“From Economist to Executive Coach: David Ehrenthal’s Unconventional Journey”

In this episode of Career Coaching Secrets, host Kevin sits down with David Ehrenthal, founder of Mog 10 Career & Leadership Coaching. Unlike many coaches focused on group programs or scaling, David has intentionally stayed 100% one-on-one, believing that real transformation only happens when the client is deeply committed to change.

Connect with

LinkedIn:https://mach10career.com/
Website: https://davidehrenthal.substack.com/

Transcript

David Ehrenthal: 0:00

It's 100% right now one-on-one coaching. I've considered branching off into team coaching. I have done a little bit of it. Um for some reason I have not made the decision to branch off into it aggressively. I would do it if someone asked me to, but I don't really advertise it or promote it in any way. As a coach, my responsibility is to facilitate a process that to some degree is anchored in some goal or change that the client, the individual, is looking to pursue.

Davis Nguyen : 0:30

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast where we talk with successful career coaches on how they built their success and the hard lessons they learned along the way. My name is Davis Wynne, and I'm the founder of Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, and even $100,000 weeks. Before Purple Circle, I've grown several seven and eight figure career coaching businesses myself and have been a consultant at two career coaching businesses that are doing over $100 million each. Whether you're an established coach or building your practice for the first time, you'll discover the secrets to elevating your coaching business.

Kevin: 1:01

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets Podcasts. I'm Kevin, and today we are joined by David Ehrenthal. He's been in the coaching industry for about five years. He is the founder of Mog 10 Career and Leadership Coaching. Welcome to the show, David.

David Ehrenthal: 1:15

Thanks for having me.

Kevin: 1:16

Yeah. You know, other than when I was looking at your LinkedIn, I saw that we're from the same hometown and whatnot. But what I'm really excited about is to hear the origin story, the lore of how you got into coaching and what made you want to start a business out of it.

David Ehrenthal: 1:31

Well, it was very accidental. I spent over 30 years in positions ranging from economist eventually strategy. I worked for a number of large corporations. I both in Europe as well as in the US, a little bit in Latin America. And I frankly became very tired of the corporate world and uh wanted to do something else. So I left my position as head of marketing CMO and decided to explore new paths. That was about five years ago, and that was right around the time the COVID hit. And my graduate school offered me a fellowship in career development, experimental. And I really wasn't, I was actually consulting at that time to some higher education institutions. And I was specifically focusing on career development. And I at the end of the podcast, we were podcast. At the end of the program, we were in pods and we went around the pod and everybody expressed what they had learned and what they tended now to do. And I didn't really go there, participate to find a new career. And everybody asked me, Well, why don't you be a coach? And I said, Well, that's an interesting idea. Why do you say that? Um, and they said that I had been participating more as a coach versus a participant since the beginning. So I researched it, got trained, and I also realized that for the last probably 10 years of my career, most of my time was spent coaching my teams. So it it really appeared to be a very natural evolution for me.

Kevin: 3:00

That's really interesting. So it seems like it was a natural progression over time. So, like, fast forward to now, who do you help or who do you coach? And what kind of problems do you help them up?

David Ehrenthal: 3:10

I would say there's really two categories, and they're much more adjacent than maybe we believe. One category is career coaching, and there's a range of issues that I'm helping people deal with. On the other side is executive coachingslash leadership. Often issues that relate to career development are actually more leadership issues. And sometimes leadership issues are more career issues. So that there's a real intersection of the two. I coach people ranging, you know, pre-Ukraine invasion. I had had a client in Moscow. I coach a lot in France because I can coach in French. I coach lots of people at very large technology companies. Um, and I also coach people who are out of work and and looking to get back in. So it's a real broad range. Probably the middle 50% is between 30 and 50.

Kevin: 4:01

Wow, quite a range. So man, that's really interesting that you're kind of coaching internationally as well. Because my US brain always thinks like you're just coaching like in the US, but you're doing it all internationally.

David Ehrenthal: 4:13

It's a lot of fun. I mean one of the I certainly enjoy coaching. One of the the part that I probably enjoy the most is it gives me exposure to a very broad cross-section of the world. Um, and and that's really interesting. There's kind of an intellectual side to the coaching, and uh, you know, we're we're in our little bubble, and but I get to hear what people are concerned about in Paris or Montreal or Australia or New Zealand. It's kind of all over the place.

Kevin: 4:39

Do you see common themes between all these different countries and whatnot?

David Ehrenthal: 4:43

Well, I mean, everybody is human, but we are the same species. So yeah, there are definitely common themes. I could go into them if you want.

Kevin: 4:50

Yeah, please. I would love to hear a few of them.

David Ehrenthal: 4:53

If I were to sum up what I've learned over the first over the last five years, and it's certainly, you know, it's certainly shaped and influenced by my previous years, is that at the end of the day, everything seems to lead to, I would say, belonging and impact. I think there's obviously more to it than that, but a lot of what goes on in our lives at work is wanting to be part of something. It's jogging down.

Kevin: 5:18

Yeah, that's really interesting. And so, like, since your market is all over the world, like, how do these people does this like theme of belonging, impact, and to be part of something, like play into your market? Like, okay. So there's a theme of belonging impact to be part of something as well. Yeah. And since people are fine internationally are finding about you and your services, how does that impact your marketing? Like, what kind of marketing are you doing? How do people usually find you?

David Ehrenthal: 5:47

So I don't do any marketing um per se. I certainly don't do any traditional paid marketing. I would say the only marketing, and I don't like to think of it as marketing, is writing. I do a bunch of writing on LinkedIn um and on Substack. Don't have an enormous following, um, but I've probably written 50 or 60 articles on issues that I think would be helpful for people to see. Now, an article doesn't replace coaching, it's a complement to coaching. And the benefit of coaching is is a, if you will, an instrument to help people make changes. Coaching is about change. At the end of the day, it's about transformation change. Going to, you know, a two-day seminar on leadership is very helpful. But within 30 to 60 days, 90% of the content is forgotten. Coaching accompanies the person and helps them recognize that sometimes their mindset isn't quite right. They have blind spots, there's resistance, and the coaching can help them see things a little bit differently, see more possibilities, and make adjustments to behavior that has become habitual, not necessarily advancing the ideal person or situation that they'd prefer.

Kevin: 6:58

So it sounds like people were gonna say something.

David Ehrenthal: 7:00

I was just gonna say, but on a practical level, because I feel like I didn't fully answer the question, I'll use kind of a marketing term. I find clients or clients find me through three channels. The first is they just find me. I can't explain how uh a Russian guy from Moscow found me. He was a wonderful guy. I gotta tell you, it was it's probably um several months before the invasion. Obviously, we had to discontinue uh because he didn't feel safe having conversations with me. So one of them is sort of organic. They just come to me, maybe it's because they see my postings, my substack, et cetera, or they didn't like what I wrote. The second is I I do work for or with a private equity firm as a contractor. This private equity firm has a platform of coaches. It's primarily leadership-based. Kind of think of it as an executive confidant coaching. And the third is I do work with Better Up, which you've probably heard of. And one of the benefits of working through Better Up is that it gives me access to large businesses that I would myself have difficulty getting into.

Kevin: 8:00

It's interesting. I've never heard of Better Up. What is it?

David Ehrenthal: 8:02

Better Up, I would I suspect Better Up is the largest technology platform used by large corporations, global corporations in the world. They're probably, I'm making this up, anywhere from two to four thousand coaches around the world that participate in the Better Up platform. And they're all contractors.

Kevin: 8:23

So it's kind of like for coaches, for like large and large organizations kind of go there to kind of source coaches. Is that right?

