Episode Transcript

Chris Villanueva 0:00
Hey, how’s it going? Podcast, we have a special episode today. We’re going to be throwing back this podcast, but the conversation I had with Kerri Twigg, Kerri is just fabulous. She is a LinkedIn top voice, TEDx speaker, and somebody who truly is magnificent. Of what she does, leading and flourishing in an unconventional career requires unconventional methods.

Chris Villanueva 0:23
I’m here to help you do that. That’s how she leads in with her LinkedIn profile. So in this conversation, we’re going to be discussing how your personal narrative matters in your job hunt. I know that a lot of us job seekers carry our own stories. Some of us may feel a little bit lost right now in terms of what you’re going to do next and what your job search is going to look like.

Chris Villanueva 0:46
So I hope that this podcast will convince you that you are an amazing individual, and that you are somebody who is going to go out there and do great work you have an amazing career ahead of you. So without further ado, here is that conversation with Kerri Twigg. Have an amazing rest of your day. Bye, bye.

Chris Villanueva 1:10
Welcome to the Let’s Eat, Grandma Career Warrior Podcast, Warrior podcast.

Chris Villanueva 1:19
And welcome to the Let’s Eat, Grandma Career Warrior Podcast, where our goal is not only to help you land your dream job, but to help you live your best life. Today, we’re going to talk about why your personal narratives in your job hunt matters. Listen. You’re going to want to listen to this episode, because we’re going to give you so much context for your job search and help you to get the hunt.

Chris Villanueva 1:40
Today, I brought on Kerri Twigg, the founder and operator of career stories through courses and coaching, Kerri helps people use their stories to grow their careers, whether they aim for a job, job or running their own business, and if they’re not sure what kind of work, she can help with that too.

Chris Villanueva 1:58
Kerri has been helping people find and share their stories with confidence for nearly 20 years, seven in the career management sector. She also supports businesses as they restructure or downsize, and help support their employees who experience change or job loss.

Chris Villanueva 2:14
So we’re gonna have a really solid episode here where we go deep into the internal stories that we tell ourselves the internal narratives and talk a little bit about the external so our face on our resumes and our LinkedIn profiles and things like that. So buckle up. It’s gonna be a wild ride. This is episode 207, of career for your podcast.

Chris Villanueva 2:35
Kerri, welcome to the show.

Kerri Twigg 2:40
Glad to be here.

Chris Villanueva 2:41
I am so glad you’re here, too, and I have just been following you on LinkedIn, and just so, so cool to see all the work that you put out here, and get to have you finally on the show. I want to get one thing straight for our listeners so we know what they’re talking about when we say the word narratives. But how do you define the word narratives in this context.

Kerri Twigg 3:02
I so when I think about a career narrative, I think about really two slices of it, so the narrative that you tell yourself and the narrative that you tell other people. So I think, I think very often in in job search, people get really focused on what they’re going to tell other people. But if you’re telling yourself a story inside your head, that’s not great.

Kerri Twigg 3:24
I think that that affects, affects your career job search, even more so than what you’re sharing out there. Yeah, so two sides of it.

Chris Villanueva 3:31
So like the the internal stories are, I keep saying stories, but narratives are the the inner dialog that we’re telling ourselves, and the external is how we portray ourselves to the world, so to speak, exactly, yeah, which one is more important? I don’t know if you could compare the two, but which one would you say is more important?

Kerri Twigg 3:51
So I feel like the internal one is more important as long as it’s combined with a splash of action. Yeah, only because I think someone could have, like, I think people who obsess about storytelling rules, like resume rules, this is how you, like, make a perfect pitch. This is how you do tell me about yourself, like people who learned ins and outs of that, like, if you’re doubting yourself, if you don’t know yourself, if you think that you’re not worthy of, of going for Awesome work.

Kerri Twigg 4:23
No matter what story you tell, it’s still going to be false, right? Like great, great narratives that people latch on to always have, like a rooted in a in a truthfulness, and that’s what makes them work, right? And you can’t teach that. Really!

Chris Villanueva 4:37
I’m almost thinking about if I have this perfect resume, and I’m, you know, I get the interview, and I’m going through some sort of career change, and I’m just not selling myself the way I could be if I don’t believe where I’m headed, or if I don’t, if I don’t believe that about myself. So yes, you’re saying it’s almost like this, this priority thing, first, get your inner story down and then move on to that external narrative.

