#Spotlight with Valerie Pierce, Author and Founder of 'Clear and Critical Thinking'
At AwakenHub we’re privileged to meet so many incredible women through our community and last year the amazing Susan Hayes-Culleton introduced me to another one of those women, Valerie Pierce. Valerie’s focus is very much on strengthening thinking techniques to improve work productivity and the notion that all output is only as good as the thinking applied to it and her books have been described as the definitive guide to success and have formed the basis for an international training programme Clear & Critical Thinking which has been implemented by corporations and businesses world wide with the names of Apple, IBM, Coca Cola, AIB group, Pfizer, The Central Bank of Ireland, Dept. Enterprise, Trade and Employment and RTE amongst many others household names gracing her client list. Then in June 2021 I had the pleasure of hosting a conversation with Valerie at an Awakenhub Community Event, Hustling 101: Empowering Female Founders in the skill of negotiation (watch again here) and I’m super delighted to further chat with her through our first #spotlight piece of 2022!
Valerie Pierce, Author and Founder of 'Clear and Critical Thinking'
First things first Valerie, tell us where we can find you online.
You can visit my website here: www.clearthinkinginaction.com or connect with me on LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/valeriepierce (don’t forget to send me a message with your LinkedIn request to let me know that you’re a fellow #awakenhubber!
Valerie, tell us about you and your journey from academic, author and entrepreneur.
Well, Clare, my journey started when I was studying French Literature at Trinity College, Dublin. One day I walked into a lecture on ancient philosophy, where the lecturer was explaining the origins of many of our everyday beliefs, how they came about and how they changed over time, and I was hooked right there….
I understood for the first time that the way we think, believe and act is there to be analysed and changed, if we so wish. We have the power to think for ourselves in order to make our life the best it can be. I immediately went over to the philosophy department and said I wanted to change from studying French, to study Philosophy. I had, of course, to sit an entry exam, go back a year in my BA degree, but I knew I was on the right path and philosophy is what I was meant to work with for the rest of my life.
Fast forward to being a post graduate student in philosophy at Bristol University 3 years later. I was working my way through college as a part time receptionist at a Management Training School and I noticed they had excellent courses on developing good psychological skills. For example, in ‘Negotiation Skills’, there was excellent tuition on the tactics and strategies to use, but no one was looking at the clear thinking needed to create the best tactics and strategies, etc. I spotted an opportunity in the market, went to the Head of the School (as the receptionist) and told him there was a gap in his training.. He listened and I developed the first ‘Clear & Critical Thinking’ programme. I dropped my studies and went straight into corporate training, developing my ‘thinking only’ courses with a strong sales team behind me.
As the daughter of a Wool Merchant, my focus was always more on business development than staying in academia and so I became ‘a philosopher in the business world’. I am so excited to see how philosophy, ‘the ability to think about how we think’, can be so helpful in creating successful businesses and I absolutely adore working with highly creative, intelligent and extremely motivated entrepreneurs. They give philosophical thinking a new life.
From there on, through clear marketing and word of mouth, the corporate world in many different countries wanted to employ my skills. This was so important for my own development, in opening my own mind to many new experiences and therefore being able to help others in completely diverse business settings.
Though to progress my career, one thing I have never done is make ‘5 year plans’. I know we are told that these are very important to achieve goals, etc, but I’m afraid I cannot disagree strongly enough. A ‘5 year plan’ is a limitation. The danger is it can stop us from grasping opportunities when they present themselves. Opportunities we would never have thought of in our 5 year plan….
In business, we meet new people all the time and if we are listening to them, they can introduce us to so much more then we could ever imagine. I know in my particular case, I have learnt so much and developed my business through interaction with my clients, rather than with my own imagination. The best philosophy is the one where we know we know nothing…and never stop being curious. Something we see in all successful business owners and leaders.
You’ve been described by the Irish Times as a ‘modern philosopher in the market place’ and you specialise in enabling clients to separate their passion from their emotions to obtain clear focus – why is this important and what does it achieve for your clients?
