Don’t miss the Fearless Career Day, September 8 – Empowering Musicians to Succeed

Michelle Lynne: Welcome back to the Fearless Artist Podcast. I’m your host, Michelle Lynn, and today I’m honored to have on my coach, Bernhard Kerres. Bernhard, welcome to the podcast.

Bernhard Kerres: Thank you so much for having me. It’s a pleasure to be here and I’ll speak slower than you. That’s something I definitely do.

Michelle Lynne: That’s something you’ve been working with me on for a while now, so it’s good that you mention it, and I will try to go largo and not presto. So, Bernhard, what’s on your mind today?

Bernhard Kerres: What’s on my mind today?

Michelle Lynne: Yeah, yeah. Go ahead.

Bernhard Kerres: It’s very simple. In a couple of days, we have one of the greatest days coming up too, which came out of a coffee conversation the two of us had, saying, “We should put a day together for classical musicians speaking about their careers and getting a couple of great people together.” And that’s what’s actually very much in my mind, besides a couple of other things.

Michelle Lynne: Yeah, the Fearless Career Day, September 8th, is coming up, and that’s actually why we’re having this special conversation today. I mean, I’ve wanted to have you on the podcast forever because I have so many things to ask you about, and I love your podcast and I want you to talk about be your own manager and the community that you’ve built, of course. But specifically, we wanted to chat today and let people know about what’s coming up on the eighth. And that is a bunch of really amazing speakers who are going to be coming and doing 50-minute sessions with a teaching aspect, but also an implementation part. And that is so crucial, because then people can learn something but also learn how to put it into action right away. Do you want to share a little bit about who our speakers are?

Bernhard Kerres: I would love to introduce a couple of them, and perhaps you then also speak about a couple of them. So we start off with Agnes Vass. Agnes is an amazing flutist playing in Germany, in the Philharmonic Orchestra of Bremerhaven… but she’s also a yoga teacher, and she just founded her Body Mind Music Lab. And I just spoke to her actually before that call here. And she is excited to share the life in an orchestra: the brilliant sides, but also the darker sides people don’t necessarily talk about. And also to share a couple of ideas about mini yoga exercises you can do, about all those stress reliefs you can do, perhaps a bit of breathing and so on. So, very practical exercises from a musician who is out there playing in the orchestra. And that is followed by a talk by Antonia Paulus… Antonia is one of the really great artist managers whom I highly respect, and she really cares for this strategy and looks for that. And she will speak a bit about what it takes to work with an artist, what does she expect from an artist, what can you expect from her, and when is the right time to look for an artist manager?

Michelle Lynne: That’s so helpful. Yeah, really important.

Bernhard Kerres: Right?

Michelle Lynne: Mm-hmm.

Bernhard Kerres: That is followed by a session you should not miss, because it’s a session on sales, and I know all the musicians love sales, right, Michelle?

Michelle Lynne: Most of them, they don’t even know what they’re selling half the time. Yes. Sales. And you, you also have a course about sales that I wanted to mention, but yes, sales is by our friend, Dominic.

Bernhard Kerres: Yeah. Dominic.

Michelle Lynne: Dominic.

Bernhard Kerres: And so that will be great. And then I, and then after that, we will speak to Felix. Felix Heri, who is still the head of contemporary music at Lucerne Festival, but also the founder of Kfka and has his hands in a couple of festivals. And he talks about collaboration, which goes beyond just playing together, but actually working together. So, that will be a great insight. And then Michelle, it says here, “The Power of Us. Michelle, Deanna, Bernhard.” What is that?

Michelle Lynne: Have we planned that yet? I think we, I think we wanted to talk, the three of us. Well, Deanna, by that time Deanna will be awake because we’re starting at 10:00 AM European time and poor her… she’s in Minnesota. And I think we wanted to share about the communities that we’ve built. Of course, us with The Fearless Artist, and you with the manager. I know you have a wonderful community of musicians. I’ve had the privilege of meeting a few of them when I was in Vienna in October. So I think we’re going to be sharing about what we’ve built and the importance of community.

