Episode 119 | From News Anchor to Business Coach: Tips for Success - Margo Myers

In this episode of the Uncopyable Women in Business podcast, I sit down with Margo Myers, a certified executive coach and former TV news anchor, to discuss her remarkable journey from the world of broadcasting to founding her own communications and PR company.

Margo opens up about the importance of self-belief, the value of celebrating small wins, and how identifying and leveraging your strengths can lead to success in both business and life.

This inspiring conversation is a testament to the power of self-confidence, continuous growth, and the ability to redefine success on your own terms.

About Margo Myers:

Margo Myers is an award-winning former TV news anchor and the founder of Myers Communications, a firm specializing in executive presence coaching, media training, and strategic communication. With over 20 years of experience in broadcast journalism, Margo has a unique ability to help leaders craft compelling messages and deliver them with confidence and authenticity. At Myers Communications, she works with executives, entrepreneurs, and professionals to enhance their communication skills, navigate high-stakes presentations, and manage media interviews effectively. Margo brings her warmth, expertise, and insider knowledge to empower clients to stand out and succeed.

Connect with Margo:
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Kay Miller interviews women in sales with proven track records, as they share their experiences, success strategies and tools you can use to crush your sales goals. Kay has a history of sales success, earning the nickname “Muffler Mama” when she sold more automotive mufflers than anyone in the world. Kay and her guests deliver actionable insights and real-world tools that will help you overcome obstacles, adopt a winning mindset, and maximize your sales results.

Kay is the author of the book, Uncopyable Sales Secrets – How to Create an Unfair Advantage and Outsell the Competition. Go to Amazon.com and search “Uncopyable Sales Secrets” to order the book, or click the link below.

Contact:
kay@uncopyablesales.com
linkedin.com/in/millerkay
Order Uncopyable Sales Secrets: amzn.to/35dGlYZ

Transcript

Margo Myers 00:00:00 Because we can't be good at everything. As much as we would like to be.

Kay Miller 00:00:06 Welcome to Women in Business. I'm your host, Kay Miller, also known as Muffler Mama. Stay tuned as I, along with my guests, give you marketing, sales, and personal branding strategies that will give you an advantage. We can't be good at everything. I'm just going to use that to lead into my guest, who I'm so excited to talk to. I'm with Margo Meyers, and Margo is a certified executive coach, and she has spent a lot of her career helping high achievers advance their careers and nail high-stakes presentations. Here's what I think is very interesting. Margo spent over 20 years as a TV news anchor, multiple locations, but she ended up in Seattle, which is my hometown, Margo. I feel like I know you, even though I don't, and I'm sure a lot of listeners and viewers feel that way. Then in 2009, she started her own communications and PR company. Things got pretty interesting from there.

Kay Miller 00:01:08 Margo, I'm going to let you talk about that. First of all, I would like to say welcome to the podcast.

Margo Myers 00:01:14 Oh, thanks for having me. I'm happy to be here. And I know that we share a little overlap in our years coming up through Washington State, so I'm excited to talk to you about that.

Kay Miller 00:01:25 Yeah, I am too. And I knew that you went to Washington State University, WSU, but I'd forgotten about that. But it makes sense. Washington State has a really great communications program. I'm sure people listening don't realize that Edward R. Murrow went to Washington State University. He went to WSU. And probably the most famous—besides you—the most famous graduate.

Margo Myers 00:01:50 Oh, I'm not. Kathy Goertzen and Keith Jackson, all kinds of people over the years. Eric Johnson—WSU has launched a number of really great journalist careers over the years, and so I was really lucky to be on the professional advisory board for a number of years. And then when Kathy Goertzen passed, and I worked with her at KOMO for a number of years, President Floyd tasked me with the job of finding a way to honor Kathy on campus. And so now we have Goertzen Hall on the WSU campus that is home to a number of the communications programs and classes. So I'm very proud of that, and I was happy to do that with really a wonderful team of people.

