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    PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT
    Podcast 13 min read

    How To Become World-Class At Anything w/ Jodie Cook

    with Jodie Cook

    Chris Do and Jodie Cook examine the focus, evidence, and sustained practice required to become world-class.

    Chris Do

    Chris Do

    Founder, The Futur™ · May 20, 2026

    Recognition Is Not the Standard

    Popularity can make ordinary work look exceptional. Mastery demands a harder test. Jodie Cook, a business owner who says she competes internationally in powerlifting and teaches LinkedIn to coaches, approaches that distinction through pursuits where performance, judgment, and repeatable methods matter.

    Her conversation with Chris Do begins with an uncomfortable proposition: becoming genuinely exceptional requires more concentration than an impressive collection of interests suggests. After studying people intensely devoted to their work, Cook felt the urge to stop doing almost everything except one thing.

    That impulse puts pressure on a familiar creative ambition. The designer wants to write, speak, build a business, publish content, and remain an outstanding designer. None of those ambitions is inherently wrong. The question is whether collecting them leaves enough attention to reach an exceptional standard in any one.

    Before arguing for focus, Cook defines what the focus is supposed to produce. World-class, in her account, describes someone who belongs among the best and helps establish the standard against which others are measured. It is not simply another word for successful.

    She proposes five criteria:

    • Measurable dominance: Results can be compared through records, championships, market share, output, or skill ratings.
    • Consistency over time: Exceptional performance persists rather than appearing once and disappearing.
    • Separation from peers: The difference in speed, quality, or insight is apparent even beside other high performers.
    • Influence on the field: Others begin adopting the person's techniques or style.
    • Mindset and process: Training, recovery, feedback, and attention to detail support continued improvement.

    The framework is useful because it makes reputation answer to something outside itself. An audience can recognize a name without understanding the work. A large following can establish visibility without establishing superiority.

    Do challenges precisely that confusion. People encounter someone on Instagram and quickly accept that person as world-class. The platform has supplied familiarity; the viewer supplies the conclusion.

    Not recognition. Evidence.

    Cook's final criterion also changes the meaning of discipline. From outside, a person's routine can look punishingly regimented. From inside, it can feel like the natural organization of a life around work that matters. The system remains demanding even when its owner no longer experiences every repetition as an act of resistance.

    This distinction between attention and achievement sits alongside the related subject of The Costs of Being Internet Famous. Visibility and capability belong in the same conversation, but they are not interchangeable measures.

    For creative professionals, the difficulty is that there is no universal scoreboard. A championship can produce a placing. A portfolio produces interpretation. Cook and Do do not resolve that difficulty by abandoning standards. They begin translating the standards into the decisions and results a particular field makes visible.

    The Work Must Survive Comparison

    Consider celebrity portrait photography. The category is specific enough to make the ambition intelligible, but it still needs evidence. Being good at taking photographs does not establish a position among the strongest practitioners of that particular craft.

    Cook suggests looking at who gets selected for the work, which subjects become available, and whether other photographers begin emulating a recognizable approach. Selection is not the whole definition of excellence. It is one observable signal that a claim has moved beyond self-description.

    Influence creates a more uncomfortable signal. A photographer develops a distinctive backdrop or camera technique, then sees something similar elsewhere. What looks like a threat can also indicate that the work has started shaping other people's decisions.

    Cook's response is not to celebrate copying indiscriminately. It is to change the reference point. If the originator continues improving, an imitator is following a position the originator has already begun leaving behind.

    Do recognizes how difficult that stance is in creative industries. Techniques and processes become guarded assets. The professional worries that sharing the method will create a competitor capable of delivering the same result.

    His broader point is about the cost of protection. Attention spent preventing every imitation is attention unavailable for making the next piece of work. The impulse can become especially restrictive when the professional treats every other practitioner as a subtraction from a fixed pool of opportunity.

    Confidence, in this account, is not a promise that nobody can copy anything. It is confidence that a single technique does not contain the whole practice.

    The same distinction appears when Cook considers her own claim to excellence. She initially proposes combining several attributes: lifting, business ownership, travel, and co-hosting. The combination creates a description with fewer direct competitors.

    That is a positioning argument. Do wants to keep it separate from a performance argument.

    A narrowly defined category can make someone distinctive without proving exceptional capability. Otherwise, the label becomes available to anyone willing to keep adding qualifications until no comparable person remains.

    Cook then turns toward more concrete examples. She identifies equipped bench press as a strength, describes living in about 35 cities with repeatable travel processes, and reports a seven-figure agency exit. These are her stated grounds for confidence, not independent rankings established by the conversation.

    The distinction matters because each claim requires a different test. A sporting result, an acquisition, and a travel system cannot simply be placed on the same scale. They can, however, be examined for outcomes, repeatability, and usefulness to other people.

