we want to be certified as a competent mentor, you know, and so what can you do, and so the company in the US, they weren't prepared at that particular time point to go down that road. But I found a colleague in Calgary, Alberta, who was actually that was his area of expertise was the ISO standards, certification based on on ISO standards and all that. So he and I embarked on a journey and fast forward to today, that's one of the things that we offer through a joint company. But to come back and directly answer your question, the it took me a while to kind of coming around the

Unknown Speaker  3:37  
horn. This is good information

Unknown Speaker  3:40  
was the aspect of my own company talent, see people Services Incorporated, is very much focused on all things mentoring. So implementing mentoring programs in a workforce, one on one mentoring leadership mentoring, the this. I'm the director of practice and outreach for the sub company, I guess we'll call it that that I formed with my business partner in Calgary.

Unknown Speaker  4:12  
So when we talk about being a mentor, what exactly is a mentor?

Unknown Speaker  4:18  
So I'll give you the this sort of that that definition. So a mentor is someone who is involved in the mentoring process, obviously, and mentoring is a two way trusted relationship where both the mentor and the mentee are going to learn and grow, learn and grow personally and professionally, through obviously through mentorship development, and that's kind of you know what it is so, a mentor would be somebody who obviously embraces the mentoring process and concepts, but as somebody that is, in my case, it's a commitment to helping others be do the best they can be on a personal and professional level.

Unknown Speaker  5:04  
Now, how is that different from like being an executive coach? Or, or something like that? Is there a distinct difference between the two?

Unknown Speaker  5:11  
You know, that's a good question because I get asked it a lot. And it's, I see mentoring as more relationship based. So like, I'm, I'm mentoring people today that I've been working with them for probably six, seven years, and you'd probably think, well, gee, you take you to been able to help them with whatever but but where it comes for me is it's the relationship. And they know that they can pick the phone up at any given time, and call me and and I'll just listen, I'll let them talk their way through stuff. Where I seek executive coaching or even just coaching is it's very much it's, it's very performance driven. So it's right, it's, there's an issue that we need to deal with. And we're going to go and here's the process we're going to follow, where if if that was me coming in, as the mentor, I would sit down and sort of say, Okay, let's have a conversation, initially. And then after that, I want the mentee to be sort of driving the bus, I want them to take ownership of where we're going and how we're going to get there. And I'm just going to guide you, I'm gonna steer you in the right direction. And that's where when, you know, somebody says, Well, what do you need? For skills? What do you need to have for skills to be a great mentor? Well, the one of the biggest things is listening and hearing and effective communication.

Unknown Speaker  6:48  
Listening is a forgotten art at least in in the world that I've been in. A lot of people don't listen, they are preparing rather than listening. They're preparing for what they're going to say, based upon what they think they heard, rather than listening to what they the other person actually said. Does that make sense?

Unknown Speaker  7:09  
It does. Yeah, it does. And it's kind of interesting and very strange, I guess, in some way. But I'm involved in a meeting tomorrow. And there's the bringing someone in to do a presentation on listening. And here we are, we're talking about it. And you had to go through this two page questionnaire, listening self inventory. And it's how you know, how you how you perceive yourself responding or not responding to various conversations and stuff like that. And so I'm going okay, okay, and I'm thinking, I probably shouldn't be circling them all the same. But that's the real, the reality of what it is for me, because of the teaching that I will go through with some of the people that want to become effective mentors. Some of these are points that we actually talk about, quite quite often. And so it sort of made sense after I thought about it was that, you know, circling all the answer a and B's kind of makes sense, because that's the market I'm working in.

Unknown Speaker  8:21  
So being a mentor, it's a much deeper relationship with the mentor II than like coach and type information because you're working with these people for literally years.

Unknown Speaker  8:33  
And I'm probably going into spots where the coach may not want to go. And one of those is the mental health space that that I'm I'm now I've devoted a lot of time and effort into being able to work with people who are dealing with mental health challenges.

Unknown Speaker  8:55  
I think we all get to deal with that for one time or another. How do you identify it someone? And did does it take a long time and a degree and all of that to be able to, to understand and to work with it?

Unknown Speaker  9:09  
You know, the first part is identifying when it is something we need to have a conversation about it. What I found is that if I voluntarily talk about some of the things I'm dealing with, like my, you know, dealing with post traumatic stress or dealing with grief, and I openly share, and that's probably some of the things that I talk about very early in our mentoring relationship is is those very same things. And that's not something that's easy for everybody to do. And so like I've had it where I'm working with a young entrepreneur that within 10 minutes of our conversation they let me know that they'd been diagnosed with three or four different events. or health illnesses. And I was without me kind of poking and prodding. And all I actually did was I just shared my own story.

Unknown Speaker  10:09  
So you've been down the road, and you've got the experience of going down the road of mental health and with PTSD and and some of the other ones bipolar would be another one that comes to mind or are some of the can those are our major things that are that are that we are dealing with as a culture, aren't they?

Unknown Speaker  10:28  
They are. And and and I think you know, for the benefit of your listeners thinking that here's this row Mountie are men mentor are running around trying to heal the world. And that's definitely not the case is that there are, are definite from my perspective anyhow. And what we teach people that want to go down this path is that you need to know where the line in the sand is. And you don't cross over into a space where it would normally be dealt with by a counselor or social worker, psychologists or psychiatrists that my job is to listen and hear when you know, when you're comfortable wanting to talk about what it is you're experiencing. My job is to listen and hear and to make sure that you are you know, are you availing yourself of all the professional help that you, you could, you know, could get your hands on, and then are you comfortable having me sort of standing beside you, so to speak, as your support structure,

Unknown Speaker  11:31  
that's got to be a very comforting thing for someone to have someone that we take into our inside, if you will, because we've all got this little date that we will that we surround ourselves with. And we don't let people in generally speaking, even even family and friends, we don't necessarily treat that like a relationship that you can let them in, they open up the gate and let them in and close the gate. And then and then you can have a real conversation. So that that how do you get someone to let you into the gate is aware.

Unknown Speaker  12:10  
A large part of that is, is it's building a trusting relationship, and it's all focused on trust, but it's also making sure that they understand and, and living up to those expectations myself is that what we talk about is confidential. So I don't go, you know, I don't go and say, you know, I had a meeting yesterday with Kevin, and this is what Kevin said, and, you know, oh, my gosh, the poor guy, you know, I feel really bad and all that stuff. That just doesn't happen.

Unknown Speaker  12:44  
Which is, which is a matter of trust. And you have to be able to trust somebody, if you're, if you're going to talk about things that you might not have told anybody in the world. And but it's affecting you in a in a profound way, you really need that trust in order to get that out.

Unknown Speaker  13:02  
And what I found is that by creating that level of trust, creating that level of confidentiality, and also sharing some of my own personal stories that demonstrate my vulnerability, that creates that safe environment for the person to want to open up and share a bit more. And, for me, the it's probably not the best definition or example of gratification. But for me, the gratification I get is when I get told something that I know no one else has been told.

Unknown Speaker  13:40  
Yeah, that would that's can be gratifying, it also can be a heavy burden.

Unknown Speaker  13:46  
You know, it, it can be you know, especially when you start a, you know, you sometimes the depth of the information that you get is such that you're you ask yourself, and I needed to know that because of why. And I even I think back to times when I'm still working in Royal Canadian Mounted Police, managing 140 160 employees, males, females, all different categories of employees. And it was it was not uncommon for a male or a female employee to walk in, sit down, close the door and just do a dump. And it would be personal stuff and work related stuff. And I'm, you know, you're kind of sitting there, and I'm going and I needed to know this because why and then I thought, Doug, take that step back and be thankful for the trust that they place in you that they they know they can come to you and they can tell whatever story that they want or towel, whatever they want to you and they know it's not going to go anywhere. else

Unknown Speaker  15:00  
I imagine being working for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. And there are some relatively horrific stories that you've heard in private, that have stayed in private. Because they needed that expertise. And they needed to be able to get that off their chest, in an environment that they might not get anywhere else.

Unknown Speaker  15:22  
True. And when I think back to that timeframe, when I was still in, in the police force, there was still a gap, there was a gap missing of the support structure. So if I went on a call, and let's say it was, somebody took their life, shot themselves, and I'm having to process all this stuff. And I ended up having to transport the body out eight, eight hours in a vehicle in the middle of 40. Below weather. And, and going through that, where I, you know, I get get back to my place where I'm stationed where I'm living, and I've got no one that I can actually reasonably turned to and say, you know, I need somebody to talk to because they're just and it was something that nobody seemed to think much of, and I don't think, organizationally that we were in a place where that sort of thing was even entertained or even offered as a employee service that, you know, we need to help our police officers decompress after, you know, after a trauma laden event that's taking place, we need to help them be able to work their way through that. And that never happened.

Unknown Speaker  16:48  
They're getting better at that now, it seems Yes, then than they used to, because they used to be like, suck it up. And it's just not that big of a deal. But it always is. And they have shooed me. And, and I know I was when I was a bus driver for a long time, if somebody got into an accident, or there was a fight on the bias, or there was a shooting on the bus and heaven forbid that there was an outlet for us to go talk to somebody. But that doesn't necessarily mean that they were the right person to go talk to. Does that make sense?

Unknown Speaker  17:21  
Yes, it does. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker  17:23  
Because that's what they're used to doing. But they don't necessarily get into the the real feeling of what you're feeling. And it takes you have to have been there, I would suspect. So I imagine that you've been in some of those places.

Unknown Speaker  17:37  
And I think you know that as long as you don't say, why, you know, I remember a time when I did this, you know that that really doesn't apply in this situation, it's, I'd like to understand how you feel, after what you've just witnessed. It's important to me to be able to understand what you're feeling and what you're thinking at this particular time point. And, and kind of use that as the bridge to get the conversation started and get it going. But having, it's like mentoring, I've always people say, Well, you need to have industry specific experience to be a manager in that particular industry. And I'm going no, you don't. You just need to know the questions to ask to get the conversation and discussion going. Because you got to remember the definition of mentoring is a two way trusted relationship. And so it's you know, you've you've got to, you've got to get down that path in order to be able to do it. And I can do that. Without industry specific experience. Like I've worked with the health sector, I've worked with manufacturing organizations, I've worked with educational organizations I've worked with, I forget we did a count. I forget how many it was five, no, it was a couple of 100 different genres that I was actually mentoring in or had mentored him.

Unknown Speaker  19:17  
And that's really interesting, because what you're doing is you're able to help people in a broad range of things that are involving in their life and because it transcends just business, or just personal life, a lot of times they're intertwined and and they're working through all of that, and you can help them with that. But it takes experience to be able to do that then that

Unknown Speaker  19:41  
it dies and you've actually touched on a real good point is the aspect of the personal and professionals growth part. And that that I have found that if you come to me and say I want you to mentor me and I'm all focused on wanting to develop myself for develop Want my career because I want to, you know, today I'm gonna, I'm a team lead tomorrow, I want to be a director and all that sort of stuff. I'm going to focus on your personal side of things first. So I'm going to find out, you know, whereabouts are we with self esteem, self confidence, self worth, self doubt, all the all of those things. Because we need to kind of get your house in order with those before we actually start to move forward to deal with anything career development wise, because you know, what's going to happen is that those things self esteem, especially if somebody's struggling with their self esteem, and that becomes a road roadblock or a barrier to moving forward with trying to help you get your career career kick started.

Unknown Speaker  20:49  
I can see how that could play into it. It's like if you were, if you wanted to go into management, as an example, but you had a problem with self esteem. And you didn't think that you're good enough, and you didn't think you could stand up to other people, and that you would not make a very good supervisor?

Unknown Speaker  21:06  
No, no, you wouldn't. And I actually, you know, you can take that in an even more deeper pool, where you take a look at the aspect of communication skills, and you can take an existing manager or supervisor who can't communicate well. And that can have an impact as well. So it's a matter of, let's identify that, and there has to be some self identification that has to take place as well. But let's identify that, and then let's start to work our way through that. And sometimes, I know I have this service I call mentoring versus termination, where you're going to terminate, somebody will bring me in and let me spend five, one hour sessions. And in most cases, with the exception, I think of one, I've been able to turn that person's behavior around to make to get them back where they're that engaged, productive employee that that you hired, and you've saved yourself the hassle of going through and having to hire somebody new put them through training, loss, productivity, all of those things, because I think it's what do they say about 2.2 times your annual salary is what it costs every time they have to train a new employee,

Unknown Speaker  22:27  
it's been my experience that you very rarely are able to hire, the next hire that you make is going to be better than the hire that you lost or the individual that you lost. And sometimes it takes as many as 234 or five people that you need to run through before you get the desired result. And that can be very expensive.

Unknown Speaker  22:50  
Yeah, definitely. Yeah, definitely. And you know, and I see the I know, of a couple of organizations that have got a fairly high turnover rate. And I, I just, I feel bad for the people that are working there, because it's a revolving door, and they just they don't know, you know, who's going to be going out the door next? And who's coming in? And are they going to be a good fit? And there's all those questions that, you know, they're asking themselves, and they just, they want to be able to work in a place where there's some consistency. And it's, you know, things aren't changing all the all the time and employee wise, because it is disruptive?

Unknown Speaker  23:39  
Well, you know, and I was in the restaurant business for a long time. And what I found was that when you had high turnover, it affected your entire business, it affected your customer base, it affected the other employees, because they're constantly having to retrain, and they can't just go and enjoy their customers, they have to be retraining people on stuff. And it causes your business to not thrive because nobody is as good or because it takes time to get good at a particular function that you're doing. And if you don't take that time, or your continuing to turn turn that over, you never get there, which was bad for the business. Why isn't it that some businesses don't recognize that?

Unknown Speaker  24:22  
I don't know. It's the same sort of thing as you were describing the situation. I'm thinking of plug a mentor, plug a mentor in there, plug a mentor in there, right. And, and you just you don't see organizations, you know, taking that step back and saying, Well, things aren't working, what can we do to change that? And then someone saying, Well, let's try this mentoring thing and see what will come from that. And if you go about it the correct way and put the right pieces to the puzzle into place. It's going to make a difference.

Unknown Speaker  24:58  
It will and it does By nature, by its nature, it has to because one of the issues while and I know that you know this, but when you talk to employees about why they left a company, lack of money is like six or seven. It's like number one is like camaraderie, being part of the team, feeling successful feeling that you can, so that you like going to work rather than dread going to work. And and if a lot of people don't get that, and that's why a mentor, and a mentor can help a boss who doesn't see who's Sure, very short sighted, it can help them take a little bit longer of a view, don't you think?

Unknown Speaker  25:38  
Yeah, most definitely. And, and the other aspect of actually, one additional thing that you can add to the list of why people leave organizations is because of a lack of good leadership. And that's where you making that decision to say, we need to do something more than what we're doing today, because people are leaving as fast as we hire. So let's maybe say put in a as part of their new employee coming in, we have an onboarding process, and part of that is we assign them a mentor.

Unknown Speaker  26:13  
That makes that makes a world of, of sense. And, and then they you can help train the manager because one of the things that I've always noticed is that if you ever noticed that, when guys get promoted, or gals get promoted into a new position is because they either were really good salesperson, and when they were salesperson, or they were really good secretary, whatever it was, that doesn't translate necessarily into being a kind, compassionate, effective boss. And that would be really helpful to get them to see, because there are lots of blind spots, and they will be great for them to be able to see the blind spots,

Unknown Speaker  26:53  
they are most most definitely in. And they used to say at times in the police force, they used to say that the only way that people got promoted was they either a gotten into trouble. And so they promoted them, or, or, or B, they decided that they needed to get them out of this particular area. So they promoted them into a new area. And hopefully then that just shifted the problem from one place to another and it didn't work.

Unknown Speaker  27:25  
It never works. It never works. So So if if, Doug, if somebody wants to get a hold of you, and they want you to work for them, or work with them or their company, because you also do a lot of work with companies and stuff, how do they get a hold of you? What do they do?

Unknown Speaker  27:42  
Well, typically, they can reach out to me so they can reach out through the website. So triple W dot talent, see.ca. That's, and there's a contact, contact me button on on the website that you can click on and it'll send me a message, you can check out LinkedIn, just do a search on Doug Lawrence. And it'll pop my name up, and you can direct message me through through LinkedIn if you want to go that way. And the easiest way, and I have no issues with us doing this is for just send me an email and my email is Doug, dot Lawrence. That's LA, w r n, C, E at talent C, so the word talent letter C on the n.ca. And I'll I'll get back to you as quickly as I can.

Unknown Speaker  28:34  
Has there been anybody that has gone through that and you talk to him and and you ended up saying, Well, you know, I would love to be able to help you. But I don't think I can have that conversation ever happened? Or have you been able to pretty much help everybody once? And I don't want you to go into details. But yeah, it must have been something that you just felt like they weren't going to be able to get through.

Unknown Speaker  29:01  
You know, it was it was more mental health related and, and they needed to, through their employee program they needed to get in to see a counselor or a psychiatrist, psychiatrist or they needed professional help. And I just said, you know, I'm here for you, I'll do whatever I possibly can but you need to see you need to see professional help and you need to see it quickly.

Unknown Speaker  29:32  
Because there are I have a relative that has been diagnosed but doesn't want to take the medication. And if in she can't get better, it's it's a catch 22 If she can, she has been diagnosed and but you can't get better without taking the medication but you won't take the medication surgery can't get better. So that makes it really hard, doesn't it?

Unknown Speaker  29:56  
It does, but I you know, I do It's not a, it's not an uncommon position for people to take, because I hear that quite often, I was working with a young lady who had bipolar was diagnosed bipolar and absolutely refused to take the medication. Because the side effects from her perspective, the side effects were worse than just dealing with the illness. And, you know, I respected that and, and I did what I could, you know, to help her work through her. Her bipolar rants as I used to call them, where she would just unload for 45 minutes to an hour. And that's that was what what was needed was she just needed to vent to somebody who stayed quiet and was non judgmental. And she said, I don't need pills. I got you. Why would I need pills?

Unknown Speaker  30:57  
You must have the patience of a saint.

Unknown Speaker  31:01  
Well, some days, yes.

Unknown Speaker  31:05  
So you're in doubt you're a human being. And we all have got days, we all got good days and bad days. But what do you do? Who do you go to to vent?

Unknown Speaker  31:16  
Hmm, good question. I, you know, actually, I do have, I have probably two or three people that I can I can go to and the, for me, it's a matter of I just need to get this off my chest. So don't, don't ask me questions. Just listen. And then I would go 20 minutes later, I would say thank you very much, I feel really good now. And we'll talk again. And that's, that's what I need.

Unknown Speaker  31:52  
That is a nice place to go when you need somebody to. Because, you know, most of us if you if you go to a family or friends and stuff, a lot of us are judgmental. And a lot of us will say things that we we probably shouldn't say, but we think we're doing the right thing, but we're really not, which is why it's important for someone like you to know the right things to say and what not to say. More. So.

Unknown Speaker  32:21  
Yeah, yeah, it's, it's extremely important. And you're absolutely right on the money when it comes to I'm in a lot of cases, I am better off with taking going to one of my inner circle people and saying, I just need somebody to talk to because there's, you know, this and this has happened and, and I and I just need to kind of vent and get it off my chest. And I know that if I go try to go to my family for that. They're busy, they don't have time, and I don't know that they're comfortable. And you know, enough to be able to say, Okay, come, you know, come on, Doug, let's just sit down, and we'll talk about it over here and go through it that way, I, I just I get a sense that they're not, they're not in a place where they can do that for me. So I rely on people that are part of my inner circle and kind of keep the stuff out of the Family Circle.

Unknown Speaker  33:23  
Well, you know, and a lot of us are taught from the very early ages that you you need to just, you know, buck up just to get through it. You can you can just get through it. And you can be a tough guy and, and don't cry and don't have any emotions, just anger, you can show if you're a man, but if all the other ones you've got to keep hitting. And just backing up.

Unknown Speaker  33:46  
Well, I can honestly say I think I've just proved that. Good. You know, I, I've had situations where with grief with the loss of my life, where I've had to go grocery shopping on nylon, and I had to pick up birthday anniversary cards or whatever. And I can still remember pushing the card up by the greeting card area and starting to pull out cards. And as I pulled them out, I could feel the tears running down my cheeks. And I actually got very emotional and I'm kind of looking over my shoulder to sort of see who's watching and there was people there and they just ignored. Nobody turned and said, you know, can I help you? Is there something wrong? They just they went about their own business and it's probably was a better thing, I guess, you know, when you think about it?

Unknown Speaker  34:41  
Oh, I don't know. It would be it would have been nice to have. If somebody just said I Yeah, it's a matter of fact, we've got a young lady that I interviewed the other day. And what she does to help people is she's got these these Polish stones and the Polish stones Got the inscription hope on them. And if she runs into somebody who she feels like, they just need a little bit of hope, she'll just walk up to him and say, Here, I want you to have this doesn't engage with them doesn't do anything other than here, I want you to have this. And it's just a little bit of hope. I think that's a really cool thing to be able to do.

Unknown Speaker  35:24  
Yeah, I do, too. I really liked that. I really liked that.

Unknown Speaker  35:28  
It's, it's amazing what we can learn from each other. If we if we take the time. And

Unknown Speaker  35:35  
go ahead. I was just gonna say, and especially in light of all the different things that you know, we're dealing with, you know, PTs and the, the aspect of grief and that and I'm, you know, I'm absolutely blown away by the number of people that are impacted on a daily basis. By grief. It's just, it's, yeah, you know, you take a look at the number of people that are that are dying or passing away from cancer, which is the leading cause of death in the world today. And you kind of go like, how do we how do we even get past that? How do we, you know, what do we what do we need to do to make that better? And I still haven't found the answer for that one.

Unknown Speaker  36:25  
It's, it's, it's tough. I have a friend of mine that her mom and dad passed away 20 years ago, and she's still affected negatively by grief. And it's not something that and she's tried, you know, Elisabeth Kubler Reiss wrote the book, the five stages of grief and stuff in shows she read that and that really helped a little bit, but not really. It's a very individual thing. That's grief, isn't it?

Unknown Speaker  36:53  
Yeah, it is. And it's interesting, because I, I was searching, looking for one of my colleagues to write the foreword in my next book, and I shipped off the the information and stuff and what she had come back with was that this was caused her to do a lot of reflection about those around her. And, and it was a heart wrenching story where because in the book, I share my dealing with grief and stuff like that, and, and she said that it was a very heart wrenching experience to have to read that and, and then be able to write the foreword for the book.

Unknown Speaker  37:43  
It's hard. Yeah. Especially and by the way, I want to, I'm sorry, for your loss is thank you. And I can't imagine losing a spouse, I would be that no child would be the two worst things.

Unknown Speaker  38:01  
You know, I thought, I thought, well, I've done this my I, my mum passed away in in 2007. And that was tough for me, because I had such a close relationship with her. But it doesn't compare whatsoever to losing my wife Deborah, at, you know, it just it doesn't compare?

Unknown Speaker  38:29  
No, no, well, especially you were going to grow old with your wife.

