Transcript of The Power of Adaptability: Lessons from Ilana Golan

Mick Unplugged
39:28 79 views Published about 1 month ago
Transcribed from audio to text by
00:00:25

Could you imagine starting a business with a partner, a co founder, Raising capital, and then all of a sudden getting kicked out of that business? Well, that's what happened with my great friend today, Elana Golan, and we're going to talk through IQ and EQ. Emotional intelligence has been a thing. But what about your IQ? That adaptability quotient. And if your IQ isn't strong in 2026, you're going to struggle. We're going to break that down at the end in our rapid fire top five, and then we're going to find out the one word that defines your legacy. Ladies and gentlemen, I present my good friend, the leader's leader, Mr. Lana Hulana.

00:01:05

You're listening to Mic Unplug, hosted by the one and only Mic Hunt. This is where purpose meets power and stories spark transformation. Mic takes you beyond the motivation and into meaning, helping you discover your because and becoming unstable. I'm Rudy Rush, and trust me, you're in the right place. Let's get Unplugged.

00:01:30

Alana, how are you doing today, dear?

00:01:32

Oh, my God. Can you always introduce me wherever I go? I'm going to have a Mic coming with me to introduce me. Thank you so much. So great to be here.

00:01:41

No, I am the honored one. Thank you so much for taking the time. I know how busy you are, so I know you just don't do things to do them. So that's why I have goosebumps because been a huge fan of you. Honestly, since over a year ago, when our podcasts were beside each other all the time, and I was like, oh, who's this podcast that I keep getting recommended that I should listen to? And then I started listening and I was like, Wait, this podcast is amazing. And so literally from episode one to what are you at? 141 now? 142? I'm like that.

00:02:19

I don't know.

00:02:20

I literally have listened to every single one of them, and most of them I've listened to twice. So thank you for being here, dear.

00:02:29

Oh, my Oh, my God. That makes my day, Mic. And I obviously listen to you as well. And I loved Unplugged. So let's go. And I hope to add a ton of value to your listeners, because if you're on this podcast, then you know what's coming. So it's going to be gold. So let's go.

00:02:46

Let's go. Let's go. Let's go. I know you're going to bring it. And you know how I like to start it. And I know a little bit about this, but we get to go deeper. I want to know, Elana, with all the amazing things that you do, from to helping entrepreneurs to helping leaders become better, what's your because? What's that deeper purpose that you have to do all that you do? Because honestly, at the end of the day, Elana, you don't have to do the things that you do. There's a purpose behind it. What's your because?

00:03:15

I love that question, and you know that, Mick. And it's interesting because you actually opened my eyes to the idea because that's all happened when I was listening to your podcast, right? And initially, I was just Well, I just want to help people. I want to feel like I'm making a difference. It's true. Losing my identity, feeling stuck in my career was one of the hardest moments in my life. If I can help somebody get out of that unstuck and feel accomplished in the better version of themselves, that is my mission. However, you lit my eyes that there's a deeper sense of it. When I was reflecting on it, and my biggest reflection always comes when I hike, I realized that it was that moment where, and I think I told you that story, I held my mom's hand and she was passing from cancer. I remember trying to ask her if she has regrets, and I couldn't ask. I felt ashamed or I didn't want to admit that we lost the fight. I was so hungry to fight for her and to win. I'm not used to giving up. I I realized that I don't have a chance.

00:04:32

She has a week or two to live. I remember thinking, What are the regrets? What are the regrets? When she passed, not feeling regret became so prevalent for some reason, and that became my fuel. That became my because. And that basically lit a fire under me because you're right, I don't have to do I do. My husband is cycling in all these countries, and he keeps like, Let's retire together. And I'm like, I'm not ready for it. I'm on this planet for a bigger purpose, and I have to do this. So that's It makes me love it.

00:05:17

I love it. And Alana, again, being such a huge fan of yours. This episode, I'm going to ask a whole bunch of just personal questions, not personal questions, but personal questions that I want to answer because you are someone that I look to for advice. You are that person that I'm like, there's synergy. I know that Alana has resources on this or that you've gone through this. And one of the things that I love, and for those that don't know, I'm going to highlight this a little bit. This journey started for you. You had just raised money, right? One of your companies that you were starting with a co founder, everything's going well. And then one day you get kicked out of your own company. So my first question, how in the heck do you get kicked out of your own company?