    Cook places particular value on that last measure. A method matters to her when another person can learn from it or use it to produce a better outcome.

    The title alone does no work. The evidence has to carry it.

    When Skill Stops Explaining Itself

    Much of the conversation turns on a paradox: getting better at something can make the process harder to describe. What once required deliberate attention becomes immediate. The practitioner sees a solution without consciously replaying every decision that made it visible.

    Cook uses the four stages of competence to explain the progression. The framework gives language to changes in awareness, not merely changes in performance. Knowing that a skill is missing feels different from possessing it, and possessing it consciously feels different from using it automatically.

    • Unconscious incompetence: The person does not yet recognize the limits of their ability.
    • Conscious incompetence: The person recognizes what they cannot do.
    • Conscious competence: The person can perform the skill through deliberate attention.
    • Unconscious competence: The skill becomes intuitive enough to operate without constant conscious instruction.

    Cook suggests that the third stage can encourage protectiveness. The work is good, but the practitioner remains aware of the effort required to produce it. Because the method still feels accessible and explicit, the prospect of someone else learning it can feel especially threatening.

    At the next stage, the advantage is less easily reduced to a recipe. The practitioner has accumulated judgments that appear together as intuition. An observer sees speed or ease without seeing all the earlier effort supporting it.

    Do describes the awe of watching Paul McCartney sit at a keyboard and produce a song. The point is not a claim about the quality of any particular composition. It is the apparent distance between an empty starting point and something coherent.

    For the observer, the work seems to emerge from nowhere. For the practitioner, the decisions no longer announce themselves individually.

    That appearance can distort self-assessment in both directions. Beginners can underestimate the difficulty because they cannot yet perceive it. Capable practitioners can underestimate themselves because they compare their current work with an imagined, perfected future version.

    Do sees that second error among creatives who possess more ability than they acknowledge. Their reference point is not the work they can actually produce against a real brief. It is an ideal that continually moves beyond their present reach.

    The distinction is important: awareness of a gap does not automatically establish incompetence. Sometimes it reflects a demanding standard. Sometimes the comparison itself is poorly chosen.

    This is adjacent to the question posed by Where Do You Draw Confidence From?: confidence needs a foundation more durable than either praise or self-criticism.

    Cook sees intuitive competence as a powerful destination. Do adds a complication. Once an ability feels as natural as breathing, its owner can forget how much another person still has to learn.

    The ease is real. So is the blind spot.

    The Expert Can Become the Obstacle

    Do's account of teaching at Art Center gives that blind spot a concrete setting. He remembers seeing a conceptual connection in a student's work that seemed immediately available. The student could not see it.

    He offered hints rather than supplying the answer. His intention was to preserve the student's satisfaction in making the discovery. But as the exchange continued, the gap between his perception and theirs became a source of frustration.

    Eventually, he would turn the page slightly and draw the connection himself. What looked obvious to him had remained inaccessible to the people he was trying to teach.

    The failure was not simply that the students lacked skill. The instructor had underestimated the steps separating their view from his.

    Do calls this the curse of knowledge: expertise makes it difficult to remember what not knowing felt like. In his description, accomplished practitioners remember the difference between near-perfect performance and perfection while losing touch with the much larger distance a beginner must cross.

    That distinction changes the teaching problem. Repeating an instruction more forcefully does not necessarily make the missing reasoning visible. Neither does placing the solution directly beside the student's work if the student cannot perceive the relationship.

    His example also complicates a generous teaching instinct. Letting learners discover something themselves can preserve agency and satisfaction. Yet withholding too much structure can leave them stranded inside a problem the instructor has forgotten how to enter.

    Good intentions do not replace a usable explanation.

    Cook extends the issue beyond the classroom. A highly capable business owner can begin treating every failed handoff as proof that nobody else can do the work. Hiring becomes difficult. Outsourcing becomes disappointing. The owner keeps taking responsibility back.

    The result is not necessarily superior quality. It can be dependence on a single person's unspoken judgment.

    That pressure belongs to the territory of Moving from Makers to Entrepreneurs. A maker can rely on personal execution. A business owner who wants a team needs a way to make at least some of that execution understandable to someone else.

    Cook's prescription is structural: record methods before they become invisible to their owner. Teaching is one route. A journal is another. The point is to preserve the reasoning while the practitioner still knows what required attention.

    Do argues that conscious competence therefore offers a valuable teaching window. The person knows enough to help but has not yet forgotten the mechanics of getting there. This is his practical argument, not a claim that advanced experts are incapable of becoming excellent instructors.

    He describes having to reconstruct his own thinking when someone asks how he produced a result. Expertise remains an asset. But making it transferable becomes a second piece of work.

    A method that cannot leave its owner is a limit on everyone around it.