Bernhard Kerres: Yes, yes. And then Chris Still is coming. Can you tell us a bit about Chris?

Michelle Lynne: Oh, I love Chris. Chris is a trumpet player with the LA Phil. Actually just last night, they played a John Williams show, 18,000 people in the Hollywood Bowl.

Bernhard Kerres: 18,000?

Michelle Lynne: He took a video. Yeah.

Bernhard Kerres: Wow.

Michelle Lynne: With John Williams, and everybody had lightsabers ’cause they were there for the Star Wars music. So, the whole stadium had like lightsabers in the audience. So cool. Chris is amazing. He is got an audition accelerator program. He’s also coaching musicians. He’s very active on the socials. He’s empowering musicians to practice better. He is, I’ve had him on the podcast before. He’s got great, great resources. So, he’ll be coming on to do a session with us, which I am really, really thrilled, and he’s just a lot of fun. And then I think the next one is Angela. Is it?

Bernhard Kerres: No, Krishna comes in between. Krishna Thiagarajan, the former President and CEO of Seattle Symphony, also of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra of the Chamber Orchestra, and currently working with the Doman Philharmonic. And he will talk about the future of orchestras, what he sees, also the shifting in cultural landscapes. So, that would be really interesting also to get an insight into where someone who has spent his life managing orchestras sees the world going and what does that mean for musicians.

Michelle Lynne: Yeah, that’s so important, especially because, yeah, when I was teaching on faculty, the biggest thing that the, the kids want is to get the orchestra job and then afterwards not knowing necessarily how to navigate that. So, I’m glad that we have speakers coming to talk about what life is really like after that audition win.

Bernhard Kerres: Yes, which… I can tell you from my coaching practice without naming any names, it doesn’t get any easier when you won the audition. Yeah, this first year, the so-called, even in English, is one of the toughest years you can imagine. And not easy. Really not easy. And some people actually spoke or speak very openly about their experiences in there. But Krishna sees it from the management side, and we round off the day with Angela.

Michelle Lynne: Angela Miles Beaching, author of Beyond Talent. And there were two books that I used primarily in my curriculum, and that was yours, Bernhard, Be Your Own Manager, and hers, Beyond Talent. And she’s a coach. She worked at the New England Conservatory in Boston. She works with musicians all over the world. She’s phenomenal. Also had a great conversation with her on the podcast, and she talks about a lot of tools from Phil Stutz, who’s a therapist in LA and ways to overcome this resistance part as an artist to overcome what she calls, you know, the shadow self. She teaches the tools that Phil Stutz has, and it, she actually coached me on the podcast episode. It was very helpful. And I think she’s going to be talking a lot about that to help overcome all of this resistance that we feel as artists, specifically around, you know, putting ourselves out there, the pitching that we have to do, approaching people that might be intimidating to us. I mean, even the, the bios of the people that, that we have coming are just astounding. It’s such a privilege to be able to host all of these great speakers who have influence in the industry and to get a more rounded view of what’s happening out there and how we can be part of.

Bernhard Kerres: And they are also very, very interested in about what you have to say and what your questions are, and so be prepared to share, to ask questions, and so on.

Michelle Lynne: For everyone who’s coming and everyone who’s listening right now, you can get tickets by sending us a message on Instagram or checking out the website, and we’ll link all of that in the show notes. So Bernhard, what was the idea behind this day? Because it was actually you who approached me with the idea. So, what, why did this come to you? Because I think it’s amazing.

Bernhard Kerres: It came to both of us, kind of speaking about the work we do with musicians and how much we enjoy that. And that sometimes it would be good, you know, all these other people, and I work mostly with corporates or with business people and so on, they have days for HR people, for, I don’t know, investors, for innovators and, and then, and I just thought, “Something is missing here. We don’t have a day for musicians themselves.” We have music industry conferences, which are great, some of them. And so I thought, “Wouldn’t that be great?” And that came out of our conversation in Vienna a couple of months ago and to put that together. And the fun of working with Michelle is kind of, you say something, and then it’s rolling, right, then we are just doing that. Yeah. And I love that spirit.

