Podcast: Lisa Nichols
Lisa Nichols
Join Sharon Fiehler and Beth Chesterton as they talk with Lisa Nichols, CEO of Technology Partners. Technology Partners is an award-winning, certified Women Business Enterprise that provides premier IT staffing and solutions across the United States. They partner with hundreds of clients across a range of industries nationwide, with long-term client and consultant relationships.
Built upon a revolutionary transparent-margin business model, Technology Partners provides better value for our clients while giving our consultants higher salaries and career control. We’re committed to partnerships with our clients and consultants in thoroughly understanding their needs and providing them with the utmost service.
Transcript of our conversation with Lisa Nichols:
Sharon Fiehler
Hello, everyone. I'm Sharon Fiehler. I have Beth Chesterton with me today. We're with ABC to CEO. And we're glad to have you join us for a new Preparing for the Possibility Podcast™ offering guidance and advice on the possibility of someday becoming a CEO. Joining us today is Lisa Nichols, an entrepreneurial woman who, along with her husband, created an organization called Technology Partners. Tell us a little bit about what made you create this...the journey.
Lisa Nichols
We're originally from Kentucky, so you probably detect a little bit of a Southern accent. My husband and I were at the same college/university in Kentucky, and we were recruited by McDonnell Douglas. We were recruited right out of college to work for Mac. I came from an accounting background, education wise, so I have a bachelor's in accounting, and my husband was a software engineer. I practiced corporate accounting for about five and a half years and then decided I want to be doing something a little bit different. About after five and a half years, I decided to make the move over to corporate sales with another Fortune 500 company. I did that for several years. And then 20, almost 25 years ago, it will be 25 years in May, we decided to jump on the entrepreneurial wagon. We said, let's combine our individual strengths and form a company. And that's what we did. We feel incredibly blessed to have made it this far. 25 years in May. So we've seen lots of evolution with the company.
Sharon Fiehler
I'm sure you have in the technology business.
Lisa Nichols
Oh yes. What was good yesterday is not good today, right? So you have to be very agile.
Sharon Fiehler
So when you think back on starting this company, what do you think were experiences you had as a teenager and maybe in your college years and even early career that kind of gave you some foundation for being able to do this?
Lisa Nichols
That's a good question and one that I can answer easily. I was seven years old, and I decided I really loved flowers growing up. We grew up in rural Kentucky, my parents had land, and we had humongous vegetable gardens. But I loved flowers. We didn't have any flowers, but our next-door neighbor's, the Smiths, had lots of flowers. They had tulips and jonquils and roses. They had things blooming all the time. So one day I thought, wow, I really like flowers. I bet other people like flowers too. So I decided I would go into the flower business at seven. And I pulled my little wagon over to the Smiths' house. I took straight pins, and I pulled off all the yellow blooms off of their jonquils.
Sharon Fiehler
Did they know you were doing this?
Lisa Nichols
No, they did not. In fact, nobody knew that I was doing this, okay! I stuck straight pins in the flowers and I went about the neighbors' selling my wares as corsages, for a quarter a piece. And I was pretty happy with myself because I thought, wow, you know, I just created this company out of thin air and a few flowers from my neighbor's garden. So I tell the story, it's funny, I really thought I was big time until my dad found out what I'd done. That was probably one of the first leadership lessons that I had: Sometimes you have to do really hard things because first of all, you have to go back to the Smiths' house. You have to knock on the door and you have to apologize to them for stealing their flowers.
Sharon Fiehler
You know, this apology thing. We interviewed a number of people who, as children, had to go back to apologize to adults for being a little too aggressive.
Lisa Nichols
Yes, that was interesting. I think I just grew up wanting to do that. My dad owned his own business. He also worked two jobs. He was a plant manager at a large company in Kentucky. I watched my dad do that, and he'd always say, if you can work for yourself..., and I saw the flexibility that he had–that he worked when he wanted to, that he took the clients he wanted to take, that sort of thing. And then when we were in college, Greg and I were very like-minded in that way because he started several businesses when we were still in college. I was a smart girl. I knew this guy was going somewhere. I was thinking, this guy is going to do something, he's going to do something big. But I'm so glad we had the corporate experience. We both started our careers at McDonnell Douglas, and I cannot say enough good things about the training we had. Greg was a software engineer, and I always say, McDonnell Douglas was not on the leading edge. They were on the bleeding edge, really, of technology. In fact, I was just at a meeting this morning talking about artificial intelligence, and in technology, you hear blockchain, you hear AI machine, learning all these things, and it all seems new. It's not new. I mean, 35 years ago, McDonnell Douglas was using artificial intelligence in their scheduling systems, and actually sent Greg to get a degree in AI from WashU. The experience and the foundation that we got there...you can't replace that.
