Andy talks to Hannah Keep, author of Fight Back!

Topics include

• Fighting Back; Building your bounce-back-ability.
• Generating and maintaining a Positive Mental Attitude
• The exploding freelance market

Transcript of Interview with Hannah Keep

Andy White: I am absolutely delighted to have on the line, Hannah Keep, who is the author of a very good book called Fighting Back. Hello Hannah.

Hannah Keep: Hi Andy

Andy White: And I’d like to say a massive big welcome to the freelance adviser podcast. I’ve read your book, and one of the reasons I like your book, and it’s a very very good book, I’m very bad at reading, and this book had quite big writing and lots of pictures. Is this a book that was within you for a very long time, or did you write it quite suddenly?

Hannah Keep: I’ve always thought that there was a book in me, because apparently there is a book in everybody, so I’ve always been wondering when is this book going to suddenly appear then, and then last November I was on the train and I guess we were really in the midst of the credit crunch, and the book suddenly came to me. How can I reach out to people who are having a tough time, being made redundant, money worries – how can I really help them bounce back and stay positive, so that they’ve got the energy to fight back and not give up.

Andy White: Now tell us a little bit about yourself, because I know that you’ve got quite an interesting history. You were in recruitment at one point weren’t you?

Hannah Keep: I was. I started first of all in the training industry about 12 years ago, but I’m not going to tell you how old I am because that would give everything away, but I started of in training and got head hunted to join a recruitment firm, where I was responsible for recruiting freelancers and contractors in the areas of IT support and development and programming, so I had a good five years placing people, and seeing what it was like from their perspective as well as from the clients perspective employing them.

Andy White: It’s always a good sign when you get head hunted.

Hannah Keep: Well yes, I think so.

Andy White: You must have been very good at what you did.

Hannah Keep: Well, I guess I’m going to be British now, I think I had a way with people and my passion is people, so I’m really keen to help people make the best out of themselves, and out of the situation that they’re in, and that’s what drives everything that I do. So if I’m good at that then great. I’ll take it.

Andy White: The book basically talks about getting yourself out of adversity by being sort of positive and saying the right sort of things to yourself. Would you say, obviously you’ve met loads of people, would you say that there is a fairly common barrier that stops people from fighting back, is there a common thing that a lot of people do wrong in terms of remaining positive?

Hannah Keep: I think there is, and in the book it details six key steps to bouncing back, and I know you’ve read it, so you will know what I mean. A lot of people get stuck at step one and what happens is that instead of acknowledging that there is a problem, they can either be stuck in complete denial, so there is no recession going on and I’ll carry on spending, or they think they are powerless to change the situation they are in. We’ve always got a choice. I believe that there is always a choice. There is a recession, we can’t change that but what can we do. What options do we have available to us. It’s just taking that mindset of being stuck in the problem or not even seeing the problem, and then thinking what can I do? Once people make that leap they can bounce back quite quickly.

Andy White: I’m interested in the same sort of question, but specifically in relation to freelancers. You’ve met a lot of freelancers, and what should freelancers be concentrating on do you think Hannah?

Hannah Keep: For me I think it’s about selling themselves, you just asked me the question what you did, maybe we’re a bit British, maybe it’s a cultural thing, but we don’t like to overtly say yep you know what I am good at this, and I am an expert at this, and for me freelancers they tend to have a huge expertise, whether it’s in programming, media, camera work, they have a huge talent, their opportunity is to get out and really sell that and talk about those achievements, because the freelancing market is just exploding because of the economy, so they’ve got to be able to differentiate themselves over and above what they technically do in their day job. I guess it’s that question what makes you different? They need to be able to answer that.

Andy White: Do you think a lot of freelancers just don’t give themselves credit for what they know? It’s quite easy to forget how much you know.

Hannah Keep: It is, and I don’t think it’s just freelancers. I think many people I’ve come across don’t give themselves enough credit, and sometimes we can do very well in our careers, and instead of saying yep, I did that, we sometimes put it down to luck, and maybe not take all of the credit for what we have done, so you read in the book there, it is about looking at what have I achieved, what am I actually really really good at, because that’s what’s got me here today, and that’s what’s going to get me forward in the future, so everyone needs to take more credit.

Andy White: I think you were mentioning about being British earlier, I think we are all very prone to these modesty attacks aren’t we?

Hannah Keep: We are, but modesty doesn’t help you fight back. We are not talking about being arrogant here or taking credit for what we haven’t done. We are talking about giving ourselves a pat on the back, because there are enough people out there with a stick, so take the credit.

Andy White: Now I remember a long time ago, I was reading a lot of books all about self development, and they were kind of like yours but not as good. I was very much into this whole PMA, positive mental attitude, type thing, and I found, and I’m not sure if it’s true today, and that’s what the next questions going to be, but I found that a lot of people at the time were sort of quite skeptical of people who tried to be positive, and I was possibly just being positive in the wrong way. It’s like a double-barreled question really. Do you think that there is still a lot of scepticality today, if that’s a real word, about people who are positive, and is there a wrong way to be positive?

Hannah Keep: Yes there is, and I think there are two things for me there. One, I believe that people in the world are naturally optimistic, so glass half full, whatever happens they will look on the bright side. Then you’ve got the pessimists who will focus on perhaps what’s gone wrong, or what could go wrong. Neither is good or bad, it’s just a different way of looking at things, and actually you need to be optimistic and you need to be pesemistic as well. So I think what you get from the pessimist is that skepticism, so I think yes there is still lots of that out there. I think what can be irritating is a faked optimism and that’s what breads that skeptically. We are having tough times now, so if I went out to all my clients and said get over it, look on the bright side, in that kind of annoying fake way, that’s what gets irritating. So fake optimism and unrealistic optimism is perhaps the wrong way.

