***Journalist for a Day (Morgana goes undercover)

I have a habit of saying “yes” to adventures. Then I have to deal with what I got myself into…

Last week I said yes to being a “journalist” at a super-exclusive conference in Los Angeles, where I was invited to interview some of the most outrageously successful innovators on the planet–people on the forefront of technology, banking, social media–people who “hang out” with Mark Zuckerberg, Barak Obama and Bill Gates.

There was just one problem. I’m not a journalist. I wasn’t covering the event for a newspaper or planning to sell stories as a freelancer. My 7,000 ezine subscribers (or 12,000 facebook followers) aren’t impressive to a guy who just sold his little media company for $55,000,000 to AOL.

I felt like a fake, a phoney, a loser… I couldn’t get anyone to say yes to an on-camera interview… it was awful!

Wanna know how I turned it around? I’ll boil it down to FOUR STRATEGIES:

1) Make a decision to be yourself and be HONEST.

When people looked at my name tag and saw that I was a journalist, I found it was best when I “broke character” and shared that I was a journalist that day only. In truth I’m usually the one being interviewed. (Being profiled by United Press International and the Wall Street Journal Online does help.) The less I pretended to be something I wasn’t, the easier it became to get cool people into a conversation.

2) Share your passion for something bigger than yourself.

Things also got easier when I shared my interest in consciousness around money, and that I’m passionate about helping idealistic entrepreneurs make money while they save the world. (Can you hear how even a billion dollar venture capitalist might be interested in that?)

3) Single out people you genuinely connect to emotionally.

This is HUGE. Because I asked some very, very personal questions of my interviewees. At least one of them later admitted that if I hadn’t been so nice, he’d have thought this was an “ambush” when I started talking about life purpose.

Because I approached my subjects from my heart, and they could tell I genuinely cared, not only could I get away with asking
some pretty OUTRAGEOUS questions, but I made some real, human connections.

4) Have back up support.

Thank goodness for my genius friends!!!

Thought Leader-Connector Jacqueline Hadden and I were wing-girls to each other. She’s interviewing 300 business leader/philanthropists for a book and documentary. We introduced each other and tag-teamed our interviewees. It always helps to travel with a friend.

We hired my close friend (and multiple-Emmy award winner) Michael Peak to film our interviews. I may not consider myself a professional journalist (though I had my own national magazine column for a year), but he is. He’s also a very successful author, producer, and director. He made me a professional… for a day.

I CANNOT WAIT for the videos to go live so I can share them with you!

Namaste,

Morgana Rae, journalist for a day