Michelle Lynne: Yeah. That’s great. Yeah, no, I mean, it’s a, it’s a real honor to get to collaborate with you. Would you share, just for everyone listening, a little bit about be your own manager and your background? I know you have a long and varied career, but just so that people will get to know.

Bernhard Kerres: So, I’m a failed opera singer. I sang with Jose Carreras, Agnes Baltsa, and a couple of other people many of you might not know anymore. But when I was 27, I realized, “At best I’ll make a mediocre career.” And that’s the best shot I have, so I better look for something differently. Did an MBA at London Business School, went into very naturally into strategy consulting for tech. I don’t know why, but they took me. I think they’d love to have a kind of colored bird or so, very good for the Edward things. Stayed with them for five years and then was asked by one of my clients to join their board. So, became, first of all, which is really funny, as an opera singer, a CFO, and for the people who don’t know what that means, that’s chief financial officer. That’s the people, the number crunchers and the accountants and so on. I hadn’t had a clue about that. Yeah.

Michelle Lynne: How did you get there if you didn’t?

Bernhard Kerres: I had fantastic people working with me. Fantastic. And if I think about friends and others, yeah. They were amazing. And I had a conversation with my finance director at that time and said, “Why don’t you want to have my job?” And he said he doesn’t want to deal with the owners and the shareholders and so on. Then I said, “Okay, we’ll do a deal. I handle the shareholders and so on, but you answer me every single question patiently about accounting and taxes and so on.” And we had the deal, and he taught me patiently to read a balance sheet and what that all means. So, it was fantastic.

Michelle Lynne: So you on, on the job.

Bernhard Kerres: But relying on people who were amazing and creating the space for them also to thrive. Yeah, so, we had very clear agreements, but we spent a lot in team building and that was a stellar team we had there. Really great. Yeah, really, really wonderful. Then I went off, became CEO for a small stock market listed company. Had all the deal things to do, you know, with stock markets and shareholders and I don’t know what, really funny. But then came the call to the Vienna Concert House. And which I first of all was very hesitant about because I thought I was too young for that. At that time, I was just in my end thirties. And in the end, one of my mentors. And it’s really important to have mentors, told me, “Bernhard, you’re stupid. If you want to do it, do it now.” He says, he never said that. I know I should have recorded it. He said it exactly like that. “You’re stupid. Do it.” So, I had the chance to run the Vienna Concert House for six years, which was an amazing experience. And for the people who don’t know it, it’s the most beautiful house in the world. Forget the Golden Hall. It’s boring, too much gold. The Vienna Concert House is built for the people, has fantastic acoustics. Like some conductors coming to me after a concert conducting, for example, a big Mahler symphony, saying, “You know, it’s the only concert hall that I do, do not need to hold back the trombones. I can actually also play full fortissimo and you can…” Yeah, but you also have a solo recital, piano recital on the big stage with a Steinway or others, and it sounds brilliantly. So, we did a lot of things there. It was an amazing time. I loved it very much. Also not always easy, to be also clear about that sometimes. Definitely challenging. And when my tenure came to an end, I thought, “Hmm, what can I actually do?” And one of the things I realized is that young musicians don’t have a clue about managing their careers. Sorry to say that bluntly. And it hasn’t changed. Yeah.

Michelle Lynne: Say it louder. Please say it louder.

