Whitney Johnson on Disrupting Yourself

Whitney Johnson is a leading business thinker and expert on disruptive innovation and personal disruption. She covers the framework for personal disruption in the critically-acclaimed book Disrupt Yourself: Putting the Power of Disruptive Innovation to Work.  Originally an award-winning stock analyst, Whitney chose to leave her Wall Street career behind at the height of her career. This bold act of personal disruption and the following years of entrepreneurial exploration led to her new career as a business coach, writer and speaker.  Whitney is the host of the popular Disrupt Yourself Podcast. You can gain special insights into her seven-point framework for personal disruption by listening to Disrupt Yourself episode #120, “Play to Your Distinctive Strengths” at https://whitneyjohnson.com/distinctive-strengths/. In this episode Whitney and I discuss: How she went from secretary to award-winning Wall Street analyst Why taking a step backward was Whitney’s slingshot forward on Wall Street How disrupting yourself sets you up for greater success Why Lady Gaga is the perfect example of personal disruption The three factors that helped her develop the confidence to make big leaps The importance of grieving failure Resources mentioned Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail by Clayton Christensen Building a StoryBrand: Clarify Your Message So Customers Will Listen by Donald Miller  My book, Think Like a Rocket Scientist, is now available for pre-order (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indiebound). I’ve been ecstatic about the early reviews. The book was named a “must read” by Susan Cain (NYT Bestselling Author of Quiet), “endlessly fascinating” by Daniel Pink (NYT Bestselling Author of Drive and A Whole New Mind), and “bursting with practical insights” by Adam Grant (NYT Bestselling Author of Originals). If you pre-order the book, you’ll get immediate digital access to read on your favorite device. That means you can start reading it NOW, months before the book is published. You’ll also get pre-order bonuses worth at least 10 times the cost of the book. You can check out the bonuses at rocketsciencebook.com. Why am I running a pre-order campaign? First, pre-order bonuses are my way of thanking you for supporting my writing.  Second, I’m donating 100% of my royalties (up to $10,000) from the pre-order sales to a non-profit called charity: water, which is on a mission to create a future where everyone has access to clean and safe drinking water.  My goal is to sponsor an entire water project, which will cost $10,000 and bring clean water to a community of roughly 300 people. By pre-ordering the book, you’ll help bring this goal to life. Third, pre-orders carry tremendous weight in book promotion. Major bookstores use pre-order numbers to gauge public interest in the book. If the pre-order numbers are high, they’ll stock more copies of the book, which, in turn, means more readers will see it. You can pre-order any edition of the book from any bookseller (Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Indiebound). After you pre-order the book, please forward your receipt to rocket@ozanvarol.com, and your bonuses will land in your inbox. 

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On Famous Failures, I interview the world's most interesting people about their failures and what they learned from them.