About — Matt Mosich

At 21, I talked my way into a Merrill Lynch internship with a 1% acceptance rate. The other five interns in the Orange County office were Ivy League. I was an SDSU frat boy. The interview ended with "anything else we should know about you?" I spent three minutes on bodybuilding, tracking my macros, and the books I was reading. I never said the words disciplined, curious, or driven. Driving a friend to the airport the next morning, mid-ramble about how I couldn't believe I got in, it hit me like a double shot of espresso on an empty stomach. "I showed them who I was." Seven years at Merrill and a CFP later, I left to figure out how that works on purpose. Today I work with advisor teams and the leaders who run them, so when they walk onto the NYSE, a Future Proof stage, or a prospect meeting, business gets won.

At 8 years old, I was handed a script and told I had 30 minutes before I'd speak to 500 people. (Thanks, Dad.) It was December 2002, and we were at my Pop-Warner Football banquet. We'd just won the championship — cool, trophy, yay. But what banquets really meant was friends, pizza, cake. I was mentally preparing to chow down when I felt eyes on me. My dad and some businesswoman were talking, glancing my way. I made eye contact. Mistake. They waved me over. She got on a knee, pulled out an 8½ x 11, and told me I was introducing one of the other teams. That sheet was my script. My eyes must've screamed panic, because my normally stern father turned soft. He told me it was going to be ok, it'd only take a minute, he knew I could do it. Terrified, I nodded. And waited. After 30 minutes that felt like 30 days, I was waved to the stage. Knees buckling, palms glistening, I faced the crowd. And spoke. Before the last syllable left my lips, I was ready to bolt. But I didn't make it far. My parents, grandparents, and team stopped me. "You spoke so clearly." "You're really good at speaking."

Not because I was special. Because when I was 8, someone told me I was good at something. I believed them before it was true — and kept going until it was.

The first time I called myself a communication coach in public, a speaker tapped me on the shoulder. "I need a coach." He delivered more keynotes in a month than I had in my life. Four weeks in, he says: "Will you fly out and train my team." He briefs me first. Each person's strengths, each person's challenges. Next thing I know I'm in San Jose for a full day of live training. Nearly everything I taught, he'd already taught them. Nearly everything I noticed, he'd already told me I'd notice. When we wrapped, I asked what he saw.

A CEO told me his team called my work "nice to have." He disagreed. But his team didn't feel it was a need. "Does anyone have something important coming up?" "My senior partner is speaking at our industry's biggest conference." "Let me help him." He was moderating a panel. How much can I really help. So I started asking questions he'd never been asked. About the audience, about what they needed to walk away with, about whether he had a story worth telling before the panelists told theirs. Every conversation ended the same way: "I'd never thought of that." He had a story. He'd never thought to tell it. The managing partner told him after: "That's the best I've ever heard you speak." During their annual planning meeting, I became his top agenda item.