Bernhard Kerres: So I thought I’d create a platform called, at that time, Hello Stage, kind of the LinkedIn for classical musicians where you can have your page and link, connect with other people. And then, then, and it was a brilliant idea. I was so proud of it. I brought it to Silicon Valley. I had Silicon Valley investors. Brilliant. But what I forgot was that especially young musicians don’t make any money. And just for all the young musicians out there, so that you’re aware is that something like 25% of graduates from great music universities live under the poverty line. That is a quarter of the musicians living under the poverty line. Now, I’m appalled by that just to make that very clear. First of all, from society, certainly. But also by the universities because only a few universities really teach good management schools, management training and career management training. But also, and I won’t stop there, by some of the musicians who hope that by talent and practicing alone, they will make a career. And I think we both agree that talent and practice is very, very important. It will not make your career. You need to invest on the business side. It’s not lots, you need to understand a bit. And if you spend, you know, 30 minutes, an hour or so a day on the business side, you will make it. And I’ve seen brilliant musicians, but I have also seen, you know, good musicians, they are not, not the, the big stars. Yeah. Who consequently did that, they spent 30 minutes, an hour every day on their management side, and they did that. And that, that didn’t mean that they just, you know, scrolled Instagram or LinkedIn or something like that. They really worked their connections with their, with the industry. And so our business case failed. I was broke. I came back to Europe and said, “Damn, what am I going to do now?” And so Bettina Mayer, a wonderful friend and she leads a couple of festivals now and works with a couple of ensembles. And she was an agent. We wrote together a book, Be Your Own Manager, which you can get on Amazon and everywhere. It’s also in Japanese. Kind of answering all the questions you might have about a career and trying it to be very practical. So, not very philosophical, but kind of, you know, get your hands dirty and do it.

Michelle Lynne: I think my copy’s like in, within reach here. ‘Cause I always have it beside me. I’m serious. Like we used it in class because it’s just so great and you go, you go chapter by chapter, you know, website, bio, networking, just how to, it’s very practical…

Bernhard Kerres: Yeah, that was the aim for it. And I started teaching that. And then also when I came back I needed to earn some money and some people kind of, um, showed me a bit of co, about coaching and so I thought that might be interesting and started doing my coaching training and I’m now a certified coach. And I coach, yeah, executives and business people, but also musicians and entrepreneurs, sometimes scientists and doctors. And I also teach coaching, which I love to do. I had the wonderful honor to teach Michelle and to learn from her while teaching her, which was really great. I can remember some legal sessions. I still have some photos somewhere of them, brilliant legal, legal, blocks, you know, these plastic colorful blocks,

Michelle Lynne: Oh, the Lego, the Lego stuff. I, I had a mental breakdown during that Lego session just for everybody listening. We had to use Lego to model out the problem, and I had a lot of problems that day.

Bernhard Kerres: Yeah, and that’s my life. And by the way, if I may say, so I built over the summer, I always have these periods where I do things which are a bit crazy, and over the summer I had an AI period. So, what I did was I built an AI career advisor for musicians, https://www.google.com/search?q=askbernhard.com. And it’s built in a way that you can ask any kind of career questions and it will answer them not kind of on the channel, you know, ChatGPT way or so, but actually based on the material I wrote and I teach. And it’s actually even good, really good to build programs or so. I was astonished by that. So, look it up. Yeah. Okay. We have to talk about this ’cause this is actually really. Did you try it out?

Michelle Lynne: I was playing around with it when I was in Portugal. Yes. Yes. I was talking to it about money and pitching and getting concerts.

Bernhard Kerres: Did you try asking about a great program?

Michelle Lynne: A great program like, uh, for coaching?

Bernhard Kerres: No, to play.

Michelle Lynne: A piano program? No, but that’s a great idea. Did you train it for?

Bernhard Kerres: It does that. It comes up with amazing programs.

Michelle Lynne: Oh, that’s smart.

Bernhard Kerres: Yeah. You can say, you know, you want to have this or that and and so on, and it’s really good.

Michelle Lynne: Okay, awesome. No, I’m definitely going to talk to it now about that. So, yeah. Please tell us about Ask Bernhard.

