828 Pam Sherman: Author of Play You

0:00I am unwilling to give up, but I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be.

0:09Kara Goldin:You just want to make sure you will get knocked down, but just make sure you don't get knocked out. So your only choice should be, go focus on what you can control. Hi everyone and welcome to the Kara Goldin Show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world's greatest leaders. We'll talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs, and really some of the most interesting people of our time. Can't wait to get started. Let's go. Today's episode is brought to you by 1-800-Flowers. I've been thinking a lot about the moms in my life lately and the little things they do that nobody else does quite the same way.

0:55Kara Goldin:The things that often go unnoticed but mean everything. And it always makes me think they deserve so much more than they get. That's why I love 1-800-Flowers. Flowers might feel like a simple gift, but when they're done right, they say everything you sometimes don't put into words. And for over 50 years, 1-800-Flowers has been helping people do exactly that. Send something beautiful that really shows your appreciation. Right now, when you order one dozen roses, they'll double your bouquet to two dozen for free. Twice the flowers for the mom who gives everything. And I actually received a bouquet and have to say the quality really stood out.

1:39Kara Goldin:The flowers were fresh, beautifully arranged, and immediately felt like something you'd actually be excited to receive. It's the kind of gift that immediately makes someone feel seen and appreciated. And if you're like most people and tend to wait until the last minute, they've got same day delivery. So you're covered. Mother's Day is Sunday, May 10th, and bouquets are selling out fast. Trust me, don't wait. To claim your Double Roses offer before they're gone, visit 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. That's 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. Thanks to HomeServe for sponsoring this episode.

2:24Kara Goldin:It's 2026. Owning a home still feels like a win until it doesn't. Everything's fine until suddenly it's not. A pipe burst, the water heater dies, or your AC taps out during a heat wave. Home repairs don't care about timing, and they definitely don't care what's in your bank account. You insure your health, your car, even your phone, but what about the systems inside your home? Many homeowners are surprised to learn that regular insurance often doesn't cover everyday wear and tear, like plumbing failures, electrical issues, or heating and cooling breakdowns. That's where HomeServe comes in. HomeServe is like a subscription for your home.

3:05Kara Goldin:For as little as$4.99 a month, you can choose a plan that fits your needs and your budget. And when something covered goes wrong, instead of scrambling to find a contractor, you just call their 24-7 hotline and start the repair process. It's that simple. If you've ever had a surprise home repair, you know how expensive it can get. and how stressful it is trying to fix it fast. Honestly, if I had needed this, HomeServe is what I'd use. Having that kind of backup brings real peace of mind. They've been helping homeowners for over 20 years with a trusted national network of 2 ,600 local contractors with 4.5 million customers, a 4.8 out of 5 post-repair rating, and an A-plus BBB rating.

3:53Kara Goldin:They're the real deal. Help protect your home system and your wallet with HomeServe against covered repairs. Plans start at just$4.99 a month. Go to homeserve.com to find the plan that's right for you. That's homeserve.com. Not available everywhere. Most plans range between$4.99 to$11.99 a month your first year. Terms apply on covered repairs. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the Kara Golden Show. So today I'm joined by Pam Sherman, who is not only a leadership consultant, president of the Sherman Edge, actor, former attorney, and now author of the brand new book, Play You, The Role of a Lifetime, Bridge the Believability Gap to Boost Confidence, Connection, and Impact.

4:46Kara Goldin:We'll call it PlayU. Pam's journey is nothing but conventional. As I mentioned, a former attorney turned professional actor transition that earned her a feature in People magazine. She has spent years mastering what it means to step into a role with presence and truth. And today she brings that same expertise to leaders around the world, helping them ignite audiences, connect more deeply and find their edge, explore, dream, grow and excite. So her book, Play You, introduces a very powerful concept, which I cannot wait to get into, called The Believability Gap, the space between who we are and how we show up.

5:34Kara Goldin:So we all need this, all need to read this book, but I am so excited to have her here today on the launch or pretty much the launch of PlayU. So very excited. And Pam Sherman, thank you so much for coming on the Kara Golden Show. Thank you so much, Kara. It's great to hear somebody else describe you, right? You know, it's like, oh, wow, I really believe in that person. I love hearing about that person. And then you have to integrate it and make it all part of you. But I can't thank you enough for describing my journey and my mission. This message is a paid partnership with AT &T Business. Hey, everyone, Kara here.

6:18Kara Goldin:Let's get real about those early days of building a business. Not the highlight reel. the actual day-to-day, the friction, trying to manage everything across time zones, across teams, across locations, and realizing how much depends on staying connected. I remember those days at Hint, a retailer call, an order, a decision, all of it. And you realize quickly, connection isn't a nice-to-have, it's the lifeblood of your business. As a founder, you don't want to think about your connectivity. You just need it to work every time. That's why AT &T Business matters. AT &T Business is the reliable provider for small business owners.

7:03Kara Goldin:And when you have that kind of reliability behind you, you can focus on what actually moves your business forward. Powered by AT &T Business. Built to work. Get AT &T Business at business.att.com. Thanks to HomeServe for sponsoring this episode. It's 2026. Owning a home still feels like a win until it doesn't. Everything's fine until suddenly it's not. A pipe burst, the water heater dies, or your AC taps out during a heat wave. Home repairs don't care about timing and they definitely don't care what's in your bank account. You insure your health, your car, even your phone, but what about the systems inside your home?

7:48Kara Goldin:Many homeowners are surprised to learn that regular insurance often doesn't cover everyday wear and tear, like plumbing failures, electrical issues, or heating and cooling breakdowns. That's where HomeServe comes in. HomeServe is like a subscription for your home. For as little as$4.99 a month, you can choose a plan that fits your needs and your budget. And when something covered goes wrong, instead of scrambling to find a contractor, you just call their 24-7 hotline and start the repair process. It's that simple. If you've ever had a surprise home repair, you know how expensive it can get and how stressful it is trying to fix it fast.

8:28Kara Goldin:Honestly, if I had needed this, HomeServe is what I'd use. Having that kind of backup brings real peace of mind. They've been helping homeowners for over 20 years with a trusted national network of 2 ,600 local contractors with 4.5 million customers, a 4.8 out of 5 post-repair rating, and an A -plus BBB rating. They're the real deal. Help protect your home system and your wallet with HomeServe against covered repairs. plans start at just$4.99 a month. Go to homeserve.com to find the plan that's right for you. That's homeserve.com. Not available everywhere. Most plans range between$4.99 to$1 ,199 a month your first year.

9:14Kara Goldin:Terms apply on covered repairs. Totally. Well, I'm so excited and I love, love, love the book. I was lucky enough to get a pre-copy of it. So I devoured it and absolutely love what you're speaking about. So play you. How do you describe the core idea behind the book? It's so interesting because for a long time, people kept throwing the word authenticity at me. Oh, you help people be more authentically them. And I really started thinking about it. And I realized that authenticity is really about you. It has nothing to do with your audience. And I came from a background of, yes, I was a lawyer. But when I became an actor, I learned that it isn't about you at all.

10:01It's about the other actor, the audience, connecting to them, taking people on a journey. And if you hear great actors talk about their fellow actors, they'll say they were a great listener. They were so generous. And I realized that what we ought to be seeking for ourselves, for our leadership, for our impact is believability. And it came from a quote actually by Edward R. Murrow that to be truthful, we have to be credible. and to be credible, we have to be believable. Can you imagine finding that quote when you're going on this journey about what it is I do? And I combined that with a quote from my acting guru, Sanford Meisner, who said that acting is the ability to live truthfully in given imaginary circumstances.

10:46And isn't that what we want from all of the people that we interact with? The ability to believe in them, that they're truthful and that they can manage the circumstances that they're given in a way that's generous, has interplay, and raises the game for everyone when they're in the room and energy of everyone in the room. So that's how I really started thinking about what is it do I do? I've been doing it for over 15 years, almost 20 years now. And that leap to bridging the believability gap led to this book.

11:20Kara Goldin:This message is a paid partnership with AT &T Business. Hey everyone, Kara here. Let's get real about those early days of building a business, not the highlight reel, the actual day-to-day, the friction, trying to manage everything across time zones, across teams, across locations, and realizing how much depends on staying connected. I remember those days at Hint, a retailer call, an order, a decision, all of it. And you realize quickly, connection isn't a nice to have. It's the lifeblood of your business. As a founder, you don't want to think about your connectivity. You just need it to work every time.

12:04Kara Goldin:That's why AT &T Business matters. AT &T Business is the reliable provider for small business owners. And when you have that kind of reliability behind you, you can focus on what actually moves your business forward. Powered by AT &T Business. Built to work. Get AT &T Business at business.att.com. Today's episode is brought to you by 1-800-Flowers. I've been thinking a lot about the moms in my life lately and the little things they do that nobody else does quite the same way. The things that often go unnoticed, but mean everything. And it always makes me think they deserve so much more than they get.

12:50Kara Goldin:That's why I love 1-800-Flowers. Flowers might feel like a simple gift, but when they're done right, they say everything you sometimes don't put into words. And for over 50 years, 1-800-Flowers has been helping people do exactly that. Send something beautiful that really shows your appreciation. Right now, when you order one dozen roses, they'll double your bouquet to two dozen for free. Twice the flowers for the mom who gives everything. And I actually received a bouquet and have to say the quality really stood out. The flowers were fresh, beautifully arranged, and immediately felt like something you'd actually be excited to receive.

13:32Kara Goldin:It's the kind of gift that immediately makes someone feel seen and appreciated. And if you're like most people and tend to wait until the last minute, they've got same day delivery. So you're covered. Mother's Day is Sunday, May 10th, and bouquets are selling out fast. Trust me, don't wait. To claim your Double Roses offer before they're gone, visit 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. That's 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. So the believability gap, when you think about how people know when they're in it, how would you describe that to somebody? So quite simply, the definition for me is it's the gap between who we fundamentally are and who we think we're supposed to be.

14:32And that makes us have an internal believability gap. We don't believe in ourselves. And then there's the external believability gap, which is the gap between who we fundamentally are and how we show up for other people. And then they don't believe in us. So quite simply, you have to both believe in yourself and you have to show up as you, but you have to have other people believe in you as well. And that journey came to me personally when I started my career as a lawyer and I like to tell the story of my ill-fitting suit, which I wore actually and metaphorically because I thought I was supposed to show up like all the lawyers I saw on TV.

15:13And I thought that being a lawyer was going to be exciting and that it was going to be, you know, marching up the courtroom stairs and making these incredible arguments. And instead it was soul sucking work inside of a law library, you know, looking up, you know, the best citation that you could get to make it all important things for the client. But it wasn't, it just didn't feel right to me. So I would close the door to my office and in the middle of the day, literally lie on the floor and have a silent scream. And it really was going back. I decided to go back to my original dream and I'd always wanted to be an actor.

15:52And so I decided to go back and take an acting class while I was a lawyer. And I got back into that room and I found my power in not the world of pretending, but in trying to be believable as a character, in doing the character work I had to do and understanding who that character was, in telling a story in a compelling way, in being part of an ensemble in a collaborative way. And I started showing up differently as a lawyer because I started to believe in myself again. I started to bring my energy back. I knew what my power was. I had to work on my character in the same way that I did in the rehearsal room.

16:32And suddenly I was dressing better, that's for sure. But I was most important. I was showing up in a way that I believed in myself. And then my audiences started to believe in me to the point where I'll never forget one client said, wait, you're not a partner? I'm like, no, no, not yet. So it built my confidence and it helped me be more impactful. And I think it made me in the end a better advocate for my client. It changed the possibilities of what I could do.

17:03Kara Goldin:This message is a paid partnership with AT &T Business. Hey, everyone, Kara here. Let's get real about those early days of building a business. Not the highlight real, the actual day-to-day, the friction, trying to manage everything across time zones, across teams, across locations, and realizing how much depends on staying connected. I remember those days at Hint, a retailer call, an order, a decision, all of it. And you realize quickly, connection isn't a nice to have. It's the lifeblood of your business. As a founder, you don't want to think about your connectivity. You just need it to work every time.

17:47Kara Goldin:That's why AT &T Business matters. AT &T Business is the reliable provider for small business owners. And when you have that kind of reliability behind you, you can focus on what actually moves your business forward. Powered by AT &T Business, built to work. Get AT &T Business at business.att.com. Today's episode is brought to you by 1-800-Flowers. I've been thinking a lot about the moms in my life lately and the little things they do that nobody else does quite the same way. The things that often go unnoticed but mean everything. And it always makes me think they deserve so much more than they get.

18:34Kara Goldin:That's why I love 1-800-Flowers. Flowers might feel like a simple gift, but when they're done right, they say everything you sometimes don't put into words. And for over 50 years, 1-800-Flowers has been helping people do exactly that. Send something beautiful that really shows your appreciation. Right now, when you order one dozen roses, they'll double your bouquet to two dozen for free. Twice the flowers for the mom who gives everything. And I actually received a bouquet and have to say the quality really stood out. The flowers were fresh, beautifully arranged, and immediately felt like something you'd actually be excited to receive.

19:16Kara Goldin:It's the kind of gift that immediately makes someone feel seen and appreciated. And if you're like most people and tend to wait until the last minute, they've got same day delivery. So you're covered. Mother's Day is Sunday, May 10th, and bouquets are selling out fast. Trust me, don't wait. To claim your double roses offer before they're gone, visit 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. That's 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. 1-800-Flowers.com slash Kara Golden. This episode of the Kara Golden show is brought to you by Intuit QuickBooks Payroll. When you're building a business, it's easy to get pulled into the little details and lose sight of the big picture.

20:04Kara Goldin:That's why having the right tools matters so much. Intuit QuickBooks Payroll helps you save time, reduce errors, and make smarter decisions by connecting payroll, employee management, time tracking, and accounting all in one system. And this summer, QuickBooks Payroll is expanding to support even more of how you hire, onboard, manage, and retain your team. Soon, businesses will be able to hire and onboard employees inside QuickBooks, manage HR documents with e-signatures and organized storage, automate HR workflows, and track time off performance and benefits alongside payroll. No duplicate entry, no jumping between vendors, no learning a whole new platform.

20:53Kara Goldin:Start using QuickBooks Payroll today to keep your focus on the big picture and get ready for what's next. Learn more at quickbooks.com slash workforce. That's quickbooks.com slash workforce. So interesting. So it and obviously it's not just about what you're wearing, but also, you know, your overall presence and really and, you know, the story, right? The overall story of it. So I think it's it's so, so powerful for sure. Yeah. And by the way, and then I discovered clients who had this problem, you know, a client who thought he had to be authoritarian in the workplace, you know, that his job was to tell people what to do instead of bringing out their creativity and their collaboration.

21:43and I realized that we both had the same problem. He wasn't showing up as truly himself and his power was being tampered by what he thought he had to show up like and so people didn't believe in him. I like to say he was, I fell into the diminishment camp. I diminished who I was and he exaggerated who he was. So it's finding the balance of understanding the core of your character and doing that work that helps you bridge the believability gap and really have a generosity between you and your audience that I think creates collaboration, it leads to innovation, and ultimately leads to everyone being more powerful in the room together.

22:29Kara Goldin:So core character, it sounds good, but what does that mean in practical terms? And I guess, how do you figure it out? How do you understand what is Kara's core character? What is Pam's core character? It's so interesting because I think this is really important to entrepreneurs especially, right? You often think of the core of your product, what problem you're trying to solve, what are the core beliefs about your product, but we never think to do that for ourselves. And so I think you have to start with you. It's really a journey of self-awareness. And I call it your power words. You have to discover that your power isn't in your title, isn't in the role you play.

23:18It lies within you. And it's a pretty simple exercise. There's two aspects to it. The power word is both your core defining word. It's who are you at the core? If you had to think of one word, it's a truly reductive exercise, Kara. One word that describes who you are, I always say it can't be situational, like late, tired, hungry, you know, those things. And it really, there's got to be an ounce of self-awareness because there's always someone in the room who says, I'm inspirational. And everyone's like, yeah, that's not the word I would use about you, you know. So it's fascinating. that word is fundamental and it doesn't change.

24:01My word, do you like to know what my word is? And the dirty secret is it took me a really long time to figure it out. I kept thinking I knew what it was. And it finally was given to me by somebody who said at the end, I was in Morocco doing a big event. And it was a four-hour facilitated event, life-changing for some people, sharing stories, working on this kind of work. And at the end, someone came up to me and said, thank you for sharing your energy with us. And it just struck me. I said, wait, that's my word. It's energy. And when I'm not showing up in accordance with my core defining word, meaning I'm not caring for myself, I'm not bringing my energy to the game, I'm not raising the energy in the room for others, I'm not being true to myself.

24:55And then the second part of the power word construct is your character beliefs. You know, and every time I would work on a script as an actor, the first thing I would do is figure out what does my character believe in? What are the core values that drive this character? And every character has one. We all know what core values are. They're the things that make us choose our behavior. But I call them true character beliefs because they're going to be part of what drives you, what leads you to bridge that believability gap for yourself. And, you know, there are all sorts of, you can find them online, lists of character beliefs.

25:35I don't like to lay that on people because we all know what's important to us, right? But it's not what you're good at. It's what's important to you. And again, And for me, I had to find those. And those power words are what drive the core of my character, help me. And when I show up and I pay attention to them, and they're not just words on a page, but I live them both in my physicality, in my intent, in my communication. Well, that's when suddenly I can start believing in myself as me, and I can start helping my audience believe in me too.

26:09Kara Goldin:So is it possible to define yourself one way and then shift into that aspirational term that you wish you were energy, but you're not? So that I think is what a lot of people also. And I think sometimes it's because they're in the wrong career, they're not able to really play themselves. But I'd love to hear your perspective on that. It's so interesting you say that because a lot of my clients, some of the work I'm doing is helping them figure out, are you really in the right place? Because, you know, there's all these studies and I talk about it in the book that people who don't feel that they can be themselves in the workplace are more likely to leave.

27:04But those who actually do this work on themselves and they come to more purposeful connection to their work are more likely to stay, which I think is really interesting. So no, I don't think you should be, your core defining, I had one client who said, I would like my word to be orderly. I'm like, well, are you? So what are you just setting yourself up for failure? I mean, I can understand, it might be aspirational character belief that you want to work on, save it for working on it, but don't make that who you are at the core. It is, the whole mission of this is that you should be who you are, wherever you are.

27:42and then this is important, in order to ignite your audience because you aren't you in a vacuum. You are you for those you wish to impact, lead or serve. So I think in toxic work cultures, it can happen where somebody feels they have to tamp themselves down and guess what happens? Creativity is lower, innovation is lower, collaboration is lower and they feel uncomfortable for a reason. But this can even happen where you're not the right fit in a well-received culture of an organization. But doing this work, sometimes I will often tell the leaders who hire me for their team, I may be their parting gift.

28:23Are you willing for that to happen, right? Because they might discover something about themselves that makes them realize I'm not in the right place for who I want to be in the world.