Kerri Twigg 5:02
Yeah, and then, if you, like, go to an interview and it’s not the right fit for you, you’re not taking it personally. You’re not, like, going through the motions afterwards because you’re telling a story, of, like, actually, this isn’t the right fit for me. I’m not going to be happy here. They’re not going to be happy with me. Artists are better than this, whereas, if you don’t have that, you’re still gonna put on a great show, you might even land the job, and then you’ll land it, and three months later be looking for new work. So I don’t know how it helps you, right?

Chris Villanueva 5:30
Right! Can you give it an example of internal narrative or some things that we might be telling ourselves when we are in that stage of development?

Kerri Twigg 5:40
Yeah. So most often, I think what people will tell themselves is a story of like, I suck. So a story might just be like, I suck. If someone has experienced job loss, especially like now, a feeling of like I I’m not different, or there’s nothing unique about me. My story isn’t good enough. And then even people who are in jobs that they like, that are steady, that they kind of like but don’t love, might be telling them a story, like, who, who am I to want more? Like, why can’t I just be happy with this?

Kerri Twigg 6:14
So I think there’s, there’s like, ones that are really mean to ourselves, and then ones that are that are mean. But don’t sound like we’re being incredibly cruel to ourselves.

Chris Villanueva 6:24
Right! Yeah, we’re so mean to ourselves sometimes, like, and this is like a song from the 90s, I’m sure, but like my own worst enemy sometimes, in terms of the things that we tell ourselves, because a lot of us were so self critical with where we are in our careers. You know, oftentimes we’re comparing ourselves to other people who may be the same age as us, or the same graduated the same year, etc, and it’s it’s really hard sometimes to have to deal with that inner dialog.

Chris Villanueva 6:55
So I think I want to dive a little bit deeper with you real quick before we move on to the external but let’s say that we are having some trouble developing our own narrative here. How would you recommend on tackling that to make sure that it’s a, it’s healthy, but B, it’s aligned for the job that I want to get?

Kerri Twigg 7:15
Yeah, so I think, and it’s not for everyone, I think the easiest way to get there is through meditation. So the only like, when I look at the science of how can you change negative thinking to yourself, is being a one is being aware that you’re doing it so it might be tracking it right. Might be like, I feel like dirt today, and I don’t know why.

Kerri Twigg 7:38
It might be like writing down just like, hey, every time you’re talking to yourself, What are you saying? What are you saying over and over? And just becoming aware, you might go, Oh, I didn’t know I was saying to myself, like, you’re a loser, like, 30 times today, right? And so I think one is, is that awareness? The other one is, can you start to say kind things to yourself? So there’s meta practices. So did you know any like, Do you do any meditation at all

Chris Villanueva 8:04
Every morning I did right before this podcast.

Kerri Twigg 8:07
Beautiful. And do you ever do a meta meditation?

Chris Villanueva 8:11
I don’t even know what that is. No, what is that?

Kerri Twigg 8:12
Okay, like meta, not like meta, like M E T A, but meta, M E T, T A, which is specific kind of meditation, just for loving kindness. And so the way that it does like And traditionally, it’s you think about, and if you can’t think of self love first for yourself, you imagine someone that you can easily send love to. So it could be, you know, a partner or a child or your parent, or someone you love, and you imagine them, and you just you say words to them, right?

Kerri Twigg 8:42
So like, may you be filled with loving kindness, may you be well, right? So you send these words out, and then you take it away from that person, and then you start to bring it closer to you, and you’re like, Okay, I’m just gonna say it to me, right? May I be filled with loving kindness, may I be well, may be healthy and at ease, right, and repeating that to yourself, and it might be for like, five minutes.

Kerri Twigg 9:06
So that’s a way of getting in tune with that positive feeling of love that sometimes we can love other people quickly, and then tuning it back on ourselves. Another simple was, like, put on headphones and a great piece of music that, like, makes your heart sing. Pay attention to your breath. And every time you inhale, just say to yourself, I love myself. And then feelings of like, this is stupid, not like this.

Kerri Twigg 9:30
Like, exhale that out and then bring it back, like I love myself. And it can sound a little corny, I did it like I that’s kind of how I started meditation. And what I noticed that when I said positive things to myself every day, that I the way I started to move in, the world changed so.