Knowing the difference between Passion and Emotion is the most important skill needed to achieve confident thinking. When my clients become emotional instead of passionate about their projects, they become easily derailed at meetings and so cannot achieve their goals, and become highly frustrated in the process. They suffer from what the French call ‘Esprit de l’escalier’ – the great ability to know after the meeting, what we should have said during the meeting. Passion and emotion are both feelings, but when thinking with these feelings, our thoughts will go in opposite directions. With Passion our thoughts are directed or focused on the issue we are trying to achieve. That is clear and directed towards a goal. Emotion however will focus on the ego when trying to achieve that goal, and will try to defend it at all costs, thus losing sight of the issue one has set out to achieve. Passion is directed towards the issue, emotion is directed towards the ego. To make the best use of your thinking my strap line is ‘Use your Passion to control your emotions’.
Is there a technique or a skill to developing focus and can it be learned, or does it come natural?
I believe we all have an innate ability to focus exactly on what we want when we want it. If you remember back to your childhood and your sibling was about to take the piece of chocolate you really, really wanted. Your focus was razor sharp in order not to let them get near it…..
Buy Valerie’s Books here:
Today, If we find it hard to focus, I do think that is because we do not truly believe in the project we have set out to do, or we are not attached enough to the outcome we want to achieve. So belief and desire are two strong foundation stones or attitudes required for successful focus. If we want to throw in some skills, I believe discipline and an ability to deal with delayed gratification are essential. As if a desired goal or ambition is in any way worthwhile, it will take hard effort to achieve it. Believe it or not, I was never a believer in ‘multi tasking’. To really concentrate on succeeding well, focusing on an individual task, one at a time, is much more rewarding.
You’ve been named as one of Ireland’s Top 50 Most Influential Women in Irish Business (Sunday Tribune) – how does that feel and what’s next for you? Any new book ideas or training courses in the pipeline?
I was extremely honoured and humbled to be on that list and grateful for such recognition. The recognition in particular gives a marvellous boost to one’s business so I would encourage all our women at Awaken Hub to seek out recognition and reward and apply for all accolades in their sector. When growing your business it is not rational to be hiding under a bushel!. And creating a successful public profile creates even further success.
What gave me an even stronger profile also was the publication of my two books ‘Quick Thinking on your Feet’ and ‘Focus: the art of Clear Thinking’ and the translation of these books into different languages such as Chinese, Japanese and Arabic. I am able to reach a far larger and more diverse audience, one I am learning so much from myself…..
My dearest wish now is to popularise the concept of Passion V Emotion and a second thinking tool that I have created called ‘Changing Negative thinking into Positive Action’, that is building on the value of negative thinking instead of trying to avoid it at all costs. My challenge is to teach these ideas in a simple story format of every day women at work. So if there are any budding story tellers out there, please do contact me. I really want to awaken the world of women at work to being passionate and not emotional by telling the story of a Mary, Sarah, Amanda or other….
Our AwakenHub mantra is ‘We won’t change anything by doing nothing’ – if you were given a magic wand and could change one thing… what would it be? Who inspires you?
What a wonderful question and a very thought provoking one. I suppose there are many things we would like to change, but if I had that magic wand, I would make us all (including myself) just ‘be more kind’. Apart from creating a more pleasant world, we could have so much more space for listening, developing creativity and succeeding much more quickly in a world where we put the emphasis on appreciating all the qualities, that can benefit us all.
To answer the second part of your question, I would not be inspired by one individual or famous person, but I am very inspired by the type of person who is able to overcome incredible personal challenges every day, in every way. They are presented with problems and they simply get on with it, making life so much easier for those around them, and also for the rest of us.
Being resilient in this way is inspirational. It is a wonderful quality to have and I believe one that sustains all women in business as we cross the many hurdles we must overcome on our way to success. So to answer your question, I am inspired by each and every woman in AwakenHub and beyond. We are an inspiration to each other!
Thanks Valerie for sharing your thoughts and insights with us and let’s watch this space on the popularisation of your Passion versus Emotion concept. I for one am very much a fan of your’ Changing Negative thinking into Positive Action’ mantra! I’ll leave you with 3 key takeways from Valerie:
Be focused
Use your passion to control your emotions
Negative thinking isn’t a barrier but a signpost