Andy White: That’s really interesting, because, I’m trying to be okay with myself here but, I wouldn’t describe myself as a particularly optimistic kind of guy. I think what I was doing all those years ago, I was being a bit over the top, and faking it until you make it. But what advice would you give to people who aren’t naturally sort of gungho and optimistic. What ways can they develop a more optimistic attitude?

Hannah Keep: I would say when they are going through experiences or situations or challenges, do what you would naturally do, which would be to look at what the worst thing is that could happen, and maybe what has gone wrong and analyse that, because they are very good problem solvers, then to also spend some time thinking about okay so what is positive in this, what opportunities might there be, and if I was going to give myself a break what’s the one thing that I have actually done quite well. Look at both sides.

Andy White: You’ve hit on a really interesting point there, about remembering the good things that you’ve done. I think we all ought to do that more shouldn’t we?

Hannah Keep: We absolutely do, because nobody else is going to do it for us.

Andy White: Tell us a little bit about, you’re doing some stuff with freelance adviser.

Hannah Keep: I’m really excited about this; they’ve been really kind to me, and given me the opportunity to set up the training function of the site. What that means is that they are going to be posting regular articles on different topics that we believe from a training and learning perspective are going to be useful for freelancers, whatever their background is, we are talking about generic skills, from selling yourself, market yourself, look at all the finances and accounting side of your business, because some of these things don’t come naturally to us, me as well. I love being out there with people but get me around numbers and the finances and receipts and all that kind of stuff and that’s not my natural strength. So what we are saying is between freelancers you’ve got huge expertise in what you do, let us help you with those areas that perhaps aren’t within your comfort zone, so there will be loads of stuff on the site for people to download, and podcasts, but also we are going to be running some workshops where people can come along and learn some of these skills with other freelancers.

Andy White: Now there’s an email address, is it training@freelanceadviser.co.uk that people can send questions into, is that right?

Hannah Keep: Yes they can. What we are going to start to do is if people can send in any kind of question that they’d like to know the answer to and we are going to either answer that in a podcast or a post. It’s a bit like having a coach, you don’t actually have to meet or speak to, so perhaps a one liner and a question that they’d like the answer from someone with some coaching expertise. On any topic, as long as it’s nothing to do with what they technically do in their day job, because that’s something I can’t help with. So send in your questions and we can start that going, I think other people can learn from the answers that we post as well.

Andy White: How do people find out about these physical workshops?

Hannah Keep: If they go on to the freelance adviser website and see the posts there. If you want to go direct into the training section then its freelanceadviser.co.uk/training and that well have a list of all the sessions and dates, and you’ll be able to book on there or find out more information.

Andy White: What sort of things are you looking to cover in those Hannah?

Hannah Keep: Well we thought Selling You, which is the first workshop we are promoting, which is actually a full days training, with a load of stuff in there, but it gives you a basic sales process which you can use, whether it’s on the telephone or face to face, we are going to do some objection handling, negotiations, how to communicate with different clients, because some personality styles will need you to be flexible in the way that you sell to them. Most importantly confidence. A whole big area of self confidence and self belief, because I think some people when they get into freelancing, maybe it’s a bit tough, they are not getting as much work, then we start to get that self doubt gremlin, you know that voice that says are you sure you should have gone freelance.

Andy White: The little guy on your shoulder with the horns, the red guy.

Hannah Keep: We stamp him or her out, and we just work positively. So I think it’s more than just selling, but also being able to demonstrate how you are unique, how you are going to sell you to others.

Andy White: Have you got some more people involved with this, isn’t there a little team of you doing this training?

Hannah Keep: There are a couple of us so far, but we are expanding the team, as we are looking to do this across the country. In London I’ve got a colleague Darrell Close, he’s taking care of the financial management, accounting, business strategy, part of the business, and he is launching his first workshop which is called “Taking Care of Business” which is a good one to go for if you are just getting into freelancing, or even if maybe you’ve been in it for a while and you think am I going in the right direction here, do I need to just take a step back, so he’s about to publish some dates for that. I’ve got another company that run a fantastic time management course called “Getting Things Done” and that will be up on the site soon, and they’ve been kind enough to let me go down and attend their workshop, so I will come back being even more of a whirlwind hopefully. Loads of things happening, very exciting.

Andy White: Well it’s a fantastic resource for anyone, not just freelancers.

Hannah Keep: It is, and so far we are the only company out there that is just specialising in training for freelancers, and I believe that goods because we are unique and freelancing is a different market place and the training has to be geared to understand and appreciate that market place, and freelancers are different people, we are unique and different.

Andy White: So there we have it, Hannah Keep, author of Fighting Back. Have you got a URL that you want to direct people to, and tell them more about what you do?

Hannah Keep: There is post that’s up on Freelance Adviser called “How to Deal with the Ups & Downs” and I detail the six steps there that are in the book, so that’s a really handy article to read if you need a boost and on the article there will be more about the book and if you want to purchase it there is a PayPal link there, so again that’s freelanceadviser.co.uk/training.

Andy White: Fantastic. Hannah Keep thank you very very much indeed.