Today’s market is ripe for thought leaders who work internationally. This ability lets you hedge your risks and find new opportunities that might not have existed before.
In this fun and information-rich interview, Cheryl Cran share some of the reasons why you want to work internationally. In addition to that, sheshares a wonderful insight — as a secret tip! — that can help you when you’re doing all that flying and need to stay refreshed and healthy. This one surprised me and you will find it delightful.
We look forward to your comments here. Let us know the reasons you like international business —- or why you don’t. Any specific caveats you’d like to share? Please let us know what you think. Leave your comments below or bounce over to Twitter. My Twitter handle is @TerryBrock.
You can reach Cheryl Cran at her website, www.CherylCran.com
We look forward to hearing from you.
Terry
Terry Brock, MBA, CSP, CPAE
www.TerryBrock.com, @TerryBrock, Terry@TerryBrock.com
As an added feature, here is a complete transcript of this interview. This way, if you like to watch, you can. If you like to listen, you can. And if you like to read, you can do that also! Please let us know what you think of this approach. We look forward to hearing from you.
Terry
TB: Hi, I’m Terry Brock with TerryBrock.com. International travel today is important in doing business internationally. It gives you, as a thought leader, a lot of latitude to do even more. We’ve got an expert with us today who travels the world (literally) extensively, and she’s got some tips that can help you on the reason to do that. Her name is Cheryl Cran and she joins us from her office in Vancouver, over there in British Columbia. Thanks for being with us today, Cheryl.
CC: Thanks for having me, Terry.
TB: Well I know that in international work there’s a lot of things going on. There’s a lot of people that are doing it. What are some of the main reasons you see in the benefit in working internationally in today’s environment?
CC: Well frankly Terry, in my opinion, we are a global economy and we need to all be looking at diversifying our business. For me, I’m a Canadian who works in the US, who works in other countries. If I rely simply on my own one economy (which is the Canadian economy) to support my business, I’m limited in the amount of business that I can grow. And I really believe the future for all in industry is that global expansion- having global partners and global business in order to diversify the business.
TB: Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense because you say because you limit it to only Canada, you can insert (country) wherever you are. And I think that’s very important to be there. It seems like there are some other good reasons too; like, some people are concerned about the political or economic trends that are going on right now. What role do you see that playing with the international business that we do today?
CC: Oh, I think that’s so relevant. When I was in Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur in April (I was working there), and it was just before their election, it was interesting because I’m there and I actually asked that question about, “How do the politics in Malaysia affect business in Malaysia?”. And many of them who live there say, “I have business in other countries for that very reason, because we don’t know the future stability of our country’s politics.” So that, for instance, the client that I was working with has partners in Australia and Indonesia and other neighboring countries because the political climate there is so tenuous that they can’t rely on it from a business standpoint. Now in Canada, even, we have maybe a bit more of a stable political environment, but even then, we just had a recent provincial election. Had it gone the way that I had hoped it wouldn’t go- in other words, the party that I voted for got in… but there are politics that are pro-business as you and I know, and there are politics that are not. And I think that we have to look at that when we are looking at our business strategy. How do the politics in the countries that I plan to work with… how could they affect me doing business in that country?
TB: Yeah, I think that’s a very good point because throughout history we’ve seen a precarious nature of any country. And the economy can be unstable, it can change quickly, and the danger comes if we think, “Oh! For the last few years it’s been fine, in this country, whatever this country is, and we think, well it will always continue that way.” And of course, our country is different. We will stay the same. Well guess what? The Romans said that, and they thought the Roman Empire would around be forever! They’d been around for a few thousand years. It’ll eventually crumble. We look at the Ottoman Empire, we look at the Dutch Empire, the British Empire- all of them came, went up and then started coming down, and it just makes a lot of sense to diversify in different areas. I think you raise some very good points on that.
CC: I think the nature of the economy is cyclical, and it would be very arrogant for any country to think that somehow, because they’re having a very affluent time at the present, it would be very arrogant to consider that that would maintain the status quo for time to come. Everything’s cyclical, so we can all experience the down flow in every country that we live in or work in.
TB: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. Well now one of the things that I wanted to share with our audience that’s very practical and relevant, is when you’re doing that travel it sometimes it can wear and tear on your body. And you shared with me a secret that you said, “Terry, this is the very best.” So I’m listening to what Cheryl Cran has to say because it’s important, and you gave me some advice and I’m going, “Uh yeah, ok maybe, because I’m a journalist and we’re trained to be very skeptical,” but I tried it, and it really is working. Share with us that secret that everyone that travels internationally needs to know.
CC: It’s so funny and it seems like a no-brainer and very obvious when I would say it, but frankly for me the biggest difference in all the international travel- and as you know Terry, at the end of March I was in Australia, and then I was in South Africa, and I went from South Africa to Malaysia, and Malaysia to Singapore, and then Singapore back to Vancouver (so quite a bit of air travel in a compressed period of time)- was, wait for it (drum roll)… compression stockings!
TB: So tell us, what are compression stockings?