00:06:11

Oh, Meg, this is such a humbling experience. And I always say to people, you can talk on any... I love vulnerability, but the truth is you can only be vulnerable when you're from the scars, not from the wounds. And if you would have asked this a decade ago, I could not talk about it. I was so embarrassed. I was so ashamed. And you're right. So basically, we lived the Silicon Valley dream. I live here in Silicon Valley. Right across my fence is the Steve Jobs basement. This is where he started. I'm covered with this incredible Silicon Valley vibe. So at that point, I was already vice president in a very successful company. I literally built it from buying the printer and the to this mega five sites, multimillion dollar deals. It was incredible. But I was burned out. I was tired. I was flying every week. And then a friend of mine, somebody I knew for 20 years, said, Hey, let's start this company together. I got lit up again, Mick. I was just so excited. So even though I was busy, I was working on this thing day and night, and I was so excited.

00:07:22

And we did this whole Silicon Valley thing. We went to visit investors. And it was incredible because our story was so good that Within a few weeks, there was. There was a term sheet. They were evaluating a little baby at $5 million. So they were investing about $800,000. And it was three prominent Silicon Valley. It wasn't even just one. I remember like, Oh, my God, I'm so lucky. How did I get so lucky? During the goodbye party, I told everybody about the startup. I was so proud about the money we raised. Within 24 hours, my co founder decided to take the money to his bank, throw me out of the business, and I was left with nothing. No job, no salary, no startup, no investment. So you're asking, how is that possible? The truth is it's ignorance. I didn't have somebody to tell me what to do. I didn't know that I need to put a founder's agreement And I didn't know I need to put things in rules. It was all like, excitement and doing things and hustling and creating stuff. And then, yeah. And I think one of the things that you raise is that embarrassment movement of how on earth did I let that happen?

00:08:33

And one of the hardest thing about this moment is that your ego just comes crushing down. Who am I without that identity? Who am I without my title? Who am I without my company? Who is Elana? And to make it even worse, I didn't know where I want to go. So now I look all confused and they go to all these events and people are like, Ilana, who are you? It's like, I don't know. What do you do? I don't know. What do you want to I don't know. Who am I, Mick? Anyway, so that was my story.

00:09:05

No, I love it. And there's two things I think are important here. One, for everybody that's listening, that's an entrepreneur, that's in a partnership. Here's the real truth about AI. Ai didn't change my businesses because it's cool. It changed my businesses because it removed friction. My teams move fast. Podcast production, media, deals, leadership development. We have systems everywhere. And for a long time, speed meant chaos. Then we leaned into Zappier. Zappier is how we stopped talking about AI and started deploying it. We use Zappier to connect the tools that we already use every single day. Leads get enriched automatically. Workflows trigger without reminders. Systems talk without meetings. And here's what matters. You don't need to be technical. You don't need IT. You don't need complexity. Zapier is built for real teams doing real work who want real results. No hype, no buzzwords, just time back and momentum forward. Join the 3. 4 million companies already automating with Zapier and transform how you zappier. Com/mic. That's z-A-P-I-E-R. Com/mic.

00:10:26

Verwandle deine Leidenschaft mit Shopify in ein business und knack Umsatzrekorde mit dem Checkout mit der weltweit besten Conversion. Du hast richtig gehört. Der Checkout mit der weltweit besten Conversion. Der legendäre Checkout von Shopify vereinfacht das Shoppen auf deiner Website bis hin zu Social Media und überall da Make sure your paperwork protects you.

00:11:00

Make sure you review the paperwork. We all do it at some point. Even now, one of my companies is with one of my really good friends. But the first thing that we did was make sure the paperwork was right, his attorney reviewed, My attorney reviewed. And then we had a separate attorney that didn't know either of us draw up the actual agreement because we didn't want to feel a certain type of way. Then the second thing that I think is important that you said was that you had an ego. I think people try to say, Oh, I don't have an ego. We all do. We all have some type of pride, some type of emotion. It doesn't mean that you have a big ego. But I think everyone has that sense of pride and to lose that. It's tough. Is that right, Alana?

00:11:51

Yes, Mick. But I got to be honest. I think when you ticked some of these boxes of success in corporates as a VP, running some big things. I have bigger ego than I should. And I think that confuses you. Again, I do believe I was a great leader. I hear it from my people all the time, and they were still in touch with people that reported to me. But I didn't realize that when you're trying to do something you've never done before, you don't know what you don't know. And to make it even worse, the worst part is actually not what you don't know that you don't know. It's what you're absolutely sure you know, but you know wrong. And I was absolutely sure that I will know how to start a company, and I was absolutely wrong, Mick.