Chris Villanueva 9:48
So your behavior followed those thoughts that you are now managing a little bit better.

Kerri Twigg 9:53
Yeah, so like when people would ask me to do things that I didn’t love to do that were really bad. That the old me would have been like, well, you should, because you have to prove yourself, so you need to take this thing on. Instead, I was like, Well, no, I love myself, so I’m not going to add this thing onto my clay that I don’t need.

Kerri Twigg 10:11
So it can change the what you say no to. And I think from that place, then it’s easier to start thinking about the next narrative.

Chris Villanueva 10:18
That makes so much sense, and thanks for bringing that to light. I’ve been a huge fan of meditation for years. It’s something that’s calmed a lot of my own stresses and fears in my own life, and it’s helped me to really get a handle on my own narrative. So I’m glad you brought that up. It’s probably the first time in many episodes that we’ve talked about meditation, so I think that’s great.

Chris Villanueva 10:40
So you really think, for listeners listening to this who’ve never tried meditation before or possibly journaling practices, that this is something that everyone should do for their own job search.

Kerri Twigg 10:51
Yeah. Another really easy one is like, if you just want to be aware of to stop the thoughts, is you can just, like, even close your eyes right now and just go, What does my life sound like? And pay attention to the sounds that are, that are happening. And if there are sounds, then it’s not judging them, not getting annoyed. It’s just like, oh, you hear my dog walking. You’re Kerri talking.

Chris Villanueva 11:17
I do hear you talking.

Kerri Twigg 11:19
And if there is no sound, you can just label it rest. So you could just go, Oh, I’m gonna focus on, like, on the rest and just be curious. And even that for like, a minute can snap you out of, like, a negative thought loop, right? What does my life sound like? Right? Now, no judgment. That’s meditation, right? Yeah!

Chris Villanueva 11:40
That’s all it is. It’s like, it’s funny when you realize the thoughts you are telling yourself, because oftentimes you’re you’ve been in your own head your entire life, so you don’t really know or hear these things. But when you just stop for one minute and realize that you have been telling yourself things like, I don’t think I can get this job or this interview, I’m gonna suck. Or, ah, I hate doing this. You start to realize how often you actually do end up having this inner dialog with yourself.

Chris Villanueva 12:08
So yeah, that’s a really good point. And may I ask, Why am I going from being a teacher to a software engineer? So people who may feel maybe a sense of imposter syndrome, or maybe a sense of, like, not not being sure whether they’re they should be taking that next job. How would you recommend that people get clear in that path?

Kerri Twigg 12:31
So on that path, the thing I always recommend, and you’ve probably heard me and, like, if you follow me, you’ve heard me say it, but then it’s asking yourself, like, what am I proud of doing in my career? And well, no, not even that. It’s the wrong question. Like, when was I happiest at work? When was a day that I felt super alive and really proud of what I did? Ask yourself that, and then I do it with index cards. So I’ll say, write down the exact moment. Like, be really specific about the moment.

Kerri Twigg 13:03
Do that for seven days. And then after seven days, look at the stories you wrote out and ask yourself, What skill or strength that I use in each of these stories? And so you’ll have seven cards just listed with a bunch of different skills. And then look for the common skill. So if you see like, cooperation and communication and helping people through the muck come up in almost every story, then that’s really, that’s really the career narrative that you need to tell yourself.

Kerri Twigg 13:33
Like, no matter if I Sorry, what was your example before? Like moving from what to what it was, teacher to software developer. Yeah. So no matter where I am in my career, whether I’m teaching or whether I’m developing software, the thing I’m really great at is this, this and this. And you can’t really have imposter syndrome because with that, because it’s based in truth, like it’s based on what you’ve already done, right? So yeah, you’ve done it as a teacher, but you can absolutely bring that anywhere.

Chris Villanueva 14:02
Yeah!

Kerri Twigg 14:02
Yeah, you’re hurting people by not.

Chris Villanueva 14:04
I agree. I think people, and it’s funny, we had a podcast episode, I think it was maybe 2020 ago, where our guest Maya Grossman talked about how soft skills really are, the these skills of the 21st century, rather than those hard skills, because industries are changing so rapidly anyway, that the ones that truly matter are the ones that you carry yourself, you know, those inner strengths, so I don’t know whether it may be creative thinking, problem solving, things like that are are really what matter because you can learn the hard skill.