    Specificity Makes Expertise Visible

    The problem becomes more complicated when expertise must be evaluated. A capable practitioner can struggle to explain an intuitive skill. An unqualified practitioner can sound confident. Presentation and ability do not always arrive together.

    Do initially says that exceptional competence can be felt in a person's language and manner. Cook catches the weakness in that answer: he is describing an intuitive judgment without explaining the process behind it.

    His response becomes one of the conversation's most useful demonstrations. Rather than asking for a grand theory of expertise, he asks Cook about a specific ability: recognizing a LinkedIn opening that will perform.

    At first, the skill sounds like instinct. Then the questions become narrower. What patterns distinguish effective openings? What makes an ineffective one recognizable? The move from broad claim to concrete comparison begins exposing the judgment inside the intuition.

    Cook identifies several characteristics:

    • Strong openings create an information gap that gives the reader a reason to continue.
    • They produce an emotional response rather than merely presenting information.
    • They say something less familiar than the usual formulation.
    • Weak openings ask questions whose answers do not matter to the reader.
    • Other weak openings demand too much thought or omit too much context to make sense.

    These are Cook's stated observations, not guarantees that a particular post will succeed. Their value in the exchange is diagnostic. She can move beyond saying that a hook feels right and identify the features informing that feeling.

    The ability to distinguish productive curiosity from simple confusion is especially revealing. Both involve missing information. Only one gives the reader enough orientation to want the rest.

    The discussion connects naturally to Mastering LinkedIn, but its larger lesson is not platform-specific. Asking someone to compare successful and unsuccessful examples often produces more useful information than asking whether they are an expert.

    Do's test is the ability to expand under specific questioning. Someone who has practiced deeply can often name differences, explain failures, and describe what should change. Their reasoning does not have to begin as a polished lecture to become inspectable.

    Confidence is less important than what the questions uncover.

    This also offers a better way to seek help. A vague request for someone's process can be difficult to answer because the process contains too many compressed decisions. A narrower question gives the expert a point of entry.

    In Do's teaching story, an outsider's question forced him to crawl back through his own thinking. Here, he performs that service for Cook. The exchange turns an apparently private instinct into a set of distinctions another person can examine.

    The strongest evidence is not the smoothness of the original claim. It is the useful detail that remains when the claim is pressed.

    The Plateau Is Where Focus Gets Tested

    Cook's opening impulse to abandon everything except one pursuit returns with more precision. The destination is not merely competence. It is the level at which sustained practice has produced a depth of judgment that casual participation cannot replicate.

    The obstacle, in her account, is often the end of easy progress. Starting something new produces visible gains. Then the rate changes. Improvement becomes less obvious, and another pursuit begins looking more attractive.

    Cook describes that moment as an inevitable dip or plateau. Her concern is not that people lack the ability to begin. It is that they change strategies before their existing work has had enough time to develop into something exceptional.

    The temptation is understandable. A fresh pursuit restores the feeling of movement. The current one has begun demanding more effort for less immediately visible change.

    But changing activities can mean repeatedly collecting beginnings rather than developing depth.

    This is where more energy into fewer things becomes the practical center of Cook's argument. She does not finish by announcing that she will abandon powerlifting, business, or every other interest. She decides that adding more is the wrong direction.

    That is a more demanding conclusion than it initially sounds. A new commitment rarely arrives labeled as a threat to mastery. It arrives as an opportunity, an interesting idea, or another capability worth developing.

    Cook's point is that the new activity still draws from the same available attention. Its appeal does not erase that cost.

    She also resists pretending that every person needs an identical number of pursuits. Different people can sustain different combinations. Her governing assumption is stricter: begin with the focus one pursuit requires, then recognize that each addition takes something away.

    The conclusion is not an argument for a life without variety. It is an argument against treating every ambition as compatible at full intensity.

    Do's account of his own skills reinforces that selectivity. He describes graphic design, particularly typography, as an area where he believes he can outperform most people. He does not extend the same claim automatically to authorship or public speaking.

    That restraint gives the claim more definition. Competence in one field does not become universal excellence simply because the same person enters another.

    Cook's research has made obsession attractive to her, but the conversation strips away some of its romance. Obsession is not just enthusiasm that sounds impressive in retrospect. It has consequences for the calendar, for competing interests, and for how long someone remains with work after novelty has faded.

    The question is no longer whether mastery sounds desirable. It is whether the person wants it more than the next appealing addition.

    Choose the Work That Gets the Time

    By the end, Cook's prescription is direct. The language is simple because the difficulty lies in following it, not understanding it. There is no elaborate productivity system offered to make the commitment painless.

    Her closing instructions establish a sequence:

    • Pick something.
    • Find a master.
    • Become a student of the game.
    • Keep going through the dip.
    • Do not underestimate the intensity required to do something well.
    • Trust that continued development can lead toward unconscious competence.