00:12:44

But you got up, though, right? I know that there was a moment that you were down on yourself. There was a moment you didn't leave the house, you didn't leave the bedroom, you didn't do whatever, but you did get up. And when you got up, Alana, you freaking took over the world. That fire that you have, that passion that you have, that thing that, and these are the words of Mick and Mick only, but that thing that makes Alana exceptional. The one thing that I think Alana Golan has that most people don't is that grit, but that grit with purpose. There's a lot of people that have the fight, that have the grit, but you did it with purpose, and then you became the person that you were supposed to be. Is that right?

00:13:28

Yeah. It It was incredible. And that's also a reminder to people listening, because you will make mistakes. Yes, I didn't know about the founder's agreement. I made a lot of mistakes. But the truth is, thank God I didn't have a founder's agreement because I would have been stuck in this minutiae thing that actually went down, like a basic, exploded a few months later. And instead, I had to lean into figuring things out. And that became my purpose. That became my mission. That became LEAP Academy. That became everything I do now. So to some extent, a reminder to everybody, your darkest moment. Again, it's always darkest before sunrise, and it's very, very likely that this is your teaching moment to actually reflect and actually put you on a journey that will change the second part of your life. So the question is not why is this happening to me, but what should I learn from it? And who am I becoming because of this? And I think that's just such a powerful thing.

00:14:35

I love it. And so I'm going to do something I never do live. So this segment that we're about to go to is brought to you by Leep Academy. So everybody right now go to leepacademy. Com because we're going to talk about Leep Academy, why you decided to start it, and what Leep Academy is doing to impact the lives of others. So Leep Academy with Alana Gold.

00:15:01

Wow. I'm honored. So again, the idea, the mission of Leep Academy is to take driven professionals that want more for themselves or individuals that want more for themselves or feel stuck or know that there's more to them and really understand that clarity, understand who they are, what their story is, how to build that brand, how to open the right doors so that they can either land the right opportunity for themselves or switch to a new industry or switch to a new function or start a business. Because, again, I wanted to gain the income, the reputation, the balance, the impact that they deserve to have and live the best version of themselves. The beautiful thing is we talked a little bit before the show, in the future of work, reinventing yourself, leaping again and again is becoming the most important skill for you right now. People will reinvent themselves every year. People don't realize it. Even if you're in the same corporate job, you're going to switch functions, you're going to switch technologies, you're going to switch responsibilities. You're going to change all the time. If you're a business owner, you're going to adapt all the time.

00:16:13

So adaptability is the most important skill, and I can't stress it enough. So if you're going to learn how to do it again, again, you can create a portfolio of things and ventures of income that will change the rest of your life and create not just the paycheck, but the life that you want with the paycheck. That is one minute about LEAP Academy. Let's go, Mike.

00:16:32

I love it. I love it. I love it so much. Alana, you have a statement saying, and I've said it a thousand times as well. Ironically, one of my programs, it's how the video starts, and it starts with something that you also say, Success leaves clues. Talk about success success, but more importantly, how do people pick up on the clues that success leaves?

00:17:05

That's such an important thing because for me, one of the hardest thing was not having that clarity of what's next, what's next, what's next. There's so much on the menu these days, so many options that people don't even know, and nobody teaches you. So how do you find among all these options, the days of me being in one place for 40 years is gone. So in that case, how How do I find what's next? Who's going to teach me? The interesting thing is when I was trying to figure out my zone of genius, what was interesting is that we tend to look only at skills or things that we learn in the university. But that's actually usually not going to be where your zone of genius is. When you actually look at your zone of genius, it's going to be a way broader. First of all, there's the because, your why, and your because. What is that But on top of this, it's like, what are people already intrigued by you? What are people already coming to you from? What are the things that lighten you up and get you excited? And again, there's a list of things that we do with people to actually understand their zone of genius.