Chris Villanueva 14:41
Like, if you’re if you really have the drive for it, you can learn how to code. Maybe not some people, but if you really, actually, maybe, if you really do have the drive, you can absolutely do it so.

Kerri Twigg 14:50
Yeah, I once had a job as a receptionist at a radio station, and it was part time, and I heard that the station manager, director didn’t like the weekend morning host, but I knew he really liked me, and he was because I would calm people before they went on air. And so I heard he didn’t like her, and I wrote a little email. I was like, hey, Vic, heard that you’re not loving the person who has this gig.

Kerri Twigg 15:13
Do you think I’d be good on the weekend morning show? And he was like, let’s talk. And we talked, and he said, Yeah, I think you have, like, you love people, you can talk, you ask good questions, but you need to learn how to use a soundboard. And so he put me in training, where at nights, I would run the soundboard at a radio station for sports, games, nothing about sports.

Kerri Twigg 15:35
I would say, like, announce the weather, sometimes traffic things, but I learned that. But the hard like, and I, I didn’t go to Radio school, right, right? And then I was, I was hosting for a while, and then realized I didn’t really, actually like it.

Chris Villanueva 15:51
First of all, dream job for me, because people always told me to work at a radio station, but, yeah, that’s a separate thing, but you learn the soundboard and that’s what matters, and that was, if that’s the missing piece to you getting the job, then why the heck not? And I think that’s amazing.

Kerri Twigg 16:06
Yeah!

Chris Villanueva 16:07
So Kerri, let me ask you about resumes, and this is my segue here to external narrative. Let’s roll with the teacher to software engineer, example, because I get these people for our resume service. And it is they come in with this anxiety and this this stress, asking themselves, how the heck am I supposed to show that I am qualified?

Chris Villanueva 16:33
I know I can do it. I feel like I’m qualified to be going through this coding school. I feel like I can code some really amazing games, whatever. But they feel like when it comes to writing a resume, it’s a very stressful process.

Chris Villanueva 16:45
How would you recommend people brainstorm and start to sketch out what belongs on the resume or any document that is supposed to portray you as a the right person for the role?

Kerri Twigg 16:59
Well, I think looking at the job Ad, so if you’re writing it, if you’re writing it for a specific job, I would first look at what the job ad is looking for. So if the first bit, can you think about like, like, first thing a software you say, software developer, what would they do? Like, what would be a first task.

Chris Villanueva 17:22
Correct? So, just writing lines of code for programs. And that’s very generic, because it could software engineer do any sort of program or any sort of thing.

Kerri Twigg 17:33
Yeah, okay, so we’ll say the first one is coding. What else we’re gonna make up a job ad.

Chris Villanueva 17:37
Oh, nice. I like it, and this is where I am going to fail at coming up with a good description. So you can say, you know, partnering. See,

Kerri Twigg 17:50
Are you looking for a sample? I feel like a software engineer. Maybe a collaborate with other covid with other engineers.

Chris Villanueva 17:57
Correct, the collaboration piece is usually a part of it? Yeah, okay, I’m thinking of maybe more upper level, but I’ve seen this sometimes, but it’s, it’s using, like agile, or from or just just different methodologies that have to do with the way you work.

Kerri Twigg 18:16
Okay, so we’ll say that the first four lines of the job ad are that you have to do coding, you have to partner with other tech people, you have to collaborate with other engineers, and you have to lead scrum meetings in an agile environment.

Kerri Twigg 18:31
So if you’re writing their resume, and this is like the super tailored version is, you would first go, okay, as a teacher, when did I code something? And if you haven’t like, if you haven’t coded something, well, you should be applying for this job, but you probably did it as like as a student, but you want to first tell them about something that you coded, and it would be great as you’re thinking about making that leap from teacher to software engineer.

Kerri Twigg 18:57
If you did some kind of coding project in your school like you, and it doesn’t need to be in the classroom. It could be something you did to help with, you know, attendance records or some outreach program. But you have some example of when you’ve done coding, because the they’re only going to care about the stories that relate to the job.

Kerri Twigg 19:14
Then you want to think about a time that you partnered with other tech people, or other external people tell them that story when think about when you collaborate with other engineers. So the the stories and the narratives that you’re talking about can come from can come from teaching, but you’re linking it to their ask and then you just tell them solid examples.