Bernhard Kerres: So, https://www.google.com/search?q=askbernhard.com came about my kind of crazy holiday project and this crazy holiday project simply come up when I, you know, I have some time to think about it. And I actually wanted to write a coaching book. That was my plan. But then I got so intrigued by AI and I thought, you know, “AI is better than the ChatGPT we just know.” And so I built this bot. I also built actually an AI coach, which will come online in the next couple of weeks. But askbernhard, was really this. Fed with my book, with my lecture notes, with my thinking. I sometimes write a couple of notes there. So, it’s based on what I believe in, what I’ve seen in the market, what I’ve talked to people about. So, it’s not just the general AI, but it is something tailored to musicians based on my experience and hopeful, the expertise.

Michelle Lynne: Yeah, it’s incredible. And did you feed it also your book as well?

Bernhard Kerres: Yes.

Michelle Lynne: That is so cool. I mean, I know people are using ChatGPT and talking about issues and things, but having one that’s tailored to a musician, a freelance, classical musician, all of your wisdom and coaching. Can you share a little bit, I know we talked privately, but what is the ideal outcome for you in offering this for free to so many musicians?

Bernhard Kerres: It is very simple. First of all, yes, it’s for free and it will stay for free. The reason is I love music. The second reason is our society needs music more than ever. And I’ll talk a bit about that in a second. And that’s why if I can help musicians a tiny little bit to make money out of it, it will be good for our society. So, it’s that’s the reason behind it. And why do I say that? We need music in our society. So, if you look in the development of the last 20 years or so, we had amazing technological advances from the internet to, you know, computer power, which is immense to now AI, and that is fantastic. It’s really amazing. Yeah, it’s a lot of innovation. But the thing is that then the innovation happens from lateral thinking, from connected thinking, from thinking outside of the box. Now, we do not think outside the box if we constantly work with ChatGPT or any of the other tools. And actually what will happen, and you see that in some of the AI tools, that the answers over time will get worse and worse. And the reason behind it is it gets asked questions, which are not on the point anymore, not as good, and it learns from itself. So, it’s in decline. Now, we need people who understand the kind of the bigger picture and where to apply AI, where to apply technology, and where on the other side, you know, to come together to, to do music. And neurology shows us that when you make active music and when you listen actively to music, especially classical music, that you rewire your brain in a way which makes you more creative and thinking outside of the box. So, if I hold, I actually on, on last Saturday I was in Ljubljana, speaking at a business conference with the Slovenian minister for economic there…. And trade there, and I asked them all to stand up, close their eyes, and to hum. What happens when you do that with 200 people in the room is that they, without talking to each other, without me talking to them, agree on one note. That is per se, really beautiful. What happens is what I call a resonance. And resonance is so much more than just listening and hearing and so on. It creates an emotional bond between people and that was is always amazing, and that’s the power of music. So, we need music more than ever to create these human bonds and to enable us to think outside of the box and creatively. Because that will make a better society, otherwise we’ll end up to be actually the worst robots because the real robots will be better than us.

Michelle Lynne: What a beautiful way to kind of fight this shift where people are relying maybe too much on having the computer think for them. You are attacking this from a different perspective. I think that’s so interesting and creative. I’ve never, I haven’t heard anyone talk about this like that way. And I’m having Molly Gerian on the podcast next week and she wrote this book, Learn Faster, Perform Better. And she studied neuroscience and how to practice so that your brain will wire more efficiently when you’re repeating bars and taking breaks and the power of sleep and all of those things. So, I love thinking about how our, our brains are being rewired creatively. That’s amazing. So tell me a little bit about your coaching with the musicians and how, how have you seen them grow and change through taking time to invest with you financially, but also just talking and taking the time to talk about their business?