00:18:17

Because, again, when you find it and you can lean into it, it's incredible how it's going to fuel you in a whole different way. And maybe I'll say one more thing. I think in the startup world, again, And after that horrible down moment that I had, I did start a tech startup. I did sell it. I did start it. And I started mentoring in some of the biggest startup accelerators in the world. And I'll share why I'm saying this. It It was things like Google, Accelerator, and Singularity University, and, et cetera. And one of the things that people don't realize in startup world, you experiment finding market fit all the time. You experiment, experiment, experiment, where should I go? Where should I go? Which should I People don't realize that they can actually use that in a career-related arena. You can actually experiment. Is this my zone of genius? Is this what I want to do? If you actually experiment, you can move so much faster and with so much more clarity because the clarity will come from action, not just ideas, not just dreaming about it, thinking about it. It's going to come from that action and that conviction that you're going to build along the way.

00:19:25

Wholeheartedly. I want to go deeper into the zone of genius. I know it's something that you spend a lot of time when you're working with your clients on. At the academy, you and your coaches spend a lot of time helping people identify it. For the person that's listening or watching right now, the It's like, I'm good at a few things, but how do I find my zone of genius? How do I connect with that thing or those couple of things that I do, exception? What's the advice you have for them?

00:19:58

Such a good question. So first of all, I will say that many, many, many times, like I said, a jar cannot read its own label. And leaning on somebody else to share some of their perspective, again, not in a beautiful setting and people that are positive in the world. Don't take their victimhood. But it's good to listen to what are people saying about you. For me, it was like suddenly I realized that some of the recommendations on LinkedIn that I had put in words things that I didn't even think of. Or some of the thank you, thank you that people will send you in messages or people will come and say, Hey, Lana, do you have a few minutes? I want to talk to you. The interesting thing about it is people will already hint you, what we said, success leaves clues. People will already hint you what they're intrigued by you. The question is, what is that? What are those moments? For me, It's really about really distilling it to what are those pieces that actually makes me unique, what makes me different, what are people already drawn to me, and what makes me excited again.

00:21:16

Again, I think the truth is you will not necessarily know one thing until you start doing it, get clarity, get more conviction. It's not that I knew I want to start Leap Academy. I didn't know I want to grow this thing to a multi, multimillion. That's not how things start. I think there's also a little confusion about you'll suddenly know and you'll be passionate about it and things will just be so easy. And the truth is, I don't think that's the case. I think that's a myth. And you don't have the conviction or the evidence to know that this is the thing yet because you didn't build this yet. So I think there's a little bit of how do I just take I'm one step further. Again, I'm going to look at that 10, 10, 10. I look at it as 10 days, 10 weeks, 10 months, experiment. The way I look at it is for 10 days, let me just pretend like this is what I'm doing. Let me read through it. Let me read other people that are doing it. Let me see if this lights me up. Let's see if I care about it.

00:22:22

If I do like the 10 days, all I need to decide is not, is this going to be my career direction? Because that's a really scary decision. But all I need to decide, is this worth 10 more weeks, for example? If it's worth 10 more weeks, is it worth 10 more months? When you try to think and distill it, it actually lets you off the hook a little bit. You don't need to decide this career direction. All you need to do is decide this one thing. Is this worth a little more time, a little more investigation, a little more clarity? I think that takes that pressure of just knowing. You won't just know. You're going to have to build that clarity as you go.

00:23:06

Love it. Alana, I have to give you kudos for something. I purposely waited for this conversation to tell you. We talked about offline and earlier today about me starting a podcast. One of the things that was important for me even before the podcast was reinvention. The reason I'm bringing this up to you now, and this is before you even had a podcast, I knew you were really one of your pillars. One of the things that you pride yourself on is the reinvention. So when my kids would tell me, Dad, when we Google you, all it shows is the insurance stuff that you do. And unfortunately, that's not sexy and that's not cool. All the things that you do with your friends and your mentors and your buddies and How funny you are. People need to see that side of you. And I'm like, No, I'm on LinkedIn. I wasn't even on Instagram at this point. I'm a LinkedIn guy. And on LinkedIn, it's business Mick and business Mick only. And my kids were like, But, Dad, you're going to miss the boat. So I reinvented myself, but I didn't know how to really do it.

00:24:20

But you have a great framework. And I love for you to just spend a moment because I don't want to talk about it because I won't do it the right service. But I needed to give you kudos for helping me reinvent the person that my kids, my friends, and my family knew that I was, but nobody else in the world knew any of the things that I was doing. But I followed your framework. So talk to us about the importance of reinventing yourself, because I know there's someone that's listening or watching right now that's like, Yeah, I need to start reinventing myself. Because in today's age, if you haven't reinvented yourself in the last three years, you have to today anyway. So The floor is yours.