Sharon Fiehler
So the combination of your dad having his own business, you wanting to make money, and then getting kind of a great experience in the corporate world launched you. So you saw yourself at an early age being the leader of a company.
Lisa Nichols
I don't know that I really thought of myself as a leader. I was a leader. I was a leader in school. I took on roles like president of my junior and senior year in high school. That's what I would say, take those opportunities. If you have a propensity, or if you have a desire to lead people, take every opportunity you have to say, I'll be the chair of that. Put your hand up, because people can't read your mind. You can learn a lot just from that. This is funny. I haven't thought about this in a while, but I can remember starting a bike club. I don't know how old I was. We had dues, and we made everybody pay their dues. I don't even really know what the value proposition was. I don't think we knew that back then. But we did have everyone pay dues, and we put it in a Mason jar, and we buried it in the ground. It's probably somewhere now, with 50 cents on it or something. I think I always kind of had that desire to lead. Even at a very early age.
Sharon Fiehler
Well, I remember when I was young. It brings up a story I remember. My neighbor and I wanted to make money. So we put together this little play, including acrobats and we would run around the neighborhood on our bikes, sell tickets for 10 cents each, and we would have people. Young kids came with their 10 cents, and that's how we made money on our little show.
Lisa Nichols
Right, but you learned a little bit from that, didn't you? You know, Economics 101.
Sharon Fiehler
There was first the production of the little show. And it was the marketing and selling of the tickets, and then actual performance, and then dividing up the money at the end. It was quite good.
Lisa Nichols
Both Greg and I grew up with a very competitive spirit. You guys remember selling pecan logs and things like that at school to raise money. Did you ever sell pecan logs?
Sharon Fiehler
We did stuff with 4H.
Lisa Nichols
4H, yes. I remember, every time we would have those fundraisers, I wanted to win. I would sell the most pecan logs. Greg grew up with sports, and just grew up being a very competitive person. So I think some of those traits were just there right from an early age.
Sharon Fiehler
Being a CEO today, what surprises you about being a CEO that you'd like to tell people in advance? If you do this, either beware, or this is wonderful? What are some of the things that you've learned about being different than maybe what you would have envisioned?
Lisa Nichols
That I don't know much...interesting. As I've gotten older, I'm like, wow, I just don't know that much! But, there's one thing that I would say is really important. We talked about IQ. We talked about EQ. Those things are very important. But I've got something in there called GQ–and I'm not talking about Gentlemen's Quarterly. I am talking about the growth quotient. That is your composite of who you are in your propensity to want to grow. I think that that is one of the foundational aspects. If you are a person that has a propensity to want to grow and want to learn, you can move the needle on your EQ, you can move the needle. IQ is pretty set, but say you get into a situation where you think, I need a little bit more financial literacy. I don't really understand the P&L on the balance sheet and the cash flow statement. You can go and learn those things. You can move the needle on those things. I know for myself and Greg, it's the same way. If you look at our office, we've got a whole wall of just books. We both just love to learn. We love to grow. When you read John Maxwell's leadership books, he says, when you stop growing you die, and I really do believe that.
Sharon Fiehler
What book are you reading right now?
Lisa Nichols
Oh, goodness. I'm reading several. I just finished Michael Hyatt's Living Forward, which was just a phenomenal read. What else do I have? Atomic Habits, which is a really good book. I've got a list, and I'm pretty bad about reading multiple ones at the same time. I say it's not just about the next great read and breezing through that. It's about really taking what you're reading, figuring out how you can practice and apply things. I look at different aspects of my life and say, okay, this is an area I really do need to grow in.
Lisa Nichols
Well, that's great. So constant growing is the thing.
