Chapter 6

RELATIONSHIPS ARE THE NEW CURRENCY

Good relationships are the foundation for success in all areas of life. We are social creatures. In fact, one of the most basic needs we have as human beings is the need for connection and belonging. We need it just as much as we need food, water, and security. Relationships are essential to meeting this basic need no matter our age, our nationality, or our gender. Without relationships, life can be useless, boring, and lonely. Being in healthy relationships can provide you with life energy that nurtures you from within. And it can bring you greater fulfillment, open new doors, and expand your knowledge and perspective.

Practicing Self-Love

My religious faith taught me at an early age that one of the Ten Commandments required me to love my neighbors as I love myself. Through my faith, parental teaching, and life experiences, I have come to believe that the most important relationship in life is with yourself. If you don’t love yourself entirely, take care of yourself consistently, and ensure that your own needs are met and that you are at your best, you will find it difficult to do the same for other people.

The way you treat yourself determines how you will treat others. I’ve come to believe that practicing self-care isn’t being selfish, and being self-centered is necessary self-care. I don’t mean that in the negative sense, that no one else matters. Rather, once you become grounded and centered in your own well-being (mind, body, and spirit), serving and empowering others will come naturally.

To feel your best, do your best work, and achieve your dreams, you have to be centered on building your self-esteem, sense of self-worth, and self-confidence. Much of this book has been about doing the work within. It’s been about releasing the limits you have placed on yourself and getting out of your own way so you can realize your dreams. This is self-love at its best.

It is impossible to dream and imagine your life being better in the future if you aren’t mentally, emotionally, and physically ready to respond. Some opportunities come only once, others may come occasionally, and sometimes they come often; but whenever they come, you don’t want to miss out simply because you haven’t done the internal work. Some of the best advice I have received is that it’s better to be prepared for an opportunity and never have one than to have an opportunity present itself and not be prepared. That’s the worst feeling you can have. In this book, you’ve read my stories about not being ready and what it cost me. I hope you’ve learned how important it is to stay on the journey of self-love and self-development and to build a great relationship with yourself, because it is the key to your success.

How Do You Know You Love Yourself?

For years a question I asked myself was, How do you really know you love yourself? Having been through the process of self-development and overcoming self-defeating beliefs, I offer here a few ways to know if you are in a great relationship with yourself. Some of these statements were shared by many of my mentors and advisers who experienced similar journeys toward self-love. Review the list and rate yourself on which of these statements are true about you and which you need to work on.

1. You are true to yourself (meaning you are honest with yourself about where you are in life and about your strengths, shortcomings, needs, hurts, feelings, and so on).

2. You accept your flaws and your mistakes, and you don’t dwell on them.

3. You are kind to others.

4. You don’t seek validation from external sources, such as social media.

5. You value your alone time.

6. You celebrate yourself.

7. You take care of your mental and physical health.

8. You manage your finances responsibly.

9. You have a positive attitude.

10. You are grateful for what you have.

Building Relationships with Others

Personal Board of Advisers

Once you establish the most important relationship in life, it is critical to surround yourself with two other groups of people. The first group is what I call my personal board of advisers—my closest and most trusted family members, friends, and colleagues. If you have them, you could also include your spouse, partner, spiritual leader, and others. My board of advisers has built me up, pushed me forward, made me better, and provided the kind of support that has enabled me to realize my dreams. They know how I think and what my strengths and weaknesses are, so they know how to support me personally and professionally.

Through the years, they have been instrumental in my growth, my recovery from failures, and my reinvention. I am so grateful to call my mom, dad, brothers, and daughter my biggest cheerleaders, confidants, and members of my personal board of advisers. Additionally, my best friend of more than thirty years and a few of my colleagues and clients who have become close friends are also part of that elite and small circle of advisers.

Building an Extended, Diverse Network

Second, I have an extended network that provides me great counsel and wisdom from their experience, and they share resources that help me in my career and business endeavors. It has been said that it’s not what you know, it’s who you know, and this couldn’t be a truer reason for having a network. I consider myself a master connector and an effective relationship builder, and I have experienced the value that having a great network can bring.

A professional network consists of a group of individuals with whom you connect and build relationships that will enable you to advance your goals and access new opportunities and resources. Unfortunately, I have found that not everyone knows how to build an effective, diverse network, so here are some strategies I used to build mine.