    The first instruction is deliberately broad, but the rest prevent it from becoming casual encouragement. Choosing a pursuit means choosing a standard to study. Finding a master creates a reference point beyond personal enthusiasm.

    Becoming a student requires more than admiring finished work. Across the conversation, the substance of that study has already appeared: attention to technique, training, recovery, feedback, and the patterns that distinguish a strong result from a weak one.

    The plateau then tests whether the commitment survives a less flattering phase. Cook does not offer a timetable for reaching intuitive mastery. Nor does the conversation establish that persistence alone guarantees world-class performance.

    Its narrower argument is stronger: abandoning the work whenever early gains disappear prevents the deeper development being sought.

    There is also a responsibility to retain evidence. Cook's five criteria keep the ambition from dissolving into identity alone. Feeling exceptional can influence how a person behaves, but measurable results, sustained performance, and influence provide something other people can examine.

    That tension between identity and evidence remains productive. Cook values the integrity of acting in accordance with a chosen identity. Do insists that self-identification needs an objective counterpart. Confidence can organize effort; it cannot certify the outcome.

    For a creative professional, the practical challenge is therefore twofold. The work needs enough concentrated attention to improve. The claim of improvement needs enough specificity to be tested.

    Those requirements also explain why documenting methods belongs inside the pursuit rather than after it. The person who becomes exceptional but cannot share any reasoning has preserved a personal advantage while creating a teaching and management problem.

    Cook's version of achievement includes helping others benefit from what has been learned. Do's teaching experience shows the effort that requires. Giving away knowledge is not the same as making it usable.

    The final challenge is subtraction. A professional already carrying several serious ambitions does not necessarily need another framework, platform, or identity. Cook's response to studying exceptional people is to stop expanding the field of commitments and put more force behind the work already underway.

    The standard stays demanding. The schedule has to become more honest.

    Do reduces the prescription to its bluntest form: “become obsessed and then do the work”.