Bernhard Kerres: So, most of my coaching with also this musician goes beyond just the kind of the business questions and “How should I write this email?” or so. It is going very much into the deep personal stuff, questions. “Why the hell do you actually make music?” Yeah. “Is it just because as a child you got a violin in your hand and people said, ‘Oh, you’re so great, you need to do that?’ Or is it something, is there an inner voice, which actually wants to get out and wants to be heard and there is something and music is your expression?” So, I help people to untangle that and to find these inner voices, there. And then I encourage them very much and work with them to see, “What is outside that kind of little square box of, ‘Oh, I could become a member of an orchestra,’ or ‘I could teach.’” “Perhaps I could combine the both of them then?” “There are two boxes. There’re twice as big, but ladies and gentlemen, the world of music is huge out there. It is fantastic.” And Michelle just shared how many people were in LA to hear John Williams. Fantastic. Yeah. I know by the way, how many people love to listen to Michelle so often in her wonderful piano playing. Yeah. And it is sold out and people love it. And so there is so much outside of that, and I hopefully inspire musicians to think creatively the kind of music they really want to make and then to make it happen. And my biggest privilege is, except for some musicians, right, Michelle, that they sent me often samples of their music, the crazy music they would never share, you know, suddenly becoming singer songwriters or something like that. Yeah. Fantastic music, which is so inspiring. And then step by step, they actually walk and do that and become, I, I hate the word “successful” because it implies, you know, you make lots of money or something like that, but they become really fulfilled and it’s also business-wise, successful.

Michelle Lynne: Yeah. Yeah. It’s so beautiful. Our first connection was you giving a workshop for our fearless artist community, and that was how you presented it. “Why do you make music?” and this, uh, what do you call it, the

Bernhard Kerres: Love mark…

Michelle Lynne: The love mark, that, the cross, the cross, point of, um, what you’re talking about, getting out of the box and finding this, place where you’re on the edge of the box, it makes you distinctive, that people will remember you. That you’re not just a drop in the ocean, but there’s something about you that’s memorable and finding this, this particular thing that makes you special or stand out or your purpose. And these are the kind of concepts and questions that you gave us already. I think it was 2020 that you came and it just profoundly impacted me. So, I kept following your content and over the years. Then I saw that you were offering coaching and I’d been wanting to, to step into that for a while, and I thought, “Perfect,” because it is just, I love working with you and, you know, classical musicians and you’ve got the, the history and it was just, it was so, so great and fulfilling and it taught me coaching. I mean, I, I continually keep reaping the benefits of learning and being trained in this area. First of all, to slow down, I have made progress. And then second of all, asking better questions. Learning to listen differently. And I think that all of these things that we’ve discussed in your course have been so helpful. So, I mean, you’re also giving a session at the Fearless Career Day. Do you want to, um, share a little bit about?

Bernhard Kerres: Yes, I will do that. But before that, I just wanted to say I love coaching musicians and I know that some musicians are kind of, sometimes they have more finances and less finances. So, I do that in a pay-as-you-can scheme, similar as that I teach musicians that way. And it’s very simple. You come up, you go to forward coaching on my webpage, you book a slot, you come, you get an email afterwards with an URL where you can pay whatever you feel is right and you don’t need to think a lot about it.

Michelle Lynne: It’s worth it. Go talk to Bernhard. Go talk to the real Bernhard, not just the AI.

Bernhard Kerres: Thank you. Thank you.

Michelle Lynne: He’ll ask you good questions.

Bernhard Kerres: On the career day, I also talk about one of my pet projects. So, I told you about askbernhard, but I also created an app which you can download from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store, which is called Re Vibrations, R-E-Vibrations. And ReVibrations has a couple of things. It has a couple of my courses and yes, I should record more of my courses. I know, and I will do that. So you can do a course on career strategy, on sales, on marketing on there, but you also can join the Penguin Club. And the Penguin Club is, oh. It’s fulfilling. I can’t tell you. And actually Michelle coached one of the sessions and had fantastic feedback. I need to bring her back there. And it’s mostly musicians. Sometimes there are a couple of other people who come. It’s a small group of three to six people and we spend 90 minutes together every month. And just to speak about topics which are important for us, that can be the purpose in life, the purpose of our music making, that can be around feminism, about the role of gender, of diversity. A lot of different things and it’s a very open, it’s a safe space. So, we share within that group, but we don’t take anything out there. And I learned so much from these groups, but Michelle, how was it for you? Can you remember?