00:25:01

You made my day, Mick. This makes me so happy because it's really important for me that every single person... We're going to have tens of millions of people that are going to need to reinvent themselves. I want everybody to listen to this podcast and to know how to do This, right? And the very first thing is you're going to have to know what you want to do. The clarity piece is really, really important. And that's where the zone of genius. This is where the experimentation comes in. Because otherwise, what happened to me in the past is when I had no clue what I wanted to do, I was becoming a red flagman. I still remember the day when I met the CEO that could have opened any doors for me. He was also a venture capitalist. And it took him five minutes to say, Lana, you have no clue where you want to go, right? I'm like, Oh, darn. So not only that I'm not doing myself a service, I'm actually becoming a red flag. So the clarity is number one. It's so, so, so important that you'll know what's next, even if it's a test, even if it's an experiment, but you know what you want to do.

00:26:02

Then you're going to want to line the story according to where you're going, not where you are today. Now, it's with complete integrity. We're not lying here, but we're emphasizing the right things according to where you're going. Because, again, if I want to build LEAP Academy to one of the most incredible reinvention schools and portfolio career schools in the world, I can't talk about all the cool algorithms that I was writing in Intel. Nobody cares. That just doesn't care. I need to emphasize the right things and the right stories and the right points. Then, yes, it is about building a brand because especially now in the lack of trust economy, your brand is your currency. Your brand is the only insurance policy you have. Gary Vee said that. He said it better than I do. It's incredible. This is what are going to allow you to leap again and again. Now, on top of this, I will say all the coolest opportunities for mid to late stage career, especially when it's crowded, if you do want to land a job, if you do want opportunities, all the coolest things are only in the hidden market.

00:27:07

It's who knows you that will bring opportunities to you. That's the fast track. If you want the fast track, if you want a land of opportunities. If you want to play in the hidden market, this is where the portfolio career is. This is where the advising, the board seats, the co-founding teams, the executive things, the investment opportunities, the leadership retreats. It's all in the hidden market. If If you're not playing in the hidden market and your brand is not aligned with the opportunities that you want to get, you're not going to get the right opportunity. With the clarity, the story, the branding, the hidden market, and when you actually play those games and you leap again, again, again, your life changes forever. People around you will say, Oh, my God, what happened? And that's just the most incredible feeling in the world because you can inspire, you become the role model that you're meant to be, you can build the life that you want. It's just incredible.

00:28:01

I believe you, and I know that, but there's somebody that's listening or watching right now that's saying to themselves, or they may be saying it out loud, Alana, that's awesome, but I'm comfortable right now. I'm comfortable. I'm okay. I know that my good friend Alana Golan is going to tell you, comfort kills dreams. So how does that person that's comfortable, they know they need to reinvent themselves. They know they need to take themselves serious as a brand, how do they go from comfort to having that courage muscle to actually do the thing?

00:28:39

That's such a beautiful question. I will say a few things. First of all, we're living in a time that the pace of change is absolutely mind-blowing. There is no comfortable. There is no staying stuck. If you're not moving forward at the pace of change, at least, and leaping again, again, you will fall behind. You will lose relevant at a pace you don't even realize how fast that is. Now, with all respect to somebody comfortable, ageism exists. People are seeing less and less opportunities as they age out. If you don't start creating a safety net, but beyond that, it's really not about just the pay. It's really about the life that you're trying to create with that paycheck. I don't believe you're comfortable. I believe that maybe you're not dreaming big enough, and that's okay. But in order to dream bigger, you will have to start creating a big action. To take action is everything. But I will say one more thing, Mika. I think people don't realize the era that we're in, and I think it's important to talk about it for a second. Maybe you talk a little bit about it in your show, I remember.

00:29:54

But about 40 years ago, whatever, we were in the era of IQ, and we talk about intelligence. We would do these tests. And if you were smart and you had good IQ, then you would be a successful person. And about a few decades ago, it was switched to EQ, to emotional intelligence. You talk a lot about it. And I think Richard Brenser was one of the first ones to say EQ is actually more important than IQ. And that gave a green light to a lot of leaders, a lot of founders. Suddenly, because I didn't have the highest IQ, I was never the highest student. That's That's not it. But if you're going to search today and people are listening, if you're searching for today, the skill that is most important right now is EQ, Adaptability Quotient. If you don't build that adaptability, your ability to reinvent and leap is actually becoming the most important skill for the future of work. And it is happening right now in front of our faces. And if you're not starting to create that safety net, if you're not creating your portfolio career, if you're not getting into a habit of reinventing again and again and again, you will lose relevant at a pace you've never seen before.