Kay Miller 00:02:38 And Kathy Goertzen, she was amazing and unfortunately died way too young. But she was also in your group at that time. And not only did you and I both go to WSU, but we were there at the same time. I graduated in ‘82. I think you said, what, ‘83?

Margo Myers 00:02:54 ‘83 is when I graduated.

Kay Miller 00:02:56 And we just found all these connections, including the fact that we lived in the exact same dorm before you went into a sorority. And so that's quite the coincidence there. And like I said, just watching you on the news, I felt like I knew you and there was a connection. So it makes sense that you went into your own communications and PR agency. So one of the topics that really pertains to our discussion, and that's women in leadership. So what were you telling me right before we started recording?

Margo Myers 00:03:28 When I left TV news, I started my own business, and that was all well and good. And then about the same time, I also had the opportunity to join a startup where I joined with Susanne Kiel Ekman and Jenny Hogan, and we put together a women's leadership group or course. And it started out as Go Girl Academy and morphed into Springboard Academy. And it was a great program for teaching women leadership. So this would have been about 2010 or so. And then we had companies start asking us, can you bring some of those topics into our companies? And we want you to teach both women and men. And so we did that, and we became the Springboard Academy and did that for several years. And we had been bringing in executive coaches for some parts of the program. Finally, Susanne and I looked at each other and said, okay, why are we doing this? Why don't we just become coaches? And so we did.

Margo Myers 00:04:32 And so I got my coaching certification through the Hudson Institute of Coaching in Santa Barbara. It was a very rigorous program. It's very well-known, and there are many Hudson-trained coaches in the Seattle area. It's a fantastic program. And so I've been doing executive and leadership coaching really for the last decade and absolutely love it. But really got my start doing that, putting together this women's leadership course, which is a completely different track. And at the same time, it just built on everything that I had learned coming up in news. And in fact, I was telling the story yesterday to one of my former coworkers, and I was speaking at a coaching event in Seattle, and I had this master coach look at me and snarkily say, so how can you go from being a news anchor to being a coach? I said, it's funny you should ask because what do we do as coaches? We develop rapport with our clients. What do we do as reporters and anchors? We develop rapport with our viewers.

Margo Myers 00:05:46 What do we do as coaches? We listen. What do we do as reporters and anchors? We listen, right? We ask questions. We do the same as coaches. We pull the relevant threads of information and help people make sense of that. And she's like, okay, I get it, I get it. Anyway, so that's what I've been doing really for the last decade. And I just love that, and I love seeing people have those moments where it all comes together and they figure it out.

Kay Miller 00:06:18 I would like to have you share a few things about your advice to women in leadership and in sales, like you said, in communication and connection. I know you personally are not looking for more clients now, so I just want to say that you're moving into a new chapter. You've got some great clients you are already working with, but not really taking new ones and moving into some new endeavors. We talked about painting, which hopefully we'll get time to talk about a little bit. But you know, you are just such a master of reinvention.

Kay Miller 00:06:50 And first of all, how did you have the guts to become a newscaster? That's scary. And you went on multiple locations, mostly California. But didn't you say Oklahoma?

Margo Myers 00:07:01 I think yeah, I moved around first. It was really funny because it was my mom who said, you might want to consider going into news. You're good with people. You're good at writing and telling stories. And so really, it was my mom who suggested that. And I went to WSU. They do have a fabulous communications program, and I started off in broadcasting. I got into a broadcasting class my freshman year, and I can remember the professor, Glenn Johnson, who said, broadcasting can be a really tough career because you work weird hours. It can be tough on your family life. It's 24/7, especially if there's breaking news, and there's a lot of divorce. And I thought, who in their right mind would want to do that? So I immediately transferred out of broadcasting.

Kay Miller 00:08:03 Really?

Margo Myers 00:08:05 Yes, into journalism, because I figured, okay, I can write anywhere. And go figure.

Kay Miller 00:08:10 That's pretty funny.