David Ehrenthal: 8:31

Yeah, I mean, they have scale. I mean, if you're, you know, IBM and you want to um roll out coaching beyond the C-suite, you need a partner who's that scales. And I think what Better Up offers, and I don't work for them, I'm a contractor. What Better Up offers is the ability to scale it across a large organization. It with some assurance that the quality will be good enough. At least.

Kevin: 8:57

Which one is the largest lead source for for you, like for clients and whatnot?

David Ehrenthal: 9:02

I mean, I would say probably from a unit point of view, it's probably better up.

Kevin: 9:06

I see. Very interesting. This is the first time I'm hearing about this. So it's like really interesting to see someone that's actually using it. Perfect. Okay. And so these people are kind of finding you, whether it's through BetterUp, whether it's through that PE firm, or whether through it's like Substack, LinkedIn, good old S classic SEO, maybe. They're starting to inquire about your services and work with you. And so when you mentioned that coaching is facilitates change, what do the coaching modalities look like? Is it like one-on-one coaching, group coaching, organizational trainings? Like how do you facilitate that change?

David Ehrenthal: 9:41

100% right now, one-on-one coaching. I've considered branching off into team coaching. I have done a little bit of it. Um, for some reason, I have not made the decision to branch off into it aggressively. I would do it if someone asked me to, but I don't really advertise it or promote it in any way. As a coach, my responsibility is to facilitate a process that to some degree is anchored in some goal or change that the client, the individual, is looking to pursue. Now, there's two factors that are very important for the process to be successful. The first factor is it has to be really important to the individual. If it's not important to the individual, the change, there is there's more of a risk that it won't be successful. The other is there there need to have a certain degree of confidence in their ability to make this change. And the coaching session, there's an onboarding process where the overarching goals or change are explored, defined in pencil. And then through each session, we have conversations in which the individual senses and becomes more aware of the things that may be blocking the blockages. And as they become more aware of the blockages, there is a continued reflection on whether or not they want to do something to engage and address that blockage. And if they are interested in addressing and engaging with that blockage, how can they practice and experiment such that the habits that are holding them back are changed?

Kevin: 11:16

I see. That's really interesting. And I did want to touch upon the first point too. You said that it has to be important to the individual for the coaching process to work. Have you kind of seen maybe like a situation where it wasn't important to an individual through your experience? Like maybe a company forced this person to do coaching and they're just like going through the I'm kind of curious through your experience.

David Ehrenthal: 11:39

Yeah, I mean, there's historically coaching for many has been perceived as remedial. John isn't performing, therefore, we'll get John a coach. And so John gets a coach and he he resents the fact that he has a coach. Now, there's ways of working through that, but we as coaches, I don't control the outcome. And sometimes it's also hard to know whether the individual doesn't think they need the coaching or they're afraid of it. Because let's be honest here, in the coaching process, it's not therapy, but there are some things that are going to come out that are uncomfortable. The reality is if it were so easy to change, we would change all the time. We would never be stressed. We would just do it. Unfortunately, we get stuck in old ways of doing things where we just get stuck into doing nothing. Um, and it takes some degree of motivation and confidence that we can make changes. That is true for career and is, you know, a a I'll I'll give you a uh perfect example in career coaching. One of the most effective, I would call a tactic in career coaching is the interview. If you got the interview, which is difficult to get these days, you want to make it count. And there is a blind spot that almost everybody on meet has. And the blind spot is this people want to present themselves as being really good, but they forget that the starting point is what the hiring manager is looking for. It's not, it is about you, but it's what you say really needs to align with the basic skills, competencies, behavioral traits that align with what the hiring manager is looking for. So if you write a cover letter, if you could be conversation or resume, I will look at cover letters and say, how does that align with what that hiring manager is looking for? Well, what do you mean? Well, you're highlighting, you know, you have nine bullets in this letter. Which of those are relevant to what the manager is looking for? Well, none of them. Well, what might be relevant? That's an example.