Sharon Fiehler
Yes, be a lifelong learner. That's what I want to tell any young person. Be a student your whole life. Now, the other thing is: Somebody that I just dearly love and respect was in St. Louis. He lives in Atlanta. He was in St. Louis last year. He's an international speaker and author. His team had said he's going to be here for four days. Can you help get him booked? And I did. I got him booked with several speaking engagements with different groups. Friday night, I had reserved. We have a little recreational barn, Greg and I and our family. I'd reserved Friday night for millennials because I love millennials. I have three millennials of my own. I reserved that night for them, and I was so excited for them to get to meet this amazing person that I've just come to love. He's an amazing teacher. So, I'm playing hostess, and one of the things he said just hit me right between the eyes. He said, when you decide to stay where you are, someone will get hurt. And what he meant by that was: Your employees, the people that you have influence over, whether that's your family, whether that's the community, if you do not continue to grow, they need you to be the best version of yourself. Somebody is going to get hurt because you're not moving. That hit me like a ton of bricks. I started crying, and here I am, the hostess for this thing. It just really got me thinking about all the different people that are important to me – our employees here and our family and our children, and we have a grandson. Am I the best version of myself that I can be for that person? It's very simple, but profound.
Sharon Fiehler
You've worked with a lot of women. You've seen young women, you've seen mid-career women and women like me who are now post career. What are some of the pitfalls you think women sometimes get themselves into that keep them from moving forward? We know we've got very few CEO women in this world, in this country. What do you think are some of the pitfalls for women who maybe would like to aspire to that level? Do you see something you can share?
Lisa Nichols
Well, one thing that comes to mind is lack of confidence. There are so many studies out there. There is a job that's posted, and there are maybe 10 requirements for that job. No offense to men, but they may have two of those qualifications, and they'll say, yeah, I'm going to put my name in the hat. And a woman thinks, oh, I don't have 80%.
Sharon Fiehler
Don't even try.
Lisa Nichols
I'm not even going to try. Here again is where I'm going to go back to the growth quotient. You can fill in those gaps. I think really what's important is for you to understand what your strengths are. I'm a big believer in working from your strength zones, and then having the humility to say I'm not very good at that. So I need to lean into someone else, or I need to surround myself. But, I think lack of confidence. I also would say, you've got to have courage. Sharon, you said it earlier. Raise your hand. It takes courage to do that. I once had a friend say, one of her secrets to success was really raising her hand for the things that nobody else wanted. Which really seems like an oxymoron. Why would I want to raise my hand for this failing division over here? But if you will do that, people will take notice. Your superiors will take notice of that. So I would say: lack of confidence, courage–those would be two big ones. I always say confidence, but not hubris.
Sharon Fiehler
Yes, there's a difference.
Lisa Nichols
There's a big difference. Nobody wants to be around a hubris person, especially a woman. Having humility. I always say, always be kind. When we think about women, women think I have to act like my male counterpart. And when that happens, you lose the beautiful diversity.
Sharon Fiehler
And who you are genuinely.
Sharon Fiehler
You don't have to be brash, you don't have to be unkind.
Sharon Fiehler
There's more than one kind of leader out there. You don't have to emulate what you see. You just have to be your own leader.
Lisa Nichols
Absolutely, and be the best version of yourself.
Sharon Fiehler
So given you've been in business 25 years now–in your own business, you and Greg–what do you see is different in the world today that you would need to be attentive to if you started over today?
Lisa Nichols
That is a good question. One of the things that I would say–and this is something I will just be very candid and honest with you–I struggle with still sometimes: There is more information. There's more good stuff out there than there ever has been. We have information in my inbox. I have things coming to me every day: Listen to this webinar. Go take this class, you have to listen to this person. I am dating myself, but we really didn't even have the Internet. We started as an IT staffing company. We would fax over resumes, you know, and it was all in a file drawer, and that's so different today. But the amount of information...so I would say there's a good, there's a better and a best. Having the discernment to decide the best, because there's a lot of good things out there that you can do, but we all know that that's a dilution of your energy, your effort, your resources.
Sharon Fiehler
Be selective about what it is. So you have daughters, you have a son, too. Your children or in their 20s. If you're going to give advice today to parents raising younger girls, do you have anything you would say to them that you think might help them on this path to becoming a leader, and even the leader, a CEO someday? Do you have advice to give parents?
Lisa Nichols
I do, and this is very close to my heart. I would say what your children need from you more than anything is they need your love. And they need unconditional love. So sometimes, we as parents think that our children should follow the same path. But here's the deal: They are not you. They are their own unique people. And I would say love them for who they are. So our daughter–we don't really have anybody in our family that went into health care–but she wanted to be a nurse. We would love to have had somebody who we would love to have as a succession plan for Technology Partners, and one of them to want to do that. But I would say love them for who they are in the way that they're bent. They're not you, so don't try to make them you, but encourage them in the way they see themselves. Also just encourage them to have the confidence that they can do whatever it is. And the most beautiful thing is when you can marry what a child's passion is with what their sense of purpose is. They may have a passion, they may have a skill set for a certain thing, but where they see themselves. That's just that's a beautiful place to be when you can find that intersection. Help your children, guide them. You're guiding them, you're coaching them, you're always coaching.
Sharon Fiehler
Right, but with unconditional love, regardless of which direction they take.
Lisa Nichols
It's imperative. They have to know that you're in their corner, no matter what direction they decide.
Beth Chesterton
Lisa, obviously anybody who's listening can tell you have an amazing personality and you're so warm. You connect so easily with others. You also mentioned an interest in lifelong learning. What do you think your other strengths are that have helped you to be so successful, even innate strengths?
Lisa Nichols
Definitely connectedness. I've done my strengths finder. I've done all my assessments. I would encourage any young girls out there to take advantage of every assessment that you can take advantage of. I always said, when I went through school, we didn't have Birkman. We didn't have DISC. We didn't have any of those things. It's important to understand yourself. I do a lot of introspection, a lot of reflection. That does not happen though. Something I've had to learn that has been difficult for me is putting boundaries around my time. My assistant would tell you that I'm a lot better today than I was even a few years ago about saying no. To be introspective, to have that time to really reflect and think on things–it's what I call think time, and you almost have to plug in that because if you don't, somebody else will be dictating your calendar.
Sharon Fiehler
It needs to be a task, like anything else. It needs to be a meeting, it needs to be a place on your schedule.
Lisa Nichols
Have a meeting with yourself to reflect and say, how am I doing in these areas? The other thing that I would say–and this is an area I've grown up with too: My love language is words of affirmation. So sometimes, negativity, constructive criticism...oh, I wasn't always great about receiving that. I would say, asking for feedback and being willing to have the humility to say, yes, I know that's probably a blind spot.
Sharon Fiehler
And not take it as something negative, but as an opportunity.
Lisa Nichols
An opportunity to grow, right, Sharon. It's an opportunity to grow.
Sharon Fiehler
I know when I was younger, when someone gave me feedback that was negative, I was embarrassed that, oh my gosh, I'm doing something wrong. I'm not good at this. Not that my feelings were hurt, but that it didn't make me feel good. You have to change how you look at this, and if the person giving it to you is somebody you respect, you should listen, because it's an opportunity.
Lisa Nichols
It is, and you want people like that in your life. You want people that are going to speak truth to you, right? A gentle truth, because it's not always fun to get that. I call it blind spots, and everybody has them. There may be things in your life that you're not even aware of that you do.
Sharon Fiehler
I was talking to a friend of mine, actually yesterday morning, who is coaching somebody. He said, I just would like to know what you think about how I should tell her this. He was going through it, and I said, how old is this person? And he said, well, probably late 40s. And I said, nobody has ever told her this before? And he said, I don't know, I'm just coming into this situation. But I can't believe somebody could get into their late 40s and have these blind spots brought to their attention for the first time. So either they're ignoring what's being told to them, or people aren't being honest in saying it.
Lisa Nichols
And it could be either or.
Sharon Fiehler
Yes, and sometimes you really need to seek it out, because giving the feedback is not always easy either.
Lisa Nichols
It's not, because you don't want to hurt their feelings.
Lisa Nichols
Sometimes you have to be the one, especially if you've got a mentor. You've got somebody who's a supporter of yours. You probably will do yourself a great service if you say, I need you to tell me. What should I be working on here that I'm not?
Lisa Nichols
Another great question is, how can I improve? Or say, for instance, you're in a meeting, and if you have that mentor, you can say, was there something that I did or didn't do that I should be thinking about? How could I have shown up differently? Those are awesome questions to ask.
Sharon Fiehler
So we talked about something you would still like to share.
Lisa Nichols
Well, I have a podcast.
Sharon Fiehler
Oh yes, that's right. Let's talk about your podcast!
Lisa Nichols
It's called Something Extra with Lisa Gayle Nichols. You can find it on our website. It's under Technology Partners University, if you go to our website, www.technologypartners.net.
Sharon Fiehler
What's the mission of the podcast?
Lisa Nichols
It's really a leadership podcast.
Sharon Fiehler
So our listeners can go, in addition to our Preparing for the Possibility™ Podcasts, listen to these Something Extra podcasts.
Lisa Nichols
That is exactly right. And we'll be promoting your podcast too. It's all about learning.
Sharon Fiehler
Thank you, everybody.
Lisa Nichols
Thank you so much!