    TRANSCRIPT

    Today we're going to talk about how you become world -class at something and honestly in researching for this it just made me want to stop doing every single thing that I do apart from one thing and be world -class at it because I've been studying people who are obsessed with one thing and it's infectious. It's really cool. So what does world -class mean Jodie? So I wonder how do you define world -class? I've got someone is not only among the very best but they set the standard for others and then the definition of world -class that we could follow in this episode has five main points and that's measurable dominance that it can be quantified against others so like world records or championships or market share or output or skill ratings something that shows that you operate at the very top. Two is consistency over time so it's not just that you peak once it's that you sustain it so world -class means you show up year after year it's not just this flash of brilliance that then goes away. Separation from peers number three so the idea that if you watch someone doing their thing the gap is obvious they've got some kind of speed or some kind of quality or some kind of insight that makes even other high performers look ordinary. And then four influence on the field so they're almost redefining what good looks like so they're doing their thing and then others are copying their techniques they're copying their style because that person has themselves raised the bar and then the fifth one is their mindset and the process that they follow so the idea that they're not just talented and they haven't just been born with something that they're just using they've also got a system they're obsessed with the details they put in relentless training recovery feedback loops and then discipline to keep improving even when they are already ahead. And then discipline we'll probably talk about later because they might not see it as discipline they might just see it as a system they're obsessed with the details they put in relentless training recovery feedback loops and then discipline to keep improving even when they are already ahead and then discipline we'll probably talk about later because they might not see it as discipline they might just see it as what they do but then to an onlooker they will look incredibly regimented and disciplined yeah so your definition or your criteria for being world class is much deeper than i thought but i'm not surprised there when we ask you are you world class people are really quick to say yes or i'll say is this person world class because you've seen him on instagram like yes like hmm i think we're not looking hard enough we're just assuming popularity equals world class and it's not that way so let's take photographer for the sake of conversation let's say you shoot celebrity portraits that's about as narrow as i can get so if we look at that jody based on the things that you've been able to observe the five criteria does anything change at all like how do we help people understand this kind of in layman terms i think if your field was something narrow like celebrity portraits i think it would be really important to define yourself when you feel like you are world class in that which might be different from someone else's definition but it doesn't necessarily matter but that might be when you get the jobs over other people when you get selected over other people when you get to shoot who you believe are the best celebrities in the world when you're shooting a -listers instead of d -listers and then i quite like the idea of influence on the field in that i feel like if you were in that field and you were becoming world class you would start to notice your specific style being emulated by other people and maybe at first you would see it and you would say huh i do that i did that i invented that camera technique or i invented that backdrop or something like that and you would feel a bit strange but then you would very quickly realize that that was a such a big compliment and then you would start to feel proud of people copying you because you're still improving so if they're a few steps behind fine let them be because you're still going yeah a lot of people don't see you like that though unfortunately especially in the creative space so that's why certain techniques tools processes are such guarded secrets people don't want to share that because they don't want to create clones so if they're a few steps behind fine let them be because you're still going yeah a lot of people don't see it like that though unfortunately especially in the creative space so that's why certain techniques tools processes are such guarded secrets people don't want to share that because they don't want to create clones now i'm not advocating for like people copying people it's inevitable but here's an example this is a real world example for many years and probably still to this day if you go on a photographer's website they use some kind of flash or java so that you can't download the images but you know i can just screen capture it they just don't want to make it 20 easier for you to download and because of that the spiders from google can't index your images so when you search for your work you can't find it so yeah you're making it like 10 20 harder for people to download your images but you're also making it 20 or 100 harder for indexing robots to find your work and to be able to send people your way so it's it's a double -edged sword but they'd rather do that now you can test this theory and it it's slowly starting to change because i think they've like raised their hand and said well i would prefer to be found than to try to protect my images this way and so we kind of use that as a way to slow down competition we don't look at it as a there's like a scarcity mindset there's a zero -sum game mindset and there's not an abundance mindset where you know there's a lot of work out there and the people who know will know that i was the one who took these photos and originated this particular style or technique i feel like the people who are really truly at the top so the people who spring to mind are people like beyonce does beyonce protect things on her website because she thinks that people are going to copy it like i don't think she does i think she's just being beyonce doing her thing knowing that copycats are inevitable but just she's so far away from that that it doesn't even cross her mind i think i'm not i don't know her personally but i can almost imagine you get to a stage where that just doesn't even matter at all it's just too small for you to think about yes you know let's go beyond that though when you're so confident and world -class you start to let go of this idea like i've got enough and actually i want to help other people in my space do well but i also want to lead I can almost imagine you get to a stage where that just doesn't even matter at all. It's just too small for you to think about. Yes. You know, let's go beyond that, though. When you're so confident and world -class, you start to let go of this idea like, I've got enough. And actually, I want to help other people in my space do well. But I also want to lead and show that generosity can be a thing. And so I'm going to just give stuff away. And I think it takes a level of confidence to be able to do that. And they're not so worried like, oh, I mean, as soon as you listen to something, that's a Moby sound. You can tell his signature, his fingerprints are all over it. Same thing with Trent Reznor, Nine Inch Nails. It's like, yeah, it's so distinctive of a sound that it'd be hard for you to copy and not be labeled as a copycat. If we also look at the different stages of competence as well, because that's all on the journey to becoming world -class. If you have first unconscious incompetence