00:31:07

I freaking love that. You just saw me writing, Adaptability Quotient. We're going to record a whole another episode and just talk about that. I'm just going to say this now. This is me asking you a question I'll get with your team, but March 11th and 12th, I'm doing... I have a leadership series I call Lead Loud, so they're leadership summits. In March, I'm doing it with my best friend in the world, Robert Irvine. Robert is going to be there. Mace Curran, Michelle Mace Curran, former F-16 firefighter as well.

00:31:48

I know her.

00:31:48

Joanne Bass, former Master Sergeant of the Air Force, is going to be there. I think I need Alana Golen on stage to talk about Thank you.

00:32:00

Let's do it.

00:32:02

I'm putting it out there in the universe. If you receive it, you receive it, you just let me know. But we got to talk about it. We got to talk about it.

00:32:11

That sounds amazing. I love it.

00:32:13

You know I could talk to you all day. Yeah, definitely. There's so much that I want to ask, but I know that you are a very busy human being and you have a lot going on. So I'm going to ask you, where can people find and follow you first and foremost? And then I have five rapid fire questions that I get to have fun with. Where can people find and follow Alana Golan?

00:32:38

Oh, perfect. So first of all, thank you. This is amazing, Mick. They can definitely find us in leepacademy. Com. We also going to have a giveaway for you, specifically, Mic Unplug. We want to give them a ton of value. So if they go to your link, they're actually going to have a gift from us, a free training, and something you can download, and something that you can, we call it the Career 360. It's a way for you to really find that few things that actually are blocking you from being your full potential. It's an incredible assessment. It's going to be for free. Usually, We charge for it. But Mike, we're going to give that for you so that you're going to have it for your listeners. I don't know when this is airing, but on February 26, 27, we have our own Leadership Conference, and it's going to be really, really fun. We're going to have guests like the President of Starbucks speaking and Tom Blinkoff, who is a director in Netflix and Disney of all the biggest shows that you can think of. We're going to have some amazing speakers. It's going to be really, really fun.

00:33:45

It is for people who want to reinvent themselves, build an incredible brand, and become their best version of themselves. You can also find me on LinkedIn, on Instagram, Elana Golan. I'm all over. All right.

00:33:59

Elana, before I get to the top five, your event is February 26th, 27th, right? Mm-hmm. I don't know how much tickets cost, so don't tell me. The first three people that message me, AQ, are you more on LinkedIn or Instagram, personally?

00:34:30

It's both. It's both. Okay.

00:34:32

All right, so I'm going to do four then. The first two people that tag Alana and I, AQ on LinkedIn- Yeah, let's give them.

00:34:42

I'll gift them. Let's go.

00:34:44

No, No, no, no. No, this is my gift. I am going to buy four tickets. So two to the first two people on LinkedIn that you got to... What I want you to do is this so that you're not messing around. I want you to write down what adaptability quotient means to you, tag Alana and I, the first two people, I'm buying your ticket to the event. And same thing on Instagram. So the first two people on LinkedIn, first two people on Instagram. It doesn't count if you don't write what it means to you and what you want to get out of this and hear out of this. I'm going to buy four tickets. I'm also going to be there as an audience attendee because I want to learn. I want to be a part of this, too. I'll bring a couple of my team members. So February 26th, If you want to hang out, me, Elana, I'll be there.

00:35:33

How about that? That's so cool. Let's go. Let's go.

00:35:37

Let's go. All right. So rapid fire. Top five questions. First one, you're an avid hiker. What's the food? What's your fuel when you come down from an amazing hike? What do you want to eat?

00:35:52

I need my coffee first. I'm a good latte person, so I need my latte art and all of this thing. But it's probably going to be, I don't know, an assay or something, or maybe pasta. I don't know. I'm a foodie, so I love food. I'm food and I see.

00:36:15

All right. So you're a foodie. What's your favorite Israeli dish?

00:36:21

I love hummus. I love tchaxuka. I don't know. I love salad. I think the salad, they're so fresh and everything is so yummy.