First, assess your current network. I know it’s human nature to want to be around people who are just like you. However, I cannot overstate how important it is in a multicultural, multigenerational, and globally diverse world to surround yourself with people who will help you expand your thinking and grow your ability to work, live, and lead effectively and succeed in this new demographic reality. Likewise, having a lot of people around you is not as beneficial as having the right people in your network. It’s about quality over quantity. That means having a professional network of people from all walks of life who are different from you—various ethnicities, genders, cultures, ages, beliefs, personalities, experiences, skill sets, thinking styles, and the like. I began building this kind of network early in my career. Such a broad network makes for a rich and beautiful tapestry of unique gifts and talents that can contribute great value to you.

Ask yourself these key questions:

a. Who are the people currently in my network?

b. Why did I select them, or vice versa?

c. What skills, experience, and resources do they offer?

d. Does everyone in my network look, think, and act like me?

Once you have answered these questions, you will have a better idea of who you already have and who else you need to invite into your network. For me, this approach really yielded tangible benefits. For example, when I relocated to another state a few years ago, I didn’t know anyone in the area. I accessed LinkedIn and joined a few professional groups in my region; I also sent invitations to connect to HR professionals and diversity and inclusion practitioners in my area. Another example was when I was working on a large culture transformation project for a client and they wanted to know how other companies had approached the same work and what some best practices and trends were. I sent out a message to a number of people in my network who I knew had experience and success. I was able to get from them a lot of great resources, lessons, and tips that enabled me to achieve better results for that client, and it saved me so much time. More recently, I was seeking a candidate with specific skills in auditing and research. The first thing I did was reach out to my network to solicit recommendations. I received a number of responses and within a few days I was scheduling interviews with several qualified candidates, and ultimately hired one.

Second, while attending live social events such as conferences, conventions, seminars, or workshops, look for opportunities to initiate a conversation. I do this often and here’s the approach I take. Let’s say you’re at the conference reception or at a table for lunch or sitting beside someone in a session. Take the first step and initiate a conversation. Get to know who they are, what they do, and about their experiences and expertise. I usually start the conversation with “Hi, I’m Dr. Shirley Davis, CEO of SDS Global Enterprises.” They usually return the same information about themselves. Then I’ll ask something like, “Have you attended this conference before?” or “What made you attend this seminar?” Take it from there and see where it goes.

Look for commonalities; perhaps you work in the same industry, are at the same level in your career, are from the same geographic location, have the same kind of business, and so on. Use that information to further the conversation. Should you find them interesting and possessing diverse skills you can benefit from, ask them if they would be open to connecting with you on your social media platform, such as LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and the like.

This leads me to the third way to build an extended, diverse network: connect online. I conduct searches on those same social media sites, and I conduct other Internet searches to find professionals who share my interests and have unique skills and expertise that I can benefit from, and I invite them to connect. Also, when I come across someone’s online post that interests me, I engage with them by responding and thanking them for their posts. Then I send them an invitation to connect, stating that I like to learn from interesting people like them and add them to my network. What I learned in implementing these three steps is that identifying the right people is about being intentional and strategic in who you invite and why.

Benefits of a Broad, Diverse Network: Leveraging My Network for Career Success

As a woman, a minority, and a young professional, I didn’t see many people who looked like me at the top of many organizations and I knew I would need the support of others to get there. I built relationships and a broad network of professionals who taught me how to navigate inside an organization as a minority, a woman, a single mom, and other underrepresented traits; how to position myself as a leader; and how to communicate my value.

I also leveraged my relationships to increase my knowledge and skills, to learn more about the industries I worked in, and to get access to resources. As a result, I worked my way up to senior leadership and executive roles and enjoyed tremendous success later in my career. And now, as the owner of a global workforce solutions firm, having those broad relationships has been critical to my success and to the many opportunities that have come my way via referrals and recommendations. Several of my contacts were converted to contracts.

I’m a big believer that people come across your path for a reason and you must nurture each relationship in such a way that it yields benefits to both people. Here are two examples of relationships I nurtured.

A Partnership with Grace

For more than ten years I enjoyed a mutually beneficial relationship with a colleague I met at work named Grace. She was a well-respected consultant and speaker and was passionate about her work in leadership, change management, and diversity. When we first met in 2005, we became fast friends as well as professional colleagues. We spoke at conferences together, served on committees, referred business to each other, and collaborated on books, white papers, and training programs. One year she landed a multiyear contract with a large bank in the northeast part of the United States. She was ecstatic and they loved her work.

A few years into the contract, she suffered a stroke and lost her ability to speak clearly and to walk or stand for long periods, among other things. This was a devastating event because it was unexpected and it took away one of her main sources of income and something she was gifted in—speaking and singing. She had a voice like an angel, and I remember her opening a conference I hosted with a beautiful rendition of “Amazing Grace.”

After weeks of being in the hospital, she reached out to me and requested that I take on one of her major clients while she rehabilitated. She indicated that she trusted me with her business and with this client and knew they would receive me well. I agreed and immediately began delivering coaching and training to them with another colleague she had also reached out to. For the next year she continued to develop new training courses for the client and to work behind the scenes to support us in delivering.

One evening I reached out to her to get last-minute updates and to let her know I had arrived at the hotel safely and was all set for the next day of training. We spoke and she was thrilled to know that everything was good. But she wasn’t feeling well that evening and let me know she had been in the hospital a few days that week.

The next day I reached out again and left her a message saying that the sessions were well received again and the client was satisfied. I didn’t hear back from her, but I figured she was resting and recuperating. Two days later I received a message that she had passed away the day I left her that message. I was devastated! It was unbelievable news. Later that afternoon I called the client to ask if they knew of her passing, and they had not heard. They too were devastated. A week later, the client called me and wanted to talk about next steps with the contract. She said, “Because she trusted you with us, we trust you with us,” and the contract was transferred to me for another year.

While this story is quite sad, it really is a story about the power of relationship. Over the years we had nurtured a trusting, respectful, and mutually beneficial relationship that turned into a business opportunity for both of us. I was able to step in and partner with her in her darkest hour and in her last days, and she trusted me enough to serve her client. As a result, her client trusted me because she trusted me. This is what I mean when I say that relationships are the new currency.

An Encounter with Les Brown

One year I attended a conference while enjoying a vacation cruise with my mom. We had just left a session and were heading back to our cabin. We were standing in front of the elevator door waiting for it to return to the lower level, where we were. Finally it arrived, and when the elevator door opened I saw a crowd of people packed in like sardines. As another crowd of us awaited their exit, I looked up and saw Les Brown in the center of the crowd inside the elevator. Yes, the Les Brown, world-renowned motivational speaker, best-selling author, radio personality, and “Mrs. Mamie Brown’s Baby Boy.”

We locked eyes and he immediately walked over to me with two others (who turned out to be his daughter and one of his assistants). He looked at me and said, “You look familiar, do I know you?” I knew who he was because I had been listening to his motivational speeches for years. A year earlier I had spoken at a conference where he was the headliner and had participated on a panel in my role as Ms. American United States Woman, but we hadn’t gotten to meet in person because I had to leave immediately following my session. That’s the only time we were in the same room, so I shared that incident with him and assumed that must have been why I looked familiar.

Turns out that’s where he remembered me from. He didn’t remember my name, but he remembered me participating as Ms. American United States Woman. I went on to mention that I had listened to several of his motivational speeches, including “Live Your Dreams” and “It’s Not Over Until You Win,” and I commented on how much they had inspired me during my pursuit of the crown. I told him I had just completed my reign and had crowned my successor a few months earlier and was treating mom to some rest and relaxation on vacation.

Naturally we connected, because we were fellow speakers, but from that day forward we were fast friends. He invited me to attend his sessions on the cruise and insisted that mom and I have dinner at his table. When the ship stopped at various islands, he invited mom and I to tag along with a few others, including his daughter and some other friends. I had no idea where this was going but I pinched myself a few times because I couldn’t believe what was happening.

Mom and I had the best time and enjoyed getting to know Les. He was down-to-earth, had the most infectious laugh, and told so many stories and jokes, and nobody was a stranger. He would walk down the halls and on the decks of the ship and just stop and talk to people like he had stopped and talked to me. But I was invited to be a part of his entourage. It would be a game-changing experience for me and I knew that purpose had collided with opportunity.

As the cruise came to an end six days later, Les invited me to attend one of his upcoming speaker training workshops. I agreed to do so, and the rest is destiny (not history, but part of a divine plan). After attending his speaker training workshop I was never the same. I learned so much and even won one of his speech competitions. Sound familiar? Yes, I won my first speech competition in my first pageant at the age of thirteen, and now I had come full circle to be exposed to someone like Les Brown.

Under his tutelage I found my voice and my purpose, developed my life plan, and gained a mentor and ultimately a good friend. I sharpened my public speaking skills and won a spot as one of his Platinum Speakers. For five years I had the honor of traveling with Les and a few of his other Platinum Speakers all over the world, and it gave me the courage, the hunger, and the determination to push myself even more toward achieving my dreams. He was there rooting me on and encouraging me to jump and grow my wings on the way down. (I share more about this idea in the next chapter.) He provided me with resources and was constantly pitching me to conference and meeting planners. He urged me to write my first two books and has become one of my biggest brand ambassadors.

He also wrote the foreword for this book, and throughout my writing it he would check in on my progress. When I finished writing it, he helped market it by hosting me on his daily Facebook Live show, mentioning it in other forums where he was speaking, and encouraging all of his followers to purchase the book. He bragged about me and this book like a proud papa. I am forever grateful for these kinds of relationships, because they have made me a better person. From Les Brown to my best friend of more than thirty years, Dr. Luquanda Neekey Hawkins, to my parents, my daughter, my spiritual leaders, and a few trusted advisers, many have contributed to the success I enjoy today. They have helped me get out of my own way, move beyond my “What if?” questions, and live over here on this side of my dreams.

Other Benefits of Having a Strong Network

Having a strong and diverse network of people has many other benefits and advantages. I am often asked how I am able to get so much done and achieve so many things. My response is always that I have an awesome network of strong relationships that I access, and they help me to save time, money, and unnecessary effort. Additionally, there are a myriad of other benefits and advantages to having diverse and strong relationships. Here are six more that I have enjoyed; that have been instrumental in my ability to overcome personal, organizational, and societal barriers and limitations; and that have contributed to my ability to realize my dreams.

First, when I started my career in human resources, I joined several organizations, read a lot of books, and subscribed to a number of online platforms. But it wasn’t until I made the human connections with professionals who possessed diverse expertise, skills, and backgrounds in HR that I began to grow new skills. They shared best practices and pitfalls, and offered resources and learning opportunities that gave me an edge and cut my learning curve in half.

Second, by leveraging my relationships I obtained new job opportunities. When the time came for me to move into new roles, I reached out to my network to inquire about what was available. Many of them referred me to their companies or to other jobs they were aware of and offered to be references. They also recommended me to recruiters and to job sites that expanded my search. As a result, I was often able to secure a new opportunity.

Third, meeting new people has been a great advantage to having a broad network. I meet many of them on social media, through community groups, online events, and virtual introductions. And as I travel all over the world and speak at conferences and companies of all types, I am intentional about meeting new people, fostering relationships, and inviting people to be a part of my network. This approach allows me to expand my knowledge and my exposure to different cultures, countries, and backgrounds.

Fourth, receiving feedback and coaching has been one of the most significant benefits of having a broad array of relationships. I have learned so many perspectives, ideas, and solutions from people with varying experiences and backgrounds that I wouldn’t have learned otherwise. I have become a better person personally and professionally because I not only solicit feedback but also welcome unsolicited coaching. Feedback and coaching have contributed to my journey of overcoming the many obstacles I faced that limited my thinking and believing.

Fifth, I can’t tell you how much obtaining new referrals and recommendations has accelerated my career and my business success. As I mentioned earlier, when I needed to learn about my industry, to understand trends and best practices, and to obtain resources that would help me complete a project or prepare for a new assignment, my network was a great source. Also, I led recruiting for more than ten years and I can tell you that even today recruiting firms reach out to me requesting referrals and asking me who I know who can fill the roles they are seeking to fill. Many people I know got their jobs through referrals from someone they knew. New job opportunities are all about relationships. As president of my consulting firm, I am pleased to tout that more than 95 percent of my business is driven by referrals, repeat business, live events, and my presence on social media—building connections and new relationships. Of course this success requires that I deliver value, but it also requires that I give more than is expected. When this happens, clients and colleagues are more than happy to refer me to others.

Sixth, having a broad array of relationships has enhanced my health and well-being. We are all social beings and need connection. So, when I needed encouragement, support, and advice when faced with my many fears, excuses to put my dreams on hold, disempowering “What if?” questions, and the temptation to give up, it was my network that helped me get through these tough transitions and challenging times.

Today I have mastered the art of building and fostering great relationships in both my business and my personal life, and they have added tremendous value to my heart, my soul, my well-being, and my business success. Over the years I have learned that people hire, promote, pay more, and do business with people they know, like, and trust. I often say that it’s not just what you know or who you know but what they know about you. Having a loving relationship with yourself and learning the art of building beneficial relationships, as well as knowing how to leverage those relationships in a way that helps you learn, grow, and become better, are critical ingredients in achieving your dreams.

Last but most important, while I consider myself a master connector and an effective relationship builder, I would be remiss if I didn’t recognize the most important relationship in my life—my vertical spiritual relationship with my Creator. It is this relationship that is the foundation to who I am, what I am becoming, what I believe, and how I live my life.

It is on this relationship that I have relied the most to guide, protect, and sustain me through the toughest and most difficult times and that has brought me the most calm and peace when everything around me has seemed to be falling apart. And it is this relationship that I believe has ultimately directed my steps to the right people, whom I have surrounded myself with and who have contributed to my success and helped me get to this state of living beyond “What if?”