Margo Myers 00:08:12 And yeah, and then my senior year, I really discovered that I missed putting the words with the pictures. I'm very visual. And I really missed that part. And so what I did, I went back to the professor Glenn, and I said, Glenn, I'm really interested in broadcasting. Would you consider letting me into Cable 8 just so I can get some practical on-air experience before I leave WSU? And he looked at me and he said, oh, I have 20 students ahead of you who need this class to graduate. And I said, okay, do what you think is best. So I come out a couple days later, I look at the list, and mine is the very last name on the list. And it really changed the course of my career, because just that small experience gave me enough to land an internship in Spokane. I didn't even finish my internship and landed a job down in Redding, California, and I was off and running.

Margo Myers 00:09:06 I never thought of it as scary so much as just what I did and telling people’s stories. It was never about me and being on camera, like a lot of people—that's their primary motivation. That wasn't my motivation. Mine was sharing people's stories and sharing relevant information that's going to help people make decisions in their lives, whether it's local politics or what's going on. Or wildfires—covered huge wildfires down in San Luis Obispo when I lived down there, and it was more of a public service, is how I looked at it. So that's how I got started. And then went from Redding to San Luis Obispo to Tulsa for all of four months. And then my old boss had moved up to Salinas. So then I worked at KSBW in Salinas for about six and a half years, did the 1989 earthquake where we were doing coverage for the Loma Prieta earthquake, and just had the 75-year reunion this last fall. So I went down and got to see a lot of those people that I worked with. And that was a lot of fun. So it wasn't really scary. It's just what I did.

Kay Miller 00:10:20 Interesting, because I've talked to several women who have said that if you're nervous or you're scared, it means you're thinking about yourself. So if you could really focus on your audience or your listeners or whoever you're trying to help, that makes a huge difference, because then it's not about you, it's about them. What a career. And just curious, where along that trajectory did you meet your husband, and how did you stay married?

Margo Myers 00:10:46 I thought you were still married, right? I'm still married. Let's see. I think we're coming up on 37, 38 years. I don't know, I have to do the math. It's been a long time.

Kay Miller 00:10:55 Yeah, you know what? We're 37 years. I just—we're living parallel lives. I also told you that my husband happened to be traveling and was in that area when the earthquake hit, so it's just super bizarre. Anyway, so how did you meet him? Because practically speaking, I think women in your position would want to know how that works out.

Margo Myers 00:11:13 It's funny, I met him when I was working in San Luis Obispo. And we met—there was a group of people that we hung out with—but I met him through some friends where people met. And for dinner one night, we were at a sushi bar, and I played racquetball, and I was leaving to meet somebody else to go play racquetball. And he says, give me your number and I'll call you, and we'll go play racquetball. And so I said, okay. So a couple days later, he calls, and we're going to go play racquetball. The construction crew has cut a power line in the area of town where we were going to go play racquetball. He goes, do you want to go? Do you want to go in? And I said, do I want to go what? He goes, abalone diving. And I'm like, okay.

Kay Miller 00:11:59
Looking for abalone. Is that what it is?

Margo Myers 00:12:01
Yeah. That we were gonna go get abalone. This is from a small town girl who grew up in the wheat fields of a.

Kay Miller 00:12:08
Very small town that you were in. But you know what? Not that far from WSU. So that was a great coincidence. So tell me about adding it's not crunches how you're not doing crunches and working on your abs.

Margo Myers 00:12:17
No, we went we hiked. We actually we had to go in through the entrance of the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant. We parked at the lighthouse there, hiked about a mile, scaled down some cliffs, got in the water and pried these abalone off the off the rocks, took him back to his house and cooked abalone. he already already had. And that was our first date. We decided to get married six weeks later.

Kay Miller 00:12:43
Wow.

Margo Myers 00:12:44
I know we didn't actually get married because I promptly took a job in Oklahoma and he moved down to San Diego. He ran a sport fishing long range sport fishing boats then, and so it took us about a year and a half before we got back into the same town in Monterey and Salinas. And but yeah, we've been married ever since, and it's been quite a journey.