CC: Well, they’re pressurized stockings that you can buy in varying degrees of pressure. But, what they do is: you wear them on your feet and they compress the arteries and the blood flow and move it all, keep it all towards the heart. And interestingly, (I can’t take credit for this by the way)- I was at the German Speakers Association meeting in September and I had traveled from Vancouver to Toronto, Toronto to Düsseldorf and I’m sitting there- my legs had swollen,[and] I was quite uncomfortable. I felt lethargic and tired. And I turned to a colleague (and you know this colleague), Graham Codrington. And I turned to Graham and said, “Oh, look at my legs, it’s so uncomfortable.” And he said, “Cheryl-”and you know Graham does a lot of international travel and work- “for the last three years all I have been doing is wearing compression stockings.” And I had the same reaction you had; I kind of went, well you know, “What do you mean?” And I asked my doctor about it and my doctor says, “Yes, it makes complete sense because when you’re on an airplane, specifically long-haul flights (I don’t care if you’re in business or at the back of the bus), you’re still being succumbed to less moisture in the air, less oxygen, and gravity.” So, all three of those things contribute to the body. The blood vessels can’t function- the blood flow- and the heart can’t pump the way it’s normally supposed to pump.
And what the compression stockings do is:? a) They gave me major energy. I can honestly say I did not feel, as one would normally feel, fatigued when I got to my location. ? b) I was able to sleep on the airplane easier, and I don’t know if there’s a correlation there.? c) They prevent embolism or blood clots, which is a very serious concern with all of the air travel you and I do.
So yeah, they work, and that’s my big secret. I swear, everybody needs to get them. And by the way, you don’t have to spend a lot of money. The website that my husband and I bought our stockings from- I think we gave it to you, Terry- it’s ameswalker.com. And you don’t need a doctor’s prescription to go there. You just get it. Now, I think I purchased the second-highest pressure. I think it’s 25 pounds per… however they do the pressurizing. But they’re really hard to get on. You have to literally tug and roll and really work to get them on. As a woman, I bought the thigh-high ones because I wanted to really keep the blood going as high as I could and for me they work like a dream. My husband bought the knee-high ones and he found them equally effective.
TB: Very good. I remember getting a note from your husband Reg and he said, “Yes, we recommend those.” So I went out and got some myself. And in fact, in full disclosure to our audience right now, I’m wearing compression socks as we speak. You can call them compression stockings, or we call them compression socks here in the US. But, they work just fine. And it’s really important. It’s a fun thing and we can laugh about it, but it really does make a difference when you’re doing that international travel.
CC: I swear by them. For example, I flew from Johannesburg to Kuala Lumpur and I connected through Dubai so that’s a long flying cycle, and I literally- I think I got 3 hours of sleep. It helps to fly Business class. So I got 3 hours of sleep, but I got there, I had to do a full day program, and honestly I was as good as… I was quite surprised at how much of a difference they made.
TB: Yeah, they do. Well, going back to the subject of international work and the kind of things we’re doing there: what do you see for the future and what would you recommend for someone that says, ok I’d like to do a little bit more internationally or I’d like to explore that more? Where’s a good place for them to start and how would they find out more about that?
CC: You know it’s interesting- I don’t know about you Terry- I never had in my mind as a strategic plan to go global. My business was Canada and the US. And in the time that I’ve been in business, I’ve done business in London and Scotland and I’ve spoken in Trinidad and Tobago, but I’d never made it a part of my strategy. But here’s the thing: what’s really important is to make those connections with people in the countries that you wish to work in. I mean, to me that’s a no-brainer and once I knew that in my role as a GSF president that I would be traveling to these countries, I immediately reached out to all of the contacts that I had in those countries and said, “I’m going to be there, here’s what I can do for services and work. Are you interested in taking me up on it?” And as it turned out, I ended up getting business in Kuala Lumpur and in Singapore, and I ended up working a fair amount while I was away. And if you don’t have contacts, go to your circle of influence in your local market because it’s likely that someone you know has contacts. For example, I client of mine here when she found out that I was heading to Australia, referred me to a major internationally known steel manufacturer who she thought could really use my services. Now, I’m working with them to put together a proposal, and if I hadn’t asked her, I wouldn’t have known that there was a contact in Australia while I was going to be there. So I really think it’s about thinking beyond our local market and as we’re talking to our clients, saying, “I’m going global.” Or, “my business is scalable and I am able to launch it in multinational markets.” You know, talking that way. ??A couple simple things I did on my URL, on my website: I actually secured the URL called, GlobalKeynoteSpeaker.com, so when you go to CherylCran.com, if you were also to key in “GlobalKeynoteSpeaker” you would go to CherylCran.com. I’ve also written articles on working in global markets. I’ve made sure that I get testimonials from my global clients. I’ve also been asking my global clients for referrals, and saying, “Look, I’m coming back to Asia in October. Would you like to bring me into your organization to do something for you?” So I think those are the things that, for me- now that I have the lens open for global- that’s what I will continue to be doing.
TB: Yeah, I think it’s really good because what you’re talking about, it’s really relationships. People wonder, “How do I get over here in this country, or that country, etc?” Well, it’s the same as if you want to go to any other city in your own country. You build relationships. And that’s what you’ve been doing so brilliantly well, Cheryl. And we appreciate your information today. And if someone says, “Ok, I want to find out more about this and find out how Cheryl can come in and teach our people some of the leadership principles that you talk about, or international ideas, etc,” what’s the best way for them to get in touch with you?
CC: Thanks Terry. The best is probably my main URL, which is CherylCran.com- just my name- and you can find me on YouTube. I have videos on leadership and some of the international work I’ve been doing. Also, another resource- you and I know Terry, because we’re members of it- is Global Speakers Federation, so GlobalSpeakers.net. Even though we may have viewers not part of that community, there is some information on there that is related to working in different countries that could be helpful.
TB: Very good. Alright well, Cheryl Cran, always good to hear from you about really helpful things including compression socks and practical areas like that. Thanks so much for being with us today.
CC: Thank you, Terry.
