Kevin Eikenberry Success Interview
Josh Hinds: Hi Kevin, could you share your background with us? As well as what has lead you to what you're doing now?
Kevin Eikenberry: I grew up on a farm, and learned many things in our family business that have served me very well.
Because of that background I always planned to be a business owner and not an employee. As such I wrote a business plan in college, but to make a long story short took a job in sales with Chevron Chemical Company rather than opening that business.
After 7.5 years and six jobs there, I left to start what became the Discian Group. During my Chevron experience I learned much about myself and my skills. During my last assignment there I confirmed that I wanted to be in the training and consulting business.
Today I wear many hats, and I guess could have many titles - business owner, trainer, speaker, consultant, writer, coach, etc. The title that really encapsulates all of this for me though is learner. Discian - the key word in my business name is a Latin word I made up from two roots. Literally translated it means "related to learning".
Everything we do at the Discian Group is related to learning and helping organizations, teams and individuals reach their performance goals through learning.
Josh Hinds: Your business encompasses several areas. Can you please touch on each and share the benefits of each with everyone.
Kevin Eikenberry: As I mentioned above, the common thread in everything is learning…
The Discian Group is the training and consulting business - and the center of all activity. Here we benefit teams and organizations through consulting and training processes.
Powerquotes and Powerquotes Plus are daily email services offering readers inspiration and reflection through quotations and
questions to ponder. Over 90,000 people read the free version Powerquotes. Fewer, at least for now, read Powerquotes Plus, which is fee-based. The "Plus" is action steps. So with Powerquotes Plus members get a quotation, questions to ponder and actions to consider, five days a week.
Vantagepoints is a monthly essay on learning from everyday life situations. I started writing this for clients to send via fax. Now it has its own website, a readership of about 6,000, and is something I am very proud of.
MillionDollarSkills.com - is an exciting part of our business, but since that is the focus of the next question, I'll save that!
Magical-Movies.com is the website for one of
my book projects, and the associated radio show. More on this later too!
There is more - the best way to learn more is to go to http://KevinEikenberry.com.
Josh Hinds: I'm particularly interested in your Million Dollar Skills, can you get in depth about both the its benefits as well as how it came to be?
Kevin Eikenberry: MillionDollarSkills.com is the site for our digital Learning Systems. I read the phrase "listening is a million dollar skill." I couldn't get it out of my mind! So I bought the domain, and brainstormed a list of "million dollar skills" skills possessed by people who are successful in any area of life - not just financially. We are building email delivered learning systems on these skills. They aren't all there now - but they will be!
While this site is designed for small business people, entrepreneurs and anyone interested in their own personal and professional development, we are also selling these Learning Systems to our corporate clients - and they love them.
The Learning Systems are built on everything I have learned about how we learn - we have worked to translate that knowledge into these learning systems in as many ways as we could. - Email certainly limits some things that we can do (compared to interaction in a workshop setting) but we are quickly learning that the repetitive, bite-size nature of the systems is very valuable.
There is a lot more I could say about these - I think they will be a huge part of our business - but you can learn more at MillionDollarSkills.com!
Josh Hinds: Kevin, if you had to narrow them down, what would you consider to be
your three most successful habits?
Kevin Eikenberry: Funny that this is next, because along with Million Dollar Skills, I have brainstormed the Million Dollar Habits! I don't think I have all of them, but I do think my habits of goal setting, positive believing, being a continual learner, and practicing gratitude are my most important habits. Oops! That's four. Sorry Josh :-)
Josh Hinds: You're the host of Magical Movies (I'm a fan by the way), can you share the background on that, how it came to be, how it can benefit others, etc.?
Kevin Eikenberry: Magical Movies started as a book project. The goal was/is to help people draw inspiration and learning from a medium that is all around us - movies. I saw that there were many inspirational movies and wanted to give people some tools for exploring them - either alone in the form of their thoughts or journal, or with others in conversation, be it at the coffee shop, in a party situation, or as a part of a movie club.
I came up with the concept of a movie club as an analog to a book club - only more social. People come together to watch the movie, then discuss it.
The radio show is an outgrowth of that idea. For more than two years, I have hosted a show where we talk about inspirational movies. Most shows are a conversation, just like we were in my living room. I have also had producers, screenwriters, authors and more on the show. The show airs live on the internet each Wednesday at 7 pm ET, 4 pm PT. You can listen and contribute at voiceamerica.com.
The magical-movies.com website pulls all of this together. You can buy materials from the upcoming book, listen to all of the archived radio shows, and most importantly, vote for your most inspiring movies.
The site features a poll and results of the Most Inspiring Movies of All Time. So please go
and vote - and email me if there is a movie you would like to talk about on the show as my guest!
Josh Hinds: What are your favorite Three Books of all time? And can you share a quick
overview of them.
No way can I pick just three Josh, that isn't fair! Besides the Bible, which I don't read enough, but I am always inspired and awed when I do, there you go...
1. "See You at The Top" - Zig Ziglar. This one makes the list because it was the first self help/motivational book I read. I got my first copy at the library and read it during Christmas break when I was in college. I still have all the notes I took from that first reading. My eleven year old son read it earlier this year!
2. "The Greatest Miracle in the World" - Og Mandino. I love Og and this is my favorite of his. The story is marvelous and mysterious and The God Memorandum at the end is amazing writing. One of my favorite quotations comes from this book - "Use wisely your power of choice."
3. Whatever I'm reading at the moment. One of the joys of reading is sharing what you have
recently read with others. Ok, I recently finished the "The Zen of Listening" by Rebecca Shafir.
Josh Hinds: What do you do to keep yourself motivated?
Kevin Eikenberry: I stay focused on whys. I find that when I focus on goals themselves, I often lose traction. When I focus on the intents and underlying whys of the goals, I move much faster. I also draw motivation from daily learning, reading, everyday life, and my family.
To be honest, I am so grateful for the talents I have been given Josh that I am motivated to use them - I consider it an obligation.
Josh Hinds: What are some of the necessary ingredients you believe people must acquire
in order to become successful?
Kevin Eikenberry: You mean, what are the Million Dollar Skills, Habits and Behaviors?
(Sorry, I couldn't resist!).
Your definition of success would determine exactly which ingredients to include in your personal recipe. And like in good cooking, there is most always something that could be tweaked for personal taste. My ingredients would include:
Love
Gratitude
Desire to be a lifelong learner
Ability/willingness to collaborate
Self knowledge
Ability to focus and prioritize
Purpose
Optimism
Bias towards action
Ability to communicate
I'll stop now, because if I keep going, I might not ever be able to quit! Are there other
important things, of course (I've already thought of a couple). I'll stick with this list
and just say I know it is incomplete.
One last thing though, self knowledge is big - understanding who we are and who we aren't,
then living that. Focusing on our unique talents and abilities and using them to the best of
our ability. If we do that and have people around us we love and who love us, I'd say we
are doing pretty well.
Josh Hinds: Kevin, I appreciate you taking the time to be with us. Is there anything
you're working on now that you'd like to share with our audience? As well as anything we didn't touch on that others would find of value.
Kevin Eikenberry: Josh, it has been a pleasure and an honor. Two last things.
I am privileged, due to the Magical Movies project, to be working on a Chicken Soup for the Soul book. The title isn't yet set, but the stories will all be stories of how people have been influenced or impacted by a movie. If you have read any Chicken Soup books you know
they are all about the stories. So I need stories!
If you have, or know someone with a great story about how a movie impacted your life, let me know! You can get all of the details at magical-movies.com/story.asp.
Second, I encourage everyone who reads this to laugh a bit more, learn a bit more and love a
bit more - everyday.
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