Margo Myers 00:13:07
Quite a ride.

Kay Miller 00:13:08
You are quite the adventurer. You've done scuba diving. You've flown with the Blue Angels. And you. Actually, I love this. You dance with the groundskeepers at the Mariners games, which I don't know if they're doing that anymore. Last few games I've been to, they don't do it, but it was so cool. The guys who swept up between the innings would do these dances and it was all choreographed. It was so awesome. I haven't seen it lately, but. So you did that with them.

Margo Myers 00:13:35
I did that with. That was a result of back in the day. Como had started airing the Mariners games. So I forget what year this would have been, but we went down and we did a series of stories with the Mariners and the groundskeeper. I can't remember his first name. Mr. Christopherson. Anyway, it was his friends that were the groundskeeper. Oh, you got to come down and dance with us. So literally, I was going down at night, and they would clear out the locker room, move these big black leather couches out of the clubhouse there.

Margo Myers 00:14:09
And we would choreograph and practice these dances. And then we went out and performed in front of 45,000 people. And I have no video of it. And I was really awful. But I remember being really nervous because these rakes are huge. And we actually did have to do raking around the bases and do groundskeeper thing. And anyway, and I didn't want to hit Bret Boone with the rake. Was my second base and I remember that. And we did a routine and went back in. I still have the uniform, the clothes that we wore for that and it was really fun.

Kay Miller 00:14:50
I want to take a quick break to ask you a question. Does your personal brand set you apart and make you unforgettable? If you're not 100% sure, you need my free email series, Five Steps to a Profitable Personal Brand. Sign up and get a daily email for five days, plus a bonus—a list of personal branding shortcuts that will give you an advantage. Go to Ben Copyable the number five emails.

Kay Miller 00:15:28
It seems like you never say no to something exciting and adventuresome, so that's a great quality. And let's talk about what other qualities make you great as a news anchor. And I know one of them was hard work. I read you had to get up for how many years? At two-something in the morning, and you had that confidence. And then you've now you work with women on leadership. So what do you think? Is it about Kay Miller that has helped you be successful in various endeavors? Meeting challenges?

Margo Myers 00:16:02
Honestly, I'm always up for something new. I'm always up for a challenge. I'm an adrenaline junkie. I get that from my dad. When my dad retired from being a wheat farmer, what did he do? He raced hydroplanes. And I get that from my dad. Yeah, I think just being up for things that are different or new, I totally consider myself a lifelong learner. Hard work. Growing up, I didn't grow up on the ranch because we didn't move out to the farm until the end of my junior year in high school, but I worked for my grandmother during harvest, and so there was always a lot of work.

Margo Myers 00:16:45
So I had a very strong work ethic and still do. And so that served me well and saying yes to opportunity. I also think, and this is for your women listeners, it's really about having that belief in yourself. And early on, in fact, it was my first job in reading the news. Director said, why don't you come down and anchor a newscast with me? Because he not only was my boss, but he also was the main anchor. And I said, okay, so we did that, and it went okay. It wasn't great. And we're looking at the video afterwards. And he said, you're never going to be a great anchor.

Margo Myers 00:17:19
I said, really? And why is that? He goes, because you have a fat neck. And I just looked at him like, are you serious? And so I looked.

Kay Miller 00:17:44
Did he ever—would he have ever said that to a man? I'm just wondering, would he.

Margo Myers 00:17:47
No, I'm 23 years old, and I could have folded right there, and I could have said, yeah, you're right. I don't look great on camera. And instead, it was like, okay, constructive criticism. Maybe that wasn't the most flattering neckline or outfit that I wore or color, but I knew what I was capable of, and I had that belief in myself. And this is the funny part. This guy went on to hire me like three more times as a main anchor.

Kay Miller 00:18:19
And if you're not watching this, if you're listening, I just have to say Kay does not have a fat neck.