when you don't know that you're not very good at something, then as soon as you start trying it out, you realize that you now know. That you're not very good at it. And then you progress up to conscious competence where you know that you're becoming really good at something. But then after that, you move beyond it where it becomes this unconscious thing where you almost just have this intuition around what you're doing. I think that the stage at which you really do want to protect what you're doing is probably number three, the conscious competence. Because that's probably where you are aware that you have to put a lot of conscious work into being good. And therefore, it could maybe feel like there's a danger there that someone else could just do that too. But I think that once you get to unconscious competence, you're almost untouchable because of how many hours you've had to put in getting to that level of just innate being good at something. And if you realize you're in that stage, there's a big power in that because you could just keep going forever and ever and keep getting better. There's a lot of power in that because it feels effortless to you. People look at you and it's like, how are you doing? Are you just pulling us out of thin air? When I watch Sir Paul McCartney just play a thing on a keyboard and just write a song from nothingness. I'm not saying it's a great song, but it's still a song. because it feels effortless to you. People look at you and it's like, how are you doing? Are you just pulling us out of thin air? When I watch Sir Paul McCartney just play a thing on a keyboard and just write a song from nothingness, I'm not saying it's a great song, but it's still a song. It's like you're in awe. But there's the downside. So as I spend more time thinking about my own philosophy and belief systems, and I'm kind of bumping up to other people who share the same ideas who are much more deep in the philosophy, but there's this idea that there's no such thing as a good thing without a bad thing and no such thing as a bad thing without a good thing. So what's the problem when you reach unconscious competence? Meaning you're so competent you don't even think about doing it. just gets done. It's so natural, like breathing. We're not focused on breathing. We do it all the time. Or like blinking. You only exert effort when you think about it. That's the level you want to get to, okay? The downside to this is a form of cognitive bias called the curse of knowledge. You and I probably suffer from some form of curse of knowledge. The curse of knowledge says we've become so good at doing something that we forget at one point in our lives we used to struggle. So this is where some high performers get really nasty with people. Like, why can't you do this? You're so stupid. It's so easy. Just do it like this. And so they make horrible instructors because they can't remember what it was like from zero to 70. They just know what it feels like from 99 to 100. And so for many, many years this is a confession. I'm so sorry, everybody. My former students at Art Center I was like how come you can't see these two things? Like literally right next to each other the image you should have made is like right there. And they're staring at it and everybody's like what is he looking at? I'm like it's right there. I swear to you it's right there. And I would give him hints without trying to tell him what it is. And then after 20 minutes of doing this they're like ah, will you just tell us? I'm like, alright. I walk over with my marker I turn the page a little bit and I draw this. And they're like oh my god! And I think what they're thinking is we hate you. It was literally right there. It was just a squint of the eye a little bending of your what you perceive and the answer was there and conceptually. And the reason why I'm so reluctant to show them I want to oh my God. And I think what they're thinking is we hate you. It was literally right there. It was just a squint of the eye, a little bending of your, what you perceive. And the answer was there and conceptually. And the reason why I'm so reluctant to show them, I want to lead them without telling them because I do not want to rob them of the joy of putting these things together themselves. But I say all this stuff because when I went to teach, I would get frustrated because I'm like, guys, we've been doing this for 10 weeks now. And every single time I ask you, think about it like this, you're still stuck. So this is the curse of knowledge. When you have unconscious competence, you can get a little testy with people. You forget the actual steps. So when you were saying before, when you're consciously competent, it's a dangerous time, but it's actually your best time to become an instructor because you're moving into a state where you will no longer remember how to do what you do, but you have enough knowledge behind you that you can teach others. And most of us either never get to conscious competence or zoom past it and we lose this window that we have. So it's not until some young person or some inexperienced person from a different field asked me, Chris, how'd you do that? And it's never occurred to me that it's not obvious to everyone until I'm asked, how'd you do that? And then I have to sit there and crawl into my own brain and say, let me try and break it down for you this way. Now, luckily I have that ability to do that, but a lot of people who are very good do not have that ability to do that. I feel like when you do have the unconscious competence, you can be such an intolerant person. And then I feel like every interaction you had would just back that up. So you would keep thinking, oh, no one else can do it. I have to do it myself. It would become hard to hire, hard to outsource. It would feel very lonely at the top, but then you have to, like in order to grow, in order to keep progressing, unless you want to be this solo artist and not build a team around you, you have to turn your methods into structure. But like you said, the step before, that's almost the consultant's play. source it would feel very lonely at the top but then you have to like in order to grow in order to keep progressing unless you want to be this solo artist and not build a team around you you have to turn your methods into structure but like you said the step before that's almost the consultant's playground that's the trainer's playground that's this whole place where if you realize that you are getting really good at something before it gets unconscious you have to write your methods down you have to find some way of teaching them even if you're just keeping a journal how do you demonstrate that you're world class or you're that good so that you've earned the right something like that right so if you've won awards it's clear if you judge shows it's pretty clear if you've been in a field for a very long time like you're considered an og an original gangster and you were there at ground zero you're part of a movement if the the history books already include you while you're still alive that's a pretty good sign if you're a professor or lecturer on this topic where people fly you in i think you can demonstrate it quite handily and you don't have to demonstrate it to that person it's more have you given yourself permission to be this person or not it almost feels like you only get celebrated for the good stuff when you have made it and then before that that's the stuff that you almost get teased at school about like being obsessed or being intense or being like never giving up on something or being just crazy about this one topic that's all the stuff that if you're at high school people would be saying oh you you're a weirdo like what are you even doing and then it only looks like art and genius when you have demonstrated that you can be world class at it but how do you get over the bit before then how do you go from bullied to celebrated i can share with you some of my own life experiences and see if it makes any sense to you and if you can unpack it i have always remembered being good at art and design and creative because i was the creative weird quiet art kid i would draw all the time in my notebooks and so whenever there was a sporting event i would be last picked but if there was a creative project i would be first picked like we want him because we know it's going to be good so i think in grade school you can be obsessed about something you can be obsessed about something kid. I would draw all the time on my notebooks. And so whenever there was a sporting event, I would be last picked. But if there was a creative project, I would be first picked. Like we want him because we know it's going to be good. So I think in grade school, you can be obsessed about something. And I think it's actually good. I don't think you get picked on that much unless you start acting really weird. And I think people respect conviction. Like when you show up to school in your scouting uniform and people would snicker a little bit and you're like, I'm proud to wear this. I've earned this. So we talked about how in unconscious competence, you often can't really explain it. People will say like, oh, how do you do that thing? Like, how do you? Okay. So you're in a really good public speaker. Like what's your process? And they go, I don't know. I just do it. That's them kind of not being able to explain themselves, which then might look like they didn't know or they weren't legit. When actually they are so legit that they've forgotten how to explain themselves. So then how do you, how do you know? The kind of person who lies during an interview is consciously incompetent. Stage two, because they're aware that they don't know stuff. So they just make up stuff. They're aware and they're very insecure in this state because the worst state to be in is stage two, in my opinion. It's good to be stupid and happy. You don't know what you don't know. In fact, sometimes unconscious incompetents are the people who are actually world breakers. They just think anything can be done. They do it and they don't even know that you can't do it. Where a lot of creative people live in, unfortunately, is they're misdiagnosed as consciously incompetent when they're actually competent. They just think I don't have enough skills. They're comparing themselves to an imagined perfect future self or others. And they're just like, I'll never measure up to that. Well, no one will. No one's who they're going to be in the future today. That's why it's called the future. So if we talk about people who are unconsciously competent, like you're so good, you forgot how you do it. You can always tell. I've never once met a person who was that good, who you just couldn't feel from them that they're that good. This is you doing it as well. This is you saying, yeah, it's easy to tell. And I'm like, tell me the process. And you're like, you just, you just know. competent like you're so good you forgot how you do it you can always tell i've never once met a person who's that good who you just couldn't feel from them that they're that good this is you doing it as well this is you saying yeah it's easy to tell and i'm like tell me the process and you're like you just you just know i'm going to tell you the process you can tell give me a category go with an easy one first and then go crazy on me and make it very difficult for me to tell okay yeah go with one that's kind of they're unconsciously competent about something what are they unconsciously competent about linkedin okay somebody says i'm really good at linkedin and then i'm like what are you good at i can just tell when a hook is going to perform and when it's not okay have you noticed any patterns between the ones that work and ones that don't yeah they create an information gap they create an emotional response they make someone want to read the rest of it and they're also something that not everyone says so there's an element of oh no they didn't so when you see one that isn't what are you looking for you must have seen really bad hooks yeah i just look at them and i go oh that's not going to work and that's a shame but i don't always know sometimes it's because it's like it's a question but no one cares about the answer sometimes it's because you have to think too much sometimes it's because there's too much information missing so it just doesn't make sense okay so you've already demonstrated it you've already demonstrated by your ability to expand now a lot of people who are really good they don't sit around and think about what they do anymore but when asked very specific questions they can answer them pretty easily and you can tell because they don't even have to think about it rarely have ever met someone that was that good that you just didn't understand in their body language in their tonality their phraseology and their succinct answers you could just tell and they're very specific about what you can do vague generalities are a good sign that you don't know what the hell you're doing so this is actually something that i've been teaching recently because we have this webinar that i've been running called the linkedin for coaches webinar and there's a framework that i've been talking about and i'm calling it adopt adapt improve and it's my dad taught in me but it's from like a it's kind of a like a round table motto like a kind of club in the uk but i think that if someone wants to be really good at something but I've been running called the LinkedIn for Coaches webinar and there's a framework that I've been talking about and I'm calling it Adopt, Adapt, Improve and it's my dad taught in me but it's from like a it's kind of like a round table motto like a kind of club in the UK but I think that if someone wants to be really good at something but if they don't want necessarily the giant hours of learning curve it's like how do you get there a little bit faster but still become like an expert or still get really good at it enough to be able to grow your business. Look I don't know where we're going to end but I do need to do something with you before we end on this topic okay. Is Jodie Cook world -class at something and how do you know? So one of the things I was thinking about is how I think it's a Seth Godin quote the idea that if you you keep defining what you do until you're the best in the world at what you do and I do like the idea that you stack stuff together because I'm definitely not the best powerlifter in the world I'm not the best female powerlifter in the world I'm not the best 57. That's the best just world -class though are you world -class yet? Well I compete internationally so I would say like international elite is like a category that comes up that if your numbers match then you are that so yeah potentially but then the real like top 20 people in the world or that kind of number I feel like no apart from bench press but then if you combine that with something else like something to do with business or something to do with travel or something to do with something else there is a combination of words that you could say that I would think yes that is me I'm world -class at that. Okay so you you niche down enough where you can be world -class top 50 in the world is that the idea? Yeah I think so I think so because then you just own that thing and then all the different combinations of having amazing traps and being good at bench press and also being a co -host and also being a business owner that means that you're then this world -class version of you that there is no competition you feel it wholly there's no question that you could get asked that you would slip up on because it's just who you genuinely are and then you go around feeling like you're world -class which I think is the main thing because once it's your identity I find it really hard not acting in ways accordance with the identity that I've got for myself. wholly there's no question that you could get asked that you would slip up on because it's just who you genuinely are and then you go around feeling like you're world class which I think is the main thing because once it's your identity I find it really hard not acting in ways accordance with the identity that I've got for myself because it's an integrity thing so if I'm like I'm world class at all these different things combined I'm like world world class at these things then you always act like you are and then it proliferates and then you continue to be so what is Jody world class at what is your niche based on your answers I don't know I don't know how I actually define it okay so to be continued then yeah sure yeah so have you defined yours like if I said what are you world class at I believe I'm world class at graphic design so you want to put me up against some people and whether it's a competition or something I can out design most people I'm not saying I'm the top one but I can out design most people when it comes to typography and there's things I aspire to become somebody had said you are the best known graphic designer on the planet I'm not sure if that's true and I'm not sure how to determine that but it is a term that people are using from time to time even though I don't find myself as a graphic designer anymore that was what I used to do there's other things I've worked on but I would not consider myself world class I'm not a world class author I'm not a world class public speaker I'm a pretty kick -ass keynote designer who designs the work himself but I don't think there's a category for that just yet okay I think I have better answers now I've heard yours thanks that's really useful you're welcome so I'm world class at equipped bench press because I came with the world championships for it and then I would say I feel like I'm a world class digital nomad whatever that means but it's because of how many different cities I've lived in which is like 35 and also the processes that I've got for each one that means it doesn't stress me out it just is my identity and other people ask me about it and other people copy my processes and I give away my processes so that other people can have a better time becoming a digital nomad but it's because of how many different cities I've lived in which is like 35 and also the processes that I've got for each one that means it doesn't stress me out it just is my identity and other people ask me about it and other people copy my processes and I give away my processes so that other people can have a better time becoming a digital nomad and doing their thing as well I would say I felt like a world -class agency owner because I had a pretty big agency and also had a seven -figure exit and then also taught people how to have their own big exits by putting some of my steps in place so I feel like the the big way I would measure it is the ability to then teach other people or inspire other people in some way after it more so than the the rankings because that just feels like that's really important to me so I think there's some form of self -identification but then we need to also bring in some objective measurement because then this opens a can of worms for anybody to say I'm a world class at x now that's not to say that you can say I'm niched into this thing which I love and I think that's the intention behind what Seth is saying he goes be important enough to a small enough group that where they think of you highly which is really cool from a marketing point of view I get that but we're talking about a little bit more objective measures of being world class now while doing research about this very topic you open our conversation by saying I feel like I need to quit everything and focus in on this one thing because everybody I've studied does this thing and they're doing pretty good tell us a little bit more about that and tell us what your conclusion is my conclusion is that in order to be world class at anything by the definition that we have just come up with and to travel through the stages of competence so that you can get to this unconscious competence where you're essentially you're essentially untouchable and you still have problems and you still have frustrations because other people aren't quite there where you are because by definition and maybe you feel a bit lonely at the top maybe you feel like you have to go through more challenges to teach people what you do but overall there are far more benefits than than there are negatives I feel like doing that involves starting to do it getting the newbie gains from starting to do it becoming an absolute student feel a bit lonely at the top. Maybe you feel like you have to go through more challenges to teach people what you do. But overall, there are far more benefits than there are negatives. I feel like doing that involves starting to do it, getting the newbie gains from starting to do it, becoming an absolute student of the game in whatever you're doing. Then when you hit that inevitable dip, that inevitable plateau where your newbie gains run out, where you start to think, oh, should I be doing something else? You keep going then. you get to this glorious stage where it's so intuitive. It's so awesome that you don't even know what's possible at that stage. And that's where it's really interesting. But I feel like so many people don't ever get there because they do get distracted, because they look at what other people do, because they switch strategies far too early and they don't just keep going. So when I looked at all these Beyonce, Mr. Beast, even my friend with his Instagram agency, who's just got this intuition about how to blow people off on Instagram. It was like just specialize, like just focus, be a geek, nerd out. And that's how you make it big in any field. So what are you going to geek out and nerd on and be super obsessed about? LinkedIn, obviously. Are you giving up the plates? No way. It kind of inspired me to think, I just don't want to add anything. I have everything I need right now in the things that I'm like four, six, eight out of 10 in. And that's it. It's like, don't add stuff. If anything, take stuff away and double down so that more energy goes into fewer things than is spread like too thinly. And I feel like for everyone, the number is going to be different as to how many things they can focus on at any given time. But if you think the goal is one and everything else you add takes away from that, then it might be two or three, but it can't be like seven because it's just stupid. It's never going to work. I want to end on this. If you are of the mindset that you want to become world class, get really prescriptive for us, Jodi. I want to reward them for making it to the very end of the episode. What do they need to do? Pick something, anything, find a master, become a student of the game, keep going through the dip. Don't underestimate the intensity required to do something well and trust that you will get to the stage of... what do they need to do pick something anything find a master become a student of the game keep going through the dip don't underestimate the intensity required to do something well and trust that you will get to the stage of unconscious competence where everything feels amazing wonderful i will say slightly differently just much fewer words which is become obsessed and then do the work if you want to be world class that's what it requires
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    “become obsessed and then do the work”

    — Chris Do

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