Kevin: 13:36

Since you're head of marketing, I'm sure you'll appreciate this. This reminds me of the classic copywriting, what they say about a copywriting, like who is your audience and like write for your audience, especially when it comes to like sales pages, email marketing, all that sort of stuff.

David Ehrenthal: 13:52

It's exactly the same thing. Now, now, does that mean that you, you know, you're a chameleon and you fundamentally just, you know, talk or or behave or accept jobs that don't align with with what gives you meaning, what you enjoy doing, or gives you the extrinsic rewards you're looking for? No. But if you're at the interview point, you're interested in the job, it is ultimately about getting to the next round.

Kevin: 14:15

As you're going through that scenario, it's like, of course I want a life of resentment of all these jobs I don't want. That's really interesting. And so it sounds like a lot of the work you do is like quite intimate as well. So when it comes and since your majority do it, since it's 100% one-on-one coaching, how do you manage your client capacity? Do you have help at all, like admin help, or do you hire? I'm curious on that end as well.

David Ehrenthal: 14:40

Well, I do have a partner. Um, sometimes I will bring people in, um, but I probably have 35, 40 concurrent clients. Um, I don't meet with all of them weekly, some of them. It's it's very manageable, and I and I really don't allow it to get unmanageable, to be honest with you. I'm just not interested in that. I'm not interested in scaling my business. That could change. But right now, um, you know, I spent my entire career scaling businesses. Right now, I help people one person at a time. It's not doing this, if you will. The money is probably third on my list of reasons why I do this.

Kevin: 15:20

What's number one into?

David Ehrenthal: 15:21

I think number one is I know through experience how difficult it is to find both fulfillment through work and also live a a life of balanced, and you know, if I were to put it in biological terms, homeostasis, it is very complicated what drives us. And I I think to some degree my decision to become a coach four or five years ago, it's not a coincidence that it took place during COVID, because I suspected COVID was gonna create tremendous complexities for people in the workplace. And I was worried. It reminded me a little bit of the financial crisis of 2007, 2008, but I didn't really know what it was gonna do until it happened. And now it didn't do what I expected it to do. It did something else. I thought I expected you know a cratering of the economy like seven, eight. I expected it to be significantly worse. And I thought the challenge was gonna be fundamentally there's no jobs. What I find the crisis being is difficulties losing social activity through in in-person work or the experience of being part of something socially. I think work is much more of a social institution than we understand. And I think there's much more uncertainty today of politically, economically, technologically than I ever remember. And that uncertainty triggers a lot of stress. The stress has meaning stress does have negative consequences on the body and on, you know, on the mind. And part of what really drives me is trying to help people find that balance and enjoy life and their work. It can be a fantastic channel for creativity and and uh you know social togetherness and belonging. It can also be a tremendous struggle and point, persistent point of stress.

Kevin: 17:17

Yeah, I definitely do notice that too. Like, especially right now, there's uh doom and gloom with like the threat of AI, job instability, and all that, and people are just going through a rough time. So I can see why you do the work that you do to help people through these like really, I would say uncertain times, you know. I I don't even think it's rough quite yet because like it's the anticip, it's like that roller coaster where like we're like going up and up, everybody's waiting for the drop.

David Ehrenthal: 17:44

So, you know, you know, neurologically, and I find the neurological part of it very interesting. Our brains are prediction machines, and we create narratives in our brain. And these narratives can cause us to get stuck. And some people will call that kind of getting stuck in the victim hole. It's not fair, there's no way out. And some of what I do, depending upon the client, is to try to work with people to get them out of that being stuck in that victim mindset into a more empowered mindset. It's not easy, you know. So, okay, you're stuck now. What?

Kevin: 18:20

What can you do? Oh man, I could talk about the neuroscience of all this too for like hours, by the way. But there's some other topics that I want to ask you about as well, David. Okay. So you're facilitating these conversations, you're helping people through these uncertain times to not get stuck through this. Like, did you use the word victim, like kind of like mindset? I can't remember what I'm saying.