Margo Myers 00:18:27
No, I have a neck. But have that belief in yourself and don't let somebody else's ideas stand in your way or hold you back. Because we all have those limiting beliefs and those stories that we tell ourselves that may or may not be true. Right? And I love the quote: Everything you want is on the other side of fear. Fear is that one limiting thing, and we get so caught up in what's so-and-so going to think of us or what will other people say. But at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter.

Kay Miller 00:19:03
I love that.

Margo Myers 00:19:05
Be true to yourself.

Kay Miller 00:19:07
I'm really surprised every time I do a podcast interview. These really successful women like you still have that fear or those negative voices that they have to overcome. So it's not that you don't have fear. Maybe you don't have as much fear as other people who can't even imagine being on network TV or being a newscaster for a major market like Seattle. But you just have to do it, overcome it, and believe in yourself. And part of me wants to say, where does that belief come from? Because if people are listening and they don't have that belief, do you have any secrets or tips, or do you think it's just partly who you are and partly who you decided to be?

Margo Myers 00:19:53
I think partly it’s who I am and my personality. I played sports growing up. I played basketball and tennis, but a lot of basketball. And part of it is just being confident in yourself and being part of a team and learning all those great lessons that I think sports teach you.

Margo Myers 00:20:14
And I think the other thing is, and I work on this with some of my clients: look for the small wins. You don't have to solve world peace right out of the box. What are the small steps that you can take that are going to get you those wins? That builds confidence. And if you can start with the small steps, pretty soon you're doing bigger things and bigger things. I didn't start out working in TV in Seattle. I started in a small market and worked my way up to Seattle. I would not have been ready to go on live TV in Seattle when I was starting out. That wouldn’t have been the case. Start and learn your craft. Learn your skill, whatever the case may be. Start small, and then you develop confidence from there.

Margo Myers 00:21:18
Say yes to opportunities when other opportunities come your way to learn or take on something new. Say yes. Don't hold yourself back because you never know where it’s going to go. And that’s one thing I would say.

Margo Myers 00:21:32
The other thing, and you mentioned when you said decide who you want to be: Yeah. Make a decision. Just decide. Yeah, I'm going to do this. I mean, it can be like, yeah, I decide I'm going to lose 10 pounds, or yes, I decide I'm going to become a marathoner or whatever it is, but just make the decision: Yes, this is what I’m going to do, and then do it.

Kay Miller 00:21:44
You know what? Nike stole the best phrase in the world. Just do it. Really. It's decided and do it and follow up. But I love what you say about small steps. And I didn't know you until you came to Seattle and you were on the news and I'm like, wow, I felt this connection. You happen to be beautiful. You know, you just you had that way of of just your persona was great, but you didn't start there. Yeah. Spokane. That's that was your starting market and that's small. If you don't know where Spokane is, it's probably because nobody knows where Spokane is.

Kay Miller 00:22:17
I think that's really interesting. And those are some great pieces of advice just in a few minutes that we have left. Do you have any other thoughts that come to mind about maybe your own reinventions because after you left news, you went on to have your consulting agency or PR agency. And so how? What would you say about reinventing yourself.

Margo Myers 00:22:39
Reinventing yourself? I think we all reinvent ourselves a couple times through life, and making those transitions were not always great at making transitions, because we don't do big transitions a lot through our lives. And so giving yourself grace, right. It may not go perfect. William Bridges is the father of transitions, and he says every transition begins with an ending. Something ends. And then you enter this neutral zone where you're figuring it out, and that can last for a while as you maybe you experiment and try some different things, and then finally you get to that, that new beginning, and then then you're launched into whatever you're doing now. And I think that.

Margo Myers 00:23:28
One thing that I am definitely a firm believer in, and I know we talked about this a little bit, is playing to your strengths because we're not naturally good at everything. As much as we would like to believe that we are, but we're not. And one of the things that I believe is look for the things that you are naturally good at doing. I became a strengthsfinder coach and work often with clients just to help them find, okay, what are they good at doing? Because people have a general idea, but maybe they don't have the verbiage to go with it and the description of what it is they are great at doing because we all have these talents, and if we can take those talents and develop them into strengths, then we can take that so much farther than if you try to develop something you are not naturally good at doing. And so, like in the Strengthsfinder parlance, if you will like, my top strengths are maximizer, which is taking something good and making it great. Don't give me something to fix because it will just it's already broken because it will just frustrate me.