Michelle Lynne: I mean, it had such an impact on me because it was a slower type of conversation than I’m used to, which meant that there was a lot of space for things to unfold. And it went deeper, so that was so, so nice. All of the people in the group were very open and willing to share. They had been, I think, safety. What I’ve learned with coaching and ethics and the confidentiality and creating that place of safety for people, it is so crucial. Even though for me, sometimes it’s uncomfortable at the beginning to say, you know, “Everything you stay say here stays here.” ‘Cause people are like, “Yeah, of course, I assumed that.” But just the fact of me saying it out loud, I noticed that they’re more vulnerable during the session. Um, so I, I make a point of saying that now every time. And all of these participants were so beautiful and, and sharing thoughts and asking questions, and it just allowed for things to kind of unfold in a way that I didn’t expect. I think it, it provided some new perspectives on, on things and it, it reconnects us again to the purpose of why we’re doing this, because it’s so easy to get swept up in “next, next, next.” And so just taking that zoomed out perspective and stepping back for a second, it can really ground you into what you’re doing and the impact. And I know impact is something that’s really important to you and that we’ve talked about privately as well. Um, so yeah, very.

Bernhard Kerres: Thank you. No, I love it. And if you want to try it out, come, uh, simply. Go to the ReVibrations app and download it. And there is, I think, a 14 days free, or something like that. So you can try it out for free, very.

Michelle Lynne: I have the app and I haven’t watched your sales course. I need to, I need to watch that.

Bernhard Kerres: Yeah. About the app. Other than that, you also find leadership courses there. And it’s also a community where you can ask questions and so on. So, it’s a fun app to have on your mobile phone because sometimes, and the later courses are all in podcast style, which means they’re really great if you are going somewhere and walking somewhere or even on your bike or in your car so you can listen to them. And you have materials there. Just speaking about sales, for example, there is a sales cheat sheet, as we call it, which will help you to kind of prepare for an important phone call and also know how to close the conversation. And it’s helpful, it’s easy, and I. Yeah, sure. Yeah. And I also encourage you to practice it with colleagues. I do that when I teach. I always have them give them scenarios and say, “Now, you know, negotiate, call someone on up.” I sometimes collect all the mobile phones and hand them out to different people and then say, “Call that person to sell your next concert.” It’s fun. It’s really cool.

Michelle Lynne: That’s amazing. Do you have any success story? I know you don’t like that word, but any, any story that comes to mind of someone who coached with you and then you saw this transformation?

Bernhard Kerres: Oh, I could tell you, I don’t know, unbelievable people and I would not say that it is my, just to be clear. Yeah. I witnessed them. I just was their at work and if I accompanied some of them, bits and pieces here and there. Fantastic. I’m happy about that. Yeah. What comes to mind is, one of them is, Alexander Nche. He’s a violinist. Traditional violist. Classical violist based in Vienna. And he actually loves this kind of, you know, rock. And so he recorded, I think, already his second, you know, rock album, which is great music. You have to listen to it. Yeah. But he still keeps also the classical side of his music and he plays, you know, concerts and teaches. And then, and there’s a great example. Another example is Andrea Kira. She’s a flutist from Romania. And I mean. Andrea is one of the best goal setters you could find in the world. Yeah, because I can remember when I met her, she told me, saying, “Bernhard, I want to have a major recording. I want to teach regularly, and I want to have a regular concerts, performances.” Now, she has an amazing recording of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons on Pan Flute. You need to listen to that. Crazy. Yeah. With a fantastic German orchestra, brilliant. She teaches a lot. She built up pan flute classes in upper Austria where there was no pan flute teaching ever before. And she has so many students that she can’t take them all. So there’s a whole pan flute movement now happening in a posture and she regularly plays in fantastic places with amazing musicians and so on. So, she really made it. Yeah. And it was her persistence, her goal setting thing. “That’s what I want,” being able to write that down. “That’s what I want to do.” And then go step by step, slowly, towards that, these goals.

Michelle Lynne: That’s amazing. It’s, it’s incredible to see people having their ideas and then making them concrete because I think a lot of people get stuck in so many hangups of self-doubt or not knowing where to start. And so working with someone like a coach where you can unpack all of your thoughts and look at your options, clarify your options, and then make a decision, and then you’re accountable. By having multiple sessions between sessions, there has to be some growth or else you have nothing to say at the next. So, I mean, that’s why coaching is so effective.

Bernhard Kerres: But I think it’s also the, the, masterclasses. Yeah. Or the masterminds you are doing. Yeah. It is this accountability in the group and I think very often I highly recommend that, yeah. To go to Deanna and Michelle to do the masterminds because it’s a program which holds you account. You need to do things, and when you come there regularly and you still haven’t done it, you either will drop out or you will get your act together and just do it. And don’t be afraid of that. Yeah, because, um, I wouldn’t be here where I am without a mastermind. So when I started coaching five years ago, I met with three others, and we met every single week for an hour. And set ourselves small goals, which we wanted to achieve within the week. We held each other accountable, we supported each other, and it was amazing. Yeah. And all of us had a huge boost in their careers. And I’m still close friends with one of them. We were often working together and we think back to and saying, “What a lucky movement to do that.” And actually today I also been speaking to Agnes Vass. Who is per speaking, on the eighth, she was also speaking about the study groups, which were part of BYOM. When I taught they about online, and she said she’s still in touch with some of the people she did the course with five years ago. And they still exchange views. So, think about these mastermind, think about what Deanna and Michelle offers is a unique opportunity to boost your career, better than a lot of things you can do.

Michelle Lynne: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. And I think the accountability and support is really what helps propel people forwards. ‘Cause they do have the capacity to go after and create their goals. It’s just having the structure and the support is often what we need.

Bernhard Kerres: Yeah. Is if you get stuck in between, yeah. Go to use Ask Bernhard or something like that. Yeah. Because it will help you to say, “That’s the next step,” or “Find the next step you can do right now. Right here.” Yeah. So, it takes you out from that stuckness and perhaps the last thought. For, I think all of us, Michelle, Deanna, myself, is, if you’re really stuck, reach out to any of us. Yeah, I think we’re happy to help. And sometimes also to kick if that’s necessary or helpful. Yeah. But we’ll do it softly enough, but strongly enough that something happens.

Michelle Lynne: I think people know when to come to me and when to come to Deanna based on how they want to be coached. They’re like, “If I go to Michelle, she’s gonna tell me to just post it, get over myself.” So sometimes I go to Deanna, but it’s fine. We’re here to support you. Whatever you need. Okay, well, I’m very much looking forward to September 8th. Thank you, Bernhard. Everybody go check out askbernhard.com. Is that the, the right?

Bernhard Kerres: Askbernhard.com.

Michelle Lynne: Askbernhard.com. Sign up for the Fearless Day. The career day. It’s September 8th. It’s only 49 Euros. It is a steal and you’ll learn so much. You’ll be inspired. Small investment that will pay off. We’ll put the link in the show notes, or you can send us a message on Instagram. Bernhard, anything, one.

Bernhard Kerres: Yes, go out there, make great music, and make sure that people have an ability to listen to you. That means also you inform people of your concerts and so on. All right, Michelle.

Michelle Lynne: Absolutely. That’s why you gotta spam them on your newsletter list and make sure that it’s not going into their spam. Okay. This is getting personal. Okay. Thank you, Bernhard, for your time and your wisdom. It’s always a great pleasure to speak with you. And thanks everybody for listening, and we’ll see you on September.

Bernhard Kerres: Thank you.

Michelle Lynne: Be fearless. Bye guys. Thank you so much.