Unknown Speaker  38:36  
Yeah, you know, it's, I jokingly, at times will say that, you know, we renewed our vows at 30 years, and we signed an agreement to be together for another 30. And one of us decided that that wasn't or didn't have a say, I guess in the good Lord decided that. I don't know. I think it's time. I need her someplace else.

Unknown Speaker  39:05  
Well, and I, and it may be hard to hear. But I also submit that that in the work that you're doing it actually it certainly gave you a moment of a bit of empathy for people, other people that are going through that as well.

Unknown Speaker  39:25  
Yeah, most most definitely. There was. There was a lot of lived experiences that came out of her passing a lot.

Unknown Speaker  39:36  
Yeah. And the sad thing is about that is that we all are going to face that either somebody that we know or love. I mean, I lost my best friend from high school two years ago, my brother two years ago, my mom last year. It's like when you get older, that stuff just starts happening all over the place.

Unknown Speaker  39:54  
Well, we, when I was growing up, I grew up on a farm and we used to say that The only time we got to meet some of our relatives and that was either at a wedding or at a funeral.

Unknown Speaker  40:05  
Exactly. Exactly. Before my mom passed, one of the things that they did was like, on a weekly basis, somebody had had gone. So they went to somebody's funeral, like, once every week or once every other week and, and that kind of stuff, but it's how you choose to deal with it. And, and to in the frame of mind which what you take from it. You know, that really matters. And how you deal with it. You know, cuz, you know, we all we all miss people that the folks that we loved in the past, but I tend to believe that they still are around. Maybe that's my own self delusion to make it a little bit better. But you know, I don't know.

Unknown Speaker  40:48  
No, I would agree with you. 100%. And I just had a friend who she was actually Deborah's girlfriend. And she has this firm belief that, and I agree with her 100% Is that if Deborah's around, she will leave a bird's feather. And so here the other day, she actually found or saw there was a bird's feather that was there. And she, I think she said her daughter had had thrown it in the garbage. And so she said, You can't do that. And they ended up they, they retrieved it because Deborah left that for us. So it was, it was very touching for me that, you know, that they, they would do that. So. But yeah, it's I agree with you 100%, that, you know, that they're with us all the time.

Unknown Speaker  41:47  
And they're watching over us, and they're taking care of us. And that's, you know, and that's that is this life is hard enough. If you if you don't believe that there is something later that's, that's better, or if you know, you know, I never understood that. But it's but people that we love are with us for a long time. And I've been fortunate that I feel that I feel them around me. And I know you do too. Yeah, definitely. But that also helps you become a tremendous mentor.

Unknown Speaker  42:23  
Yes, that's it definitely helps a lot.

Unknown Speaker  42:28  
And by the way, you won, I was looking at your homepage, you won an award or you are? What do they call you?

Unknown Speaker  42:37  
So are you talking about the book?

Unknown Speaker  42:42  
Talking about the let's see, where are you here? The Certified competent journey? Mentor?

Unknown Speaker  42:48  
Oh, yes. Yeah, so that's a that's a mentor certification. So it's a certificate of competence, Journey mentor. And the idea behind the certification was number one to help people navigate through the certification process. And then number two was to be able to work with people that are dealing with mental health challenges.

Unknown Speaker  43:15  
So one of the things that you do is you work with other people who wants to be mentors to teach them how to be a mentor? Correct? Do you ever come across somebody that you say, you know, you're just not cut out to do this? Yes. That was, that must be a hard conversation to have.

Unknown Speaker  43:32  
I'm not not totally because what to go through the certification process, especially at the competence and the journey, mentor level, you need to have a mentoring log that captures the amount of time and all that sort of stuff that you've you've done prior to having a conversation with me. And so I've had a lot of people that have, have said, I want to go through the process. And so we start them going and I said, Okay, I need to see your log, and they give me a lot that's got seven hours. And so I spin them around and send them back out the door and say, you know, you need probably 20 to 30 is a good number 40 really makes me happy but 20 to 30 is a good number. And here's some things to think about that you need to include on that because you're going to be interviewed by a panel that's going to verify that you that you have the lived experience that you say that you do and that this is where you've used it. So it's

Unknown Speaker  44:40  
it's a real complete program then.

Unknown Speaker  44:42  
It is yeah, it definitely is. Well, if

Unknown Speaker  44:45  
somebody would like to do that they can follow and follow it and do the same way by going to talent, which is T L t a l e n t c.ca current. Doug is right Arias get his pictures right on the front, you can call him there's a big thing that says called Doug Lawrence. And that you can do that. This is it's a pleasure talking to you, sir. And I love the work that you're doing. Well, thank

Unknown Speaker  45:11  
you very much. And it's, I enjoy the conversations that we have.

Unknown Speaker  45:16  
Guys, they're really good. And thank you for the for that. But the you, you are very good at what you do. And I, you know, I got a lot of questions. And so it works out well.

Unknown Speaker  45:25  
That's good. That's good. Hopefully I was able to answer them.

Unknown Speaker  45:28  
You did for the most part, absolutely. But you've also, you've also taught me that, that it takes a very special individual to become a mentor. Because not everybody can do it. If you're thinking about yourself, when somebody else is talking to you, you're not going to be a great mentor. You're because you're not absorbing what they're telling you. That right?

Unknown Speaker  45:51  
That's correct, absolutely on bang on.

Unknown Speaker  45:54  
So it's it isn't it's a skill. It's an important skill. I wish everybody had it, but they don't. And that's why they need to come see you.

Unknown Speaker  46:05  
And I would welcome them with open arms.

Unknown Speaker  46:09  
So before we go, I want to give you the opportunity to tell our audience anything that you would like them to know about virtually anything, because you're pretty versed on a lot of stuff.

Unknown Speaker  46:21  
Well, excuse me, I would all use this opportunity to promote my book, you are not alone, which is available through Amazon. And it is a Amazon number one bestseller. And so I'm working on my third book now, but I should probably back up a little bit is that you are not alone is also a finalist in the global Book Awards. And so I find out middle of November, if I am a finalist, or if I am a actually a winner in the category that I submitted for. So I'm pretty excited about that. Because that that's, that's recognition that, you know, from an author perspective just tells me I'm going in the right direction.

Unknown Speaker  47:16  
And you're number one bestseller on Amazon, you're not alone mental health. Mentors take the journey with you that that is I'm sorry, we didn't bring up that a little bit sooner what? What caused you to write the book?

Unknown Speaker  47:31  
That was actually so I I've written the gift of mentoring was my first book that I wrote. And that came from a number of my colleagues, my inner circle saying, you've written all these blog articles, you need to pull them all together and make it into a book. And so I did that you are not alone is a similar story where people said you're mentoring people that are dealing with mental health challenges, you need to write a book that talks about how mentoring can be part of the support structure for for mental health, you need to write that book and you need to tell your story, because it's a powerful story.

Unknown Speaker  48:11  
You know, I honestly believe that. People believing that they are alone, and then no one would understand is probably one of our biggest obstacles to changing the world. Yeah, I would agree. And I'm glad that you're doing what you're doing. And you've written the book, you are not alone. Go to Amazon, they got it right there. And you can you can order it. The author, of course, is Doug Lawrence. And, Doug, I'd like to thank you again for being with us today.

Unknown Speaker  48:40  
Thank you very much for having me. Your

Unknown Speaker  48:43  
information is going to help somebody and I hope if somebody feels a need, if they really need somebody to talk to give you a call. Yeah. Sorry. If you will wait right there, sir. I will be right back. Hey, thanks for enjoying this episode. All the way to the end. Please give us a like and subscribe to this channel. This has been a production of positive talk radio dotnet please visit our website oddly named positive talk radio dotnet for more details about us and our mission, which is to provide great positive programming designed to inspire us all. I'm Kevin McDonald. I'm proud of these shows and I'm truly hope that you'll like them and share them with friends and family. So on behalf of our entire team, remember, be kind to one another because each other's all we got to do