Margo Myers 00:24:44
Give me something that's already pretty good. I'll make it great. Activator. Let's just go. I'm perfectly comfortable with. Let's build the plane while we're flying it. Not a problem. I have to remember, though, that not everybody is comfortable with that. Achiever, I work hard. Strategic thinker. So knowing instinctively what is the right path to take. And then my other top five strength is learner. So being a lifelong learner yeah. Let's just let's figure it out. We'll learn as we go. And so helping people find their strengths and playing to those, I think it just opens up so much more opportunity For people to have success in whatever it is, whatever path they choose to take.

Kay Miller 00:25:32
One of the things I like about that is, is when you talk about the strengths that you have, it reminds me of the color palettes. I can't remember what that was all called, but the system of what color should you wear? Oh, yeah. Winter.

Margo Myers 00:25:45
Spring?

Kay Miller 00:25:46
Yeah, probably a spring or something.

Kay Miller 00:25:48
But what was what struck me about that is that the colors I look best in, quote unquote, are also the colors I like. And I think that's the way with strength. Right? Your strengths aren't something that you hate. Usually there's something you're really good at. And I love this quote. You've got some great quotes. Here's my quote. The average child is average. And as a parent we think our kids are just off the charts. Brilliant. But the truth is, they're average in a lot of things, but they're brilliant at something or some things. And so that just proves the point that you're not going to be great at everything. You're probably going to be average at some things, but you need to find what you really like and go with that. As we close this out, what do you have as far as a recommendation to help listeners find their strengths? Where would you start with that?

Margo Myers 00:26:39
There's the the book Strengths Finders 2.0, which is a great opportunity to read more about the 34 strengths.

Margo Myers 00:26:49
And then I think there's something in the back of the book where you can actually do your do your strengths. And if anybody does that and wants to learn more, they can always reach out to me and I'm happy to talk them through that because I think it is important to have some context around that. And also, you know, it's I always hold those things loosely too, because as a coach, I sincerely believe that people can change. Although I do feel we all have our natural talents. So that is one thing. I think the other thing is if there was some, if there was some advice, it would be, listen to your gut. Right? Listen to your gut. Our our conscious minds can process about 40 bits of information every second. Our unconscious minds, what we don't even know, that we know can process about what is it? 11 million bits of information, a second. Wow. Which is amazing. And so we're constantly taking in information. And so pay attention to your pay attention to your gut if something feels right, okay.

Margo Myers 00:28:05
If something feels wrong. The biggest things in my career where I didn't listen to my gut, those have been some of the things that I've regretted because it wasn't the right choice for me. And listen to what? Listen to what your gut says. Because we know. Right. And so those are some of the things play to your strengths. Listen to your gut. Believe in yourself and also reach out for help. Reach out to other entrepreneurs if that's where you're good. Reach out to those people who are where you want to go. And there are great mentors, advisors, advocates, people in business who will help you. And you really have to get over yourself. And don't be afraid to ask.

Kay Miller 00:28:51
Wow, that's a great place to end. Fabulous advice, and I just am honored that you would come on the podcast with me and share some of your wisdom, your experience and advice to women listening. And guess what men listen to. So yeah, you could take this advice too. So Margo, it's been a pleasure.

Kay Miller 00:29:13
And I just want to say thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Margo Myers 00:29:17
I thank you so much for having me, Kay? And I've thoroughly enjoyed it. And connecting with someone who we have our few years in common, and also some similar philosophies in how we go about our days, how we go about our business. So I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me today.

Kay Miller 00:29:37
Thanks for listening to this episode of Uncopyable Women in Business. See you next time and always remember to be uncopyable.