Kerri Twigg 19:14
In the in the profile section you want to use, like two of the things, to the words that they ask for in the profile at the top of the resume, yeah, at the top of the resume, I think it’s important to put two words that come from the job ad, that describe you and that are true, and then one that comes from your career cards, like one that is only you would word it in that.

Kerri Twigg 20:00
So that you still have personality, right? Because you don’t want to, you don’t want to sound like the job ad. So I think it’s, it’s putting in in splashes of you while hitting the marks. And it’s a very, I know I’m describing it a bit abstractly, but that’s you. You need to start talking about, yeah, how what you did, you’ve done it before, maybe in a different environment, and you’re using a mix of your language and their language to prove it.

Chris Villanueva 20:26
Absolutely, I think the summary or the profile, that’s one of the best opportunities for job seekers, because it’s a little it is abstract. It’s a little less cut and dry than the rest of the document, and you can really use creativity to say, Hey, this is why my background still works for the job that you’re applying for, and this is why I’m the best person for the role.

Chris Villanueva 20:48
So I’m glad you bought you brought that to light, and I want to ask because we talked about this in our last conversation before this episode, but you talked about this example, where it was you were working as a playwright, or you’re working within theater or drama, and you used an exercise to help come up with your own narrative. Does that apply? And could you give, could you give that example here?

Kerri Twigg 21:13
Yeah, so that’s what I did with the career cards. So I okay was, yeah. So I was working as a playwright. I was working as a drama teacher. I’ve been teaching drama forever, made very little money, and decided that I wanted to, I saw people in suits who made money, and I wanted to be, you know, like a making art in a community center basement, you know, with a master’s degree, getting paid $30,000 a year, but being like the top of my game in the arts, and still feeling like I’m not making enough money, and then I’d see people in heels.

Kerri Twigg 21:49
So I did the cards and figured out that, although I was a drama art teacher, the things that I was really great at was helping people love to help people right in the moment. I loved solving problems, and I was great at building programs. Often that doubled the revenue of organizations. So I went, Okay, where can I bring that? And when I looked at where that would work in a business sense, I went, HR, right.

Kerri Twigg 22:15
They need people. I could help people. I could build programs to help people, and I’d solve problems. So I and I did that piece. I did like the HR certificate, but the story that I had to sell myself as wasn’t as this drama teacher playwright. I had to tell a story of this professional who built programs, who could meet people where they’re at, could take people who didn’t know something and teach them something.

Kerri Twigg 22:41
So I didn’t have to switch my skills, but I had to switch the words that I used. So I couldn’t say students and I couldn’t say participants, because the job ad said clients, right? So when they talked about, I think the job ad was something about processes. So I had to think, okay, when did you when did you improve a process? Oh, yeah.

Kerri Twigg 23:03
So I talked about including it the way, the way that we had changed how we registered people for classes. So I had to look for examples that felt like a bit of a stretch, and then put it into the language of HR, and then believe it myself, right, like, believe that the first narrative I could do it.

Chris Villanueva 23:22
How long did this whole exercise take you all together?

Kerri Twigg 23:26
Oh, like, Well, years and months. Like, so okay, I didn’t have a map or a guide. So from the from the Yeah, and I did a certificate. So just, I don’t know if that’s a fair question,

Chris Villanueva 23:40
Fair enough, but yeah, yeah.

Kerri Twigg 23:42
So from like, from knowing what my skills are to figuring out HR and taking a class, I took HR classes while I worked full time for about a year and a half, but I landed a job after a year in HR as a HR consultant at a firm

Chris Villanueva 23:59
Great some people need to hear that it is going to take as long as it takes for them to land that next job. It may be within a week, could be within a year, could be several years. Of course, you’re finding ways to support yourself financially Throughout all this, but I, you know, I once spoke to someone who and I’ve said this example a million times, I’m sorry if you’ve heard it as a listener, but applied to 1000 jobs within the span of a year.

Chris Villanueva 24:26
It was a full time job on top of his other job that he was working, yeah, and it took him a year to land that dream job, but it nonetheless, it was a huge career change, and it was his dream job, and it was a springboard for everything that he’s doing now today. So, yeah, Patience, my friends.

Kerri Twigg 24:45
Sometimes it’s taking that Limbo job in between. So I had, I had this full time job, um, took classes on the side, and then also, like, network during the HR Association, like, did all of that and and learned how to talk like an HR person.

Kerri Twigg 25:00
I had to do that first. But I think it was like a 42% salary increase when I got the job so and then the next job I got another, like, 30% increase, right? Like, it just like, after I figured it out and could sell the narrative and share it, then it would like, it’s limitless now.

Chris Villanueva 25:20
I love it, Kerri, you are awesome and this poll first segment has hopefully opened up many eyes here from this podcast, helping to develop the narrative for job seekers. I want to bounce on over to the second segment and whether this is going to end up being its own separate episode, I don’t know, but I think this is a very important part of it.

Chris Villanueva 25:42
One of the things that we talked about in our last conversation was the right way to apply for jobs. And I know you just talked about that job posting, but you are also an advocate for why you shouldn’t look at the job posting first as that guide to help you come up with your resume. I want to hear you just riff a little bit on that concept and why you believe that.

Kerri Twigg 26:04
Yeah, so in the example I give before we were you, I was assuming the person knew what they wanted. So had done all the pre work, and they already knew that they wanted to be that person. The issue with starting with the job ad is that whatever the job ad has, if you use the words in there to brand yourself, if the job’s not real, and we all know that, like, not all job ads are real, sometimes they’re posted to, you know, make the competition think you’re expanding, but they’re not.

Kerri Twigg 26:35
So you’re you’re putting your whole career brand on what someone else that’s so dirty. It’s so dirty. I’ve heard of like HR people like, internally, they’re saying, we want to raise and so they’re like, Okay, they put a job out, ad out, and ask people to say what they would expect to make salary wise and then they take all those applications, there’s no real job and then they show their staff, hey, if we were to replace you, these people are expecting this much we are at market value, like dirty, dirty things.

Kerri Twigg 27:04
So but if you’re you’re basing your bat, your whole brand on a fake Ad Ttey don’t call you What do you have? And then it means that the next time you apply for a job, you’re going to take all the words from that job ad and put them on yourself and I think it’s really hard to show up at an interview. Even if you apply for three or five jobs, you’re like a, I call it a career chameleon.

Chris Villanueva 27:30
Yeah!

Kerri Twigg 27:30
You change who you are based on what they’re asking. And if it’s not real, or if you don’t get it, you have nothing at the end of it. Whereas if you start with, start with, Hey, I know what I’m awesome at, and I know the kinds of places that I want to work. And then research and use those words and and then be specific, you’re at least going to have a grounding, right? And you had a great story about this, yeah.

Chris Villanueva 27:54
Yeah! And this, I mean, this is a good friend of mine, but this is just an example, because I’ve worked with several people like this, and I’m sure many people come to resume services also with the same mentality. But the problem is, when this person came up to me said, here’s the job posting.

Chris Villanueva 28:12
This looks like a great job for me, even though I’ve never done it before, but I feel like I would be a really good, good, good job. And this person almost became married to this job ad, because it just seemed like such an exciting opportunity. There was a lot of research done for that company.

Chris Villanueva 28:31
Oh, this is, like my dream company, there is, you know, everything, everything positive about this company culture is, everything that, everything that I am and I ended up, you know, spending hours coming up with this person of this resume that was this perfect match for this job and the sad news is, when we were in the final stage of completing it, which I was pretty dang fast.

Chris Villanueva 28:57
I mean, this was like a quick turnaround time, but when we were in the final stages, bad news, the job posting was taken down. Ouch, within such a short time. Because sometimes these job postings are in and out.

Chris Villanueva 29:10
You just don’t know when it’s going to be taken down, time and time again. People, really, I think, chase those job postings and try to make themselves a perfect fit for something. And it’s like, almost, is chasing your shadows? Is that? Is that an example of that, or chasing a shadow, or chasing something that should not be the source of what you are going for?

Kerri Twigg 29:31
Yeah, I think it’s hard to recover. Like, I think if you have that kind of experience, you go like, Oh, I didn’t work. I’ll just stay where I am that’s that narrative again. Who was, who was I to think I could go for this, this great, big opportunity exactly, I’m not ready. I Yeah, it’s not as bad as I thought it was here. Yeah.

Chris Villanueva 29:52
So the antidote, which you alluded to, but I just want to get it clear for listeners, is what, exactly, instead of what.