David Ehrenthal: 18:41

Yeah, I did I did use it, and I want to be very careful of it. There's a a positive psychologist um um who you may know, Scott, what is it, Scott Barry uh Kaufman, I think his name is Scott Barry Kaufman, and he published a book called Rising Above. Um, I think we have to be very careful. Is it a politicization of the term? And I want to be careful with it. Um, but I do think there's a there's a bit of a cultural trend toward feeling like a victim. And I think it can be very I think it can be blocking for certain people. It's not to say that some people aren't victims, but anyway, so I answered your question, I did say it.

Kevin: 19:19

Yeah, the whole victim thing. No one likes being called a victim. It's very ego-triggering and it's very like negative connotation. But you're right, there's a level of like uh the word I would think about is almost like this feeling of helplessness a lot of times, right? Like maybe that's how I would label it.

David Ehrenthal: 19:36

Some people, it's interesting that you said that it has a pejorative kind of connotation. Some people will argue today, and I really well, yeah. Some people argue today, and I see it, that there is a tremendous advantage to being considered a victim. It serves, can serve people.

Kevin: 19:54

How do you see it from your perspective? The things I think about are like perhaps the ego, maybe, but I would love to kind of hear like how you see it serving them.

David Ehrenthal: 20:03

I think we get splintered into so many identities that we start to think, you know, it's not fair. People like me are getting screwed. And there are some cases where it's true, I mean, we're getting into a kind of a slippery slope here. Yes. But I feel as if it's become a general reaction to things. One of my favorite headlines in the New York Times in 2004 was Are there any Iraqis in Iraq? Are we just Sunnis, Shi's, and Kurds?

Kevin: 20:31

Interesting food for thought, right there. Okay. So you're getting these clients and all that, and they're finding out about you. We talked about your kind of like facilitation of this process. One of the things I love your advice on this because some people listening to this, especially the coaches, one of the common themes I see that they struggle with is pricing and pricing strategy. And especially with how especially with like executive and leadership coaching, the value can sometimes be a little bit more subjective. Versus like, hey, I'm a sales coach and I help you improve your sales. Like you can easily track that. But the leadership stuff is a little bit harder and stuff like that too. Anyways, you don't have to give any hard numbers, but if you're open to it, like how do you think about when it comes to structuring your pricing? Are there any str uh price strategies that have you gravitated to? Sure.

David Ehrenthal: 21:18

It is a very complicated issue for coaches. And we're not just coaches, some consultants in general, you know, and we're not consultants, we're professional services. I have a couple of advantages. So I get to punt most of the time. The private equity firm I work with tells me what you know what my fee is going to be. And it's very high. And when they talked to me, they said they were sorry it was so low. I thought it was really high. So it would the question of my mind was, my God, are some of these coaches earning, you know, more than four figures? Uh better up. I don't have any choice. It's based on my certification, you know, a uh PCC. And then when I go direct, I do have some numbers in mind. I charge a little bit lower for or less, I should say, for the career coaching and a little more for the leadership coaching. I, you know, I and I can't I'd be happy to give you some numbers. Um I I was coaching uh this guy in Moscow. Um, and at one point I said, Are you making choices between paying me and feeding your family? And he hesitated and I said, Stop paying me for the next few sessions. Cut my fee in half, but don't not choose me over your family, and I'll still coach you. So I have a bunch of cases like that where, you know, if I charge, let's just say $300 per session, $200, $300 per session, if I sense somebody can't afford it, it's gonna put strain on them.

Kevin: 22:45

I change. Well were if you don't mind me asking, what were some of the indicators that you notice where someone's like really struggling? I hear I listen to them. With with fee? Yeah, for example, the um uh for example, your previous Moscow uh client as well, right? Like you mentioned you you brought up that question, but were there certain signs that you're like telltale signs where you're like, this guy might be struggling? And I should probably bring this up. He was out of work.

David Ehrenthal: 23:12

If they're out of work, it's all it's generally when they're out of work that I will say that. Because you were you know how long your runway is gonna be or your you know your on-ramp. So actually the bigger question for me is how many sessions I lock them into the program. That to me is the bigger issue. And what I don't want to do is that I don't want them to throw good money after bad. In other words, if they're really not fully committed, I will encourage them not to do it. I don't really want them to do one or two sessions unless I unless I believe it would really benefit them. That's where I have a dilemma. I don't want to coach somebody who I don't think will sustain what they need to sustain to to achieve their their goals. I feel bad. I can't do it. It's not even an ethical dilemma. I won't do it.

Kevin: 24:03

How did you kind of come up with that initial, like, especially when you were first starting, how did you come up with that initial number? Did you look at what other coaches were doing?

David Ehrenthal: 24:13

I have a mentor. Um, she is where I was trained when I got my coaching training. She was, I think, on the board at one point of the IFC. She gave me some some guidance. She gave me some guidance. I had come up with a number in at a vacuum.

Kevin: 24:26

So you went to uh your mentor and she kind of gave you that guidance as well.

David Ehrenthal: 24:30

Oh in in the program it was, you know, how did I start? You know, I had to get a hundred hours right to get my uh, you know, ACC. So, you know, how did I start? I started with a buck. I went to 10, I went to 50, I went to a hundred, I went to two hundred. Once I got to two hundred, and then I decided that, you know, now I just need to figure out, you know, where what my baseline is. With career coaching, it's actually more complicated because some of the work is done outside of the session. So if I, you know, and I don't, this is not my favorite part, but if I help them with a resume, if I help them with their value proposition and actually do writing and things like that, research, that's more complicated how much I charge them. And it's actually more consulting from my point of view. So it's kind of a consulting fee.

Kevin: 25:12

I see. Are you planning to just keep things where they are, or is there anything else that you will kind of want to work on with your business at this point in this season, I guess?

David Ehrenthal: 25:19

Yeah, yeah. So I'm mainly in a phase of inertia and I know it. Um sliding along. The only thing I have done recently, I'm in kind of a steady state. BAU, business as usual. The only thing I have done is I've gone back to my books and reread some of the books with the knowledge that I have now versus when I read them four or five years ago when I was training. And I've actually found that to be really, really because really, uh that I really want to refine my effectiveness. That's what's right now still important to me. Have I thought about group coaching? Yes. Have I written up a program to do group coaching? You know, one of the things I actually wanted to do was I wanted to create a program to help managers become good coaches. Because I think that, you know, we these people, but they also need to be, they need to develop better coaching styles and modal switching. By mode I mean style in their management or leadership capacities. I think I haven't really pursued it aggressively at all. I just haven't found a compelling reason to push it. I could find a compelling reason to push it. I think that the I have is as, you know, a very small entity getting into businesses, successfully selling myself into businesses. I know if I worked really, really, really, really, really, really hard at it, I probably would eventually get in. I have worked with a couple of businesses, independent of Better Up and the private equity firm, but I I have not been interested. I it's because I'm a marketing guy. I I kind of know what I'd have to do, but for some reason I haven't been motivated to do it. I could change. Something would have to grab me and I'd have to say to myself, this is worth doing.

Kevin: 27:02

It's really interesting. Cause it's interesting because you mentioned, yeah, you were ahead of marketing, right, at one point and CMO. And so like it seems like it's uh kind of the compelling reason. Do you think you'll do you think you'll find that reason, or do you think that reason will just kind of pop up within the next, I don't know, maybe five years?

David Ehrenthal: 27:22

I I really don't know. I mean, I I I work with some people. Some of the joy I get is I work with some people who are kind of leaders in business academia. You know, you can imagine where, you know, I'm around Boston, so you can imagine there's a lot of places I can be, you know. And I work with some psychiatrists who were part of this group, some neurologists and some people in Europe who were focused on uh sort of the autonomic layer of what's going on in the workplace. I get a lot of fulfillment from that. And I think the reason I don't pursue it is right now is because the financial incentive doesn't drive me enough. Other things could drive me. I get financial benefit from working with these people. Yeah, I published a couple of articles, one of them was ink. That felt, you know, that was nice. Get some more exposure. But um I am not driven as much by the financial incentives that I suspect most coaches are, and therefore it would take it would have to be some meaning. There would have to be something about it that really resonated with me and motivated me very intrinsically. Uh yes. Although I do want to get paid. I do want to get paid, and some of it is habit. I just don't feel right if I don't get paid. It's really weird.

Kevin: 28:43

Yeah. Speaking about getting paid, I would like to play a game with you if you're open to it. Sure. It's through the lens of business investments because a lot of coaches invest into like coaching, training, team members, marketing, a lot of different things, right? And so I kind of want to hear stories about your personal business investments. And so I want to play the storytelling game. I'm gonna prompt you four things, and then I'll ask you a summary question at the very, very, but I'm gonna just prompt you a question and you just tell me the first thing that comes to mind, okay? Your first business investment you remember.

David Ehrenthal: 29:14

My training. I trained through the Gestalt International Study Center, which is actually based in Cape Cod. Oh, actually, they're in Boston now. They moved to found the G I F C. So I I made a decision to invest in a Gestalt approach to coaching. So that was like my first.

Kevin: 29:29

Okay. Last business investment you made.

David Ehrenthal: 29:31

Uh I think my got paid the invoice for uh I think it's $30 million or something like that.

Kevin: 29:35

Okay. Best business investment.

David Ehrenthal: 29:37

I I'm glad I got trained. I I'm glad I went to uh a a meeting that was uh developmental, not performance based. I didn't really want to do performance coaching. I think probably that.

Kevin: 29:48

Worst business investment that you kinda wish you got your money back from.

David Ehrenthal: 29:51

This is gonna sound really s arcane and stupid. I probably trust pilot, although because I mean it sounds stupid, but I didn't really need to pay though. Are there ways of getting done what I need to get done? I have not invested very much. Much investment is my time. It's the old sweat acquaintancy.

Kevin: 30:07

As you reflect on like these different stories or maybe memories that these prompt up in your mind, I guess like I'm not sure if it has changed a lot, but I guess how has your decision making process changed and what to invest in, if at all? Like how do you decide what to invest in and what not to invest in?

David Ehrenthal: 30:25

You're you're gonna put on probably one of my biggest flaws, and that is it's a very unsatisfying answer. I don't really invest. I mean, I don't invest capital. And I think it probably limits me. There's a little bit of a playing not to lose versus to win in me. And for some reason, that's what I'm doing. You know, I have a mentor coach, but I suspect if if I you did extensive coaching, they would tell me, you know, is that a habit you want to continue? Or or you you want you and and I would say how much time you got to work through it. I don't know. There's a reason I do what I do, there's a reason we all do what we do. Does that mean it's the best choice for us? No. Otherwise, we wouldn't need coaches.

Kevin: 31:03

Yeah, that was the first thing that popped in my mind is like, is that something you're happy with?

David Ehrenthal: 31:07

I probably could take more risks.

Kevin: 31:09

Yeah. Last bit of advice I would love from you is like, let's say you had to start over tomorrow. You lose all your followers, your clients disappear out thin air, you don't know why. And all for some for some reason, all the relational capital that you've built is now gone. But you have all the experience that you do have. And let's say you had to rebuild this business. I'm kind of curious, what would your first 90 days kind of look like?

David Ehrenthal: 31:33

Can you tell me why I lost everything? Or just just a magic wandless wave and it's gone.

Kevin: 31:37

It's kind of like uh, have you ever seen uh and uh uh infinity wars with like the Marvel thanos just like snaps? Just like comics. Yeah, just like that, gone, disappeared.

David Ehrenthal: 31:47

I think uh I would do a lot of the things the same. I probably would have invested earlier in understanding the neuro neurological aspects, the neurobiological aspects of it. I I probably would have more quickly got integrated into a group that was fun multi-yeah, maybe no, it's not functional. Um, that came at the issues I'm dealing with at different angles. I bel I believe very strongly that um there is a flaw in many coaches in that they're stuck in coach land and they're not understanding, understanding is the wrong word, they're not getting exposure to other elements that affect or shape people and how they're, you know, kind of conducting their lives. It sounds a little vague, but I'm talking about the business side, the psychological side. I think they probably do a lot of that, the sociological side, the political side, you know, um, maybe even the medical side. I think some do touch on some of those areas, but I find that a lot of the coaches when they express themselves on LinkedIn take very strong positions. And I don't think that's always helpful. I don't know if I answered your question. Oh, what would I do differently? So I would have gotten more integrated into this group like I'm in. I would have probably invested a little more into the the neurobiological side of things. That's a really good question. I need to think more about that.

Kevin: 33:09

How about when it comes to like I know money is not the the the primary driver, but let's say your cash flow goes to zero. How do you think about getting clients? Would you approach more PE firms? Would you reset up Better Up and all that? I'm kind of curious about like how do you think about that?

David Ehrenthal: 33:26

It's a really I'd be screwed. Yeah, yeah. Because I would I wouldn't be that all kind of happened. I mean, you know, I you know, for a year I swore I would never work with BetterUp and then I did. And I I was intentional about it. It wasn't like a whim. I never thought about working for a private equity firm and then I did. That came out of nowhere.

Kevin: 33:42

Do you mind sharing that by the way? Like, how did that happen? Because this is like the fur you're one of the first people that have mentioned like the private equity.

David Ehrenthal: 33:50

Um, you know, um, you know, we you know, maintaining bridges is a good thing in life. And I happen to know somebody who was a coach um well before me. And he knew me he knows me well and he recommended me. And that was it. And I interviewed several interviews and did some mock sessions and and I kind of fit in. They're all excellent. They really are. It's it's it was a little intimidating in the beginning. Uh they're more they have m larger, generally larger practices. They're outsourcing some things. One of the I think the big difference between me and a lot of coaches is I like to write. And even though I know it's not really working for for me from a business perspective often, videos and sound bites are all the thing today. That's okay. I like to write. So I'm gonna write.

Kevin: 34:39

I love it. Speaking about writing, David, how can people find your writings, find you, and connect with you?

David Ehrenthal: 34:47

Well, uh, if they ever want to talk to me, uh they can call me uh or text me. I'll give you my number, 617 529 8795. My website, I do have a website, uh mock10career, all one word.com. Um, I'm on LinkedIn. My email address, this is gonna be a hard one, is D and my last name, Aaron Thal, at moch10career.com, which is the domain. Um or they can come by Carlisle, Massachusetts and say hello.

Kevin: 35:19

I lived in Massachusetts most of my life. I don't even think I've been to Carlisle ever.

David Ehrenthal: 35:23

How did you get to uh it's it's it seceded from Carlisle in the 18th century? It should really go back. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah.

Kevin: 35:30

I think I passed through, but I don't think I've ever intentionally like gone.

David Ehrenthal: 35:34

There ain't there ain't much out here. Unless you cycle, you're probably not coming out here.

Kevin: 35:39

Well, David, it was so great just having you.

David Ehrenthal: 35:41

I want to thank you for for inviting me. It was a fun conversation. I learned some things myself uh from the conversation. And uh I I enjoy being with you. Thank you so much, David.

Davis Nguyen : 35:51

That's it for this episode of Career Coaching Secrets. If you enjoyed this conversation, you can subscribe on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to this episode to catch future episodes. This podcast was brought to you by Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, or even $100,000 weeks, all without burning out and making sure that you're making the impact and having the life that you want. To learn more about our community and how we can help you, visit join purplecircle.com.