00:36:30

You're a foodie, and then you tell me your favorite dish is a salad. See there, I guess- I'm sorry.

00:36:34

We do make really good salads there.

00:36:37

I know.

00:36:40

What's the most surprising-We need to thank you for Israel.

00:36:43

What's the most surprising- Let's go. I'm there. What's the most surprising lesson from the Air Force that still guides you today?

00:36:52

Oh, my God. I think it's knowing my audience. I think it's learning that when I was giving feedback to people, I wasn't understanding that it's not about what I say, it's how I say it. And if I only knew them better, I would have said it differently.

00:37:10

Love it. Fourth question, what's one myth about success that people need to drop?

00:37:19

The four-hour freaking work week. It does not exist, everybody. If you want success, you freaking be ready to work hard. And if If you want a four-hour work week, no worries. But anybody driven will work really, really hard and then have a little bit of four-hour work week, and then you're going to work hard again.

00:37:39

There you go. Totally agree. Last question. When the story of Elana Golan is written, what's one word that you want to be in that story that defines you?

00:37:56

Impact.

00:37:59

Love Love it, love it, love it.

00:38:03

I want to impact a lot of lives and make a lot of people smile. That's it.

00:38:09

Well, you do that already. That truly is a word that defines you because you've impacted me. Again, I want you to know that and to feel that. Everybody do me a huge favor. Leepacademy. Com. Make sure you're going there. Alana has... Her and the team have free resources that are available to you that I promise are going to be Life Changing. You have the ability to work with her team as well. Just a ton of amazing things that they're doing. If you are a leader, if you are trying to change and really get out of your comfort zone, there's only one place I'd recommend you go, and that is Leep Academy. So leepacademy. Com. Reach out today.

00:38:50

It means the world. Thank you, Mick.

00:38:52

You got it. To all the viewers and listeners, remember, your because is your superpower. Go unleash. Go, I'm Lisa.

00:39:00

That's another powerful conversation on Mick Unplug. If this episode moved you, and I'm sure it did, follow the show wherever you listen. Share it with someone who needs that spark, and leave a review so more people can find their because. I'm Rudy Rush, and until next time, stay driven, stay focused, and stay Unplugged.

Episode description

Ilana Golan is a transformative powerhouse with a career spanning elite engineering in the Air Force, founding and selling companies in Silicon Valley, and now empowering high achievers through Leap Academy. As an investor, TEDx speaker, and acclaimed podcast host, Ilana is dedicated to helping leaders and entrepreneurs reinvent themselves, discover their zone of genius, and leap forward with clarity and impact. Her mission is driven by a deep desire to help others avoid regret, build fulfilling careers, and continuously adapt in today's rapidly changing world.

Takeaways:

Reinvention is Essential: In today’s fast-paced environment, staying adaptable and reinventing yourself is vital—not only for professional relevance but for true fulfillment.

Clarity Drives Opportunity: Knowing your direction and crafting your story and brand around it opens the doors to hidden, meaningful opportunities beyond traditional career paths.

Grit Meets Purpose: Setbacks aren’t just obstacles—they can become teaching moments that fuel your mission and propel you toward greater impact.

Sound Bytes:

“If you’re not moving forward at the pace of change, you will fall behind, and lose relevance faster than you think.”

“Your brand is your currency, especially now in the lack of trust economy. It’s the only insurance policy you have.”

“Success leaves clues—look for what people are already drawn to you for, and lean into your unique zone of genius.”

Connect & Discover Ilana:

Linkedin: @ilanagolan

Website: ilanagolan.com

Leap Academy: leapacademy.com

Facebook: @ilanagolan2010 

YouTube: @ilanagolan-leap-academy 

Podcast: leapacademy.com

Instagram: @ilanagolanleap

🔥 Ready to Unleash Your Inner Game-Changer? 🔥

 Mick Hunt’s BEST SELLING book, How to Be a Good Leader When You’ve Never Had One: The Blueprint for Modern Leadership, is here to light a fire under your ambition and arm you with the real-talk strategies that only Mick delivers. 

👉 Grab your copy now and level up your life → Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books A Million 

 

FOLLOW MICK ON:

Spotify: MickUnplugged

Instagram: @mickunplugged 

Facebook: @mickunplugged

YouTube:  @MickUnpluggedPodcast 

LinkedIn: @mickhunt 

Website:  MickHuntOfficial.com

Apple: MickUnplugged

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices