The Jo Show · 11 February 2026
Episode 13: Her publisher went bankrupt mid-launch — she hit #5 on amazon anyway
What 20 years of consulting for Fortune 500 companies can teach small business owners about closing more deals, building resilient teams, and getting unstuck when everything feels like it’s falling apart.
Brianna Sylver had just finished the first draft of her book when her publisher went bankrupt. Same week. Monday she completed the draft. Thursday the publisher folded.
Most people would have shelved the project and moved on. Brianna hired her book coach independently, found a new publisher, and launched Leading Through Free Fall: How Innovators Turn Turbulence into Trust to a Top 5 spot on Amazon — and a Forbes “essential reads” list.
That kind of resilience isn’t accidental. It’s built through two decades of leading teams through uncertainty at companies like NASA, PepsiCo, Marriott, and Mozilla.
In this episode of The Jo Show, Brianna and I dug into the practical strategies behind her business, her leadership, and what small business owners can take from her Fortune 500 playbook.
Here are the biggest takeaways.
She closes 80-85% of her proposals. Here’s why.
Sylver Consulting doesn’t win work by undercutting competitors or sending cold emails. They win because by the time a proposal hits the table, the prospect already trusts them — and already understands their own project better than they did before the conversation started.
Brianna uses what she calls an inquiry-based scoping process. Before she writes a proposal, she leads the prospect through a structured conversation that clarifies the problem, defines what success looks like, and aligns expectations. The prospect walks out of that conversation with more clarity than they walked in with.
The result: proposals that hit the mark almost every time. And when she loses the remaining 15-20%, it’s usually because the client chose not to proceed with the project at all — not because they chose someone else.
What small business owners can take from this: Stop pitching before you’ve properly scoped. A short, structured discovery conversation — where you help the prospect understand their own problem more clearly — does more for your close rate than any polished proposal deck. When people feel understood, they buy.
LinkedIn is a 10-year nurture game
Brianna has clients who met her a decade ago and are only now reaching out with a project. She doesn’t chase them. She stays visible on LinkedIn, shares her thinking consistently, and lets the relationship develop at the pace it needs to.
For a consulting business where clients might only need you once every five years, that long view is essential. You can’t force the timing. But you can make sure that when the timing is right, you’re the person they think of.
What small business owners can take from this: If your LinkedIn strategy is “post for three weeks, get frustrated by the lack of leads, and quit” — you’re playing the wrong game. LinkedIn is a trust-building channel, not a direct-response channel. Show up consistently. Share what you know. Let the compound effect do the work.
The relationship doesn’t end when the project does
One of the most impressive parts of Brianna’s business model is what happens after the work is delivered. Her team continues to check in with clients — not to upsell, but to help them recognise the full impact of the work they did together.
She finds that innovation projects often create ripple effects beyond the original scope. Teams collaborate better. Communication improves. New capabilities emerge. But if nobody draws attention to those outcomes, the client only measures the narrow deliverable and misses the broader value.
Those check-ins generate repeat business, referrals, and something harder to quantify: genuine loyalty. When people leave a client organisation and move to a new company, they bring Brianna with them.
What small business owners can take from this: Your post-project follow-up is one of the most underleveraged parts of your business. A simple check-in three months after delivery — “How did that work out? What changed?” — deepens the relationship and surfaces results the client may not have noticed. That’s where referrals come from.
The “bitch fest” that rebuilt her team culture
Brianna didn’t always have a thriving team. About a decade ago, she hit rock bottom with her internal culture. She was stretched thin — running a business, raising a toddler, not showing up as the leader her team needed.
Her turning point was brutally honest self-reflection. She sat down and listed everything she hated about how things were running. Then she flipped each item: what would the opposite look like? What would she actually want?
Three values emerged: personal responsibility, shared appreciation, and collaboration.
Then she started small. A Monday morning check-in where each team member shared how they were feeling coming into the week. That’s it. People started talking about their lives, not just their tasks. The culture shifted almost immediately.
She kept experimenting. Some initiatives stuck, some didn’t, some worked for a while and then needed replacing. The point was the commitment to keep iterating.
Today, team members who leave for other opportunities come back and say they’ve never worked anywhere that felt as supportive. That doesn’t happen by accident.
What small business owners can take from this: If your team culture isn’t where you want it, start by being honest about what’s broken — including your part in it. Then pick one small experiment. You don’t need a full culture overhaul. You need one change that starts shifting the dynamic. Assess it. Keep what works. Replace what doesn’t.
When you’re stuck, break it down
The most immediately actionable moment in our conversation was Brianna’s Creative Action Pathway — a framework for getting unstuck when everything feels overwhelming.
It works like this:
Write down every way you feel stuck. Don’t filter. Just dump it all out.
Then for each item, ask: what could I actually do about this one thing? Brainstorm freely. Some ideas will be unrealistic. That’s fine. Others will be things you can act on today.
Pick the actions within your control and start there.
The principle is simple but powerful: when everything feels like one giant unmanageable problem, you’re paralysed. When you break it into specific, individual items, you find the pieces you can actually move. And once you start moving pieces, the system starts to shift.
What small business owners can take from this: Next time you’re overwhelmed, don’t try to solve the whole thing. Grab a piece of paper. List every specific thing that feels stuck. Then work each item individually. You’ll find that at least a few of them have a clear next step you’ve been too overwhelmed to see.
Resistance is information
One insight from Brianna that reframed how I think about pushback in business: if people are immediately jumping on board with your ideas, you should question whether you’re pushing far enough.
Resistance isn’t a sign that something is wrong. It’s a signal. It tells you where people are on the change curve, what needs more communication, and whether you’re actually doing something meaningful or just rearranging furniture.
The same is true in your business. Rising costs, shifting markets, team friction — these aren’t just problems to manage. They’re information about what needs to change. The businesses that treat resistance as data rather than disaster are the ones that adapt and grow.
Watch the full episode
The full conversation goes deeper into all of this — including Brianna’s daily journaling practice for managing anxiety, how she handles it when clients want to quit mid-project, and why surrender is sometimes the most strategic move a leader can make.
[Watch the full episode here] or subscribe to The Jo Show on YouTube, [Apple Podcasts], or [Spotify].
Connect with Brianna
Jo McKee is a marketing strategist and founder of McKee Creative. She works with small business owners and eCommerce brands to build marketing systems that deliver solid, compounding revenue growth. Get in touch.
Transcript
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (00:02)
Brianna, welcome to The Jo Show. Thank you so much for your time.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (00:06)
It’s my pleasure. can’t wait for the conversation and appreciate the opportunity.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (00:11)
Yeah, I’m pretty excited about the work that you do. Your book, Leading Through Freefall, teaches leaders how to manage chaos during the process of innovation. In the process of launching your book, your publisher went bankrupt. What went through your head in that moment?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (00:28)
my gosh, that moment was like such a, know, suck the wind out of my sails type of moment because literally the same week that that happened is when I had finished all the first conversations to do the first draft of the book. So the entire first draft of the book was spoken first and then basically took transcripts and put it into, you know, a flow basically to start working on the editing of the book.
And so earlier that week, on Monday, the last conversation towards that goal was done. And then on Thursday, I found out that the publisher had gone bankrupt. And so two things kind of went through my mind, right? Like one, I had had all these transcripts that were made, but I did not have them.
And so it was like, is all of the work that I have done over the past, you know, know, a couple months or maybe four or five months or so up to this point, is it all gone? And how do I retrieve that? And then, you know, certainly I don’t have anything that looks like a true book yet. So like, how do I move it from here to there? Right. So.
Um, so it was a real, it was a, it was a moment of a lot of like uncertainty and ambiguity and indecision and ultimately kind of sat in that space for a couple of months. Uh, because then they did finally communicate like a couple of weeks into, or maybe like a couple of days to a week later of like what was happening. And it was basically like, so we’re going to be bought, but we don’t know, will these, you know, will the new publisher honor anything or they, will they not?
And so it was really just sort of being stuck in limbo for months until finally like in mid July, it was clear that they were not gonna honor those contracts. And so then I was kind of left and I was just like, what do I do? ⁓ But.
It was also a time of just saying, okay, I’m gonna move forward regardless. And so it was a little bit of a faith walk, right? Of just being like, okay, I’m gonna start moving forward. And I ended up hiring the woman who was my book coach through the original publisher, independently. We kept working on the book while I sought out another publisher, finally found a new publisher page too and they’ve been fantastic to work with.
You know, net net being on other side of it, it all worked out, but it was definitely a free fall moment in the middle of it.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (03:08)
record. Most people would have given up and the fact that you kept going and just figured it out was excellent. I’m just going to keep going here and just close the window. We’re in the wet Sundays and it’s wet season and it started to rain heavily. One moment.
Bang that shut. So it’s not self publishing then. So you have a publisher in page two. Do you do much of the marketing yourself or they’re looking after it all for you or do you, is it a bit of a hybrid setup? How does that work?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (03:40)
The majority of the marketing is happening on my side. There’s a few things that they supported like straight out the gate in terms of like, you know, helping to get, you know, third party reviews of the book. And then they helped to broker some connections with like media outlets in support of that. So that was, you know, hugely successful. But I would say the lion’s share of the marketing effort has definitely been on myself and my team.
to really get the book out there, you know? And that’s kind of an ever evolving process because what I have found, Joe, is that marketing an $18 book is a lot different than marketing a five or six, six, seven-figure study.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (04:24)
Yes, that is a huge thing. I do want to just stop on that for a moment because when, people don’t realize what it costs to run paid campaigns, you have to factor in the cost of your ad budget. What does it cost you in dollars and cents to acquire that purchase? And so if it’s going to cost you $20 to acquire a purchase for an $18 book, you have a problem. yes.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (04:47)
Exactly. Exactly. No, it’s just, it’s been, it’s required a ton of like trial and error of like, how do you actually just go and do that? And, and a lot of like real like visibility, you know, because, you know, I mean, in my consulting practice, I mean, yeah, we’re talking about, you know, five, six, seven figures for each project that gets sold, you know, but it’s not a high volume.
type of thing, you know, might have like 30, 40 projects over the course of a year and that’s like a really good year, right? ⁓ But you know, 30, 40, $18 books isn’t yielding much, right? So like, it’s a complete, you need a volume play from that. Now, of course I didn’t necessarily, you know, create the book for the numbers of copies sold to the book. I created the book to really be,
you know, a tool for people, but also, I mean, it’s a, it’s a lead gen for my business as well. Right. So like the value of the book is going to be more in the consulting that comes with the speaking that comes from the book less about the book itself. But that said, marketing a book is a whole other skillset that I’m learning real time with some trials or some error. You know, some things are being successful. Some things are being
not successful, but we just kind of keep moving forward and learning and editing and changing as we go.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (06:17)
That’s right. And treating it as this first step in a funnel is what many people do as a lead generation and the order value is on the back end, not on the book itself. I know that some people, when they launch a book, we’ll get people to buy in corporate bulk amounts, you know, and you get a special, like a Kickstarter, I suppose, way of thinking about it. So lots of different ways to do it. But definitely when anybody comes to me with any product that is
If the average order value is less than $150, you know, it’s very hard to bring a solid return on ad spend online. It’s quite a challenge. ⁓ Plenty of people can and do it with the right viral content, of course, if you can get those cheap clicks. But otherwise it’s quite the work. What would you say, what platform works best for you at the moment to get the book in front of the right people?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (07:08)
LinkedIn for sure is the platform that’s working the best for us. ⁓ I’ve always been pretty visible on LinkedIn and definitely in the last couple of years, well, I I shared the entire process of writing the book with my community as they went along, ⁓ which was a big ⁓ piece of having this group of people who had been supporters so that when it came to
know, creating early reader programs, for instance. Like I had people who stepped into that and then who have followed through in terms of, you know, reading the book, leaving reviews, et cetera, right? So like that has been, that has been helpful. ⁓ I’ve just started dabbling in Amazon ads. ⁓ And so that has been kind of an interesting, you know, definitely.
100 % hear you, Joe, of like, it’s hard to make money from an ad-spent perspective on an $18 book. But at the same time, it’s like another thing that I’m kind of experimenting with and sort of learning as I go. A lot of times I learn the best by making mistakes along the way. So I’ve kind of like given myself some grace of like, okay, let’s just put some money behind this, see where we are.
Like of course, learning, you know, and taking advice from others in the process and refining my approach. ⁓ but I have found that to be helpful and I’m zeroing in on, know, the things that are, that are working from that perspective, but really honestly, probably the most effective strategy so far has been people who read the book and then share about the book themselves.
And then really, you know, connecting with those people who have shared about that book, right? And starting that, that has probably been the most effective. Also have been doing a fair amount of ⁓ speaking engagements and then podcast guesting related to it as well. And I think that that has helped. And then just being silly, like we did like this holiday jingle. ⁓
Well, for the break or like leading up to the holidays because we had like a holiday gift box associated with it where came with an autographed copy of the book. And then there’s going to be a 90 minute workshop for people to kind of go deeper into some of the principles of the book and early February. So it’s like a holiday gift experience that people could give. And so we did a lot of fun content with that. But one of them is, you know,
I, as a hobby, I sing. Uh, and so we did like a, like a, you know, dashing through the store, got to find the perfect gift. And like basically took the whole jingle bells and like changed the word words to be a bit more, you know, obviously appropriate to, that gift box experience and stuff like that. Kind of, worked, you know, it was fresh, it was different and people were like, Oh, well, let me get that a little bit more. So I actually had really strong sales on the book in December.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (10:15)
Well done. And it is, just a perfect example of, you know, leading into your strengths and your fun. And people love that. We want something that’s unique and different. So that’s brilliant. You’ve been recognised by Forbes as one of five essential reads for leaders driving change. How did that come about?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (10:32)
Yeah, so that was one of the connections that came through the publisher. So, you know, they have connections with, you know, different media outlets and periodically they will ⁓ make recommendations of kind of like listicles, ⁓ which is what that’s technically called, right? ⁓ So, they made recommendations of myself and a couple other books that were in there.
their catalog and then ⁓ a few other books that were not part of their catalog got all written up into that, which was a really big deal, right? Like to be called one of five books to elevate your leadership and drive change. was like, well, that’s amazing. That’s fantastic. Thank you.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (11:18)
It is. It’s a big deal when that happens. I’ve had that happen with a client who was featured in Oprah’s best gifts and it worked out beautifully. We were able to then negotiate to use the logo in emails and on the website for a period, which, you know, is very helpful for Christmas sales at the time. So when you can have that happen, it’s, it’s fabulous. You’ve been running silver consulting for 20 years. first congratulations. many businesses don’t 20, yeah, don’t even make it past two years. So that’s.
a step in itself, working with Fortune 1000 companies and city governments, is that correct?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (11:54)
That’s correct. I mean, I would say the majority of our clients these days are in the Fortune 500, even Fortune 50. But yes, over the couple decades, we have, ⁓ I guess, made it further up in the Fortune list, if you will.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (12:12)
⁓
What’s working in your marketing right now to bring in these big clients? don’t imagine that you’re cold calling city managers. Like, how are you making
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (12:21)
No,
so a lot of our work, so we’re really intentional about the whole life cycle associated with our business. So, you know, it starts with some of that upfront stuff. So like, as I mentioned, you know, really, really, you know, intentional with, you know, our marketing on LinkedIn, right? At least podcast guesting, like all these things that kind of like help to, you know, potentially generate new connections, you know? But the types of services that we are offering,
we aren’t necessarily like, even if somebody is our ideal client, they may only need us once every five years, right? So like, you gotta really nurture that connection. So that’s the power of LinkedIn for us is in the nurturing of those connections where you don’t have to be in dialogue all the time, but they kind of get a sense of what you do, how you’re supporting other people.
I regularly have people who are, met 10 years ago who will then reach out and say, hey, now I have a project and you’re perfect for it, right? And so, so that’s kind of like the role that that happens. But once something comes in and there’s like an actual lead that, know, is a somebody’s got a project right there. We have a really intentional scoping process that we lead people through. And so.
oftentimes they come out of that scoping conversation, even understanding their project better than they did when they came in. And so, and that’s one of the tools that’s referenced in the Leading Through Free Fall book, just to sort of gain alignment and framing the problem appropriately. And so that really helps us to really make sure that we are putting together proposals that are really hitting the mark.
And we have a really, really high hit rate and close rate on proposals. it’s, any year it kind of waivers between like 80, 85%. So for a typical consulting company, that’s, you know, from what I understand is pretty, is pretty, it’s pretty amazing.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (14:27)
solid
because you’ve done the groundwork first, as you say, in vetting and checking things are in alignment and building that trust on LinkedIn and elsewhere over time, having that ⁓ long-term view. It’s, it’s a very wise way to do business and shows in your clothes. Right. It’s brilliant.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (14:44)
Yeah. And so then once they come in and they start working with our team, know, then we also have, you know, pretty, standard ways in which one of the core values that we really offer is a different type of partnership to our clients. And that’s hard to communicate upfront, but once they experience it, they’re like, my goodness. Like this is like really, truly different. And, and so in the process of working with our team, there’s specific things that really
kind of underscore that and collaboration is at the core and co-creation is at the core of that. And then as we finish projects and technically our work is quote unquote done, then we continue though to still check in with the client. So the cadence of that check-in differs, but ultimately what we’re trying to do in those check-ins is really understand like what actions have been taken on the work that we were involved with with them.
and also helping them to more broadly understand the impact because sometimes we can very simplistically say, well, you know, was action one taken? Yes, no. If no, it was a failure, right? Or if yes, it was a success. But we find that with our work and particularly with how collaboration is at the core of how it gets done.
there’s a lot of byproduct impacts of our work that are above and beyond the actual topic or project that we were talking about specifically. And so in the context of those conversations, we also helped to bring those to the fore, which then like the full value of working, ⁓ of what was yielded from the work together, like really becomes visible.
And then, you know, just continuing to stay in dialogue. And so, you know, we get a lot of our work through repeat business. We also get a lot of work through referrals. And usually when we work with somebody and they move to another organization, oftentimes they will then call us at that new organization, right? So it kind of is like, those are the primary ways in which we…
in which we are yielding new work. And lastly, I guess the other piece is, there’s certain times of year, like the start of the year where everybody’s putting together learning agendas and learning plans, that it’s like, these are times to connect and be like, okay, what are you trying to do this next year? And where and how could we be a value add to you in that process, right? And so,
were afforded the ability to have those conversations because we’re such a relationship focused business.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (17:29)
Yes, it’s very solid. love hearing it because it’s just solid from start from as the relationships first connecting right through the process and the follow up to bring the value out. I like seeing how thorough you are. So many businesses are not. And I think it’s a great example of how to do things very well in your book or you’re teaching people how to lead, you know, through the innovation and it’s messy in the middle.
And I understand with innovation, all say we want it, but then it feels uncomfortable and problems happen and obstacles turn up. How do you take a team through that messy process? Can you share any client examples? Are you able to do that?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (18:10)
Absolutely. ⁓ first of all, it’s kind of like three different distinct stages to think about the process. So there’s the suiting up part of the process, which is really like, that’s all the things that you can predict. It’s things like, we need to know what success really looks like and feels like. And so let’s get really clear about that, right? And there’s a tool to support that. Or we want to do innovation.
But know, innovation can mean a lot of different things. So like, how do we get clear about what innovation means in the context of this project, right? And what is our, and so there’s another chapter that’s all around defining your innovation ambition, right? And so each chapter kind of has a different focus, but the whole suiting up section is either around different ways to gain alignment with the team and or how to have anchor points to come back to. getting to your, know, coming back to the comment you just made.
around like everybody wants innovation, but then they get uncomfortable and start shrinking back, right? Like something like the innovation ambition matrix is perfect because then you can say, and like one of the case studies that I share in the book is, you know, a group was like, yeah, you know, we want game-changing innovation, right? ⁓ As they started their project. And then as we got further into the initiative and we started like,
we were in ideation and coming out and choosing, you know, what to push forward into prototyping and testing. Then they started choosing all these things that were just incremental innovation ideas, right? And it was just like, all right, we gotta have an alignment connection here because you said you wanted this, but now you’re choosing this. Has something changed internally? Which sometimes it does, right?
and we need to adjust our ambition or do you need to adjust your ambition and you’re kind of falling back on what just feels comfortable. So the whole first section that’s suiting up is about, know, setting yourself up for success and creating anchor points to come back to. Then there’s the midsection, which is all the free fall. So this is like the stuff that comes out of from left field that you could never predict happening, but now you’re stuck sort of dealing with it. So like an example is,
you know, like your project owner, they got fired last night, right? So they’re no longer at the place of business. And so now you have no project sponsor. What do you do? Right? Or like, you know, like one of the stories I share in the book is it’s a good thing. Like we were working on a project for a big CPG company and it really started to get like a global presence, the project that we were working on.
And they had a global meeting coming up and they said, you we really need to advance the insights of this project to hit the timeline of this global meeting. Well, the problem is it was already a pretty lean timeline for the project to begin with. And they needed me to cut another like three, four weeks off of that timeline. And I’m like, how do I do that? Right. So.
you know, kind of give strategies for how to deal with these sticky, these sticky situations that you might find yourself in and how to like basically take a pause and a breath and kind of look at it from a zoomed out perspective versus sort of like a chaotic, like, I don’t know what to do type of perspective in it. Right. So, so that’s the free fall. And then the, the, the last section of the book and just sort of the framework of leading through free fall is, it’s called the safe landing.
And so this is like, now that you have recommendations, you have ideas, you have next steps defined, ⁓ how do you actually start to action those in a way that start to fit into the framework of the broader organization? Because in most cases, people are not waiting with bated breath for whatever comes out of an innovation program, right? Like they’re…
they might be on board with it, but they also have, you know, from an implementation team perspective, you know, a three-year roadmap that’s already been, you know, secured and approved by a board that they’re moving forward with. And it’s like, how do I fit new into the old? And so there’s different strategies that are shared in that section of the book of how do you really support like that prioritization to really make sure that you can get traction.
So one chapter is about prioritization. Another is about like how to gain traction and figuring out where do you put efforts and resources first, second, third, et cetera. And then the third is really around also just the nature of like, you need to surrender because there’s sometimes like as an innovation change maker, we are seed planters and sometimes those seeds germinate quicker than others. And you need to kind of like just…
Sometimes if you try to force it, you actually make it worse than just allowing space and time to do its work.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (23:28)
I’m sure you hit a nerve with people often when you use the word surrender and tell them that they just need to the seed. that’s, that’s a good one. I noticed that you post about morning journaling and to me, ⁓ leadership, business ownership, it actually just brings out a self-development program organically in each of us. So how do you use journaling as a, I guess, a technique for your own self-development so that you can better handle situations in your work?
and in the training.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (24:00)
Yes, I started journaling daily probably 10 years ago, maybe. And I would say prior to that, I felt very chaotic and in my brain a lot of the time, right? ⁓ And also had a high level of anxiety as well. ⁓ And so I started this practice of journaling. It changes over time.
but it kind of has like a couple of core pieces to it. So the first is, so I am a Christ believer and that’s a big piece of the journaling for me is the way in which I communicate and am in connection with God. And so it usually starts with giving thanks and sort of like just pouring out whatever’s on my soul at that day, right? As I wake up. ⁓
And then it usually transitions into praying for specific people or situations that are also on my mind. Usually every day I am reading some type of nonfiction book as well as scripture. And so I will read like a couple of pages of whatever nonfiction book it is, whatever, you know, catching my fancy for that, for that period of time.
and I’ll read a couple of pages to a chapter of that. And I will pick out whatever stands out for me for that day. ⁓ I’ll highlight things as I read it and then I’ll look back at the highlighted passages. And whatever just sort of stands out to me, I just take as sort of like the hit from reading from that day. And then I do the same thing for scripture. whatever I’m reading from, usually I’m doing some type of plan of some sort and…
I will just highlight a verse that just stands out for me from that reading for the day. And then the other thing I do is I journal on the connection of those two pieces. And specifically, how is what I’m picking up from that reading and how I’m picking up from that scripture verse, what am I being guided to do daily in terms of a next step action? And so I take that, put that.
wisdom into a notes app on my phone. ⁓ And then I come back to it at the end of the day or the next day to say, what, you know, now that I see it and I’ve now experienced the day, what was that really showing me? You know, because a lot of times it’s not concrete, like call Joe, you know, it’s like, know, being something super abstract that you’re like, I don’t even know what that means. And then as you go through your day, then you’re like,
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (26:38)
it down and run away.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (26:48)
that’s what that means. Okay, I got it. Right. you know, and then I end that, and this all takes me about an hour every day, by the way. So then I end that time period where every year I have explicit goals and I will then order my to-do list based on that. So I’ll be like, okay, in service of X goal, what are the key actions that I meant to do today? And then, you know, whatever comes out through that auto writing,
And then the next, know, in service of goal two, what am I meant to do? And then the last step that I do is I go look at all of those things. And then I highlight the item that really stands out to me as sort of the non-negotiable for the day associated with each of those goals. And then I just have a miscellaneous category too. And so I started that because I’m a person who ⁓
a hard time being in the present, right? I’m always thinking about either the future or, you know, the past, right? And so it’s like, it helps me to stay present of like, you are making traction on your goals, and you’re making traction on your goals in an even way, even though you can’t do everything today, right? Like, and so it, you know, that that kind of like, is just another way to sort of like, center and ground me in the process. So
You know, that’s generally, that’s more or less what my process is today. Like I said, it changes a bit over time, you know, as I grow, ⁓ but ⁓ that is what is keeping me centered today.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (28:26)
I think it’s a great illustration for anybody managing pesky anxiety. We know that when you’re feeling anxious, if you can make a plan, it’s just calming. You go, okay, I know what I’m dealing with now. And so what you’re doing essentially is making a little plan for each day saying this is my focus, you know, and I’ve got the authority of the scripture that I’m reading and I’ve got what I’m learning from the book. As you say, that takes your fancy. can imagine like me, you’ve probably got a stack of books on you.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (28:55)
have so many.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (28:57)
But it does coalesce into a plan, if you like, and therefore you’ve got a plan and it’s calm. And as you say, it helps you be more present and do the thing now. So it’s really good. But what I like to is that you go back and review it because that is where, like you review with clients, drawing out the value. That’s where you those insights. So that’s a really good layer with your team. When I look at, you know, your team profiles, they all look very accomplished.
And it looks like you’ve built a really good team. You’ve got a team that is working with companies who are all dealing with their messy middle because that’s what you do with the innovation. How do you build a culture for your team where they are thriving even when it’s a messy middle, maybe internally in your own business, while you’ve also got stuff going on with clients? How do you manage that?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (29:46)
Yeah, so this has been a bit of a journey for me, like, ⁓ you know, going back to, you know, probably about the time period that I started journaling, like, I didn’t have the best culture on my team back then, right? And I think, like, I think back to who I was at that moment in time. And I think a lot of leaders find themselves in this space where it’s like, you’re not confident in yourself as a leader. You’re not centered for yourself as a leader. And so,
when that is the case, you’re not centered for the people that you’re showing up to lead as well. And so, you know, I kind of like hit a real rock bottom in my team perspective. And partially it was like just the nature of, kind of around that time. I mean, now I guess maybe it’s a lot longer than 10 years, but because my daughter’s 14, because I think like when I became a mom, like,
things shifted, right? So like a toddler at home, I was running a business, I had a team, like ⁓ I was really expending a lot of energy and I just didn’t feel like I had the right support. And you know, yeah, maybe I had the right people on the team, maybe I didn’t have the right people on the team at that moment in time, but I also don’t think I was showing up to lead those people on the team.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (30:46)
Listen to just
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (31:09)
the way that I could have or should have and how now how I have learned too, right? So when I hit that moment of rock bottom, it was like, what do I really, really want us to stand for? And so like, I went back and I like, I don’t like, I kind of like just had a, you know, full on bitch fest with myself, right? Like these are all the things that I hate. And then I started to look at each one individually and say,
So what would be the reverse of that? Like, what would I really want if this is what I hate, what do I really want? Right. And then, and then what does it look like to really operationalize that too? you know, ⁓ and so then like when I did that, ultimately it came down to that. wanted our culture to really stand for three things. And so I wanted, I wanted to have a lot of personal responsibility. Like if somebody screwed up, I wanted them to just say, I screwed up.
And this is why, right? Or if they said, I’ll do that, that they would do that. And I didn’t have to follow up and have an open loop to be like, did you do that? Right? Like, and so, you know, the personal responsibility was one of them. Shared appreciation was another, like I didn’t like want it to be where people were nitpicking each other or being like focusing on the weaknesses. But I really wanted people to be focused on the strengths that each person had. Right. And.
in the contributions and how everybody was moving the needle. We all have strengths and weaknesses. It’s just, how we are as humans, right? And so you get to choose where do you focus. And then the other thing that I really wanted is I wanted a culture that at its core was all around collaboration. I didn’t want infighting. I didn’t want people throwing each other under the bus, which there was some of that happening. And so when I started to look at that, I said, all right, if this is what I want, how do I start to build it?
And so like I created little experiments and the very first one, I mean, it’s so simple, so, simple, but I had gone to a networking event and I had heard somebody talk about this and I was like, that’s brilliant. I’m going to start it on Monday. And it was just literally like coming into there. She actually had like a card that she gave me and it was like, you you kind of, I don’t know, there was like maybe six or seven emotions on that card and you would just start the, our Monday morning meeting, which is when we use it.
and just say what feeling best represents how you feel coming into the week and why, right? And it was things like, I feel tender, I feel excited, I feel happy, you know? And so it started out initially as that, where it was all around like, how do we get to know each other as people instead of just like as people who work together, right? And so people then started to share things like,
Well, you I feel a little tender coming in on Monday morning because you know, like this happened to my best friend over the weekend or, know, I’m feeling really excited because, my family went to this, concert and we had a blast over the weekend. Right. And so you started to hear these little tidbits about who people were outside of work and just, know, a little bit more about their hobbies, et cetera. And it started to change our culture, like literally like overnight, felt like. And so.
It happens fast. so like that was, that just became like a common thing. We don’t use the card anymore. Now it becomes more of just like, okay, you know, what’s your highlight that you want to share from the weekend type of thing. Right. But in it, in it does take a significant amount of time. takes 30 minutes every Monday morning to go around and hear about everybody’s weekend. However, it is a game changer to the connectedness of our culture.
And so we just kept taking on little experiments and we’d say, okay, what is this experiment meant to do? Is it meant to fuel collaboration? Is it meant to fuel, you know, shared appreciation or personal responsibility? And then we would try it and we’d assess like, does it work? Does it not? Like an example of one thing that we, in the middle of COVID, we put on a 30 minute standup every day for our team. And then, you know, as COVID kind of went away and
you know, people started to get back in, you know, out into the world and stuff like that. We took it off. And then we found that we, that that was so critical to the alignment of our team. Once it was no longer there that we put it back on. Right. And so we had, we had, we had not appreciated the level of alignment and collaboration and connectivity and just general team cohesion that came from that. So, you know, my advice to everybody is like, if you don’t like where you are,
First, you gotta define where you wanna go. But then second of all, you’ve gotta be willing to take these little experiments and it doesn’t have to be an all or nothing type of thing. Some things are gonna work, some things are not gonna work, some things are gonna work for a period of time and then they kinda die out. But you just gotta like kind of keep iterating and keep experimenting.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (36:16)
I love that flexibility. I love that you put it in, take it out, whether it’s working or not. And I guess just really assessing and listening and seeing your team, it makes such a massive difference when people truly see each other and know each other and appreciate each other’s strengths and weaknesses, as you say. So you say that.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (36:34)
mean,
like today, our team is so connected and the level of cohesion, know, people who leave our team, you know, to take on new opportunities. I think almost all of them in the last five years have come back and said, ⁓ I just so miss you guys. Like I’ve never had an environment that is so fun to work in that I feel so supported in. And so, you know, as the leader now I’m like, yes.
That is everything that I was hoping to make happen, but it doesn’t happen overnight. It really takes a lot of intentional effort and continued intentional effort even once you have quote unquote arrived, right?
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (37:15)
I think you’ve exemplified beautifully. read yesterday in an email from Tom Bellew. He just kind of said, everything is your fault and that’s the good news. And the fact that you sat down and had the bitch session and let it all out and then go, okay, flip it around. What do I want it to see? What I want it to be. And, and started making those small experiments. We have so much more power to make change than we often realize when we get stuck in their little ruts. So, you know, fantastic encouragement for people.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (37:45)
I talk about this entire process in the book and have all of the scripts and basically the reflection questions that I used and all that type of stuff, because I think the reality is it’s a huge problem. And I think most leaders don’t have the self-awareness that they are part of the problem.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (38:07)
Well, just think of the whole trend of quiet quitting that we keep reading about in the news. You know, how devastating for people to spend so much of their lives in an environment that is just where they’re just feeling dead inside. And yet if the leadership can actually take your advice, read your book, we better link it in the comments. Things would be very, very different. You talk about resistance and innovation and you say that it’s actually a gift. I think the same is true in business when there’s
resistance that gives us information. So for somebody watching this who might be facing massive resistance in their business right now or their team or a project, how do you help them reframe that so that they can keep going?
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (38:50)
Yes. I mean, every, every form of resistance that you receive is just a signal telling you a next action that you need to take. And so this can take a lot of different shapes. Like one of the, I’ll talk about one just in terms of change, but then, you know, one just more in terms of business. like, you know, anytime, I guess one of the key insights that I had as I was writing the book is that when people are going through any type of change,
it really takes on a similar curve to a grief curve. And so the very first step on that is resistance and denial and then anger and then bargaining depression before they finally get to this point of acceptance, right? So now how fast people travel that grief curve is gonna change depending upon who they are as people and how comfortable or not they are with ambiguity and uncertainty.
it also is gonna change depending upon like the scale of the initiative that you’re doing. like, you know, from a change maker perspective, if people are just like automatically jumping on to for your ideas, you might wanna just question yourself of like, are you pushing them far enough ⁓ or not, right? So like, that’s just something that for me as a change maker and leading that,
Like that was just like a huge aha of like, ⁓ so I really shouldn’t be frustrated. I just need to be more compassionate about this is where they are on the change curve and kind of move from there, right? So that’s one piece of it. For me personally though, there’s definitely have been seasons in my business where it’s like everything that you did before is no longer working today. And those are like,
really, really challenging situations for many, many different reasons, right? Like one, oftentimes they just come with a massive amount of stress, especially if you have, you know, employees and you, you know, have, you know, heavy payroll and all the other stuff like I do, like those, you don’t have a huge runway for figuring out all that stuff. So like there’s stress associated with that. And then there can be also just sort of like,
you know, identity sort of hit to the ego type of perspective. It’s like, well, you know, I thought I was more of a change maker kind of leading forward and kind of see in the future. And I guess I’m not right. So there can be a little bit of a hit to the ego there. But I think like when those seasons have happened, what they have really forced me to do. And I’m kind of like right now, like mentoring a friend through a similar season in her business. And like,
It’s just, it’s not necessarily saying that you should hang it up and move on. It’s just saying that you have to change the way in which you work. And you only change when you get to the point of pain, to the point where you can’t forward, right? To any more. So like in those seasons that I’ve had in my business, I’ve had to like get to those moments so that I’m really prepared to let…
the old processes die to bring the new processes in. you know, like, you know, I started, you know, earlier back when I said, you know, we have like an 80, 85 % hit rate with our proposals. We didn’t use to, right. But we hit a season where it was like, it just felt like every opportunity coming into the door just wasn’t converting into a sale. And it really took a lot of like energy to be like, what is going wrong?
And that’s when we put in a bunch of things in the upfront sales process that changed. I mean, I don’t recall what our hit rate was back then, but let’s say it was like 30 % or something to then now 80, 85. I’m like, that’s huge. That’s like amazing, right? And in most of the cases, we aren’t losing to somebody else. It’s just they’re choosing not to move forward with the project. So it’s not even necessarily that, you know.
they’re necessarily choosing to work with somebody differently. I don’t know what the exact percentage of those types of cases are, but ⁓ it’s pretty minor of that 15%.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (43:03)
Hmm. And then you can have the opposite problem when a business grows so fast. I’ve seen it quite a few times with clients when I think it’s a Japanese principle. Can’t remember where from, I’m sorry. But if a business grows three times, everything breaks, just all the systems. there’s a lot of
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (43:18)
Yeah.
100%. Like, and I feel that too, like even in just the growth of our business, like you definitely hit moments where it’s like the way in which we’ve worked in the past is not how we can continue to work in the future. And we actually had this instance maybe about 18 months ago ⁓ for our company. ⁓ Maybe it two years ago now, relatively recently where we had to literally re-engineer some
full on processes and it did not necessarily go smoothly. It’s not like everybody was on the team saying, yeah, let’s do this, right? There was some resistance, but on the backside of that, actually just the fourth quarter is always the busiest time in our business. And we really sailed through the most difficult sort of high volume time with so much more ease because of all those changes that we made.
I’m a big believer of that principle and from an experience perspective.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (44:21)
I think it’s great to hear. Your examples are so helpful for listeners. If somebody was listening right now, their business owner and they’ve just copped a whole lot of challenges from all directions, it might be rising energy prices, it might be policy changes according to what’s happening in their field, or it might be staffing or whatever, but they’re just exhausted and it’s feeling pretty messy for them right now. What’s one thing you would say to them is to help them regroup and move forward.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (44:52)
Yeah, so I actually would suggest ⁓ there is a framework that we oftentimes will use. It’s called the Creative Action Pathway Framework. And I would suggest that they sit down with a piece of paper, ⁓ cell file, whatever works best for them, right? And just do a dump, first of all, of all the ways in which they feel stuck. Like, just, know.
doesn’t matter how many items are on that, you five, 10, 15, what, it doesn’t matter. Just like, ⁓ why do you feel stuck in your business? And then for each of those items, then go and ask yourself, okay, well, why am I really stuck on this? Like, what could I do to get unstuck related to this particular item, right?
and just sort of brainstorm on the pieces. Because oftentimes, like when we get into those moments, you’re approaching everything as the big conglomerate in your head and it all feels like it’s all together, right? And you can’t move one thing because it’s all just so terrible. And so this is about like,
How do you break it down into the details? And when you start to do that and you start to brainstorm for each of those things on that laundry list, how could I do this or what could we do to change it? There’s gonna be things on there that you’re like, nah, that’s not gonna happen, right? But there’s also gonna be things across that whole list that you’re like, you know what? I actually could make that change. I could do that. And so the goal is that you kind of, you know, basically
brainstorm unfiltered for each of those items that you had put in terms of why you feel stock, and then to identify a core set of actions that you’re willing to take action on in the things that you feel like you have control over. So, you know, certainly if the market conditions are changing, you might not have control over that, but you do have control over how you talk about your value proposition.
And so maybe your value prop has to be much more refined, much more clear, much more targeted, you know, than it’s been before, for instance, right? And so that might be a place where you start to take action. And so when I have found myself in those seasons, as well as then when I have coached other people through those seasons in their own businesses, when people start taking action against those things,
First of all, again, they feel a lot less anxious. You’re probably seeing a good thread here. How many ways can Brianna make herself feel less anxious, right? But they feel a lot less anxious, but then also they start to make traction. And because then they’re changing something in the system, other things change in the system by, you know, through the byproduct of that. And so they oftentimes soon find themselves unstuck.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (47:57)
Mm-hmm. I saw, I saw a very small snippet of Peter Diamandis interviewing Tony Robbins yesterday. And he was talking about how people will find meaning if we don’t do any work, if things have changed so much that we just don’t do any work because of AI. And he said, we are made not to manage things we’re made to create. And if we’re spending all of our day just managing and putting out fires, and I’m just thinking about what you’re saying now and feeling overwhelmed because the challenges are so big. And yet you say,
take the list, write it down, all the things that are stressing you out and look at which ones you could make a change on, then that’s moving from managing to creative in the state of mind. And as you say, lowering anxiety. it’s brilliant. Brianna Silver of Silver Consulting. I really think you’ve shared so much of value today. I’ll be putting your LinkedIn profile and of course your book and website in the notes. And I just encourage anybody listening, if you’re looking at making change in your business,
and you need somebody to guide you through that process of innovation to get in touch with Brianna. ⁓ It’s really good quality processes that you’re bringing to people. So thank you.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (49:08)
So appreciate it, Jo. if you’re up for it, I’d love to offer a free gift to your listeners as well. And I’ll provide you with the link in the show notes that you can put in, but it’ll access a free chapter of the book of leading to a free fall, how innovators turn turbulence into trust. So people can kind of experience it and see if it can supportive to them in their work.
Jo McKee I The Jo Show (49:32)
Definitely. Thank you. That’s fantastic. Appreciate it. We’ll get it into the notes. Okay. Thank you, Brianna.
Brianna Sylver I Sylver Consulting (49:37)
Excellent. Thanks, Jo. I appreciate the energy and time.